Shakespeare's a Racist?!?!?!

Well, not really. Shakespeare was only writing for his time. You see the Tempest is a story of power, renege, and colonialism. Caliban, the native to the island, oppressive Prospero lands on, is depicted as a sort of monster. Which is nicely described by our friend Trinculo, "

What have we here? A man or a fish? Dead or alive? A fish. He smells like a fish, a very ancient and fish-like smell, a kind of not-of-the-newest poor-john. A strange fish! Were I in England now, as once I was, and had but this fish painted, not a holiday fool there but would give a piece of silver. There would this monster make a man. Any strange beast there makes a man. When they will not give a doit to relieve a lame beggar, they will lay out ten to see a dead Indian. Legged like a man and his fins like arms! Warm, o' my troth. I do now let loose my opinion, hold it no longer: this is no fish, but an islander that hath lately suffered by a thunderbolt."

 This, in today's scope of thinking, would be kinda racist. Can we blame him however? Most people in the 18th century stereotyped the "others of the world, like the middle east and beyond, as infidels and savages.  Shakespeare was making a show that was intended to be viewed by most Europeans.  so if a=b and b=c then a=c as well. its common math, i think? So yes, he did present a stereotype according to today's standards, but it was quite different then. 
Another way to justify this claim would be through his other play, The Merchant of Venice. In this play a Jew is portrayed as an evil character that is out to steal everyone's money, and has every other Jewish stereotype. The people that were viewing this show were, well you guessed it, Anti-Semitic.  If Shakespeare were to portray the Jew any other way, well he would have at least been chastised, but i fear it may have been much worse.
This "racism" of sorts was carried on through all of the colonialist times of the world. Take for example Rudyard Kipling's "White Man's Burden." This poem dramatized the role of society to go to these so -called savages of th Philippines, a parallel to Caliban, Christianize them, and make them "white." This ideal was shared by most white folks in America.
So you see Shakespeare wasn't a racist at, here was merely weak willed, conformer :) & that's what I'm throwing
This Post was orginally done on September 23, but i had trouble uploading it untill now, hopefully that's okay?

Thou Liest, Malignant Thing!

                  Prospero, a lone islands appointed leader (appointed by himself), rules over the land with aggression, magic, and words. If something isn't going right, with just a flick of the wrist of swipe of the tongue, Prospero can control Caliban, his man servant, Ariel, his magical nymph/genie/thing, and his daughter, Miranda, to do whatever he wants.
                       Take Ariel for example. Prospero has, according to the text "I Prithee, Remember i have done thee worthy service, told thee no lies, made thee no mistakings, served without or grudge or grumblings. Thou didst promise," promised him his freedom. Since Ariel is very useful to Prospero, he doesn't want him to go, so he retells the story of how he saved him , blah blah blah, used some highly convincing worths and BAM! Ariel was convinced to stay, as long as he set him free in  a few days.Just by the way he spoke to Ariel, Prospero is able to contol and morph Ariel's thought to bend to Prosperso's will.

                   This method proves to work on Miranda, he innocent and naive daughter, as well. But in this case it is slightly different, for Miranda came to the island when she was very young, and has no remembrance of what happens before they came to the island. Prospero is able to make up any story that suits his needs and Miranda will believe him, for she has nothing else to believe in. HE also has magical control of his daughter too, "Thou art inclined to sleep. 'Tis a good dullness, and give it way. I know thou canst choose. Miranda Sleeps" It is almost creepy or disturbing the amount of power Prospero has over his daughter. He can not only control her mentally and emotionally, but physically as well.. Weird....

& that's what I'm throwin'

      

Chinchillas and Barf (Single Story Blog)

Imagine, you are with a group of friends. One “friend” decides to steal a glorious chinchilla fur muff to keep her hands warm during the cold months.  Minutes later, the police shows up and asks, “Who stole this glorious chinchilla muff?” All of a sudden this same friend points to you, while the muff is on her arm, and puts the blame on you. The police then proceed to pat your “friend on the head and tell her “thank you for tracking down this muff-napper. Here is a cookie.” They then arrest you and fine you triple the value of the glorious chinchilla muff and slap you hand.  While this story is quite ridiculous, it emphasizes the hazard of the “Single-Story.” If society only listened to one side of the story or trusted merely the information we are taught through history or literature we would ultimately “rob people of dignity… and make our recognition of our equal humanity difficult” (Adichie).

In Literature, nowadays, the premise of the single story is beginning to disappear for we live in the postmodern era where novels are written for whatever the author want it to be written.  This was untrue during the enlightenment and before, because books were written to a center, like the church. Adiche focuses her speech on the western world’s misconception of Africa and other cultures based on our literature written on it. Can we blame solely literature for this misconstruction? What about what history tells us? It also seems that the history in the postmodern world has moved on past the “single story. In 7^th grade for example, the curriculum included learning about all the major religions of the world, not just Christianity, and require individual research from a large amount of sources. We could probably rule history out then. Maybe it is just the ignorance of select Americans that gets amplified through media, for example Jay Leno goes out into the streets of New York and asks simple questions, where most of the people give hilariously wrong answers. This process fails to show anyone who answers the questions correctly. In this case we are also given merely one side of the story, the ignorant side. Here’s something to think about: What if Adiche is merely stereotyping Americans based on a few experiences she had with them?

This article was not meant to say that the single story dilemma is not a bad thing or is not present anymore. It was merely to conjure up the idea that maybe we cannot blame the history books and the narratives for giving us the single story.  Society is moving past the days of the singe story, and rather than dwell on the fact that it was a problem of the past, change it. Heck! The internet connects the world to each other allowing this multiple story “machine” to inform society.

However, when it comes down to it, most people are not mal-informed, they are merely rejecting the idea of another story, based on what they want to believe. ...And that is what I am throwing

(Wow this jumped everywhere!  All my ideas came out  at the same time and word barf was produced, oh well. Enjoy my barf! :) )