Emily Bell was a field study student who went to Dharamsala, India to study narrative theory in the spring/summer of 2010. We were friends in the prep class required for our program, and it was nice to have a fellow English major to try to relate to in the sea of all these research projects. After reading this final paper, I am really grateful that it is available on the field study database because there is a lot of useful information here not only in terms of location, but also my new project idea. Here is what I gathered from it.
First, I've just got to say that I relate completely when Emily states that people would look at her strange when she would say she was doing a "creative writing project." This was my experience in Ghana, and it looks like I will have the same experience in India. Whenever she wanted to sound extra smart, she would say she was studying "narrative theory." Mine? "I am studying the authenticity of experience in travel writing." How is that to swallow?
There were several quotes I pulled from this reading that really related to my project. Emily says that "everyone has a story" and that the people there are especially good at telling it." She goes on to say that she was surprised at how "readily Tibetans will talk about their lives here." Some of it she says is from a sense of responsibility since the "Dalai Lama himself has encouraged all newcomers to share their experiences with the world" (3). This statement is golden! I have got to find the original source for that. It gives me hope that this is a feasible project and that I might be helping with their goals if I am able to write their stories. If anything, telling me their story is not as invasive as it could have potentially been seen.
Emily goes on to say that "stories have power. Life does not happen in stories, but we think in stories" (4). This is where we get to some of her sources she mentions and the narrative theory she was looking at. She cites two other works I have copied here:
Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2004. Print.
This source talks about the universal narrative and could be something to look further into. She also defines something called an "Elixir," or the process of the hero taking home her or her new found knowledge from being abroad that is essential to stories.
Fisher, Walter R. Human Communication as Narration: Toward a Philosophy of Reason, Value, and Action. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina, 1987. Print.
This source she mentions goes into how we are constantly recreating our lives through stories and how we tell stories to ourselves about ourselves.
Both of these external sources I think would be great to look into, but more than anything I was just grateful to look through this final paper and look at her experience as an English major writing a story in McLeod Ganj. After reading this paper I definitely want to get together and have a discussion on her findings. This has been one of the best sources I have encountered so far, and it got me excited for my project!
First, I've just got to say that I relate completely when Emily states that people would look at her strange when she would say she was doing a "creative writing project." This was my experience in Ghana, and it looks like I will have the same experience in India. Whenever she wanted to sound extra smart, she would say she was studying "narrative theory." Mine? "I am studying the authenticity of experience in travel writing." How is that to swallow?
There were several quotes I pulled from this reading that really related to my project. Emily says that "everyone has a story" and that the people there are especially good at telling it." She goes on to say that she was surprised at how "readily Tibetans will talk about their lives here." Some of it she says is from a sense of responsibility since the "Dalai Lama himself has encouraged all newcomers to share their experiences with the world" (3). This statement is golden! I have got to find the original source for that. It gives me hope that this is a feasible project and that I might be helping with their goals if I am able to write their stories. If anything, telling me their story is not as invasive as it could have potentially been seen.
Emily goes on to say that "stories have power. Life does not happen in stories, but we think in stories" (4). This is where we get to some of her sources she mentions and the narrative theory she was looking at. She cites two other works I have copied here:
Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2004. Print.
This source talks about the universal narrative and could be something to look further into. She also defines something called an "Elixir," or the process of the hero taking home her or her new found knowledge from being abroad that is essential to stories.
Fisher, Walter R. Human Communication as Narration: Toward a Philosophy of Reason, Value, and Action. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina, 1987. Print.
This source she mentions goes into how we are constantly recreating our lives through stories and how we tell stories to ourselves about ourselves.
Both of these external sources I think would be great to look into, but more than anything I was just grateful to look through this final paper and look at her experience as an English major writing a story in McLeod Ganj. After reading this paper I definitely want to get together and have a discussion on her findings. This has been one of the best sources I have encountered so far, and it got me excited for my project!
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