Hannah K Jung

my uwcsea story

CAS Project Week Final Reflection LO2

During this project week, I learnt a lot of new skills and gained a memorable experience. Overall, I thought that the project week was relatively easy going with the main challenges being in the boxing. Not only was this a new physical skill I was learning but it also took a lot of concentration and energy. I took risks by trying something I had never done before but in the end I thought it was really interesting how it turned into something that I could use for self defense. I realised I could see the application of these skills in a scenerio in the future.

Overall, I thought that while there were some minor challenges, with the help of those around me I was able to overcome most of them. One memorable challenge I had though was one with one of my friends I was working with. Spending time with each other for 4-5 days all the time meant that we saw every aspect of vulnerability and strength. Somedays there were minor issues that could have snowballed but I learnt how to overcome this through calm communication. I realise I could measure my improvement of myself and the affect of these experiences through my approach to certain situations. This is definitely a skill I can apply to situations in the future.

CAS Project Week Intial/Mid Reflection LO3

Unlike previous years, our project week was based soley in Singapore. However, that did not change the part of planning that we would have to do to organise the CAS project week. Although there were lots of restrictions on what we could do due to feasibility and timing, we were able to narrow down our activities to boxing, paddleboarding and glass making. My group and I wanted to do something that would push our skills in various aspects.

On a google sheet, we decided to plan out the time periods we would do each activity across the allocated 3-5 days. Luckily, we were able to get in contact with studios that offered glass making, company that offered paddleboarding and a private instructor and space to teach us boxing. In the end, those indications would suggest our planning was very successful.

We felt that while it was cool we could develop creativity and activity skills in the activities we already planned, my group wanted to learn an additional skill. We were lucky enough to be in a position that offered a first aid course and allocated an extra day to the first aid course.

Through the course we were able to learn collaboration skills in addition to the new tips about safety that would be useful in future adventures.

Some difficulties we faced during planning was a miscommunication with the organizations we reached out to that caused us to lose spots for other water sports such as wind surfing that we wanted to do. In the end, we adapted to activities that had openings such as paddleboarding.

P2 Q about past stories/lit traditions

“Every story is born out of and speaks to past stories.” How do two of the works you have studied refer to past stories* and/or draw upon literary traditions**, and to what effect?

In both the Road and Fun Home, Mccarthy and Bechdel draw upon several literary traditions to illustrate how stories influence the relationship between a parent and child. In the Road, Mccarthy reveals literary traditions through several biblical allusions and allusions to the past in the form of the father’s memory. Regaridng Fun Home, the function as a graphic autobiographical novel speaks to the past story of Bechdel herself.  Mccarthy then uses these references to illustrate moral tensions between the father and his son which in turn causes a moral dilemma to appear within us as well. Bechdel’s Fun Home is littered with intertextual references illustrating the relationship with young Bechdel, current Bechdel and her father that surround both Bechdel and her father’s journey with their identity and queerness.

The Road

  • episodic in nature due to the gaps from the father’s narration, referencing  the bible as the bible itself is composed of a series of stories
  • biblical references such as the rotting apple in the apple orchard. Rotting apple as a representation of their decay. Perhaps civilisation’s decay. The apple in the bible being a representation of good and bad knowledge. Therefore highlights the judgement of what is morally good and morally bad. The boy as a representation of hope with some type of “glow” behind him. This is similar to when Jesus was resurrected and hope was restored.
  • Ely as the blind man. referring to past stories such as Antigone/Oedipus. Ely is a character trope for Tiresias. The blind prophet (also biblical), the one that can see beyond and are wiser even though they are blind. However, Ely is very cynical about their world even saying there is no God.

Fun Home

  • The function of the novel itself as a graphic autobiographical novel itself. Reflecting on her childhood and pulling on her own stories. Through this she demonstrates two clear perspectives: her as she writes the story and reflects upon it and her childhood self.
  • Intertextual reference to Great Gatsby that are used to show Bruce’s character and his artifice. Bechdel saying Bruce’s life parallels to Fitzgerald himself and living a double life.
  • Biblical reference: ‘Sunday Morning’ by Wallace Stevens discusses the nature of the afterlife and the role of God and nature in the creation of paradise. This was Bruce’s favorite poem. Death/afterlife as form of escape for Bruce to be his true self.
  • Intertextual reference to the Importance of Being Earnest and “bunburying.”

ELP Curation

Discuss the importance of voice in two of the works you have studied.

Possible Texts: Woman’s World, Human Acts, Fun, Home, The Importance of Being Earnest, Carol Ann Duffy.

