Freedom Over Me & Other Connected Readings
Freedom Over Me is a book written by Ashley Bryan when he came into contact with papers and documents from an estate sale when a plantation owner's wife intended to sell their slaves and estate when her husband died. Bryan includes the narratives of each slave in this story, but he also includes something unexpected: he includes their dreams. Bryan creates a story behind each character including their real names, ages, relationships, trades, and dreams. Bryan was able to hand over the control of the narrative to the slaves and the stories they had to tell. He gave power to their voices and allowed for them to make choices to create a better world. Ashley Bryan is also an "own-voice" African American author as he writes about the narratives of slaves.
Rudine Sims Bishop wisely wrote:
Rudine Sims Bishop makes the connection that books can be mirrors, windows, and sliding glass doors. If a book is a mirror, students are able toe easily see themselves within the narrative of the book. Maybe the main character looks like them, acts like them, comes from a similar family structure and home life as them, and is in some way relatable to them. If a book is a window, however, readers are able to see another perspective when reading a book. When a book is a sliding glass door, readers are able to see another perspective, like a window, but are also able to enter the world and think critically about it while in it. They are also able to re-enter their world once they have finished on the opposite side of that sliding glass door.
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In the article Walking Into the Wardrobe and Through the Sliding Glass Door, the authors offer up a fourth way readers can interact with texts. A persona poem can act as a wardrobe for students. Students can "try on and borrow appropriate attire and tools in order to move through the sliding glass door better outfitted and equipped to inhabit the (character's) world" (Frye, Hardin, Bouwman, & Stumb, 2018). Students are able to become a character once in the wardrobe, and are magically transported into another world. Much like with a sliding glass door, students are able to interact in a world much different than the one they are a part of. The wardrobe component allows for students to become a character and interact with the story that much more critically and effectively.
Thanh
Alyssa Scarfato
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Dreamer.
But scatterbrain sounds more accurate.
I have trouble focusing
except when I am telling a story.
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But what good are stories on this boat?
There's no escape
from the vast ocean that surrounds us.
Not even an out-of-this-world adventure
could take me away from what we're going through.
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Sometimes I feel as though
it's my fault all this is happening.
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Maybe if I were smarter.
Maybe if I could focus better.
Maybe if I had paid more attention in school.
Maybe.
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The second world seems
more fitting for someone like me.
I feel like I could
do better here.
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The second world feels like home.
The second world welcomes
scatterbrains
like me.
When I first started writing my persona poem, I felt like I should stick to the outline given to me. Often times, especially with poetry but honestly with any kind of writing, I have a tendency to doubt myself. I feel like my writing will be strained, won't be any good, and will be difficult to complete. But every time, I surprise myself. There's no pressure to complete this assignment except to complete it. No one is looming over my persona poem saying it isn't good enough. Once I got the self-doubt out of my head and completed my assignment, I actually enjoyed stepping into Thanh's wardrobe while writing this.
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I felt like I was able to become Thahn while writing this. I thought like he thought, I doubted myself like he doubted himself, and I tried to picture the world how he pictured it. Thanh felt like such an outsider and a nuisance in his world (the first world) and I really tried to convey his internal struggles into this poem. But once he finds himself in the second world, he finally feels at home and he feels like he belongs.
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It was really cool to step into the wardrobe and become someone who I otherwise wouldn't have gotten to know so well. This activity really made me appreciate characters and the way the author wrote them. I can't wait to use persona poems in my own classroom.
Bouwman, H.M. A Crack in the Sea (2017). Penguin Publishing. London, England.
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Bryan, A. (2016). Freedom Over Me. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster.
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Bishop, R.S. (1990). Mirrors, windows, and sliding glass doors. Perspectives, 6(3), ix–xi.
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Frye, E. M., Hardin, B. L., Bouwman, H. M., & Stumb, A. E. (2018, December). Walking Into the Wardrobe and Through the Sliding Glass Door: Writing Persona Poems with A Crack in the Sea. Retrieved from https://asulearn.appstate.edu/pluginfile.php/122114/mod_page/content/30/VM0262Dec18Walking_Frye et al.pdf.
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