In class, we practiced steps we can take to apply theoretical lenses to a text. We read Sharon Old’s poem titled “On the Subway” through a number of lenses in order to select the most relevant and thought-provoking details for analysis. For this post, I’d like to see you continue the discussion by analyzing a quote or two through one lens, and commenting on at least two students’ posts.
Quick-Review of the Steps for Applying Theoretical Lenses:
1) Select your lens and then write out the language of the lens
2) Re-read the poem and find words, phrases, lines that best match up with the lens language
3) Write about these lines to unlock a deeper meaning to the poem by connecting the lines to the lens language.
Remember—choose only one lens! (Lacan’s mirror stage theory, Freud’s memory theory, W.E.B. DuBois’s double-consciousness theory, Homi Bhabha’s hybridity theory, Judith Butler’s gender performativity theory).
If it’s helpful, you can select one of the following sentence starters to begin. There is no right or wrong way, and these are just a few of a million ways to do it! The only rule is to avoid simply summarizing the plot.
- Lacan would have much to say about Sharon Old’s narrator in the poem “On the Subway.”
- A post-colonial reading of Sharon Old’s “On the Subway” reveals ____________.
- An interesting way to read Sharon Old’s “On the Subway” is through Homi Bhabha’s hybridity theory.
- A close look at the poem “On the Subway” through Lacan’s mirror stage theory exposes ____________.
- Sharon Old’s train in “On the Subway” is a literal representation of ___________.
- Sharon Old’s poem titled “On the Subway” is about ____________.
BRING YOUR MEMOIR TO NEXT CLASS!
Post colonial theory deals with expectations about race and culture. The poem "On the Subway" by Sharon Olds, she uses this theory providing a history point of view of a white person and a Black African American person who is simply sitting across from her in the subway. This black man is looked at as "stronger" to the white women who is "fragile", and also explains her assumptions of a colored race, which is significant to the quote she uses that says "he could take my coat so easily, my briefcase, my life-". There are many other quotes that can also connect to the previous grow above, but overall the connection with post colonial theory is proven to be used throughout the poem.
ReplyDelete- Tiffany Da Silva
I agree with you when you talk about how the black man is seen as stronger and more powerful than the white woman, and she is seen as helpless!
DeleteI agree that the poem has a lot of "othering" going on. The author definitively feels that blacks are inferior to whites.
DeletePrevious quote above ***
DeleteI agree with your analysis, this black man in the poem seems powerful to the narrator and has the ability, the white women thinks, of taking her coat away so easily, my briefcase, my life...
DeleteIt seems to me that there are stereotypical generalizations going on there.
I agree about showing race and gender together bring some post-colonial facts into this
DeleteI agree about showing race and gender together bring some post-colonial facts into this
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DeleteI agree, America has a deep ingrained sense of racism dating back the the early colonial Era starting with the Native Americans, over time, it has become much more subtle in certain ways, and this poem portrays that through the thoughts in the womans mind
DeleteThere seems to be that fear of the "Other" in this poem. The narraator feels mixtures of intimidation and power as the black man is being described.
DeleteA post-colonial reading of Sharon Old’s “On the Subway” is about a black man and a white woman on a train, and the woman is judging him because of his race and his looks. This is shown when "The young man and I face each other. His feet are huge, in black sneakers laced with white in a complex pattern like a set of intentional scars." What I think she means by scars is that men are shown to have scars unlike woman who should be seen as "gentle" and "fragile". In conclusion post colonial theory is shown throughout the story.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you it feels as if the author wants to show that shes a victim, while antagonizing the "other" race. Especially when she describes the young man in the poem.
DeleteI agree with you that this does have to do with the interpretation of appearance. How a male may have bigger feet compared to a women who have smaller feet. With the male having big feet is significant to how he may be "bigger then her" or "more powerful then her".
Delete- Tiffany Da Silva
I agree with you this does feel as if the white women is judging him to be powerful and stronger because he is a man, and he describes herself as gentle and fragile because she is a women. She is certainly making conclusions based on what she sees.
DeleteI agree, she makes the man sound as if he's just another human walking the planet as if he had no meaning as if he is "the other". She feels as if she is the victim but yet he's the victim because of her judgement.
Delete-Alexandria J.
I agree with you, I feel like she does place a judge.
DeleteReading the poem, "On the Subway" through a post colonial lens, one can see how the author describes the other race in a "othering" way. The author does this by creating a image that she is the prey to a scary predator. Although it can felt that she is a predator who ravenously attacks the other persons identity.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your example how she explains "she is the prey to a scary predator" which is the quote you are using when she describes that she is wearing a animal skin clothing while the African American Black male is wearing a red sweater which signifies that since she is wearing an Animal Skin clothing is is the pray to the red male.
Delete- Tiffany Da Silva
I definitely agree, especially on the point that one of the base elements of the poem is the creation of otherness and the reflection of a division between the man on the subway and the narrator. However, I believe that she is not attacking the man's identity, and I rather creating it on her own terms.
