Thinking Activity: Documentation: Preparing the List of Works cited.

 Hello Everyone,

I am Hinaba Sarvaiya, a student of English Department MKBUniversity. This blog is given by Megha Madam. This blog is based on Academic Writing. Which is presented in the Mechanics of Writing, how to cite in MLA citation. 

What is mechanics in writing:-

In composition, writing mechanics are the conventions governing the technical aspects of writing, including spelling, punctuation, capitalization, and abbreviations. Getting your main points together can be a challenge, and one solution is to put together a draft of main ideas before writing. Some writing textbooks also include issues related to usage and organization under the broad heading of mechanics. 

Although the scope of this book precludes a detailed discussion of grammar, usage, style, and related aspects of writing, this chapter ad- dresses mechanical questions that you will likely encounter in writing research papers.

1. Spelling

2. Punctuation

3. Italics

4. Names of persons

5. Numbers

6. Titles of works in the research paper

7. Quotations

8. Capitalization and personal names in languages other than English

Spelling:-

In written language, spelling is the correct arrangement of letters that form words. To improve spelling skills, you can use a memory device known as mnemonics. This memorable phrase, acronym or pattern can come in handy for remembering something like the spelling of a word. You can also increase your reading skills, make a list of common words you often misspell or mark words in a dictionary that seem to give you trouble repeatedly.

Punctuation:-

Punctuation is the set of marks used to regulate texts and clarify their meanings, mainly by separating or linking words, phrases, and clauses. 

 

I have to review The Gun Island, this novel written by Amitav Ghosh. It is a very famous novel. Amitav Ghosh presented many concepts like, the historification of myth and mythification of the history, Climate Change, Migration - human trafficking ect in his novel. 

In 2016, Amitav Ghosh published The Great Derangement, an examination of collective denial in the face of climate breakdown. It posed a question: why did the gathering clouds of environmental catastrophe appear to present fiction – including his own, where he noted his tendency to address the subject only obliquely – with “peculiar forms of resistance”? Future generations would surely conclude that “ours was a time when most forms of art and literature were drawn into the modes of concealment that prevented people from recognising the realities of their plight”.

A crisis of climate is, therefore, also a crisis of culture, one in which writers’ fears of improbability, of depicting apocalyptic fractures of history and geography within the confines of a story expected to take its metre from the scale and scope of human lives, have resulted in evasion. 

Ghosh’s response in his new novel is straightforward: if realism is not a capacious enough vessel to accommodate the truth, then dispense with it. Gun Island brims with implausibility; outlandish coincidences and chance meetings blend with ancient myth and folklore, tales of heroism and the supernatural set in a contemporary world disrupted by the constant migrations of humans and animals.

The Gun Island novel is divided into two parts and many separate parts are there. Here we can see that. 

PART ONE: The Gun Merchant

Calcutta

Cinta

Tipu

The Shrine

Visions

Rani

Brooklyn

Wildfires

Los Angeles

Gun Island

PART TWO: Venice

The Ghetto

Rafi

Strandings

Friends

Dreams

Warnings

High Water

Crossings

Winds

The Lucania

Sightings

The Storm

The novel's beginning chapter is Calcutta. The strangest thing about this strange journey was that it was launched by a word – and not an unusually resonant one either but a banal, commonplace coinage that is in wide circulation, from Cairo to Calcutta. That word is bundook, which means ‘gun’ in many languages, including my own mother

tongue, Bengali (or Bangla). Nor is the word a stranger to English: by way of British colonial usages it found its way into the Oxford English

Dictionary, where it is glossed as ‘rifle’.

But there was no rifle or gun in sight the day the journey began; nor

indeed was the word intended to refer to a weapon. And that, precisely, was why it caught my attention: because the gun in question was a part of a

name – ‘Bonduki Sadagar’, which could be translated as ‘the Gun

Merchant’.

Title of the novel The Gun Island shows that the connection of the gun means a weapon and some are delivered like that. But here they have very different meanings. Gun Marchant who is travelling in Venice and he journey of Venice this is presented here. Gun Island has nothing to do with guns but it might be Venice. Which was the name of Arabic known as al-banduki. 

Its narrator embodies scepticism and a frequently limiting adherence to empirical reality. A rare book dealer of Bangladeshi heritage, he has settled in Brooklyn after a politically adventurous youth. His name has mutated from Dinanath to the American-friendly “Deen”, and he mitigates his emotional and romantic difficulties with visits to a therapist while attempting to keep financial troubles at bay by amateurishly dabbling in stocks, shares and complicated insurances against the future. But a visit back home to Kolkata – his family having relocated to India during Partition – threatens to derail his self-imposed and self-contained exile. Events turn on the mention of a Bengali legend, the tale of a merchant fated to travel the world seeking a safe haven from the goddess of snakes, Manasa Devi. It is a story passed down through centuries, with which Deen has been familiar since childhood; its retelling at a party sparks a journey that takes Deen from the mangrove swamps of the Sundarbans to a Los Angeles benighted by forest fires to a gradually sinking Venice.

