In Humanities we are each studying a colonial research topic, mine is clothing, to research these topics we are using Noodletools. For each of the note cards we had to fine a evidence, from a database, book or interview. Once we found a good piece of evidence we would copy and paste some of it into Noodletools. This was one of the last note cards that I did, for me it was harder to find evidence because I had used most of it and I didn’t want to be repetitive. Next we had to put the quote into our own words. This was a little hard because it couldn’t be similar to the quote while saying the same thing. Lastly, We had to write an analysis, this for me was the hardest. Sometimes it was all questions and other times I would just restate the quote. I think in this note card I found a good balance between the two, while also adding my own thoughts. I think that I did a good job on this note card and since I worked on it so much I got a four!

Ruby Wexler

Notecards

notecard #9

Fashion Shows Identity

Source:

Hall, Jill M. ““Clothing and Fashion in the 17th Century.”.” Facts On File , 2014, online.infobase.com/hrc/search/details/358077?q=colonial clothing.

Quote:

“The details of appearance conveyed identity. Contemporaries recognized a person of wealth and privilege by his or her fine clothes, rich ornaments, and elegant bearing, and responded with an appropriate level of deference. Clothing also represented actual value. A person’s wardrobe represented a significant investment. Clothes were worn, repaired, remade, handed down, and sometimes sold or pawned for cash.

European writers revealed their discomfort with the relative undress of Native people, describing them as “naked” even while enumerating their garments (breechcloths, leggings, moccasins, mantles, and so on). Colonial narratives record gifts to the Native leaders, gifts that usually included at least some items of European clothing. A key element of many colonial ventures was to “civilize” American Indians, and an essential part of European civilization was proper—that is, European—clothing. In this instance clothing served both as a gift of value, costly and—in the colonial context—rare, and a gift of identity, which would bring the Native leader and eventually the community closer to the European ideal of appearance.

Native peoples adapted European cloth and clothing, incorporating them into their dress. They used thick “duffel” cloth for cloaks or mantles that had traditionally been made of furs. But as the growing colonial population eroded the traditional Native ways of life, Native peoples were increasingly pushed to adopt European ways, especially European clothing.”

Paraphrase:

• A person’s wealth was distinguished by their clothing and decoration.
• One’s clothing was one of the main things that they spent their money on.
• Clothes were used, sold, given to younger relatives and reused.
• The Natives were first viewed to be naked because they wore little clothing.
• The English gave gifts to the Natives lots of the gifts had English clothing in them.
• Some of the European settlers wanted to “civilize” of the Natives, one of they ways they tried to make them more proper was to give them English clothing.
• Eventually the Natives used some of the English clothing as well as their own.
• The Natives used a cloth called duffel cloth to make cloaks, though their cloaks were usually made out of furs.
• As time went on and the colony grew, more and more Natives started to the English ways and use more and more of their clothing.

My Ideas:

Clothing was one of the main points that lead the depletion of the Native Americans. The English settlers gave them gifts that often included clothing, the Natives started to take the new clothes into their own culture. This seemed harmless at the beginning, but later it became clear that the English want to take over the Natives. I think that they tried to make the Natives respectable by making them look more like the English. One of the examples of this is Pocahontas, she was the daughter of the great chief Powhatan, then she married John Ralph. She was given a new name was taken into the English traditions and ways of dress. In a way this is a less brutal version of bringing Africans and making them work under terrible conditions. The enslaved Africans started to adopt the English clothing while still keeping their own culture’s clothes. Though like the Natives they were eventually forced into the European ways of dress. The English showed their wealth and rank through their clothing, enslaved people were automatically judged by their clothing and race. The Natives also had their own hierarchy that was also shown by clothing. I think that eventually the Natives were showed their rank through the amount of English clothing they had showed their rank because if you could have traded moe clothing that means you have things to trade and you are wealthy. Clothing could also have been very helpful or unhelpful in the drama of society. If you were someone looking to get married you would want to have nice clothing to look wealthy, to look well keep and maybe just to show off. If you wore odd or different clothes you might be though as odd or different. The English settlers spent a good amount of their money on their clothing, the Natives and enslaved people weren’t this particular though they were still showing their rank through their clothing. 