In Han Kang’s Human Acts, voice is a centripetal force operating through the 7 characters and in each of their narrations. By including these various voices, Han creates a collection of experiences narrating and capturing the tragedy of the Gwangju student uprising. Voice becomes an important tool to aid the understanding of the reader through the retelling of this tragedy. In Graham Rawle’s Woman’s World, voice is a powerful (and biased) tool used to create the characters of Norma/Roy, their mother and other characters like Mr.HANDS and Eve. Voice is also important in its physical presence through the collage of cut-outs and fragments of magazines from the 1950s and 60s. In both texts, it is clear that voice is integral to the creation of both texts but also to the understanding of the reader.

One example of voice being important in Human Acts is in chapter 2 with the use of a reverent narrator. Because the reverent narration looks beyond, operating as the voice of a soul that overlooks the physical world it is able to capture a different perspective and emotion not previously available with the physical scenery. The reverent voice of Jeongdae goes on to illustrate the long-term effects of trauma. The questions that are directed at the reader in second person narration convey a sense of urgency and lack of accountability. The structure of repeating demanding questions such as “where were they right now?” and “why did you kill me?” scattered throughout his narrative helps to reinforce his strong desire “to know.” The emphasis on the pronouns “they” and “you,” mimics the effect that Kang is speaking directly to us. We are positioned to feel responsible.

Similarly in Woman’s World, Rawle also uses voice to capture the mental effects of trauma. Voice is able to capture Norma/Roy’s tender consciousness. However, unlike Human Acts, Rawle does not use voice to show a traditional duality between the mental and physical effects of trauma. Instead, voice in itself in the effect of trauma that the reader only really understands till later in the novel. Norma’s voice is characterised and portrayed as being delusional and almost treading into the realm of fantasy. Often this is seen through the way she gets almost distracted by the littlest details which sends her into a spiral of advertising descriptions. Her voice

In addition, Human Acts, the dissonance that reverent Jeongdae experiences as he reflects upon his dead body and recognises that he “wasn’t Jeongdae anymore,” highlights the ability of an event to change a person. Jeongdae changes from a middle school boy to one of the several victims of the authoritarian regime.

Similarly in Woman’s World, the voice of Norma communicates that trauma has an effect on changing one’s persona. In contrast, Woman’s world portrays this effect to be much more extreme with Roy who is a crossdresser to capture that memory.

it is also to important the function of voice on the level of the writer.

  • han kang having her own separate chapter
  • rawle’s voice in pulling on his own experiences to pick out the mothers reaction

 

Vocabulary associated:

 

 

Local Service Officer Final Reflection LO7

As I reflect on my role as being a Local Service Officers, I saw how much responsibility this role entails. But what I failed to consider and what was highlighted to me during this experience was the role of ethics. Here is a link to my video reflection.

Ladakh GC Final Reflection LO1

After being part of this global concern for two years, I’ve seen how the aims and the activities of the service has changed through COVID and emerging out of it. I have also witnessed how the service has changed while old people wave out and new people come in.

Being part of several moments throughout this experience made me avertly aware of my strengths and my areas for growth. I identified these strengths and areas for growth through my roles in different departments of the service group. For part of this last year, I was working alongside other members and communicating with the Ladakh GC in UWCSEA Dover Campus. I definitely saw that communication was important and built upon this skill as there were clarifications and pieces of information that needed to be passed on to the members at the Dover Campus in deciding how the money would be distributed to fund the scholars at Lamdon School where are partners are located. In addition to this, being part of the Communication Team allowed me to build upon the different types of communication skills. I worked on creating logos, posters and editing the service’s portfolio to raise more awareness to our cause toward fostering more equal education. In turn, we were able to gain a greater membership and therefore with more minds, we thought of creative events to help us raise the money needed.

Adaptability also became another one of my strengths that I saw through the shift of our traditionally in person event to an online one. Due to COVID and the coupled restrictions, we had to move our Run for Rights event online. This event, which traditionally had races and other running events, was complex to be moved to an online platform because well, it is based on exercise. However, slightly changing the name to Move to Make a Difference, we ended up coming up with a solution. This name connoted that people would individually track their movement and pledge an individually decided amount. In the end, it was a successful and personally, I learned how to come up with creative solutions and that there is always a way to adapt.

