My Response to Jacqueline's : "Blog 11: Another September 11th"

This is a very interesting blog post! It’s interesting to note, though, that the significance of the date September 11 differs for the 1973 events and the events of 2001. It has been speculated that the terrorists of the 2001 attacks chose September 11 because of the symbolism of the date: 9/11911. 911 is the number that we call in America to contact the police when there is an emergency, and thus the terrorists might have chosen this date to symbolically enhance the terror of the attack. In Chile, the fact that the overthrow of Allende happened on a September 11 was pretty random; it was just by chance that the referendum was to be held on September 12, so Allende had to be overthrown before then. (Also, this date could not have been symbolic beforehand for the same reason as the 2001 attack, because the emergency number in Chile was not 911, plus, as in Spanish-speaking countries, the date would be written 11/9.) Anyway, just thought I’d mention this! There’s no doubt that now the date September 11 is equally symbolic for Chileans and Americans, but I just thought that the difference in the symbolism of the date for the different attackers was interesting.

http://latinamericancivhon280.blogspot.com/2014/03/blog-11-another-september-11th.html?showComment=1396206795376#c3769950741818609249

Blog 11: Pablo Neruda and "The Heights of Macchu Picchu"

For this entry, I wanted to elaborate on what Taylor and I came up with in class on Monday, our connection between “The Heights of Macchu Picchu” and Communism. As Neruda was a Communist, perhaps this connection was intentional on his part. If not, I still think that it is an interesting similarity between this poem and the ideals of Communism.

In verses X through XII, Neruda laments the plight of the slaves, servants, and workers who suffered in order to make Macchu Picchu the extraordinary place that it was:

          
            Return to me the slave you buried!

            Shake the suffering people’s hard bread

            from these lands, show me the servants’

            clothes and their windows.

He also says:

           

            Macchu Picchu, did you place

            stone on stone, and, at the base, rags?

            Coal on top of coal, and tears at the bottom?

            Fire atop gold, and, trembling in it, the giant red

            raindrop of blood?

These sections basically suggest that Macchu Picchu was built upon the blood and tears of the lower classes that actually built Macchu Picchu and served the upper classes, and in return suffered from hunger and were inadequately clothed.

The fact that these people worked hard to maintain the upper classes’ standards of living and received nothing but suffering in return can be related to Communism. In Communism, the idea is that it is the large working class that keeps the economy running, but the workers benefit very little from their hard work, earning small wages while the business owners make huge profits. In a way, then, the business owners can be seen as similar to the elites in Macchu Picchu. They exploit the workers, just like the elites exploited the lower classes and caused their suffering in order to live extravagant lives. In turn, the workers suffer like the lower classes did because they earn very little and thus have very little.

My Response to Matt's "Blog number 10: The Yarur Legacy"

What Matt said:

"This week I want to talk specifically about the Peter Winn book we are reading for prof. Stark's discussion questions. I have been doing my questions lately, and I am liking this book significantly more than the others this year so far, so I would like to talk about why that is for this week's blog. I am going to talk specifically about the 3 Yarur leaders that the book describes; Jorge, Juan, and Amador and their leadership. I personally found their systems and the shifts between them to be comical. The father Juan was the man who set up the company, and he did so during pretty bad times, with a lot of outside support. He set up a very loose system where he was seen as a father figure, walking among his men, and being friendly with not only the employees, but their families as well. He took advantage of his incredible skill in business as well as his charismatic character. The people liked him, and were happy to work for the successful company during hard times. But then he died, and his most successful son took over the reigns for the company. This shift to me was the funny one, as he took everything his father had put together, and threw it out the window. The Taylor system was implied in the factory, half the workers laid off, while production doubled. Jorge focused completely on productivity and efficiency of the factory, and the factory benefited in exchanged for unhappy workers. He created a gap between the workers and leaders of the factory, where his father had worked hard to prevent that very thing. This is one of those scenarios where one could imagine the father rolling in his grave with what his son was doing. But at the same time, he was a businessman, so perhaps not so much, it is just difficult to tell whether this was a move that would have been supported or not. It is also difficult to choose whether the boost in production was worth the decrease in worker happiness. I for one think so, but then again, ultimately the workers take over, so who knows. But then Amador takes over from his brother, and he tried to essentially return to his father's ways while retaining the productivity. He tried to return to the paternal image, but he lacks the charisma of his father, and the workers hated him. He kept the productivity high through further worsening the working conditions, to the point where a 3 minute bathroom break got the worker yelled at. The people increased their dislike for management, and eventually take the factory.

In a single generation, the Yarur leaders lost all the support of the workers, and completely revamped the system of the workers. It is just funny and strange to me that brothers had such different ideas from one anther and their father as well."

