American Born Chinese Blog Post

Reading American Born Chinese was my introduction into reading graphic novels. I have never read a graphic novel before, and when I was younger was not real big on comics either. I loved it! What a great experience and I highly recommend using this this type of text in the classroom. The only thing that makes me nervous about using this text is student’s being taken away from more intense reading by using novels, short stories, poems, and other text.

American Born Chinese does a great job of appealing to students and many of the “rites of passage” they face in the time of growing up. The ever-constant idea of fitting in and being “normal” and “accepted” was the common theme I found that was addressed by the characters and stories in American Born Chinese.

I found it interesting in the story told during Chapter 4 when the author introduces the character of TUT (Tze-Yo-Tzuh), how similar it is to the representation of God. The Monkey King is constantly questioning TUT and asking him to prove the things he claims. This would be an interesting way to have discussions with the class on religion and questioning of a higher power. That is of course if you could even have that kind of conversation in a classroom. If you kept it specific to just the characters of the book you might be able to get away with talking about proof of TUT as God and not expand or relate it to the student’s lives.

I did find the responses of the Monkey King to his obstacles interesting. The fact that he responds to his situations with anger and beating people up has me a little nervous about using the novel in class. But, this is also a result some students may turn to in real life when rejected from “being accepted as part of the group.” Students at this age do experience anger and use it as a response when they are not taught how to respond differently. I guess a teacher could address this issue and then teach students not to respond in such a manner. They can explain better ways to deal with their problems then turning to physical violence.

As far as using this book in the classroom, I think I’m for it…but I don’t know if I can say that wholeheartedly without any reservation. I worry about the stereotypes in this book and the derogatory comments (or images) contained in the book, but then I compare to any reading students would do on the Holocaust, slavery, or The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian and realize it’s the same sort of concept. I guess it’s just a process of getting used to a new text and finding resources to tell me why it would be appropriate for the classroom, or why not. After researching the use of the novel in the classroom I will make my own decision with the information available and talk to my administration before incorporating into my lesson plans. Ideally, I think it would be a great book to incorporate into my classroom.