DeleteA post-colonial reading of Sharon Old’s “On the Subway” reveals that the author is making stereotypical judgments of this black man because of his race. She points out how he has the power to take her coat "easily", her briefcase, and her life. It seems as if she is saying this because she views black men as stealers and killers, something very stereotypical. Just because she is white, she says how she is eating the steak and he may be not eating. She is expressing how the white man rules, and are better off because of their skin color or race. But people of color are perceived as stealers, killers and hungry. She is making real stereotypical judgments which I find to be fallacious.
ReplyDeleteI agree what you have to say but do you think could be that she's a women?
DeleteFor all we know, although not typical, that man could be rich and eat the same "steak" she does, and that's just how he prefers to dress. "Appearances are everything".
DeleteDoes she actually claim those stereotypes or are you stating those stereotypes because of your own personal cultural baggage?
DeleteIn the poem called "One the Subway" by Sharon Old's was base of the gender differences. Some people say can be base on race which I agree but I think Sharon wanted this Peom to be base on Gender. Noticing in the poem stated how big the men feet and having power. Giving that old ideology of when women were consider weaker then man because they not have the physical "Strength". compare to men. The author is showing the Gender appearance as I stated in my findings. Also to make it clear I do believe some women can have physical strength even greater than some man .
ReplyDeleteI agree with you, she also has a great way of balancing out Gender vs. Race.
Delete-Alexandria J.
I agree because we had previously read that sex and gender are two different things. Sex is your biological categorization of male versus female whereas gender is basically the assumed roles of that sex. These gender roles can differ from person to person and just because your sex is female doesn't mean you need gender characteristics such as fragility and inferiority.
DeleteI agree with you but I think she uses race and gender together in this poem to show the judgements people can have for not just one side of a person but for multiple.
DeleteLooking at "on the subway", from a gender based lens, we can identify the stereotypes of both men and women, and even come to realize some of our bias ideas that we may have thought of while reading through the poem. The man is described in a almost animal way, as cold and bruitsh, and that he also radiates the aura of a mugger, while the presumed women, is described, or percieved as the prey, or victim waiting to be attacked/mugged. The author, I believe, wanted to show the bias we may come up with in our minds, based off a description which we can then turn into vivid imagery. For all we know, he could have been homeless man, sick and tired, or that was just the way he choose to dress, while she could have been a robber, or killer.
ReplyDeleteYour point is very interesting. It just speaks to the fact that looks are deceiving yet we still use someones appearance into to categorize them in society's groups.
DeleteIn reading Sharon Old's "On the Subway" I found that she is a very judgmental person She judged another person based on his gender and his race. She felt that just because she was a woman she was the on in danger, and that she was even more at risked of being robbed because the man was black. It is clear that she failed to take into consideration that you cannot judge a person based on stereotypes.
ReplyDelete-Alexandria J.
Well lets just think about it, who doesn't do what she does. As much as most people would like to say they do not judge based off of gender, we do it unintentionally. At times it i ourself to blame for doing this, other times its what we grew around that made up slowly believe it was true.
DeleteI agree with Sherien, everybody judges everyone else but not everyone voices out there opinions like the author of this poem did. Everyone thinks about these stereotypes when they see another person, and although we can't base everything off stereotypes, they are a large part of how we think about somebody.
DeleteUsing a post colonial lens allows me to see the vicious way in which an individual can "other" another individual. Phrases such as "he is in my power" and "I must profit from our history" demonstrate the firm superiority the narrator is self-proclaiming for herself. The impact of one's difference in race can usher in terms like "murderous," "broken," and "dark." By affiliating these words with the young man the narrator saw on the subway, there is evidence of supremacy and stereotypes. All these depict aspects of colonial oppression and perception of the "Other."
ReplyDeleteDon't you think it's crazy how we can just label an individual as an "other" without realizing how disconcertingly far we can take our viewpoints? We take into consideration factors such as race and status to label others when in reality, we don't know anything about the individual we are making assumptions about. Just because an individual looks or acts a certain way doesn't mean the person belongs to a certain group. However, we can't deny the fact that this is just how society was brought about (according to the post-colonial theory).
DeleteA post-colonial reading of Sharon Old’s “On the Subway” reveals that people justify one another actions based off their gender.
ReplyDeleteA post-colonial reading of Sharon Old’s “On the Subway” also reveals the for the most part the pressure there is on both men and women to act "appropriately" to their gender.
What does she state that allowed you to draw that conclusion?
DeleteA close look at the poem “On the Subway” through Lacan’s mirror stage theory exposes the poets inability to perceive someone for who they actually are instead of their external appearance. " He has or my white eye imagines he has the casual cold look of a mugger, alert under lowered eyelids." Although the poet is aware that this pre-conceptions of the man in front of her may be distorted, it continues to highlight the judgements people reveal at first glance of someone.
