Reflective 4/15

I feel the idea that we are all aliens, even to our own country, was overlooked. Maybe I'm saying this because that statement is more evident in my case than the rest of the class. First off, I'm blessed to have lived at AU for a whopping 3 years (well three years in Fall 2008). That might not be calls for celebration for the rest of you, but for me it is. I'm not trying to sound like I broken record, but I'm lucky to be in one location for 2 years. Yes, I am an American citizen, but I find myself an outsider everywhere I go, even at AU. I've lived in Europe for 6 1/2 years and the rest has been stateside. I don't have a "home," the closest thing for me is my grandparents' farm where we spend 1 or 2 months visiting every summer. I don't have a home state, I had to think long and hard to figure out where I register to vote. For those who don't understand why: I was born in Las Vegas (valid reason to register there), until Spring Break my driver's license was from Utah where I also graduated high school (another valid reason), and my permanent Address is in Virginia (yet again another valid reason). In the end I picked Virginia, mainly because I changed my license over the Break. I apologize for not saying this in class, but I felt I wouldn't add to the conversation. This is something that is very close to my heart, mainly because I have yet to feel like I "fit in" on my floor, in my classes, and with my peers. Even the old saying of "home is where the heart is" is hard for me. I have yet to discover where my heart is. Is it in Germany, Italy, or the US? Virginia, Kansas, Nevada, or Utah? I hope I can find an answer, and maybe I'll be happier if/when I get this answered. There are times that I despise my upbringing, but I have witnessed so much that many people only dream of. I have been exposed to cultures and countries outside of my comfort zone. At the same time my thoughts will sometimes wander to my Dad, asking myself if he is alright, if he misses me. Call me over dramatic, maybe I'm not this worked up for my Dad's current assignment, but he has served in conflict zones before in more danger than he is now. I envy everyone else, having a home they can go to, friends they can go back to, having a familiar place they can go to. That is the downside of my experiences, I can go home; but Alexandria is not my home. I will always have a loving family to go to, but nothing else in Alexandria. No friends to see, no place to just go to.

I don't expect anyone to try and understand me. I feel I can offer a different side than most people have seen, I've just learned to be the quiet kid in the back of the classroom. I don't care if you think I'm crazy or if this has been meaningless, I just wanted to get it out there.

What happened on Columbus' and Cortez's missions are sad. Conquering/exterminating another race is not "moral" but at the same time progress was made. Life is just a double-edged sword, both sides will get hurt. I would do just as Scott said, I'd rather be Columbus because ignorance is bliss. I'd rather do something I felt was right instead of doing something I knew was wrong. Wait a minute, I did the Columbus thing (doing what I feel is right) with the AUCC. I'm even hated for it, but one person can only do so much. Like the saying goes, "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make them drink."

Are we all aliens in America? Aren't the only true "Americans" the descendants of the Native American tribes?

Todorov

I find myself kind of surprised by some of the other posts with regard to this as a strictly historical text. I was also surprised by the presentation of the presentation of the "discoverers" of America, but at the level of understanding afforded to the Spanish invaders and Todorov's restraint from completely demonizing the Spaniards. Of course part of my European history class in high school was taught using Howard Zinn, I suppose that's no great shock. I had always reduced the motives for conquest down to "gold, God, and glory," but I feel like this presented a slightly more balanced view. I appreciated his attempt to avoid the pitfalls of the dichotomies usually applied to this period, although I don't think that he can by any means be viewed as unbiased. I have a hard time accepting his extensive use of quotations as exclusively"letting the authors speak" as he terms it, and I would have at times appreciated more of his argument and less of him cutting and pasting theirs. That said, this was a really fascinating read, and his quotations gave great access to documents most of us would never have access to, or at the very least inclination to seek out.

With relation to science fiction, if you enjoyed this, pick up Card's Pastwatch at some point. Card notes his use of Todorov, but really it's an almost exact (fictionalized) version of Todorov's ideas. It strikes me how important for both Todorov and science fiction writers how important the idea of communication is. It's interesting to compare communication in Todorov to that in the Sparrow. Todorov notes that the conquistadors were interested only in finding the Spanish equivalents to words (when they bothered at all); Sandoz moved beyond that (he notes how careful he was to find out exactly what their words meant) but he still didn't bother with all of the signs and cultural symbols. Doesn't seem like a whole lot of progress to me. Ender's Game shows the same thing, we don't understand them, so lets eliminate them (which is much easier to deal with because, as Phil's discussion of the Sparrow alludes to, they're ugly). I suppose that most sci-fi is dystopian, but its still sad to see how little we have progressed, and how little authors envision us progressing.

