Students in this week’s first in-school lesson looked at perspective and point of view. We began with a strange activity in which students studied one particular portion of the room and then made a list of things they saw. From this we were able to determine that we would often have been able to determine where in the room the student was standing just from reading what she saw.

From this, we extrapolated the fact that where we stand (literally and figuratively) shapes what we see (literally and figuratively). We then applied this to the story “In the Family,” in which it appears that we can make inferences about where the narrator stands based on some of the things that she sees.

It appears that the narrator might have some mental health issues, and we even came up with the argument that since others in the family see the same things, it might be schizophrenia as there is a genetic component to that disease, and it produces auditory and visual hallucinations. All this leads us to believe we can’t entirely trust the narrator.

However, “In the Family” is an example of magical realism, so we are to take the events as they are presented no matter how confusing that is. We will, though, be able to use the same analysis for “The Cask of Amontillado” tomorrow and Thursday.

Class Notes

Notes for the day's classes are available here.

Please note that this is a composite file including notes from all classes, though occasionally it might only be one or two classes. I don't differentiate in the file; that is up to you to do.