ReplyDeleteA close look at the poem "On the Subway" through Lacan's mirror stage theory shows the different perceptions a person can have of the same person. The poet judges the man based on his clothes and his shoes. She assumes he is a man who would take her grandmother's fur coat, but bases this on nothing reliable. She judges a person before knowing them.
ReplyDeleteIt's so funny because I feel like we could all relate to this at one point or another. We all make presumptions of different individuals before actually getting to know the person and we tend to base this off of many factors (e.g. how people look, dress, act, and so on and so forth). Therefore, I can concede to the fact that Lacan's mirror theory is applicable to all of us.
DeleteThis example reminds me of Ms.Walsh's example in class about her brother riding his bike
DeleteThe poem "On the Subway" can actually be seen through the Marxist theory which assumes that society is influenced by economic and class structures. We can all concur that whites are seen as dominant in both economic and status power in mainstream society. So basically, Sharon Olds revisits this idea in her poem when she says "he is black and I am white, and without meaning or trying to I must profit from his darkness, the way he absorbs the murderous beams of the nation’s head, as black cotton absorbs the heat of the sun and holds it". Notice how she uses the word profit, as if she is stressing white dominance.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you. The author places labels on him, without even getting to know him, therefore showing that the white race is more " superior".
DeleteHow does social construct affect relationships between the characters?
ReplyDeleteAre they blinded by society's norms?
DeleteDo they have to act a certain way?
DeleteA post-colonial reading of Sharon Old’s “On the Subway” reveals that race and attire are just another way for humans to classify each other and separate. The fact that she in the very first sentence had to classify what gender he was and the color of his skin just shows that we are unable to understand the point of the poem without unnecessary classifications.
ReplyDeleteRegarding Sharon Olds poem "On The Subway" through a lens of race on post colonialism reveals several ways in which she holds a mirror up to her personal biases. For example, she immediately attempts to discover a hierarchy to structure here relationship with this strange man. She concludes that she is in one way, more powerful than him due to an institutional advantage. Her marking of race line sis incredibly quick, and she delves into this by assigning classic and imperialistic roles to the character, as a savage, and herself, as civilization. She describes him as looking like a mugger, and subtly draws analogies to him, the black subway rider, as some sort of hunter and adversary. This is evidence of her cultural baggage and explores her process of creating racial hierarchies.
ReplyDeleteA couple of lines in Sharon's Olds, "On the Subway," that stood out to me were darkness "He has or my white eye imagines he has the casual cold look of a mugger." This stood out to me because Sharon is applying gender bias to the man by saying he looks like a "mugger," because a mugger is usually classified as a man because of it's aggressive and physical nature.
ReplyDeleteRegarding Sharon's olds "On the subway", the author makes assumptions based off of the man's looks.She regards him as ruthless and aggressive able to get anything that he wants. This is shown by the quote: " I look at his unknown face, he looks at my grandmother's coat, and I don't know if I am in his power - he could take my coat so easily,my briefcase,my life" This quote shows how she has already made assumptions about the man based on his race , without even knowing him.She puts labels on him because he is a man, because she feels inferior to him.
ReplyDeleteLooking at Sharon Olds “On the Subway” I noticed that she uses a very vague but descriptive language. To the average childmind-like reader the text could just simply be her talking about an unusual encounter that she had with a dark-skinned gentleman. However that isn't the case as to follow the story is a a bit more dark with details placed in that might be deemed unusual and/or offensive. To elaborate, she states “We are stuck on opposite sides of the car, a couple of molecules stuck in a rod of energy rapidly moving through darkness...the rod of his soul that at birth was dark and fluid, rich as the heart of a seedling ready to thrust up into any available light.” This popped out to me during class as I couldn’t help but notice that she somehow alludes or is actually describing the man's genitals. Now looking through a gender lens this helps as you can notice the descriptive language such as “rod of energy”, “ “rod of his soul, dark and fluid”, “rich as the heart of a seedling ready to thrust up”. Surly I need not go further in detail, however it's clear that from a gender lense this language is easily describing the sexual divide of a man and woman sitting on opposite sides of a spectrum, moving through the darkness (otherwise known as the unknown). Now looking at the text through a postcolonial lense I couldn’t help but notice that she describes or alludes to the mans race/skin color; “And he is black and I am white, and without meaning or trying to I must profit from our history, the way he absorbs the murderous beams of the nation’s heart, as black cotton absorbs the heat of the sun and holds it.” This can be seen as being offensively as if one were to look at it from a certain angle she states “he absorbs the murderous beams of the nation’s heart, as blank cotton absorbs the heat of the sun and holds it”. Now I believe that this is referring to the nationality of the country, people generally associate America with “white” much more than say “black” or “brown”, so she is referencing the murderous beams as negative gazes/actions towards him. Secondly she refers to black cotton as it absorbs the heat of the sun, she could be referring to how slaves would pick cotton in colonial america, and the way the sun holds it is a referencing to tanning or the darkening of one's skin. Looking at Sharon Olds “On the Subway” it's clear she has a very ambiguous way of writing.
ReplyDelete