English Works Reader Blue Book

See the Face in the Mirror by Blossom Beeby – tasks

Blue Book: English Works Reader, Page 56  Major General John Cantwell

Analysis of character:   analyse the various conflict emotions that plague General Cantwell’s return from war – explore the juxtapositions and the imagery.   Why is it so hard to cope with the real world?  Give quotes and evaluate the sense of anger, shame, guilt, betrayal.

Craft of writing/personal/real-world connections:  Note the raw emotions and the complex reactions/ emotional responses.  Note the vivid imagery and the concise descriptions.

Text response skills: 

Write one/two paragraphs based on the following prompts.  Be specific. Answer the question. Include relevant quotes and evidence. Make sure you contextualise your examples, so that they link to the prompt.  

1. How does the author explore the challenges of survival in a hostile world.
2. How does the author explore the concept of resilience?
3. We grow through conflict.
4. The way we deal with conflict shapes who we are.
5. Experiences of conflict change our priorities
6. Facing conflict demands strength of character.
7. It is almost impossible to remain a bystander to conflict.
8. Experiences of conflict lead to change.

Forever Shaped:  Book – Exit Wounds  Major General John Cantwell

Survival is just not about self-preservation and physical survival, but also concerns who we are as people, our self-respect and dignity. Sometimes we might have to fight to preserve our goodness and our humanity. Sometimes traumatic war experiences can leave psychological scars that undermine our peace and sanity.

• Major Cantwell fought in Iraq in 1991 and in 2006. In 2010 he commanded the Australian troops in Afghanistan. Since his return, he has been diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder and depression and spent time in psychiatric wards.
• He struggles with a complicated mix of emotions; insurmountable grief, horror and shame.
  He states that he feels a sense of betrayal towards the men for whose lives he was responsible and who ended up maimed or killed. He now feels “redundant, without purpose” and desperate because he can no longer help.
• Forever traumatised: Walking down the street in Melbourne, signs of war trigger his trauma. For example, a plastic garbage bag rustling in the wind recalls an improvised explosive device (IED). “I freeze, then force myself to calm down”.  Whenever he uses antiseptic chemicals at home, he recalls dead bodies in the mortuary.
• “I try hard not to dwell on the troubled past, but it invades my consciousness without prompting.    “The real me – the person who has led soldiers in battle – watches aghast at the blubbering fool I have become”.
• Ever since his return, he is on a cocktail of drugs for depression, anxiety and pain that he believes have left him “dull-witted”

Blue Book: English Works Reader, Page 63, Joy Hopwood ABC Playschool Presenter

Text response skills: 

Write one/two paragraphs based on the following prompts.  Be specific. Answer the question. Include relevant quotes and evidence. Make sure you contextualise your examples, so that they link to the prompt.  

Include references to role models and their advice/impact.

1. How does the author explore the impact of social and racial prejudice.
2. How do the authors explore the concept of resilience?
3. Having a sense of difference makes it difficult to belong.

Note the examples relating to racial profiling and the impact of racial biases.

Example with her mother at school: what is Joy’s dilemma?

Joy’s dilemma: she feels ashamed that she disowned her mother, but at the same time she does not want to be singled out as different and wants to try to fit in with the other students. For this reason, she does not like the fact that she is ignoring her mother, and feels mean, but she prefers that than the alternative, which is to expose herself to ridicule. She was disappointed that she was ashamed; she wished she had the skills to deal with it.  Note the advice from Jan Edmunds.

• Joy’s mother was persecuted by the students when she worked in the school canteen because of her difference and her poor language skills.
• Joy has difficulty withstanding peer pressure because she was young and vulnerable.  Rather than defend her mother, she disowns her and distances herself from her mother.
• She matures and changes when she realises that racist taunts should not be experienced personally but are more of a reflection of the perpetrator.  The comments from Jan Edmund give her strength: “racist remarks .. reveal the racist’s ignorance and lack of intelligence and by no means is it a reflection of the receiver”.\
• The friend’s comments make a difference and change her: gives her confidence to be different and to defend her mother without feeling ashamed. She is able to appreciate her mother’s pain and her strength of character.

Blue Reader, p. 60 – 61. Kayne and Adam Hughes

Analysis of Character – transformations and epiphanies.

Write two paragraphs to the following prompt:

1. How does the author explore the concept of resilience?
2. What does the author say about the difficulties of finding a place to belong?
3. How does the author explore the importance of human connection.
4. What role does determination play in the lives of the characters?
5. Discovering who we are and where we belong can be challenging.
6. Our connections with others make us who we are.
7. The way we deal with conflict shapes who we are.
8. Experiences of conflict change our priorities
9. Facing conflict demands strength of character.