History:

Created: 11/02/2016 12:44 PM

For Thanksgiving we all had to write a piece about a person and a food that we connected over. I think that this is a representation of some of my best work. I feel that I am good a zooming in on a small moment. This was also a very meaningful piece for me and I feel like I put all that emotion into the piece. This was also one of my favorite writing things that we have done this year.

11-4-16                                                                                                      Humanities

Food Writing                                                                                              Group B

Cookies And Reindeer

By Ruby Wexler

In the middle of winter when it’s so cold and the freezing air seeps through the walls and fills the house with bitter icy air, only is one thing that makes me grin and fills me with joy. Gooey chocolate chip cookies, though they are warming to eat it’s really more about the process of making them that warms me so much. I always love to make cookies with my sister, Ella. We always make them when it’s cold and take them out of the oven early so they’re warm and gooey.

On a freezing morning that seems to go on forever, I am sitting in the living room, wrapped in a warm blanket. My sister comes thundering down the stairs. She hurries to the pantry, leaping like a deer. She opens it with a flourish and pulls out a yellow and red bag, which makes me grin.

“Chocolate chips!” I yell. Ella smiles and nods. She started to pull out all the dry ingredients. I run over to the fridge. All cold has left me now. I pull out the milk, butter and eggs, then run to the shelves and grab canola oil. We pile all the ingredients on the counter and take out bowls, spoons and measuring cups. We start to mix the dry ingredients. They are all as white and fresh as the snow outside. Ella sticks her finger into the sugar, that we are about to add, and taps my nose so the tip of my nose is white.

“Ruby the white nosed reindeer!” She sings.

“Had a very sugary nose,” I continue. We both laugh. The sound is like little chiming bells and fills the room with sunshine. When it’s time to add the brown sugar, we eat so much of it there is only just enough to put in the mix. I turn on the mixer it swirls the light brown contents until it is smooth. It 1looks like freshly made caramel waiting to be eaten. Then we add the flour mixture, slowly sprinkling into the bowl slowly mixes it in. We look in the bowl, there is only a little bit of flour left Ella takes it and throws it in most of it ends up on us because the mixer is too fast. We fall over laughing getting the snow white powder everywhere. At last it’s time to add the chocolate chips. We take turns adding them, throwing them in then watching them disappear in the depths of the dough. The recipe says to add a cup, but we always add an extra handful for fun. We scoop out the dough on to sheets, making sure they are evenly spaced out and put them into the oven. Then we take our places across from the oven with the bag of chocolate chips between us. The wait is almost unbearable. With ten minutes left, we have eaten almost all the chocolate. Five minutes left the floor is hurting my butt! Three, two, one! The timer dings and Ella puts on oven mitts, and pulls out the gooey, perfect cookies. We wait again until they are cool enough to eat. I touch one. It’s warm but not too hot. We both grab the same cookie and grin I break it in half, we each take one half and take a bite. The outside is crunchy, but the inside is gooey and the chocolate is melted perfectly. We eat a few more then save the rest. They are always good but not as good as the first bite that I shared with my sister.  

This memory is important to me because my relationship with my sister has changed. She decided to go to boarding school. She left home four years earlier than I thought. That memory took place three years ago but it feels like another lifetime. It feels like a hundred years until she comes home for break. It’s like one of my best friends has grown up and left me, no, one of my best friends has grown up and left me. Leaving behind me in a ever blowing storm, where I sit alone waiting for the angel that will save me with the sweet smell of baking cookies. Though when she does come home we make chocolate chip cookies and I feel as happy as I did three years ago. When we do we dance, and I am, once more a forever happy reindeer.

