Intertextuality Projects

Monsters - Quy-Dzu

It was interesting to see how different cultures had very different ideas of a monster. The monster in Beowulf and the Wendigo are both shown to be unintelligent and ruthless monsters whereas Grendel and Ramayana depict an intelligent monster. I found it interesting to hear of the Monstorum and how it was initially about real human deformities. This shows how not only are the qualities of monsters drawn from real people but their features as well.

Female Protagonists of Color - Bianca

I found it intriguing in this project to read about issues that women face that are still a problem today.Sula wants to be more than just a wife, Clarice wants to be a housewife, the del Pino family deal with love issues, and Dina is forced into a menstrual hut of sorts and is forgotten by her family. All of these stories, even The Red Tent from Biblical times, touch or focus upon problems that women worldwide combat today. I thought it was neat how all of these women fought against these issues, even though the time/location would have heavily discouraged them from speaking their minds.

Gender Inequality - Isa

I liked how in this project sexism and misogyny is shown to be so similar regardless of time or location. Sappho's and Fu Xuan's poems both challenge the then-popular idea of a daughter being less desireable than a son despite being written centuries apart on different continents. It was also neat how the authors themselves contributed to the point of gender inequality. Sappho's poems were burned and de la Cruz was forced from writing due to the forbidden content of their works, demonstrating how women are silenced and not allowed to speak of their own oppression. In contrast, Freud was allowed to write incredibly sexist theories with little consequence.

Parents and Children - John

I was really interested to read more about this project because this was one of my potential topics early on. I found it very interesting how many of the relationships involved a child who didn't want to be like their parent but ended up like them regardless. I thought it was great how not only were the stories from different times/places, the people in the relationship were different too. The children were of varying ages and genders, which goes to show how universal the parent/child relationship is.