Some interesting quotes

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Some interesting quotes

• To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong
  romance. ------Oscar Wilde
• Take care to get what you like, or you will be
  forced to like what you get.
• ------George Bernard
  Shaw

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Unit Two
Text II Gossip
Francine Prose
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• Group presentation
• Detailed study of the text
• Discussion

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Francine Prose is the author of many bestselling
books of fiction, including A Changed Man and
Blue Angel, which was a finalist for the National
Book Award, and the nonfiction New York Times
bestseller Reading Like a Writer. Her novel,
Household Saints, was adapted for a movie by
Nancy Savoca.
Another novel, The Glorious Ones, has been
adapted into a musical of the same name by Lynn
Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty, which ran at the
Mitzi E. Newhouse Theatre at Lincoln Center in
New York City in the Fall of 2007. Her latest
novel, Goldengrove, was published in Sept 2008.
She is the president of PEN American Center. She
lives in New York City.
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• How do you understand the word gossip?
• Do you like gossiping? Have you been gossiped
  about?
• If people gossip about you, how do you respond?

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• More about the Siamese conjoined twins Chang and
  Eng (know as the Chinese twins in Siam, now
  called Thailand)
• http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chang_and_Eng_Bunker

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• Textual development
• I. Introduction Paras 1-2
• (1) announces the central topic
• (2) stimulates the readers
  interest
• II. Body Paras 3 9
• (1) para 3-7 gossipsocial
  communication
• gossip not properly
  recognized
• gossip vs.
  exchanging information
• my definition of
  gossip
• gossip a synonym
  for connection
• (2) para 8 gossipa tool of
  understanding
• (3) para 9 gossippart of human
  nature
• III. Conclusion Para 10 an echo to the major
  point

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Questions for discussion

• 1. Why does the author begin her essay with the
  small towns reaction to the domestic
  arrangements of a pair of Siamese twins?

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• Answer for reference
• Prose identifies gossip with the community in
  which it is carried out it is part of the
  community, contributing to linking all its
  members into a whole. The domestic arrangements
  of the Siamese twins, though an event sensational
  enough to arouse much town talk, was in the
  womans opinion, incomparable to what had been
  happening in the town itself. Note that in the
  quotation of the woman, the words nothing and
  before are made prominent by being italicized.

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• 2. How is Proses thesis echoed in the concluding
  paragraph?
• Gossip makes her feel close to those places where
  she had once lived. What she wants to emphasize
  is the strength of gossip as the heritage, as the
  legacy of a certain community.

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• 3. Most people make a distinction between
  gossiping and exchanging information as Proses
  mother does. Does Prose herself agree to such a
  distinction? (para. 4)
• No, she doesnt, although sometimes she seems to
  be following the trend and making such a
  distinction. (refer to para.4) Yet the truth is
  that she is doing so out of the pressure imposed
  by social strain or simply out of courtesy.

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• 4. What point does Prose want to make by tracing
  the origin of the word gossip in para.6?
• To show that gossip is a synonym for connection,
  for community. It thus should not be regarded as
  a word with negative connotations.

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• 5. Why does Prose think gossips analytical
  component is more important?
• To examine why somebody does something
  contributes to ones moral development.
• 6. What negative aspect of gossip does Prose
  touch on near the end of the essay?
• Nosiness. But this is unavoidable for we were all
  born to be curious.

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What is gossip?

• Get the good gossip on any little mountain town,
  scratch the surface and youll find a snake pit!
• Gossip, the juicier the better
• Gossip must be nearly as old as language itself.
• gossip has rarely received its due, its very
  name connotes idleness, time-wasting, frivolity
  and worse.
• Gossip is the unacknowledged poor relative of
  civilized conversation
• Gossip predominantly scurrilous, mean-spirited.
• I heard my voice distorted by that same false
  note that sometimes creeps into it when social
  strain and some misguided notion of amiability
  make me assent to opinions I dont really share.

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What is gossip?

• I dont, mean rumor-mongering, outright
  slander, willful fabrication meant to damage and
  undermine.
• ordinary gossip, incidents from and analyses of
  the lives of our heroes and heroines, our
  relatives, acquaintances and friends.
• Paring away its less flattering modern
  connotations, we discover a kind of synonym for
  connection, for community, primary function of
  gossip.
• calling it oral tradition
• gossip may be the way that most of us learn to
  tell stories.

