BODHI International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
An Online, Peer reviewed, Refereed and Quarterly Journal
Vol: 2 Special Issue: 2 March 2018 ISSN: 2456-5571 UGC approved Journal (J. No. 44274)
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BODHI
BODHI International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science (ISSN: 2456-5571) is online, peer reviewed, Refereed and Quarterly Journal, which is powered & published by Center for Resource, Research and Publication Services, (CRRPS) India. It is committed to bring together academicians, research scholars and students from all over the world who work professionally to upgrade status of academic career and society by their ideas and aims to promote interdisciplinary studies in the fields of humanities, arts and science.
The journal welcomes publications of quality papers on research in humanities, arts, science. agriculture, anthropology, education, geography, advertising, botany, business studies, chemistry, commerce, computer science, communication studies, criminology, cross cultural studies, demography, development studies, geography, library science, methodology, management studies, earth sciences, economics, bioscience, entrepreneurship, fisheries, history, information science & technology, law, life sciences, logistics and performing arts (music, theatre & dance), religious studies, visual arts, women studies, physics, fine art, microbiology, physical education, public administration, philosophy, political sciences, psychology, population studies, social science, sociology, social welfare, linguistics, literature and so on.
Research should be at the core and must be instrumental in generating a major interface with the academic world. It must provide a new theoretical frame work that enable reassessment and refinement of current practices and thinking. This may result in a fundamental discovery and an extension of the knowledge acquired. Research is meant to establish or confirm facts, reaffirm the results of previous works, solve new or existing problems, support theorems; or develop new theorems. It empowers the faculty and students for an in-depth approach in research. It has the potential to enhance the consultancy capabilities of the researcher. In short, conceptually and thematically an active attempt to provide these types of common platforms on educational reformations through research has become the main objective of this Journal.
Dr. S. Balakrishnan Publisher and Editor - in - Chief [email protected] www.bodhijournals.com
BODHI INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF RESEARCH IN HUMANITIES, ARTS AND SCIENCE (BIJRHAS) An Online, Peer reviewed, Refereed and Quarterly Journal
EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS
Publisher and Editor-in-Chief Dr. S. Balakrishnan Executive Director, Centre for Resource, Research and Publication Services (CRRPS) Tamil Nadu, India
Vice Editor-in-Chiefs Dr. Manimangai Mani Dr. B. Jeyanthi Senior Lecturer, Department of English, Assistant Professor & HOD of English, Faculty of Modern Languages and Anna University, Tirunelveli Region, Communication, Universiti Putra Malaysia, Tamil Nadu, India Selangor, Malaysia Dr. T. Marx Dr. Mamta Brahmbhatt Senior Lecturer, Department of English, Associate Professor of Management, Faculty of Modern Languages and B.K. School of Business Management, Communication, Universiti Putra Malaysia, Gujarat University, Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India Selangor, Malaysia
Pradeep D. Waghmare Mr. B.P. Pereira Assistant Professor of History, Visiting Professor of English in Journalism, Ramnarain Ruia College, Madurai Kamaraj University, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India Madurai, Tamil Nadu, India
Editorial / Review Board Dr. Sunil S. Narwade Dr. H.S. Rakesh Professor, Dept. of Economics, Assistant Professor of History, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Marathwada Davangere University, Karnataka, India University, Aurnagabad, Maharashtra, India Dr. Indira Banerji Dr. V.N. Kendre Assistant Professor of English, Yogoda Satsanga Assistant Professor of Sociology, Mahavidyalaya, Ranchi University, Ranchi, University of Mumbai, Mumbai, Jharkhand, India Maharashtra, India Dr. Punam Pandey Dr. Nana Pradhan Assistant Professor, Dept. of English & Modern Assistant Professor of Physics, European Languages, JR Handicapped Ramnarain Ruia College, Mumbai, University, Chitrakoot, UP, India Maharashtra, India Dr. Harshad Bhosale Dr. Prasenjit Panda Assistant Professor of Political Science, Assistant Professor, Dept. of English & Foreign Kirti College, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India Languages, Guru Ghasidas Vishwavidyalaya, Koni, Chattisgarh, India
Dr. H.M. Kantharaj Dr. Vaishali Pusate Assistant Co-ordinator of Education, Assistant Professor of Zoology, Davangere University, Karnataka, India Ramnarain Ruia College, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India Dr. Vipin Kumar Pandey Associate Professor of English & Other Foreign Dr. P.V. Mahalinge Language, DSM National Rehabilitation Assistant Professor of Hindi, University, Lucknow, UP, India Ramnarain Ruia College, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India Dr. B.V. Dhananjaya Murthy Assistant Professor of Political Science, Dr. Neelkanth Bankar Davangere University, Karnataka, India Associate Professor of Psychology, University of Mumbai, Maharashtra, India Dr. Vijaykumar Chavan Assistant Professor of Chemistry, Dr. Rajeshwar Andhale Ramnarain Ruia College, Mumbai, Associate Professor of Mathematics, Maharashtra, India Ramnarain Ruia College, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India Dr. Vijay Shankar Sharma Assistant Professor of Special Education, Dr. Anupama Mujumdar DSM National Rehabilitation University, Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Lucknow, UP, India Ruparel College, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
Dr. Sunil Shankadarwar Dr. Parvez Shamim Assistant Professor of Botany, Assistant Professor of Physical Education & Ramnarain Ruia College, Mumbai, Sports, Government P.G. College, Noida, Maharashtra, India G.B. Nagar, UP, India
Mr. Amit Agnihotri Assistant Professor & Head of Information Technology, JR Handicapped University, Chitrakoot, UP, India
EDITORIAL NOTE
Language is the medium of Literature. Every language is a collective art of expression. Literature moves in language as a medium comprising multiple layers of signs, symbols and meanings. Literature serves as a gateway to imagination, creativity and knowledge. Every discourse of literature is both personal as well as universal wisdom encompassing time and space. Both, Language and Literature record the intuitive expressions of human beings from time immemorial. To quote the words of Oliver Wendell Holmes, “Language is the blood of the soul into which thoughts run and out of which they grow.” This international seminar will provide a valuable platform to scholars and researchers to express their thoughts and ideas on the specified areas of language and literature. This book is a collection of articles exploring the techniques, methods, approaches, uses of e-learning- teaching tools framing the recent developments in English Language Teaching and narrative modes, gender issues, autobiographical elements, identity quests, ecological aspects, postcolonial discourses, postmodern conditions constituting contemporary trends in literature.
Editors
HAJEE. Dr. H. MOHAMED MEERAN
Principal
Dr. J. AHMED MEERAN
Head & Assistant Professor of English Hajee Karutha Rowther Howdia College (An Autonomous Institution Affiliated to Madurai Kamaraj University, Madurai) [Re- Accredited with ‘A’ Grade by NAAC] Uthamapalayam- 625533, Theni Dt, Tamil Nadu
ABOUT EDITORS
Dr. H. Mohamed Meeran, Principal, Hajee Karutha Rowther Howdia College , Uthamapalayam, joined as Assistant Professor of English in the year 1988. While working as Assistant Professor, he studied M.Phil., and also completed his Ph.D., and was appointed as Principal when he completed 25 years of Service in teaching. During his service as Associate Professor, he has attended so many seminars, workshops and conference at the Regional, National and International levels and presented papers. So far, more than 40 of his articles have been published in different books related to English Language and Literature . He did his Doctoral Degree in common wealth Literature, on “The Social, Cultural and Political Disintegration in the Novels of V.S.Naipaul, a post – colonial West Indian writer”. He has been the Chairman in the College Academic council, Board of Studies, Finance Committee, Magazine Committee, Selection committee and acted as Chair Person in International seminars . He has been guiding PG students in the ir projects and M.Phil Scholars. He also won “Best Educationist Award” from various organizations. Until now, he has been updating the academic knowledge, besides striving to bring more honours to his institution and to make the college surge ahead toward s the pinnacle of glory.
Dr. J. Ahmed Meeran, joined as Assistant Professor of English in the year 2006 at Hajee Karutha Rowther Howdia College, Uthamapalayam, While working as Assistant Professor, he studied M.Phil., and also completed his Ph.D., and he was elevated as Head of the Department of English. During his service he has attended many seminars, workshops and conferences at the Regional, National and International levels and presented papers. So far, more than 20 of his articles have been published in various books and journals related to English Language and Literature. He did his Doctoral Degree in “Use of Myth in the Select Plays of Girish Karnad”. He has been serving as a Public Relation Officer, Member of College Academic Council, Board of Studies, and acted as a Resource Person and delivered guest lectures in various colleges. He has been guiding PG students in their projects and M.Phil Scholars. He is also one of the associate editors of the International refereed Journal. He continues to strive hard to bring laurels to the institution. His saga of rendering services in the field of teaching will continue forever .
BODHI INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF RESEARCH IN HUMANITIES, ARTS AND SCIENCE An Online, Peer-reviewed, Refereed and Quarterly Journal with Impact Factor
Vol: 2 Special Issue 2 March 2018 ISSN: 2456-5571
Aim & Objectives CONTENTS
Academic Excellence in research is S. Page Title continued promoting in research support for young No No. Scholars. Multidisciplinary of research is motivating 1 Paranormal Lovey -Dovey in Stephenie 1 all aspects of encounters across disciplines and Meyer’s Select Novels research fields in an multidisciplinary views, by Ms.S.B.Chandhini Priyadharshini assembling research groups and consequently 2 Enhancing Language Skills Through ICT 7 projects, supporting publications with this Mr.PM.Noushad inclination and organizing programmes. 3 Nursery Rhymes in English – The Missing 10 Internationalization of research work is the unit Component in ELT Today seeks to develop its scholarly profile in research Ms.Amy Gracelyn Paul through quality of publications. And visibility of 4 Anarcho -Transhumanism in the Select 13 research is creating sustainable platforms for Short Stories of Philip K. Dick research and publication, such as series of Books; Dr.C.G.Sangeetha & T.Sowmya motivating dissemination of research results for people and society. 5 Social Media as a Tool for Learning 18 Language Disclaimer Mrs.M.Rizvana Contributors are advised to be strict in 6 English as a Universal Link Language 24 academic ethics with respect to acknowledgment Dr.J.Ahmed Meeran of the original ideas borrowed from others. The 7 Comparison of Films and Literature in 27 Publisher & editors will not be held responsible for “The Glass Menagerie” any such lapse of the contributor regarding Ms.M.Tamilarasi plagiarism and unwarranted quotations in their 8 The Journey of Overcoming Fear in John 30 manuscripts. All submissions should be original and Green’s The Fault in our Stars must be accompanied by a declaration stating your Mr.A.Babu research paper as an original work and has not 9 The Representation of Woman and 34 been published anywhere else. It will be the sole Femininity in Kamala Markandaya’s responsibility of the authors for such lapses, if any “Nectar in Sieve” - A Review on legal bindings and ethical code of publication. Mr.S.Velmurugan 10 Merits and Demerits of Bilingual Method 36 Communication Mr.A.Sivasankaran Papers should be Mailed to 11 Adaptation as an Art: from King Lear to 38 [email protected] Ran Arya Balachandran 12 Eco -Feminism in Gita Mehta’s A River 43 Sutra – A Study Mrs.S.Anees Fathima
13 Subaltern Studies -Dalit Writing - A Study 46 19 Slave Narratives: An Anti -Slavery 68 of Bama’s Karukku, Sangati Propaganda in the African American Mr.P.Parthasarathy & Ms.S.Jeyanthi Literature 14 Mobile - Assisted Language Learning 50 Ms.M.Sumathy (Mall): A Paradigm Shift in English 20 Subsistence of Tribals in Mamang Dai’s 71 Language Teaching The Legends of Pensam Mr.A.Rajamani Ms.M.Benazir Nuzrath 15 Writers of Indian Diaspora: An Overview 52 21 Biography: An Effective Tool for Teaching 73 Mr.N.Raja Marichamy English Language 16 A Feministic Perspective in Chitra 56 Ms.M.Ummu Jasmine Banerjee Divakaruni’s Sister of My Heart 22 Narratology in Meira Chand’s A Far 77 Ms.S.Gomathi & Ms.R.Asha Horizon 17 The Issues of Indian Immigrants and their 60 Ms.H.Rakhiba Implications in Kiran Desai's Novel 23 Evolution of E – Learning 81 - The Inheritance of Loss Ms.A.J.Saleema Kathoon Mr.V.Muruganandham & Dr.L.Rajesh 24 Demythologizing the American Past in 84 18 Culinary Paradigms in the Literature of 65 Ishmael Reed’s “Flight to Canada” Indian Diaspora Mr.S.Mohamed Rowther Ms.M.Fathima Sanjeetha 25 Newspaper as a Tool in English 88 Language Teaching Class Mr.S.Abubacker Siddiq
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PARANORMAL LOVEY-DOVEY IN STEPHENIE MEYER’S SELECT NOVELS
Ms.S.B.Chandhini Priyadharshini Ph.D. Research Scholar, Sri Sarada College for Women, (Autonomous), Salem
―And so the lion fell in love with the lamb…‖ he murmured. I looked away, hiding my eyes as I thrilled to the word. ―What a stupid lamb,‖ I sighed. ―What a sick, masochistic lion.‖ -Stephenie Meyer Paranormal romance is the fastest growing Moon, Eclipse and Breaking Dawn. Author subgenre of the romance in young fiction. The Stephenie Meyer was born Stephenie Morgan on term ‗paranormal‘ can be defined as something December 24, 1973, in Hartford, Connecticut, to that is said to be beyond normal. The term Stephen and Candy Morgan. ―paranormal‖ has existed in the English Meyer has called the uncommon spelling of language since at least 1920. The word consists of her first name ‗a gift from her father,‘ who added two parts: para and normal. The definition implies the letters ‗i‘ and ‗e‘ to the end of her name to that the scientific explanation of the world around create ‗Stephenie‘. As the second of six children, us is ‗normal‘ and anything that is above, beyond, Meyer took on the duties associated with being an or contrary to that is ‗para‘. Paranormal events are elder sibling in a large Mormon family. Between phenomena described in popular culture, folk, and caring for her younger brothers and sisters, she other non-scientific bodies of knowledge, whose developed a passion for reading, thus becoming an existence within these contexts is described to lie avid fan of classic authors Jane Austen, Charlotte beyond normal experience or scientific Bronte and Margaret Mitchell, among others. explanation. The most notable paranormal beliefs In 1996, between her junior and senior years include those that pertain to ghosts, extra- at Brigham Young, Meyer became re-acquainted terrestrial life, unidentified flying objects, psychic with childhood friend Christian Pancho Meyer abilities or extrasensory perception, and cryptids. .The reunited friends soon began dating, and were A cryptid is an animal whose existence is not married less than a year later, when Meyer was confirmed by science, or is a specimen that is just 21 years old. Meyer graduated from Brigham typically considered to be extinct. Young University in 1997. That same year, she Paranormal romance is a subgenre of both gave birth to her first son, Gabe. Sons Seth and Eli romantic fiction and speculative fiction. Romantic followed, and Meyer experienced a busy life as a fiction place their primary focus on the stay at home as a mother. relationship and romantic love between two On June 2, 2003, Meyer became an author in people, and must have an emotionally satisfying earnest. Twilight was released in 2005 to fume and optimistic ending. Speculative fiction is reviews, quickly becoming a best-seller. Like J.K. an umbrella genre encircling narrative fiction with Rowling‘s Harry Potter franchise, Meyer‘s book supernatural or futuristic elements. Thus, bridged the gap between teen and adult fiction. paranormal romance must possess the She also increased her popularity through her characteristics of both the above said fiction. online accessibility, and frequently made herself The author whose work this paper focuses to available to her fan base. Twilight was honoured as explore under paranormal genre is Stephenie a New York Times Editor‘s Choice and Publishers Meyer. She is best known for authoring the Weekly Best Book of the Year. Twilight Saga book series. The series has a The following year, Meyer published her sequence of four books namely Twilight, New sophomore effort, the sequel New Moon, and sold
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the film rights to Twilight. With the third and accompanied by Edward‘s sister, Alice. They meet fourth instalments, Eclipse (2007) and Breaking with the Volturi, a powerful vampire coven, and Dawn (2008), Meyer‘s series has sold more 250 are released only on the condition that Bella be million copies, and has been translated into 37 turned into a vampire in the near future. Bella and languages. The books were also adapted for a film Edward are reunited, and she and the Cullens series amassing five instalments, including The return to Forks. Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2, released in In Eclipse, Victoria has created an army of November 2012. In 2008, Meyer released her first ‗newborn‘ vampires to battle the Cullen family non-Twilight work. The Host, a grittier novel and murder Bella for revenge. Meanwhile, Bella is targeted at an adult audience, features an alien compelled to choose between her relationship with romance instead. Meyer‘s Twilight books, as well Edward and her friendship with Jacob. Edward‘s as the film franchise, continue to garner media and vampire family and Jacob‘s werewolf pack join fan attention. forces to successfully destroy Victoria and her With a brief introduction about the author, vampire army. In the end, Bella chooses Edward‘s the paper shifts to give in a short summary of the love over Jacob‘s friendship and agrees to marry selected works. The major characters around Edward. whom the fiction revolves are Isabella Marie In Breaking Dawn, Bella and Edward are ‗Bella‘ Swan, the heroine, Edward Cullen, the married, but their honeymoon was cut short when hero, Jacob Black Bella‘s best friend, Carlisle Bella discovers that she is pregnant. Her Cullen father of Edward, Emmett and Alice pregnancy progresses rapidly, severely weakening Cullen, as well as Rosalie and Jasper. her. She nearly dies giving birth to her and The story begins with Bella Swan, who moves Edward‘s half-vampire-half-human from Phoenix, Arizona to live with her father daughter, Renesmee. Edward injects Bella with his in Forks, Washington to allow her mother to venom to save her life and turns her into a travel with her new husband, a minor vampire. A vampire from another coven sees league baseball player. After moving to Forks, Renesmee and mistakes her for an ‗immortal Bella finds herself involuntarily drawn to a child‘. She informs the Volturi, as the existence of mysterious, handsome boy, Edward Cullen and such beings violates vampire law. The Cullens eventually learns that he is a member of a vampire gather vampire witnesses who can verify that family, which drinks animal blood rather than Renesmee is not an immortal child. After an human blood. Edward and Bella fall in love, while intense confrontation, the Cullens and their James, a sadistic vampire from another coven, is witnesses convince the Volturi that the child poses drawn to hunt down Bella. Edward and the other no danger to vampires or to their secret, and thus, Cullens defend Bella. She escapes to Phoenix, they were left in peace by the Volturi. Here ends where she is tricked into confronting James, who the story of twilight saga with a blissful note. tries to kill her. She is seriously wounded, but After a brief outline of the novels, the paper Edward rescues her and they return to Forks. now attempts to focus on the significane of love In New Moon, Edward and his family leave employed in the novel. Bella and Edward are the Forks because he believes he is endangering main couple throughout the twilight saga. The Bella‘s life. Bella goes into a depression until she saga mainly focuses on their relationship‘s develops a strong friendship with Jacob Black, development, starting with their first and who she discovers can shape-shift into a wolf. dangerous encounter in Twilight to their eternal Jacob and the other wolves in his tribe must love in Breaking Dawn. The below lines depict protect her from Victoria, a vampire seeking to Bella‘s feelings for Edward in the novel Twilight: avenge the death of her mate James. Due to a About three things I was absolutely positive. misunderstanding, Edward believes Bella is dead. First, Edward was a vampire. Second, there was a Edward decides to commit suicide part of him, and I didn‘t know how potent that in Volterra, Italy, but is stopped by Bella, who is part might be that thirsted for my blood. And
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third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in the form of a visiting vampire coven consisting love with him. (Twilight 195) of Laurent, Victoria, and James. James tricks When Bella and Edward first met in Twilight, Bella into confronting him alone in a ballet studio Edward realizes that, he is unable to read Bella‘s she once went to as a child, and all of the Cullens thoughts, which he finds frustrating for reasons he come to her aid, destroying James before he can did not know at the time. Later he finds it difficult kill Bella. Bella spends time in a hospital with to be around her; because even though he is a Edward constantly by her side, where he admits ‗vegetarian‘ vampire, her blood is more appealing that his sister Alice saw a vision of Bella becoming than anything he had ever tasted. The compelling a vampire. However, he is determined to keep her desire is so overwhelming that he considers killing human, despite her wanting to become one. her, as well as the twenty other surrounding Twilight ends with neither one of them winning students, to remove all living witnesses. He the argument, but neither is giving in. Instead, attempts to change his biology class to avoid being they enjoy the moment together. with her, but fails since every other class is already ―This is the last time you‘ll ever see me. full. He believes her to be of interest because he I won‘t come back. And you can go on with your cannot read her amusing thoughts and dismiss life without any interference from me. It‘ll be like I her, as he has done for most of his vampire life. never existed, I promise.‖ (New Moon 71). These He temporarily runs away from her to Alaska, lines were said by Edward to Bella. The next book where he stays with the Denalis for a short while. in the series, New Moon, begins with Bella The day after he returns, he saves Bella from celebrating her eighteenth birthday. She is being hit by a van, exposing his superhuman depressed because this is the day that, she strength and speed. Bella tries to confront him becomes physically older than Edward, who is about it, but he refuses to tell her anything. perpetually seventeen. Edward invites her over to Edward becomes increasingly infatuated with his family‘s house to celebrate. She receives a Bella, and cannot get her out of his mind. His paper cut while unwrapping one of her gifts, and infatuation with her reaches to the point that he Edward‘s brother, Jasper Hale, tries to attack her. sneaks into her room at night to watch her sleep. As a result, Edward leaves Forks and Bella, On the first night, while Bella is dreaming of telling her that he no longer loves her, because he Edward, she says his name in her sleep. Edward thinks that leaving her is the best thing he can do then realizes that he loves her, and tries to get for her. Bella then goes into an immense close to her again. After yet again saving Bella in depression, and once ‗awakened‘, becomes closer Port Angeles, Bella tells him that she knows about to Jacob Black and he wants to be more than him being a vampire and that it does not matter, friends are, but that is not what she wants. They proving that she loves him as well. The following argue, leaving Bella heartbroken. Jacob gives Bella lines of Edward explores his love for Bella: succinct hints about what he is, and Bella ―You‘re the most important thing to me now. The discovers that he is a werewolf. most important thing to me ever‖ (Twilight 274). Bella soon finds out that when she is in Edward takes Bella hiking to a meadow, a danger, she can hear Edward‘s voice clearly in her place he considers the most beautiful around the mind. When wanting to hear his voice again, she dank forest of Forks. Bella thinks the same. Here, attempts cliff-diving, and nearly drowns in the he shows her what sunlight does to his body for process. When Alice, who can see into the future, the first time. The sight of Edward‘s sparkling skin sees her jump, she believes that Bella has dazzles Bella immensely. Bella and Edward committed suicide, and travels to see Bella and see become closer, eventually beginning a for herself. Edward, believing Bella to be dead relationship. Edward invites her over to meet his from Alice‘s vision, loses the will to live and family who are excited to meet her, except travels to Volterra, Italy to have the Volturi kill Rosalie. She was later invited to their baseball him, and end his misery without Bella. game. During the game, danger reveals itself in
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When they prevent the Volturi from killing that he will go in battle, intending to die since she Edward, he begs her forgiveness, and tells her that will not love him back. Bella tells him to kiss her he loves her, had always loved her and always so he will think she loves him back, but as she will, and promises to never leave her again. Bella kisses him, she realizes that she loves Jacob as forgives him entirely and becomes completely well. She also recognizes that her love for Jacob normal again, as if Edward had never left Forks. has no comparison to the love she holds for Later, after his family votes in favour of Bella Edward. Once the battle is over and Victoria and becoming a vampire, Edward agrees to do it her army are defeated, Bella visits Jacob and tells himself if Bella will marry him first. Bella is still him of her decision to stay with Edward. worried that if Edward does not turn her into a That night, Bella breaks out in tears for having vampire she will continue to get older while rejected Jacob and Edward comforts her. Bella Edward will be seventeen forever. She is also later decides to let Alice arrange the wedding and outraged that he refuses to turn her just because he be her maid-of-honour. Edward realizes how wants to protect her soul. much she is giving up for others and decides to When Eclipse begins, Bella receives a letter repeal his conditions except for the wedding, but from Jacob, saying that he misses her too, but that Bella is determined to do everything right: it does not change anything. She is saddened by marriage first, make love, and then become a this, but Edward visits her, and her mood greatly vampire. At the end of the story, they agree to improves. Initially banned from going inside the tell Charlie about their engagement. house, Edward is now allowed entrance for How many times had I stared at Edward and limited amounts of time, under orders of Charlie, marvelled over his beauty? How many but he ignores this by sneaking into her room hours―days, weeks, of my life had I spent every night. Later, while Bella is visiting Jacob, he dreaming about what I then deemed to be admits that he is in love with her, and forcefully perfection? I thought I‘d known his face better kisses her, saying that she must either have him as than my own. I‘d thought this was the one sure her boyfriend or not at all. Bella is furious with physical thing in my whole world: the flawlessness Jacob for this, and nearly ends their friendship. of Edward‘s face. I may as well have been blind. Meanwhile, Bella still has her heart set on For the first time, with the dimming shadows and joining Edward and his family as a vampire. But, limiting weakness of humanity taken off my eyes, after some consideration, she decides that there is I saw his face. I gasped and then struggled to find one thing she would like to do while human that is the right words. I needed better words. (Breaking to have Edward make love to her. Edward Dawn 37) immediately refuses this ‗demand‘, explaining that At the beginning of Breaking Dawn, Bella and although he wants her as much as she wants him, Edward are married in a beautiful ceremony he could easily kill her if he lost control. Bella orchestrated by Alice. Edward and Bella ask Mr. insists that he would never allow himself to let that Weber to change the words, ―till death do us part‖ happen. Eventually, Edward agrees that they can (Breaking Dawn 38) to the more appropriate ―as ‗try‘, but she must marry him first. Bella long as we both shall live‖ (Breaking Dawn 38). reluctantly agrees, because of her parent‘s early After they are wed, Bella and Edward share their divorce, and becomes Edward‘s fiancée. customary first dance during the reception. He Moments before Bella‘s graduation, she comments on how ―heart-breakingly beautiful‖ realizes that the army of newborn vampires are (Breaking Dawn 40) she is and frequently addresses under the control of Victoria and therefore will be Bella as Mrs. Cullen and his wife. Jacob comes to coming after her. Having no other allies, since their wedding and when Bella insists that she can the Denali family will not help due to Irina‘s have a ‗real‘ honeymoon, he is upset, as he hostility towards the werewolves for believes Edward will kill her if they make love killing Laurent, the Cullens and the La Push pack while she is still human and threatens to kill of werewolves join forces to battle Victoria and her army. Before the battle, Jacob informs Bella 4 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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him. Seth and Sam are forced to take Jacob away she surprises everyone, including herself, with from the reception. extreme amount of maturity and self-control for a Edward takes his wife to Isle Esme for their newborn; when Edward takes her out for her first honeymoon, where they consummate their hunt, they cross a human scent. Rather than going marriage. The next morning, Edward is horrified for the kill, Bella freezes and runs away, which that he has bruised most of Bella‘s body with his amazes Edward, and even more Jasper. Bella is hard skin and strength. He refuses to make love also happy to finally be Edward‘s equal and that until she is turned into a vampire. However, Bella he no longer has to hold back his feelings and convinces him otherwise after waking from a strength for her safety. dream so good that she cries, wanting it badly to Later on when Edward explains what had be real. She pleases with Edward to realize her happened to their family and Jacob while she was desire and he gives in. converting, they are all in shock. Bella, Edward Bella soon after feels a bump on her belly and and Renesmee are given a cottage as a gift from misses her period. She then realizes she is their family. Jacob does them a favor by telling pregnant with Edward‘s child. Her pregnancy Charlie about the supernatural world without progresses at an extremely fast rate, and she mentioning vampires, and telling him to accept becomes very sick. She cannot digest her food, as that Bella is different now. When Charlie comes to she vomits most of it, and is dying, for the baby is accept her change and Bella exerts enough control part vampire and not accepting food that Bella to avoid hurting him, they are all allowed to stay eats and therefore starving her. Also, the baby longer in town, much to Bella‘s pleasure. inside of her is so strong that it has been After a vampire named Irina mistook accidentally breaking her ribs. Edward asks Jacob Renesmee for an immortal child: a creation that is to help him convince her to kill the baby that is forbidden in the vampire world, the Volturi set out killing her, but Bella refuses, because she has to destroy the Cullens as punishment for the already developed a love for her unborn child. alleged transgression. In hopes to prevent this Edward also tells Jacob that if she wants kids, she threat, their family gathers allies from many places can have ‗puppies‘ with him. Jacob then has a to witness that their child is not a full vampire and thought that ―the monster craves blood‖(Breaking poses no threat to their existence. In the Dawn 52), and Edward is intrigued by the idea. meantime, Bella uses the remaining time to learn They let Bella sample human blood, and she finds fighting skills and how to shield other people with it appealing, and she is almost instantly revived her power, while also secretly forging legal when she drinks it. Throughout the pregnancy, documents to save Renesmee in case they had Bella drinks gallons of blood to sustain herself and failed to stop the Volturi. Though they and their the baby. Near the end of the pregnancy, Edward friends manage to convince the Volturi that begins to hear the baby‘s thoughts, and when he Renesmee is not an immortal child, her existence hears that the baby ‗absolutely adores Bella‘, his is still claimed to be threatening. hatred for it is replaced by new found love. Jacob However, Alice and Jasper arrive in time to remarks that Edward could never hate anyone prevent the fight from breaking out and present who loved Bella, which is why Edward does not two prominent witnesses Nahuel and Huilen, who hate him. manage to end the confrontation peacefully. Once Edward delivers the baby when Bella the Volturi leave the Cullens, Edward and Bella unexpectedly goes into labour. She names their are free to live their lives in peace with their child ‗Renesmee‘, and Edward injects her heart daughter. At the end of the saga, Bella removes with his venom, turning her into a vampire. the shield on her mind to let Edward read her Jacob imprints on Renesmee, unknown to Bella thoughts for the first time, which brings them even until she is immortal. During her transformation, closer to each other. Though her removal is not Edward stays by her side, refusing to leave the perfect, she states that they have forever to work room. After Bella‘s transformation is complete, on it. The saga concludes that the couple continue
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blissfully into their small but perfect piece of life Twilight saga can serve as the best example forever. for unconditional love. Edward and bella though To sum up, vampires and werewolves are not faced ample obstacles in their life, they still the only element of fantasy depicted in the novels. sustained facing those situations staying strongly It is the instant and eternal attraction between together. Thus through her novels, Stephenie Edward and Bella, two somber teens, one human Meyer has brought out a positive moral influence and one vampire, pulled together inexplicably on teenagers rather than just depicting fantasy. against all forces of danger and all rules of logic. Edward‘s desire for Bella is so ravenous References in nature that he literally craves her blood above 1. Kerns, S. The Culture of Love: Victorians to that of any other, while after a fleeting encounter, Moderns, Cambridge: Harvard University Bella is so taken with Edward that she cannot Press, 1992. Print imagine her existence without him. 2. Meyer, Stephenie. Breaking Dawn. Boston: Falling in love can mean opening oneself up Little, Brown and Company, 2008. Print. to new experiences, feeling free, spontaneous, 3. ---. Eclipse. Boston: Little, Brown and generous, and differentiated from one‘s past. Company, 2007. Print. When one finds someone with whom one shares a 4. ---. New Moon. Boston: Little, Brown and deep and meaningful connection, one has to Company, 2006. Print. struggle through real issues. In the current 5. ---.Twilight. Boston: Little, Brown and scenario true love is quite dissipating with an Company, 2005. Print. exception to few. Though paranormal romance is 6. Waller, Alison. Constructing Adolescence in not possible in reality it can be taken in the right Fantastic Realism. London: Routledge, 2009. sense. No humans are perfect everybody has some Print. paranormal behaviour within themselves. Real life has no assurance to sail in the same smooth boat, at any time it is prone to face storms and tornados. It is in the hands of the people to tackle the difficult situations in one‘s life.
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ENHANCING LANGUAGE SKILLS THROUGH ICT Mr.PM.Noushad Assistant Professor of English, H.K.R.H College, Uthamapalayam
Abstract The English language is a necessity for most people in today's world.The monotonous way of teacher-oriented classroom atmosphere should be changed to a creative student-centred classroom. In the days of technological advancement, a student should be created interest in the classroom by utilizing the technology. Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) is one of such methods to be adopted in modern teaching system. Keywords: ICT, Interactive multimedia, Interactive whiteboard, Social interface.