Along the way, we meet a glamorous Italian professor whose erudition allows for a belief in precognition and visitations from the dead; a pair of young Bengali men who submit to the vicious charges of the dalals (traffickers) in order to reach Europe; and an intense marine biologist who is tracking the disturbing rise in stranded whales and dolphins – the result, she believes, of the spread of oceanic and riverine dead zones. Many of the interactions take place by text, phone, email, social media; a facet of the carbon economy that Deen slowly comes to realise has shifted our perceptions of place and time entirely.

Some conversations we can see that,

‘What’s a connection man?’

‘They’re called dalals in Bangla. 

They’re the ones who make all the

necessary connections for migrants, linking them from one phone to another to another. From there on the phone becomes their life, their journey. All the payments they need to make, at every stage of the journey, are made by phone; it’s their phones that tell them which route is open and which isn’t; it’s their phones that help them find shelter; it’s their phones that keep them

in touch with their friends and relatives we wherever they are. And once they get where they’re going it’s their phones that help them get their stories straight.’

It’s little surprise to find Ghosh playing fast and loose with conventions; his Ibis trilogy, set against the backdrop of the opium wars, was founded on puckish digression and operatic swoops between tragedy and comedy. Gun Island, too, is keen to play with its own ridiculousness; as Deen and the professor slowly disinter the likely origins of the novel’s founding myth, their grandiose speculations often call to mind the satirical portrayal of the academic world that one might find in a David Lodge novel. Turn the page, though, and a king cobra is about to strike, or a block of masonry to fall from a building and narrowly miss one or other of our principals.

Thank You...

Work citation:-

Book citation:-

Ghosh, Amitav. Gun Island. Penguin Canada, 2020. 

Website citation:-

Nordquist, Richard. “The Mechanics of Writing Composition.” ThoughtCo, ThoughtCo, 19 July 2020, https://www.thoughtco.com/mechanics-composition-term-1691304#:~:text=Updated%20on%20July%2018%2C%202020,of%20main%20ideas%20before%20writing. 

Newspaper citation:-

Clark, Alex. Review of Gun Island by Amitav Ghosh review – climate and culture in crisis, Review of The Gun Island The Guardian , 0 Jan. 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/jun/05/gun-island-amitav-ghosh-review. 

Photo citation:-

Amitav Ghosh . 2017. 

Interview citation:-

Ghosh , Amitav. “Amitav Ghosh on Gun Island .” PBS Books, National Book Festival , 2019, https://youtu.be/A1ThLi0wkMw. Accessed 2019. 

The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy

 Hello Everyone,

I am Hinaba Sarvaiya, a student of the English Department at MKBUniversity. This blog is given by our prof. Dr. Dilip Barad sir. This blog is about Arundhati Roy's novel "The Ministry of Utmost Happiness".

“There’s really no such thing as the ‘voiceless’. There are only the deliberately silenced, or the preferably unheard.”                

                            ―Arundhati Roy 

About Author:-

Arundhati Roy exhibits amazing ingenuity in crafting a literary diary for the people who exist on the fringes of Indian society. After the remarkable success of her debut novel The God of Small Things (1997), Roy continued writing non-fictional works that were quite provocative and radical in nature. She often contemplates on the issues of national importance. She is a novelist, a feminist, a literary activist and an ardent environmentalist. 

The Careerist 

The boy had always wanted to make something of himself. He invited four militants for dinner and slipped sleeping pills into their food. Once they had fallen asleep he called the army. They killed the militants and burned down the house. The army had promised the boy two canals of land and one hundred and fifty thousand rupees. They gave him only fifty thousand and accommodated him in quarters just outside an army camp. They told him that if he wanted a permanent job with them instead of being just a daily wage worker he would have to get them two foreign militants. He managed to get them one ‘live’ Pakistani but was having trouble finding another. ‘Unfortunately these days business is bad,’ he told PI.‘Things have become such that you cannot any longer just kill someone and pretend he’s a foreign militant. So my job cannot be made permanent.’PI asked him, if there was a referendum whom he would vote for, India or Pakistan?‘Pakistan of course.’‘Why?’‘Because it is our Mulk (country). But Pakistan militants can’t help us in this way. If I can kill them and get a good job it helps me.’He told PI that when Kashmir became a part of Pakistan, he (PI) would not be able to survive in it. But he (the boy) would. But that, he said, was just a theoretical matter. Because he would be killed shortly.

Q 1: Who did the boy expect to be killed by?

(a) The army

(b) Militants

(c) Pakistanis

(d) Owners of the house that was burned.

Ans(b) Militants 

The Nobel Prize Winner 

Manohar Mattoo was a Kashmiri Pandit who stayed on in the Valley even after all the other Hindus had gone. He was secretly tired of and deeply hurt by the barbs from his Muslim friends who said that all Hindus in Kashmir were actually, in one way or another, agents of the Indian Occupation Forces. Manohar had participated in all the anti-India protests, and had shouted Azadi! louder than everybody else. But nothing seemed to help. At one point he had even contemplated taking up arms and joining the Hizb, but eventually he decided against it. One day an old school friend of his, Aziz Mohammed, an intelligence officer,visited him at home to tell him that he was worried for him. He said that he had seen his(Mattoo’s) surveillance file. It suggested that he be put under watch because he displayed ‘anti-national tendencies’.When he heard the news Mattoo beamed and felt his chest swell with pride.

