ＨＩ，ladies!!
It is Thursday, November 6, 2008, today.
Since the STEP test finished around 2 weeks ago, I’ve been lowly motivated. I always rush recklessly to achieve my end, and get tired of keeping go ahead when it comes to end. I think it was so hard for me to try a STEP test with such poor ability at English. But fortunately I have the greatly hard working teacher and friends, who are tirelessly enjoying the English study. Thanks to all of you, I manage to continue learning English.
With such a low level of tension, I happened to watch a TV program last night, which led to a good effect for me. Yesterday was the memorable day when Obama won the miraculous victory as the first African-American President of USA. In that program, a Japanese comedian, who is skillful at mimicking Obama, challenged to meet himself directly in the USA to get an official recognition. What an impossible idea!
But, contrary to my expectations, he did a good job. Beyond a lot of rigorous security checks, he eagerly chased after Obama from Chicago to New York, running through Central Park and having his hair cut like the real Obama. Though his English was poor, (he always said, “I, meet, Obama, from Japan!”) his desperate efforts generally moved me, and I couldn’t take my eyes off the scene on TV.
Finally an unexpected opportunity came his way. After Obama’s speech was given in front of about 100,000 audiences at Chicago (?), he could shake hands with Obama, shouting “my name is Obama!,” and the real replied with big laugh, “Oh, that is right.” His dream eventually came true! I was impressed by his frantic look.
Thank you for reading. See you next, bye!
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Hi, ladies!!!
How are you, my lovely friends? It’s been a warm day today, hasn’t it? How have you been enjoying this mild weather?
I called my daughter on mobile yesterday, assuming that she was in bed still in pain, but it turned out that she already left the hospital and was at home waiting for her husband to come home so that they might bathe their new baby together, for the first time after he was born. I was just stunned.
My daughter was allowed to go home third day after getting her baby delivered by Cesarean and her baby, leaving the hospital, had not been bathed. (She must have got twenty or thirty staples on her tummy and her baby was still blood stained, I suppose.) Oh, dear. I was at a loss for words.
Then she sent me a photo by email yesterday. Anyway, she and her baby appear to be well and happy, which relives me so much.
Good night to you all, my precious friends. Sweet dreams.
Hi, everyone!
Alice, Cherry and Cosmos, Thank you for your warm welcome to me.
Plum, I appreciate your sincerely responding to my question. Your daughter's guts remind me of yours.
I attribute it to your gene.
Today, I have two good things and one bad thing.
One is I found a lemon fruit in my lemon tree, this year I had thought this tree yielded no lemons. You think it is too trivial. I think,however, how do I define happiness, happiness should be determined by myself.
The other is that I found "Fujin mondai 16kou" written by Oku, which I have thought it exists only in the Diet library in the form of microfilm, in the Tsurumai library. I am very happy. Unbleavable!
Bad news is that Michael Crichton died of cancer. He is an author of Jurassic Park. I used to indulge myself in his books. Recently I ordered his book through the internet. He wrote many books, adopting cutting edge theory.
He wrote that science has heritage or when social behavior is changed, civilization perishes or Nature is flexible more than we know.
I have been influenced by his books.
Dear Cherry and friends,
Good evening!
How are you?
Although perhaps having watched the movie, I don’t remember the story of Jurassic Park very clearly. All I can remember is probably from previews aired many times on TV. I have read one of Michael Crichton’s SF novels, Sphere. I am not a big fun of SF or fiction, but this is one of a few English books I read in my 20s. An Australian teacher recommended and lent it to me. It was a kind of what keeps you screaming until the end of the story. Neither the characters in the novel nor the reader know what’s happening exactly. My poor English made my understanding more ambiguous. If I remember correctly, a group of people who were inside a submarine lost control of it and became unable to return. They felt as if being in a sphere, which was, they found, a huge “squid” who (or which?) caused mysterious incidents not as the results of its intention but because somebody inside thinks so. It’s tricky, isn’t it? What a scary squid!
From Poovey’s The Proper Lady and the Woman Writer
* -------------------------------------------- *
• The Situation of Women Writers
Before analyzing three women writers’ works, Poovey overviews the circumstances where they were situated.
What writing meant for women was to enter the public arena, that is, men’s world.
Respectable women who did not have to write for profit tried to avoid competing with male writers by circulating their writings among only their respectable friends as amusement or publishing their opinions and ideas anonymously. While such efforts disguised the avoidance of public attention, literature had gradually been opened up to women during the eighteenth century for three reasons. First, “a woman could publish anonymously, without having either to solicit the interest of patron” or to reveal “her own sex” and she often had her male family member “negotiate with a publisher.” (p. 37)
Second, “the Bluestockings provided a model for the literary women,” allowing them to “discuss literary interests.” (p. 37)
Thirdly, the century’s “embrace of philosophical empiricism and the accompanying interests in and emphasis on individual feelings” enhanced their literary activities. (p. 37)
* -------------------------------------------- *
It’s raining outside. I hope the sky will clear up tomorrow.