KAYNE AND ADAM HUGHES met through the Brothers Big Sisters Youth Mentoring Program   (The pair featured in Two of Us in The Good Weekend, The Age)

Our home environment and relationships with parents can have a big influence on our self esteem, our confidence levels, and our wellbeing.

The influence of one’s home environment is clearly evident in the personal life of Kayne Hughes, who featured in the article “Two Of Us” in the Age’s Good Weekend.  Kayne Hughes experienced two completely different home environments – one with his drug-addict mother and a string of abusive boyfriends. The other was with a supportive foster family during his later teenage years.

Initially, Kayne Hughes was a “child starved of a childhood”. He was insecure, lacked trust and exhibited many anti-social tendencies which saw him move between 19 different primary schools. He admits, “when I was young I was full of hate … I didn’t have much respect. I was the ultimate rebel without a cause.”

Conversely, a supportive and trustworthy environment had the opposite effect.

When Adam Hughes adopted Kayne through the Big Brothers Big Sisters youth program, he matures and responds to an environment of trust and love, one in which he is “welcomed with open arms”. As a motor mechanic apprentice, Adam is given the keys to the workshop and values the first “home” he has ever truly had. 

Kayne even shows a remarkable capacity to overcome resentment and anger.

Kayne recognizes his mother as a negative force who showed him a path he did not want to take. He believed he was more grateful and appreciative because of his early negative childhood experiences.

As Adam discovers, “the power of friendship is life-changing”. He cites communication and trust as key ingredients that helped to transform Kayne’s life.

Blue Reader, Anecdote: Habitual cruelty, p 62

Write two paragraphs based on the following prompts:

1. We grow through conflict.
2. The way we deal with conflict shapes who we are.
3. Facing conflict demands strength of character.
4. Experiences of conflict lead to change.

Positives:

• Many children who are bullied in the school playground often learn to conquer their fears and have successful lives. They learned to toughen up when they were threatened.
• Fiona Scott-Norman states that people who are bullied or are unpopular at school are often forced to rely on their own resources and become very resilient.
• Many people who have been threatened often have amazing life skills and fierce determination to succeed.  This may be because they know how unbearable it is to be lonely and depressed.

The Age writer Fiona Scott-Norman interviewed local celebrities who were once victims and collected their stories in a new book called Don’t Peak at High School: From Bullied to A-List. Her 15 former victims include Megan Washington, Eddie Perfect and Penny Wong. Charlie Pickering, Judith Lucy and Brendan Cowell also lift the lid on loserdom.

• The moral of their stories is that all conquered their fears and went on to have successful lives. In other words, when the going got tough, they got going.
• “Being bullied shaped these people,” writes Scott-Norman. “There are advantages to being unpopular at school, because you are forced to fall back on your own resources.”

Negatives:

• Kendall Hill is bullied; he is kicked around like a “chocolate dipped loser” and withdraws completely. He spends a lot of time in the sick bay and the rest of the time he spends reading the in school library with the girl from the Jehovah Witnesses.

Include real-world examples and parallels.

STELLA YOUNG, Former comedian.

Stella’s desire to join the popular group at school, often set her up for ridicule.  Typically, she often heard the girls talking: You know, “I wish she’d just get lost.” Eventually she realised they were talking about her. So she raised her chair , went to the toilet and cried.

At high school there was an integration aide under my name because I was the one who looked disabled enough for  the school to get some funding, but I used to cringe when people referred to her as my aide. I saw her about three times.

 “At high school, I just wanted to fit in with my non-disabled friends. I didn’t like hanging out with other people with disabilities. But walking to class with friends, invariably I’d have to duck off and find the accessible entrance, and I’d get really worried about rejoining the conversation. I’d pretend I hadn’t missed huge chunks. I’d be all, “Oh, yes, yes. Of course.”    I’d never ask anyone to go with me.

I didn’t want to put anyone out, or ask anybody to assist me because then they might make the integration aide hang out with me. That, as I’d learnt in primary school, would be social suicide.

Naji Chu – blue reader p. 64

Write two paragraphs based on the following prompts:

1. How does the author explore the challenges of survival in a hostile world.
2. How does the author explore the impact of social and racial prejudice.
3. How do the authors explore the concept of resilience?
4. What does the author say about the difficulties of finding a place to belong?
5. What role does determination play in the lives of the characters?
6. How does the author examine the need to belong?
7. How does the author show the impacts of loss and change?
8. The way we deal with conflict shapes who we are.