My response:

"I also thought that the shifts of leadership between Juan, Jorge, and Amador were interesting. I found Juan and Amador’s paternalism to be kind of creepy—who wants their boss to act like a father figure, when he is really just trying to manipulate you to keep you loyal? I was actually pretty surprised when Amador got control over the mill from Jorge; in these kinds of cases, I usually expect the “most capitalist” system to be the one that prevails. Jorge did manage to increase productivity and efficiency (but, like you said, in exchange for the workers hating him), and it was strange that Amador would want to reverse some of the changes that Jorge had made."

(http://mattsinclair17.blogspot.com/2014/03/blog-number-10-yarur-legacy.html?showComment=1395592270033#c5154593644147211520)

Blog #10: A Mural and Two Books

Hey everybody! Since today we looked at a bunch of José Guadalupe Posada's work, I thought I would share this picture of the mural that my friend created last year for her final AP Spanish project. (My project was an Apples to Apples game in Spanish, in case you were wondering J) Obviously, the black and white parts of this image are a recreation of Posada’s “La Calavera Catrina,” and my friend added in color where she saw fit!

Since I finished Weavers of Revolution yesterday, I thought I would do a sort of book review of Aviva Chomsky’s A History of the Cuban Revolution and Peter Winn’s Weavers of Revolution (I can’t believe I read two full books in less than two weeks!). I would have to say that I enjoyed reading Weavers more than A History. My main complaint of Chomsky’s book is that she uses quotes way too much. Not only does she use quotes from actual Cubans or other historical figures relevant to the Cuban Revolution (which is fine), but she also quotes other historians and authors a lot. Especially when these quotes are up to a paragraph long, they get really annoying. (And now I understand why when you’re writing an academic paper, you shouldn’t use quotes to make your points—saying it in your own words not only demonstrates your understanding, but as a reader it’s less annoying as well.) Chomsky was pretty interesting, but I found the more focused topic of the Yarur workers in Winn’s book to be more interesting.

To me, once I got into the meat of Weavers, it read like a political/social drama. One of my favorite quotes was:

        

           “I told you that this could not be,” Allende fumed.

“What would you say to two thousand workers who are all on their feet demanding socialization…demanding that the president fulfill his promises,” Varas replied. “What would you say? ‘No, that you can’t.’ They would throw me out of there feet first.”

I loved it when parts like this read like a novel, and I think that the story of the Yarur workers would make a great film. Winn’s writing really made me empathize with the workers, and when all of their accomplishments (spoiler alert?) were thrown out the window in one chapter when Allende was overthrown, I actually felt kind of depressed.

Anyway, these are my thoughts on these books. I’m glad that we get to watch a documentary on Chile for Professor Serrata’s part of the class. I watched it today, and it kind of tied up the loose ends that were left at the end of Weavers. Pinochet doesn’t stay in power forever; eventually democracy returns to Chile!

My Response to Elena's: "Blog #9- Balthazar and the Biblical Magi"

What Elena said: 

"While reading Balthazar's Prodigious Afternoon, I remembered that Balthazar was the name of one of the three biblical magi. Although there are no apparent or specific biblical allusions within this text, there is a definite connection that can be created between the Balthazar in this story and the Balthazar of the bible. 

The Biblical Magi, or The Three Wise Men, visit Jesus when he is born and bring gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. Often in nativity scenes, the three wise men are depicted. There is symbolism behind what the three wise men give Jesus. The gold symbolizes his kingship or his royal status, the frankincense symbolizes his divine status or priestly role and the myrrh was given to represent that he too would die one day. The symbolism behind these three gifts has long been debated but these seem to be rather common interpretations. 

Balthazar in Balthazar's Prodigious Afternoon bears a gift just as The Three Wise Men do. Initially the cage was not meant to be a gift but rather a consumer good. However, Balthazar offers the gift to Montiel's son, Pepe, because it would hurt his reputation. The symbol of the cage differs however from the symbols of the three gifts of the Three Wise Men. Within this story, the cage is meant to symbolize the oppression of the poor. It has a rather negative connotation or symbolic meaning rather than positive as the three gifts are."

My response:

"What interesting comparisons! However, while reading “Balthazar’s Prodigious Afternoon,” I didn’t think that Balthazar gave the cage to Pepe as a gift because otherwise his reputation would be hurt (or do you mean it would hurt Montiel’s reputation?), but rather because he was generous and genuinely wanted Pepe to stop being so upset. He didn’t have a problem giving away the cage for free because he wasn’t greedy; in the beginning of the story, he didn't want more than twenty pesos for it, let alone sixty. Anyway, if Balthazar gave this gift because he was generous, then I think it fits your analogy better: the three wise men were simply generous as well."

