J Hurtado Simonds' Online Journal

In this essay I will be explaining how Junior is presented as an outsider. In The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian is about a young Native American and how he has to choose whether to remain in his community or go school in a different town, which is racist towards his people.

At the start of the book the author presents him as outsider by giving him a birth defect, which makes him look different to everyone else. I think that this makes him an outsider because he does not look like an ordinary child, which prevents him from interacting with other children because he may feel insecure. This would make him an outsider because he would be expelling himself from the community and staying by himself all the time. A quote that supports my statement is “Wierdo me”. The word ,Wierdo, means a person who dresses or behaves strange or eccentric. This means that Junior is trying to call himself strange.

Another stage in the book when Junior is presented as an outsider is when he is travelling to Reardan. This makes him an outsider because he is travelling to different places, which could mean that he does not have enough time to get to know or mix with people because he is always having to travell. A quote that supports my statement is,” I always felt like a stranger”. The word stranger implies that someone is not accustomed to a certain person or surrounding. This means that Junior was not used to being in this town and round the white people, so he wouldn’t be comfortable or himslef around them. This makes him an outsider because he would be the odd one out, as in he would be the only one who doesn’t know anyone there.

Junior is presented as an outsider again when he first arrives at Reardan. The author presents him as an outsider by giving him bruises all over his face. This makes him an outsider because his face would bring him attention as his face would be marked.

The first moment, in which Junior is presented as an outsider, is when he appears at Reardan with a black eye. This makes him a bigger outsider than he already is because as he is a Native American the white people wouldn’t be used to seeing them at there school. In addition to this he walked into Reardan with a black eye, which brought extra attention as it appeared that he had gotten into a fight. Another point that made him an outsider was the fact that Reardan’s school mascot was an Indian. This makes Junior an outsider because by using an Indian as their mascot they are indicating that they think less of Native Americans or that they are do not believe that Indians are equal to white people, so being in an environment which people think little of you would make you feel unwanted and different to everyone else. A quote that helps the point that Junior is an outsider is, “They stared at me.” The word ” stare” helps the point because by saying this, the author is implying that the white kids thought that junior wasn’t like them because when you stare at something you do it because you are not use to something or have never seen it.

Junior is introduced as an outsider in the third paragraph by the author making him take a journey through two towns. This makes him an outsider because he is travelling through two towns, which he did not know, so this made him feel like a stranger. In this paragraph Junior mentions that he feels like he is half Indian in one place and half white in the other. I think this means that Junior feels like he does not fully belong to a particular community and is outcast by most members from both communities. The phrase, “I felt like a stranger” implies that he did not feel like he belonged in the community or place he was currently in. The word stranger means a person who is unknown in a certain place, so saying that you felt like a stranger implies that you felt like nobody knew who you where in the certain place. This is how I think Junior was presented as an outsider.

For version one I would talk about how he is adressed by different names everywhere he goes. I would also add how he travels far away to get to his school. Another point would be that when he first arrived the white people couldn’t believe their eyes.

Version two I would write about how his whole family have been poor even in the past. I would include how most people thought white people where more important. I would also add that they stared at him like he was a UFO.

On version three I would say that Indians think that they deserve to be poor. Another point would be that the white people had more hope in life because most people where racist. I would also add how he was treated differently compared to white people.

The absolute true diary of a part time Indian  is a book about a kid, named Junior, and how he is neglected throughout his community. Junior is born to a poor family with a physical defect. Junior is born with an alcoholic father and didn’t have many luxuries compared to the white people. During this essay I’m going to write about how Sherman Alexie treats Junior like an outsider.

In my essay i will be exploring the book (The arrival). The arrival is a book without words that sends its message through pictures. The theme of the book is immigration and adapting to certain circumstances in life. Shaun Tan has written about immigration several times. As an Australian himself  he knows how many refugees are treated, as Australians thought of refugees as a waste of space. For this reason the author decides to write about a father leaving his daughter and wife to look for a better life as their economic value could be very bad or could need more money. Shaun Tan allows the reader to sympathise with the traumatic experiences that most refugees go through.

In the very first picture I can see images of several people. I think that these pictures have the fact that everyone is a different race in common. They do not seem to be happy in their pictures, this may be because they are migrants. I presume that they are migrants because their clothes look old and very worned out, the reason for this is probably because they are migrants and they are looking for a better place to live so they won’t have much money to spend on appearance and glamour. He added several pictures because he wants to give the reader a better chance of knowing what is happening as he is not using any words. He gives the reader more many images of people that do not seem that rich and that are completely different races to each other.