Introduction To promote the study of ICT based texts as The word ICT Stands for information and valuable text types Communication Technologies and is defined as a To provide practical guidance to teachers "Diverse set of Technological tools and resources based on a theoretical understanding of the used to communicate, and to create,' disseminate, purposes and advantages of using ICTs. store and manage information". ICT has become To heighten awareness of the issue if equity one of the basic building blocks of modern society. and access to ICTs in our classrooms ICT to a great extent facilitates the acquisition and absorption of knowledge, thereby raising the level ICT Tools of quality of education. ICT has the potential to ICT is changing processes of teaching and remove the barriers that are causing the problems learning by adding elements of vitality to learning of low rate education in any country. It can be environments including virtual environments for used as a tool to overcome the issues of cost, less the purpose. The new digital ICT is not a single number of teachers, and poor quality of education technology but combination of hardware, as well as to overcome time and distance barriers. software, multimedia, and delivery systems. Now, ICT has been used in almost all fields of Today, ICT in education encompasses a great life, including in education. To equip students to range of rapidly evolving technologies such as be literate lifelong learners and global citizens of Desktop, Note Book, and Handheld Computers, the 21st century we must successfully integrate Digital Cameras, Local Area Networking, ICT into both the English curriculum and English Bluetooth, Internet, the World Wide Web, pedagogical practice.ICT is a valuable tool to Streaming and DVDs; and applications such as enhance teaching and learning. For teachers, ICT word processors, Spread Sheets, Tutorials, is a professional resource, a mode of classroom Simulator, Emulator etc. ICT also allows for the delivery, and a source of valid and valuable text creation of digital libraries where students, types. For students, ICT provides opportunities to teachers and professionals can access research communicate more effectively and to develop material from any place at any time. critical literacy skills. It is a valuable tool for researching, composing and responding, viewing ICT Tools in Language Context and representing in English. However, if all There are some kinds of technologies students are to have the opportunity to develop classified into information and communication ICT skills and achieve English syllabus outcomes, technology commonly used in language context, issues of equity and access to technology must be such as: addressed. The purpose of this paper is: To advocate an increasingly authentic use of Interactive Multimedia ICTs in teaching and assessment Interactive media is the integration of digital media including combinations of electronic text, 7 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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Graphics, moving images, and sound converted Mobile Gadget into a structured digital computerized Mobile gadgets such as cell phone and environment that allows people to interact with smartphone which are equipped with programs the data for appropriate puposes. The digital like the computer, which enable it to perform as environment can include the internet, telecoms mini Personal Computer. By using this gadget and and interactive digital television. (Finney, 2011:2) its internet connection, everybody could enjoy chatting, browsing, and discuss each other with Computer the wider range. The advancement of science and A computer can be utilized with other technology make the size and price of those multimedia learning devices or it can stand alone gadgets are getting cheaper and reachable (a standard PC) and still serves its basic purpose as an electronic medium of language learning. The Social Interface computer is an electronic device which is capable This media provides facility or example that of receiving information (date) and performing a enables an interaction between human and sequence of logical operations in accordance with computer.People set up more interaction with the a predetermined but variable set of procedural computer in a more intuitive with less effort instruction(program) to produce results in the through writing, voice.touch, eye movements, and form of information or signals based on Oxford other gestures.(hartoyo,2012:34) This technology dictionary. It consists of CPU, monitor, keyboard serves as the milestone of the recent development and other apparatus. of interactive multimedia,audio-graphic computer teleconference, and interactive television via Audio Devices satellite (National Broadband of Employment, Audio devices can be used with other media Education and training,1993:5) to form and also be utilized separately as an independent tool. Audio devices includes speaker, Interactive Whiteboard earphone CD etc An interactive whiteboard or IWB, is a large interactive display(such as touchscreen Internet monitor)which is connected to a computer and The Internet can be used as a medium of projector.A projector projects the computers' language learning through email, www(World desktop onto the boards' surface, where users Wide Web)text, audio and video conferencing. control the computer using a pen, finger or other devices. Television According to Oxford Dictionary, Television is ICTs and the English Classroom a system for converting visual images (with The use of ICT in the English classroom sound)into electrical signals, transmitting them by extends beyond its motivational value to address radio or other means, and displaying them key outcomes of its syllabus, and allow students to electronically on a screen. become competent users as well as consumers in English Telephone This telephone medium has not been widely Research Suggests that Incorporating ICT into used for language teaching because of the poor English Curriculum can quality of analogue transmissions. However, there Improve writing and reading skills is new invent of digital quality and lower Develop speaking and listening skills connection cost which potential for conference Support collaboration,creativity,independent calls. learning and reflection (Becta,2003a,Becta,2003b,VTC,2003)(cited in Becta 2005).
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As an interactive and collaborative medium, accessing any information necessary learning ICT allows responding composing and independently influence the value teaching Publication to be easily shared and offers students student's character, it does not always depend on the opportunity to explore the language of text others. Mastering current tick is necessary for more creatively and develop as speakers writers every human being in edible age as well as in and readers for an ever-widening range of education, innovative learning, especially learning purposes and audiences. can be done by using the internet to generate device-based learning ICT. ICT Can Enable Students to Access information and respond to a References widening range of text 1. Anderson,N (2005) "Mindstorms" and Organise and present information in a variety "mindtools" Aren't happening: digital of forms streaming of students via socio-economic Broaden the range of audiences for their work disadvantage. E. Learning journal vol 2. Compose a widening range of text for a broad No2.2005. range of purposes 2. Barton,G.2006 ICT in English www. long Compose for real audiences ICT can support man.co.uk/tt-seceng/websites/article.htm them in their choice of genre for audience and (10/4/2006) purpose 3. Banaszewski,T.(2002).Digital Storytelling find Identify on characteristics and features of text. its place in the classroom. Multimedia schoolsjan /Feb2002(11/4/2006) Develop understanding of language and 4. Beavis,C.(2006) Lara meets Critical literacy (becta, 2006, ICT in the Literacy:Computer Games and English curriculum). 5. http://www.sofweb.vic.edu.aalenglish
Conclusion (11/4/2006) ICT is a form of advanced science Technology 6. Becta.(2006) Benefits anf features of ICT in must be optimised function especially in the English.ICT in the curriculum. implementation of learning. ICT provides http:llcurriculum.becta.org.uk/docserver.php opportunities for students in the era of global /?docoid:657 (11/04/2006) competition needs to obtain adequate supplies. 7. Becta (2006) ICT in the Curriculum True innovative ICT based learning can provide 8. http://curriculum.becta.org.uk/docserver.ph? West opportunities for students to home and temid:255 (11/04/2006) promote competence on an international scale. On the other hand mental attitude and self-Reliance in
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NURSERY RHYMES IN ENGLISH – THE MISSING COMPONENT IN ELT TODAY
Ms.Amy Gracelyn Paul Department of English, SHUATS, Allahabad
Amy Gracelyn Paul, Department of English, communicative. It is the result of direct instruction SHUATS, Allahabad in the rules of language. In language learning, Language teaching has become an integral students have conscious knowledge of the new part of education in schools and colleges. English language and can talk about that knowledge. speaking skills have become indispensible for the Children, on the other hand, acquire language job market and there has been a mushrooming of through a subconscious process during which they institutes and centres claiming to teach fluent are unaware of grammatical rules. This is similar English in 30 or 90 days. In this constant search to the way they acquire their first language. To for unique methods and short cuts to fluency, acquire language, the learner needs an some basic methods are being overlooked and environment of natural communication. even dismissed. One among such overlooked Skinner in 1957 tried to explain language practices is the teaching of nursery rhymes. They acquisition through behaviourism. Skinner argued are an essential component of language learning. that children learn language based on behaviourist Considered frivolous and even anachronistic, reinforcement principles by associating words with nursery rhymes are confined to the nursery meanings. Correct utterances are positively schoolrooms. The reasons for the rising reinforced when the child realizes the unpopularity of English nursery rhymes are communicative value of words and phrases. manifold. The impact and the long-lasting hold of Noam Chomsky, commonly considered the rhymes is something that is not really talked about ―Father of Modern Linguistics‖, in the 1960s in ESL/EFL in India. The idea of introducing proposed the LAD – Language Acquisition rhymes to adult ESL learners is rejected out of Device as an explanation for the ability of children hand assuming that rhymes are for children and to learn a language. Chomsky believed every child that adult learners will feel uncomfortable in has a ‗LAD‘ that ‗encoded‘ the major principles singing childish songs. This paper aims to shed and structures of language. He proposed that the light on the work already done on the efficacy of brain was ‗hard-wired‘ to learn grammar. This rhymes and why they should be used in our implies in turn that all languages have a common ESL/EFL classrooms. structural basis: the set of rules known as Language acquisition is the process by which "universal grammar". Chomsky and other humans acquire the capacity to perceive, produce generative linguists like him have shown that the and use words to understand and communicate. It 5000 to 6000 languages in the world, despite their involves the picking up of diverse capacities very different grammars, do share a set of including syntax, phonetics, and an syntactic rules and principles. These linguists extensive vocabulary. Language development is a believe that this ―universal grammar‖ is innate. complex and unique human quality but yet Recent research concludes that the process of children seem to acquire language at a very rapid second language acquisition is not very different rate with most children's speech being relatively from first language acquisition. The learner grammatical by age three (Crain & Lillo-Martin, acquires the ability to distinguish the various 1999). There is an important distinction made by sounds of the language. She/he acquires linguists between language acquisition and vocabulary in reference to the known world and language learning. Language learning is not experiences. Finally, the learner acquires
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grammatical structures. A look at the average A rhyme or a pop-song becomes the wholesome language classroom reveals counter-intuitive ESL classroom material by providing the four techniques and methodology that only increase skills – reading, writing, speaking and listening. the stress of the learner by introducing him to Starting with vocabulary, the student learns grammatical structures early in the process. syntactic structures in an illustrated context that With Chomsky‘s Universal Grammar and the s/he can imitate in a different context. Krouse Behaviourist theory put forward by Pavlov, (1988) states that learners discover vocabulary, Skinner, and Watson, methods of teaching second structure and other language components through language changed drastically from the previously songs. Along with his Affective Filter Hypothesis, followed Grammar-Translation and Direct Krashen (1982) also put forward his Input Method. Georgi Lozanov (1979) proposed the Hypothesis where new, unfamiliar vocabulary is theory of Suggestopedia. It states that when the acquired when its significance is made clear to the mind and body are relaxed, the brain absorbs learner. Meaning is conveyed by providing knowledge without effort. The Suggestopedia "comprehensible input" in the form of classroom uses music to help soothe students as extralinguistic support such as illustrations, teachers employ various language-learning actions, photos, videos and context. Rhymes activities. According to educators of second introduce the learners to similar sounding words. language learners, music is advantageous for still From this base a corpus of semantically related other reasons. words can be introduced by creating coordinate Stephen Krashen (1982) put forward the pairs (e.g., pot and pan) and subordinate- Affective Filter Hypothesis. Lack of motivation, superordinate pairs (e.g., furniture – chair). stress, negative attitude and any number of such Ryan (1969) addressed the issue of rhythm reasons affect the learning process. Krashen and its impact upon short term memory, Shepard explains that for maximum results the filter should and Ascher (1972), also taking a more linguistic be weak. First, for most students, singing songs approach, studied the effects of rhythm (i.e., and listening to music are enjoyable experiences. intonation) upon short-term memory as well. Even The positive effects of music on the psyche are rote learning and memorization is aided by using well documented in psychology. Music infuses rhythm. For example, students learning creativity in the classroom and provides multiplication tables use a rhythm which becomes motivation by being novel. The tedium of very obvious in a classroom setting. textbooks is broken by unpredictable teaching Rixon (1996) pointed out that nursery rhymes material- music. Music reduces the stress of ‗form part of a child‘s linguistic data base from learning a second language. This stress, especially which generalizations may be made. Nursery in an adult learner, is a major inhibitor of rhymes abound in partial repetition at the language learning. Music thus, increases the linguistic level, with ‗many repetitions of word attention and reception of the learners. Through sequences containing slight variations, which from the child‘s point of view, may aid the perception songs or rhymes, students are exposed to of abstract linguistic categories. Crystal, (2001) ―authentic‖ examples of the second language. stated the importance of language patterns to Furthermore, target vocabulary, grammar, learners. And due to the repetitive language and routines and patterns are modelled in context. the repetitive nature of their use, nursery rhymes Rhyme is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as lend themselves well to functioning as linguistic ―a word that has the same sound or ends with the drills, without the accompanying feeling of same sound as another word‖ and ―a short poem potential boredom or frustration and they help in in which the last word in the line has the same developing automaticity of language use, sound as the last word in another line, especially alongside catering for different learning styles and the next one‖. A nursery rhyme is essentially a multiple intelligences. In addition, Gardner, ‗story-song‘. (2011) stated that they provide ample A small incident or event, sometimes opportunities for recycling the language by nonsensical, set to a simple, catchy tune. offering a wide range of options for developing 11 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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classroom activities to accompany them. Nursery to learn more and use the language out of the rhymes provide a large corpus of material to classroom. The superiority of nursery rhymes as develop classroom activities addressing the four an ESL/EFL class room material lies in the fact skills. Nursery rhymes, in general, are based on a that it is readily available and can be used without small incident, as in ‗Jack and Jill‘, ‗London a teacher‘s supervision. In this regard nursery Bridge is Falling Down‘ or ‗Mary Had a Little rhymes make successful materials. In addition to Lamb‘, or repetition of meaningful structures, as catchy tunes they have the added advantage of in ‗Wheels on the Bus‘. Unlike poetry, nursery accompanying visuals which increase the rhymes follow rules of syntax, keeping to sentence attention, motivation and input of the learners. order and tense. The different types of sentences are introduced along with the various tenses. The References simple rhyme scheme introduces the learner to the 1. Crain, S., & Lillo-Martin, D.C. (1999). An various sounds, helps train the listening skill in introduction to linguistic theory and language distinguishing the various sounds of the language. aquisition. Malden, (MA): Blackwell Shin & Crandall (2014), pointed out that rhymes Publishing Ltd. ‗help language learners acquire connected speech‘ 2. Wikipedia contributors. "Universal and they are considered to be especially useful for grammar." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. intonation and practice ‗in a stress-timed language Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 4 Jul. such as English because the rhythm forces 2016. Web. 15 Jul. 2016. [learners] to put the stress in the right places and 3. Chomsky, N. (1965). Aspects of the Theory of to observe the strong and weak forms.‘ Syntax. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. Pronunciation, rhythm, stress and intonation can 4. Krieger, D. (2005). Teaching ESL vs EFL: be practiced. Nursery rhymes also inspire Principles and practices. English Teaching creativity in the learners by motivating them to Forum, 43(2), 8-16. form their own sentences, or even rhymes at an 5. Lalas, J. & Lee, S. (2002). Using Music to advanced level. Enhance Second Language Acquisition: From Research has shown that a student who has Theory to Practice. Language, Literacy, and memorized the rules of the language may be able Academic Development for English language to succeed on a standardized test of English Learners. Pearson Educational Publishing. language but may not be able to speak or write 6. Krashen, S. (1982). Principles and Practice in correctly. Rote memorization of the rules of Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: grammar does not ensure fluency. A major error is Pergamon Press. made when the classroom is treated as an ESL 7. Krouse, M.A.1988. Beginning English. setting rather than an EFL setting. A clear Mastering Second Language First Three distinction should be made in this while teaching Years. Babelegi. Unibook Publishers. Craft the students. Krieger (2005) clearly states that in Press. an EFL class, students are usually monolingual 8. Ryan, J. (1969). Grouping and short-term and they learn English while living in their own memory: Different means and patterns of country. In ESL contexts, the learners live and are grouping. Quarterly Journal of Experimental already immersed in the culture of the target Psychology, 21, 137-147. language. That is, a classroom full of immigrant 9. Shepard, W., & Ascher, L. (1973). Effects of learners set in the U.S.A. would be an example of linguistic rule conformity on free recall in an ESL classroom but a classroom full of Indian children and adults. Developmental Psychology, students, sharing one language, set in India would 8(1), 139. be an EFL classroom. Each classroom has 10. Shin & Crandall, (2014), Shin, J. K. & Crandall, different requirements and they also call for J. (2014). Teaching Young Learners English: From different approaches and materials. Any successful Theory to Practice. Boston: National Geographic ELT material should eventually free the learner of Learning. the teacher‘s supervision and motivate the learner
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ANARCHO-TRANSHUMANISM IN THE SELECT SHORT STORIES OF PHILIP K. DICK
Dr.C.G.Sangeetha Assistant Professor of English
Ms. T.Sowmya Ph.D. Scholar, Sri Sarada College for Women, (Autonomous), Salem
Nothing travels faster than the speed of Donald Wollheim, who later, in 1955, published light,with the possible exception of bad news, Dick‘s first science fiction novel, solar lottery. As which obey its own special laws. he grew up, however, science fiction was -Douglas Adams discarded as interest of childhood. Dick‘s interests American Literature is the literature written or in his teens and early twenties were classical produced in the United States and its preceding music, a lifelong concern, and the classics of country. Science fiction has long been the subject literature. He read the French realistic novelists, of discussion; argument and criticism. Much of Kafka, Joyce, Dostoevski, and ancient literature. this stems from the existence of a science fiction Philip K Dick science fiction writing career sister-genre, ―fantasy‖, and a need to differentiate started in October 1951, when he sold his first between the two. The act of refining the definition story to Anthony Boucherr‘s influential Magazine of ―Science fiction‖ has been a cornerstone of the of fantasy and science fiction. In 1982, the year he study of science fiction. Science fiction deals died, Dick had written thirty six science fiction principally with the impact of actual or imagined novels and over one hundred short stories. Dick‘s science on society or individuals or having entire body of fiction, in which master pieces scientific factors as an essential orienting alternate with lesser works, is rated among the component. In the science fiction short stories of finest achievements of American science fiction, Philip K Dick a structural tension is established and it has contributed to the development of between a metaphysical vision of the absurdity of academic interest in science fiction as a literary life and a critique of social and political genre. This paper elucidates the Anarcho- convention. transhumanism in the select short stories of Philip Philip Kindred Dick was born in Chicago, he k Dick. had a twin sister, Jane C. Dick, who died when The termAnarcho- transhumanism is the the two were a month old, a fact that deeply recognition that social liberty is inherently bound affected him and which reflected in the image of up with material liberty, and that freedom is estranged couples and split pairs of siblings that is ultimately a matter of expanding our capacity and a recurrent motif in his work. Dick‘s parent opportunities to engage with the world around us. separated when he was five years old he stayed It is the realization that our resistance against with his mother; back from Washington, D.C, those social forces that would subjugate and where he did not do well at school, they settled in limitus is but part of a spectrum of efforts to Berkeley, where Dick attended high school until expand human agency to facilitate our inquiry and 1945. creativity. This mean not just being free from the When he was twelve Dick read his first arbitrary limitations our bodies might impose, but science-fiction magazine, Stirring Science Stories; free to shape the world around us and deepen the he had been looking for the popular Science potential of our connections to one another monthly and came across the other magazine by through it. accident. Stirring Science Stories was edited by
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The story Second Variety deals with non- Hendricks cannot believe that he is still alive but humans which means robots endowed with travels with him. Hendricks tries offering David artificial intelligence try to take controlover food, but he refuses, creating a suspicious that humans, humankind split into two blocks on David is a mutant. Later Hendricks sees two Earth governed by the US and the USSR by Russian soldiers with a woman. The soldiers shoot posing as human beings and making attempts to David. While Hendricks things he will be killed destroy all human beings. Second story Imposter next and that the meeting was a trap, the soldiers deals with non-humans extraterrestrials try to take show him that David was a robot. The soldiers are control over humans united on Earth under one the sole survivor of an attack on the Russian rule, represented here by a police like Institution forward command. by posing as human beings and making an attempt One soldier was a Polish conscript named to destroy all human being. Both the stories deal Rudi Maxer. The other was an Austrian Klaus with robots evolving into humanoid androids Epstein. The woman, Tasso, is a prostitute that capable of artificial intelligence. Rudi and Klaus were visiting during the attack on Second Variety beginstwo UN remnant soldiers the forward base. Rudi explains that the Russian see a Russian remnant soldier climbing a hill. have known for a week that the claws have been They are about to engage him in combat but he is creating their own upgraded versions that use killed by automated robotic soldiers (claws). They pathetic figures like the starving boy (third variety) inspect the body and find that the Russian was or a wounded soldier (first variety) to sneak into carrying a message in an aluminum container. The bunkers. They also stopped differentiating solider was a runner attempting to deliver a between UN and Soviet forces. message to the forward command of the local UN With most of the Soviet bunkers forces. They requested a meeting at the decision compromised, their only hope is to inform the UN level. Major Hendricks, who has been cooped up forces. Hendricks tells them that the Moon base in the bunker for too long, decides to go to the should still be safe. It is highly vulnerable. The meet. machines need to get only one inside and it will let Hendricks is bothered by the claws, despite the others in. That evening Hendricks learns about wearing a protective wristband that identifies him Tasso, who is Russian and came to the front when as a UN soldier, but takes comfort that they are she was sixteen to begin working as a prostitute. allowing them finally to win the war. Hendricks Klaus enters restraining Rudi with his gun. Klaus considers the history of the war. The Soviet Union tells Hendrick and Tasso that Rudi is the second began it with a massive nuclear strike. variety. Hendricks and Tasso point out, in horror Washington retaliated and the leadership moved and disgust, that Rudi was not a machine. to the Moon. The Americans kept production The three survivors make their way to the UN going on Earth, but this was prevented by a Soviet base. Tasso points out that the different varieties invasion. Most production also moved to the seem to not communicate and were made in moon. After the first couple years of the war, the different factories. When they approach the base, only human population that remained on Earth Hendricks tries to communicate with the people was isolated pockets of survivors and soldiers. The inside, demanding that they come out. He talks to Soviets were near winning when the UN two different people. When they come out of the developed the claws, which were automatically bunker and Hendricks insistence, they prove to be produced in underground factories. Hendricks two copies of the David model of claw. The three believes that the meeting may be to arrange are attacked by a larger number of claws. During surrender terms. The claws have effectively won the battle, Tasso uses a bomb, destroying many of the war. the claws. She also shoots and destroyed Klaus Hendricks meets a boy named David holding who is revealed to be a claw, presumably the a teddy bear. The boy explains that he lives in the second variety. After the battle, Tasso and ruins and comes out to look for things to eat. Hendricks conclude that their only hope is to escape to the moon base. Hendricks knows about 14 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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a secret rocket cruiser hidden in the area that is in ruins, in sewers, cellars, with the rats and designed to travel to the Moon base in the case of snakes. (377) an emergency. After a lengthy search, they find This is the end logic of war for Dick. the ship, which has room for only one person. Hendricks fights for the UN troops but identifies Since Hendricks is injured Tasso must go first and himself as American. The two Russian soldiers he return with help. Hendricks provides Tasso meets are actually conscripts from Poland and information about the location of the Moon base Austria. While the world is divided into two sides and she departs on the cruiser. in an endless war, there remains a great diversity After she leaves, Hendricks begins his wait, of local identities. This is an important reminder either for help from the Moon base or death from from the age of total wars, when numerous the claws. He comes across the body of Klaus. nations and colonies were drawn into war efforts Taking a closer look he finds that Klaus was spanning the entire globe. The conflicts among the actually labelled as the fourth version (IV-V). The rulers are often not carried on at the level of identity of the second variety is confirmed when individual solders, many of whom are conscripts. he is attacked by claws, including two ―Tasso‖ The story ImposterbeingsSpence Olham talks models. His final thoughts are that the Tasso about taking a vacation after ten years of working model he travelled with used a bomb designed to on the Project with his wife Mary. The war with kill claws. When the last humans are eradicated, the Outspacers has not slowed down, but the the claws will begin to fight each other. development of the protec-bubble provides some Second Varietyis the massive indifferent of the basic protection to Earth cities. While the weapon institutions to human life. This was the logic that that will push the war in a positive direction is still went into the design of the ―claws‖ and they undeveloped, Olham is sure the Earth is in no turned out so catastrophically.. Both immediate danger. A colleague Nelson comes deromanticize war by showing its bureaucratic with an older man who turns out to be Major logic and systematic indifference. One reason may Peters. Peters is from the government‘s security not feel too bad about the ending, which agency and tells Olham that he will be arrested for foreshadows the end of humanity through the being an Outspacer spy. Peters reports on the infiltration of the Lunar base, the last refuge of arrest to his superiors as they depart for a base on humanity, is that the only real humanity left is on the moon. Peters takes some time to explain to the surface of the Earth. Tragically, it is this Olham that he will be quickly destroyed by a team humanity that the claws are able to exploit. The of specialists. Olham is confused and desperately three varieties the wounded soldier, the attractive wants to inform his wife of what has happened. women, the starving boy David all take advantage Peters explains that they got a report that the of the humanity that remains in the abused, protec-bubble was infiltrated by a robot with a U- abandoned, and long-suffering soldiers on Earth. Bomb, that would be set off by the utterance of a The soldiers need to be used to get at the officers certain phrase. The robot killed Spence Olham, in the bunker, because we imagine their hearts are taking over his identity. Olham insists that he is much harder. not a robot. He tells Nelson and Peters that the Both Second Variety and Imposter emphasize robot must have never reached him. But Peters the complete horror and misery of military life in clarifies that the robot would not know that he had an era of total war. Other early Dick stories, even taken over role of Olham. He would ones dealing with horrifying things, have space for becomeOlham in body and mind.Olham asks for a moments of joy and even humor. Hendricks doctor to prove that he is not a robot, but they recounts: refuse. Olham bluffs Nelson and Peters about They remaining troops stayed behind as best setting off the trigger. They flee the ship and they could; a few thousand here, a platoon there. Olham takes the ship back to Earth. No one knew exactly where they were; they stayed On Earth, Olham contacts his wife, where they could, moving around at night, hiding instructing her to contact a Dr. Chamberlain or any other doctor to go to his house, with the 15 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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equipment that will prove that he is a human. danger is that the morally human robot may still Chamberlain was the doctor attached to Olham‘s be preprogrammed as a destructive force. project. When he goes into his home and sees his But these fears come from a very real place wife, Olham knows that the secret police have and are entirely consistent with the world that already intercepted her. He fears that they will Philip K. Dick lived in. The reason war was such assume she is a robot as well. He flees to a nearby a common theme in Dick‘s early stories is not only forest. Peters arrives and insists that Olham is merely because the genre of magazine science delusional to think he is a human, telling him that fiction liked to explore war. War was very much he will be destroyed on site once he is discovered. the daily experience of people in Dick‘s The entire county is being scoured. Olham had six generation. He few up in the context of the Second hours to escape. If he could find the Outspace ship World War. His earliest writings were published with the robot that was supposed to replace him, during the Korean War. In the 1950s there were he could prove he was human. He assumes that good reasons to think that war with the Soviets the ship would be in an out of the way place, near was imminent. It is not surprising that Dick his home. He guesses it must be near Sutton dreamed up geopolitical backgrounds that were Wood. bipolar and based on conflict and war. Olham‘s Just as Olham locates the Outspace ship, job is to participate in the arms race. Peters and Nelson intercept him. Nelson is about Interestingly, although the United States was to first at Olham, but Peters decides to give him a historically one step ahead of Russia throughout moment to prove he is telling the truth. Olham much of the arms race, there were brief periods, points out a body on the ground, that looked especially in the 1950s, that suggested that the humanoid but on closer inspection looked like a Soviets would outpace the U.S. The Sputnik broken machine. Peters begins talking to Olham moment articulated this fear. In Imposter humans about his much needed vacation, when Nelson had just figured out how to protect their cities notices that the broken robot was actually killed from attacks from the outside this protection is with an Outspace knife driven into its chest. Just immediately trumped by the use of these robotic as Olham realizes that the body is the remains of agents. the real Olham, the bomb goes off, triggered by To sum up science fiction seems unaware of some of the robot‘s last words. the element of irrationality implied in the act of Impostor is the realization that Olham is both providing logical justifications for situations that capable of massive destruction, yet could be are basically impossible and at variance with morally human. He acts with many of the empirical experience and analytic thought. Again, characteristics of humanity: a desire for self- granted that the presence of a rational, congnitive preservation, concern for his wife, concern for his dimension is the main determining factor of the community through working on a project, an science fiction native, it seems arbitrary that this ability to adapt to the situation. He is such a should be located exclusively on the science- convincing avatar that the agent of the secret fiction author‘s ability to supply the reader it police is fooled at the end. It seems that the realistic evidence for fantasied events. transplanting of the memories into a robot sustains Narratives in motion are a shift of power our humanity. This is a central premise of within the relative equilibrium among the ruling transhumanism and runs deep in cyberpunk institutions and corporations, usually triggered by literature. a destablising element which takes the form of a The potential to translate a human piece of advanced equipment or extraordinary consciousness onto a mechanical body is perhaps ability. Philip‘s stories show the anxiety, losing the ultimate in using technology to liberate control, and desires to destroy all of which are humanity from its confines. In Impostor Dick evidence of just how unstable and throbbing our focuses on the inherent danger. In this case the world and how impenetrable the logic of power distribution usually is, and how fragile things happen to be at times. 16 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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References 3. Scholes, Robert and Rabkin, Eric S. Science 1. Dick, Philip K. The Collected Stories of Philip K. fiction; history, science, vision. New York, Dick.Subterranean Press, 2010. Oxford University Press, 1977. 2. Rose, Mark. Alien encounters; anatomy of 4. Palmer, Christopher. Philip K Dick: sciencefiction. Cambridge, Massachusetts, Exhilaration and Terror of the Postmodern. Harvard University Press, 1981. Liverpool University Press, 2003.
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SOCIAL MEDIA AS A TOOL FOR LEARNING LANGUAGE
Mrs.M.Rizvana Assistant Professor of English, H.K.R.H. College, Uthamapalayam, Theni District
Abstract Social Media is a controversy topic in today‟s society. Some people think that Social Media destroys human interaction and real life human relationships. While other think that Social Media is a bless to humanity. Social Media makes human interaction much more convenient and much faster than real life human interaction. It makes globalization a reality. It gives a chance for interacted people to express themselves and it also benefit develop international relationships whether its education or social. Social Media also allowed students to work with new technologies. This paper focuses on important of social media and how it use for learning language.