Q 1: Why was Mattoo shot?

(a) Because he was a Hindu

(b) Because he wanted Azadi

(c) Because he won the Nobel Prize

(d) None of the above

(e) All of the above.

Ans(a) Because he was a Hindu

Q 2: Who could the unknown gunman have been?

(a) An Islamist militant who thought all kafirs should be killed

(b) An agent of the Occupation who wanted people to think that all

(c) Neither of the above

(d) Someone who wanted everyone to go crazy trying to figure it out.

Ans(a) Islamist militants thought that all kafirs should be killed

The characters of The Ministry of Utmost Happiness :-

Khwabgah - Jantar Mantar - Jannat Guest House / Graveyard - Kashmir. 

Kulsoom Bi, Saeeda, Bismillah, Ziauddin - the blind Imam, Gudiya & Bulbul, Bombay Silk, Jahanara Begum, Mulaqat Ali, Anjum/Aftab, Ahlam Baiji, Mary, Razia, Nimmo Gorakhpuri, Mr. Aggarwal, Tubby Old Gandhian, Manipur Nationalists, Bhopalis, Protest to make Hindi as National Language, Jannat Guest House / Graveyard - Saddam Hussein, Mr. Gupta, Captain Amrik Singh, ACP Pinky Sodhi, Balbir Sodhi, Jalil Qadri, Musa Yeswi, Gulrez, King Aurangzeb, Abhaychand, Hazrat Sarmad, Zainab, Changez Khan, Borte Khatun, Sakim, Sangeeta Madam, Sherawat, Dr, Azad, Gujrat ka Lalla, Trapped Rabbit, Biplab Das Gupta, Charerupa, Rabia and Ania, Hariharan Nagarjun, S, Tillotama, Maryam Ipe, Arifa, Jebeen , Baby - Jebeen(The second Udaya), Khadijha, Aijaz, Revathy. 

Anjum is born intersex and lives as a Muslim hijra, who lives in the Khwabgah for many years before leaving and eventually founding the Jannat Guest House. On her visit to a Gujarati shrine, Anjum gets caught in a massacre of Hindu pilgrims and subsequent government reprisals against Muslims. She is anxious about the future of her own community, especially the new generation. She was born as Aftab, the long-awaited son of Jahanara Begum and Mulaqat Ali.

Mulaqat Ali is the husband of Jahanara Begum and the father of Aftab. He is a hakim, a doctor of herbal medicine, and a lover of poetry. Ali is the direct descendant of Mongol Emperor Changez Khan – through the emperor's second-born son, Chagatai.

Zainab is a three-year-old girl whom Anjum picks up on the steps of the Jama Masjid. Zainab is brought up at Khwabgah and later goes on to become a fashion designer who marries Saddam.

Saddam Hussein (Dayachand) is one of the guests at the Jannat Guest House. He was originally named Dayachand but named himself after Saddam Hussain after seeing a video of his execution. Saddam works odd jobs – in a mortuary, as a helper in a shop, a bus conductor, selling newspapers at the New Delhi railway station, as a bricklayer on a construction site and as a security guard. Saddam wants to avenge his father's death by killing Sehrawat, the Station House Officer of the Dulina police station.

Dr. Azad Bharatiya is one of the many protestors near Jantar Mantar. He continues his 10-year fast and runs a newsletter called "News & Views".

S. Tilottama is a student at the Architecture School who is estranged from her Syrian Christian mother, Mariyam Ipe. Tilo becomes friends with three men – Musa Yewsi, Nagaraj Hariharan and Biplab Dasgupta, whom she meets while working on sets and lighting design for the play directed by David Quartermaine.

Nagaraj Hariharan is cast as Norman in the play. He later becomes a top-notch journalist who works in Kashmir. Tilo marries Naga as suggested by Musa for strategic reasons and later abandons him.

Biplab Dasgupta was to play the role of Garson Hobart in Norman, Is That You?. He later works for the Intelligence Bureau as Deputy Station Head for. Biplab secretly loves Tilo and rents her room after she walks out on Naga.

Musa Yeswi (Commander Gulrez) is a reticent Kashmiri man who is classmates with Tilo in Architecture School and later her boyfriend. Musa later returns to his homeland to become a militant and fight for Azadi. Musa marries Arifa and fathers Miss Jebeen the First.

Begum Arifa Yeswi is the wife of Musa Yeswi. Musa meets Arifa in a stationery shop where a grenade explosion takes place.

Major Amrik Singh is a military officer in charge of counter-insurgency operations in Kashmir. He murders Jalib Qadri, a well-known lawyer and human rights activist and subsequently seeks asylum in the US claiming to be the victim of the tortures he has inflicted on others.

Comrade Revathy is a Maoist from East Godavari district of Andhra Pradesh who is raped and tortured by policeman. She's the mother of Udaya (Miss Jebeen the Second). Revathy leaves Udaya in Jantar Mantar.

Jahanara Begum – Mother of Aftab (Anjum). Dotes on him and takes him to the dargah of Hazrat Sarmad Shaheed. Even after Aftab moves to Khwabgah, she continues to send a hot meal every day.

