I was looking through my daybook for a while trying to find something to write a blog post about when I saw the looping activity we did for The Things They Carried. I had to reread what I wrote in my daybook to remember exactly what the story was about.
I remember in The Things They Carried, the author spent a lot of time literally describing the items that the soldiers carried with them during the Vietnam War. I saw that I made a note in my daybook about how the author then started talking about how the soldiers "carried the land itself- Vietnam, the place, the soil." I was trying to make sense of that when I remembered the writing into the day we did about the things we carried ourselves, and what they said about us.
I then went to my entry from Nov 1, and saw that I just talked about how I usually am only carrying my phone, wallet, and keys, occasionally headphones, and whatever I need for school. The main point of the entry was to make sense of what the items you carry say about you, which I had some trouble doing. I felt like items you're carrying shouldn't really say anything about who you are, although I feel like I'm looking at the topic from a different point than the author of The Things They Carried.
Hi Dillon I notice the way you are pondering how your understandings of meaning might be different than, for instance, the author you were reading. You get me thinking about how maybe I don't necessarily think I am creating any particular meanings by the things I carry either... but then again people do create meanings around things... I was just reading a little post thing on Facebook... where someone was talking about the meanings inscribed by others when for instance someone is using food stamps in the grocery store line but also has a cell phone and designer pocketbook and whatever. The post was basically saying how without a deeper look at the contexts for this person (how the phone was a gift, the pocketbook a knockoff, the clothes from Goodwill) the objects still carry social meanings... hmmm.. anyway complicated...
ReplyDeleteI like how you lead us through your thought processes. It was interesting hearing a different persons point of view on that assignment. I feel like the things we carry to school aren't that significant to who we are as a person but in the context of being in the Vietnam War, that was more of what would you carry if you were to be shot down any second? And I believe that that does say a little about a person. Like if your house was on fire, what would you carry away if you were able to, I think the items that person grabs says a lot about a person.
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