Social Media Follow Educational Accounts Social media are computer-mediated One of the best and easiest things you can do technologies that facilitate the creation and to start learning English on Twitter is to follow sharing of information, ideas, career interests and educational accounts. There are many Twitter other forms of expression via virtual communities accounts that post daily tips, tricks and vocabulary and networks. The variety of stand-alone and words. Many of these accounts also encourage built-in social media services currently available you to practice right there on Twitter. This is a introduces challenges of definition; however, there great way to try out new words, because it‘s quick are some common features. and you can get direct feedback. Social media are interactive Web 2.0 Internet- Other educational accounts share their own based applications. and other interesting blog posts for English User-generated content, such as text posts or learners. You can use these when you have some comments, digital photos or videos, and data more time to practice your English reading and generated through all online interactions, is the discover some new learning tips. lifeblood of social media. Some educational accounts you can follow on Users create service-specific profiles for the Twitter are: website or app that are designed, and maintained EspressoEnglish — Shares daily tweets with by the social media organization. links to quick English lessons and vocabulary Social media facilitate the development of building pages. online social networks by connecting a user's FluentUEnglish — Shares all the blog posts profile with those of other individuals or groups. published on FluentU‘s English Language and Culture Blog. Types of Social Media WoodwardEnglish — Tweets words of the Baidu Tieba, Facebook , Gab, Google+, day, along with sentence examples of how to MySpace, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Reddit, use them. Snapchat, Tumblr, Twitter, Viber, VK, WeChat, PhraseMix — Shares links to daily English Weibo, WhatsApp, Wikia, Snapchat and lessons and tips. YouTube. LearnEnglish and @LearnEnglish_BC — Shares idioms, words and other vocabulary Twitter resources using Australian and British Cool Ways to Learn English on Twitter English. Once you follow some English learning accounts on Twitter, you‘ll start seeing tips and 18 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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tricks in your feed every day. Now you‘ll need to For example, if you‘re interested in working organize them. in a hotel or any other part of the hospitality industry, you can find some interesting articles by Make Lists for Different Kinds of Learning searching for #hospitality. If you hope to someday Making lists is a way to organize the be a hotel manager (or already are one), you can accounts you follow on Twitter. For example, this find advice for leaders at #leadershipadvice. could let you group all the daily vocabulary words You can find Twitter communities and together in a list, all the blog posts in another list, hashtags for your industry by just searching etc. Twitter for a hashtag, or using a service like Rite To make a list, just visit a Twitter account Tag, which lets you search for hashtags. page, click on the gear icon (it looks like a circular flower) on the top right of the account page, and Ask Questions to Native Speakers and Experts select ―Add or remove from lists.‖ You can have Don‘t be afraid to tweet at someone on as many lists as you want, and they can be public Twitter. Remember, Twitter is all about (shared with everyone, like this ESL list) or private conversations! Of course, not everyone on Twitter (just for you). responds to all their messages, and you don‘t want Then, go to ask too many questions to the same person. to https://twitter.com/[YourTwitterName]/lists You can tell if someone responds to messages (just replace ―[YourTwitterName]‖ with your often by checking how many replies they post. actual Twitter username), and you‘ll see all your Simply visit their account page and select the lists in one place. You can also join a service like ―Tweets & Replies‖ tab at top of the page. TweetDeck, which lets you create columns for Some English experts who would be happy to different lists. help with your English learning are: Benny Lewis is the founder of the website Enter Casual Conversations Fluent In 3 Months. You can ask him for study One of the best things about Twitter is that tips, recommendations and other questions about you can jump into any conversation. You can English learning resources. enter conversations that your friends are having, Terry Fredrickson is a former ESL teacher talk to other English learners, or even ask for who now adapts news articles for English learners English advice from native speakers. on Bangkok Post. He welcomes discussions about Some useful hashtags to know for entering the articles he posts, so read an article and share casual conversations are #twinglish, which is a your opinion or question. place to practice your English, and Grammarly is a grammar help website. They #grammarhelp, which is a way to ask for help in can help you find learning resources or answer correcting your grammar. You can also tweet at grammar questions. (or mention) a specific account in your tweet; If you‘re not sure if someone can help you, many of the educational accounts are happy to just ask. See if they‘d mind answering an English help English learners. grammar question, for example. Many times if someone can‘t help you, they‘ll give you the Join Professional English Discussions in Your account name of someone who can. Field Twitter is not just a good place for casual Explore Your Interests conversations. It‘s also a great place to connect to We mentioned before that you can use and learn from other people in your field. Even Twitter to keep up with things you care about or though people often use casual language online, are interested in. This is an important and you can learn some professional English on incredibly fun part of using Twitter. So many Twitter just by following news, finding blog posts people use Twitter that you can find people talking and articles, and joining conversations in the field about anything and everything. or industry in which you work or study. 19 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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Your favorite brands, celebrities, comedians, events. Practice English with real world examples actors and even politicians are probably on through audio clips, podcasts and news articles. Twitter. Your local coffee shop might be on Remember: This is British English so some words Twitter. Some accounts use Twitter to stay in will be spelled differently than they are in touch with their fans. Some use Twitter as a diary, American English, like colour (British) versus posting their thoughts about the world or their color (American). day. Others use it to just be funny. VOA Learning English Instagram This page, run by Voice Of America, is For most people, Instagram is a way to share similar to the BBC‘s English learning page, but it your life with the world through pictures and uses American English. The language is a bit 15-second videos. You can live harder to understand but the idea is the same: You vicariously through travel bloggers profiles, plan can learn English by reading about and discussing your daily outfits with Insta‘s fashion icons, drool things that are happening in the world right now. over fabulously delicious entrees and meals, VOA also has some fun grammar videos, tips, new and/or get some inspiration for health and words and much more. exercise. But there are so many more opportunities, which is what I am here to tell you Learn English—British Council about today! You can expand your vocabulary, Here‘s another excellent place to learn practice speaking, improve listening skills, review through just talking about things. Instead of using grammar, and even meet others for language current events as the topic of discussion, the exchange! If you haven‘t connected with me yet, British Council page uses more casual things like I‘ll give you a second to do so now…. go ahead… short stories and popular TV shows. The operators @jenesl760. of the page are always happy to help in the comments, too. Watch out for British spelling Facebook again! Learn English with Facebook: Facebook has a huge variety of pages. Here Learn English Online Community are just a few of the great pages and groups on If you want to learn from a teacher without Facebook that you can use to learn English. going to a classroom, this online community will have something for you. The Learn English Learn English Online page shares many blog posts and YouTube This Australian Facebook account shares videos of different kinds of teachers giving English some excellent blogs about English words. It posts classes, like Fluency MC, the teacher who raps daily explanations about everyday phrases and about English grammar. When you‘re done commonly confused word pairs. Each explanation watching or reading, you can always come back to is very easy to understand and includes examples the page and leave your thoughts or questions. of the words in use. Best of all, if you try out the Maybe you‘ll find your new favorite online words or phrases in the comments, Learn English teacher here! will help you by correcting your grammar. Practice English Everyday BBC Learning English Practice English Everyday is a great place to You might be familiar with the BBC. It‘s a meet a practice buddy. It‘s a very friendly group public service broadcaster, which means it runs where people ask each other questions about British programs and TV shows thanks to English and share great English lessons they donations. The BBC also has a huge collection of found. They also practice together and test each online English learning tools. Their Facebook other on their English knowledge. page challenges English learners to answer Post your own questions or get involved by questions and write their opinions about current responding to posts from other members of the 20 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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group. Join the group and introduce yourself— Youtube you‘ll get some warm welcomes and immediately YouTube Resources for English Students (right away) feel more confident about posting. Learn American English – free daily videos that are designed to help you learn English quickly Whatsapp and include real American slang, idioms and How to Turn WhatsApp into English-learning phrasal verbs. Tool Holmwood‘s Online Learning – this smart WhatsApp is a mobile chat application that video series is a pain-free way of getting a good allows you to chat with people you know and foundation in English grammar. make new connections. You can have one-on-one text conversations, participate in group chats and Awesome Channels to Learn English on make calls through the app. YouTube WhatsApp is very popular worldwide. It is Speak English with Misterduncan free and easy to use, available for most phones and This is one of the most popular YouTube includes simple features for sharing files, photos, channels for learning English. It‘s easy to see why. links and videos. Plus, WhatsApp chats are Misterduncan is passionate about his topic. encrypted and private. He‘s excited about English and you can feel it in Many of your friends may be on WhatsApp these well made videos. He uses humor a lot of the already, but even if they are not, you can still use time to help you learn. Misterduncan teaches it to chat with like-minded people and make new English to the world for free and has had a friends. channel on YouTube since 2006. There are many This makes WhatsApp a great tool for lessons on topics like the senses, slang, news, practicing and learning English! fashion and money. They‘re easy to watch and are WhatsApp could help you a lot. Here is why: about how the language is spoken instead of You can practice in a familiar setting. With grammar. WhatsApp, you can chat and practice your English with people you already know, such Learn English with English Class101.com as friends or family. Designed for rapid English language learning, You can collaborate (work together) with these interesting video lessons cover many aspects other learners. With group chats, you can of American and British culture. So you can communicate with people from across the discover more about the countries as you learn globe who are also learning English. their language. You can use WhatsApp on the go. Because If you love their videos, there‘s much more WhatsApp is a mobile app, you can read and that you can learn from EnglishClass101 by respond to messages on your schedule and Innovative Language. It‘s so much more than a practice anywhere. YouTube channel! It‘s actually a complete English There is no need to rush. When using learning program with over 1,000 English video WhatsApp for text chats, you can take your and audio lessons. You can sign up for free and time to think about your responses. learn more on their official website, here. You can learn while you type. Using the Real English autocorrect feature on your phone is a good Real English is one of the best channels for way to learn proper spelling while you chat on English language beginners and has a large library WhatsApp. of free access lessons. Each one includes two It is not just for text. WhatsApp has free video videos, one with subtitles and one without and a calling, so you can practice speaking handful of exercises. It has real people and real-life and listening in English, too. situations, so you get a true feel for how people
really speak English.
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BBC Learn English Linguaspectrum Interesting English From one of the world‘s most famous Linguaspectrum Interesting English takes a broadcasting companies (the British Broadcasting different approach from many other language Corporation) comes a bunch of free English learning channels. It concentrates learning around language learning lessons. They‘re in a variety of interesting things that you may encounter. For formats such as real life situations, cartoons and example, there are lessons about the vocabulary interviews. you will need at an airport, creepy-crawlies There‘s also a really cool collection of videos (insects) and types of musical instruments. for words you‘ll hear in the news. The videos are The narration is straightforward and short but filled with a lot of really good accompanied by subtitles and occasionally some information. fascinating scenes. The lessons all link to follow- up interactive elements on Linguaspectrum‘s Business English Pod website which are also free. You can ask for directions, get a meal in a restaurant and tell the time in English. But what if EF pod English you‘re called on to attend a business meeting Learning English from YouTube is made a lot conducted in English? There‘s no need to break easier with EF podEnglish. These are slick, bite- out into a cold sweat as Business English Pod has sized 5-minute English lessons that are aimed at it covered with clear and thorough lessons on English language learners at every level, from topics such as supply chain management, finance absolute beginners to advanced students. They‘re and economics and contract law. well-structured with a three-part lesson plan: watch, learn and try and there‘s a great range of VOA Learning English topics too. These include families, pets, directions, VOA is something a bit different. The channel weather, films and technology. Some of the offers subtitled news reports that are read out at lessons use humor to get the points across. These slower speeds than normal. This gives the viewer are welcome touches that make learning easier time to hear every word clearly and to see the and ensure that new words are memorized. shape of the announcer‘s mouth as he or she reads the script. Learn Something New Every Day VOA also posts its Google+ Hangouts where One of the most useful aspects about learning callers from around the world discuss in English English on YouTube is that most of the lessons in the stories that have been making the news. Other the above examples are short, but convey a lot of Hangouts provide tips on grammar and different information in easy to understand ways. There‘s aspects of speaking the English language. no chance of you losing your focus. By dipping into one short lesson a day you will soon notice Jennifer ESL the difference in your ability to speak English. English with Jennifer is a rich collection of Recently society has been undergoing a period more than 200 videos that are grouped into easy to of significant changes in all aspects of life. The use playlists. There are lessons for beginners, education system as one of the fundamental lessons to improve your writing in English, lessons institutions of the modern society, consequently is on grammar and many more. strongly effected by these changes, the new What marks them out as a cut above the rest educational process that have appeared in our past is the fresh and simple presentation and the special industrial society as well as the corresponding focus on pronunciation. There are no scripts and innovative learning environments were the focus no actors, just real, natural English language on this paper. speaking. In common with many other language learning channels, there is interactivity as well. References 1. The Use of Social Networking in Education: Challenges and Opportunities Ashraf Jalal 22 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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Yousef Zaidieh ICT, Collage of information 5. Nicole A. Buzzetto-More University and communication technology, IIUM KL, Maryland Eastern Shore, Princess Anne, MD, Malaysia USA. How social media is changing 2. The Positive & Negative Impacts Of Social education. Media On Our New Generation By Khaama 6. Social Media Use in Higher Education: Key Press - Wed Nov 19, 2014 Areas to Consider for Educators Julia 3. Using Social Media for Collaborative E. Rodriguez Assistant Professor Information Learning in Higher Education: A Case Literacy and Educational Technology StudyNa Li, Sandy El Helou, Denis Gillet Librarian. 4. Social Networking in Undergraduate 7. Oakland University Rochester, MI 48309 Education . USA.
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ENGLISH AS A UNIVERSAL LINK LANGUAGE
Dr.J.Ahmed Meeran, MA., M.Phil., Ph.D., Head & Assistant Professor of English, H.K.R.H. College, Uthamapalayam
Introduction 1963 the official languages Act 1963, providing for In this era of globalization and Information continued use of English for an indefinite period. Technology, English has a special and Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru also assured the predominant role in the communicative sphere of southern states that English would continue to be the world. This language is taught everywhere in Associate official language until such time as the the world. This language enjoys most prestigious non – Hindi states agree to accept Hindi as the reputation in the world. It has a special identity in only official language of the country. the field of education. We know it very well that Besides being the Associate official language teaching of any subject is a social and cultural which is understood by the educated people all activity. First of all we should know how English over the country. Without English both official is a link language? In my opinion a link language and private communication between many parts is one by which a man, belong to any social, of the country will be completely cut off. In this national and international strata to express himself connection, the clear and emphatic opinion of in a better way. Now if we see in modern scenario Jawaharlal Nehru is worth quoting: ― If you push English has become such a language which is used out English, does Hindi fully take its place? I hope to give expressions to thoughts and feelings of a it will. I am sure it will. But I wish to avoid at all social group not only in India, but also in this costs. It is very vital to do so in the interest of the planet. In other words, English has become unity of the country. It is this that leads me to the indispensable for us. It works as link among all conclusion that English is likely to have an people of the world and creates among them a important place in the foreseeable future. feeling of ―universal brotherhood‖. As we are The Indian Education Commission (1964-66) observing in post modern era the need of English has also recommended the continuance of all language is becoming mandatory in every sphere English in the interest of national integration and of life but there is one problem is arising is that the for higher academic work. It is therefore apparent standard of teaching English is degrading day to that English must continue as a national link day so the students are losing their interest of language for quite some time to come. studying English as a subject and due to this they English is not only important in getting a have to face problems in communication. ―In better job, it is everywhere in social interaction. If teaching of English‖ P. Gurrey writes, ―It is highly you can‘t speak it then you are nothing and you desirable to know exactly what one is hoping to feel humiliated if you can‘t speak English. People achieve. If this can be clearly seen, then the best think you are dumb. Seeing its importance way of getting to work usually becomes evident. C.Rajagopalachari once said, ―English language is We ought, therefore, to consider carefully what we the gift of Saraswati.‖ English is becoming are trying to do when we are teaching English‖. popular every day. There is a craze for English in The Constitution of India, adopted in 1950, Indian society. In this age of Information had envisaged Hindi as the only official language Technology one cannot think of making progress of the Union of India and English was to continue without the knowledge of English. There is an for 15 years from the date of adoption of the awakening in society towards the learning of constitution. This was vehemently opposed by the English. Our government too has awakened to the southern states. As a result, parliament enacted in importance of English in education curricula. 24 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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English has been introduced in syllabi right from by the Britishers. At this time, this language the early stage. More and more institutions have enjoyed a royal place, or a place of importance. been opened in for English teaching and learning. After independence drastic changes come English medium schools are thriving even in regarding the place of English in India. Since it backward parts of the country. They aired was a language of colonist who exercised exploiting this rising popularity of English. They atrocities over Indians, the first reaction was to are making good money. Today, even a low dethrone English from its exalted position. As a income family seeks to educate its children in an consequence. Hindi in Devnagri script was English medium school. We cannot think of declared as an official language by the constitution success at the cost of ignoring English. The key to of India. English did not remain the medium of success lies in English learning. Even at higher instruction. Dialects become the medium of level English is the mode of instruction. English is examination. English was not more a compulsory the proper way of the research and technology. All subject. But soon the phase of dethroning English the research and studies are done in English. was over, it is soon realized that English is a Whether it is defense, aviation, airlines, research language of masses. English has become part and and technology, institutions of higher studies or parcel of our life. It is used in every walk of life. foreign affairs, the medium of learning and From a lower to higher society English is spoken, instruction is English. The importance of English or is a medium of effective communication. If we can be considered under these major heads which talk about lower class, suppose you had a maid- are given below: English as an International servant in your house she does not know how to language. English as a window of the world. communicate in English but still she pronounced As above we have discussed that the place of such words as, vacuum cleaner, washing machine, English in India has been a matter of controversy bed sheet, jeans, shirt etc. in English. There are since Independence. But English as a link many words we use in social life as newspaper, language has served two extreme views. There are thanks, welcome, health, student, wife, husband, those who advocate that English is indispensable class, teacher etc. No doubt English is a language and should be given supreme importance to keep of aristocrats but even now it becomes a language the country abreast of the latest developments in of illiterate or a rustic people. Wherever we go we science and technology. There are others who in see English is penetrating in our blood and mind. their nationalistic zeal want a complete switch- To sum up, the discussion ―English Language over to Hindi and a Ban on the use of English in is our major window on the world‖ we find that any field. English acts as the link-language, English is not only a link language in India but because it is easier to find people in every part of also in world. Because English is so widely country, who know English. Therefore, a north spoken, it has been referred as a ―world Indian traveling in the South can communicate language‖. While it is not an official language in with them, if he knows English. The same cannot most countries, it is currently the language most be done in Hindi. The experience of replacing often taught as a foreign language. So English is English with the regional language as the medium rightly flourished not only in India but also in of instruction of the university level has proved other countries of worlds. English is everything extremely harmful. The regional languages are not that one can think of-the tool of empowerment fully developed. Moreover books in different and alienation, the way of bringing about equity subjects are not available in regional languages. and creating divisions, the mass instrument of This makes the task of teaching in the regional education. Education is yet to take full cognizance language very difficult. As we see that how of the onslaught of English. In the era of English become a link language in India we just globalization, English has no longer confined to want to throw light on the condition of English the four walls of a classroom-an affair between the before independence to the present days. The taught and the teacher- but has been acclaimed as history of English in India goes back to pre- a link language for all human activities across the independence days when this country was ruled globe. Thus, far from being labeled as the 25 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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language of the colonizers, it has today acquired References the status of the international language, more so 1. Goodman W.R., English Literature for because of the globalization. Thus the knowledge Competitive Examinations, 9th Edition, (2009) of English Language has become a prerequisite for 2. Kachru Braj B., The Indianization of English: professional development in the modern world. The English language in India, New York: English vocabulary encompasses almost all the Oxford University Press,(1983). subjects of sciences and humanities and all the 3. Mishra Pramod K., English Language, emotions and expressions that human beings feel Postcolonial Subjectivity, and Globalization and conceive. The worldwide global markets have in India in ARIEL: A Review of International adopted English as their link-language for English Literature, 31(1 and 2),383-410 (2000) communication. The use of technology can and is 4. Trivedi Harish, Colonial Transactions: reshaping the way we teach and learn. If we pay English Literature and India, Manchester: attention to the above problems and causes of Manchester University Press,(1995) English Language we should try to change the 5. Viswanthan Gauri, Masks of Conquest: scenario of the teaching English Language from Literary Study and British Rule in India, New primary to Higher Education. York: Columbia University Press, (1989) 6. http://www.usingenglish.com/comprehensio n/9.html, (2013)
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COMPARISON OF FILMS AND LITERATURE IN “THE GLASS MENAGERIE”
Ms.M.Tamilarasi M.Phil. Research Scholar Aringar Anna Government Arts College, Villupuram
Abstract Literature and Films are related to each other but still they are separate in their own ways. From the early magical experiment till the recent release of RON HOWARD‟S “ANGEL AND DEMONS” the relations between Literature and Films. Films are emerging art. It has most popular and vulnerable years succor from the previous generations of literature and films. Most of the films has depends upon literature only. The film makers also taken few scenes from drama, novels etc. Let me I thought and discussed about “Tennessee Williams” work “The Glass Menagerie” and “Shyamaprasad” film “AKALE”. Both of them discussed of same story and themes. It was a one of the interesting story in all other age peoples. The play was discussed about difficulty of accepting reality, impossible of true escape, unreleventing power of memory, duty, family, drugs and alcohol, weakness abandonment. “AKALE” This movie also discussed same thing only. The movie started with Anglo-Indian Family was lives in Northern Kerala. The story was discussed four main characters Neil, Margaret, Rose, Jim. Throughout the story represent a glass unicorn also. This unicorn also compared with rose life. Keywords: Literature, Films, Family, Irresponsibility, Glass, Unicorn.
Introduction can‘t reveal Jane Austen‟s detailed description I started to discuss about important about people‘s changing their attitude towards differences between films and literature. In Darcy Mr. Darcy was soonly drew the attention of literature as well as films are undertaking an the room and everybody thought Darcy was the audiences inner mind. According to philosopher one of the proudest, most disagreeable in the C.S. Peirce talks about visual image vs. verbal sign. world. Finally everybody hoped that he would He was discussed about some terms sign and icon. never come there again. The film present rather The terms signs refers to the arbitrary relationship complicated through Darcy‘s cold facial between two things. For example, a word ―tree‖ expression and the dialogue between Elizabeth can be a sign of a tree; also a picture of a tree can and Charlotte. In contrast the subtle change in be an icon of the tree which shows a less arbitrary people inner world towards Darcy could be relationship between two. As medium of revealed vividly and clearly in the novel. This literature representing film is made of icons, the difference between film and literature gives the images in the film have more direct and differences experiences. immediate relationship to what it describes the sound in the film could greatly enhance the Narration audiences easily understand. It is also true one in Narration is an important one in films as well film‘s grasp of seem to much more direct and as literature. In films the particular characters or easily intelligible. The film is much make easier to story was described from some narrators, the level be understood than that of the novels. of narrations only makes some curiosity to readers mind. The readers as well as audiences to sitting Surface vs Interior and enjoying with that stories. This is actually The camera can only show the surface, the caused but its iconic nature. The films show films have to use some other methods to express people the story, while the novels tell people the people‘s thought. Joe wright‟s “Pride and Prejudice” story. According to me what I am trying to (2005) the film could show the excited people. In saying? The novel could be narrated either by the the first scene of ball the beautiful ladies and first person or by someone outside it, most of the handsome gentle men as well as their actions. It films followed by omniscient point of views. We
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can see and hear whatever the directors want to expression, discussion, speaking, motivation, hear and saw. In very nature, the visual images collaborative learning. directly display what things are happening, the 3. Any sequence with clear body language and audiences while watching the films. According to facial expression. Bluestone claims that ―the novels has three tenses; 4. Two sequences about 6 minutes but the film has only one‖ However when 5. Activity time: 30 minutes. compare to the films, the novel writers could From the discussion and the sample activity handle this very easily. displayed above, it is reasonable to claim that the films could enhance the English language Sound and Silence teaching. Because of it very nature, the films could The sound of the films is greatly enhancing only create lot of advantages opportunities in the the audience‘s comprehension. In films audiences language class. But the novel is couldn‘t record could receive the information from both image and represent all kind of voice and action in and sounds. While the novel readers only from the various authentic situations. Moreover it is like a text even though they can visualize thoughts. window on English language culture. The teacher There are three types of sound in films classified should design appropriate activities based on films into namely, speech, music and noise. The sound according to the special needs. Films have a great in films the audiences could feel the characters potentiality in facilitating English language emotions. The magic of the sound in films is that learning. The paper suggests that a further study is touch the audiences inner mind. In novels the needed to explore how to use films in a deeper and readers could sit alone and started to read wider in English language classroom. The students something about that novel they just enjoy to read as well as teachers also enjoy to read something then only they can get some sort of pleasure to with our own pleasures. In language class is that particular mostly students get easily tired, the teacher too get tired soonly. But in film review classes are totally Films in Language Teaching different from language classes. The students are The films are actually having great enjoyed to watching films and them also happily significance in English language teaching. It is disused about the films in free hours too. necessary to clarify the the ―literature teaching‖ the using of video material could enhance the Comparison of ‘The Glass Menagerie’ and students from motivation and provide them ‘Akale’ Film different ways of input. The learning material with Akale, based on Tennessee Williams play visual elements are more meaningful and alive and ―The Glass Menagerie‖ is the story of an Anglo- help to bring the real world into the classroom. Indian family in Kerala. The family consists of It provides opportunities for the students to Margaret (Sheela), Neil (Prithviraj), and Rose see the people, customs and cultures of the target (Geethu Mohandas). Margaret the mother has in language community. The non-verbal aspect been taking care of her children‘s as well as such as gesture expression, posture as well as family. Her husband was leave permanently her dressing sense. Some teachers does not followed life. Neil the eldest son works as a clerk in a the play of the film inside the classroom. So the warehouse and he also dreams become a writer, teachers need to design with some activities based Rose the daughter is a very timid and sensitive on the films and the novels. Which the students person who does not to anything herself. Rose could inter activity with effectively with each who has a slightly deformed leg suffers from other. he paper will illustrate a sample activity is inferiority complex. The movie also based on this designed to the features of the films. For example: themes and characters. Throughout the movie 1. Watching& Role Play. stands on the beautiful characters. All the 2. Intermediate and above understanding the characters live in their own dreams and afraid to level of non verbal communication like body faced reality. Rose spending her time with to easily break glass toys. Neil lives in dream world 28 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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of script writing and stories. Margaret was dream About the Movie world in soonly her daughter will recover leg Geethu Mohandas as acting with rose suffers and will soonly, find a suitable boy. character. She is one of the famous actress in The movie is mainly talk about rose and her Malayalam movies. Tom George who is lover of personal life. She felt inferiority complex about her rose he is also the producer of this movie. The legs suffers. She mostly spending her time with cinematography part of the movie is well done. glass toys and she also speaking their toys and We never seen anything bright are very pleasing, handled very carefully her toys. In her small life the whole movie has a color tone which is kind she felt like all creatures are unique and have their and old nostalgically work. SHYAMAPRASAD own lives. ―We all have our own dreams in our is the director of in this movie. The movie has a life, but we never achieve that goal easily‖ when nice BGM, it was a very pleasing music. There is we successfully achieve our dream that will be a no song in the movie. Later only released the magical moment in our life as well as pure joy and music video. Especially the title song Akale, an happiness from the bottom of the heart. One day awesome melody. Sheela got an award from best when Rose was not expecting, her dream world supporting actress in Akale movie. This movie peeps into her real world. She meets her childhood won six awards for best film, best director, best crush (Freddy) and it was a magical moment in cinematographer (S. Kumar) and art direction her life. In that single moment of care, love and from (raja unnithan). attention, rose blooms, she loses her Inferiority complex, forgets an entire life‘s sadness and References dances to the music. She is so happy about the 1. http:// meeting and she also forget about her crush nadirafromkannur.wordpress.com/2004/09/1 Freddy breaking the horn of her glass unicorn. 6 akale-and-The-glass-menagerie/ This is the small movie which runs for a one 2. http://pdfs.semanticsscholar.org hour, half and hour minutes. The movie is ditto 3. the differences between novels and films- recreation of the Tennessee Williams play. The enhance literature teaching by using films-july stereotypical way of an old hero with beard and 2008,volume 5 no.7(serial No.44) us – china glass doing a flashback. It was look like an old Education Review, ISSN 1548-6613,USA. style. This movie is comparing with old contemporary Indian movies. This is very sensitive, minimalistic and different movie.
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THE JOURNEY OF OVERCOMING FEAR IN JOHN GREEN’S THE FAULT IN OUR STARS
Mr.A.Babu M.Phil. English, Jamal Mohamed College, Trichy
Abstract John Green is a recent popular name in the American young adult fiction. He is also a video blogger who has published numerous educational videos online. The Fault in Our Stars is considered to be his outstanding novel of the genre young adult realistic fiction. It vividly presents the lives of cancer patients and their psyche and also factors which offer emotional healing to the cancer patients. Green presents the optimistic, hilarious and lighter side of the cancer patients that enables them to live an optimistic life amidst adversities.This chapter “The Journey of Overcoming Fear” portrays the sufferings and fear which the characters undergo and their means of overcoming them. It also explores the psychological problems of the characters like fear of intimacy, fear of death and fear of oblivion, all because of their cancer. The impact of cancer on them and their family leads to the psychological trauma of each character. The society considers the cancer patients as special and they look at the cancer patients as semi-human as if they are partly dead. This makes Hazel think of herself as a grenade and keep herself aloof from her peer group. She fears intimacy because she thinks that her death will hurt her loved ones.
