Elena Luedy

Professor Cohen

E-Sem

10/8/15

Wild About Wild

            Wild, a riveting memoir by Cheryl Strayed, talks about her experiences hiking the Pacific Crest Trail and what lead her to start the difficult journey. Throughout the story, Strayed uses juxtaposition to tell her story, alternating between her life before and during the PCT. While reading the book, the audience comes to realize that the story is not so much about the wilderness of the trail itself, but Strayed’s internal wild.

From The Veil to The Earbud:

Limits of Black Representation in Music

     Voice is a quality of humans distinct to each. It is that set of experiences and moments that shape one’s particular perspectives on life in a way that is all consuming, allowing the tastes of one to bleed through words and express one’s essence. This concept of voice allows for a give and take of shaping experiences. One can accumulate new ideas and reshape their essence at any given time. Theater works as a mechanism within which one can alter their voice uniquely, as it creates a “third space” by “[establishing] connections between groups that otherwise might not come into contact and… imagining communities different from those we have at present” (Fraden 23), thus permitting one to examine oneself with new perspectives.

Wild, by Cheryl Strayed, is a novel greatly influenced by the dichotomy between power and fear and the attempt to overcome fear using power. The following passage about her rejection of fear clearly defines Strayed’s struggle between the two forces:

In order to negotiate the silences and opportunities for voice, one cannot ignore the power inherent in language. Race, class, religion, and all other aspects of one’s identity and background construct the shape of language. In choosing to forge the distance through sliding doors, elevators, and body checks, I am implicated in the dialogue of justifying and questioning our words at the prison. I am redefining and manipulating the power of language through deciding to communicate with voice and claiming that it has reason and should be acknowledged. I am unsure, inarticulate, and maneuvering through the unexplained implications of “teaching” and designing a “classroom setting.”

 often struggle to focus during extended periods of conventional talking and listening conversation, so I wanted to do an out-of-the-box experimental essay. In class, we had a conversation with our hands, with water colors and colored pencils and markers and pens. I began by sharing my “essay,” a watercolor I painted that was inspired by DuBois. To get our minds going, I opened the space for us to share some texts from DuBois--anything that stood out to us or inspired us--and then make lists of the phrases and words that stuck with us from what our classmates shared. Mine are posted below. With the text rendering for inspiration, I offered art supplies, music by the Fisk Jubilee Singers (referenced by DuBois), and fifteen minutes to contemplate, write and/or do art.

Sasha Moiseyev-Foster

ESEM: Changing Our Story

Professor J.  Cohen

October 8, 2015

Wildness and Wilderness in Wild: From Lost to Found on the PCT

Journey to the Sacred

When summoned to my mind, the term ‘sacred’ often carries along the image of a formal religious space. The Oxford dictionary tells me that the sacred lies within that which is holy, and that which is holy is “dedicated or consecrated to God or a religious purpose”. This binding of terms – sacred and religious – furthers the twist that serves as a mechanism to ‘other’ people who do not identify with any religion. In doing so, usage and application of the term ‘sacred’ is taken away from those who do not identify with the religious connotation.

Is it possible—can the sacred exist without religious power? Cheryl Strayed’s journey goes to show that sacredness transcends the ancient paradigm.

To survive three months of hiking mostly alone on the Pacific Crest Trail, Cheryl Strayed needed physical and emotional strength. At the beginning of her journey, she didn’t have either, or at least, not as much as she needed. She could barely lift her backpack, and she didn’t walk nearly as far as she had expected to each day (Strayed 43, 87). She was getting over a heroin addiction that had been helping her cope with the death of her mother (Strayed 53). She was often depressed, tired, or absent-minded. In short, she did not hike the PCT because she was strong; she hiked it to become strong.