The Book of Salt was an interesting new way of reading into identity. I found it particularly interesting that the cook, Binh, was exiled from his home country of Vietnam for being gay, but then ends up finding somewhere to live and work where gay was the norm. Binh was told that being gay was a disease and that it wasn’t excepted. His father was abusive and basically threw Binh out for being gay. The only true identity Binh knew for himself, he was taught was wrong. Then, he replies to this gay couples ad in the paper to be a live in cook.
The couple, Gertrude Stein and Alice Toklas, are happily gay and married. They are also successful and famous. This idea of being show that a previously unaccepted identity is in fact okay is a really interesting turn that we haven’t really looked at yet this year. Being exiled from one’s country should be a punishment, you are being exiled for something you have done very wrong. But then to be accepted by another country for the reason you were exiled from the original country shows how the views of identity can really change.
I think this idea is very important because it shows that no matter what your identity is, or whoever thinks it’s a “bad” or “negative” aspect, there’s always going to be someone else in a similar situation. I think this helps show that one person is never fully alone, with an identity unlike another else’s. I think this is important to see that different cultures expect and accept different things in identity. Not only is Binh being shown a world were being gay is okay, he is put in a situation where the gay couple is actually famous. The Stein’s also often have guests over for tea parties and such, which shows that others are not bothered by the fact they are gay. It is simply a part of who they are. Being gay is not a disease, rather something that a person can’t really help, it’s a part of who they are.
What I really liked about this novel was the different streams of consciousness we see from Binh. We get a look into his past and his memories so we can understand how he has come to be, what helped to form his true identity. Yet we are also seeing a clear picture of what is going on in the present and how he feels about the current situation that he’s in. It becomes incredibly interesting when Binh has come to a point where he has to choose where to go next with his life: whether to go with the Stein’s to American, stay in Paris, or go back to his homeland of Vietnam. Binh’s decision here really helps to show the changes he has undergone throughout the book and how his identity has formed and changed throughout everything he has gone through. His disease of whether to take his life next really shows readers how ideas and identities can be changed throughout a person’s life.

Taking a look at the essay “The Other Question” and the book The Heartsong of Charging Elk, there’s really a lot to see and learn about identity. In “The Other Question”, the idea of the otherness and unconscious are linked with identity. These ideas work very well with this story, because essentially the character has lost most of his ideas of his identity. He is in a new land of Europe where people dress, talk, and function differently they he does. He is a complete outsider. He has trouble trying to get help while in the hospital because he cannot speak the language. The only comfort the character has is dreaming and thinking about his previous life.
The flashing back and forth between memories and present is very interesting in this book. It really helps make an emotional attachment to the character. He knows who he was in his past life, but there’s a void or unconscious period of his life that he cannot recall, (the accidents that put him into the hospital). He really doesn’t know how he came to his present state and doesn’t understand the land that he is in. The character is forced to change his identity to try to communicate and survive.
In the essay, the author discusses a point of unconscious pole of colonial discourse. This is really demonstrating how power and impact are lost to a person when they suffer a trauma such as Charging Elk did. The alienation and fear brought about by the event have a higher bearing over anything else the character knew from his previous life. It is this fear and alienation of his people, language, country and dress, that Charging Elk is forced to at least try to remember and understand where he is. He essentially is forced to assimilate by fear and alienation, which is very interesting.
In what we have talked about so far in class with identity, there was never a character that was placed in such a fearful situation as this one. With what is basically amnesia, the character is really left with no identity and his surroundings do not match anything he recalls or knows in identity. This crisis gives a whole new spin on the importance of identity and what it means to a person, but also the importance of a person being willing and able to change their own identity for survival and to fit in culturally.
This situation is much more unique them the others we have read about previously, but at the same time similarities can still be seen in how the character is left in a space of unknown identity. In other stories, such as Drown and Blu’s Hanging, the characters identities are being forced to change because someone left them alone without help, or notice. The same is true for Charging Elk. He is left alone by all the showmen in the Wild West Show. He knows no one in a new land and is isolated and alienation. Seeing this similarity with other stories brings up the question of whether or not isolation and alienation are key factors to a person being forced to question and change their identity and have to assimilation to new ideas and cultures.

I found Blu’s Hanging to be entertaining, yet very disturbing. This book made me really think about the ways that different people handle death. I found it really hard to relate to a father pretty much abandoning his children after his wife died. He only abuses and screams at them. I would see an event such a death being one to bring a family closer together rather then tear them apart more. But in the middle of the story, when the author explains the father’s actions, it really helped me understand that he may have been suffering more then the children, and that looking at the children only brought him more pain. The children to Poppy were basically the reason his wife was dead. In his eyes, the wife killed herself to save her children. He was much closer to his wide after having become so close to her when they both had Leberacy. I started to have more positive feelings toward Poppy at this point in the novel.
I was also somewhat disturbed on how sexual and animal abuse were used in the story. I found it interesting how some of there beliefs and lessons they learned from their mother played into this. For instance, the first time Blu was sexually attacked was by the neighbor their mother had told them not to ever go by. The first time he disobeyed the rule, he was attacked. This really shows how the mother really protected them, but when she was gone, it was as if her lessons of protection were gone as well.
I found the idea with being able to see spirits with dog tears very interestingly played in the story as well. They discussed how this worked, and then later in the story the children had to slowly bury all these dogs they were trying to take care of and had grown to love. I really enjoyed how the rule of the mother was played throughout the whole story with the dogs between praying for the dogs and using their tears. I found it very sad how they always told the dying or dead dog their mother would help take care of him.
When Ivah is given the chance to go to a better school in Honolulu, I wished she would have received more support not necessarily from her father since he was never around, but from her siblings. I think Blue and Maisie both knew and understood how much Ivah has to give up to take care of them, but they won’t allow her the chance to take care of herself for a change. Blu seemed to not really grow up very much in this book and had a really hard time finally accepting that he was old enough to step into Ivah’s shoes so she could go to school. I was glad that Big Sis and the teacher went so far out of the way to help Ivah, but I think the others needed to be more supporting of her.
I was also somewhat disturbed about the last sexual abuse act in the book by Paulo to Blu. It was exciting that Blu was trying so hard to earn money to go to Honolulu, but at the same time, I think he knew that going to Paulo would only cause problems. I think it was somewhat selfish for him to go there to wash the car when he knew what Paulo had done to others. I think he knew it could jeopardize his sister’s leaving but he did it anyway. Right away when Blu planned on going alone to wash the car, I knew what was going to happen and wished that he would really think about what he was doing.
I didn’t really like how the story ended. I think it could have left on a happier, more complete note besides the home with the father would was out of it and the children would were scared. I would have liked to actually see Ivah going to college or at least getting on the plane to go. Maybe a chapter of what it was like after she was gone. The ending where it stands was very disappointing for me.