Introduction anyone. Because she thinks herself as a source of Psychoanalysis is based on the concept that pain for people who love her, especially to her individuals are unaware of the many factors that parents. She knows that her death is not far away, cause their behaviour and emotions. These that her death will hurt everyone who is close to unconscious factors have the potential to produce her. That‘s why she calls herself as a ―grenade‖ unhappiness, which in turn is expressed through a (99). score of distinguishable symptoms, including Once, when Hazel was near dying, she disturbing per It seeks to explain the complex overheard her mother saying if Hazel died she relationship between the body and the mind and wouldn‘t be a mother anymore, and this thought further understanding of the role of emotions in stayed with Hazel for years. This made her very medical illness and health. curious to know what would happen to the Fear is said to be one of the deadliest enemies characters at the end of the novel ‗An Imperial of mankind. It is surprising that this enemy is Affliction‘ especially to Anna‘s mother. She wants created by man himself out of his own mind. It to know whether Anna‘s mother would survive doesn‘t come from anywhere outside. ―The only beyond her daughter‘s death. If Anna‘s mother place where fear can exist is in your mind. It has survives, Hazel thinks that her parents too will no other residence‖ says Swami Sivananda (Gupta survive even if she dies. 8). As a human being everyone experiences some Hazel keeps herself aloof from her peer kind of fear within oneself. Fear should not be left group. Hazel feels the sense of otherness when she uncontrolled; one should try to conquer fear. shops with her friend Kaitlyn in the mall. There is Fear of intimacy is generally a social phobia a certain ―unbridgeable distance‖ (45) between and anxiety disorder resulting in difficulty in them as they shop for shoes. She never again feels forming close relationship with another person. natural to talk to Kaitlyn. Kaitlyn too identifies This fear is also defined as the inhibited capacity Hazel as a cancer patient. This is how society of an individual, because of anxiety, to exchange looks at cancer victims. Even a close friend will thought and feelings of personal significance with never act or talk with a cancer patient in a normal another individual who is highly valued. At the way. Cancer patients are kept at a distance and beginning of the novel one finds that Hazel is their fate is pitied. Being always seen as a cancer obsessed over the impact of her death. It is not patient makes Hazel feel awkward. This sense of that she fears death but she fears getting close to otherness vanishes when Hazel is in conversation
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with a little girl in the mall, who spoke with her suffers from eye cancer and he had lost his right freely not knowing anything about Hazel‘s cancer. eye, when he was a kid. In the support group At that moment Hazel feels free from her identity everyone talks about ―fighting and battling and as a cancer patient. winning and shrinking and scanning‖ (5). Patrick, Hazel‘s fear of intimacy is obvious. She the leader of the Support Group, himself is a maintains a little distance from Augustus Waters, survivor of ball cancer. He lets everyone talk about even though she loves him very much. She doesn‘t dying though many would live into adulthood, as express her love to him because, she fears that her Patrick does. death will hurt him. When her mom tells her, Hazel views the world in a skeptical way. She ―your father and I are excited to see you become a attacks the convention of portraying kids with young woman, making friends, going on dates‖ cancer as heroic victims. Without any doubt, she (99). She replies ―I‘m not going on dates, I don‘t sees these conventions as empty clichés. Both want to go on dates with anyone. It‘s a terrible Augustus and Hazel living with and dying from idea and huge waste of time and—I‘m like. Like. cancer, discuss the idea of ―cancer perks‖ (23). I‘m like a grenade, mom. I‘m a grenade and at Hazel mocks the idea that anyone sick with cancer some point I‘m going to blow up and I would like is supposed to be fearless and an inspiration to to minimize the casualties, okay?‖ (99). No those around them. Susan Sontag in her book says wonder Hazel wants to stay away from people. that, ―Theories that disease are caused by mental She likes to spend her time reading books and states and can be cured by will power are always being with her parents. an index of how much is not understood about Hazel‘s fear of intimacy is different from that disease‖ (Illness, Sontag). of others. Most people avoid intimacy because of No two people with cancer respond alike. the fear of losing the loved one or being invaded, Everyone has his own way of coping with cancer. controlled and losing oneself. But Hazel feels that Some people find it easier to face the reality than her death will hurt others. ―It is passivity that dulls to be afraid of it. ―Worry is yet another side effect feeling‖ (Regarding, Sontag). Hazel is a passive of dying‖ (65). So it‘s better not to worry about the fighter, that‘s why she plunges her feelings within disease or death. Death is inevitable. Everyone her. In contrast, Hazel‘s friend Isaac feels rejected finds his death in one way or the other. The reality by his girlfriend Monica. ―She said she couldn‘t Hazel has to face is that she will die soon, handle it, I‘m about to lose my eyesight and she inflicting a huge amount of pain on her parents. can‘t handle it‖ (60). Isaac is heartbroken, and he She realizes that those who are close to her will finds it difficult to accept the reality. He doesn‘t have to deal with the emotional trauma of her want to be with anyone. He fears abandonment death. and hence is afraid to have relationship with She finds the book ‗An Imperial Affliction‘ as anyone. This means that his fear of abandonment a touchstone of her life. She tells Augustus, ―It contributes to his fear of intimacy. wasn‘t even the book was so good or anything; it There is an idea that battling cancer is a noble, was just that the author, Peter Van Houten, heroic, and rewarding act, but this novel seeks to seemed to understand me in weird and impossible downplay this idea by showing the realities of ways. ‗An Imperial Affliction‘ was my book, in terminal cancer. Hazel is afflicted with terminal the way my body was my body and my thoughts thyroid cancer, stage IV which has ravaged her were my thoughts‖ (34). She is obsessed with the lungs enough to necessitate the use of oxygen fates of the fictional characters. tanks wherever she goes. There is nothing noble Coming to Isaac, his cancer of the eye makes about Hazel struggling to breathe and knowing his girlfriend desert him when he needs her that her death will hurt others. So is the case with support. He feels totally distraught and angry and Augustus Waters a survivor of oesteosarcoma explodes into sobbing, pillow-punching, trophy- with his leg amputated. smashing outburst. This incident captures the Both Hazel and Augustus are involved in a emotional distress gone through by many a cancer common battle against cancer. Their friend Isaac patient. Yet another cancer-patients‘ reaction is
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worth noting. Augustus‘s former girlfriend not survive forever. There was time before Caroline Mathers with brain cancer becomes very organisms experienced consciousness, and there cruel towards him as her condition worsens. will be time after. And if the inevitability of Instead of being resigned to her situation, Caroline human oblivion worries you, I encourage you to behaves very negatively. However, the ignore it. God knows that‘s what everyone else psychological trauma that she has to undergo does. (13) awaiting slow and painful death is understandable. She tells them that she has learned this from Cancer causes changes in the family‘s her favourite novel ‗An Imperial Affliction‘ by identity, roles and daily functioning. Cancer is Peter Van Houten. Hazel‘s speech on the quite common nowadays. The attitude to cancer inevitable demise of humanity creates the first has changed remarkably, but the disease as such is bond between Hazel and Augustus. Fear of dreadful. It is not the victim alone, but the entire oblivion motivates Augustus‘s desire to perform family suffers. Here, in The Fault in Our Stars one some heroic act before he dies. He wants himself finds that both Hazel‘s and Augustus‘s parents to exist even after his death. He worries that continue to love Hazel and Augustus. Hazel‘s without doing something dramatic or achieving parents motivated her to attend the support group something, he won‘t matter in people‘s minds. He to overcome depression. She thinks that Hazel thinks that his consciousness will be consumed by deserves to live. Also both their parents try to keep oblivion after his death. their children safe. They are also very possessive For Hazel, the fear of oblivion strikes her in a towards their children. different way. She wants to know that those close Although death is inevitable, both Hazel and to her, and her relationship with them, will carry Augustus Waters juxtapose their faulty health, on after her death. Hazel is very curious to know forming an intimate bond with ―Oblivion‖ (12). about the fate of the characters in ‗An Imperial Oblivion refers to an eternity of nothingness. In Affliction‘ after the protagonist Anna dies as the The Fault in Our Stars, Green‘s ambiguity in the novel ends. She focuses on finding out what definition of ―Oblivion‖ (12) allows the world to happens to Anna‘s mother and the Dutch Tulip carry multiple messages. The fear of being man, and even Sisyphus the Hamster, with a view forgotten is distressing and if one is obsessed with of knowing what will happen to her parents after post-existence, it can cause mental trauma. The her death as whether they will survive or not. novel is a tribute to thoughtfulness. It celebrates When the book‘s author Peter Van Houten intellectual engagement with the world not only as tells her that the characters cease to exist the a means to an end, but as a rewarding way of moment the novel ends, she tells him that it is living our lives. impossible not to imagine a future for them. It When Patrick, the leader of the Support means that she wants to know whether her parents Group asks Augustus to share his fears, he replies, will continue together even after she dies. She ―I fear oblivion, I fear it like the proverbial blind doesn‘t want to ruin their life. She wants them to man who‘s afraid of the dark‖ (12). Hazel, who have a future. She doesn‘t want them to worry rarely ever speaks in the group, points out: about her loss. She is relieved to hear her mother There will come a time, when all of us are say that that she has been taking online classes to dead. All of us. There will come a time when there become a social worker. And her father assures are no human beings remaining to remember that her saying, ―your mom and I love each other, and anyone ever existed or that our species ever did if we lose you, we‘ll go through it together‖ (299). anything. There will be no one left to remember This makes her feel relaxed and overcome her fear Aristotle or Cleopatra, let alone you. Everything of oblivion. that we did and built and wrote and thought and Unlike Hazel, who is cautious and doesn‘t discovered will be forgotten and all of this will want to hurt anyone, Augustus Waters is have been for naught. Maybe that time is coming determined to leave a mark on everything and soon and maybe it is millions of years away, but everyone. He wants desperately to leave a lasting even if we survive the collapse of our sun, we will impression on the world and he philosophizes
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about heroism and his favourite book in a deconstructs all the representations of cancer. novelization of a video game. In the game, he Both Augustus and Hazel take joy in poking fun at heroically throws himself on a grenade to save the clichés and baseless social conventions, especially school children. He tells Hazel, ―All salvation is regarding cancer and death.They rebel against and temporary‖ (59). Though he has lost the game, he come to terms with society, family, rules and saves a few kids in the game, for he tells Hazel, ―I religion. They are constantly facing the fact of bought them a minute. Maybe that‘s the minute their own impermanence. that buys them an hour, which is the hour that Although death is inevitable, both Hazel and buys them a year. No one‘s gonna buy them Augustus juxtapose their faulty health with forever, Hazel Grace, but my life bought them a oblivion. Augustus‘s fear of oblivion motivates his minute. And that‘s not nothing‖ (59). One of desire to perform some heroic act before he dies. Augustus‘s gripes about dying is that he always He wants to live a meaningful life. He wants wants to live a meaningful life, that his heroic himself to exist even after his death. In contrast, deeds will be recorded in history. Hazel wants to know that those close to her and Augustus influences to overcome her fear of her relationship with them will carry on after her intimacy. But in the end, through her relationship death. She wants to die unknown and unnoticed. with Augustus she learns that just because she is Hazel ends up finding a positive light in her dying doesn‘t mean that she‘s only a source of dark days. In the beginning she thinks the world is sadness in the lives of her loved ones. Her love for very bitter, and attributes negative meaning for Augustus has brought out this drastic change. everything. However, after meeting Augustus, she Even though Augustus knows that his obituary soon sees the value of life. She realizes there is joy would be in newspapers, he harbours the doubt out of pain and laughs out of tears. Augustus whether he is special. Hazel is found telling him, brings out the best in Hazel. Hazel helps Augustus ―You say you‘re not special because the world overcome his fear of oblivion. Even Hazel is able doesn‘t know about you, but that‘s an insult to to cope with Augustus‘s death. Both Hazel and me. I know about you‖ (240). She tries to impress Augustus take a journey, both physically and him saying, ―I just want to be enough for you, but emotionally, that brings meaning in their life. She I never can be. This can never be enough for you. often says, ―Some infinities are larger than other But this is all you get. You get me, and your infinities‖ (205). She is happy with her small family, and this world. This is your life‖ (241). infinity with Augustus. It is obvious that one can Augustus fears earthly oblivion. He fears that lead a happy and meaningful life, even if one has a he won‘t be able to give anything in exchange for short life. his life. According to him one should live a life in Life is impermanent. Where there is birth service of greater good or at least to die a death for there is death; birth and death are a cyclic process. greater good. He fears that he won‘t get either a Some people think that death means the end of life or a death he expects. He is obsessed with everything. People normally fear death but there is dying for something or leaving behind a great sign nothing to fear about death, because death is of heroism. Finally in his letter to Van Houten, inevitable to everyone. Anything can happen at Augustus says everyone wants to leave his mark any point of time in one‘s life. Coming to the behind, but these marks are really unpleasant novel, it is no one‘s fault when one is afflicted scars. He is happy to leave his ―scar‖ (313) on with cancer and awaits death. The fault is in the Hazel. It is because of Hazel he overcomes his fear stars but how one tackles it and lives through it is of oblivion and this leads to his transformation of important. No one can escape death, at one point mind. Their family and love help them overcome one has to meet death. So one should accept their fears. everything in life and should live every moment of Hazel is a passive fighter. She has no illusion one‘s life with joy, love, happiness and bravery about her health, she lives in the reality.Hazel even when one is facing death.
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THE REPRESENTATION OF WOMAN AND FEMININITY IN KAMALA MARKANDAYA’S “NECTAR IN SIEVE”-A REVIEW
Mr.S.Velmurugan, M.A., M.Phil., B.Ed., Assistant Professor of English Hajee Karutha Rowther Howdia College, Uthamapalayam
Introduction she intends to depict the rural problems. Her One of the major causes of the persecution of major characters are all rural characters rooted in women in Indian Society lies in the fact that our Indian Culture and soil. In the novel, Rukmani society is predominantly patriarchal in which the leads the life of mental and physical tortures, right to property and the right to make important financial scarcity and hardship, but she shows decisions rests with the eldest male members of remarkable forbearance. Markandaya presents the family. In short, the will of males prevail over Rukmani as the positive and dynamic image of the females. This system gave rise to the demand heroism in the midst of inexperienced hardships of dowry by the bridegroom‘s parents at the time and despair. As a matter of fact, the story of the of marriage. The identity of woman in India is one novel is the story of Rukmani‘s life which is a that is usually connected to and defined by the gallant and persistent battle for herself and her societal and cultural norms of a practicable family against fate. familial structure. This identity is defined within Rukmani was the fourth daughter of an the parameters of their social relationship to men. Indian village head –man. She was neither Most Indian women are traditional, conservative, beautiful, nor could her father offer her a and therefore, are reluctant to cross the threshold substantial sum as dowry. Contrary to her of their family and culture and have specific roles expectations, she was married at the age of to perform at different times. They are to always fourteen to Nathan a tenant farmer. Her welcome their guests and entertain them, care for Husband‘s house and the village atmosphere were their family members performing all the not up to her expectations. Nathan‘s abundant household responsibilities and if there is any pain, love for her compensated for his lack of wealth. they are to hide it. This symbolizes true Indian Rukmani concealed disappointment and damaged tradition and culture. to move freely with the villagers and learn the Kamala Markandaya is one of the most work of the village housewife and tried to make popular Indo-Anglian novelists with vast herself and her husband happy. When she did not concourse of readers in India and abroad. As a conceive for several years after Ira‘s birth, she woman novelist Kamala Markandaya represents feared that she might be looked down as barren by the creative release of the Feminine sensibility in others. This did to take away her faith in life. She India. The consciousness is central to all her received Kenny‘s help and surmounted this novels. Her novels full of pregnancy and child difficulty. births. Her being a woman has also influenced her Throughout her life she had identified herself narrative art as women are natural story-tellers. completely with her husband and was a partner in This accounts for the dominant female view point all his sufferings. She took the news very calmly of her novels. even when Nathan himself revealed to her of his ―Nectar in a Sieve‖, the first novel of Mrs. secret love life with Kunthi. She implicitly Maarkandaya‘s first novel published in 1954. It believed that a woman‘s place in life always by her brought the greatest recognition to her as a husband. That is why she could not reconcile novelist. The novelist represented the rural theme herself to the news of Kenny‘s family living away, in this novel. Her characterization in ―Nectar in separated from him. Sieve‖ is convincing, logical and excellent. Since 34 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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When Rukmani first became pregnant, she conservative character, since she dislikes Arjun‘s tried to train herself again in the art of reading and and Thambi‘s joining the tannery because they are writing to enable her to educate her children. This not of the castes of the untouchables. Being a shows how much Rukmani prepared herself to traditional woman, she is devoted to her husband. love her children even before they were born. This She is devoted to her husband. She always love never diminished in course of years when she remains with him despite his unlimited miseries. had to meet with a chain of disappointments and Though she belongs to a rich family, after her sorrows in life. When Arjun and Thambi prepared marriage with Nathan she makes no complaint of to leave to be employed in the plantations of her low status of Nathan. In fact her ways to lead Ceylon, she knew by instinct that she would be life are guided by the Indian culture. losing them forever. She tried to dissuade them Rukmani is the most remarkable characters of from going, by telling them that happiness in life the novel. She dominates all the characters of the did not depend on money alone. But they were no novel. She wins readers sympathy. Her belief in more children, but grown up men who wanted to Indian tradition and culture makes her personality have their own way of life. simple and outstanding. Despite numberless Rukmani‘s life was a constant battle against miseries, she does not give up her patience relentless nature. The forces of nature play a simplicity, submission, tolerance and acceptance. prominent part in the lives of Indian farmers. As a ―Nectar in a Sieve‖ hints at the fact that matter of fact, the life of every farmer in India is a women did not have as much power in their battle against nature, which is beyond his control. society as men. The women of this novel, The villagers are always at the mercy of the cruelty however, exercise tremendous and unusual power of nature. Either they are punished by a severe in many different ways. Rukmani is educated and drought or they are made to suffer by incessant savvy; her brave actions to seek fertility treatment rains flooding their fields and their huts. It is a allows her and Nathan to have sons, and even pathetic sight to see farmers like Nathan who though she‘s technically subservient to Nathan, work to produce food, suffering from starvation she‘s gained power in their relationship by gaining because of the vagaries of nature. Incidentally the his love. Also, Rukmani exercises power by cruelty of the landlords of the time is also seen narrating her own story: she is in control of what when the agent demands the dues of the landlord, we know, and has power over her readers. Ira and knowing fukk well the sufferings of the farmer. Kunthi turn to prostitution to gain economic Rukmani is a woman of robust commonsense. power. This choice hints at the deeper power that Her instincts were always right. It was the who women‘s sexuality gives them over men. Thus we correctly prophesied that the tannery would not be find in Rukmani a noble woman who raises in our for the good of the villagers. She was not duped by esteem in spite of her sufferings, because we find the apparent prosperity brought by the that her sufferings caused by a cruel fate do not establishment of the tannery. She argued that have the power to change her inherent noble though more money flowed in, the prices of goods qualities. The novelist has the succeeded through simultaneously increased. the portrayal of Rukmani in bringing before eyes Poverty drove her to the unknown city and the noble qualities of our Indian womanhood. there she had to work as a coolie. She had to live among beggars in the temple. Even in her References sufferings she did to lose her kindness and 1. Iyengar. K.R. Srinivasa ―Indian Writing in sympathy for others. She shared her food with English‖ Sterling Publishers puli, and taking pity on him adopted him as her 2. Image of woman in The Indo-Anglian Novel child. Even after the death of her husband, she did (New:SterlingPublishers1979) not lose her faith in life. She lived a noble life even 3. Demonstrating Feminism: Nectar-in-a-sieve under pressing difficulties beyond human and the Phenomenon of Change, "Indian endurance. Women Novelists Set II, Vol. II ed. By R.K. As a typical Indian woman Rukmani‘s belief Dhawan (New Delhi: Prestige Books) in Indian tradition is film. She seems to be a 4. www.postcolonialweb.org/india/literature/s ml9.html. 35 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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MERITS AND DEMERITS OF BILINGUAL METHOD
Mr. A.Sivasankaran, M.Phil (English) Jamal Mohamed College (Aided), Tiruchirappalli
Introduction Prof. C. J Dodson of the University college of Bilingual method means a method in which Wales was the originator of this method. Inspired two languages are involved; the language to be by the encouraging result of the experiments, a learnt and the mother tongue. A child learns few scholars in Andhra Pradesh led by Prof. through this method the mother tongue the foreign H.N.L. Sastri of Central Institute of English, language words simultaneously. In this method, Hyderabad conducted experiments in local mother tongue is used to convey the meaning of schools using the bilingual method. The class was words, sentences and idioms to the learners. The divided into two groups. One was the use of mother-tongue is limited to necessary experimental group using the bilingual method purpose. There is an assumption that bilingual and the other was the group using the direct method is the same as translation method, but it is method. Prof. Sastri himself taught both the different from the translation method. The teacher sections for a month and tested the achievements does not use mother tongue continuously but uses of both the groups at the end. The results of the it only for explaining the meaning of difficult experiments showed that it was very inconvenient words. Students are given a lot of practice drill and unnecessary to try to teach new items through regarding the use of sentence patterns. It is not the direct method. It was found that it was time provide in the translation method. consuming and the teacher was not sure whether A child learns the mother tongue in a real the pupils understood the right meaning or not. situation. He connects the meaning of words with On the other hand, the experimenter saw that his own experience. In this way, the child grasps his task as well as that of his pupils became very the situation and forms the concept in his mind. easy when he used the mother tongue in the The child has various concepts in his mind experimental group. The learners through because his experience. Such situations might bilingual method had more practice and ease in have been created while teaching a foreign speaking correct English than the direct method language. group. The teacher was also able to establish better Bilingual method is an improved version of rapport with the children in bilingual method translation method and direct method. In this because of his use of mother tongue. At the end, method the teacher is not required to create the result showed that the average score of the situations to understand the meaning of english student who learned by bilingual method was sixty sentences and words to the student. The use of four per cent against fifty two per cent of the direct mother tongue saves the teachers from creating method students. artificial situations. Bilingual method has several advantages in This method of teaching saves the time and language teaching. Bilingual method makes use of energy of teachers and that can be used for giving linguistic habits formed during learning the more pattern practice to the students. The mother tongue. In this method students became understanding of words and sentences in foreign functional bilinguals. When the students aim to languages can be made easier by the use of mother become fully bilingual in terms of language tongue. Bilingual method is the combination of learning, this method is considered to be the the direct method and the Grammar translation appropriate one. When the students begin with the method. language learning process, their success in the 36 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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learning depends upon the competence and students. This method diverts the attention of the confidence of their language teacher. The time and students at times by the use of mother-tongue. labour of the teacher is saved by using this The use of mother-tongue while teaching method. It is less costly and suited to all types of English spoils the continuity and fluency of schools in rural or urban. language. The bad habit of learning everything by According to this method acquisition of the filtering through mother-tongue may be formed. mother tongue is very important for language Pronunciation may become defective by the learning process. When the mother tongue is influence of the mother-tongue. Slow down firmly established in the minds of the students by learning process and takes longer time to learn and the age of seven or eight, it becomes easy to learn be proficient in the target language. Students are difficult words and grammar. Thus this method dominated by the influence of mother-tongue in helps to save time by not creating artificial bilingual method. The teacher must fluent in both situations unnecessarily to explain or convey the languages in order to make the concepts clear. meanings in English. This method does not need Students may develop dependence on their trained teachers. It also stresses speech practice. mother-tongue. If the teacher fails to carry out this An average teacher of English can teach the lesson method properly, then it can degenerate into pure successfully through this method. In this method translation method. This method is still in an much audio-visual aids are not needed. experimental stage. By using this method in The meaning of English words and sentences language teaching the language teacher sometimes are made quite clear to the students. Hence it could not provide a correct mother-tongue ensures accuracy. The students are given a lot of equivalent. It may create confusion among practice in spoken language too. It is free from the students due to the contrast between the features defects of direct method in which meanings of of two languages. In bilingual method students English words and sentences remain vague and finds lexical gap. Translation from one language pattern practice is given in difficult situations. In to another is often difficult because sometimes direct method a lot of illustrative methods in the there is a lexical gap. form of audio-visual aids, are needed. In direct Finally, bilingual method sheds it light on method, it involves a lot of expenditure, which language acquisition. Now many researches are schools cannot afford. In this method, importance doing research in the field of first language is given to the mother tongue and its culture. Thus acquisition, bilingual acquisition and bilingual it does not lead to substitution of one means of education in secondary language teaching. Seeing communication for another. the whole picture from a bilingual perspective, This method of language teaching ensures from the social to the individual level, this method reliability. Students find it easy to learn the is widely used in many schools for better teaching language by using this method. The use of mother and learning. tongue, the teacher ensures that the learning is happening. The bilingual method uses written References form of the language which allows the students to 1. Dodson, C.J: Language Teaching and the learn the shapes of the words as they repeat the Bilingual Method: Pitman Publication, 1967. words orally. 2. www.googreaders.com Bilingual method has some disadvantages. A 3. www.inabooks.com contrast between the features of two languages 4. http://enotes.com may confuse the student. If the teacher fails to 5. http://www.bookbrowse.com handle the bilingual method properly, for example the more use of mother-tongue may be turn into translation method. Bilingual method is not useful for senior level students. Bilingual method may be used for the primary level
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ADAPTATION AS AN ART: FROM KING LEAR TO RAN
Arya Balachandran M.Phil. Scholar, St.Teresa's College, Ernakulam, Kerala
Cinema, from its very inception, has had a The 1985 Japanese- French film Ran, co- fascination for popular texts and an interminable written and directed by the Japanese filmmaker desire to transform them into celluloid versions. Akira Kurosawa is an adaptation of the Julie Sanders in her work Adaptation and Shakespearean tragedy King Lear. Kurosawa has Appropriation defines adaptation as a not only adapted the story of King Lear into a transpositional practice, an act of reconsideration different language, time, place and culture, but by casting a specific genre into another generic also into a different genre. The film was made in mode. She says, ―Adaptation is a specific process such a way as to suit the contemporary involving the transition from one genre to another: sensibilities with several changes from the core novels into film, drama into musical, text. Kurosawa‘s replacement of Shakespearean dramatization of prose narrative and prose fiction; stage with a Japanese background makes the film or the inverse movement of making drama into a standout among the various adaptations of King prose narrative‖ (19). Adaptation studies focus Lear. Kurosawa has transformed the plays both more on the cinematic versions of canonical plays culturally and linguistically. since they provide a manifestation which is Sometimes, the process of adaptation becomes common and easily understood. more preoccupied with culture rather than Studies on film adaptation mainly focus on focusing on a close reinterpretation of the source the question of fidelity, as if the only task of a film text. Adaptations may sometimes comment on the were a mimetic re-presentation of the written text. politics of the source text or those of the But such faithfulness is often impossible because a background, or both, usually by means of text and a film are two entirely different Media. modification or addition. In Ran Kurosawa finds a George Bluestone in his Novels into Film describes new interpretation of King Lear with the aid of the major difference in transference of a story from Japanese culture and its traditional practices like a written form to a film. ―The film, then, making Samurai Warfare. Ran is set in the medieval its appeal to the perceiving senses, is free to work sixteenth century Japan, characterized by civil with endless variations of physical reality where wars, political instability, dominant patterns of the moving picture comes to us directly through ambition and treachery. The title of the film also perception, language must be filtered through the signifies this as it means rebellion and chaos. The screen of conceptual apprehension‖ (3-5). A word film centers on an aging warlord Hidetora by word adaptation would be too unexciting as it Ichimonji, patriarch of the Ichimonji clan. Taro, would only give the impression of a whole text Jiro and Saburo are his three sons. Following a being read out aloud. A film may employ certain weird dream, Hidetora decides to divide his techniques to present the effects of a written text kingdom among his three sons and retain the title that may vary with language, culture or age. How of the Great Lord. When, Saburo, his third son words printed on a book‘s pages are transformed bravely tells his father about the stupidity in his with a satisfying equivalency on to the screen is plan of unification and foolishly expecting that his the major concern here. To accommodate the new sons would be loyal to him when Hidetora himself medium, there may be changes in the form as well had used the most ruthless and violent methods to as the content of the text. seize power. Hidetora mistakes Saburo‘s
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comments as a threat and banishes him along with reveals his film to be a metaphor for nuclear Tango, who comes to Saburo‘s rescue. Saburo warfare and the anxiety of the Post-Hiroshima however is given refuge by Fujimaki, another lord age. He found parallels between the Samurai who offers his daughter for Saburo to marry. tradition and the world he lived in and chose the Tango pledges his devotion to lord and decides to social settings and ethics of the warrior culture to follow Hidetora in disguise. Later we see the two represent the nuclear warfare and destruction of sons, Taro and Jiro turning against Hidetora on his times. Bert Cardullo quotes Kurosawa‘s words attainment of the power and authority from him. in Akira Kurosawa: Interviews, ―All the Lady Kaede, who seeks to take revenge on technological progress of these last years have only Hidetora for deceitfully murdering her family and taught human beings how to kill more of each forcing her to marry Taro, plots against the lord other faster. It‘s very difficult for me to retain a and forces him to leave the Castles and followers sanguine outlook on life under such and wander in wilderness, losing his sanity. When circumstances‖ (93). This nihilism is evident in her husband Taro gets killed, she becomes Jiro‘s Ran from the beginning, when Hidetora hunts mistress and urges him to kill his wife Lady Sue down a boar and refuses to eat it to the last scene and marry her instead. However Lady Sue is of Tsurumaru. Ran portrays life as an unending rescued by Jiro‘s General Kurogane. Hidetora in cycle of suffering. A person is either a victim or a the end is found by Saburo, the only son who is villain or both. Saburo, the just warlord dies loyal to him along with Tango and the Fool futilely and the upright characters like Lady Sue Kyoami. The ending of Ran corresponds to the also submit to the violence and treachery around ending of King Lear with the death of all major them. The immoral characters like Jiro and Lady characters; a sniper sent out by Jiro kills Saburo Kaede are never given a chance to apologize or and Hidetora dies overcome with grief, thus make amends before their death. marking the end of Ichimonji clan. One of Jiro‘s Chaos, being the central theme of the film, is men murders Lady Sue. General Kurogane, in employed to highlight the absence of gods. The rage beheads, Lady Kaede for Sue‘s murder. Jiro title is an allusion to the disorder and destruction and his army die in the battle with Ayabe‘s army, awaiting the Ichimonji clan. Using characters like who comes to help Saburo.. The film ends with Lady Sue, the most religious character in the film, blind Tsurumaru, Lady Sue‘s brother standing Tsurumaru and Kyoami, the Fool, Kurosawa alone on top of his ruined castle, stumbling and denies the existence of gods. Hidetora tells Sue escaping a fall. While trying to avoid the fall, he that ―Buddha is gone from the miserable world‖. drops the scroll of Buddha his sister had given Sue is eventually killed despite her belief in love him. and forgiveness. In the last shot, we see blind In this reinterpretation of King Lear, Tsurumaru stumbling towards the edge, on top of Kurosawa intends to communicate his opinions, his ruined family castle. He has a narrow escape influences and messages to the world and from falling down, but accidentally drops the comment on contemporary events. Kurosawa‘s scroll of Buddha Sue had given him. He stands interests in the Samurai tradition developed from there all alone. Tsurumaru represents the modern his education in martial arts. In Japan, medieval concept of the death of god and through his period was the age of Samurai warfare. The alienation he characterizes modern humanity centerpiece of the film Ran is the battles in it. unaware of his closeness to disaster. Kyoami, the When Taro and Jiro combine their forces and Fool, at one point claims that gods either do not attack the old Lord and his followers without a exist or are the cause of human suffering. Tango warning, a horrific massacre follows. Bows, responds saying ―[The gods] can‘t save us from arrows and swords were replaced by muskets, ourselves‖. In King Lear Gloucester says that ―As arquebus etc. in Samurai warfare. This new kind flies to wanton boys, are we to gods; they kill us of warfare spreading total destruction is illustrated for their sport (270). In Ran god never interferes. It in the battle of Hachiman field. Kurosawa himself
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is the humans who kill cruelly and bloodily before the three sons of Hidetora correspond to Goneril, a sad and silent god. Regan and Cordelia in King Lear. The good and Kurosawa first got the idea of Ran from the loyal child is banished by the king/warlord as they parable of a Japanese General, Mori Motonari fail to please him with praise like the elder and his clan during the Muromachi period. children. In King Lear, it is Cordelia, along with According to the legend, Mori has three sons. Earl of Kent, who is banished for disagreeing with Once each of the sons was given a single arrow Lear and in Ran it is Saburo and Tango. A conflict and was asked to break it and they do the same. arises in both when the other two children turn Then they were given three arrows together, but in against the lord, which leads to the complete unity nobody could shatter them. In Ran destruction of the family. Kurosawa deconstructs this parable. He illustrates The test of three arrows in Ran replaces the his plan to divide his kingdom with a parable of love test in King Lear, but it is not equivalent to it. Mori Motonari. He gives one arrow to each son It emphasizes the breaking of a bond not between and orders to break it. Each one breaks it with the father and his sons but the bond among the ease. Then he gives three arrows together to each sons themselves. Since primogeniture had already son and orders the same. Taro and Jiro tries to been established by the period Kurosawa has break the arrows but they fail. Hidetora then chosen, his Lear‘s folly seems to be in dividing his explains that one arrow can easily be broken, but kingdom and expecting harmony rather than in not three arrows together. However, Saburo, the expecting the continued love of his children for only son who truly cares for his father smashes the him (Hoile 29-34). three arrows together using his knee. There are Hidetora‘s sons prove to be more cruel and similarities with King Lear from the very beginning wild than Regan and Goneril. In King Lear as well itself. as Ran, the third child who is banished comes to Japanese influence can be seen in the acting the aid of lord/king. Thus both the adapted text as style of certain characters in Ran. Characters of well as the adaptation deals with the conflict Hidetora and Lady Kaede are influenced by the between authority and challenge within the family Japanese Noh Theater which emphasizes the where the kings/warlords/fathers represent the passionate, callous, single-minded nature of these authority figure whose power is questioned by the characters. Long intervals of static motion and subjects or children. silence followed by impetuous and wild change in Kurosawa deals with the individual conflicts manner and the heavy ghost like make-up of in King Lear in a political way. Lear points to the Hidetora resemble the masks of Noh performers. ruthless animal passions that have replaced the There have been several debates regarding the human values in his daughters. In the film this is nature of the film Ran‘s relation to King Lear. expressed through a more formal mode of Some critics opine that the essence of a submission and dominance. For example, Lear Shakespearean play lies in the poetic language of departs from Goneril‘s castle by praying for the dialogue and therefore Ran does not belong to reversal of nature‘s primary craving, reproduction. those categories of films which have either This situation is dramatized using Lear‘s Shakespearean dialogue in English or a direct devastating language. In Ran, Hidetora represses translation. his anger and decides to leave the castle when he Kurosawa skillfully merges in Ran, the stories is not given the due respect and position of the of King Lear and Mori Motonari and replaced Great Lord. Kurosawa moves away from the Shakespeare‘s daughters with male siblings. Like source because Shakespeare‘s Lear was not a Lear, Mori also repeats the same mistake of warrior like Hidetora of Ran who holds on to rewarding the two wicked children and banishing power through the destruction of his enemies in the loyal one. Both King Lear and Ran depict an his lust for supremacy. Shakespeare‘s Lear on the aging warlord who decides to divide his kingdom other hand is governed by emotions and is the among his three children. Taro, Jiro and Saburo,
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representative of every abused parent who which corresponds to Regan‘s passionate sexual believed in his children‘s continued love. craving for Edmund. Kurosawa has created Lady The embodiment of rigid ritualization, Kaede by merging Cornwall with the cunningness rigorous order and Samurai culture of sixteenth of Edmund. But unlike Lady Kaede, neither century in Kurosawa‘s film differs from King Lear. Cornwall nor Edmund have suffered at the hands While in King Lear, the values and stability of an of the characters they aim to destroy. ordered feudal world give way to modern set of There are several common themes and motifs voracious priorities, in Ran, individual courage in King Lear and Ran. A major theme of King Lear and fighting skill of Samurai is overtaken by is blindness, which is embodied by Tsurumaru in technological advance. As all warriors do, Ran. He has the dimensions of blinded Gloucester Hidetora justifies the devastation he wrought by and his legitimate son Edgar. In King Lear, though saying that it is the nature of war. What befalls there is only a passing reference to hunting, him is also in the nature of revenge. Kurosawa uses hunting as a major theme and It is often said that adaptations are made to fill discloses it in the opening sequence itself with the fissures in the original. Kurosawa talks about Hidetora hunting down a boar. From a hunter he the absence of any reflection on Lear‘s past in King later becomes the hunted. Lear which he sees as a big deficiency: The boar hunt also signifies the interaction If he begins in a position of such great power, between natural world and human world, place of and then he goes mad because his daughters turn human being in the natural world and legitimacy against him, there has to be a reason […] and the of man‘s behaviour to others of his own species. In only reason must lie in his past behavior. He must King Lear, Shakespeare employs the storm, have been a terrible tyrant to get to where he is at nature‘s chaos, to represent the disordered mind of the beginning of the play. And his daughters must his character. In Ran, the forceful wind replaces have learned from him. (Hoile 30) the tempestuous storm and it asserts the Thus Shakespeare‘s play presents a situation importance of creating domains to seek protection which moves to the future, commencing with the from nature‘s rage. The central chaos in the film is king‘s urge for his daughters to express their love not represented by storm as in King Lear, but by for him. Kurosawa presents an action which has epic battle scenes which transcends the limitations its roots in the past. Kurosawa gives a detailed of stage. Kurosawa depicts the terrible beauty of past of the misdeeds of Hidetora while the war through the furious battles between the characters in King Lear lacks a personal history. warring factions possessing long repressed There are no exact equivalents for the jealousies and resentments. At the same time, in subsidiary King Lear characters in Ran; rather there King Lear there is no detailed description of war. is a distribution of character qualities among the For example, at the start of Act 1 Scene 3, supporting characters. Earl of Kent and Lear‘s Cordelia and Lear enter as prisoners, and Fool find their counterparts in Ran. But there is no audiences are informed of the defeat of Cordelia‘s secondary Gloucester plot in Kurosawa‘s film. troop. The character of Edmund, the illegitimate son of Kurosawa‘s perception of the world and life Gloucester, has profound influence on the was changed by the evil and madness of character of Jiro for his bitterness of his elder humanity, warfare and violence around him. His brother‘s significant inheritance. Saburo stands for views of human character as ruthless, barren and Cordelia. Sue also possesses certain qualities of wild and life as a circle of endless suffering made Cordelia. More than Hidetora‘s own sons, Lady him believe that the problems to be addressed are Kaede, Hidetora‘s daughter in law unleashes spiritual ones. This realization led Kurosawa to destruction on him in revenge for the conquest of make his masterpiece tragedy influenced by her family castle by the warlord. She is also Shakespeare, Noh, parable of Mori Motonari and parallel to the character of Regan by her the Samurai culture that shows the human overwhelming and immoral attraction to Jiro suffering and destruction as if from the eyes of a
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detached god watching from above. Thus John Ellis argues that adaptation enables an Kurosawa has successfully uprooted the story of extension of pleasure connected to memory; King Lear from the west and has constructed an ―Adaptation into another medium becomes a eastern equivalent. means of prolonging the pleasure of the original An issue highly discussed in adaptation is presentation, and repeating the production of a fidelity to the original, the source text. Fidelity has memory‖ (4-5). Thus films have a vital role upon been for many years the primary measure of our experience of canonical literature. Kurosawa analyzing these revisions. In the case of film through his film Ran has elevated the position of adaptations, there exists a hierarchical Shakespeare‘s King Lear in literature. relationship. Literary texts are often considered as the sources and films as a mere copy of the References original. But this conventional notion of 1. Bluestone, George. Novels into Film: The conforming to the fidelity of original no longer Metamorphosis of Fiction into Cinema. holds a place now. An adaptation cannot be California: University of California Press, termed as good or bad on account of its fidelity. 1957. Print. Julie Sanders argues that ―it is usually at the very 2. Cardullo, Bert, ed. Akira Kurosawa: Interviews. point of infidelity that the most creative acts of USA: University Press of Mississippi, 2008. adaptation and appropriation take place‖ (20). Print. Therefore the major concern of film adaptation is 3. Christopher Hoile, ―King Lear and not to maintain literal fidelity, but to give a good Kurosawa‘s Ran: Splitting, Doubling and cinematic equivalent of the text. An awareness of Distancing.‖ Pacific Coast Philology. Vol. 22. the clear relationship between the source text and Pennsylvania: Penn State University Press, adaptation alone can give a full impact of the film 1987. Print. adaptation to the audience. In this expectation, 4. Ellis, John. ―The Literary Adaptation: An many formal adaptations bear the same name as Introduction.‖ Oxford Journals. Vol. 23(1). their source text. Also an understanding of the Screen, 1982. Web. 14 July 2015. similarities and differences are crucial in this 5. Ran. Screenplay by Akira Kurosawa, Hideo regard, and it is here the intertextuality comes into Oguni and Masato Ide. Dir. Akira Kurosawa. play. Therefore, it is essential for the audience to Perf. Tatsuya Nakadai. Toho, 1985. Film. have a better understanding of the source texts 6. Sanders, Julie. Adaptation and Appropriation. inorder to find these intertextual references. In all Routledge: Newyork, 2006. Print. categorizations and definitions of adaptation, Shakespeare, William. King Lear. Millenium what remains crucial is the pleasure principle. Offset Press: New Delhi. 2013. Print.
