Book of Negroes by Simone Browne Discussion Board

Book of Negroes by Simone Browne Discussion Board

upload a 2-paragraph (6-8 sentences/paragraph) reflection to the discussion board connecting Tuesday’s readings with one or more reading from the previous week. These are not meant to be summaries of the readings but opportunities for you to a) connect with the materials through your own ideas and experiences; b) develop critical reading practices; and c) practice synthesizing course readings and concepts. Questions you may address but are not limited to include: How do readings and course concepts relate to your own experiences within and outside of the university, your communities, families, and peers? How can you make connections between readings/course concepts and contemporary political contexts? I ask that you provide specific passages and page numbers using appropriate citation practices (MLA, Chicago, APA).

Quality of American Culture Discussion

A Bit of Background:

There are three kinds of words I can think of:

never heard of it; don’t know it

heard of it; don’t know it

heard of it; know it

That word in the title of this forum, “Serendipitous”–have you heard it before? It’s a good one, and even if you’ve heard of it and know it, let’s take a closer look at the specific definition: Serendipity (Links to an external site.).

The act of researching tends to be a purposeful act, an intentional searching for specific materials. Such is certainly good, and yes, you should regularly engage in this way. However, there are times when you’ll find connections where you didn’t previously see connections, and they may connect in ways that you need to foster. That is, if your reader is to take a leap of understanding with you, you have to show them how the connection works.

Let Me Illustrate:

An idea I’ve been slow-cooking for quite a few years now is that we, citizens of this nation, don’t quite live right and that we’re causing our own problems–we have what we want because we want it this way. I have the overwhelming sense that we are largely reactionary rather than proactive and that we tend to treat symptoms rather than root out causes of our problems. Concretely, I mean that we tend to do this on a societal level–it’s in the way we treat one another, the way we’re treated, the way we work and live and play. It’s an idea I can directly research–I can look into how we came to this place and time, what economics and history and psychology, etc. lead us here. And for the record, yes, I should look into those things.

But–what about that serendipitous moment when I see a connection that has nothing to do with the specifics of American routines and ways of life but everything to do with the bigger picture I’m exploring, the idea that we’re just a little bit off on how our lives should be, but it’s our own faults that we don’t have the ideal. I specifically encountered this article–“Lost Art of Bending Over: How Other Cultures Spare Their Spines (Links to an external site.)“–one afternoon last fall while reading in, at the risk of too much information, the bathroom. I only bring that up to illustrate that the bathroom isn’t a place I’d associate with credible research.

What You Should Do:

Take a quick read through that article, and tell me if you see how I might connect its ideas to my own. Do you think I’d be able to use it to support my arguments even though it isn’t specifically tied to my topic?

Go one step further–how can you relate the concept of serendipity to your own topic? Have you seen “sources” that you think might connect but really don’t have much to do with what your topic is? Or maybe you’ve had a hunch that there may be a connection but you dismissed it? (I will attach my Research Project Proposal to answer this question)

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