Sunday, August 31, 2014

Risk Taking Researcher

The Red Scarf Girl
Ji-Li Jiang
Chapters 3-5

Throughout the the first five chapters, I have already come to love the book. It is very interesting, because last year in humanities, we read Ties That Bind, Ties That Break. Both books were based around a similar time period, and as I am reading I can connect parts of the text to the other book. 

The book Red Scarf Girl was based during the Cultural Revolution. This connects greatly to the part I just read, because all of the important events happening to Ji-Li Jiang are related to Chairman Mao. Ji-Li's family is considered a "Black Family", because her grandfather was a landlord, and that is horrible for her, because he exploited people. Adding on, there are rumours that her dad is a rightist. Chairman Mao changed many things in the country. For example, he decided that being a scholar wasn't as important as being a Red Guard. There were no classes for many days, because Mao claimed that teachers taught like people did in the older days. Almost all of the students made a "da zi bao" about their teachers and the way they taught. Since Ji-Li was a good student, and liked all of her teachers, she had nothing bad to say about them. Therefore, she was persecuted by her fellow classmates that thought she didn't agree with Mao.

The time period of the book largely impacted Ji-Li, because she was part of a "Black Family". If she was born after the Cultural Revolution, she would have never had problems at school, and she probably would've gotten into the elite school she wanted, Shi-yi. Many of her dreams were crushed because of all the new changes happening throughout the country. She even wished that she was never born, because The Red Successors often brought up the fact that her grandfather was a landlord, and it influenced her greatly, even though she never met him. I think that if Chairman Mao never lead China, Ji-Li would have probably had a much easier and calmer childhood.


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1 comment:

  1. Mary,

    I really could understand your deep explanations. Good Job! Something interesting that I noticed in your blog post was the connection that you had with the book Ties that Bind, Ties that Break. With a major reason, I agree with you because both of these characters were experiencing what the Chinese Revolution was like. Both of them learned many things by just reflecting on how other people saw and interacted with them. Ji-Li will learn many things about her own country on her time, and Ailin learned how to be successful in China without her feet bound. I'm not sure if women had to bind their feet at these times, but if they did, Ji-Li would do it. My point is that Ailin and Ji-Li had completely different issues in their personal lives, but they both had/have to make decisions that could probably change their lives forever. Overall, your research made me understand how Ji-Li thought about what was happening at her time.

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