Ahlam Baji – The midwife who delivers Aftab and who, during her last days, grows disoriented. She's buried in Jahanara Begum's family graveyard.

Ustad Hameed Khan – Musician who taught Aftab Hindustani classical music. Aftab eventually stops going to the music classes due to snickering and teasing from other children.

Imam Ziauddin – The blind imam who accompanies Anjum in the graveyard and once led the prayers at Fatehpuri Masjid

Kulsoom Bi –Ustad, guru of Khwabgah

Saeeda–The new face of Khwabgah after Anjum and is soon to take over as the ustad

Zakir Mian – Proprietor and Managing Director of A-1 Flower. He travels with Anjum.

Begum Zeenat Kauser – Anjum's aunt and Mulaqat Ali's older sister.

Begum Renata Mumtaj – Belly dancer from Romania who grew up in Bucharest dreaming of India and its classical dancing forms. She's buried in Jannat after her death.

Roshan Lal – Headwaiter of Rosebud Rest-O-Bar

Mr. D. D. Gupta – An old client of Anjum who is a building contractor. He moves to Baghdad to capitalize on the escalating demand for concrete blast walls.

Loveleen Singh – Wife of Amrik Singh. She's a victim of domestic violence.

ACP Pinky Sodhi – Assistant Commandant and brutal interrogator who worked with Amrik Singh.

Balbir Singh Sodhi – ACP Pinky Sodhi's brother. A senior police officer who had been shot down by militants in Sopore.

Fact & Fiction :

2002 Godhra riots- Gujarat

Trauma to Anjum; their visit to Gujarat

lynching of Dalits (lower class) in Una Gujarat

Dayachand’s father’s killing in Haryana for taking a dead animal’s skin

Gulf war between Iraq and America

Hanging of Saddam Hussein by America

Inspiration for Dayachand to adopt the name, Saddam Hussein

Anna Hazare movement 2011-12

Tubby Gandhian at Jantar Mantar in TV and news

All the Jantar Mantar protests

A group from Jantar Mantar guest house visit Jantar Mantar

The madness of adopting names

Dr. Azad Bharti

Naxalite Maoist movement

Letter from Revathy

Sanjay Gandhi and Emergency

Narendra Modi is known as Gujarat ka Lalla.

Plot Overview of this novel:-

Aftab is a hermaphrodite born in Old Delhi and raised as a boy. However, Aftab is never comfortable with this and when he reaches adulthood, he opts for gender reassignment surgery. Aftab is reborn as Anjum, a glamorous woman whose affectionate, outgoing manner quickly ingratiates her with many members of the community. Eighteen and independent for the first time, Anjum finds a home with the residents of the place called Khwaboah, meaning "House of Dreams." This is a community of non-conformists, many who are either intersex or transgender like Anjum. Calling it home, she remains there for thirty years, during which time she becomes a mother figure to a little girl named Zainab and raises her to adulthood. However, when she is forty-six, she survives a massacre in Ahmedabad and decides to leave the Khwabgan. She moves into a local cemetery transforming it into a guesthouse that she names Jannat, or "Paradise." She opens a funeral services company catering to marginalized and persecuted groups. One day, a baby was found at an observatory in Delhi. Anjum takes the child in, but she disappears one day. Anjum tracks the baby down to the house of the woman who took her.

The narrative then shifts to the story of S. Tilottama, called "Tilo" for short, the woman who took the baby. The story flashes back to her college days, her narrative spliced together with the stories of two men who loved her during these years. One is an old bureaucrat called Garson Hobart, the other, a mainstream journalist named Naga whom she eventually marries. Tilo, a dark-skinned, smart woman, had been close to architecture student Musa Yeswi in university. After university. Musa and Tilo reconnected shortly after his wife died. However, Musa became involved with the Kashmiri separatist movement advocating for independence for the Muslim región at the border of Pakistan. Musa and his friend, Commander Gulrez, raise the attention of Indian bureaucrats led by the ruthless Major Amrik Singh. Singh, known for torturing his suspects brutally, captures Musa and Gulrez. Musa manages to escape, but Gulrez is killed as Tilo watches. Shaken and realizing how close she came to being caught up in an extremely dangerous plot, Tilo decides to play it safe and marry Naga. Fourteen years later, they divorce and Tilo rents an apartment from Garson Hobart. They reconnect, but she soon disappears again with the baby from the observatory. She has named the baby Miss Jebeen the Second, after Musa's slain daughter. Anjum finds her, and invites both of them to move into the Jannat guesthouse With her.

