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            At the beginning of this class, I understood feminism only through what the popular media portrayed and through blogging websites such as Tumblr. I was not very familiar with feminist theory, the many different kinds of feminism that exist, and the different “waves” of feminism. I did not think to apply feminist theory to different kinds of literary works. Mainly, I had a lot of misunderstandings about what academic feminism is. However, I still identified as a feminist.

            One of the most interesting aspects of the class for me was posting our papers and thoughts on the class on Serendip, which can be accessed by anybody. It made me feel as if my written contributions in the class were contributions to a larger academic conversation. It made me grow a lot in terms of trying to educate myself outside of the classroom, as I felt that I now had a part in helping to continue a large, informed academic discussion on these topics. I was able to turn in most of my work on time, but there were other times I forgot due to so many things I had going on at the time. I guess there was an important lesson for me to learn in trying to balance everything.

            The way the class was set up made me initially intimidated to participate in group discussion. The class was a very large group of people with very informed opinions on different topics not only in terms of feminism, but also in terms of literature and social justice as a whole. We spent a lot of time talking about silence and lack of participation on the part of some members of the class (which included me). I forget who said it in class, but someone said that you just have to “take a risk” when it comes to talking in class. I feel like I learned a lot from that simple statement. I figured that I did not really judge anyone for what they had said in class, so I was no longer afraid that they would judge me. As the class went on, I started to participate more and more. I felt like I was more able to find my voice and gain confidence as time went on, even though it is difficult to speak in such a large group.

            As for the reading, I really found the stories to be the most interesting, particularly Persepolis, The Doll’s House, and Eva’s Man. I find that an entire universe exists in narrative that is ours to analyze, reflect on, and immerse ourselves in. Stories fascinate me so much because they can be read a billion different “correct” ways. My challenges in the reading assignments mostly involved the theory. It was particularly difficult for me to read dense academic pieces and try to understand the author’s intent and theories. However, this helped me grow as a reader to try and grasp these abstract concepts that seemed so far out of my reach and apply them to actual issues to solidify them in my mind. Reading the feminist theory widened my perspective as to what feminism can be considered, its many forms and interpretations.

            Much of my written work for the class was based on my thoughts in class and reflections on what was said. My Web Events were very much based on different kinds of academic works pertaining to the topic I was writing on and how the academic approaches would be practically applied to the topic. The best responses I got on a paper were for my first Web Event. For my first Web Event, I wrote about fear and self-representation. Two of my fellow classmates replied, talking about how the topic for their papers was similar to mine. I read their work and saw how much the topic I was writing on could be understood and interpreted in different ways. I particularly enjoyed working on my second Web Event on classism in the LGBT community and my final paper on mental illness and feminism, researching the different ways that these issues could affect people. These are very real issues that have really interested me, and I was happy to write on them. I feel that I have grown as a writer because I am writing about things that I truly care about, not just writing a paper to turn in.

            I will take the confidence that I learned to have in this class as I go forward in my academic career. I now know to contribute my thoughts because the participation of each member of the class is crucial to everyone learning. I have learned what feminism really is about, and am very much a proud feminist.