Good night.
Hi, ladies!!!
It is Friday, November 7, 2008, today, and it has been another warm day, hasn’t it?
I bumped into Madam N. at the nearby post office. This is the second time this week. These days I, unnecessarily often, run into her, and she appeared to be a bit perplexed today.
One of my students in my introductory English class is very unique, and I have never seen such a Japanese English learner before. She is, perhaps, in her late 30s and has a primary school student daughter.
She said she had got two master’s degrees and intended to become a certified tax account, but, for some reason, having given it up, learned European traditional art and now teaches it to her students. (The reason she started to learn English is, according to her, that she wants to learn more about her specialized art in Europe and the USA,)
She is an extraordinarily knowledgeable and intelligent person, and explains what she knows very logically and concisely in Japanese. But, unfortunately her English writing is chaotic and totally illogical. Where are her basic English skills gone? I just wonder what she learned in her junior high English classes. But she seems to be a hard worker and is now determined to improve her command of English, which is excellent. But I just don’t know how far she could go. I will give you update information about her progress if there is any progress.
In September, I got a number of unique students including the one I just introduced, and most of them email me in English quite regularly, which makes me so busy reading and replying. I am going to have two more students next time, and last time one of them brought one of my books on English learning, asking me to sign it, which was, in a fashion, so delightful but a bit embarrassed, because I was not in the class as an author.
My present life is unusually stimulative thanks to my new students.
I hope you have a remarkable weekend, my precious friends. Sweet dreams.
Hi, ladies!!!
Oh, it’s quite chilly today, isn’t it?
I really enjoyed reading your story about the Japanese comedian you saw on TV. He is so funny and hilarious, isn’t he?
It’s Saturday today, and my husband and I went to Dr. Inoue’s clinic in the morning to see and ask her to prescribe the same medicine we are taking at the moment. She is an expert on the oriental medicine and prescribes for us the powdered medicine that improves the blood circulation, which we started to take in the spring and get her to prescribe every one month and a half.
As usual, the clinic was so crowded with the old and young. Normally we wait for, perhaps, one hour or one hour and a half, for our turn to come. Isn’t she popular, is she?
After getting the medicine, we went grocery shopping and got home. Oh, alas… One of the mandarin oranges we bought was rotten, and so I called the supermarket and the person in charge said that he was coming to get us another bag of oranges. He came around at around 3 p. m. with another bag of oranges as he said, and was giving me one thousand yen as a token of apology, but I said I didn’t have to get it, refusing to take it. (He was murmuring that giving one thousand yen to a complaining customer was a shop rule or something like that.) He put it back into his trouser pocket and went off. I found 7 oranges in the new bag, though there were 5 in the previous bag. That’s OK. I got two more oranges, which were, perhaps, a gift from the supermarket.
It’s been quite hectic so far today. Now I will sit and read one of the research materials until my husband gets home. He is gone to the nursing home where his distant relative lives, to get her two pairs of pajamas he bought for her. (Of course, she asked him to get them, since she was too tired to go out.)
Do you remember that I told you that she was in a silent world?
***a little break***
It is getting dark, and I think I have to get ready for supper. Bye for now, my precious friends. Have a fabulous weekend!!!
Dear Cherry and friends,
Hello. How are you?
Although teaching TOEIC on Saturdays, I can attend the meeting which Plum and her students are going to have at the Maruzen building because the anniversary of the school’s foundation happens to be the next Saturday.
From Poovey’s The Proper Lady and the Woman Writer
* -------------------------------------------- *
Although the “tradition” of women’s fiction developed in the eighteenth century was important, women writers experienced limitation and impediment in some ways.
First, they often “embraced the social role that women as a group had generally internalized.” Because of this image, “their novels often echo conduct books.” (p. 38)
Second, “sentimental fiction often provided them with compensatory gratification, ideal rewards, and ideal revenges, all of which discouraged them from seeking material changes in their actual position.” (p. 38)
In addition, women writers continued to suffer from “the persistent prejudice against learned ladies.” (pp. 38-39)
Women writers’ internalized self-conception was at odds with female propriety which was the norm we have examined. One of the strategies taken by them was to “express themselves in the code capable of being read in two ways: as acquiescence to the norm and as departure from it.” (p. 41)
The act of writing itself could also be a strategy.
* -------------------------------------------- *
Good night.
Hello, Cherry and my ladies!
It’s so amazing to know that foreign authors whose mother tongues are not Japanese produced highly evaluated novels in the Japanese language.
One is Yan Yi, a 44-year-old Chinese woman and a Chinese language teacher who won the Akutagawa Prize in July this year and the other is Switzerland’s David Zoppetti who received the 2002 Nohon Essayist Club Prize.
For a person like me who has been struggling to write English essays and has wanted to develop the English abilit to read and write, this news gave me a great shock and surprise. I also want to give them a great admiration.