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ECO-FEMINISM IN GITA MEHTA’S A RIVER SUTRA – A STUDY
Mrs.S.Anees Fathima, MA., B.Ed., M.Phil., Assistant Professor of English H.K.R.H. College (Autonomous), Uthamapalayam
Introduction with Naga Baba‘s search for a cremation ground. Eco-Feminism is the link connected between On his way he suffers a lot and even does not get feminism with ecology. It relates the oppression any food and water from the jungle. He is not able and domination of women‘s life with nature. All to set a right path to find a cremation ground. the sub-ordinate groups women, colour, children, At that time, Naga Baba feels that his teacher, the poor are similar to water, animals, air etc., had led him to the Himalayas and had told Naga which are exploited by men. Women‘s role in Baba that if he was still alive after the winter, his society is very close to nature. Women have take teaches would join NagaBaba to his academy in care f the day to day life such as, taking care of her the future.― Learn to survive without water. If I children and sick people, cleaning and washing in find you here when I return I will take care you to the house hold, On the other hand, men so into our Academy‖ (Gita Mehta, A River Sutra, 154). the outer world to use and exploit nature. Somehow Naga Baba reaches the cremation The concept of Eco-Feminism receives a new ground, where he prepares to settle without food different cultural context in the point of Indian and water for nine days to perform the rituals. women novelists. The woman and the nature Every year he performs that People who have appear extensions of each otherThe woman so crossed Naga Baba, have a fear to face Naga Baba, long as she is under the clutches of the cynical because people think that he has super human society is crushed, tortured. But once she is powers.―He also knew they believed he possessed allowed to come to nature, as ascetic, she is super human powers, he ability to levitate and restored to the process of being, becoming, and place irrevocable curses on any who displeased fulfillment in which she becomes a representative him‖ (Gita Mehta, A River Sutra,154). of the great river itself. The present paper focuses He starts chanting mantras and for nine days on the aspect of Eco- Feminism in Gita Metha‘s A and nights without stopping, he repeats it at the River Sutra. funeral pyre and he clears his mind from all the In a River Sutra the author beautifully distraction of people and prepares to meditate on portrays the Narmada River as a main character; the god of Death. the river is represented as a sacred place as the ―Shiva – o – ham narrator tells: I that am Shiva In the silence of ebbing night I sometimes think I Shiva _o_ ham can hear the river‘s heart beat pulsing under the Shiva –am- I‖ (Gita Mehta, A River Sutra, 155) ground before she reveals herself at least to the On the last night of the ninth day NagaBaba anchorites of Shrive deep in meditation around the performs some rituals as he had done every year. holy at Amarkantat. (Gita Mehta, A River Sutra, After friendship his prayers he asks: ―Can you 3). direct me to where the lowest caste five‖ (Gita In this novel, Mehta mainly focuses on nature Mehta, A River Sutra, 156). – woman relationships from an Indian perspective. Naga Baba wants to beg at the outskirts of All the sub-stories have different themes town, with the help of sweepers he reaches the respectively. ―The Minstrel‘s story‖, is about a houses to beg alms before he could return to the young girl and a monk who saves her from a jungle and also asks the sweepers; ―Is there a brothel and gives her a new life. The novel starts brothel in this town‖ (Gita Mehta, A River Sutra,
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157). Sweepers take Naga Baba into a brightly lit A River Sutra, 161). Here, Gita Mehta portrays the Bazaar and show him the wooden door of the woman characters as submissive to man which is brothel with colourful lights glittering outside the common in Indian society. Most of the girls reach door. After reaching the brothel door he gets brothels only because of their family situations prepared with his skull bowl for asking, ―Alms on where as few are forced by their parents to come the night of Shiva‖ (Gita Mehta, A River Sutra, to that place. 157). The man shorts and asks him to set away Naga Baba teaches her to drink fresh milk from that place. At that time, the lady who from goat in the jungle because the journey takes appears behind the man‘s shoulder welcomes him many weeks to reach the jungle, he applies fired and bends to touch his feet for blessing Naga Baba cow dung ashes all over his body to protect from touches a child behind a plastic covered sofa. The the heat and cold, she applies it on her arms, to lady commands the girl to get blessing from him. escape from mosquitoes. The journey enables then The lady offers some sweets to him but he to begin a new life. refuses it. The lady forced him to ask something Then Naga Baba gives her a new name from her because it will be a symbol of blessings if ‗Uma‘, which means ‗goddess‘ and ‗peace in the he got something from her. Then he asks for the night‘ (Gita Mehta, A River Sutra, 162). Finally child instead of sweets. The lady agrees but they reach the Narmada River, he grips her arms expects some money from him, because she had and dips her into the water and says that from that given five hundred rupees to her father to buy her day she had become the daughter of Narmada. for the brothel. Her father was a good for nothing The Narmada will give a new life to her and all fellow, who had sold out his child for five hundred her sins have vanished in that holy river, then he rupees. Women are used as sex tools to satisfy applies sandal paste on her forehead. other men for a very low price. This shows the After the ritual dip in the river a new life mentality of the society and how uncultured they begins near the banks of the Narmada. She can get as poverty envelops them. believes that Narmada is her home and mother. After saving the girl from the brothel Baba Uma keeps close track of the river and learns to carries her with him into the jungle. He asks the sing sings about the river. Later she becomes the girl about her family, she narrates about her father, minstrel of the Narmada and is accepted and and her three brothers laboring to break stones lay respects and respected at festivals on the banks of the roadside, she belongs to a poor family, and the river Narmada as a singer saint. The river does not have a name. Her father calls her plays a role like cleaning many, providing a place ‗misfortunate‘, because her mother died after her for suicide, a place for rebirth, and a place for birth. Though she did all the work in the house, extreme piety. The river itself is a goddess and she was novel allowed to eat until everyone had people respect it as such. eaten which was a sort of discrimination. This Gita Mehta describes the river as a desirable inequality faced by her was due to the fact that she woman like ‗Uma‘. Uma learns many things in was a girl and other should dine before her. Men the lap of nature (Narmada). Here nature and are reviewed as the leaders of the house and women are merged in the perfect harmony. The dining before them seems to be a great disrespect novel River Sutra is a novel of pilgrimage or of in certain communities. The followings lines are a people who have strong quest for some power or proof to the discrimination and disrespect faced by peace in nature. They are attached towards the the girl. ―I was never allowed to eat until everyone Mother Nature to lead their life peacefully. It had eaten. So I was always hungry. And I was shows importance of mother, a woman who can beaten by my father‖ (Gita Mehta, A River Sutra, guide the one who comes to their shelter with 161). tender love, if she is respected whole- heartedly. But the customers called her in the brother Otherwise she can be like a demon, which can ‗chand‘ which means ―moon lights‖ Because her ruin the unsocial elements. skin was as soft as ―moon light‖ (Gita Mehta,
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A lot of people come to the bank of river and References contemplate life in different ways. It is also a Primary Source source of mythology. Believed to be the daughter 1. Mehra , Gita. A River Sutra, Penguin Books, of Lord Shiva, the Narmada protects one form India, 1993. Print. snake‘s poison. Another myth says that the river purifies all the sins. People also supposed that the Secondary Sources goddess cures madness, liberating those who are 1. Palkar, Sarala. ‗Feminist Literary Theory: possessed, suggesting it purges the mind from Creating New Maps‟, Critical Practice, January impure thoughts and earthly temptation. 1995, Vol, II, No.1,p.137. Mythology surrounding the river is rooted in our 2. Shiva, Vandana. Staying Alive: Women, Ecology cultural memory. Connecting cultural memory and Development. New Delhi: Kali for Women, and environment in this way suggests an alternate 1989. way for eco-critics to study A River Sutra, which 3. Strugeon, Noel.Ecofeminist Natures: Race, does not merely function as a warning, but also as Gender, Feminist Theory and Political an illustration of the role of responsibility, Action.NewYork: Routledge, 1997. language and vision in the relationships humans have with nature.
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SUBALTERN STUDIES -DALIT WRITING - A STUDY OF BAMA’S KARUKKU, SANGATI
Mr.P.Parthasarathy, M.Phil. English Arignar Anna Government Arts College, Villupuram
Ms.S.Jeyanthi, MA., M.Phil., Assistant Professor in English Arignar Anna Government Arts College, Villupuram
Abstract Untouchability is one of the greatest evils in our country. Untouchability is still seen somewhere in direct form and elsewhere in a serious way. Dalit women are one of the most marginalized segments in the society. The condition of Dalit women is more vulnerable than Non-Dalit women. Dalit women are sufferings from multi-disadvantage. This paper deals with Dalit issues like daily threats of rape, sexual assaults, physical violence at the workplace as well as violence at home. Bama‟s varied representation of Dalit women in Karruku, Sangati, which interface between gender and caste significances in Dalit fiction. Bama‟s involvement in Dalit literary discourse in the early 1990s, which made a significant contribution in the gender-caste intersection in the lives of Dalit. Her works foreground the twice cursed lives of Dalit women, oppressed on the account of their caste as well as gender, at home and outside, by upper caste men and Dalit men, by the state machinery as well as the family. Bama‟s writing celebrates Dalit women‟s subversive strategies to overcome their oppression is depicted in this paper. Keywords: Untouchability, Dalit, Caste, oppressed.
Introduction of Dalits. Dalit struggles against castes tradition Dalit literature, the oppressed class under has a long history. The trends of Dalit literature, Indian caste system forms an important and the writer will make on humble attempt to point distinct part of Indian literature. Dalit narration out the core issues of its ideologies and explored have been a part of the Indian social narratives negative aspects of life. Dalit literature is since 11th century. Dalit literature is primarily a experienced based. Dalit writers, history is not social and human document, which deals with the illusionary or unreal as Hindu metaphysical people who had been socially and economically theory may make one to believe. Writers make use exploited in India. Dalit literature emerged into of the language of the out-castes and under- prominence and as a collective voice after 1960 as privileged in Indian society. Shame, anger, sorrow a part movement led by Dr. B. R. Ambedkar and indomitable hope are the stuff of Dalit undisputed leader of untouchables. Dalit women literature. The anger against the old oppression, have very few possibilities of empowering the expression of the Dalit writers has become themselves in the society. Dalit women are sharp. saddled writer. Poverty and illiteracy in a society Bama is one of the first Dalit women writer that looks at them with cattiest and gender widely recognized and translated. She is also prejudice. Dalit women exhibits enormous skills rewarded as the first black literary writer in Tamil for survival and combat. They not only avoid from literature. Bama‘s Sangati was published in 1994 the restrictive code imposed upon them by upper and was originally written in Tamil and it also castes or their own men folks, they challenge or translated into English by Lakshmi Holmstrom. subvert the same. Sangati voices the community identity. The word Dalit literature would be born only when Sangati means event and thus the novel through Dalit in the past and are suffering even in the individual stories, anecdotes and memories present itself from the Dalit point of view. The portray the event takes place in the life of the primary motive of Dalit literature is the liberation women in Paraiya community. The novel also 46 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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reveals how the paraiya women are presented as womanhood, middle age and old age almost until daily labour and it is up on them that the burden their last breath. Bama's representation of Dalit of running the family falls. The men and the other women's life span mirrors the Dalit community‘s hand spend the money they earn as they please. struggle for empowerment and realization of a The women are vulnerable to sexual exploitation dignified existence. and harassment. A girl child in Dalit community is perceived Sangati is a Dalit women history. It tells the as a potential source of cheap, unpaid labor. She is experience of Bama‘s maternal grandmother even a replacement mother to her siblings, thereby as it incorporates Bama‘s and her contemporary‘s coming to the rescue of her mother who can take experiences. It is a autobiography and as well as up her heavy workload at the farm outside and community‘s history. It stands for every Dalit leave the domestic responsibilities to her daughter. women‘s history. Dalit women leads to a cultural A Dalit girl's chores largely include fetching violence, terrible violence and abuse of women by firewood, cooking, feeding, washing and taking their fathers and husbands and sometimes care of younger siblings or even older brothers, brother‘s wife fight back. working at the farm in the afternoons in return for Bama speaks about the sufferings of women a couple of handfuls of gram or peas, running who live in Bama‘s own community. Bama‘s errands, working at factories or at farms during Sangati radically gives an account of Dalit sowing/ harvesting time and handing other wages women‘s dual oppression on account of gender to a bullying brother or a drunk father. This and caste as well as other discriminated situations emerges as a typical profile of a girl child aged of womanhood in Tamil literature. The book between four and fourteen. The girl child, of Sangati summarize the author‘s experience of course, gets discriminated against right from birth. working within a heterogeneous and oppressed Especially if she is dark complexioned. In Sangati, society. In the deep level of their mind she has the narrator observes, "The fact that I was dark kept black female marginalization and oppressed skinned unlike my elder siblings was a source of condition of the Dalit women in the converted disappointment to everyone at home." Christian society. While a girl child stays at home and takes The economic inequality plays a major role in over a group of hard tasks: "Fetching water, the life sphere of Dalit womanhood. The character firewood, mopping and washing, doing the dishes presented in Sangati is a wage earner as much as and numerous never ending tasks," boys are men are, working as agricultural and construction allowed to eat their fill and play outside. A girl laborers, but earning less than men does. They child can step out of the home only when she don‘t even care for the family, where as women picks up her younger sibling and takes him out for bear the financial burden of running the family. play. Thus her stepping out too is work-related. It The power structures their society mainly is a task that is ordained upon her on account of concerned with men or patriarchy. The caste her gender. Similarly, the games that children play courts and churches are male dominated and rules are codified on gender lines. As the narrator for sexual behavior are very different for men and recalls in Sangati, "Boys do not let girls play their women. She writes about the violence treatment of games. Girls could only play at cooking a meal, play at women by father, husbands, brothers and other being married off " or even play at getting beaten up higher caste patriarchal. by husbands! In Karukku and Sangti, foregrounds multi- In Karukku, the narrator gives an elaborate layered oppression against Dalit women. She sketch of the games played by children in a focuses on the ‗work‘ that is routinely done by Pariayar village. The boys of the colony play act Dalit women by state, family, church and upper as Naickers (upper caste landlords) and the girls caste communities. Bama presents Dalit women follow suit as Pannaiyaars (farmhands). primarily as workers who join the work force right Alternately the boys would pretend to keep shop from girlhood and toil through adolescence, and the girls would 'buy' grocery from them; the 47 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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boys would pose as priests, the girls would submit workers holding forth their leader's virtues and as sisters; the boys would act a drunken husbands glory and so on. Such a fun filled trip littered with returning home and the girls as wailing wives innocent joys, probably typical in any rural child's receiving the blows. Dalit girls are located in a routine, however, is undulated by dominant caste's subordinate position. In relation to the Dalit boys, practice of untouchability that leaves a lasting scar the girls are placed as victims, as passive receivers on these Dalit girls. who could be counted upon to legitimize the male authority (as husband, as landlord or as priest) Conclusion Girls in Dalit homes are left to fend for Marginalization is a complex phenomenon in themselves. Poverty pushes them to unprotected the world and a critical concern of national and spaces, often in search of food. international communities. African-American The narrator in Karukku recalls that children literature has some similarity to Dalit literature of roam around in the streets, in the fields or go India. Suppressed class movement started by the fishing in rain filled ponds. They dig up motivation of prominent Dalit leaders. It brought earthworms or net small fishes which they roast a new momentum to Dalit literature. Rejection over a fire kindled out of trash and rags. While and revolt in Dalit literature have been birthed they rejoice over this rare picnic, they are always from the womb of Dalit‘s pain. It is about the under constant fear of being caught and roughed oppressed according to the Indian caste system. It up by the upper caste guard lurking around the forms an important and distinct part of Indian pond. The guard would not only snatch away their literature. Dalit writing is not beauty of craft, but catch but also break their fishing rods. Boys and authenticity of experience. The most significant girls would roam the streets together at a younger attribute is that the Dalit literature displays Dalit age. But boys had greater share of the fun. They consciousness. The caste system is depicted as are allowed to play in the pond, ride on buffaloes' ―mimics‖ in their literature. Dalit‘s, the caste backs or hunt water snakes. Schooling for Dalit victims, emerge out of social and legal children is located within the context of their exploitations. survival tactics. Dalit children race towards the Dalit Feminism is more than in any other school to get their share of mid-day meal. The girl community. Dalit women are doubly victimized, child in Dalit homes gets an assured meal once a as a Dalit and as a woman. She goes through the day only in such a context. A meal that would state of depression and hopelessness, but enable her to struggle, fight and make a great sometimes reveals the vigor and courage. The only effort to fill a pitcher of water at the village hand solution is that the Dalit women have to protest pump site in the evenings. Dalit girls who are strongly against this double discrimination. lucky to attend school regularly – for instance Empowerment through education then struggle Bama – are subjected to caste discrimination at for human identity and human dignity becomes various points in their school life. Bama recounts the part of Dalit culture in 21st century. Culture is vividly in Karukku that she came to "realize, a changing social phenomenon. Earlier Dalits recognize and felt humiliated" about being born in were the silent sufferers. Empowerment through an untouchable caste when she was studying in education then struggle for human identity and third standard. The trip back home from school human dignity becomes the part of Dalit culture in was always an enjoyable one for Bama and her 21st century. Culture is a changing social friends. They could saunter through the bazaar, phenomenon. Earlier Dalits were the silent watch various forms of typical rural diversions like sufferers. The study of Dalits and their literature is monkey dance, snake charmer's skill, smell the now an established field of research within South aroma emanating from the various eating stalls, Asian Studies and many significant publications interact with gypsies selling beads and strings. have arisen from across disciplines. The journey of They could also witness on occasion, magic Dalits is from quest for identity to social equality shows, Therukootu, puppet shows or hear party 48 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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is still going on but has positive signs and effects 3. Dwivedi. .A.N. Indian Writing in English. are clearly visible throughout India. Delhi: Amar Prakashan, 1991. 4. Gandhi, M.K. ―The Untouchables‖. The References Gandhi Reader: A Source Book of his Lif and 1. Anand, Mulk Raj. Untouchables. London: 5. Writings. Ed. Homer. A. Jack. Madras: The Bodley Head Ltd. 1970. Samata books, 1983. 2. Bama. ―Introduction‖ Karukku. Chennai: 6. Bama, Sangati, Trans, Holmstrom, Lakshmi, Macmillan India Ltd, 2000. New Delhi,Oxford,1994
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MOBILE- ASSISTED LANGUAGE LEARNING (MALL): A PARADIGM SHIFT IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING
Mr.A.Rajamani, M.A., B.Ed., M.Phil., Assistant Professor of English Hajee Karutha Rowther Howdia College (Autonomous), Uthamapalayam
Introduction words. These words can be used in daily One of the most recent changes in English conversations. The modules are done in such a language teaching has been the use of mobile way that the learners can navigate it with verve. devices. The present article is an introduction to Features Mobile- Assisted Language Learning (MALL). It offers some practical ideas for using mobile Various levels- Basic, Medium and Hard technology in the classrooms. Mobile with Different categories – Words, Grammar and android applications, iPhone, iPad, iPod devices Spelling can definitely be a great resource for teachers and Topics include daily word usages at different second language learners by formulating the best occasion ways to learn the language effectively. Global level leader board to encourage the Mobile Assisted Language Learning, a learners successor of computer-assisted language learning, Learn English Vocabulary is a new phase in the second and foreign language Android Version : 4.0.3 and above learning. This aspect gains prominence due to the Availability : Google Play Store increasing interest that students show in using the Download Size : 9.5 MB mobile devices in order to practice languages and Service Provider : TFLAT Group the relevance of these devices in today‘s context.
By using the suitable applications (app) the About the App learners can increase their capacity in language. Learn English Vocabulary, offered by TFLAT This paper brings a bird‘s eye view of apps used to Group, is a game app with visual vocabulary. This hone English language. app helps the learners to cope with visual memory technique to expand their vocabulary skills. This Learn English with Johnny Grammar’s Word visual vocabulary method is a guiding factor for all Challenge the level of language learners including Beginners, Android Version : Depends on Device Intermediates and pro- Intermediates. The app Specifications starts with basic words and phrases leading to an Availability : Google Play Store advanced level of vocabulary usage. Download Size : 16 MB Service Provider : British Council Features No Wi-fi required About the App Easy Interface Navigation Johnny Grammar‘s word Challenge, offered 3000+ words with visuals and pronunciations by British Council, is a quiz app for English learners to test common vocabulary, spelling and 14 major topics subcategorized into 75+ grammar that appear in everyday English. The topics app plays a vital role in the development of Progress in the user can be tracked with visual vocabulary skills by providing various sets of pictures
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Flash card support Features Listening tasks 500000 English Sentences PLAY mode for game based learning Vocabulary Builder Reference guide with grammatical sentences Android Version : 4.0.3 and above British and American Syntax Availability : Google Play Store 100 lessons on game mode Download Size : 11MB Guide for IELTS/TOEIC aspirants Service Provider : Vocab Magik Word Champ Free-Word Connect & Puzzle About the App Game Vocabulary builder, offered by Vocab Magik, Android Version : 1.2.17 is a day to day updated app to develop the Availability : Google Play Store vocabulary skills. Besides, it helps to enhance the Download Size : 20.73 MB capacity to overcome the vocabulary deficiency Service Provider : SIS Fufla for the preparation of competitive exams such as IELTS, TOFEL, UPSC, GRE, CAT, GMAT and About the App Bank exams. Word Champ, offered by SIS Fufla, is an exciting and addictive, real time, multiplayer word Features game with strategy in mind. This app makes the 1200+ vocabulary learners to connect the words, find out the hidden Availability of audio pronunciation for each words and solve the word puzzles by swiping word letters. This game encourages the learners to Organized categories of words for divergent unlock the word badges and rewards at every level exams and for each word. The app consists of 1200+ Mnemonic dictionary challenging words for the learners and specifically Flash cards designed levels with unique letters and challenges. Basic, Intermediate and Advanced word sections Features Simple, Easy and Fun filled Speedy English Grammar No Wi-Fi required Android Version: 1.6.1 Unique Levels and Encouraging rewards for Availability : Google Play Store learners Download Size : 28 MB Extra hidden words Service Provider: Wobble Monkey English References About the App 1. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details? Speedy English Grammar, offered by Wobble id=com.english.vivoapp.vocabulary&hl=en Monkey English, is an app serving the purposes 2. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details? for ESL/EFL learners. This app consists of 100 id=com.magoosh.gre.quiz.vocabulary lessons focusing on grammar and pronunciation. 3. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details? It provides the basic nuances of language id=com.ubl.spellmaster&hl=en expanding the scope to the various topics of 4. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details? grammar. The grammar reference guide is also id=com.wobblemonkey.speedygram&hl=en color coded for easy understanding. Learners will 5. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details? know various sentence structures. The exercises id=com.brainfun.word_jumble_connect& include English and American Syntax. hl=en
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WRITERS OF INDIAN DIASPORA: AN OVERVIEW
Mr.N.Raja Marichamy Ph.D. Scholar
Introduction subsists, to what we are apt to term ‗motherland‘ The Indian diaspora today constitutes an or ‗home‘. important, and in some respects unique, force in ―The conditions that make for a diasporic world culture. The origins of the modern Indian community are admittedly complex, but this diaspora lie mainly in the subjugation of India by presumed link between diasporic community and the British and its incorporation into the British the motherland is easily questioned, nor is there Empire. Indians were taken over as indentured any reason why we must be held hostage to any labourers to far-flung parts of the empire in the form in linguistic and epistemological tyranny. No nineteenth century. The dispersal of Indian substantive issue can be decided on the issues of labourers and professionals has been nearly a ‗origins‖. (Brah 152). world-wide phenomenon. Indians and other South Writers of the Indian Diaspora have been Asians provided the labour that helped in the fairly on centre stage in the last decade, primarily reconstruction of war-torn Europe. In countries because of the theoretical formulations which are such as the United States, Canada, and Australia, now being generated by the critiquing of their Indians have made their presence visibly felt as work and the growing interest in cultural studies. professionals. In the United States at least, the Language and cultures are transformed as they Indian community has occupied a place of come into contact with other languages and considerable privilege, and many Indians could cultures. Diasporic writings raise questions reflect the moment of recognition that ‗Indianness‘ regarding the definitions of ‗home‘ and ‗nation‘. and being ‗American‘ do not always happily Schizophrenia and/or nostalgia are often the coincide. In recent years, with a declining preoccupations of these writers as they seek to economy on the one hand, and the congregation locate themselves in new cultures. of India in clusters that visibly put them apart on ―It becomes important to question the nature the other hand, Indians have for the first time of their relationship with the work of writers and become the target of racial attacks. In the Indian literatures of the country of their origin and to diaspora, the plurality of India is condemned to examine the different strategies they adopt in disappear, even as the most esoteric traditions are order to negotiate the cultural space of the given a fresh burst of life, and a unitary vision of countries of their adoption, the contributions are ‗Indianness‘ of Indian civilization and of both from India and abroad, both Indians and Hinduism, appears poised to dominate. There non-Indians, and hence the work represents might still remain questions about Indian perspective located in different cultures‖. (Jain Diaspora. 216) The word ‗diaspora‘ was first employed to The diasporic writers are induced to the refer to the Jewish people, as it suggests the idea of attachment or are willing to assimilate or integrate dispersal and fragmentation, and in much of their with their new environment, but still, they remain literature there is a presumed relationship between attached to their ancestral customs, traditions, the diasporic community and the land which they languages and religions. In The Gunny Sack, left and to which the possibility of return always Vassanji narrates the characters with their ancestral traits. The novel functions on one level
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as a ―defense against transience‖ (Vassanji 128). stimulated, or whether it is manifest in a These ancestral traits have endowed the Indo- fascination with the sense of belonging, affiliation, Canadian diasporic writers with a new identity. and communities attributed to the homes of Homi K.Bhaba in his The Location of Culture (1994) others‖. (Featherstone 47) explains: ―To forget becomes the basis of The writers of diaspora can thus use fiction as remembering the nation, peopling it anew, a sort of connective tissue to heal the gap between imaging the possibility of other contending and themselves and their homeland(s). These fictions liberating forms of cultural Identity‖. (Bhaba 5) connect the Indian diaspora to its motherland. The other is a ―dual entry matrix‖ (Lacan These writers analyze the harrowing experience of 164); as Lacan suggests the existence of its Indians who have settled down in the new, apparent binary opposite, the other. When promised land. The Indian characters find it traveling or settling abroad, members of the Indian extremely difficult to cope with new modes of life Diaspora undergo an ―othering‖, that is both in the new country. Indeed they are torn between literal and metaphorical. In literal terms, their the two worlds familiar (Home) and unfamiliar passports are stamped and checked by security country. The place of a diasporic person‘s officials, and they can traverse geographical and ‗belonging‘ may have little to do with special political borders, only if they are permitted to. The location, but be situated in familiarity and Lacanian ―dual entry matrix‖ leads to a state of community, in these symbolic features which inner hybridity, a hybridity that only becomes constitute a shared culture, a shared ethnicity of more multifaceted the further one travels from system of belief, including nostalgia for a distant ―home‖. homeland. It is when the place is least spatial, The diasporic literature is also about self- perhaps that it becomes most identifying. The discovery, of those who want to lead a convenient main features of diaspora is the history of life, through economic progress, or of those, who dispersal, memories of the homeland, alienation of are forced to come out of the mother land, because host country, desire for eventual return, ongoing of their economic condition. Through new support of the homeland, and a collective identity atmosphere, experience and language, they come importantly defined by this relationship. The host to realize their self. The search for self, country that is considered ―alienating‖ is experienced in the west is often externalized and debatable, but certainly each one of the writers‘ articulated through fiction. This journey of self- emphasizes on the importance of memory, home discovery can be compared to the Australian and identity as valuable assets and as modes of aboriginal walk about, where one leaves on a remembrance. In defining ―diasporas‖, Safan journey to find the self, and to exchange stories claims that they are ―expatriate minority with that self in an effort to re-integrate past and communities that share a memory, home or vision present experiences. The diasporic writer may go about their original homeland‖ on a similar walk about in the fiction, in order to Exile plays a significant role in shaping Indian reclaim a self that has been authored through English sensibility. It is a complex evolutionary years of living abroad. process entailing cross-cultural shifts, loss of Mike Featherstone highlights the importance mother tongue, native ethos combating with the of this reclamation of identity in his article militating elements of new environment and the ―Localism, Globalism, and Cultural Identity.‖ dual pull of cultural loyalties. Indian English ―It can be argued that the difficulty of writing, due to its cross-culture origin has handling increasing levels of cultural complexity, intrinsically been revolving time and again round and the doubts and anxieties they often engender, the theme of the compelling and challenging are reasons why ‗Localism‘, or the desire to return encounter between two cultures apparently home, becomes an important theme (in diasporic antagonistic in their attitudes, approaches and literature) regardless of whether the home is real values. The immigrant experience is complicated or imaginary, temporary, syncretised, or as a sensitive immigrant finds himself or herself 53 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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perpetually at a transit station fraught with the conditions result in very different thematic memories of the original home which are preoccupations. Expatriation implies neither a struggling with the realities of the new world. It is forced eviction from one‘s motherland, nor a more so in the case of Indian women writers in deliberate rejection. These are no connotations of English because most of them share the same permanent or obligatory leave taking. For the cultural dichotomy. To name only a few: Kamala refugee, the notion of home brings to mind Markandaya is married to an Englishman and disintegration rather than nostalgia, because they settled in England; there is Ruth Prawar Jabwalla look for space to live in, they are denied. As they of Polish parentage who had her upbringing in are refugees, their sense of segregation is much Germany and education in England and is beyond the expatriates or the exiled ones. In married to an Indian architect; there is Anita practice, however the distinction between the Desai who has a German mother and a Bengali exile, expatriate and refugee is difficult to father and there is Bharati Mukherjee who rejects maintain. The effervescence of diaspora gives rise a hyphenated identity and has avowedly become to a sense of disillusionment. This sense is, in fact, one of the Americans; Indira Ganesan is a the consciousness of crisis of the diasporic Tamilian settled in the United States and Chitra community, at being denied a central and Banerjee Divakaruni, a poignant writer, is settled nurturing tradition. A strong sense of social ethos in America from Kolkatta. These writers focus, deconstructs a complex history in order to forget a inevitably, on their roots of identity. sense of identity. And such a sense varies from These writers express the nomadic impulses of individual to individual. Within a community Indians who in their deliberate search for a there might be several conceptions about the sense materially better life, migrate to various lands and of identity and the characters in Chitra Banerjee‘s who strive to identify themselves with the foreign novels have different conceptions of identifies. land and consequently face tensions of adaptation Categorising a body of writing as diasporic and assimilation. These women writers trace the raises the question of its relationship to such object to erase the iron wall erected between counterpart as immigrant writing or exile and human beings in the name of boundaries. The expatriate writing. Immigrant writing in its conditions of struggling out of a past heavily laden preoccupation with the attachment to the with cultural baggage is an attempt to construct a homeland, for instance, Chitra Banerjee future. The cultural encounter between the ‗center‘ Divakaruni writing have the prominence of this and the ‗margin‘ must function on a level where attachment; immigrant writing does not ignore difference is accepted. The immigration polices, it this but focuses more on the current experiences in tries to divert attention from questions about the adopted abode of the diasporic writer. From identity, culture, homeland, diversity, and it different cultural backgrounds of several writers of focuses basically on a sophisticated form of Indo-Canadian diaspora induce them to focus on assimilation. their own experiences and memories. An identity ―An artist born in a colony is made conscious has developed on feeling of space that the of the culturally subservient status of her home immigrant communities can declare of space that and is forced to go into exile in the metropolis as a the immigrant communities can declare as their means of compensating for that sense of cultural own. The diasporic writings of these immigrants subservience‖. (Gurr 8) focuses on these issues of discrimination and The reality, however, is that the phenomenon demarcation. They have established an identity of exile and expatriation, particularly for diasporic with pieces of geographical space, and sense of writers is a lot more complex and gloss over or place, counter parting with their deepest underestimate the differences among exiles, emotional attachment to the country. Writers try expatriates, and refugees; although convenience to abridge their own voices and the mainstream, dictates that they can be seen together as one through their struggle for peace and identity. corpus. The sensibility informs that these The First generation Americans find 54 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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themselves stuck between traditional parents and different way from that of an American writer. upbringing at home and the more liberal and open Another powerful reason for the success of female community outside. This ―in between-ness‖ can writers is that typically their stories take place in leave them with uncertainty about their own role the context of a family. And the readers love to in society-neither Indian nor American. Their pore over such books and see how these writers thoughts were expressed in Chitra Banerjee explore not only muiti-cu1turalism and cultural Divakaruni‘s Vine of Desire (2002) and Queen of clashes, but also taboo subjects such as incest. Dreams (2004). In Jasmine and The Tiger‟s Daughter, Bhrati References Mukherjee has shown a dual cultural shock. 1. Bhabha, Homi. The Location of Culture. Jasmine and Tara leave their respective countries London : Routledge Classics 2004. in search of their dreams. This migration or 2. Brah, Avatar. Cartographies of Diaspora ―cultural transplant‖ leads to crisis of identity and Contesting Identities. London : Routledge a final reconciliation to the choice. In The Tiger‟s 1997. Daughter and in Wife, the protagonists, Tara and 3. Featherstone, Mike. ―Localism, Globalism, Dimple are expatriates, characteristic of being ill and Cultural Identity‖. at ease both in the native culture and in the alien 4. Gurr, Andrew. Writers in Exile : The Identity or one. They represent the dilemma faced by Home in Modern Literature. Brighton : expatriates. Harvester Press, 1981. Bharati Mukherjee has deliberately avoided 5. Jasbir, Jain. Theory and Practice. New Delhi : the immigrant writer‘s temptation to fall in the Rawat Publication 1998.Lacan, Jacques. trap of glorifying his native country and to belittle ―Seminar 21‖. and degrade the adopted country she has 6. Safan, William. ―Diaspora in Modern presented a fascinating study of the problem of a Societies : Myths of Homeland and Return,‖ displaced person in America as well as India. in Diaspora (Vol I, No.1) 1991. Thus, the women writers of diaspora tell 7. Vassanji, M.G. The Gunny Sack. London : stories from a perspective that is seldom fully Heinemann 1989. explored. There is a kind of hunger for the immigrant stories. They tell their own stories and those in the larger ethnic Community in a starkly
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A FEMINISTIC PERSPECTIVE IN CHITRA BANERJEE DIVAKARUNI’S SISTER OF MY HEART
Ms.S.Gomathi & Ms.R.Asha M.Phil. Scholars in English, Government Arts College, Karur
Abstract The paper focuses on the feministic views of women characters in the novel. The protagonists of the novel had tried to overcome the hurdles from the male hegemonic society. Chitra has projected her own Indian sensibility and attitude through her female protagonists which is the most compelling aspects of her works. Shedelves deep into the psyche of her women characters where they are found struggling within their own self. Sister of My Heart deals with different ranges of women experiences altogether and touches all aspects of a woman‟s life. Keywords: Feministic view, hurdles, struggle, women and hegemonic society.