The narrative then flashes back to show how Miss Jebeen the First died, in the conflict of 1990s Kashmir. She and Musa's wife, Arifa are shot by soldiers on Major Singh's orders. Although Major Singh later tries to make peace with Musa by paying him off, Musa angrily rejects him and goes undercover. We also see more of the night Gulrez died, and it is revealed that Tilo was pregnant when she escaped Kashmir and married Naga. However, she chooses to have an abortion. Back in the present, the residents of Jannat celebrate Zainab's wedding to fellow resident Saddam. One day, they receive a letter written by Miss Jebeen the Second's mother. A member of the Communist party, Comrade Maase Revathy was raped, and although she could not care for her child, she reveals she named her Udaya. The residents of Jannat agree to name the child Miss Udaya Jebeen, to honor both parents' wishes. The book ends as Garson Hobart reads through Tila's documents, realizing that he now sides with her on Kashmir Musa arrives at his apartment, and they talk about Kashmir, with Musa saving that the conflict will make the country explode one day. Musa joins Tila at Jannat for the night but leaves to rejoin the fight in Kashmir, where he's killed. Anjum takes Miss Udaya Jebeen for a walk around Delhi in the last scene, while a small dung beetle observes the world around.

Write about any one theme or character of the novel with the help of Chat OpenAI GPT. Ask to Chat GPT and put a screenshot as well as copy-paste the answer generated by this response generator.

I have to take one theme of this novel that is 'Ghost of Capitalism' and I have to find this result in ChatGPT.

The Ministry of Utmost Happiness is a novel by Indian author Arundhati Roy. The novel explores a wide range of themes, including politics, love, and identity. Somecritics have interpreted the novel as a commentary on the effects of capitalism on Indian society, with the "ghost of capitalism" being a metaphor for the destructive impact of economic and societal changes on individuals and communities. However, it is important to note that the novel is a work of fiction and the themes and interpretations may vary depending on the reader. 

કવિતાની સફરે...

 

Hello Everyone,

I am Hinaba Sarvaiya. I am also a Blogger, Youtuber. This blog is based on my creative corner. I am interested in writing some poems in three languages like Gujrati, Hindi and English. Here we can see my fews creative poems. Writing is part of my interest. Thank You for Visiting My Blog..

 

 जंजीरों से आज़ादी

 

जीवन बिताया टकरारो के साथ,

भविष्य देखा उजवलो के साथ ।

बिदा किया उम्मीदों के साथ,

साथ निभाना मिला ना साथ ।।

जिंदगीमें आया बड़ा अंधेरा,

आंख खोली ना मिला सवेरा ।

हाथो की चूड़ियां, आखों की चमक,

पैरों के नूपुर, आवाजों की चहल ।

आए धुंधली कश्ती मेरी,

बिना हाथ न पहरी आज़ादी ।।

रुह मेरी तडपी, बरसाए नहीं नैन,

हर काजल में छुपा गहरा समंदर ।।

पंख फूटने की बारी आई,

बिना घोंसला के उड़ न पाईं ।।

 

-Hinaba Sarvaiya.

 

 

   સ્મરણ

તમે ગયા છો તમારી યાદો આજે પણ અમર છે

રહ્યા હશો સાવ મોન પણ તમારી વાચા અમર છે

ભૂલ્યા હશું હિંમત નજર-અંદાજ કરવાની 

 પણ, ભીતરની ધબકતી શિરા હજુ અમર છે

સ્મરણના પોટલા ભરેલ છે હૈયે

પણ, વ્હાલની ગાથા કંઠે હજુ અમર છે

હયાતી ન દેખું આજે તમારી…

છતાં દિલના પેટાળમાં યાદ આજે પણ અમર છે

                    -વ્હાલી દીકરી…(હિના)

                    (૨૪/૦૯/૨૨)

પ્રેમ

વિહળતા ઝરતી મુકી તારી યાદમાં

અશ્રુધાર વેહતી મુકી તારી યાદમાં..૧

નો 'તિ ઈશ્ચતી તું આમ વિસરાઈ જઈશ,

પણ અંતર બાળ્યું તારી યાદમાં..૨

તકતી રેત પર શાશ્વત તપતી જોઈશ,

પણ છીછરા ખાબોચિયામાં પડી તારી યાદમાં..૩

મનની ગહેરાશ માપવા અધીરી થઇશ,

પણ ઝાકળ-જાળ ફેલાવું તારી યાદમાં..૪

પ્રેમીની આટીમાં વિટળાતી જોઇશ,

પણ ભેદી લંકામાં રહું તારી યાદમાં.૫

-11/09/22

દરિયાની મથામણ

તારા મોઝામા કંઈક ઉછળાટ હતો,

પણ ભીતર કંઈક શાંત હતું.૧

પ્રશ્નોની મથામણ મારી હતી,

પણ કેહવાના આડમાં તું હતો.૨

ઊંડાણને ફંફોસતા હોડમાં રંજની હતી,

પણ ચંચળતાથી વિલિપ્ત તારો સટ હતો.૩

ઉશ્કેરાયો મારા ઓચિંતા આહવાંથી,

પણ મારા હુંફાળા સ્પર્શની ઓથમાં હતો.૪

ગંભીર્ય ચેષ્ટા તરાંગથી છવાયેલ ઉદ્દધી,

પણ આજે આબુદ્ધતા તેની ઓટમાં હતી.૫

-13/02/22

જીંદગી

જીંદગીએ રંગોની મોહતાજ નથી,

આ રંગો ક્યારે બે-રંગ થાય તે ખબર નથી,

જીવીએ છીએ ત્યારે જીવતા નથી

મરતાને જીવવાની આશ શું?