In the second image there are object, which would all be normally found in a household. I think Shaun Tann does this because when you are moving you would usually take object of a very significant importance to the person who is leaving. The second image includes two images of the main characters family, this shows us that family is very important to him. The second image also includes a clock. This could be because he wants to be reminded of his old home, so taking an object that he constantly saw at his old home would give him a sense of security and comfort.

The third image shows two statues greeting each other. This could be seen as the citizens greeting the migrants from all around the world. The author of this book may of done this because it shows that some people appreciate what migrants could potentially bring  to their country. I think this represents migrants because there is a person with a suit case implying that he has arrived from a journey.

Shaun Tann shows that he has been tagged like an animal when they are being moved to another place. The person in the image looks confused and sad, this may be because he does not understand what they are saying because they might be speaking a different language to his own, He might be feeling sad because he is probably getting stressed out that no one can understand him.

In conclusion, I think Shaun Tann expressed migration in many ways throughout this book. I did not enjoy the book because I did not manage to completely understand it and I was still left with several questions.

John poetry a from Joel North on Vimeo.

Speak to inform John from Joel North on Vimeo.

 Dear Mr Dastagir,

I am writing to stress that favouritism is a very important issue at our school. Favourtism is when a certain pupil is treated better than another because of a their academic level or behaviour. This could affect our learning as we might not be taught as much as ohers. The effect of this would be that the certain student’s academic level would go down. This would also lower the self esteem of those who are being neglected, as you would think that other people are better than yourself.

Favourtism could also affect behaviour and attitude of the certain student who is being neglected. The consequences of this could be that students could be expelled or suspended. This would decrease the amount of knowledge they gain as they wouldn’t be recieving as much knowledge at home. If this was to happen, the particular student would have to go through the drama of changing schools.

Negative favourtism, could make the pupil being neglected leave the school as pupils would feel that they’re not wanted or appreciated. This could lead to bullying, and the population of the school decreasing because students would feel unwanted and would think that London Nautical is unsafe.

I believe that everyone is allowed to have a favourite but they are not permitted to show it in class or express it in any other way. If this happens I believe there should be a fair and just punishmment, as this is a huge dilemma.

I consider that in order to tackle this issue you should put CCTV in all classrooms so  that you would know what teachers are doing.

In addition you could tell the teachers what would happen if you were to treat students differently. This would help because if teachers are tempted they would know the consequences. This would lower the possibility of teachers treating pupils differently.

As well as this you could be more strict on the students so they conduct themselves in an orderly fashion. If this does happen the whole class would be well behaved, so the teacher would not have a reason to pick on anyone.

As favroutism affects behaviour, the whole class would be affected, as a neglected student would want attention. Furthermore the whole class would be distracted therefore students will not get much work done and would not learn to their highest potential.

If negative behaviour was to occur it would also ruin the school’s reputation as grades would go down. If grades do go down, London Nautical will not be as popular therefore students would not want to come because pupils would rather attend a school with a good reputation than a bad one.

To help this problem you could split the class into half so that the teacher could help everyone more effectively. To have less pupils in class would help them because if there are less students the teacher will not have as many students asking for help, which means the class would gain more knoledge in that time.

Teachers would also be benefited from this behave as teachers would have a clear view so students will not be able to do anything which could cause disruption. Pupils would eventually get used to this change,so they would not be tempted to do something bad.

Thank you for listening.

Your sincerely,

John Simonds

The atmosphere is sad.Throughout the whole city it is sad,glum and dull,Haroun and the sea of stories shows us this when,”It stood so mournfull sea full of Glumfish.”This shows that even animals are sad by calling a fish glum,glumfish.But Haroun and his family are not like the others,they are all happy.

Soraya,Haroun’s mother,was singing in joy and his dad,Rashid,was doing what he loved the most,tellng stories.I knaow that the town of Alifbay is all sad. I think this because in the book it says,”In the North of the sad city stood mighty factories in which (so i’m told) sadness was actually manufactured.”                                                       The author uses personification to give us a better image of what is happenng.

Haroun is a young boy who is full of questions,he’s shown this many times once was when ,”No,come on seriously.”This shows that Haroun wants to know everythįńg.

Salmon Rushdie prepares us by describing the charecters and letting us know what there personalities.