Introduction analyzing the individual responses in a particular Literature is a collection of works which gives situation. a message. The reading of all good books is like a Divakaruni‘sSister of My Heart,has constructed conversation with the finest men of past centuries. with myths and traditions related to the lives of English is a foreign language but the contribution selected group. She has been presenting Indian of Indian writers who have influenced a whole culture through her writings. Sister of My Heart is a generation and continue to inspire the coming story of two cousins Anjali and Basudha whose generations by their writings. Their works vividly love transcended even the bonds of blood portray the picture of Indian society. Indian relations. The first book in the novel is titled The writers have played a progressive part in reforming Princess in the Palace of Snakes. In this part both the Indian society. protagonists attempt to confirm to the traditional Patriotism, spiritualism and cultural feminine roles located by the male dominant importance were the major themes of it. The society. This is symbolized by the traditional Indian diaspora is a generic term to describe the fairytale of the princess in the palace of snakes people who migrated from territories that are waiting for the prince charming to rescue her. The currently within the borders of the Republic of second book is titled The Queen of Sword. The India. They are praising Indian culture through second book doesn‘t symbolize any traditional their writings. Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is a fairytale. diasporic writer with a refined and modern Anjali and Basudha were born on the same sensibility whose contribution to the diasporic day, after their fathers had disappeared in search fiction is great and unique as she has a profound of huge rubies in a fairy –tale cave. In their early knowledge of the world around her. Her age both the girls get everything they need from novelsThe Mistress of Spicesand Sister of My Heart life- Love, respect, council and friendship from were adopted into films. This paper deals with each other. They lived in the family called feminist perspective in her novel Sister of My Heart. chatterjee. As the three widows are Pishi, Gowri, Many literary writings focus on the Nalini and two young girls Anju and Sudha of this assessment of Indian women‘s psyche and reveal family proceed their way through the drama of that women are tormented by their thoughts and life, facing marriage, motherhood, divorce circumstances and hence their oppression is rather widowhood etc., a psychological phenomenon. Chitra Banerjee Both of them live in their own wonderland by tries to bring out the elements of human psyche by creating their dreams and aspirations. They differ
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from their mindset, their outward appearance as cultural vitality to their family even in the absence well as in their family background. Even though of their husbands. They lived in a world of women they differ in such things, they have an intimate and never knew any males except Singhji, and close bond with each other. The blood theirdriver. They were not allowed to travel alone relation and the relations framed by one‘s birth, in buses as other youngsters did. Their mothers friendship is the most fruitful of the entire selected traditional bordered handloom saris for relationship. Like no-one else in the entire world them to wear. does. Like no-one else in the entire world will. Anju and her mother were running a book (24) shop. Anju is a rebellious book lover and practical. They intimately grew up under the innocent Sudha is a day dreamer, one who thinks her life is assumption that they are cousins. Beyond the fairy tale and one day a charming prince will come theme of love and friendship it provides a deep and rescue her from this traditional house. Anju insight into the internal depths of the females. The reads novels especially she reads Virginia Woolf‘s society is a partial one where women always A Room of One‟s Own. She also derives pleasure by considered as subordinate to men and hence they reading Kate Chopins, Sylvia Plath and many have to live within the spheres of social norms feminist writers. Anju meets a person named, making compromises in one situation or the other. Sunil in her bookshop. Sunil entered the Chitra has given expression to the most recent bookstore. He is well dressed in traditional Kurta problems as feminisms, alienation, and an with gold buttons. He asks Anju if they have any individual struggling to be oneself. As the name book by Virginia Woolf. Anju was taken back as suggests, Basudha mirrors the stereotype image of she herself is a lover of literature. He won her traditional Indian women embodied with confidence. Anju is so happy with his meeting and patience. She is loyal to her friend Anjali; believes Sunil said ―Love happens, and so do miracles.‖ in myths, epics, folklores and fairy tales and wants Sudha falls in love with Ashok who belongs to to lead a happy life.Anjali is a symbol of divine a lower caste. The three women decline proposal offering. As named, Anju seems to be always of marriage for Sudha. The suitor, Ashok belongs ready to offer herself and her friendship for Sudha. to lower caste family, a family that‘s made its ‗Don‘t you girls ever do anything without each money in trade. Marriages are the high points in a other? I swear, you‘re like those twins, what do women‘s life. The mothers have been savings the they call them? Born stuck together.‘ (28) best things. Sudha wants to elope with him but Pishi was their widow aunt who threw herself realizes that if she does so, Anjali‘s life would get first into the younger brother‘s household when spoiled. She then rejects Ashok‘s love so that no she lost her husband at the age of eighteen. She scandal can spoil Anju‘s chances of a happy was bounded by social restrictions. Her father marriage. slapped her when she expressed her desire of Anju‘s mother suffers in heart attack so both learning. She decided to live with her brother‘s girls are encouraged to enter into arranged family who was a more reasonable person than marriages. Anjuagrees when she sees that boy her father. She devoted herself completely for the chosen by her mother seems like her own bringing up of Anjali and Sudha. ―I‘ve always character, a man who reads Virginia Woolf. Her believed in the importance of telling you girls image of marital bliss in both of them reading about your past, you know that. But this secret is Woolf‘s novels together on a couch.Sudha hate so terrible that I‘ve been reluctant to burden you the way women are paraded in front of grooms, with it. I am afraid it will take away your like animals at the fair. The girls are married on childhood and destroy the love that you hold the same day. dearest. I‘m afraid it will make you hate me.‖ (33). Anju was married to Sunil Majoodmar. They The women in this novel are portrayed as the tied their knot with their life partners, Sudha cultural backbone of the family due to their married Ramesh. He is a railway employee from a capability providing physical, emotional and remote corner of Calcutta and Anjuwas married to 57 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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Sunil, a software Engineer from America. The Anju‘s optimistic approach towards her marriage brought them the physical distance in the friendship with sudha which cannot be broken in landscape. Marriage entails not only their first spite of all the hurdles in their life. In fact when separation but also their first rivalry with each Anju comes to know about Sudha‘s position at her other, a rivalry not about material possession but in-laws house she suggests to her to come to of the heart. America and she also starts working secretly to Before her marriage Sudha loved another man save money in order to buy ticket for Sudha. Ashok, but eloping with him would mean a The three widow women decided bravely to shattering of the family reputation which would sell off their traditional ancestral house, to buy a affect Anju‘s marriage. At the altar of her flat somewhere and afford Sudha‘s delivery and sisterhood, friendship and her family she sacrificed support their coming grand-daughter. A hope rose her love for Ashok and married Ramesh. Being an in Sudha‘s eyes and she felt herself brave than Indian woman Sudha lay aside her dormant before. She left her husband to raise her child on feelings for Ashok, devoted herself completely to her own. Sudha took a decision which shows her her husband‘s household and lived as a good wife bravery. She planned to leave for America with as well as good daughter-in-law. her fatherless, newborn daughter in search of a As Anju points out, that the society wants its respectable life for both. women to be nothing more than a good breeding Sudha entered into a new world. Also their stock, while men are spineless jellyfish even as mothers entered into the new world of women. they are yet to be born female infants face deaths This symbolically shown when they sold their at the hands of a cruel, uncompromising society ancestral house and moved to a new flat. The that prefers boys. change in them after they move to their new home The three elder women suffered throughout is amazing. The mother begins to lead a fulfilling their lives in order to make their peaceful living life with a social purpose. and bringing up two daughters. Sudha‘s marital The male world only creates trouble for the life was not happy as she expected. Sudha‘s protagonists. Marriage tears them apart and Anju husband Ramesh is a kind man but before his moves to America while Sudha to Rural Bengal. mother, he is like a leaf in a gale. He cannot Men separate them effectively in terms of protect his wife from unreasonable demands of his geography. Their lives shattered when they mother. After the detection of girl child in her attempt to conform to the rules of the masculine womb she wasn‘t allowed to feel the ecstasy of society. Anju almost loses her mental stability and motherhood. The novelist here focuses on the Sudha lost her Freedom. theme of female infanticide and gender Therefore a difference could be observed in differences.Anju and Sudha got pregnant. But the woman of older generation who cared for the Sudha‘s in-laws constantly told her to abort the society and culture more than their own selves and child and take another change of pregnancy just the new woman who realized that they have the for a son. Her mother-in-law learnt from the right to take their decisions and live independently medical report that it was a female child. by caring for the society and culture. The ideal of womanhood in India is In an interview, she mentions that ―My beliefs motherhood. The marvelous unselfish, all about women‘s roles are very simple: that women suffering and ever-forgiving mother. should be respected, that they should be given Sudha who submitted herself wholeheartedly choices and allowed the means so that they can to the service of her husband and his family follow their choices and dreams.‖ considered her prior responsibility as a mother The older generation women in the chatterjee rather than being wife or daughter-in-law. family didn‘t give the freedom to their daughters, When Anju was upset by her miscarriage, because of their fear on the unsecured society. Sudha called her over the telephone and console This shows the pampering love towards their her by telling her a tale. daughters. The chatterjee girls also wished to learn 58 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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something new related to literature. They expect a References life partner should be in their choice. But 1. Divakaruni, Chirta Banerjee. ―Sister of My unexpectedly, they fell into the web of arranged Heart” ABlack Swan , 1999. marriage. This shows their sacrifice on the marital 2. Vasanthi, V. ―Women in Distree in the Novel, life. ‗Sister of My Heart.‟ Marriage life leads to their physical and 3. Choubey, Meenakshi, ―ChitraDivakaruni‘s emotional separation.Sudha voiced against the sister of My Heart: A Unique Tale of Love, female infanticide because she wants to save her Friendship and Courage. unborn daughter from her cruel minded mother- in-law. The chatterjee girls are always optimistic.
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THE ISSUES OF INDIAN IMMIGRANTS AND THEIR IMPLICATIONS IN KIRAN DESAI'S NOVEL - THE INHERITANCE OF LOSS
Mr.V.Muruganandham Research Scholar Rajah Serfoji Government Arts College (Automous), Thanjavur
Dr.L.Rajesh Research Advisor Rajah Serfoji Government Arts College (Automous), Thanjavur
Abstract One of the major concerns in post colonial literature is the problem of immigration and its consequences. On both the paradigms of Sociology and Psychology every immigrant becomes a victim of inescapable conflict and discrimination.In 'The Inheritance of Loss', the Man Booker Prize award winning novel of Kiran Desai, She addresses the post colonial problems faced by her characters. All the characters in it face the problems of the identity and alienation and become frustrated at the end. This novel depicts the feeling of the humiliation experienced by the immigrants due to the inequality and their inability to adapt to the customs. It explores the necessities of immigration and the realization of its difficulties by Indian immigrants. To explore the behaviour of characters, one has to look at the position of immigrants in this novel. This paper aims at focusing on the experiences of Biju, the son of the cook as an illegal immigrant in the U.S.A and of Jemubahai Patel, the retired judge in England along with their psychological impact it has on their lives. Keywords: immigrant, humiliation, dream, conflict, inability, Experiences, culture, religion, race.
Introduction search for home also the prominent themes find Kiran Desai is one of the most talented writers expression within the ambit of her novel 'The of her generation. Kiran Desai was born in New Inheritance of Loss'. As a moving and thrilling Delhi in January 1971. At the age of 14, she with work of art, it depicts several cross-cultural her mother moved to England and then the phenomena, human faiths and failings. Being an U.S.A. She studied Creative Writing in Columbia immigrant, one has to lose his family, love and University. She is the daughter of well known physical access to places and to people and to lose writer Anita Desai, who has been shortlisted thrice the immediacy of the culture. for her novels.She published her first novel Biju, the son of poor cook, is an Indian ‗Hullaballoo in the Guava Orchard‘ in 1988. She immigrant living in America. He left India with a is the daughter of prominent writer Anita Desai, dream of having better life in America. Generally who was thrice shortlisted for Booker Prize. Kiran Indians immigrate to the United States for various Desai wrote her second novel ‗The Inheritance of reasons. Many of them leave to study universities Loss‘ in 2006 and it conferred her the Man Booker and many are dissatisfied with political situation prize in 2007, National Critics Circle Fiction in India. But most of them are looking for better Award in 2007 and the 2006 Vodafone Crossword job opportunities as there are much higher Book Award. Desai is the youngest female writer incomes in the United States. Another significant to win the Booker prize. factor of their leavings is to financially support The Inheritance of Loss throws light on the their families from abroad. The personal problem and plight of Indians going abroad in circumstances of migration differ from individual search of their lots. The sensitive socio-political to individual, and for Indians, it is not just a issues concerning insurgency, immigration, matter of personal choice, but involved the entire identity crisis, loneliness, multiculturalism, family. poverty, racial discrimination, social realism, and
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At the beginning of the story, Biju and his and financially support his family or to go back to father as they are trying to find a way how to send India. him abroad. Here Desai describes individual‘s Biju often changes jobs and this time he finds difficulties of getting abroad. The cook‘s first effort a job at Le Colonial. Biju finds out that the whole comes when a cruise agent appears in Kalimpong. world can be found in the basement kitchens of He recruits volunteers for waiters, toilet cleaners New York. The conflict appears when he meets on the boats, basically labourers for the worst jobs. one Pakistani at work. Despite no reasonable Biju goes for an interview with fake passport and argument, Biju is not able to talk to him. He writes made up stories nevertheless he is not successful. a letter to his father who is strongly startled by the However he is forced to pay big amount of money fact that someone in America is willing to hire the and after all he is fooled. For the second time, he Pakistani. He gives him advice: ―Beware. Beware. applies for a tourist visa and this time he is really Keep away. Distrust.‖. Biju insults him with a successful and he gets it. One of the applicants swearword learned from his childhood. He says: says that Biju as the luckiest boy in the whole ―Pigs, pigs, sons of pigs‖. After their fight both of world. One can see from this situation that no them are fired. In this situation, one can see that matter what kind of job it is, and no matter what Desai points out the hatred between Indian and money they have to give. Because their Muslim. These two do not even bother to get to expectations of better life in the United States are know each other. Instead, they rather adopt so big that they are willing to do anything. In prejudices and attitudes of their fathers. This expectation of better life, the achievement of visa proves that characters are able neither critically is regarded as the most joyful news promising think on their own nor make their own opinion. them departure from India. On the contrary, his friend Saeed has a carefree After Biju‘s arrival in the USA, he spends the life. He has not been affected by the agonies of an first few weeks by selling sausages. There he is immigrant. While Biju is a lost man in the new tempted by other employees to use the services of world, Saeed is very adaptable and can lead a life Dominican prostitutes. His employer is directed to of ease without any qualms. Biju's longing for check the green cards of his employees. Biju home is continuous while Sayeed never thinks of doesn‘t have any and so the employer is obliged to leaving America. Biju was so restless sometimes; fire them. This problem with the green card haunts he could barely stand to stay in his skin. Sayeed is, him through the whole time of his stay. He in fact, a foil to Biju. The two characters are desperately desires to obtain it which would juxtaposed together to show the difference enable him to come back. Biju‘s sights are set on between two types of immigrants. Saeed does not the unobtainable golden ticket – the green card – react to Biju with suspicion or hate, like the but unless he can overcome his shyness and Pakistanis that Biju had worked with. persuade an American girl to marry him or The irony is that only immigrants like Saeed inveigle his boss to sponsor him, his chances of can survive in a foreign culture when one decides getting it are zero. The Herculean effort of trying to uproot from one‘s own culture. Desai compares to get a green card eventually wears Biju down, Biju and Saeed to show how they handle the the exhaustion of trying and getting nowhere dilemmas faced by an immigrant. Saeed seems to finally sends him home. be more pragmatic while Biju is a sort of idealist One can think that Desai‘s intention is to as he resists the Western culture in which he is show immigrant‘s worries. Biju lives alone in alien trapped in and longs for his homeland India. The country, separated from his family and he cannot writer seems to suggest that people like Biju face visit them because he wouldn‘t have another repeated miseries and misfortunes and those like chance to return to the USA. This thought arouses Saeed do not bother and they survive in an alien the feeling of confusion and homesickness. All culture at any cost. along, the immigrant has difficult dilemma This situation describes Biju‘s inability to whether to withstand terrible conditions he lives in adapt to changing conditions. For Biju, it is a 61 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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problem both to find the job and sustain it. He caught up in his own reality, unable to change finds the regular changes of his job that does not anything. suit to his mind and conscience. He notices the Biju works in the restaurant called Brittany. similar lot of different other people coming from He washes the dishes with one man in the kitchen so many countries. He is a part of a shifting and listens to his swearing, these white people! population of men camping out near the fuse box, Shit! But at least this country is better than behind the boiler, in the cubby holes, and in odd- England. This man spent eight years in shaped corners that once were pantries, maids‘ Canterbury and therefore he can compare the rooms, laundry rooms, and storage rooms. atmosphere towards immigrant in these two Kiran Desai has taken note of racist feelings countries. One can have a feeling that Desai wants as well as class-caste-language distinctions among to point out the difference between America and Indians abroad. During his second year in England from the immigrants‘ point of view. It is America, Biju becomes a victim in the hands of apparent from his speech that immigrant suffer his Italian Restaurant owner whose wife couldn‘t from racial prejudices in both countries, however, tolerate his Indian smell. After his dismissal he America seems to be more liberal than England. works in Italian restaurant called Pinocchio. The Another problem presents the fact that Biju owner‘s wife says about him that he stinks. She deals with his religious beliefs. The Brittany had hoped for men from the poorer parts of restaurant offers menu consisting of steak and that Europe. At least they might have something in poses a problem to him. The visitors of the common with them like religion and skin colour. restaurant were not only Americans but also The owner buys him soap and other hygienic stuff Indian businessmen eating steaks. He held them in but after some time Biju is fired again. This scorn and they knew that but they didn‘t care situation repeats several times. He lives in terrible about it. Biju thought that one should not give up conditions and cannot find a job. To add to the one‘s religion, the principles of one‘s parents and white man‘s degrading remarks on Biju, he was their parents before them. In this multicultural looked down upon by the three Indian girls for conflict, Biju decides to hold on to his Hindu whom he had taken soups from the restaurant. He religion and this time it is him who quit his job. feels disenchantment and pain after being He decides to look for a job in which they don‘t separated from Saeed. He also realizes the fact cook with beef. that most of the Indians who have been settled in Through the character Biju, Desai wants to the USA have adapted the life-pattern and express the internal feelings of the immigrant. One snobbish mind-set from the Americans. They do day Biju talks to newsagent who tells him that not have any feeling and fascination for the there is a problem with Nepalis in his country. country men now. After the phone call with his father Biju finds out One can have a feeling that Desai highlights that the situation in Kalimpong is serious. He the internal thoughts the immigrant might keep in ruminates about his life and relationship with his his mind when meeting somebody new. These are father. When he spoke to his father, his consequences of his upbringing. It is worth homesickness intensified and he could feel the describing Biju‘s conflict when he meets Saeed emptiness between them caused by their Saeed. Biju wants to be his friend, he is amazed by separation. him, but first of all, he has to run through the His dilemma escalates and Biju finally buys a certain doubts he has in his mind. It is essential to ticket and goes home. He knows that if he stayed mention one important thing common not only to in the America, he might never see his family all Desai‘s characters but common for majority of again. This conflict points out the internal people. They do not live the present day. Their dilemma of the character. He must choose minds are full of invented thoughts and they keep whether to live as immigrant or live with his living in either past or future. The character is then family. One can see that Desai‘s main point of this
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situation is to show the fundamental conflict the consciousness. The Judge looks at the English as character must resolve. someone superior and this attitude puts him in a However, Biju is an example of the fact that postcolonial dilemma that aggravates his living in America does not have to fulfil their ambivalent nature. His feeling like a foreigner in hopes they have been dreaming of. It is difficult to his own country shows his sense of alienation. He say from this situation to what extent it is Biju‘s isn‘t much impressed by the new atmosphere, but mistake that he does not succeed. This situation he doesn‘t make a good expression either. asks a question. On the other hand, Biju, in spite Nobody wants to rent him a room. He has of he is very young, is able to make his own visited twenty-two homes before he finds the choices, to think critically on his own and to be his accommodation. One can see that this is the first own master.So looking at him as being poor boy issues of an immigrant.. He experiences the first predestined by destiny is irrelevant. feelings of being immigrant that forms his Desai describes the judge as somebody who is personality. The racial tension he feels gradually strongly affected by his experiences. He leaves his leads to Jemubhai‘s retreat within himself. He home for the first time at the age of twenty. In studies twelve hours a day and talks to nobody. 1939, he departs from Piphit and reaches He starts to feel uncomfortably. His mind had Liverpool at first and then he leaves for begun to warp and he grew stranger to himself Cambridge. However he leaves his hometown than he was to those around him. He found his with the strange feelings. He knows that he knows own skin odd-coloured, his own accent peculiar. nothing about the world outside. When Jemubhai After he passed the examinations into Indian Civil arrives in Liverpool, he notices that a porter Service, he took revenge on his early confusions. carrying passenger‘s bags is white. He doesn‘t He found he began to be mistaken for something understand that a white person picks up a brown he wasn‘t a man of dignity. This accidental poise person‘s bags. One can say that Desai wants to became more important than any other thing. He point out the Jemubhai‘s innocence. As an envied the English. He loathed Indians. He offspring of colonial legacy, it seems that he worked at being English with the passion of believes that white people are superior to brown. hatred. He despised by absolutely everyone, both The life in England surprises him. It took him by English and Indians. surprise because he‘d expected only grandness. He This experience ruins him for the rest of his hadn‘t realized that people could be poor and live life. These years spent in England made him angry unaesthetic lives in England too. and arrogant man who pretends to be English Through Jemubhai Patel, we experience the gentleman but in fact he is Indian who never post-colonial era in all the cruelty of its old, found his identity. However, the judge‘s ingrained hatreds and prejudices. His student days experience must be understood as an experience of in Cambridge, England where he faces struggle, one individual. He contributed to his own failure confusions, embarrassments, loneliness and in large measure with his behaviour. He tries to solitude show degradation in his character. In deny his identity, his origin and it finally reflects in flashback, we learn that when he was a young lifelong schism of identity. The Judge is disgusted man, he was sent to Cambridge by his family to with human beings, after bitter racial experiences study law. But in England, he was ridiculed for his during the Cambridge days. He finds his wife accent. Young English girls held their nose as he grotesque and his people alien. He rejects his wife, passed insisting he reeked of curry. This rejection hisfamily and their ways and becomes more fuelled in his soul, a shame and a dislike for his English than the English. After bitter experience in heritage, his culture and the colour of his skin. He his youth, he despises everything Indian and clings retreated into a solitude that grew in weight day by to British customs as a sign of a higher class.The day. The solitude became a habit, the habit consequences of his bad experience gained in became the man, and it crushed him into a England have the degrading influence on all the shadow. The judge becomes a victim of double people around him. His pretended pseudo 63 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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behaviour to be a man of a very high standard position of being immigrant is hard to evaluate for causes him only troubles. He recalls the those who never were in such a conflict as Biju, humiliations and difficulties experienced there. never were brought up in such poverty and never Looking at the world through Desai's eyes, we were taught to hate people, to distrust them. As a see that it's not just those who have immigrated matter of fact, this is not only Biju‘s question but are affected by the West. In this picture, everyone the key question of the entire issue of immigration. is affected. The life of the immigrant may be rich, but part of Desai's literary exploration was also to References examine the burdens that come with that richness. 1. Desai, Kiran. Inheritance of Loss. New Delhi: And it is the complications of colonization and Penguin Books, 20006. immigration that Desai has explored in her 2. Desai, Kiran. NDTV interview. New Delhi. book.Biju's frustration on his experience in 26 January 2007. America is almost similar to the judge's first 3. Post Colonial Women Writers New experience in Britain. He realizes the emptiness Perspectives. New Delhi Atlantic Publishers and meaninglessness of himself and he likes & Distributers (P) Ltd. people who are struggling to eke out a living, 4. Kaur, Tejander. ―Problematization Issues leaving their loving families. About Home, Homeland, Diaspora and In the hope of getting more secure life he went Belongingness in Trans-national and National to the USA but even there he did not get what he Lands: A Study of Kiran Desai’s The expected. It was very shameful to him that the Inheritance of Loss‖. Kiran Desai and her country for which he was ready to render his Fictional World. (ed) Sharma Vijay and service did not recognize his feeling and loyalty. Tondon Neeru. New Delhi: Atlantic, 2011. Being an immigrant, one has to lose his family, love and physical access to places and to people and to lose the immediacy of the culture. The
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CULINARY PARADIGMS IN THE LITERATURE OF INDIAN DIASPORA
Ms.M.Fathima Sanjeetha, M.A., M.Phil., Research Scholar, Sadakathullah Appa College
Introduction Parameshwaran, Chita Banerjee Divakaruni, ―Food is a central activity of mankind and Bharathi Mukerjee, Rohinton Mistry, and one of the single most significant trademarks of a V.S.Naipaul etc. culture‖ says, Mark Kurlansky. Culinary fiction is the emerging trend in Food is the ultimate need for survival of living literature of Indian Diaspora. The word ' culinary' things. It is a source of energy for bodily function means art of cooking which is derived from and mental activities. Macmillan Dictionary French language. The cuisine of France holds a defines Food as ―the things that people or animals great influence in the cuisine of western countries eat.‖ Food is related to the environment we live. whereas, Indian and Chinese cuisines influence Food habit varies from one organism to another Asian cuisines. Indian cuisine is known for its organism; one social group to another social group multi facet nature. Each state of India has their even varies from one person to another person. unique way of cooking and food habits. The Food habit is highly connected with the cuisine of the state reflects the practices, rituals, environment. For e.g. People of north India tradition and culture practiced in the state. consumes food made of wheat whereas south Contemporary Indian diasporic writers give Indian food is based on rice. Food reflects the special focus to culinary aspects in their works. tradition and culture of the ethinic groups. Few such writers are Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Psychoanalytical studies on food suggest that Preethi Nair, Amulya Malladi, Jhumpa Lahiri etc. eating practices are essential in defining the The culinary fiction usually revolves around food. identity of an individual, family, class and society. The characters in the culinary novels have close Therefore, Food imagery was commonly used in relationship with food. literature to explain about the culture of the Food serves as a one of the important symbols particular society. in diasporic literature, women literature and in The term ―Diaspora‖ is derived from Greek children's literature. Food has its close relationship language which means disperse or scatter. It refers with the culture of the land it belongs. It is a key to the Jews who is living outside Israel and it also characteristic for a diaspora in expressing their refers to the people who are migrated from their strong sense of relationship of their homeland. native land and living in the host land. People Food serves as a symbol to talk about background living in the host land experiences lots of of the novel. Food imagery was used to symbolize hardships in assimilating to the host culture. They sexual innuendos for centuries. Senechal says that undergo disturbances like double consciousness, prostitutes are often imaged as food in cultural clash, sense of loss, identity crisis, and Shakespeare plays. Writers use art of cooking in racial prejudice etc. The literature written by the expressing the mood, feelings and the indefinable writer living in the host land is called as diasporic thoughts of the characters. Food and culinary art literature. It serves as a tool for them to express plays an important role in explaining the feminine their feeling of alienation, displacement, identity. Hence it helps authors a lot in expressing rootlessness, nostalgia and quest for identity etc. their thoughts and feelings. Some of the famous Indian disaporic writers hold a special place in works in which food plays an inevitable role are diasporic literature. Some of the well known Amulya Malladi‘s Serving Crazy With Curry, Nani Indian Diasporic writers are Uma Power‘s Ginger And Ganesh: Adventures in Indian
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Cooking Culture, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni‘s The special reference to the ingredients and dishes used Mistress of Spices, Margaret Atwood‘s The in the celebration. ―they would invite all employs Handmaid‟s Tale, Amit Majmudar‘s The and give food and gifts to them…we collected Abundance, Laura Esquivel‘s Like Water for banana leaves and saved empty coconut shells to Chocolate, Lily Prior‘s La Cucina: Novel of Rapture, burn as fuel ,and jack fruit was preserved to be Preethi Nair‘s 100 Shades of White, and Bharati used for payasam. We pickled tender mango to let Mukerjee‘s Jasmine etc. dreams ferment for an abundant harvest‖ (H.S.W The present study focuses on the role of food 63). and culinary art in the writings of Indian Diaspora Food plays an inevitable in the traditional with special reference to Chitra Banerjee practices of the people. The order of serving food Divakaruni‘s The Mistress of Spices, Before We is connected with the tradition.For.eg: Food Visit The goddess and Preethi Nair‘s 100 Shades of served during Onam must be in certain order: White. The narrow part of the leaf must always be on Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is the eminent the left, serving begins at the bottom left corner Indo-American author and poet. Her writings are .and first you place a small banana , next to this the showcase of plights of immigrants, and come the banana chips coated with jiggery, then problems faced by women in the society. Culinary papodom. From the top left hand of the leaf, art holds an important role in her writings. Her mango pickle, injipuli, thoran, olan, kichidi, First Novel ‗The Mistress of Spices‟ is known for its aviyal. Only after this placed can the guest begin culinary aspect. It is a magical realistic novel with eating. Wait for them to begin and then at the unique reference to the spices used in cooking. bottom center you serve rice, and then pour the Her recent novel ‗Before We Visit The Goddess‟ also sambar on top of the rice. When they have has lot of references on cooking. payasam after dessert, pour rasam into their Preethi Nair is another famous women cupped hands and then, wait to see if they would novelist born in Indian now lives in Britan. She like more‖ (H.S.W,65) has written three novels which deals with the Traditional practices of the people are mostly struggles faced by women in empowering based on the mythical beliefs of the particular themselves. It also talks about the plights of community. Some foods and spices have their immigrants. Among her three novels Hundred own mythical histories. Chitra Banerjee Shades of white has lot of references to food and Divakaruni in her novel The Mistress of Spices has art of cooking. referred to lot of myths related to spices. Those Food consumed by the group of people is myths secretly talks about the characteristics of the highly related to the environment they live. Food spices. of the people depends and varies by the I am turmeric who rose out of the ocean of availability of the ingredients to make food. milk when the devas and asuras churned for the Coconut trees are enormous in Kerala. Preethi treasures of the universe. I am turmeric who came Nair‘s 100 Shades of White is set in both Kerala and after the poison and before the nectar and thus lie London background. By explaining about the in between‖ (M.S, 13) ingredients used in cooking Preethi Nair has People living in the host land experience cleverly insists its background. ―Grated coconut cultural clash, nostalgia, double consciousness, added to many dishes soothed and comforted‖ (H. hopelessness etc. They undergo lot of S.W 55). Because, Kerala Cuisine is mostly based psychological problems. The art of cooking helps on coconut and it‘s by products. them to find peace for their mind. Each spices and Food is one of the principal factors in ingredients in the food has unique characteristics. celebrating festival. Onam is the harvest festival Just the right amount of cumin to stimulate celebrated in Kerala. Dishes prepared during the appetite for life, a cinnamon quill to bring spice or festival holds a crucial role in that festival. In order action into stagnant phases of life , lemon juice to to describes about the festival the author gives diffuse an argument , chilli to relieve pain and 66 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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turmeric to heal the heart. Freshly picked her guest she refers to the desserts of Kolkata. She coriander leaves tempered bad humour and gave a says: ―Life in Kolkata seemed dangerous and sense of clarity, ferry peppered rasam warmed the exhilarating. Kolkatans loved desserts they soul, the grated coconut added to many dishes thought nothing of travelling across the traffic- soothed and comforted . Pounded lentils left to choked city to the famous sweet shop Mrs. soak for days made the batter for soft pancakes Dewans owned to sample her Durga filled with shallow fried Masala potates for sense Mohan‖(B.W.V.G, 143). Whenever Bela thinks of pride and stability. Golden beans added to about her native she reminds of its sweets and that vegetable thoran were for longevity and remind her memory while living in Kolkatta. prosperity. (H.S.W 55) The art of cooking is knowingly or Food is not only for fulfilling our hunger it unknowingly connected with feminine gender. It also have the power of curing the human illness. It became their strength too. Culinary skill is a hope cures both physical and mental illness. It serves as of woman. It helps a lot in woman empowerment. a curative to diaspora people. In the novels The Lot of women left by their husbands‘ life was Mistress of Spices, Before We visit the Goddess an 100 enhanced by their culinary skills. It gives them Shades of White characters find solace through safety, serenity, and stability. Kitchen become cooking. Nalini, the protagonist of 100 Shades of earthly heaven to lonely women as it gives White, cooks Indian food even though her children happiness to their soul. Nalini, Nalini‘s mother, no longer ate her food as they were adapted to the and Bela, were the best examples of this case. food of London. She cooks, because it is her Thus, food and culinary art serves as a symbol hobby and later it became the only hope to fulfill for diasporic writers to explain the diasporic her financial requirement in the host land. In the consciousness of the immigrant people. Chitra novel Before We Visit the Goddess cooking helps Banerjee Divakaruni and Preethi Nair had used Bela to get out of guilty feeling. In Mistress of food and spices to explain their thoughts. Thus, Spices, spices became the companion of Tilo food becomes the functional and effective symbol before she meets her love and spices serves as a in Indian diasporic literature to present the plights medicine to her customers‘ problems. Tilo gives of immigrant people. Thus Culinary Ingredients turmeric to Ahuja‘s wife as it has healing power. and art become one of the effective tools in writing People of diaspora suffer from cultural clash it Diasporic literature. reflects in their food habits too. By referring to the fusion cooking the novelists has successfully References portrayed the cultural clash experienced by the 1. Divakaruni, Chitra Banerjee. The Mistress of immigrants and their struggles in assimilating and Spices. Great Britain:Doubleday.1997.print. a culturing to the new culture. When compared to 2. ---Before We Visit the Goddess. Great Britain: first generation, Second generation immigrants Simon & Schuster UK Ltd. 2016.print. easily adopt to the new culture. Tara, in the novel 3. Kurlansky, Mark. Choice cuts: A Savory Before We Visit the Goddess and Maya and Sachin , Selection of Food Writing from Around the World children of Nalini and Raul in 100 Shades of White and Throughout history. N.p .Penguin Books. adopts to western food where it is hard for Bela 2004. Print Nalini as they where first generation immigrants. 4. Nair,Preethi.100 Shades of White. Great The Nostalgic feelings of the immigrants also Britain:Hapercollins.2004.print. can be explained through food and culinary skill. Even though Bela spent nearly twenty years in America her kitchen was filled with Bengali dishes like singaras, mishti doi, murgir jhol etc. when Bela wants to explain about her native Kolkata to
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SLAVE NARRATIVES: AN ANTI-SLAVERY PROPAGANDA IN THE AFRICAN AMERICAN LITERATURE
Ms.M.Sumathy Research Scholar, Sadakathullah Appa College Rahumath Nagar, Tirunelveli
Abstract Every revolution began with problems in the pre-revolutionary time. This article tries to explain how slave narratives emerged out of slavery, cruelty, progressive dehumanitization, awareness among the slaves of their social status, the resolutions to quit slavery, demands of the black intellectuals, resistance of the slaves themselves, etc. Also tries to explore how the slave narratives became powerful anti-slavery propaganda in the African American literature. And explains how oral history or stories of the ex- slaves later developed into the fictional works, as slave narratives. And finally, how all these factors instead resulted in the revolutions and Civil War of America. Keywords: Slavery, Dehumanization, Education, Pamphlets, Slave Narratives, Anti-Slavery propaganda.