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What is gossip?

• the sole aim of gossip is to criticize, to
  condemn (or, frequently, to titillate, to bask in
  the aura of scandal
• gossip as a tool of understanding the beginning
  of moral inquiry, first steps toward a moral
  education. It has always seemed peculiar that a
  pastime so conducive to the moral life should be
  considered faintly immoral.
• I dont mean to deny the role of plain nosiness
  in all this.
• its part of human nature, of the human
  community. its that community that is being
  affirmed.

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What can you infer from the text, particularly
the lines above, regarding Prose attitude
towards gossip as well as her writing process?
Prose holds a positive attitude towards gossip,
which goes against the grain of the conventional
understanding of it. Her writing process reveals
a gradual neutralization of the term gossip.
And this is achieved through conducting a
negotiation with the social convention. She
responds to the conventional interpretation 6
times and each time reason her definition of
gossip.
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Negotiating an alternative interpretation
Prose illustrates positive interpretation of
gossip in relation to four aspects of social
life, what are these four aspects?
Gossip its etymology or origins Gossip child
development Gossip moral education Gossip
community construction
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Gossip its etymology
godsibbe god-parent, relative
Transformation of the term from N. to V.
Friends, cronies
what one does with ones cronies (gossip)
Map our ties, shape our values, and help us get a
sense of the world.
Synonym for connection, community
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Gossip child development
Pacing Tone Clarity authenticity
A form of story-telling
training
techniques
Descriptive component
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Gossip moral education
A tool of understanding Moral inquiry about
choices, consequences, responsibility will
Asking questions about why someone did certain
things in a certain way
Analytical component
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Gossip community construction
Unavoidable Part of human nature Human
community
Fulfill the desire for socialization
Social function
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• Gossip has rarely received its due (Para 3 )
• Reasons Two meanings of gossip
• 1. ????,????,??,??,??????? (rumors about other
  people)
• give rise to gossip, market place
  ...(????)
• His infidelities were common
  (???????????)
• (vi) She is above gossiping about her
  neighbors. (???????????)
• 2.????????(?????)??? (conversation about other
  people)
• Have a good gossip with a neighbor over the
  garden fence (???????)
• A gossip writer ??????
• (vi) I dont intend to gossip about my
  sickness. (?????)

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• Other uses of gossip
• Gossip column (???,???)????????
• Gossip columnist gossipiest
• Gossip monger ????????

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• Research work
• Elaboration and comparison
• Some descriptions of gossip in small town's life

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• L. Beall from http//www.helium.com/items/
• 361302-thoughts-on-small-town-gossip
• Small town gossip is something that every small
  town has whether the residents realize it or not.
  Avoiding gossip when you live in a small town is
  not possible. The occupants of these towns have
  very little to do outside of work due to the fact
  that small towns are just that small with little
  opportunity for activities outside of the homes.
  The stores (expect for larger chain stores)
  usually close early in the evening and there are
  usually not very many actives to keep the kids
  occupied.

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• By Jennifer Hall
• I live in a very small town. The population is
  under a thousand people. I love my hometown. But,
  I must say the gossip in a small town can be a
  bit overwhelming at times. I know first hand
  about stories in the gossip mill (??,???).
• You see, in a small town everyone knows who you
  are. This sounds great to some people, but, trust
  me it really is not. You don't really have a lot
  of privacy, living in a small town. The gossip
  mill in my town also only focus on the bad things
  that happen to you. For some reason, they never
  tell the good stuff that you have done. It's
  always bad. Everyone wants to hear a story about
  someone doing something nice for others, but this
  rarely happens where I live.

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• by Nadie Gehring
• Small towns are the reason for gossip. Just too
  much time on their hands with absolutely nothing
  better to do then stick their nose in everyones
  business and spread it around like whipped cream.
  
• They don't only whisper what they heard from
  Harry who heard it from Gerry who heard it from
  whats his face over there. ...you know...they
  talked about him yesterday, remember? They have
  to say it loud as to let everyone know who's
  mouth it came from so they get recognition for
  having told you the juiciest news of the day.

