Lets PlayWho Wants to be a

Millioniare

The innate truth in texts

Texts are devoid of context

Meaning is not constructed

The social construction of texts

Q1:What does representation acknowledge?

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Well Done!

White Yellow

Orange Blue

Q2: Which above model best describes how history and memory are traditionally represented?

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History: document pastMemory: personal/collective experience

History: personal/collective experienceMemory: document past

History:Factual accounts Memory: devoid of emotion

History:Devoid of emotionMemory:Objective

Correct!

represents the effectiveness of the war

represents the destruction of innocence that war causes

Symbolises the positive attributes of war

Depicts the tough decisions generals must make

Q3:What is the effect on the representation of the Vietnam War by describing the hospital, school, factory as being destroyed?

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In Thai Binh (Peace) Province

I’ve used up all my film on bombed hospitals, bombed village schools, the scatteredlemon-yellow cocoons at the bombed silk-factory,

Splendid!The poem depicts the Vietnam War through a negative representation. It achieves this by evoking images of destroyed places that strongly symbolise peace. The poem ironically discusses that the speaker wants to

forget these memories however their attempts through juxtaposition only serve to cement them into the mind of the responder. Thus the feelings of repulsion that

we feel when we imagine these images are transferred to the cause of the destruction; namely the Vietnam

War

Personification, destruction life, negative tone

Personification, rebirth, positive tone

Metaphor, destruction life, negative tone

Metaphor, rebirth, positive tone

Q4: What technique is used in the above quote and what tone does it have on the representation of the Vietnam War?

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…The scattered lemon-yellow cocoons at the bombed silk-factory

You’re a Clever Cookie!

‘Lemon-yellow cocoon’ metaphorically alludes to the corpses surrounding the bombed out factory. Cocoons

are empty shells and evokes images of death and decay. Cocoons also suggest the potential of life

which the war has prevented. ‘Lemon-yellow’ serves to show the sourness of war. The overall tone is negative

conveying the Vietnam War as devoid of life.

Questions its reliability

Questions its objectivity

Questions its validity

All of the above

Q5: The poem uses juxtaposition to cause an emotional response towards the destruction of the war. However the speaker admits that they will only select one memory to keep. What effect does this have on the concept of memory?

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Another child with its feet blown off, a girl, this one, eleven years old, patient and bewildered in her home, a fragile small house of mud bricks among rice fields.

So I’ll use my dry burning eyes to photograph within me dark sails of the river boats, warm slant of afternoon light…and a boy and small bird both perched, relaxed, on a quietly grazing buffalo.

Nice One!

Humorous Melancholy

Happiness Anguish

The wooden step acts as a metaphor for the speaker’s memory of a past love. What tone is created in the above extract through the word ‘splinters’?

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The old steps live only in me: my feet and thighs remember them, and my hands still feel their splinters.

A Time Past

You Ain’t Wrong!The speaker’s admission that memory is

selected and that some memories are repressed calls into question the validity of memory. However it is interesting that despite this

admission both memories are actually published and in fact give a fuller representation

of Vietnam and the war.

represents her husbands change in love towards her

That the steps looks nice

That the steps represents her desire for change

That her husbands love has increased overtime

Q7:What is the effect of the personification of the granite as ‘handsome’ have on the meaning of the poem?

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those wooden stepsare gone now, decayed,replaced with granite,hard, gray, and handsome.

Amazing!The steps are also used to signify the historical

significance of the event for the speaker. The ‘ancient’ wooden stairs being replaced by

granite steps is reminiscent of the change of historical periods. Levertov is thus representing personal experience (the domain of Memory) as

important and valid as History.

Viewer question• Your task is to write 200 words on the below question and bring it in

by next lesson. Best answer will win a prize.

• ‘A Time Past’ is depicting the memory of a personal event (i.e. breakdown in marriage). Does Levertov’s representation of the event increase the validity of the concept of memory? How does she achieve/not achieve this? (Make reference to at least two techniques and their effect)

That history isolates people

That he has a big family

History is a collective experience

That family is more important than friends

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What effect does the hyperbole have on the representation of history and memory in the above extract?

In houses like these your family of millions, Polacks, Wops, Scotch-Irish, people shut now into ‘projects,’

A Letter to Marek about a Photograph

Top of the Class!Levertov blurs the lines of what is history and

what is memory. The hyperbole is used to create a shared identity amongst those that are

marginalised. Moreover memories are validated as being able to produce the unwritten history

of the oppressed.

Traditional models of genre should be adhered to

Genre is constructed and can be subverted

Genre should limit composers

Composers should not subvert genre

What effect does the ‘Letter to Marek’ being written as a poem have on the concept of literary genre?

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Magnificent !The purpose of Marek’s poetry is depicted as being

a tool to record a marginalised peoples’ history; blurring the lines between the supposed ‘distinct’

constructs of history and memory. This is corroborated by the fact that this is supposed to be a ‘letter’ to Marek however it does not adhere to the

structural elements of a letter. Hence it serves to symbolise the blurring of genre/conceptual

frameworks and the purpose of texts literary production.

Suggests that poetry dilutes historical truth

Alludes to the negative impact of poverty

Symbolises the empowerment that poetry provides when it records history

Symbolises the speakers disillusionment of poetry to tell history

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What effect does the metaphor of thermometer and the personification of human ideals have on the representation of history?

to lift griefs out of the blind pit of unknowing, placing glass and mercury under the tongue of dreams – magical quicksilver that measures the fever it is to be human.

Congratulations!YOU WIN !!!!

One Million Dollars!

Sorry! That Answer is Incorrect.

Next Contestant Please!