One area of improvement that I noticed while working with this team is adapting to a new setting and getting over a mental block. Specfically, when faced with a challenge like COVID restrictions it is very easy to get trapped into a mindset that the efforts you make are pointless as there is sense of feeling stuck. I am still working on getting over this block and pushing through. I use creativity as a solution when faced with these types of challenges that I have learnt from my experience as being part of this GC.

Chamber Orchestra Final Reflection LO5

Continuing onwith this activity through grade 12 gave me the opportunity to perform in front of a live audience. Previously, due to COVID, I did not have this chance. I now see how a live performance does impact the nature of being part of Chamber Orchestra. In addition, by being part of this activity over the course of two years, I saw a change in the dynamic and collaboration amongst the group as new people were introduced to the orchestra.

Performing highlighted the importance of collaboration to me. I saw this, particularly during the rehearsal process. At specific rehearsals nearing the date of the performance, not only were we, as an orchestra, playing together as a new group but also in conjunction with other music groups. There were different and new harmonies emerging out of the melange of instruments. Not only had to listen out for additional parts to create a cohesive and harmonious sound, but sometimes I would even have to look at others playing the part. In such moments of collaboration, this performance taught me the importance of paying attention to others and listening to others.

The amount of work that needed to be accomplished also taught me how playing my role and preparing my part well was important in the process. I had to make sure to practice and learn the piece almost to memorisation so I could focus on the smaller details and calm my nerves during the performance. I learnt that otherwise (in fact there were situations exactly like this) there would be scenarios where we would be stuck on one part for 15 or even 20 minutes.

I also learnt to be flexible as an outcome of this activity. Being in collaboration with other people, the focus is on the group. It is about being able to adapt yourself to fit with the others around you to put out the best outcome. While it is easy to do so in a group you are familiar with, one personal challenge that might have reflected on the group was that there were new people at various different skill levels who overall were strangers. It took time to get to know them and really mesh with them well enough to be able to play in harmony with them. Getting to know them operated on two levels: one as a person, and the other as a player.

In the future, I hope to carry these characteristics and lessons with me in my partial pursuit of music during college.

WW Chp 6-13: patterns, connections and notable one-off ‘elements’ affecting understanding of characters and events and communication of key ideas?

The dichotomy between Norma and Roy: (Maya)

“Not a single photo of me” “Somehow she always manages to cut me out of the shot” Professional photos will ‘mean something to me – something quite special’ (197)
Make her feel ‘Invincible’ like ‘64000 silver shillings’ (201)

Plays a big role in the allusion to roy and norma being the same person
They cannot simultaneously exist, even in photos

Ruby:

Norma’s biased narration regarding Roy

  • Roy being his own person, regardless of what Norma might believe
    • Making his own decisions that contradict her narration 
    • “Roy and I have always seen eye to eye on this and I knew he would make his point emphatically, unequivocally, and without mincing, his adjectives”
      • Although sharing the same thoughts, Roy makes different decisions (especially when he passes Norma’s scarf to Eve, and does not defend Norma in the job interview) 
  • Unreliable narrator – knowing everything about everyone, dispite her dissociation to the real world
    • Roys reported thoughts and direct speech, norma is an unreliable narrator – creating the paradox
  • The grey area between Roy and Norma
    • beginning to speak in a similar idiolect to Norma (during the van scene where the bra is found)
    • First person begins to become 3rd person (almost foreshadowing the continued and more regular 3rd person narration later on in the book – Norma not being part of the picture anymore) 
  • Her bias stemming from using Roy as a face to see the world? Living through him (affectionately references him, always describing Roy in a good light)

Henah:

Henah: The role that Mary plays in the tension between the split personas of Roy and Norma

  • Mary acts as a mother to Roy, a nurturing, caring figure, while she remains a more distant ‘housekeeper’ to Norma
  • Considering that she is, in reality, mother to both Roy and Norma, this seems to be a clear rejection of Norma and her femininity
  • Mary disposing of Norma’s clothes when she was younger can be interpreted as a desperate attempt to rid of the persona of Norma herself, but also as an attempt to move forward beyond the immense grief that Roy harbours
  • Therefore Mary’s growing acceptance—or tolerance—of Norma and her clothing choices are monumental. It breaks down the formally clear distinction between Norma and Roy, and one starts to bleed into the other

Me:

In chapter 11, we begin to sense the wall break down between the separate identities of Roy and Norma. Positioned as if in the back seat of the car ride between Eve and Roy, the first person narrative seems to have shifted to an almost wholly third person description. The bra causes a near miss car accident. It is also partially revealed that a car crash was also the cause of his sister’s death. The bra’s relations with the car crash also is a significant clue for the fact that Roy and Norma are indeed the same person. As Eve finds the bra in the glove compartment, it causes Roy to deviate from his traditional “grounded” narrative. The bra is a part of his hidden person, Norma. He begins to go into magazine speak, a characteristic so typical of Norma as he describes ways to clean out the stain from the white bra.”