 આ બે-રંગ જિંદગી..૧

શીખવે છે નવા પાસા પેહેલું

છતાં રમતની આ આતઘોટ છુટતી નથી,

રોજ મનના મોકળા સ્મરણ ચિન્હ યાદ

ભૂલવા મજબૂર શું થાઉ નહીં?

આ બે-રંગ જિંદગી..૨

વાગતા, વગળતે, બે માર્ગે ભટકતા

ચાલતા, અટકતા પણ રે'તા વેઠતા,

વેરાન રૂપી આ જિંદગી સરસ શીખવતી

પોતાની મસ્ત

આ બે-રંગ જિંદગી..૩

06/10/21

ગથામણ

પોપડો સમજીને ઉખડવાની ભૂલ જો કરું,

પણ તેની જડતામા ગાઢ રીતે ફસાઉં તો શું કરું?૧

ફૂલોની છોડમા મેહકવાની વાતો શું કરું? 

આ હૃદયમાં ચૂપેલા કાંટાની ફરિયાદ પણ શું કરું?૨

ઘા ને રૂજાવામાં વાર નો'તી પણ આ ઘા ઉપર જ વાર થાય તો શું કરું?૩

પર્ણની શિરામાં ફેલાતી જોઇ, શિરા જ મર્ગવિહોની બંને તો શું કરું?૪

અંતરના ભિંડાણમાં રેહનારી આજે સામે આવે ને વમનોની આટમાં ધકેલાવું તો શું કરું?૫

સુવાસને ચારેય તરફ સુવાસી બનાવું પણ સુવાસ જ પેટિયે પુરાય તો શું કરું?૬

મહેકતા મહેલની બારીમાં જોતા બારણાંઓ લલચાય છતાં ખુલા ન મુકેતો શું કરું?૭

 25/02/22

Title:- ''I Too Call Myself I''

I Too Call Myself I

Because I am Following the Calendar made by Pigs.

I am very Poor not By Money 

But understanding of the things..

What happened to my surrounding Shut-up! I can't talk about anything happening,

I am enjoying the Jazz age. It gives me pleasure.

Too Call Myself I

Because I am using new dictionary words like Ungood, Plusgood, and Doublegood.

I Too Call Myself I

Because I am not actually where I live!

                        

Petals of Blood by Ngugi Wa Thiong'o

 Hello Everyone,

I am Hinaba Sarvaiya a student of English Department MKBUniversity Bhavnagar. This blog was posted by Yesha ma'am. This blog is based on The African Literature novel Petals of Blood by Ngugi Wa Thiong'o. Here I am discussing neocolonialism in this novel. 

About Author:-

Ngugi wa Thiong’o, original name James Thiong’o Ngugi, (born January 5, 1938, Limuru, Kenya), Kenyan writer who was considered East Africa’s leading novelist. His popular Weep Not, Child (1964) was the first major novel in English by an East African. As he became sensitized to the effects of colonialism in Africa, Ngugi adopted his traditional name and wrote in the Bantu language of Kenya’s Kikuyu people.

Summary of Petals of Blood:-

Petals of Blood is NgugiwaThiong’o’s last artistic work written in 1977; it is set in Ilmorog, an undeveloped village. The novel is divided into four parts, Petals of Blood starts 

with a knock at the doors of four characters, Munira, Karega, Wanja and Abdulla, who are 

wanted at the new Ilmorog police station, because they are suspected of murdering three 

capitalists Chui, Kimeria and Mzigo.

In the first part of the novel, Ngugi establishes the setting and mirrors through it the image of 

neo-colonial Kenya. The second part is an account of the journey to the city by the Ilmorogians to meet their representative Ndiri wa Riera. The third part illustrates the changes that came to Ilmorog from a rural community to an urban city. Finally, the fourth part reveals the beginning of the exploitation of the peasants of Ilmorog.

What is Neocolonialism?

It is a policy of a strong nation in seeking political and economic hegemony over an independent nation or extended geographical area without necessarily reducing the subordinate nation or area to the legal status of a colony. 

The term neocolonialism was first used In 1965, by Kwame Nkrumah after World War II to refer to the continuing dependence of former colonies on foreign countries

Roland Fuh gave a simple definition of Neocolonialism that,

"Neo-colonialism can be defined as the indirect control of the economic, political and socio-cultural life of African countries by their former colonial masters. Unlike colonialism which was direct control, neo-colonialism operates indirectly and secretly."

Neocolonialism in Petals of Blood:-

The novel starts with the news of murder of: Mzigo, Chui and Kimeria. Wanja, Munira, Karega and Abdulla are suspected. Ilmorog has grown from a traditional Kenyan village to a modern industrial town.

According to Josephine Sitwala, 

"The modernisation of the area brings changes which Ngugi regards as examples of neo-colonisation. He does not accept the urbanisation of Ilmorog because it has destroyed its original beauty and, as such, brought suffering to its inhabitants. 'The focus of neo-colonialism in Petals of Blood is land and is based on social abuse, oppression, exploitation and injustice.''(Sitwala, Josephine Ntelamo)

During the age of imperialism, European powers conquered African lands and ruled them as colonies. As African nations began to throw off their colonial rule and become independent in the mid-20th century, they began to form their own governments and seek to establish control over their economies. However, most of them became almost immediately privy to neocolonialism, which is where foreign investors and local ruling elites partner to "invest" in the country, but instead return said country to an almost colonial type of relationship. They are now subject to market forces, loans, transportation changes, and local corruption. Ngugi chronicles Ilmorog's experience with neocolonialism, showing that all of the new modern developments merely hid the fact that the people were losing any power of their own.