Out of curiosity I just tried accessing some articles of David Zoppetti through the Internet. Luckily I could hit his inspiring and convincing essay titled “language and identity”.
He highlighted the expansion of English is causing other minor languages and local dialects to become gradually extinct.
His opinion made me reflect on the minority people such as Aborigines and the Ainu who had once deprived of their culture and languages by colonists in history.
He concluded that the Japanese who are enthusiastic to learn English won’t forget the importance of keeping closely in touch with their own language and roots.
Hi, ladies!!!
It’s Sunday, November 9, 2008, today, and it’s been cloudy all day, hasn’t it?
This morning, an English speech presentation was held at the university library, and nine students in my classes, three and six from the introductory and pre-intermediate ones respectively, made a speech. Actually there are five different language classes all together (two Chinese classes instructed by Ms. Que and one more advanced English class taught by Mr. Slovic), but none of the students in the other classes made a speech. It’s a shame, isn’t it? But Ms. Que and Mr. Slovic kindly came to listen to my students’ speeches. How generous and sweet they are!!! I am really grateful to them for their professionalism
All the students said that they could not sleep well, because they were extremely nervous. Yes, I understand how many butterflies they got in the stomach over the night. It was their first public speaking and they had no idea how they should give a speech before their audience.
In the previous lesson, I told them to practice reading out their speech script more than 200 times, and they said today that they actually accounted how many times they read out. One said that she did 85 times and collapsed. I also told them not to read the script but to talk to their audience, although I knew how difficult it was for them. Anyway the party is over, and they could have a very good night sleep tonight, and I really hope they will do so.
Well, next Saturday, a talk show will be held at TCLC in Sakae, and recently I’ve got an email from Miho, who is going to be a talk show hostess, saying that she’s getting too nervous about the talk show to do anything at home these days. She is probably just walking around or sitting around in her house, thinking about what she has to do on the show. I told her to be herself, because she is pretty capable of doing anything. She only doesn’t know how capable she is. I am sure the talk show will give her a golden opportunity to realize how talented and skillful she is. (She will be definitely glad about it after the show.)
Well, it is almost time to get ready for supper, my dear friends. I hope you have been having a delightful weekend. Night, night…
Dear Cherry and friends,
Hello. How are you?
It rained Sunday morning in Toyohashi.
I’m still struggling with Poovey’s The Proper Lady and the Woman Writer.
While reading this, I feel as if my brain is volatile. Little content has remained. Whenever a sentence is long, I’m lost in the middle. It’s quite a challenge.
* -------------------------------------------- *
Previously, I wrote about strategies taken by women writers.
Two levels of strategies need to be distinguished here: writing par se as an act, and content and fictitious characters they created. In the former strategy, even “women taught to efface her aspiring self” could indirectly express the self. (p. 41) In the latter context, a woman writer might be able to have heroines “reveal their own desires,” or “to explore, often through the characters of servants or lower-class women, direct actions forbidden to the more proper lady.” (p. 43) Gilbert and Guber a have called such strategies feminine “swerves” from masculine genres or the stereotypes of women. (p. 44) By referring to psychological analysis by Nancy Chodorow and Juliet Mitchell, Poovey argues that, “parody can be seen as the expression of a desire to retain both the inherited and the revised genre, and the creation of demonic “madwomen” can be understood as the articulation of simultaneous, if contradictory, self-images.” (p. 44)
This accommodation includes role-playing employed by Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley, “enclosed episodes in which author can explore material otherwise considered unladylike,” and “acts of incorporation” in which “women make themselves known by foregrounding a relationship of which they are a part.” (p. 45)
In the next chapter, Poovey argues Wollstonecraft’s political disquisition and letters show the limitation how much the theorist trapped by the ideology of the Proper Lady.
* -------------------------------------------- *
Good night.
Hi, ladies!!!
It’s Monday, November 10, 2008, today, and I do not recall anything about today’s weather, because I just confined myself in the lounge, reading and never having a chance to notice the weather. Anyway it’s already dark now, and I’m very happy that time passed without much fuss.
As you are aware now, we are giving an English talk show at TCLC for the first time in my life. I have no idea how it is going to be, but should you know anyone who might be interested in coming to the show, please let me know.
I enjoy Alice’s writing about 19th century English writers, and the section about the feminist reading of Gilbert and Guber reminded me of the great impact or almost shock I received in my literature class at Auckland university grad school. That was a totally new idea, though my male relatively young tutor in my tutorial remarked some words of contempt about their feminist literary philosophy, which agitated me to some degree.
I am planning to give a seminar on English composition at TCLC in March, though I don’t know whether it will be materialized or not. I will give two sessions, and would like participants to attend the two, because two are a set. Should you know anyone who might be interested in coming to the seminar of 2 two-hour sessions on English composition, please let me know.
Well, it’s almost time for my husband to come home, my lovely friends. Goodbye for now. Night, night…
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