“Pg 172 – Roy’s conversation with Eve about Norma and Mary provides multiple allusions to the dual identity of Norma and Roy – lapses in the voice/perspectives presented (‘Mary wasn’t going to the pictures; she was staying in to make a dress for me.”

Lila:

Also interesting to consider where Roy goes, seeing as Norma has control over their body’s minds and reported thoughts/narration. Norma, when she is not physically present, is either ‘on holiday in Scotland’ or waiting in their bedroom at home. We know that once, Roy must have been completely in control of his mind (before Norma dies), and we know that to some extent Roy still exists (Norma narrates his speech as a separate character, indicating that she has no control over what he says – he still has an element of free will). So, because Norma and Roy are one, where is Roy? Is our narrator, Norma, simply choosing to not include elements of Roy’s thoughts in her reported narration? If Norma is a compartmentalised part of Roy, why is she always present as our narrator? Is this just another clue? Is Roy our narrator all along, because Norma is just a construction of his mind (ie. is his mind Norma? Is there no Roy?). If so, that raises the troubling consequence that Norma never leaves, which builds tension … However i don’t know if this is true because Norma describes ways that Roy feels that are independent to her eg. finding Eve attractive.

 

Woman’s World Connections Between POV, Voice and Social Context

The implications of perspective are amazingly complex in Woman’s World. The vantage point of the novel is layered with irony – a man writing about a woman who is biologically a man whose speech is entirely taken from women’s magazines, some of which are written by men. This means that although we explore a ‘Woman’s World’, the world is man-made, men hold all the power and even Roy/Norma, who seek to escape masculinity and prize and value femininity, impose the male gaze upon the femininity that they inhabit by pushing media-constructed ideals of daintiness, demureness and beauty upon women (especially Mary, the ‘housekeeper’). The fragmentation of advertisements to reflect Norma’s speech imprint their own distinct infomercialesque tonality upon Norma’s patterns of speech and thought. We are almost sold a version of femininity by Norma that she so willingly consumes herself, as she yearns to access the only form of ideal womanhood that she sees reflected in her world (except for Mary, who she consciously rejects as a woman on the same level as Norma herself due to her incongruity with the advertisements that Norma idealises). Nonetheless, the fact that Norma speaks through infomercials reflects the fact that she is a product of her society – she perpetuates the womanhood she is taught.  (Lila)

Roy, on the other hand, seems to be a more ‘grounded’ narrator, lacking Norma’s distinctive style of speech. However, along with the revelation of the readers that Roy and Norma are the same person, he is rendered further unreliable. It also problematises Norma’s attitude on femininity, as the male gaze already inherently present in women’s magazines are filtered through another layer of Roy’s point of view. Norma’s paradoxical omniscient and ironic alienation from femininity—through the very act of pursuing it to an utmost degree—therefore… (Henah) 

Whether this novel is a critique of the power of media through Norma’s narrative voice in “magazine speak” or if this novel uses media as a medium to communicate the plot, themes about gender. This tonally light novel is full of serious and thought-provoking implications. The unsettling comedy around “darker” times such as the police men’s treatment and the period entering Hand’s House through the voice of Norma heightens the tragedy and fear. The way that I perceived these moments, I recognised what was going to happen before it even occurred. This could be connected to the social context today. While this novel is written fully of magazines from the 60’s and 70’s, its interesting how there is almost an acknowledged widely known outcome (at least from a women’s perspective…) (Hannah) 

KL:it’s interesting how Rawle can rely upon his modern readers to…

Connections between pov, voice, and social-historical context of Woman’s World

Social-historical context of media, advertisements are more pervasive in society. The influence growing. Whether this novel is a critique of the power of media through Norma’s narrative voice in “magazine speak” or if this novel uses media as a medium to communicate the plot, themes about gender. This tonally light novel is full of serious and thought-provoking implications. The unsettling comedy around “darker” times such as the police men’s treatment and the period entering Hand’s House through the voice of Norma heightens the tragedy and fear. The way that I perceived these moments, I recognised what was going to happen before it even occurred. This could be connected to the social context today. While this novel is written fully of magazines from the 60’s and 70’s, its interesting how there is almost an acknowledged widely known outcome (at least from a women’s perspective…)

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