Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Humans vs. Aliens
So, as I read and reread Pelican Bar, I have a hard time figuring out why everyone else saw them as humans. I personally saw them as aliens from the second page and had my idea confirmed, to me at least, throughout the story. However, to write my paper, I feel that I need to be able to understand everyone else's perspective. So, if you're bored or need more posts or just feel like commenting anyway, tell me: What did you see, alien or human? Why?
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4 comments:
My perspective probably won't help you too much because it's basically the same as yours, but I'll give it anyway. I don't know if I instantly thought they were aliens, but I definitely thought something was fishy from the get-go. My suspicions continued throughout the story, and by the end of it, I was definitely left thinking that they were aliens. I was kind of surprised that so many were adamantly against the idea.
I was never convinced one way or the other, but I did side more with the they are aliens argument. Still, what made me wonder was the fact that the captors never really do anything that stands out as alien. They just seem like they could be really cruel people. Also the fact that things like this do actually happen and those people are not aliens (maybe :-) ). I don't know if that helps at all but I think I could be convinced either way depending on the argument.
I thought that something was really strange about them from the beginning, but I didn't think alien until we mentioned it class, but now I'm totally team alien. I think that one point you could stress is at the end when mama strong says that thing about how humans would have done the same thing. Also, that as humans, we don't want to believe in brutality against one another...
I think my perspective is very similar to Bailey's. I didn't really see them as aliens at all until someone brought it up in class, and even then I wasn't completely convinced.
The thing with Mama Strong's eyes, for example, I considered to be an effect of her trip. As to some of the other weird quirks, like always smelling of onions (I believe) I assumed it was a cultural difference, but a human culture.
I think as an English major one can become really bogged down in the thought process that each character in a story in some satirizes some aspect of humanity. So the comment that Mama Strong makes at the end I took as saying look at how inhumane humans can be...
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