Though slavery had its origin from the ancient There were laws that protected some of their times, the racially based American slavery became rights. As indentured servitude became an a significant one, because enslavement, racism, expensive one, the colonies and the landowners and abuse can be wholly called as American turned to a system of African slavery. The servants slavery. It carried away millions of Africans from thus brought into the country, who were not their homelands in the name of trade called Christians, were considered as slaves. All Negroes, transatlantic slave trade to the New World. The Mullatoes, and Indian slaves with in this Africans were imported to the United States of dominion, also had the same type of treatments. America to work in the plantations, mines, rail In the plantations and the working places the roads and to perform domestic servitudes. As the enslaved people were treated less than the human economic condition of Africa was devasting beings. They were considered as animals by the during the eighteenth century, the human overseers. The overseers were the supervisors in resources began to move away through all possible the plantations. They were mostly cruel and routes from the continent. The African slaves were unkind towards the slaves. The account of the purchased by the land owners and slave holders to slave life in the plantations can be obtained from build the United States of America, and the the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an prosperity of the Christian States of Europe. American Slave. In his narrative Douglass The establishment of plantations and the exposed the brutality, the progressive British colonies increased the demand and the dehumanitization of both the slaves and the slave import of African slaves to the New World. The owners, and the efforts taken by the slave owners slave trade supplied the workforce for the colonial to keep their slaves in the mental darkness. plantations and mines, where gold, silver, sugar, WM.LLOYD GARRISON, the publisher of cocoa, cotton, tobacco, and coffee were produced. THE LIBERATOR, an abolitionist paper says They became the chief material in the that ―if it were less cruel to reduce a human being international trade. The earliest settlers soon to the condition of a thing, than to give him a realized that they had lots of lands to care for, but severe flagellation, or to deprive him of necessary no one to care for it. The indentured servitude was food and clothing! As if whips, chains, thumb- born as a result of the need of the cheap labour. screws, paddles, bloodhounds, overseers, drivers, According to that system, the servants had to work patrols, were not all indispensable to keep the for four to seven years of bondage in exchange for slaves down, and to give protection to their passage, room, board, lodging and freedom dues. ruthless oppressors‖, it indicates the partiality of
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the rules which tries to shield the unmerciful acts sanctioned slavery, the abolitionists had to face a of the slave owners (Fred Doug-preface). long battle. Heartening changes came after the Frederick Douglass in his narrative had American Revolution. Many Northern States frankly disclosed the place of his birth, the names began to eliminate slavery slowly. The most of those who claimed ownership in his body and consistent abolitionist activity came from the soul, and the names also of those who committed African American community to get rid of slave the crimes which he has alleged against them. The system. From the Revolution until the Civil War effect of religious profession on the conduct of they had to work excessively to tear down the southern masters is vividly described in this system. narrative. The testimony of Douglass, on this African Americans employed many tactics point is ―A slaveholder‘s profession of Christianity and strategies in the struggle for freedom. They is a palpable imposture. He is a felon of the used an array of tools to challenge slavery and highest grade. He is a man-stealer. It is of no claim equality, in courts of law during the 19th importance what you put in the other scale‖. century. Some of the non-violent tactics were (Fred. Doug- preface) freedom suits, literary protests, anti-slavery The conditions of the slaves in the plantations speeches and petitions to end slavery and slave are portrayed well in the narrative of Douglass. In trade. No single tactic proved more effective in the the course of his Narrative, he relates two black abolitionist struggle than slave narratives. instances of murderous cruelty, the allowances of An entirely new genre of literature incorporated by food, and their yearly clothing, the allowance of the former slaves and their faithful friends in the the slave children, the nakedness of the slave Atlantic world from the late 18th century onward children, lack of bed, time, and blanket to sleep. created awareness among the people. These tales He says that, when their work in the field is done, illustrated the horrors of slavery in the USA and most of them would wash, mend, and cook for made the white readers realize slavery abolition as that night. Many of their sleeping hours were a worthy cause. It also persuaded American consumed in preparing the field for the next day. society to discuss about slavery abolition seriously. And when the field was done for the next day‘s Slave Narratives were written to evoke strong work, old and young, male and female, married emotions of anger and sympathy, and activism. and single, would drop down side by side, on one The abolitionists used not only words but also common bed, on the cold damp floor, each images to exhibit horrors in the slavery and slave covering themselves with their miserable blankets. trade. It also comprised of the most effective and They all would sleep till they hear the driver‘s influential traditions and culture of African horn. On hearing the sound, all must rise, and be Americans. The slave narratives can be off to the field. No one should be absent for the categorised into three types. They are Tales of field work, everyone must be at their post, and Religious Redemption, Tales to Inspire those who absent were punished severely, there Abolitionist Movement, and Tales of Progress. was no age or sex finds any favour. The goals of the slave narratives to expose the Some of the slaves who suffered more in the cruelty of the individual slave owners arouse the field work tried to escape from the slave life. sympathy of the white people, denial of education, Sometimes they were caught and put to death by break-up of families, and the killing effect of the the slave holders. But some of them escaped slavery on both the masters and the slaves. And to successfully and reached North America, where expose the evil effects on the enslaved African the influence of the slavery was less. The slaves men, women, and children, its spiritual thus escaped, united themselves in the Abolitionist corruption, physical pain, and the effects of this Movements and raised their voice for the peculiar institution on Humanity. Some of the liberation of the millions of enslaved people famous narratives which greatly influenced people suffering in the slavery. As centuries of religious, were the narratives of Olaudah Equiano, economic, social, and political thought had Frederick Douglass, Harriet Ann Jacobs, Solomon 69 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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Northup, Elizabeth Keckley, etc. They all united National Humanities Center. Date you themselves in the abolitionist movements and accessed essay. became passionate activists. Thus, the slave http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/tserve/fr narratives were used as Anti-Slavery Propaganda. eedom/1609-1865/essays/slavenarrative.htm As a result of all this struggles, the Slave Trade 4. American slave . Boston: Anti-Slavery Office. Act was enacted in 1808 and Slavery Abolition [Online Text] Retrieved from the Library of Act was issued in 1834. Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/82225385/. References 5. "Preface" by W.L. Garrison: p. [iii]-xii. Also 1. Equiano, Olaudah. The Interesting Narrative of available in digital form on the Library of the life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, Congress Web site. the African. Written by himself , 2 vols 6. Jacobs, Harriet A. (Harriet Ann), 1813-1897. (London: printed and sold for the author, Incidents In the Life of a Slave Girl : Written 1789). The first edition. by Herself. Edited by L. Maria Child. London: 2. Carretta, Vincent. ―introduction,‖ in The Hodson and Son, 22, Portugal Street, Lincoln's Interesting narrative of Olaudah Equiano. New Inn, 1862. Print. York: Penguin Books, 2003. 3. Andrews, William L. ―How to Read a Slave Narrative.‖ Freedom‘s Story, TeacherServe©.
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SUBSISTENCE OF TRIBALS IN MAMANG DAI’S THE LEGENDS OF PENSAM
Ms.M.Benazir Nuzrath Ph.D. Research Scholar, Research Department of English Sadakathullah Appa College, Tirunelveli
Abstract The present paper apprises the subsistence of tribals in Mamang Dai‟s The legends of Pensam. Mamang Dai is a Prestigious Sakitya Akademi Awardee from Arunachal Pradesh whose writings illustrates the life of tribals. There are more than twenty fie major tribes in this part of the world; the author brings to focus intricately woven stories of her own „Adi‟ tribe with their myths, legends, oral history and daily living patterns. This is a community that lies at the foothills of the Himalayas, sharing borders with China, Myanmar and Bhutan. The aim of the present paper is to identify the subsistence of tribals in Mamang Dai‟s Short story collection, The Legends Of Pensam (2006). Dai has sketched a combination of legends and superstitions, which are entangled with the lives of the tribals in Arunachal Pradesh. The paper highlights the livelihood, myths, Legends and understanding of the Adi‟s in the lesser known world. Keywords: Folklore, Myth, Livelihood, Modernisation.
Introdction note ―But the old villagers who miles every day Mamang Dai is a poet, novelist and journalist say: ‗When you look at the land you forget your and one of the electrifying new voices in English aches and pains.‘‖ No one was surprised when to emerge from North-East India. She was a they heard the death of Hoxo‘s father in a hunting correspondent for the Sentinel, The Telegraph and accident. The villagers were used to tragic the Hindustan Times. Her book Arunachal Pradesh: incidents. Their state of mind about myth is The Hidden Land which received the State‘s first apparent through the following lines: annual Verrier Elwin Award, 2003. Her other ―Ever since the arrival of firearms into these books include The Legends of Pensam, Mountain hills, hunting had become a passion. Suddenly, on Harvest – the Food of Arunachal Pradesh, Stupid any given day, a man would stand up, stretch Cupid, The Black Hill, River Poems and two himself, pick up his gun and walk offinto the illustrated books of folklore - The Sky forest. Many of the hunters disappeared for days, Queen and Once upon a Moon time. huddled in machan or perchad,alert, on a broad The short stories in The Legends of Pensam is branch(a diary of the world10).‖ divided into four parts representing the phases of The tribals being advocated to the animistic encroachment and development of the village, the faith, believed in co-existence with the natural subsistance of the characters, and their channel world along with the presence of spirits in their through the various stages of life. The book begins forests and rivers. We can find many characters with an epigraph of the writer stating that the killed inexplicably inside thick, dense forests. In word ‗pensam‘ in the title means ‗in-between‘ in the episode of the perfect man Kamur, when he her own Adi language which implies the middle, cut his baby girl and attacks his wife, the elders in or middle ground, but it may be interpreted as the the village realized his atrocious crime but also hidden spaces of heart where a secret garden believed him when he said that he did it in a grows. 'haunted' moment. The first part ―a diary of the world‖ is about The second part ―songs of the rhapsodist‖ the first generation of villagers. The village is begins with the setting up of an administrative unit portrayed in the primitive age with residents by the British. A British political officer set out sustaining on hunting and primitive agriculture. from the plains of Assam on the assignment to Their love for their land is revealed in the author‘s explore the course of the river Siang flowing 71 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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through the territory of the Adi‘s. The tribe‘s Later they return to the village. Social and common man Noel Williamson was killed by an economic development leads to construction of a angry Adi in the village of Komsing. They feared satellite township where the privileged congregate. that he might bring troops to destroy the villages. Even then the Adi‘s connection with the It is true that the tribes have been subjected to the traditional past is not broken. worst type of societal exploitation. They are In ―a matter of time‖, the book confirms how mainly landless with little control over resources even a distant, far flung land near the Himalayas such as land, forest and water though they cannot escape the influence of the ‗new world‘. constitute a large proportion of agricultural The Tribes in village acknowledged this change laborers, casual laborers, plantation laborers, with both anxiety and hope. The tribes were industrial laborers etc., which leads to their fear of almost wrecked when their granary doors were existence. broken for the construction of road. ―The village According to the census, in India, the seemed to stop breathing The clear air shimmered Scheduled Tribes population is around 84.3 and the longhouses shone like crouched monoliths million and is considered to be socially and with their fringe of wild plantain neatly trimmed economically disadvantaged. Their percentages in over the narrow doors (a matter of time 148).‖ the population and numbers however vary from Thus Mamang Dai‘s descriptive ability State to State, 50% of the India‘s tribal population pictures the subsistence of tribals in The Legend of is concentrated in the North-eastern region of the Pensam. Her choice of words is plain without country, who are, geographically and culturally, superfluity. Her style is simple and concise. The are at widely different stages of social as well as book takes us to the green mountains and the their economic development is concerned and flowing rivers in Arunachal Pradesh. Her writing their problems too differ from area to area within imparts a radiance and reality which is quite very their own groups. uncommon in contemporary Indian writing. Apart from human exploitation the tribes also had the fear of the vagary of the weather that References people living here have to compete with. The rain 1. Bhabha, Homi K. The Location of Culture lashes ferociously day in and day out in this London: Routledge, 1994. region, followed by times when the sun and heat 2. Dai, Mamang. The Legends Of Pensam. India: become unbearable. This throws the tribals into Penguin,2006. fume. There is no doubt that the weather, with its 3. Elwin,Verrier. A New Deal for Tribal India. constant fear of earthquakes, landslides and India, 1963. floods, is a part of nature‘s cruelty that tribes here 4. Gupta, Ramnika. Tribal Contemporary Issues: have come to understand. Their wrench of the Appraisal and Intervention. New Delhi: tribes is evident through the conversation between 5. Concept Publishing Company, 2011. Arsi and Mamo, "Is this a place to live? she had asked. ‗Why did our forefathers choose this place? Web Sources Surely, we are outcasts dumped in this bone and 1. www.scroll.in knuckle part of the world!‘.‘ What can one say 2. www.livemint.com that!‘ Mamo Dumi had replied. ‗This is our 3. www.thehindu.com world‘(daughters of the village 74).‖ In the third part of the book we can find modernisation setting in. The tribes receive better education and some go out into the world and achieve academic and professional distinction.
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BIOGRAPHY: AN EFFECTIVE TOOL FOR TEACHING ENGLISH LANGUAGE
Ms.M.Ummu Jasmine Part-Time Ph.D. Scholar, Sadakathullah Appa College Rahmath Nagar, Tirunelveli
Abstract English is the most widely spoken language in the world. In India, the students have to learn English as a second language and compulsory subject in their higher education. Many researchers suggest that no single method and approach is perfect in English language teaching classroom. Each method has its own intrinsic worth and also some disadvantages. Incorporating Literature in the language classroom demonstrates the supremacy and delight of language. It is a valuable tool for teaching language skills (i.e. reading, writing, listening and speaking) and language areas (i.e. vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation, etc.). In recent years, biography has become more popular literary form. Inclusion of biography in the language teaching course helps the student‟s progress and gives outstanding result in language attainment. This paper proves that the English language teaching through biographies is a successful tool to make the teaching-learning process effective.
Introdction of interest and negative attitude towards learning English is the most widely spoken language in English language. Thus their learning and the world. India has more second- language achievement is hindered. speakers. As a developing country, it wants to take Incorporating Literature in the language the advantage of the global language to facilitate classroom demonstrates the supremacy and its worldwide influence. The learning of English delight of language. It is a valuable tool for language begins on the day a child entering the teaching language skills (i.e. reading, writing, school. People are considered English as the gate- listening and speaking) and language areas (i.e. way of all knowledge. It is like a passport for vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation, etc.). employment. Most of the teachers consider literature as a English Language learning means obtaining separate subject that has nothing to do with four skills. It enables in transferring a child into a language teaching and learning. But there are grown up. English language teaching has taken numerous advantages for the language learners place through variety of methods and materials for with the addition of literature in the educational example, communicative methodology, curriculum. According to Coolie and Slater, communicative language teaching and As we shall suggest through many activities in communicative approach, etc. Many researchers this book, a literary text can serve as an excellent suggest that no single method and approach is prompt for oral work. In all these ways, a student faultless in English language teaching classroom. working with literature is helped with the basic Each method has its own intrinsic worth and also skills of language learning. Moreover, literature some disadvantages. helps extend the intermediate or advanced The learners are facing many obstacles in learner‘s awareness of the range of language itself. learning English as a second and compulsory (7) subject. The students become trapped in a great Literature has proved a good source that effort over the use of English and their native fulfills the four skills. It encourages more language. Many learners not succeed to amend in thoughtful and purposeful language learning. It an unreceptive, ghastly environment where they helps the students to improve their reading are made fun of when they try to speak English comprehension of English. It gives the chance to and their native language. So they end up silent open the eyes of the students as they see how the and withdraw from participation. They have lack other people think, interpret and act on a variety of things. It provides the learners with a lot of 73 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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opportunity to learn effectively to use words in tirelessly towards building a strong and self-reliant different contexts. nation. He was always interested in ways to alleviate the The selection of the literary text regarding the plight of the oppressed and the marginalized. He used to desires, expectations, interests and the language tell us that the children of India are the future of the level of the students becomes significant. In recent country, and he took a keen interest in their welfare. He years, biography has become more popular literary always launched frontal attacks against corruption, genre. Inclusion of biography in the language bribery, communalism, and every day was a new teaching course helps the student‘s progress and experience with Dr. Kalam. For him, everything was gives outstanding result in language attainment. It important, regardless of its stature. He used to insist on is an unexplored genre in English literature. the need for every paper to be studied. His memory was Reading biographies is educational, inspiring as enviable. His view was that if anything happened under well as enjoyable. It is offering valuable life lessons one‟s charge, then one should take responsibility for it, as to the students. Its characters are real; they face a leader. One should not conclude that he/she was not real situations and their actions motivate them to aware and that the task was delegated to a subordinate. think in a positive way. Learning from the I specifically remember an incident, when the Message mistakes and challenges of others is a powerful Section under my purview inadvertently sent a letter to tool for life success. the family of a M.P. in U.P. on the demise of another Biographies help the learners to acquire four M.P. of the same name. I explained the mistake to the skills in addition to exemplify grammatical Hon‟ble President when I came to know about it, structures and presenting new vocabularies, regretting in my capacity as Head of Team. His anger putting up confidence and encouraging the vanished as soon as said, ‟Sir, I am responsible for this. I students to become skilled at English language should have had checked the correct address.‟ He then effectively. The biographies stimulate the students asked me to telephonically connect to the M.P. and such as: personally expressed his regret.”(Khan, pgs 4-5) Give cultural awareness, The above excerpt is taken from the biography Reduce psychological stress, The People‟s President: Dr.A.P.J. Abdul Kalam Change negative attitude of learning english, written by S.M.Khan. The teacher can teach the Understand the historical truths of life, parts of speech, vocabularies, gerund and articles. Gain knowledge of inborn goodness of man, Parts of Speech Realize the philosophy of life, The researcher has taught different forms of Become conscious about the past as well as the same word. It is mandatory to know the the present category of words. Same words may be used as a Allow seeing the world in new ways, noun, adjective, adverb, verb etc. For example, promoting self-discovery,
Increase the empathy skills, Word: Study Engage the mind to be active in thinking Noun: I used to meet him regularly in his study critically. for official work. This paper puts forth few examples from the Verb: He used to insist on the need for every paper biographies which can be used in the language to be studied. classroom. Due to the time and space constraints, Word: interest the researcher gives few language facets in the Verb: He was always interested in ways to examples. alleviate the plight of the oppressed… “Every day with Dr Kalam was a new experience. I Noun: …and he took a keen interest in their used to meet him regularly in his study for official work. welfare. It was a direct briefing to him and a direct taking of Word: response instructions from him. His main focus was to make Noun: , then one should take responsibility for it, India a developed nation by 2020. He was working as a leader. 74 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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Adjective: Sir, I am responsible for this. Work Sheet Vocabulary I. List the adjectives and adverbs from the given Vocabulary plays a crucial role in English text. Language learning. Lack of vocabulary is an Adjective Adverb important factor, where students fail to express ______simple ideas or to understand a simple passage in ______English. The students find out their hard words ______from the text, and they have been insisted to refer the dictionary for knowing these meanings and II. Underline the difficult words. Use your transcriptions. For example, dictionary and find out the meanings. self-reliant : independent ______oppress : keep down ______launch : begin ______III. Write simple sentences using gerund. Articles ______At first the brief explanation is given about ______articles in Engish. The determiners a, an and the ______are called Articles. A and an are known as Another example from the biography The 100: Indefinite articles and the is Definite article. The A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History indefinite articles are used before singular nouns written by Michael H. Hart which can be used in and the definite article denotes both the singular language classroom. and plural nouns. The article ‗a‘ is used in the Now, one might grant that Newton was by far the beginning of a consonant sound word and ‗an‘ greatest and most influential scientist who ever lived but before a word beginning with a vowel sound . ‗An‘ still ask why he should be ranked higher than such occurs before the twenty vowel sounds of the major political figures as Alexander the Great or George English language. The students can learn the Washington, and ahead of such major religious figures usages of articles in many places from biographies, as Jesus Christ and Gautama Buddha. My own view is and they find out the same without the help of the that even though political changes are of significance, it teacher. For example, is fair to say that most people in the world were living I specifically remember an incident, when the the same way 500 years after Alexander‟s death as their Message Section under my purview inadvertently sent a forebears had lived five centuries before his time. letter to the family of a M.P. in U.P. on the demise of Similarly, in most of their daily activities, the majority another M.P. of the same name. of human beings were living the same way in 1500 A.D. An incident - the article used before the vowel as human beings had been living in 1500B.C. In the sound word. everyday life of most human beings has been completely A letter - the article referred a singular noun. revolutionized. We dress differently, eat different foods, The family - the article used before the specific work at different jobs, and spend our leisure time a great or particular area. deal differently than people did in 1500 A.D. Scientific discoveries have not only revolutionized technology and Gerund economics; they have also completely changed politics, The teacher explains about the gerund. It is a religious thinking, art and philosophy. Few aspects of verb form that functions as a noun. For example, human activity have remained unchanged by this He was working tirelessly towards building a strong and scientific revolution. (Hart, pg-16) self-reliant nation. The teacher can teach tenses through the It was a direct briefing to him and a direct taking of above extract. Tense refers to the time at which an instructions from him. action takes place. Almost every sentence, we use After teaching the above language functions to communicate with, is tense-bound. It is a the teacher gives a worksheet to the students. grammatical category that helps to locate a 75 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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situation in time. The tenses can be present, past II. Write the regular and irregular verbs. or future. There are three tenses with four Regular Irregular divisions: ______Biographies encourage interactions. They are giving multiple layers of meanings and can be effectively created for discussion and sharing feelings or opinions. The use of biographies is an
effective tool for teaching basic language skills. They use many forms, such as questions to be answered, assertions to the debated, or topics to be expanded, discussion with groups to be established. This paper proves that the English language teaching through biographies is a successful tool to make the teaching-learning Each and every action is related to a particular process effective and it must be enriched, time. Every sentence denotes tense. Learning enhanced and improved language skills. tense does not mean just learning structures and then using them. Students usually make mistake References that they never try to learn the usage of the tenses 1. Collie, J. and Slater S. Literature in Language and just try to memorize the structure of the tense. Classroom. Glascow: Cambridge University They must try to understand the usage of different Press, 1991. Pg-7. Print. tenses and should learn how they can be used in 2. Hart,H.Michael. The 100: A Ranking of the Most different situations. Influential Persons in History. Newyork: After teaching tenses to the students, the 3. Kensington Publishing Corp.,1922. Pg-16. teachers give a worksheet to know their Print. understanding. For example, 4. Khan,S.M. The People‟s President: A.P.J. Abdul Kalam. New Delhi: Bloomsbury Publishing in Work Sheet India, 2016. Pg.4-5. Print. I. Underline the past tenses in the text. Change the 5. Lazar,Gillan. Literature and Language Teaching. past tense into present tense. Glascow: Cambridge University press,1993. ______Print. ______6. https://www.usingenglish.com ______7. https://www.teachingenglish.org.d
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NARRATOLOGY IN MEIRA CHAND’S A FAR HORIZON Ms.H.Rakhiba Assistant Professor of English Hajee Karutha Rowther Howdia College, Uthamapalayam
Introdcution western tradition it goes back at least to Plato and Stories are told not only in literature but also Aristotle. in other practices-personal as well as cultural. Technique is a very important weapon for the They are told while making confessions, while writer to write his literary work or work of art sharing one‘s own biographical details, while successfully. Narrative technique is the means of singing folk songs and even while telling lies. This producing a specific effect of a novel. With the shows that narrative is everywhere, in all kinds of employment of right technique only the writer is activities and in all walks of life. Its presence able to convey his ideas to the readers. Technique everywhere can be attributed to its being the oldest acts as the middleman between life and art which form of communication. Even in our own life helps the novelist in interpreting and transforming span, a child is introduced into the order of reality. This creation involves employment of language through narrative. Thus, narrative several devices. It helps the readers to discover encompasses most of the activities of human and travel among other selves, other identities and beings and its simple meaning is anything that tells other variety of human adventures. It is the ‗how‘ a story. This ‗anything‘ includes novel, short story, (technique) rather than the ‗what‘ (subject) that is drama, film, painting, history book, comic strip, instrumental in causing paradigm shifts, in finding gossip, newspaper etc. Whatever may be the literary schools and in originating major literary structure of narrative, as Ronald Barthes observes, trends. Narrative technique is so important that ―It is through narrative we make sense of our one cannot find a writer who has no technique or world‖ (Stuart Sim 275). who eschews technique. Technique is not the Narratology has its roots in structuralism and secondary thing, some external mechanization, a it is the study of the ways in which narratives mechanical affair, but a deep and primary function. The study of ‗Narrative‘ is called operation. Hence narrative technique is not just an ‗Narratology‘. The value of narratology lies in its ornament or super imposed element upon the application. Narrative theory is concerned not content to give it additional value but the intrinsic with the content of individual stories but with quality of the subject matter itself. what stories have in common. The term There are various narrative devices employed ‗Narratology‘ was used by Tzvetan Todorov in by the novelists to explain, explore and objectify 1969 to designate ―a systematic study of Narrative their themes or ideology. Acquainting with these firmly anchored in the tradition of the Russian and narrative devices is prerequisite for the creation, Czech Formalism of the early twentieth century examination as well as understanding of fiction. and French Structuralism and Semiotics of the Depending upon the ideology, theme, writer and sixties‖ (O‘Neill 12). Though, the term is used in a period, the employment of the narrative devices broad sense for all theoretical persuasions of varies. In fact the literariness of the novel unfolds narrative theory, ―it refers specifically to the through the apt and effective use of narrative theories of narrative structure‖ (Prince 4). Gerald devices. The devices which are commonly Prince defines it as ―the study of form and employed by the modern, postmodern and functioning of narrative‖. The term narratology postcolonial writers are story and plot, may be new but not the discipline and in the focalization (point of view), analepsis (flashback),
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prolepsis (flash forward), narration time, memory, interior monologue, authentic and characterization, setting, style, intertextuality, official voices of historical personals, original multidisciplinary pursuit, chutnification, hybridity documentation, edicts, etc. to present the period in etc. the novel. The novel moves in flash back in non- Meira Chand‘s novel A Far Horizon belongs to chronological order. There are analeptic the genre of the historical novel. With the help of movements characterized by fragmented different narrative strategies, Meira Chand in this sequences, digression and jumbled chronology. novel has re-written history that covers the real The narrative is presented through third person events that took place in Fort William and omniscient narrator along with first person Calcutta in 1756. The story is set in Bengal. It character narrator. The point of views from which traces British interaction with the Indians in the the story is told keeps on changing. Different months leading to the infamous Black Hole of perspectives of the colonized, the downtrodden, Calcutta incident in which approximately 250 the oppressed, the sufferers, the marginals, the white people were imprisoned by Indian colonizers and real historical persona present vivid merchants in a tiny room, leaving only 30 alive account of the period. This shifting focalization the next day. also helps to present vividly the history of that In 1756 Calcutta is a city on the brink of period in Bengal. Empire. The grandiose buildings of White Town, Narratology has two modes of narrative settled about Fort William, are in stark contrast to irrespective of any language and these modes are the bustle of Black Town across the Maratha ―diegesis‖ i.e. ―telling” and ―mimesis‖ i.e. Ditch. The Indian Black Town and British White ―showing‖. In ―telling‖ a story, the Town were under the rule of Siraj –ud-daulah, the writer/narrator often interferes, comments and hot headed young Nawab in Murshidabad. In gives information about the fictional material in White Town, the Chief Magistrate Holwell and the course of the narrative. While in ―showing‖, his arch rival Governor Drake must unite to the writer minimizes his/her presence in the outwit the dangerous schemes of the Murshidabad narrative and it is upon the reader to experience Court. In Black Town the half- cast girl Sati, and understand the narrative on his own. Though believed to be possessed by the Goddess Kali, much preference is given to ―telling‖, both the finds herself a God-Woman and the centre of a modes of narration ―telling‖ and ―showing‖ are religious cult. Her grandmother, Jaya, and her used in A Far Horizon. The following part of the promiscuous mother Rita, married to the narrative is a proof of her mode of narration: ―At Frenchman Demonteguy, battle for the possession last she returned to Fort William and old Parvati of her. Shuttled between the two towns of hurried to greet her. She waited for Emily as a Calcutta, yet belonging to neither, Sati is in search mother would wait for her child. ‗Where did you of her identity. On her journey many fall under go to all by yourself? Running here and there like her spell including Emily, the Governor‘s wife. In a wild thing,‘ Parvati scolded‖ (Chand 101). The far off Murshidabad, the new Nawab is interested author uses the mode of ―telling‖ in a remarkable only in ridding India of the British and their way. She does it with a wish to impart and share growing threat to his country. He descends upon maximum information of the period with the Calcutta with a huge army. Locked into Fort readers. This mode of narration gives more William with a large number of the Black Town freedom to the narrator to make comments on population, the British residents plan their escape. both characters and events. She even enjoys the Their benighted attempt to flee infuriates the liberty of imposing her own view points on the Nawab and ends in the notorious incident of the reader. The point of views from which the story is Black Hole of Calcutta. told keeps on changing throughout in the Chand has re-invented past through using narrative. Chand‘s characterization has a wide different narratological devices while presenting variety as she constructs all types of characters – the personal history with nation‘s history. She uses Jaya, her daughter Rita, her granddaughter Sati 78 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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believed to be possessed by Kali, Emily Drake, with other characters, the third person narrator on Holwell, Demonteguy, and Governor Drake etc. the other hand tells the story from outside by These are the people who are either affected by or having a panoramic view of the whole as may affect directly or indirectly the history itself. omniscient narrator. It is through the omniscient Some of them are those whose destinies are narrator that one experiences the historical period written by others and some are those who write in the novel. The author is busy in giving all the destinies for others. One observes through the details of the actions of others by using the characters and their memories about the world expressions like ―he said‖, ―she thought‖, ―he they lived in during the period of British reign. It is felt‖, ―she observed‖, ―he complained‖ etc. The only through the use of aids like the original mind of the main protagonist Sati is poured out voices in her narratives that Meira Chand vividly through interior monologue in some parts adequately draws the portrait of the period of the novel. Thus, Meira Chand has not limited effectively and emphatically. The main characters the narrative to the technique of interior such as Sati, Jaya, Holwell, and Emily Drake monologue only but has also combined it with remember their past life and incidents. They serve three fold traditional technique direct narrating, as the repository of memory and thus their descriptive passages and conversation. Chand has memories are used not only to present their used these techniques to enable her characters to personal history but nation‘s history as well. dramatize their consciousness, the outward The way the events in the novel are presented happenings and the situations. in non- chronological order present the distinction All the novels at present are impregnated with between the plot and the story of the narrative. chutnification which is an explicit sign of The story moves in flash back. There are analeptic postcolonial literature and Indian post-modernism movements in the novel as the disturbed psyche of going native because chutnification is a major tool the people could only be depicted through the zig- of subversion of the notion English as a meta- zag pattern of the narrative. The memories of the language. Chutnification refers to the process of past and worries of the future haunt the characters making the diction suitable to present the narrative like Sati, Jaya, Emily Drake and through it Chand which is an amalgamation of several cultural, shows how the past may unconsciously be social, and regional factors appropriately. Chand‘s imposed on or interspersed with the present. In employment of Indian words like ―gaddi‖, ―dhal‖, this way Chand includes her readers to participate ―musumbi‖, ―chowkidar‖ proves her usage of imaginatively in the process of the creation of chutnification in her novels. narratives. It is her narrative strategy to place the Meira Chand has relied to a great extent on reader within the text to invite him to participate original historical records to create an emotional in the reconstruction of the story. In different and fictional response to the condition of sufferers. analeptic movements Emily remembers, recollects It is a history conceived by Chand through intense her childhood period spent near Bombay, on a reading and analysis of Indian historical facts. The large indigo farm under the care of the amah story, the theme, the title, the location, the Parvati, her sister Jane‘s marriage and finally her language, the background , the selection of the sister‘s death. Sati is also ravaged by Holwell and narrators, characters, the modes of narration, the is haunted by those memories. plot, the dialogues and the movement of the Another important aspect of narratology is narrative all work together to depict the period of focalization. There is the use of third-person the Calcutta under the East India Company. The narrator along with first person character narrators other narrative strategies like real characters from which has special effects on the narration of the history, their prolonged and sometimes heated story that could not have been narrated otherwise. discussions present the live scenario of the period. While first person character narrator narrates the Such discussions and conversations invite the inner psyche of the characters being one among reader into the hidden folds of the history as well them in the narrative or due to some proximity as to understand the psyche or consciousness of 79 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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the people who have lived in this period. Hence it 2. O‘ Neill, Patrick. Fictions of Discourse; Reading can be concluded that Meira Chand has taken Narrative Theory. Toronto: University of many narratological tools in her in her account to Toronto Press, 1994. Print. create a fantasy world of characters and their 3. Prince, Gerald. Narratology: The Form and experiences of life. Functions of Narrative. Berlin: Mouton, 1982. Print. References 4. Sim, Stuart, ed. The Routledge Companion to 1. Chand, Meira. A Far Horizon. London: Faber Postmodernism. London and New York: and Faber,2001.Print. Routledge, 1999. Print.
