Rita keeps on trying to find out what the world has to offer. She goes to the theatre on her own and Alas! she loves it! She hasn't chosen any given play, but Macbeth... she's so fascinated with the plot that she wants to write an essay on the play... though first she'll have to stop to think what she wants to say. Rita finds in her own language many expressions to describe how she feels towards the play, words she'd never be able to use in an academic paper! She's so pleased with the world that is unfolding before her that she finds it difficult to explain exactly how she feels...
Her relationship with Frank continues to develop in such a way that she goes to see him on a day she's not supposed to just to tell him about her experience! They're beginnig to trust each other, they even want to spend more time together doing different activities: going for lunch, going to the art gallery and the like. Frank is enthusiastic about Rita's interest in literature and even explains the difference between a tragedy, from the point of view of literature, and a tragic event in real life... Rita takes for granted that "proper" students know all about that... she still looks up to them because they know better than her. But Rita's eagerness to discover this new world takes over her whole self and leads her to explore this world the way a newly-born human being does it...
Monday, 8 October 2007
Act 1 scene 5
Rita begins to be aware what a big change studying entails: little by little she's opening her mind to new experiences, she starts to feel more alive than ever! She's getting to know this new Rita, her "own version of herself..." And she likes it! Though at times she feels selfish about it, she realizes that what she needs now is to be in touch with her new self... Up to now she's behaved in the way everybody expected her to behave, she's worked and after work been to the pub with her husband and family... Rita knows that there's more to life than that and is willing to discover what it is with Frank's help... She continues studying despite Denny's attempt to prevent her from doing so, she feels that nobody can stop her, not even Frank when he invites her to stop talking about Chekhov and go to the pub!! He doesn's realize that what Rita precisely doesn't want is to go on leading the life she's led up to now! She wants to see what there is beyond the pub, what the theatre has to teach her, what authors have to tell her about life, she wants a fresh new start and is determined to pursue her objective...
Monday, 17 September 2007
Act 1 Scenes 3 and 4
Rita's first encounter with academic writing is not as good as she had expected... Her essay is far from what examiners want from students. Rita does not know how to support her views in the paper, she believes she knows better than examiners because she has read something they have not... she needs to develop a certain criteria when reading and Frank will help her do so. But this new criteria will not only help her when writing for an audience but also in most other aspects of her life. Rita struggles every time she has to go to her lessons against her family, partner and friends: her partner, especially, does not want to let her go there... he is afraid of Rita's opportunity of opening her mind, of seeing other reality than the one she is used to, of losing her... Rita tries to continue with her course against all odds... By the end of scene 4, we can see that she is succeeding, she is achieving her objective...
Act 1 Scene 2
When Rita gets into Frank's room, she is in a different world; she can see what she expects to achieve by studying, i.e., to develop "good taste," to become somebody different from who she actually is. Though she did not have the chance to become a regular student since it was frown upon by those who surrounded her (and even herself!), she enjoys looking at them, watching or imagining how their lives differ from hers. In a way, Rita idealizes both Frank and regular students: she looks up to them as they have succeeded in doing something she did not: academic life. And this is a contradiction in itself insofar as up to this moment she has been part of a social class who regards academic people as posh, as detached from "real life..." Will Rita change her mind as to what "being educated" implies? Will she try to continue studying in spite of her prejudices? I hope my questions have an answer by the end of the play!
Sunday, 19 August 2007
Educating Rita
Rita wants to study because she wants to know everything... She knows there's more to life than meets the eye and she's willing to give it a try! She wants to have a better life and she knows that it is through education that she will be able to succeed. She is an intelligent woman and we know so because of some of her remarks when she talks to Frank. She doesn't want Frank to understimate her, she wants him to help her.
Tuesday, 14 August 2007
Term Task
Introduction
Every day, we are faced with decisions: simple, complex, easy and so on and so forth. Most of us are a aware of the fact that we must take responsibility for every decision we make. As teachers, we have this responsibility towards our students. By analysing how other teachers take respoinsibility for their decisions, we learn more about both teachers and learners.
Description of the scene
As part of my term paper I have chosen to analyse a scene from Boston Public, a tv series broadcast by Fox. In episode 220, there is a transgender student running for prom queen. A group of students who oppose the transgender student demand to speak to the Head of the school so as to complain inasmuch as they believe the abovementioned student should not be allowed to run for prom queen. It should be pointed out that only the first minute of the scene has been taken into account for deep analysis, while some other parts of the same scene will be mentioned to avoid confusion. Below is the link to the whole scene:
http://es.youtube.com/watch?v=hnyplzTITzk
Analysis
The analysis is divided into two sections:
- whether the decision was a human act or not;
-whether it was a good decision or not.
Section 1
The decision taken by the school Head not to ban the transgender student from the competition was a human act for three reasons:
- There was consciousness on the part of the Head, i.e., he was in full possession of all his mental faculties when making the decision;
- He was aware of the consequences his decision could ensue. Whenever faced with a controversial issue, it is known that there will be people in favour of it and against it. Nevertheless, the Head of the school decides to be true to his beliefs of equality of opportunities for everybody regardless of sexual preferences. To him, it was more important to be coherent with this line of thought than to avoid controversy and trouble;
- There were other choices available such as banning the student from the contest, suspending him for number of days and the like. Nonetheless, the Head makes the most difficult decision: face the problems that could arise from allowing the student to run for prom queen so as to show the school that discriminating against people leads to misunderstanding, hatred and isolation.
Section 2
The Head's decision to let the transgender student run for prom queen was a good decision for three reasons:
* it was good in itself: it would have been much easier for the Head not to let the homosexual student run for prom queen than to let him do it. His decision caused a lot of controversy among teachers, students and some parents.