Substanitive Conquest

Let me preface this by saying that I do not like discourse analysis (sorry Professor) also, I have not slept in a while, and that you should probably not read this if you have not read Children of God because I make no guarantees that I will not mention it in my post. Also, I am going to start with a rant about how Cortez knew what he was doing unlike the mission, and then try to move on to comparisons between the mindsets of Columbus and the two missions to Rakat. Finally, I hope to have another little rant about aesthetics.

To begin I look to the chapter Cortez and signs. Over and over again it reiterates how Cortez was constantly looking for more information and not trusting anyone. Why did our group not do this. Granted, they had a more peaceful intent than did Cortez, but at least he knew not to be a fool about things. We have, on a number of occasions and a number of blog posts suggested that they cannot be blamed for something we can spot as an error in hindsight. I argue, however, that Cortez's desire to learn and understand Montezuma and the Aztecs is essentially the same idea and if he thought to do it Emilio Sandoz and Company could have been able to do it as well.

Before moving on to columbus I also feel the need to mention Cortez's position in overthrowing the Aztecs as not being all that different from the position of Sofia as she lead the Runa against the Ja'anata. The book notes how Cortez's army is essentially some spanish Cavalry and a lot of native foot soldiers who had been oppressed by the Aztecs. We even see some aspects of Aztec determinism in Ja'anata life with regards to birth essentially serving as destiny.

If one puts the two Sandoz missions to Rakat together you total the misc. reasons for which Cristobal wanted to discover as well. The second mission covers wealth while the first one looks as beauty, learning, and the glorification of God. Columbus and the Jesuits share a certain presumptive success/fatalistic outlook on the mission. Both seem to believe God is leading them exactly where they want to go. If I did not know better I would say the Russell has read this piece.

The Conquest of America

High school history class programmed me to immediately think "God, gold, and glory" after hearing conquistador. And it doesn't seem that far off after reading Todorov, who went into greater detail than any high school history class. At times, it was painstakingly difficult to read quotation after quotation after quotation. I know he was trying to present an unbiased narrative of what happened through primary sources that I would never have read before, but halfway through I wished for more from Todorov, less Columbus/Cortes/Las Casas/etc.

That being said, it was interesting to read after The Sparrow, which kept popping up in my mind, but how couldn't it with all the talk of Columbus and divine intervention? He saw a lot of turtles on fenceposts, or the equivalent of such back in those days (mermaids, perhaps?). But reading about Cortes and the myth of Quetzalcoatl reminded me of Paul in Dune. During that class, a long long time ago, we brought up whether Paul manipulated the Fremen's belief in a messiah. It's a little fuzzy right now, but I thought I'd bring up that.

In preparation for PTJ's question about whether the Spaniards should have and/or could have done something different, in the text Todorov says "I do not want to suggest, by accumulating such quotations, that Las Casas or the other defenders of the Indians should, or even could, have behaved differently." (172). Interestingly, he doesn't mention Columbus or Cortes and instead focuses on defenders of the Indians or those that tried to learn about their culture. However, Cortes did learn the signs, but manipulated them against the Indians, leading to death and destruction. I don't know if Columbus or Cortes could have behaved differently because we're looking at it in hindsight.

Deus vult

As PTJ posed in class "Did the Jesuit party make a mistake or screw up along the way that we could expect them to do something else?" Our discussion brought up some good examples like Sofia rising up at the end against the military Jana'ata or the Jesuit party being too quickly satisfied with what was happening. I think that even though everyone involved became practically like family, there was still a lack of communication between them, especially on D.W.'s part. After Alan's death, D.W. planned how to use the fuel reserves, concluding that there was only enough fuel for 5 round trips to the asteroid. However, he never lets anyone else know and also smuggles the Winchester down beause "he didn't want any big damn discussion about it" (216). I don't know what the Jesuit party could have done differently, but I think that the beginning of their troubles involve the lander and the fuel problem, which eventually strands them on Rakhat. Had they the option to leave Rakhat, things might have turned out differently? They might not have planted gardens, which ultimately lead to the military Jana'ata slaughtering Runa and humans alike. But there are instances where it's implied that the mistake was earlier, perhaps in the design of the mission. Was it doomed from the beginning? On page 334 mentions that Alan Pace might have been helpful had he been alive. It is interesting when the narrator pops up, all omnipresent and god-like.

We made a good attempt to list 8 individuals to send on this alien mission. The picks were primarily practical because we read/saw what happened on Rakhat and mentally swore to not let that happen on this space adventure. During the exercise, I couldn't shake the thought about Gilligan's Island. If the space lander breaks, I'd want a Professor-like character who could build a radio out of a coconut and try to get the group off the planet (though maybe MacGyver would be a better choice since it took forever for The Minnow's passengers to get off that island). But maybe the Professor is not to blame. Was it bad luck that kept them stranded on the island or was is deus vult? No character seems to go through a crisis like Sandoz, doubting his faith. In fact, the show seems to lay blame on Gilligan and his clumsiness for each failed attempt to escape.