Petals of Blood, Ngugi records instances of corruption and capitalist exploitation of the masses by those in authority, who alienated themselves from the people to become just as 

the former colonizer. Kimeria Hawkins portrays perfectly the Native Bourgeoisie, who 

considers themselves superior to their people because of their wealth and education. 

Thus, Kimeria who was once a fighter with the Mau Mau, and who betrayed Abdulla 

and Ndinguri became a wealthy businessman. He takes advantage of Wanja, his friend’s 

daughter while she was a young college girl. On the Ilmorogians’s way to the city to see their 

representative Nderi wa Riera, Joseph falls ill, consequently Wanja, karega, and Njuguma the 

an old man seeks help from a house in Blue Hill. By their surprise, they were taken to a room in the big house and locked up in darkness89, without reason. The only way for them to be 

released is for Wanja to once again sleep with Hawkins Kimeria. She accepts because she 

fears her refusal would end in Joseph’s death and the mission might fail and she would be 

blamed by all. Indeed these peasants are treated like strangers in their own country.

 The struggling in the African 

societies in order to resist this injustice and to illuminate the leftovers of the colonizer. This news gives Karega a new hope. 

He asserts: 

"Tomorrow it would be the workers and the peasants is leading the struggle and seizing power to overturn the system of all its preying bloodthirsty gods and 

gnomic angels, bringing to an end the reign of the few over the many and the era of drinking blood and feasting on human flesh."

Started establishing their own government and control over the economy.

As Weiping and Zhang said,

 Ngugi also adopted the collective African voices to demonstrate the general opinions of the African people towards neocolonial activities. With the building of the Trans-Africa road, Ilmorog was put into the agenda of fast development and modernization. The Land was taken from the people; shopping centers, tourist centers and other infrastructure were constructed; machines and measuring instruments of different kinds were in use to promote the economy. (Li, Weiping, and Xiuli Zhang)

Conclusion:-

For Ngugi, the African females were driven to be prostitutes directly because of the imperialists' exploitation; however, these females, like other proletariats, would take actions to fight. The conflicting narrative of Ngugi reflects his oppositions concerning neo- colonialism, one as an insider opposing it, while the other as an outsider standing by it.

Ngugi has catapulted caustic criticism against the middle class of Africa who derived power from the common people during the anti-colonial struggles and after independence derived it to "form a cozy relationship with the western bourgeoisie.

 

Thank You..

The Mechanics of Writing

 Hello Everyone,

I am Hinaba Sarvaiya a student of English Department MKBUniversity Bhavnagar. This blog is my thinking activity assigned by Megha ma'am. This blog is about the Watching three videos. The title is 'Academic writing' . What should you understand about this video and writing as your task assigned. These video lectures are given by Kalyan Chattopadhyay sir and Atanu Bhattacharya sir. 

Let's have a look at what Kalyan sir says in 'Academic Writing' in the first video. 

Kalyan sir started with basic ideas of academic writing. First we have looked at the definition of academic writing.

Accordingly to Scribbr,

Academic writing is a formal style of writing used in universities and scholarly publications. You’ll encounter it in journal articles and books on academic topics, and you’ll be expected to write your essays, research papers, and dissertations in academic style.

Sir's also said that we have to write research papers, articles, journals, dissertations, and questions in exams. Those types of writing are Academic writing styles. Then sir explained the formal text and information text. 

When writing a letter, the writing style plays a very important role, especially when the letter is addressed to some respected or high-value person. There are two writing styles, i.e. Formal Writing and Informal Writing. 

Formal text:-

A formal writing style is one which is used in business or professional purposes.

Information text:-

An informal use when personal or writing style is used for we are writing for some casual reason.

F.w.- Passive voice

Inf.w.- Active voice

F.w.- Professional and officials

Inf.w- Personal and friendly

F.w.- Reference, citation needed.

No need.

These are some differences sir are discussing in this lecture. Sir also referred to hegic. Hegic means you don't argue strongly. You have not put your stand in very strongly. Academic writing does not use "I". To avoid saying what I am saying or my point of view because you tried to become objective and use a passive voice.

Do not go in a subjective way. Research means not finding a new thing but we have to re-explore things which are already told. We have to find a gap that is not looked by others and we have to stand those shoulders and look further. That is a Research. Academic writing means to use other finding, replication, recording interviews, data then further research in your research area. 

Sir's tells some interesting or fruitful tips or techniques which are very helpful to the research area which they have to do. Let's discuss techniques here,

Divide Paragraphs:-

Developed a particular aspect or association to an idea. Briefly introduced the topical sentence with supporting sentences. 

Topical sentence means a sentence that states the main thought of a paragraph or of a larger unit of discourse and is usually placed at or near the beginning.

