Critical Encounters Ch. 5

I think that reading this chapter just reemphasizes my own experience with the feminism literary theory. I say that only because a lot of the things they talk about i was thinking in my head. For instance, how my gender effects how i read the text. Being a female, i almost felt like this chapter was pointless. The feminist theory should just be known, and a lot of times when it is talked about i feel like women are just trying to make a bigger deal out of being different. This kind of goes along with how i feel about racism. I feel like a lot of time, if it just wasn't talked about as in depth and as often as it is, things might be better. However, in texts this is hard, since there are so many different ways to look at a text. I agree with Appleman when she talks about when she thinks that both "feminist" text and traditional text in the classroom. I think it would be more wise to start with the "feminist" text because i feel that it is easier to see the lens of feminism in that text, and then taking that into any text. I think that the feminist text make students more comfortable with the theory and looking at a text through that lens, and then, once they are comfortable, it will be easy for them to take that lens, and not only look at other texts, but also the world around them. i think that the activities that Appleman talks about are a really good flow to go from a poem, to text, to traditional, non feminist text, into the world around them. One thing that i thought this chapter could have done a little better is the amount of responses by the students. They were almost overwhelming, and i found myself just skimming them by the end.