Fellowship of the Blog 2 - The Extended Edition

As I have mentioned before (See Fellowship of the Blog), I am a big fan of the read around activity because we are interacting with each other as a community of learners. Not only are we interacting, but we are seeing different perspectives of the content we have been studying all semester. For me, this read around has given me brand new outlooks on topics I have a tremendous level of interest in.

I have always been captivated by the idea of transcendence. A basic desire we have as humans is to feel like there is something more than our existence here. This doesn’t have to be anything huge. I get this feeling when I listen to great music or watch a film that truly moves me. We are taken someplace else by the things we love. There are other forms of transcendence as well. Prayer, dance, alcohol, and drugs are all vehicles that can take a person beyond the ordinary routines of life. So when I came across Amanda’s post about sweat lodges, I was immediately hooked. I learned that these lodges are used for many ceremonial and spiritual reasons. But, what struck me was the unknown. What happens in a sweat lodge? I don’t know but I definitely want to find out some day.

With transcendence and the unknown on my mind, I stumbled across Michelle’s post regarding dreams. Jackpot! Dreams have always intrigued me because they are such an unbelievable phenomenon. We are sleeping but our subconscious is still at work. Michelle brought up some interesting points about dreams being an outlet for our repressed thoughts and impulses. I found this to be a profound point because dreams are truly the inner workings of our mind venting when it thinks we aren’t aware. Another great thing to come from this post was that it made me think of the song, “In Dreams,” by Roy Orbison.

With Roy Orbison on the brain, I came across Cassy’s blog regarding Joy Harjo, land, and memory. Cassy brought up many great points in her post. But, one that stood out to me was the quote she cited from Joy Harjo’s introduction. It reads, “The poet cannot be separated from place.” This is beautiful statement because I know exactly what Harjo means. In my comment, I talked about how I returned to my high school recently and all of the emotions came back to me as I walked into the building. Even though I have been separated in time from that place, I have not been separated emotionally once I am on that piece of land.

Fellowship of the Blog

It has been interesting to click around and read some of my classmates’ blogs. I’ll be honest and say that up until the point where we received the class blog list, writing these babies felt kind of tedious. It just felt like we were posting them and nobody was seeing them because there was no real sense of feedback. But with the unveiling of the blog list, this feels like more of a community, nay, a fellowship, and I may sound nerdy here, but it is kind of exciting knowing that there is indeed an audience of people out there that might read what you write.

That being said, I thoroughly enjoyed the posts I read. The one thread I see with all of the blogs I read was the fact we all seem to have a greater awareness of American Indian struggles and culture. Andrea noticed the negative American Indian stereotypes at play in the movies she rented while Rob learned from other blogs that there are fantasy fiction novels written by American Indians. These are little things that I think might have slid under our radar if we were not currently involved in this course. I also found it interesting how Ryan G looked at our recent election from the perspective of American Indians while John Trudell made Jennifer question why a person would ever feel entitled to purchase a star. Like I mentioned before, reading these posts has only increased the level of awareness and critical thinking I try to carry while viewing the world. I look forward to reading more of your posts and hope I’m not the only one enjoying these blogging adventures.