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• by Debra Herring
• Living in a small rural community has a lot of
  benefits. Privacy, however, is NOT one of them.
  We lived on a farm, out in the country, one mile
  from our nearest neighbor. You would think this
  situation would afford us a certain degree of
  privacy, but this was not the case.
• That neighbor who lived about a mile away had a
  back porch(??,??) from which they had a birds-eye
  view of our farm. The husband didn't seem to be
  too concerned about our comings and goings, but
  watching us seemed to be the wife's favorite
  pastime. She even used binoculars to get a closer
  look.

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• by Linda L Kinyon
• If you are living in a large city you don't know
  what you are missing. The pace of life living in
  a small town is scaled back compared to that of a
  large city. There is no hustle and bustle of
  people as you pass each other along the street.
  Living in a small town is a totally different
  experience. In a small town everyone knows
  everyone. Everyone knows everyone's business.
  Nothing is private. Nothing is confidential and
  nothing remains a secret for any great length of
  time. It may take some getting used to that
  everyone knows everything about you, but in a way
  I have learned to find it as a comfort not as a
  nuisance. Besides, what is gossip today will die
  down tomorrow as it will be someone else's turn
  in this small town.

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• by Timothy D Heard
• Thoughts on small town gossip
• Gossip is not always directly related to
  population size. In small towns, gossip is spread
  by the spoken word. In the city, it is spread by
  the written word. Some city newspapers and
  magazines carry a larger percentage of gossip
  than any small town could ever conceive. But
  whether it be a big city or small town, there
  will always be gossip.

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• Having lived most of my life in the suburbs of a
  metropolis, I have had the benefit of ano?nymity
  to some extent. But gossip still exists it is
  just on a larger scale and usually involving more
  prominent figures of our society. Everything from
  the city mayors wife being arrested for
  shoplifting to the story of an unknown local
  accused of animal cruelty, the big city does have
  its share of gossip. And I must point out a very
  important fact gossip can be true. It is the
  fact that there are people discussing and
  spreading someone else's business that makes it
  gossip.

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Gertrude Stein

• 18741946, American author and patron of the
  arts. A celebrated personality, she encouraged,
  aided, and influencedthrough her patronage as
  well as through her writingmany literary and
  artistic figures. After attending (189397)
  Radcliffe where she was a student of William
  James, she began premedical work at Johns
  Hopkins. In 1902, relinquishing her studies, she
  went abroad and from 1903 until her death lived
  chiefly in Paris. For many years her secretary
  and lover was Alice B. Toklas. In Paris, Stein
  became interested in modern art movements she
  encouraged and purchased the work of many new
  painters, including Picasso and Matisse.
• ?(Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts
  college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and was the
  coordinate college for Harvard University. )

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• During the 1920s, she was the leader of a
  cultural salon that included such writers as
  Hemingway, Sherwood Anderson, and F. Scott
  Fitzgerald, all of whose works she influenced. It
  was she who first coined the phrase lost
  generation for those postWorld War I
  expatriates. During World War II she remained in
  France, and after the war her Paris home became a
  meeting place for American soldiers.

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• Steins own innovative writing emphasizes the
  sounds and rhythms rather than the sense of
  words. By departing from conventional meaning,
  grammar, and syntax, she attempted to capture
  moments of consciousness, independent of time
  and memory. Her first published work was Three
  Lives (completed 1905, pub. 1909), short stories
  in which she explored the mental processes of
  three women. But her most characteristic and
  probably most difficult narrative is The Making
  of Americans (completed 1911, pub. 1925). The
  famous Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas (1933), a
  linear narrative written in relatively ordinary
  language, is the story of her own life presented
  as that of her companion. Steins critical essays
  were published as Composition as Explanation
  (1926), How to Write (1931), Narration (1935),
  and Lectures in America (1935).
•  
•  

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Reviewing Questions

• 1. What is suggested by what the woman
  said(para.1) and by the authors comment(para.2)?
• 2. What kind of reputation does gossip receive?
  (para.3)
• 3. Whats the authors attitude towards gossip?
  Where does she state her argument for the first
  time?
• 4. Whats the etymology of the word gossip?

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• 5. What, according to Gertrude Stein, is the
  relationship between gossip and literature?
• 6. whats the authors view on the analytical
  component of gossip?
• 7. what are the negative roles of gossip? And
  what about gossip irritate people?

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Assignment

• 1. Write a book report and share it with others
  on the blog.
• 2. Compare the two texts in this unit and tell
  which one do you prefer, supporting your argument
  with reasons.