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EVOLUTION OF E–LEARNING
Ms.A.J.Saleema Kathoon, M.A., M.Phil., Assistant Professor of English Hajee Karutha Rowther Howdia College, Uthamapalayam
Introduction Tweeter, blogs, mobile phones, interactive boards English as international language has been are available to make the learning procedure more realized by the people as a vital medium to flexible and user friendly. Due to the flexible communicate with one another. In International nature of E-learning, it has got more demand congress and gatherings, English is more often among the people of our country and the used than any other languages. The development requirement is mounting. As the demand is rising, of technology has given advantage for human life. this is the moment to regulate the whole E- Everyone can use technological devices to learning system in a suitable mode and the time to propagate information. increase the quality of existing trends. E-learning Education in the present century is based on is a channel of driving force as it has boomed in the improvement of global and information education and only a few would contradict that it focussed skills. These skills are searching in the has seized no large benefits to teachers and Internet, reading information, collaborative students alike. Tom Kelly quoted that ―E-learning learning, effective communication and critical is about communication, information, education thinking and creativity. The Internet has the and learning.‖ feature of being widely used in education and it is The educational institutions cannot stay inevitable that this feature is becoming more behind prescribed set of information from teacher important day by day. Language learning is a to student over a fixed period of time rather the growing sector in a globalized world. It is educational institutions can make use of the inevitable to make use of e-learning tools in acquirement of knowledge and skills through E- language education. learning. It becomes the responsibility of the Electronic learning or E –learning is a general teachers to collaborate the teaching skills with term used to refer to computer-enhanced learning. technology. Accordingly the student can access It is used interchangeably in so many contexts that easily to meet the demands of the day. it is critical to be clear what one means when one speaks of ‗E-learning‘. In many respects, it is Use of E-learning Tools in Teaching English commonly associated with the field of advanced Internet learning technology, which deals with both the Internet is not merely a source of authentic technologies and associated methodologies in material in English but also a source of learning using networked or multimedia information in the form of courses, articles, technologies. conferences and many more. The teacher can send The concept of e-learning in education has assignments to the students through e-mails and acquired the largest part in every educational can also take online exams. Parents can view their environment. Imparting technology into education children‘s work online at any time. Schools are is really important in the classroom. Broad range linked in a network and work on projects together of electronic media like Internet, Intranets, and prepare materials. Extranets, Satellite, broadcast, audio/video tape, Every school has got its own website. Many interactive TV and CD ROM, You Tube, Skype, software are also available on Internet that
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students can use free of cost. Spelling Bee is one of Blog those an internet resources, which helps the Blogs or Weblogs are websites that people can students to spell English words. write what they want and how they want without having technical information. Readers can also You Tube make comments that are important dynamics of You Tube and other video clip websites have blogs, so there is interaction between the writer become even more popular. You Tube videos can and the readers of the blog. Blogs are personal be used in an ELT classroom for various aspects Web-sites in the form of a diary or a journal. of English as to enhance vocabulary, accents, Blogging has become increasingly popular, pronunciations, voice modulation and many especially in the realm of education as they are a more. The websites also provide English learners great way to share information and generate and classes with a new tool to improve listening discussion. Instead of traditional methods, many skills. The teacher can use it as a tool for educators prefer using these new techniques to improving their listening and speaking, reading help to teach students and gain experience with and writing skills. various forms of social media. E-learning is used to make learning more interesting, motivating, Skype stimulating and meaningful to the students. E- Using Skype provides unlimited possibilities learning tools have enabled change in educational for the teachers and students to collaborate with systems and English language learning. each other anywhere in the world. It provides immense opportunities for the students in a Mobile – Phones foreign language class to connect with classes in Smart – phones and i-Phones allow us to other countries to practice their language skills. connect to the internet through wireless network. Through Skype the teachers can provide Students have internet and various applications on mentoring or homework help to the learners. The their finger tips. Using mobile tools for creating students can also participate in professional learning aids and materials becomes an important activities within the school district. part of informal learning. As more and more people purchase smart phone devices and use Smart- Boards them as their primary device for receiving Interactive white boards are good information, the use of physical text as a form of replacements for traditional whiteboards or flip sending across information has dwindled, as can charts provide ways to show students everything be seen from the sales drop of newspapers which can be presented on a computer‘s desktop. experienced by major News Vendors- Time, Daily With a smart board, teachers can combine video, mail, etc., This trend is slowly but surely creeping audio, web browsing and word processing to teach into educational circles as more educators now students interactively. develop teaching materials in soft copy formats and simply share them to their students. The Twitter multi-facet sharing and storage options provided Twitter is another social network tool that by smart devices will certainly reduce student‘s provides communication every time and dependency on plain text as well as the clutter in everywhere. It is always updated and their rooms. advantageous for the users. The teacher can use many activities for using an online education Wikipedia technology tool to engage students in classroom In the era of the WWW, Wikipedia has activities to develop a better understanding of become the world‘s single largest encyclopedia concepts. and one of the most diverse online communities. Now, the encyclopedia is more than its article content, illustrations and categorizations. In the
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language learning Wikipedia can be used very thinking abilities. They may show learners effectively in developing the reading skills and as a authentic videos of people from different parts of source of information in the project preparation in the world to show how people communicate by the language learning. Wikipedia offers many using Meta communicational elements. documented information in the form of articles. To conclude, it can be said that E-learning is The inherent development among the learners is an assorted range of technological tools and that they can unwittingly develop their skill in systems that can be operated by teachers to use the reading. Wikis also provide an opportunity for E-learning tools in language teaching. The use of developing writing skill. technology in classroom, based language teaching is more comfortable than a black board. With the Podcasts changing needs of the time, technology is Podcasts are very useful in developing developing day-by day. we are living in the 21st speaking and listening skills. They are used in Century and it is the age of technological order to create and distribute audio and video advancement. Thus the technology advancements programs in the Internet. Podcasts can be of any will continue to reshape learning over the Internet length, starting from several minutes till several with increasing use of advanced tools and hours, authentic and also created for educational technique. purposes. English learners might find directories of podcasts on the following web-page: References www.podomatic.com. Video sharing sites such as 1. Bracewell, R., Brewleux, A., Laferriere, T., YouTube, Howcast, Teacher Tube, Daily motion Benoit, J. & Abdous, M. (1998): The and BBC learning English videos help teachers emerging contribution of online resources and and students in learning and reaching foreign tools to classroom learning and teaching‖. languages. It is possible to find educational 2. Altschuler C. Glenn ―The E-learning Curve: ‖ information in almost every topic and videos NY Times; August 5, 2001. increase student motivation in class. It stimulates 3. Technology and change in English Language different types of learners as students can learn Teaching. Asia TETL Journal, 7(4), 213-227. visually through videos and PDFs, auditory 4. www.virtual- through audio clips, and also by doing it college.co.uk/elearning/elearning.aspx physically. Thus students are motivated to learn and excel. In today‘s world language learners make use of Internet and Social Networking sites in their learning. Teachers may make use of technology in and out of class to support learners critical
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DEMYTHOLOGIZING THE AMERICAN PAST IN ISHMAEL REED’S “FLIGHT TO CANADA”
Mr.S.Mohamed Rowther Assistant Professor of English Hajee Karutha Rowther Howdia College (Autonomous), Uthamapalayam
Introdcution ―Flight to Canada‖ continues Reed‘s playful Among contemporary African-American reflections on the black literary tradition and its writers, Ishmael Reed is one of the most relationship to Western literary forms. A parody innovative, prolific, and controversial. To date he of the nineteenth-century antebellum slave has published nine novels, five collections of narrative, ―Flight to Canada‖ is a wildly comic poems, four collections of essays, and four plays. novel that reverses a number of the genre‘s He has also authored three television productions, formulas, in particular the association of freedom an opera, and a ―gospera‖. Some of his poetry has with the movement from South to North. Reed‘s been set to music and produced on record. A narrator, Raven Quickskill, is an escaped slave sampling of his fiction, poetry, and essays has who has returned south to tell the story of Uncle been collected in ―The Reed Reader‖ (2000). As a Robin, a loyal house slave. The work is also a teacher, a cultural activist, and especially an editor commentary on the ways in which the slave‘s and publisher, Read has been an advocate of story was appropriated by whites. Early in the multiculturalism in American literature since the narrative Quickskill identifies Uncle Robin with early 1970s. His experimental work, which draws Harriet Beecher Stowe‘s Uncle Tom and states his from myth, history, popular culture, and African- intention to reappropriate the slave‘s story from American oral culture, can be classified as the white author. Determined to give Uncle Robin ―populist postmodernist‖. The most characteristic ―the protection‖ that Uncle Tom didn‘t have, attribute of his work is its aggressive, provocative, Quickskill will tell Robin‘s story ―using a process and sometimes outrageous humor. the old curers used, [so that] to lay hands on the Ishmael Scott Reed is innovative, dynamic, story would be lethal to the thief.‖ challenging, and controversial. ―I see life as Reed liberates the slave narrative from its mysterious, holy, profound, exiting, serious, and didactic and melodramatic roots by overlaying the fun,‖ he is quoted in the Heath Anthology of present on the past and reinventing character American Literature. He as often challenges black types. Quickskill makes his escape to Canada on a literary traditions as white ones. The 1980s began jumbo jet, the country hears the Emancipation is what Reed has called his ―writin‘ is fightin‘ ‖ replayed on television. Various twentieth-century period. After moving from the suburbs to inner- figures like Barbara Walters and Yul Brynner city Oakland in 1979, Reed‘s work became make appearances as does Abraham Lincoln, who increasingly concerned with the effect of Ronald dances to ―Hello Dolly‖ with the house slave, Reagan‘s policies on African Americans, the Mammy Barracuda. Quickskill‘s native idealism is abandonment of the poor, and the introduction of the source of much of Reed‘s satire. Booed on the crack cocaine into black communities. His two antislavery circuit and disillusioned by the most celebrated novels, ―Mumbo Jumbo‖ (1972) unheroic and self-serving behavior of his and ―Flight to Canada‖ (1976) are brilliant companions, Quickskill concludes that Canada is realizations of his aesthetic. no different from the United States and returns South. Yet the South he returns to is very different
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from the one he left. Massa Swille is dead, because horrifying detail.‖ The fugitive hero, Raven his sister‘s ghost pushed him into the fireplace in Quickskill, has a beautiful Indian lover and when the heat of an incestuous embrace. Clever Robin they enter a tavern two of the female slaves help manipulated Massa Swille‘s will, inherited the begin to ―let out their slave cackle, giving them plantation, and has turned it into a home for black signifying looks.‖ No black matriarchy for Reed. artists and craftsmen. This satiric novel has motifs that appear in various Reed‘s romp with the slave narrative is a forms in all of Reed‘s novels. Here, Reed metaphor of the black artist‘s struggle to gain demythologizes a past that has been prejudicial to narrative control over his story. In his, ―Flight to blacks: the Civil War and the book that allegedly Canada‖ (1976), Reed lampooned the slave caused it, ―Uncle Tom‘s Cabin‖ (1852). narrative and, particularly, Harriet Beecher Reed not only debunks what are, in his eyes, Stowe‘s novel ―Uncle Tom‘s Cabin‖. The major jaded legends, but also tries to createnew myths, plot of the novel involves the escape of Raven new perspectives on history, character, and race. Quickskill from his owner, Massa Arthur Swille, There are no untarnished heroes, white or black. and Swille‘s efforts to capture Quickskill. The ―Flight to Canada‖ is also another attempt at the historical Canada is the eventual destination Bildungsroman. The thematic reason for favoring where Quickskill and other slaves wish to arrive the genre is clear: Reed‘s message is the need for when they flee Virginia, but this historical Canada awareness, for education. While Reed puts his is not the heaven slaves think, and pray, it will be. character through a series of adventures that Yet in the face of the depressing stories about corrupt him or that educate him in non-Western Canada from his friends Leechfield, Carpenter, perspectives, he is shocking the reader into those Cato, and 40s, Quickskill will not relinquish his perspectives as well. The protagonist may be Reed dream. For him, Canada is personified beyond the himself coming to awareness. Raven Quickskill is physical plane-it is a metaphor for happiness, be it a writer finding his way through years of black ―exile, death, art, liberation, or a woman.‖ writes history in America. As highly individual as Reed Quickskill in the novel. Henry Louis Bates is in his approach to the novel form, the wisdom commented that ―Flight to Canada‖ is a major he teaches is that of other black writer. work, perhaps Reed‘s most ‗intelligent‘ novel. One ―Flight to Canada‖ is far from a conventional senses here a sort of ending for this aspect of his novel. The characters do not belong to a world earlier fiction: for the search for The Word, which resembling everyday reality. Their circumstances Reed began in ―Mumbo Jumbo‖, has realized are too farcical and too improbable, the distortions itself finally in the successful search for the Text– of history too great, and the manipulation of every the text that at all points comments upon itself.‖ element of the fictional form to make a point too Reed has continued to satirize in subsequent blatant for the characters to be convincing as novels, occasionally analyzing the American human beings. Yet Reed animates his characters. political and economic systems. By the end of the novel, one identifies with Raven In the novel, Reed‘s takeoff on the antebellum Quickskill and Uncle Robin as survivors in a South, black women are also prominent among world that has lost its meaning. Raven is even the boogey persons who get theirs. A black close to being the protagonist in a Bildungsroman. mammy in velvet, loyal to the incestuous, The opening pages virtually identify him with the necrophiliac master, claims that Jesus got tired of author of the book, and the story itself traces his Harriet Beecher Stowe, who ripped off Uncle coming to awareness. When he leaves the Tom‘s Cabin from the narrative of Josiah Henson, plantation, he is a native idealist engaged in and therefore caused one of her sons to be antislavery activities. He regards not only Arthur wounded in the war and the other to get Swille but also Uncle Robin as his enemy. He ‗drownded.‖ The light-skinned overseer tells the believes that Canada is freedom, that the slaves master, ―I armed the woman slaves. They‘ll keep who escape with him will join the cause, that order. They‘ll dismember them niggers with QuawQuaw, as a Native American, shares his 85 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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civil rights crusade. One by one, events disabuse Reed suggests, from pragmatic political him of his illusions. Yet he does not become a considerations. Other characters fill out the cynic. He holds on to a belief in his inner identity- sociopolitical scene. and in literature as the expression of it. His novel, Yankee Jack, as amoral as Swille, represents including the story of Uncle Robin, exposes the the new order of capitalist society. More tolerant giant villains of American society through the eyes than Swille, he is perfectly willing to admit to of one who has suffered at their hands. If Raven is Raven his methods and motives because he is the representation of the black writer who has certain that Raven will have no real power to discovered his role in American society, Uncle oppose him. He invites Raven to join him and Robin is the Uncle Tom who has used engages him in physical combat to assert his subservience to obtain his independence and the superiority, but when Raven rejects him, he property that was his due. What redeems Uncle voluntarily sets Raven ashore in Canada. Princess Robin is not his cleverness, though Reed respects QuawQuaw embodies the romantic dream of it, but his willingness to learn and to change. He innocence, pure love, art for its own sake, and the decides to use his property not for his personal nobility of primitive American life: She is the comfort but for the encouragement of black Native American. Nevertheless, her real nature culture. The castle becomes a location for emerges when she sacrifices her integrity to the ―craftsmen from all over the South: blacksmiths, god of commercialism. Mummy Barracuda as the teachers, sculptors, writers.‖ What is more, Robin traditional Southern mammy never appears as extends his own ―connaissance‖ by traveling to anything other that what she is a sadistic enforcer the ―Ashanti Holy Land.‖ Recognition of African of the Southern white mentality. The two slaves origins and African religion is an essential part of who escape with Raven reflect inadequate Reed‘s message. His wit breathes life into other response to white oppression: Stray Leechfield‘s characters as well. Arthur Swille, as evil preserver acceptance of a masochistic role in pornographic of the slave mentality, entices readers with his pictures and 40s‘ confused linking of militancy devilishness, especially in the scene with Lincoln: and withdrawal. Such characterizations are, then, Swille is the epitome of the aristocratic contempt not what one might expect or even accept at first for humble origins, the masses, moral principle, glance, but they are appropriate in the novel that for humble origins, the masses, moral principle, Reed creates: a satire on American (Western) and selfless motives. He is Mephistopheles. Reed culture. makes Swille an engaging personality because One of the main ideas of the novel never such single-mindedness in the wielding of power appears as explicit statement. While a fascinates, or as Reed would say, then con man chronological arrangement of events controls the always has an audience in America. Reed‘s structure-except for the poem-preface and the judgment of Swille is clear, however, when the opening chapter, and the simultaneity of certain daimones of his son and sister return to avenge scenes in the North and South that follow their deaths. Lincoln, too, though more of a sequentially-the attitude toward time is hardly background figure than Swille, has a convincing conventional, that is, not that to which one is reality. He is not the Lincoln one knows from accustomed in a piece of fiction. Reed myth, or even from history, but a totally practical superimposes the present on the past. He politician motivated by political expediency. He accomplishes the merger through language, using chooses to emancipate the slave because the ideal twentieth century diction to describe nineteenth is politically sound; it will attract support to the century events and attitudes. He refers to facts, Northern cause. Lincoln exhibits his own technology, events, movements and people that a cleverness in the dialogue with Swille, and in fact nineteenth century character could not know. wins the confrontation. The Emancipation Mingling with the events of the 1860‘s are the Proclamation itself is an inspiration that derives names of YulBrynner, Barbara Walters, and Harry not from Lincoln‘s moral principles but rather, Reasoner, Pabst Blue Ribbon, flower children, and 86 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
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Nazi concentration camps are bedfellows with the woman on the black man, the ―field nigger‖ as Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln‘s drinking political opportunist and the importance of self- habits, the Native American, and fugitive slave reliance. In each instance the literary folklore laws. The whole country listens to the involved varies in focus and intensity. In Emancipation Proclamation on the radio and delineating the black/white conflict the ancient watches Lincoln‘s assassination on television. African past serves as the basis for explanation Harriet Beecher Stowe captures her interview with while the Afro-American slave experience plays a Uncle Robin on cassette tape. Whatever else Reed similar role in explicating the theme of the ―field intends-and certainly the absurdity is highly nigger‖ as political opportunist. entertaining-he is declaring (as he frequently does) that there is nothing new under the sun. He References suggests strongly that all is vanity. 1. Davis, Matthew R. ―Strange History. ―Flight to Canada‖ is a demythologizing of Complicated, Too: Ishmael Reed‗s Flight to American life. The list of debunked myths seems Canada. Mississippi Quarterly 49 (Fall, 1996): endless and tempts one to declare that Reed has 744-755. no moral standard by which to judge his victims. 2. Reed, Ishmael. ―Flight to Canada‖. New No one escape unscathed, not Reed himself if York: Random, 1976. Raven is his ―Etheric Double‖ in the novel. Reed 3. Settle, Elizabeth A., and Thomas Settle. even includes the untouchables: Abraham Lincoln Ishmael Reed:A Preliminary and Secondary becomes a political ―player.‖ Women‘s liberation Bibliography. Boston: G. K. Hall, 1982. a fad, the Native American and the enfranchised 4. Strombeck, Andrew. ―The Conspiracy of slave mere opportunists. The Old South as a Masculinity In Ishmael Reed.‖ African transplantation of Author‘s Camelot becomes the American Review 40. 2(2006): 299- 311. Southern cult of Endymion, the desire to be Literary Reference Center. Web. 30 Nov. 2013. ravished. Reed raises questions about romantic 5. Turner, Darwin. ―A Spectrum of Blackness.‖ love, machismo, the dedicated artist, civilization Paranassus 4, no. 2: 202- 19, 1976. and savagery, and racial neutrality. Among the 6. Zamir, Shamoon. ―The Artist as Prophet, important themes in Reed‘s fiction are the conflict Priest, and Gunslinger: Ishmael Reed‘s of blacks and whites, the function of the white ‗Cowboy in the Boat of Ra.‘‖ Callaloo 17, no. critic, the impact of the white man and black 4:1205- 35, 1994.
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NEWSPAPER AS A TOOL IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING CLASS
S.Abubacker Siddiq, M.A., M.Phil., SET, UGC- NET Assistant Professor of English Hajee Karutha Rowther Howdia College (Autonomous), Uthamapalayam
For the past three decades, many new In an article titled, ―The National Newspaper methods and materials have been developed for as a Tool for Educational Empowerment: Origins teaching and learning English as a second and and Rationale‖, John N. Gardner and Betty L. foreign language. Though textbooks provide Sullivan wrote, ―National newspapers help plenty of activities to develop the language, learners develop vocabulary. A significantly learners should be given new materials to increase greater vocabulary is required to read with their interest in learning a language. A skip from comprehension, let alone appreciation, a national the routine can kindle excitement in both teachers newspaper like The New York Times than and learners. In addition to textbooks, a teacher virtually any local paper published anywhere in can use Newspaper for an effective teaching of the the United States. The level of vocabulary used in language. Newspaper is an authentic material for national newspapers assumes a more intelligent, teaching and learning English as a second educated, professional, and influential readership language. than the level of writing and word choice used in The daily newspaper is linguistically rich and many local newspapers. Certainly then, this is an endless source of materials for the innovative another important reason for using national teacher. The reality of events creates more newspapers in the college classroom.‖ Newspaper excitement to the learners so the process of can be used as a language-learning tool in any teaching and learning the language becomes classroom and at any time because it reflects a interesting. In his famous essay ―On Books and variety of emotional moods and affords a Reading‖, Charles Lamb writes, ―Newspapers collection of news items suiting different occasion. always excite curiosity.‖ Newspaper bridges the Learners are given the choice to go through the gap between the classroom and the real world. news items and there are possibilities to learn The large collection of information from words of different domains and jargons. This advertisements, cartoons, history, entertainment, paper set up a multitude of activities that can be comics, sports, reviews, etc motivates reading. The performed in the classroom amidst language students will continue reading the newspaper learners. throughout their adult life and learning becomes a Activity 1: Becoming familiar with your habit. newspaper (Any level) For any second language learner, newspaper The class can be divided into groups and each offers an authentic platform to enhance the group is given a newspaper. Students have to be language skills and it provides the readers an arena familiar with the particulars and macrostructure of of intrusive active and passive participation. the newspaper. Newspaper based activities inside the classroom Activity 2: Describe the Picture (Any Level) can pave way for a considerable advancement in Cartoons and the pictures from Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing skills. advertisements should be given to the students and Besides, newspaper expands thinking skills, makes they have to write what they perceive from that learning fun, cost-effective, provides a real-time particular picture. They are free to express their material for language learning and provides a perception of the picture. When they describe the better model for classroom activities. 88 Bodhi International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Science
Vol 2 Special Issue 2 March 2018 ISSN: 2456-5571
picture students imaginative skill is improved in words of particular word and can instruct the addition to writing skill. learners to find out the exact word. Activity 3: Headlines (Intermediate/ The teacher can also give antonyms of Advanced Level) particular word and can instruct the learners to Learners can be asked to form a complete and findout the exact word. Using Thesaurus may be meaningful sentence from the headlines. This handy for learners in this activity. activity develops the skill of sentence construction. Activity 8: Review Writing (Intermediate/ Activity 4: Letter Writing (Intermediate/ Advanced Level) Advanced Level) Learners can be asked to go through the book Students, in groups are asked to read the review and entertainment columns and asked to letters written to the Editor of the newspaper. write a review of a book and a movie. The teacher They learn the format of letter writing to the press. may instruct the learners to give an anchoring of They can be encouraged to write a suitable reply the events in the film. This activity develops the of agreeing/ disagreeing or simply expressing their creativity and language skills of the learners. views about an issue. Since media is the most powerful tool on the Activity 5: Identification of Errors (Advanced) earth, Newspaper, one of many such powerful Students can work in groups to find out the errors media can be excellently manoeuvred to teach in newspaper. Grammatical errors are very second language skills. Newspaper plays a crucial common in newspaper. Students have to find out role in developing oral and written language skills. the errors and come up with correct grammar and If the language learners read newspaper regularly, sentence construction. they can adopt the language and the writing style Activity 6: Word Building and Vocabulary very quickly. (Any Level) Students are divided into groups and they References have to choose long, difficult words from any 1. English Teaching Forum. Vol. Xxxiv Number section of the paper. Then they have to make new 1 Jan. 1986, pp 42-44. words out of it. Later students have to guess the 2. Newspaper Association of America meaning of the difficult words they have selected Foundation, (2007). Newspapers Maintain the through reading the news. Then they have to refer Brain. dictionary to check their guessed meaning. 3. A Teacher‘s Guide for Using the Newspaper Subsequently, the learners are asked to make to Enhance Basic Skills, 5-11. Vienna, VA: sentences with the new word they have learnt. Newspaper Association of America Activity 7: Synonym & Antonym (Any level) Foundation. Transitions Abroad Magazine This activity is based on skimming and January/February 2006. scanning. The teacher can give a list of vocabulary 4. Tafani, Vilma (2009), ―Teaching English from the newspaper and ask the learners to find through Mass Media‖, Acta Didactica out them. The teacher can also give synonymous Napocensia, Vol.2 No.1.84.
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