Creative Writing pt 1

Tropic of Capricorn

A Winter Poem

Many Midwesterners know

not to go outdoors

without thick thermal underclothes

and working men employed outdoors

layer Carhartt jackets over their long johns

during the tropic of Capricorn.

Woven scarves cover up crimson cheeks

and an Eskimo kiss can burn.

The concrete fiercens and car engines moan,

we are left watching football while teakettles warm.

written, 2/1/2013


 Ethnography (continued)

Expanding a research paper that I completed last semester, I would like to apply Ethnography to the idea of language death and restoration. Specifically, in Chicago there is a contemporary movement to revive Native American tribal languages such as Ojibwa language. Last fall, I attended a screening of an independent film called, “We Still Live Here” about a woman who revived the Wampanoag language in Massachusetts after the language had died during colonialism and hadn’t been spoken in centuries. I find language revitalization fascinating. I believe it is an important issue to preserve diversity and culture.

METHODOLOGY

To further this topic, I am going to investigate how participants in Chicago are reviving tribal languages. There are three areas in Chicago that are settings for American Indian education: The American Indian Association, the American Indian Center, and the Newberry Research Library’s Center for Native Studies. I plan on visiting each location and detailing the efforts that are evolving to record the mostly oral languages and the resources available for other people who are interested in preserving old languages.

ETHICAL CONCERNS

The main ethical concern is investigating Native American languages without exploitation of the American Indian people. Due to extreme marginalization, the populations of Native Americans seem to be skeptical of becoming spectacles or exploited. 

No Longer in Use

By Anna Moore

I.

We did not use our brains, we used our posture.  

We seldom wore shoes or socks.

We did not use doors, we were imprisoned.

They did not use tongs to serve dinner rolls. Instead,

their unwashed, bare hands.

They even used prods and empty threats.

They created their own jargon. It sufficed.

II.

We will not try our luck.

Instead, we hide our mistrust.

There is no courtesy any longer.

And we all shy away from strategy.

III.

The soldiers did not use their guns.

The prisoners did not use their lamps.

IV.

We read magazines and called ourselves enlightened.

And the others around us never used their book of matches. 

(spring semester, 2011)

I guess winter days does provide a lot of good writing fodder. It's been a polar vortex heaven all season !!