(http://elenalatinamerica.blogspot.com/2014/03/blog-9-balthazar-and-biblical-magi.html?showComment=1395006461015)

Blog 9: Dreams, Reality, and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Earlier this week, for the short essay we wrote about Borges’s “The South,” I wrote about how I thought that Borges’s message was that the imagination is incredibly powerful, that there is more than one “reality,” and that our perceptions of what is “real” and what are dreams and imagination are not as simple as we might think. This was based off my belief that in the story, Dahlmann imagined his trip to the south as a way to escape from his suffering as he was dying in the sanitarium. This imagined reality might not be “real,” but it was plenty real for the narrator.

Anyway, when I was writing this short response, it made me think of the conversation that occurs between Harry and Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. After Voldemort almost kills Harry and Harry is temporarily in a sort of limbo between life and death, he has a lengthy conversation with Dumbledore (who was killed in the previous book). At the end of this conversation, Harry asks Dumbledore if this whole conversation was real, or whether it was just happening inside his head. Dumbledore responds: “Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?”

I think that this awesome quote (J.K., you’re a genius) further illustrates the idea that our perceived notions of reality may not be correct, or are too narrow-minded. Although, I’m kind of torn here: I don’t think that Harry was imagining his conversation with Dumbledore, but I do think that Dahlmann was imagining his trip to the south. Yet both of these events took place within the character’s mind. So if Harry’s conversation with Dumbledore was “real,” then perhaps Dahlmann’s trip to the south can be considered “real” as well.

Like I stated in my discussion questions, this is an extremely abstract and therefore difficult concept to discuss. Basically what I’m getting at is that dreams and imagination can be other forms of “reality.” However, perhaps it is also wise to heed more advice from Dumbledore: “It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.”

My Response to Leah's "Blog Número Ocho"

Interesting observations! I agree that it’s fun to look at a piece of artwork and have an idea of what it’s about based on what you've learned in a class. Could you imagine looking at Rivera’s A Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in Alameda Park at the beginning of last semester? We would have had no idea of what any of it was about, but recently we were able to identify many of the people in it and come up with the gist of the story/purpose of it. Honestly, I have no idea what is in the bottom left corner of The Zapatistas, but I agree it kind of seems out of place. I wanted to point out, however, the wavy green lines to the bottom left of the man’s face. These almost look like blades of grass, or some type of agricultural crop. I think that it’s no coincidence that this image is part of the man’s hand—the Zapatistas fought for land, and that land was part of who they were, and so I think that this part of the mural represents the land they were fighting for and its importance to them.

(http://leahslatinamericancivilizationblog.blogspot.com/2014/03/blog-numero-ocho.html?showComment=1394208870368#c153700584020934102)

Blog 8: Horacio Quiroga

In Professor Stark’s reading for this week, Horacio Quiroga was mentioned. I was excited to see this because in my high school Spanish classes we read a couple of stories by him, including “A la deriva” (“Adrift”) and “Anaconda.” Horacio Quiroga (1878-1937) was a Uruguayan playwright, poet, and short story writer. The jungle featured prominently in his works, as did death and despair and, frankly, some of his stories are quite bizarre.

In “A la deriva,” a man is walking in the jungle, when all of a sudden he is bitten by a venomous snake. He and his wife live alone in the jungle, and so he has to take a canoe down the Paraná to get to a town or somewhere he can get medical attention. The venom has made his leg swell up like a balloon, and is quickly killing him. Alas, he cannot reach help in time, and dies in his canoe, left adrift in the Paraná.

This was an extremely difficult story to read in high school because there was a lot of Spanish vocabulary I didn't know. However, once I had decoded it enough to understand it, I remember thinking, “What the heck kind of story did my teacher assign us?” It was an incredibly bizarre story, and only when we researched Quiroga a little more did it make sense.

Quiroga loved very much and lived for a while in the jungle, so he was no stranger to its wild animals and other dangers. Additionally, he led a pretty traumatic life: his father accidentally killed himself when Quiroga was just a child; in 1899, his stepfather committed suicide and Quiroga found the body; his two brothers died of typhoid fever in 1901; later that year, he accidentally shot and killed his friend; and his first wife killed herself by ingesting poison, but only died after eight days of agonizing pain. Thus, Quiroga’s life was fraught with death and tragedy, so it makes sense that his stories would be filled with death and despair as well.

Anyway, I decided to make this blog post about Quiroga because he was an important author of South America during the time period we are discussing now in class, the early 1900s. His works are important, perhaps because they document life in the jungle, a life that not many intellectuals have led. Even though his stories are very strange, I would recommend them because they are still very interesting.