*it had a good intention/purpose: his decision was not selfish, had no benefits for him. He did not want to discriminate against any student, he believed in the student's right of self-determination, in his right to come to terms with his own identity.
*the circumstances were good: though at the beggining there is strong disapproval on the part of some students and parents, most teachers supported the Head's decision. They talked to the student to see if he was fully aware of what he was going to do and once they checked he was, they simpathised with him.
In the second place, it was a good decision insofar as it did not go against the principle of kinship . As far as kinship goes, it was his duty as a Head to secure that all students have the same rights, no matter what their sex, religion or race is. As for reciprocity, the Head did not expect anything in return for what he had done, but for students to acknowledge other people's right to do the same for them. His decision had an implicit message: this time the one who was being discriminated against was a transgender student; next time it could be a Jew, African, Catholic, female or male student...
Conclusion
All in all, the Head's decision to allow the homosexual student run for prom queen was both a human act and a good decision for all the elements of which these two concepts are made of are present. He could have banned the student from the competition, preventing any kind of problems with classmates and parents. However, this would have been against his beliefs, something he could not stand given his position in the school.
Every day, we are faced with decisions: simple, complex, easy and so on and so forth. Most of us are a aware of the fact that we must take responsibility for every decision we make. As teachers, we have this responsibility towards our students. By analysing how other teachers take respoinsibility for their decisions, we learn more about both teachers and learners.
Description of the scene
As part of my term paper I have chosen to analyse a scene from Boston Public, a tv series broadcast by Fox. In episode 220, there is a transgender student running for prom queen. A group of students who oppose the transgender student demand to speak to the Head of the school so as to complain inasmuch as they believe the abovementioned student should not be allowed to run for prom queen. It should be pointed out that only the first minute of the scene has been taken into account for deep analysis, while some other parts of the same scene will be mentioned to avoid confusion. Below is the link to the whole scene:
http://es.youtube.com/watch?v=hnyplzTITzk
Analysis
The analysis is divided into two sections:
- whether the decision was a human act or not;
-whether it was a good decision or not.
Section 1
The decision taken by the school Head not to ban the transgender student from the competition was a human act for three reasons:
- There was consciousness on the part of the Head, i.e., he was in full possession of all his mental faculties when making the decision;
- He was aware of the consequences his decision could ensue. Whenever faced with a controversial issue, it is known that there will be people in favour of it and against it. Nevertheless, the Head of the school decides to be true to his beliefs of equality of opportunities for everybody regardless of sexual preferences. To him, it was more important to be coherent with this line of thought than to avoid controversy and trouble;
- There were other choices available such as banning the student from the contest, suspending him for number of days and the like. Nonetheless, the Head makes the most difficult decision: face the problems that could arise from allowing the student to run for prom queen so as to show the school that discriminating against people leads to misunderstanding, hatred and isolation.
Section 2
The Head's decision to let the transgender student run for prom queen was a good decision for three reasons:
* it was good in itself: it would have been much easier for the Head not to let the homosexual student run for prom queen than to let him do it. His decision caused a lot of controversy among teachers, students and some parents.
*it had a good intention/purpose: his decision was not selfish, had no benefits for him. He did not want to discriminate against any student, he believed in the student's right of self-determination, in his right to come to terms with his own identity.
*the circumstances were good: though at the beggining there is strong disapproval on the part of some students and parents, most teachers supported the Head's decision. They talked to the student to see if he was fully aware of what he was going to do and once they checked he was, they simpathised with him.
In the second place, it was a good decision insofar as it did not go against the principle of kinship . As far as kinship goes, it was his duty as a Head to secure that all students have the same rights, no matter what their sex, religion or race is. As for reciprocity, the Head did not expect anything in return for what he had done, but for students to acknowledge other people's right to do the same for them. His decision had an implicit message: this time the one who was being discriminated against was a transgender student; next time it could be a Jew, African, Catholic, female or male student...
Conclusion
All in all, the Head's decision to allow the homosexual student run for prom queen was both a human act and a good decision for all the elements of which these two concepts are made of are present. He could have banned the student from the competition, preventing any kind of problems with classmates and parents. However, this would have been against his beliefs, something he could not stand given his position in the school.
Monday, 2 July 2007
Diez años después: ante el nuevo milenio
After ten years, Savater decides to delight us with one more chapter, as if it had been necessary to add anything to his marvellous book!!
Taking into account the times we live in, he says that the key to enjoy a good life is to care about others. We must realize that we're social beings: we need to look after ourselves and, at the same time, take care of others since we belong to the same species. We need to leave aside stereotypes and recognize each other as what we are: humans.
Apart from this, he points out that we need to take care of our "house", our planet. I find this really important, inasmuch as many times governments think about making money at the expense of our environment. There are clear examples in our country such as the paper mills in Gualeguaychú, forests in the south or the jungle in Chaco and Salta... I wonder if they've ever stopped to think that they won't have enough time to spend all the money they've got by selling our country... our planet will be dead before that can happen
Taking into account the times we live in, he says that the key to enjoy a good life is to care about others. We must realize that we're social beings: we need to look after ourselves and, at the same time, take care of others since we belong to the same species. We need to leave aside stereotypes and recognize each other as what we are: humans.
Apart from this, he points out that we need to take care of our "house", our planet. I find this really important, inasmuch as many times governments think about making money at the expense of our environment. There are clear examples in our country such as the paper mills in Gualeguaychú, forests in the south or the jungle in Chaco and Salta... I wonder if they've ever stopped to think that they won't have enough time to spend all the money they've got by selling our country... our planet will be dead before that can happen
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