This is my Giver Essay, we wrote these after we read the book The Giver by Lois Lowry. This was only a four paragraph essay which is shorter than essay I have written in the past, this men’t that it only had two body paragraphs instead of three. This was interesting because when we started to think of the topic we were going to write about, we were in the middle of the book. I wanted to do color, when I had thought of this topic there wasn’t much evidence for it. I also brought up my own topic, it seemed a littler harder and different than the other topics. Even with this I really liked it and stuck with it (even though once I wanted to change my topic) and I think that I did a good job.

Color Makes a Perfect World

By Ruby Wexler

What is a perfect world? In Lois Lowry’s The Giver, everyone is the same, they feel no real emotion, and they live bland colorless lives with families they don’t love. 12-year-old Jonas, a young boy who lives in this community which is a supposed utopia, is a good rule following citizen. This all changes when he is assigned to to be the next Receiver of Memory. As the Receiver, Jonas is given all the memories of the past. He receives the memories from the Giver who has the memories that are kept from the rest of the community. As he is receiving the memories, Jonas starts to see color. With color comes emotion and longing for someone else to share them with besides the Giver. He sets forth on an adventure to show everyone the wonders and joy they have never seen. In this society, keeping the sameness is essential to keeping the so called utopia. However, color represents difference and individuality. Emotion gives you freedom and new experiences, both of which in this society are considered dangerous to the sameness.

By trying to make a utopia the Elders have made a dystopia, where people are like blind, obedient robots. To make a utopia they took away emotion to make everyone the same, but in reality this dehumanized the community. One day the Giver is explaining the sorrows of Sameness to Jonas. “‘We relinquished color when we relinquished sunshine and did away with differences.’ He thought for a moment. ‘We gained control of many things. But we had to let go of others,’” (Lowry, p. 82). The Elders have gained control of the weather and  sickness as well as the lives and thoughts of the community. Everyone is the same, they feel no real emotion, only a toned down artificial version. People can no longer see color-this is to abolish difference, to make a perfect world. Though in a truly perfect world couldn’t people be truly happy? Yes, they take this away to stop argument and anger, though if you don’t know the opposite of  happiness you don’t know what true happiness is. Without both you cannot feel love, therefore you cannot receive the greatest gift of life, you cannot be loved. With no real emotion you cannot be happy, and with no difference you are just a one of millions, just bland without color.

In the community, there is no color, everyone looks exactly the same, and no one is special. To be truly free you have to be different, you wouldn’t get to truly live. After Jonas starts to see color for the first time, the Giver explains about skin tones. “No, flesh isn’t red. But it has red tones in it. There was a time, actually—you’ll see this in the memories later—when flesh was many different colors. That was before we went to Sameness. Today flesh is all the same, and what you saw was the red tones,” (Lowry, p. 81). Jonas sees color, he knows of difference. Later on, he wonders why the rest of the world cannot experience this. Though the answer he gets is unsatisfactory, he is told that it’s dangerous. Color represents diversity, and without diversity nothing would ever change for better or for worse. This is what has happened to Jonas’s society, everyone is the same, this is a ever looping pattern. To grow and think you must have another opinion a another way to look at things. Color gives happiness though can also give so many other emotions. Color makes us truly human. The community which is supposed to be a utopia is truly a dystopia that is full of emotionless beings that are only shells of what there once was.

To make a utopia, Jonas’s community went to sameness. Though, to keep the sameness they had to pay the price of losing the ability to see color and to feel true emotion. By letting go of these they are making a dystopia by trying to make a utopia. Jonas and the Giver are the only ones who have access to what it was like before the sameness. This makes them the only ones who can see that the world is full of puppets whose strings are held by the Elders. To have choice and freedom of thought is dangerous according to the Elders. Jonas finds out about this and decides that he wants the world to feel real emotion. To have a true utopia people must be truly happy, but you can’t be truly happy if you don’t know what anger is. If there is one point of power controlling everyone like puppets, that is a dystopia. To try to make everything perfect, you end up dehumanizing people and destroying the world.