NEW PERSPECTIVES; CHANGING EXPERIENCES… Negative home environment: family -= discrimination – rebellious and resentful

Nahji Chu is a Vietnamese migrant,  who was 10 years old when she came to Melbourne from Vietnam via refugee camps in Thailand. Her migration experience was initially negative as she suffered racist attacks in 1975. As a Vietnamese outsider, Ms Chu struggled with her identity and her ethnic difference, in response to racist taunts during her tough childhood. Nahji Chu grew up ashamed of her Vietnamese culture. She was resentful and angry and rebelled against her mother, disowned her cultural rules, and renounced her Asian features by dying her hair red.

New beginning:  new perspective – began to embrace her roots and gained a sense of pride. Ms Chu decided to seek her new beginning in a new city, Sydney. Her tough experience made her determined to make something of herself. She has since established a number of Asian tuckshops in Melbourne, and has produced a cook book. Her interest with food helped to reconcile herself to her roots, her culture and her family. She becomes proud of her heritage and encourages the next generation of Vietnamese to likewise discover their roots and their culture. Ms Chu states that “I am Vietnamese but I live in Australia”.

Blue Reader p.  66  Gill Hicks

Read in conjunction with Adichie’s “The Danger of a  Single Story”

How does Gill challenge stereotypical assumptions and preconceptions about people’s attitudes and lifestyles?   (Include parallels with Adichie’s experience and comments)

Answer two prompts:

1. How does the author explore the impact of social and racial prejudice.
2. How do the authors explore the concept of resilience?
3. How does the author explore the importance of human connection.
4. How does the author show the impacts of loss and change?
5. Experiences of conflict change our priorities
6. Facing conflict demands strength of character.
7. It is almost impossible to remain a bystander to conflict.
8. Experiences of conflict lead to change.

In 2014, Gill Hicks became the South Australian of the Year 2015 for her role as a peace campaigner Ms Hicks was the only Australian survivor in the 2005 7/7 London Bombing .

Rather than wallow in hatred, Ms Hicks made the courageous decision to try to bridge the cultural and racial divide that leads to deadly terrorist attacks.  In 2007, she organised a walk from Leeds (the home of the terrorists) to London, as part of her charity M.A.D. (Making a different for peace).  On her new prosthetic legs, she walked more than 430 kilometres to London spreading the message of peace and unity. She invited people from different communities to walk with her and communicate with one another.

Tom Williams and Kyle Tyrrell  p. 59

Answer the prompt: 

1. How does the author explore the challenges of survival in a hostile world.
2. The way we deal with conflict shapes who we are.
3. Experiences of conflict change our priorities
4. Facing conflict demands strength of character.
5. It is almost impossible to remain a bystander to conflict.
6. Experiences of conflict lead to change.

First point: the legendary “bullet-proof” hero: a constructed reality (like the salesman, like the returned hero)  :    Soldiers are encouraged to see themselves as “bullet proof” heroes in order to perform heroic feats and endanger their lives in dangerous situations. As one Sapper says he does not know if it is an “army thing” or  a “bloke thing” or wonders about the talk of “love and brotherhood” but you just want to finish the job off.”

Trooper Anthony McKenzie says, “if you didn’t think you were bulletproof you wouldn’t run towards danger’.   Such soldiers are trained and reprogrammed to run towards, rather than from, danger.  (Trooper Mark Donaldson, who was awarded the VC medal, is the typical hero-soldier who braves danger, runs towards “incoming bullets”, and towards the insurgents to provide a protective shield for his mates.)

However, such an unrealistic image sets up soldiers for failure. For those who hesitate and for those who become scared, there is a strong sense of shame and guilt.

Owing to a heightened sense of anxiety and prolonged exposure  to stress, war veterans have  become conditioned to a life-and-death reality. This alters their sensitivities, reactions and responses.

Sapper Tom Williams who served in the Afghanistan war, says that three days of intense bombing “knocked his psyche off balance”.  He notes that he became “scared shitless” and “it changed things”. “The fight for survival takes over everything.”

Many return home with post-traumatic stress disorder, conditioned to see danger in everyday situations.

Trooper Paul Clemence who returned from the Afghanistan war in 2010, found it difficult to readjust to a “normal” world and “normal” every day activities.  A handbag on a table can “totally freak him out”; so, too, does a van parked in an alleyway.  A plastic bag rustling in the wind gives him a panic attack. Antiseptic odours also remind him of the morgue.