On the topic of Gilligan's Island, I found out, thanks to Wikipedia, that there was a cartoon spin-off in the 80s called Gilligan's Planet. They go from stranded on an unknown island to a far-off planet. I'd call that a very large turtle on a fence post. I think you can only take responsibility for the failed escapes so many times before adopting a policy of deus vult. That being said, casting Brad Pitt as Emilio Sandoz-- not a good idea; deciding to make Gilligan's Planet-- very bad idea for a tv show. I can handle only so many attempts to escape an island/planet. However, according to Mary Doria Russell in the reading guide at the back of the book, "Emilio Sandoz goes back to Rakhat, but only because he has no choice. God is not done with him yet." Dun dun dun. I can't wait to read Children of God and find out what happened on Rakhat since Emilio left.

Beauty and the Other

I want to return to return to the idea of beauty in defining and understanding the other Schmitt notes "The political enemy need not be Morally evil or aesthetically ugly," but I am beginning to question if, for all practical applications, this is actually true. We only briefly touched on this in class last week, but I suspect we will spend at least some time on it tomorrow (given it's apparent importance to Columbus), but I believe it is nearly impossible for humans to separate the two. Exhibit A: the propaganda poster above--what sort of message would it have conveyed if the soldier looked like the upstanding young man who was more likely to be wearing that uniform than a large ugly Gorilla? In the same sense, what would have been the reaction of the people of earth if the Reshtar's music had sounded a little less beautiful and a little more like rape. The prince is never really a prince when he looks like a frog, and the Wicked Witch can always trick the hero if she disguises her ugly worts. We keep using biblical allusions (specifically Job) see Sarah below. I think a story with even more ties is the Odyssey--Odysseus who, during the Trojan war is watched over and guided by Athena, is finally led astray by the Gods, left to roam for years before getting home. Specific to my point in this post is his encounter with the Sirens who's beautiful song is meant only as a lure. someone needed to lash Emilio Sandoz to his mast.

Refection on the Sparrow

I had two general thoughts after reading some of the other posts and our discussion in class. First: while there were several references made in class and on the blogs to the blind devotion of the priests on the mission, and while that seemed true in the case of Sandoz, his training had been for a critical, informed, academic faith, not the stereotypical uniformed devotion. However, he seemed to lose all academic aspects of his faith about thirty seconds after hearing the transmission. Both while reading and during our discussion it struck me that one of Sandoz's primary flaws was that he became so wrapped up in his own personal pentecost that he seemed to completely forget his (presumably) extensive knowledge of both biblical and church history. While many posts and much of discussion make the assumption that the god in the book (assuming there is one) is the god of the deists who created and left, rather than one who leaves turtles on fenceposts, I don't think that this is a necessary assumption. If Sandoz's education was anything like what I'd imagine it to be, he would be well aware that the path of god, even a biblical interventionist god, often didn't lead to good places for the followers. The obvious case of this is the story of Job where a god who intervened in peoples lives on a regular basis deliberately allowed Job's faith to be tested. While this is the almost obligatory reference with regards to this novel, there are other examples of an intervening, turtle-leaving god allowing bad things to happen. John the Baptist, the "voice in the wilderness," had his severed head given to Herodias on a silver platter after having baptized Jesus; he was following the spoken will of god-on-earth and I'd argue that he had it at least as bad as Sandoz. That said, I'm pretty sure that all (there might have been an exception) of the twelve apostles were martyred, and the will of god in people's lives doesn't get much clearer than in their case. So I don't think that we can say with certainty that, in the context of the book, Sandoz's error lied in assuming that the turtles on fenceposts had been left deliberately, but rather that he made the assumption that the turtles were leading to someplace he wanted to go. Even with a complete belief in a biblical interventionist god, he should have been aware of the implicit dangers attached to "god's will."

This leads to my second (briefer) thought, which is that the church would have had a much easier time dealing with Sandoz had he been victimized in a more sanitized way. Mike talks in his post about the saintliness of Sandoz, and it seems to me that the church would have had a much easier time viewing him as good (or even saintly) if he'd simply had the good graces to be martyred like all of the others. In thinking about all of the examples of people being punished for following "the will of god" it occurred to me that while its relatively easy to glorify someone who dies in the name of god, you don't get too much press on people who were raped in the name of god. I guess death makes for better PR. Anyway it just makes me wonder how many cases like Sandoz there are out there. People who almost died for god, but didn't quite get there, and because of that were viewed with suspicion and became outcasts rather than getting their own feast days. Maybe not many, but somehow I doubt it. Either way I find myself looking forward to Russel's further portrayals of faith in the next book.