This semester changed the way I think about immigration and how deeply personal it can be in literature. Before this class, I mostly viewed immigration as a movement from one country to another or as a political issue. Through the stories we read and discussed, I learned that immigration is also emotional displacement, identity conflict, and generational trauma. Many of the texts showed that even after physically moving, people still carry memories, culture, and pain with them. While reading, I realized that immigration stories in literature often focus on feelings of separation, unfamiliarity, and trying to rebuild a sense of home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This class was definitely different from what I expected it to be. I expected more discussions about current immigration and political situations, breaking down those experiences and debating the state of those affairs. However, I can honestly say I\u2019m very happy with my experience in this course because it forced me to engage with and return to reading numerous books and other creative works, which I hadn\u2019t done in a long time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Another important part of the course was participating in class discussions and reading other peoples\u2019 work. I feel like in many of the classes I\u2019ve taken, these kinds of discussions and class participation often get lost or are not prioritized. This experience reminded me of high school English classes that focused more on engagement and understanding literature rather than just writing text or assigned reading and assignments. Hearing other students connect personally to their creative works made me realize that immigration affects people in very different ways depending on culture, race, language, and family dynamics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This class also made me realize how much my college experience has centered around my major, Dental Hygiene. It was difficult at first to step outside of that world and place myself into a course that encouraged creativity and open discussion. I really enjoyed listening to my classmates talk about different stories and seeing the excitement they had while discussing their creative projects. It reminded me that there is so much more out there and that literature can actually be fun.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Even when our experiences were different, there were still shared feelings of belonging, isolation, and identity struggles. Reading classmates\u2019 interpretations showed me that literature does not have one fixed meaning and it doesn\u2019t have to be boring even when reading about things such as immigration. everyone was able to notice different details depending on their own experiences. I think this class did a great job of bringing everyone together and creating a comfortable environment where we could share both creative work and personal stories, making the classroom feel like a community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A new concept I learned through this course was narrative technologies. It was difficult at first, and honestly I\u2019m still learning how to fully navigate it, but I found it interesting to use different technologies to explain my experiences as a reader. Through classifying experiences and identifying techniques like repetition, imagery, and reflective narration, I became more aware of how authors intentionally create emotional responses in readers. It also made me pay closer attention to the smaller details in literature instead of simply reading without fully connecting to the text. This helped me better understand stories and even reflect on lessons that connect to real life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Overall, this course helped me see immigration literature as more than stories about crossing borders. I really enjoyed exploring stories that focused not only on physical migration, but also on emotional and spiritual forms of movement. Many of the stories we worked on explored memory, identity, language, loss, and survival. I\u2019m glad I was able to fully engage in this course, stepping out of my comfort zone of teeth and health and sciences, and reflect on my own experiences, and recognize connections between literature and real life in ways I had never considered before.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This semester changed the way I think about immigration and how deeply personal it can be in literature. Before this class, I mostly viewed immigration as a movement from one country to another or as a political issue. Through the stories we read and discussed, I learned that immigration is also emotional displacement, identity conflict, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":945,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"portfolio_post_id":0,"portfolio_citation":"","portfolio_annotation":"","openlab_post_visibility":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[244],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-final-reflection","missing-thumbnail"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/945"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11848"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11848\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11859,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11848\/revisions\/11859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}