Lecture Notes for Oct 7, 2008

Judith ? At the beginning of the book she's abandonned as John takes up the burying and care of Old Jack ? John leaves to take care of Old Jack on ideological terms ? Judith is concerned when he leaves (he's carrying liquor, etc.) ? She shows up on the hill after about 250 pages without being asked ? She joins him in his attempt to make sense out of Moses Washington's sucide Questions and Themes in Story ? What does it mean to think about the black male trauma that's passed from generation to generation? ? This is very much like the trauma in Jones' Corregidora that is passed to Ursa from her forebearers ? Bradley looks at this story in more national terms and for men ? History won't stay where it's supposed to say Collaborators ? Comes back after training at the place where he first studied family history ? Judith shows up at an important moment in his search for family history, she takes the role of collaborator ? Old Jack is John's first celloborator in Moses' history ? Jack dies and Judith tkaes his place John's Trauma ? He was ten when his dad died ? He believed his father was kiled in a hunting accident ? Moses had no more capacity to train John ? After man years of not hunting he went out at got himself killed ? There are different kinds of trauma for whether Moses was killed or killed himself, if he was killed it's like he was taken from John whereas if he committed suicide it's like he left Abandonment ? Judith's a psychiatrist ? John's discoving the reality of Moses Washington removal of his life with Judith at the same time ? Abondment vs. abscene ? Moses isn't there to teach lessons ? Bill ? Bill got drafted ? He had to decide if he wanted to be an athlete or a scholar ? He had guidance from black men, but it wasn't enough Heterosexual Romance for John ? Jack can help John with racism but not family history ? CK, Lamen, Zach, Bijou- Moses could have told John about them ? CK could've given things to John ? Showed that black masculinity can also be romantic love ? John's romantic experience, rape of white woman, tortured but affectionate, he loved Nora but she became a prostitute ? Story of CK would've been helpful ? Jack thought education was useless ? Heterpsexual romance is dehabilitating ? Romance makes you vulnerable to point of death ? Moses got himself killed because he was married and changed Other Family History ? Lamen- was a mortician, had a lot of money that CK set up for him and Bijou ? CK Washington leaves legacy of book based intellectual extertion to escape burden of slavery ? Operation of freedom ? Model of black masculine identity and intellectual identity is important ? CK liked books because he loved language ? A passionate love of intellect ? It would've been useful for Moses to tell John this history to help him come to terms with his academia Judith as a Collaborator ? She shows up uninvited ? She's determined to be there because she loves him and she knows if she collaborates with him in finding his family history he will be less likely to leave her ? He talks about exacting revenge on Judith by telling her the truth of their two familes ? Interracial romance carries with it the possibility of being targeted ? Judith's concerned for his psychological state, she fears abandonments that's really going on with him, not the canned version ? Her being a psychiatrist and her being a historian plays into it ? She needs him to admit why he feels this way ? Tension in storytelling styles, emotional reaction ? Not fact, he raped a girl after a funeral not all postpone them ? In order to be cured he needs to get safe place is psychee (like in Corregidora) ? She's not going to let him go, needs emotional, got the story of his friend Robert ? She's getting formal and informal historical narratives ? Judith's conception of the world in racial terms evolves to understand black life and experience more broadly ? Once she gets socialized into this potential he decides to bring her with on this trip ? Black conciousness ? John decides to take someone with him to figure his out ? She tells him his family history isn't good enough for his rage, she want