The supporting sentences, also called the body of the paragraph, are used to support, explain, illustrate, or provide evidence for the idea expressed in the topic sentence.

Then you have to write a concluding part. Conclusion is not the repetition of a topical sentence. They different or summarize early arguments with evidence. 

Second technique is a used Signal Expression:-

Used some signal expressions like beside, then, indeed, results, although, however etc. It is helpful to connect your one argument to another one. Careful to use this. If we turn your other arguments then signal expression becomes helpful. New chapter starts with the connection of previous chapter or arguments, it is beneficial to the reader.

Third techniques is a Using a Questions:-

Academic writing is based on the questions and the first aspect is to tell the questions or find some answers. You can ask self questions, you address the questions in your research. Deal with issues and raise this question with supporting arguments. 

Sir's tells the most four things which is very useful in academic writing that is,

Careful Thought

Analysis

Comparison

Division making

These four things are more important. We see the literature Review then we have to look at it critically. Critical writing is important but it is very difficult to put your stand in a critical. Asked the question, why should I agree with questions? Then analyse, then compare your arguments with others' arguments and then you make your own decision with Supporting your claim. Use reference to support your arguments.

Briefly I tells that which is things is important that,

Established your voice

Finding link, connect the dots with previous research

You have to think a critical

Topical sentence with supporting sentences.

This whole information was talked about by Kalyan Chattopadhyay sir in this video. It is very helpful or fruitful for new researchers who are doing research. It is very beneficial for me now to do my dissertations. 

Another lecture also based on Academic Writing which is by Atanu Bhattacharya sir. He deals with many basic principles or The Mechanics in Academic Writing. 

Atanu Bhattacharya sir started with some basic principles of academic writing in a very unique style of telling things as a storytelling. 

Outline of this session:-

What not to do

What can be done

Web tools

Case study

Sir's started with academic writing as a skill. Which have developed in their own way with help of your guide, research scholars or professor ect. We have developed Academic Writing skills. Sir's give the example of Alan Sokal & Jean Bricmont who published an article which is very difficult to read or not easy to understand. The article is "Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity." He used huge gargans terms. It's very difficult to understand. Many people are admired but many do not understand. Then Alan gives an explanation that is not a good article. It presented a combination of only sentences. 

That's part sir explained things that researchers can not use complex language to not clearly understand what you say. Researchers use a simple language and write their research of reader angles. If they used a simple or understanding language it is helpful to readers and new researchers who are doing in this area what you were doing in previous. 

A few takeaways:-

Writing has material effects

Avoid massive jarganisation

Research and publication ethics

Carefully choose the topic.

Writing has material effects means we have used other materials to help our own research. To refer to the article, a journal which is based on your research area. Avoid a complex language or become familiar to some people who might understand your writing or research. Over research became easy to read by the reader. We followed the same rules and regulations or ethics in research and publication. Most important thing is to carefully choose the topic in your research because research is an individual work and means your guide also helps them but definitely to do it on your own. Research is a long process, work on your own. 

Writing it up: a few tips:-

Introduction last

Do not repeat same arguments

Use available digital tools

Follow the literature.

It is very fruitful tips given by sir. If we followed in the same way the journey of a researcher became easy and we did over research in a bounding time duration. 

Qualitative research sources:-

UGC- care list

Scopus

Scimago journal & Country Rank.

Digital Tools - reference management:-

Zotero 

MENDELEY

Microsoft windows

Language help:-

The tone of academic language is usually formal, meaning that it should not sound conversational or casual. You should particularly avoid using colloquialisms, idioms, slang, phrasal verbs or journalistic expressions because they are often imprecise, leading to misinterpretation. 

Language presented a vital role in academic writing. In the video sir's given very fruitful tips for us to use some digital tools and check your language.

Grammarly

Owl - online writing lab

Excelsior online writing lab.

Its session is an introductory part of academic writing given by Atanu Bhattacharya sir. Last part of session is based on "Academic Writing: The Mechanics"

What are Writing Mechanics?

A writing mechanics definition could be the rules and conventions concerning technical aspects of writing composition. The category of writing mechanics includes technical areas such as punctuation and spelling that concern expressive accuracy. Mechanics can also be expanded to include organization within one's writing, such as ideas, words, sentences, and paragraphs.

Genre: Classification (Swales's CARS Model)

Definition

Purpose

Justification

Literature Review

Method

Argument

Conclusion.

The Creating a Research Space [C.A.R.S.] Model was developed by John Swales based upon his analysis of journal articles representing a variety of discipline-based writing practices. His model attempts to explain and describe the organizational pattern of writing the introduction to scholarly research studies.

Its model is very helpful to define your area and complete in your time duration. Skills of classification are most important in academic writing. This classification of "alankars" of academic writing.

Organization ideas:-

Mindmup

Mindly

If we are not organised in your research in the proper way, digital tools are helpful. 

Paraphrasing:-

Avoid repeating yourself

Avoid quoting someone else exactly.

Change your vocabulary

Developed your own voice in your writing

Do not use 'I' research as objective.

Provide to generate overview to what you say

Contextualizing material.

This whole thing is told by Atanu Bhattacharya sir in a session of academic writing. It is very helpful to us. Thank You sir. 

Words 1538