The significance of laptop in What is the What confused me at the beginning. I had several questions like my peers, “Do they have Wifi Access?” or “Can they afford the electricity?” My questions first occurred when I tried to set up a birthday donation to VAD foundation. Under the ideas of how we can help, the site listed “$500 provides the school with one energy-efficient laptop computer”. Then my questions wondered, “really? a laptop?” tonight’s class lecture helped me to grasp the essential purpose of a laptop in this society. Laptop can make people access the World Wide Web, which is allowing people to connect with the rest of the world. Become aware with other parts of the world and extremely useful in today’s globalization era. Laptop (especially with internet connectivity) can store and process information and helps societies to prosper.
I would like to share this document about a study of communication technologies in Sudanese nation, maybe it'll help for the final papers.
You may click www.uneca.org/icadla1/docs/Friday/Ghobrial.doc to view the document.
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I believe that the major significance of the laptop was not necessarily to connect the Sudanese to the world, but more so to align them with the rest of humanity. I say this because although they lack connection to the world via the WEB, they are now able to connect (by being on the same level as the rest of the world) through the use of technology itself. On another note, while reading the novel I was curious about the meaning of the “Blue Dog”. It was mentioned a of couple times throughout the text and I pondered over the meaning. When researching the Blue Dog, I came across an article that discusses the Blue Dog Coalition – a group of moderate-to-conservative democrats in the US. I tried linking this to what was being described in the text but was somewhat unsuccessful. I’m not sure if they are in anyway related or if this topic was already discussed in class, but any insight would be appreciated.
ReplyDelete-J. Pajotte
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ReplyDeleteUpon further research on the "Blue Dog" (as I too was very curious about it), I read that an artist by the name of George Rodrigue created a series of painting with blue dogs which was attributed to his deceased dog and which was also influence by the Loup-garous legend:
ReplyDelete"Loup-garou - (Loup is French for wolf, and garou (from Frankish garulf, cognate with English werewolf) is a man who transforms into an animal." - wikipedia
Just taking a guess here... maybe it's an implication of how inhumanely people are being treated in the novel/being treated like animals in a sense?
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ReplyDeleteI thought that the laptop represented a connection to the outside world but not via internet just symbolically. That it is represented as something precious and priceless. Something better than any food, necessities, clothing or even any object, Noriyaki’s time and patience was precious in itself as well as having the opportunity to see such a “strange object” in such a place. That’s why Valentino says “It was indeed a strange object to see in the sort of place we lived. It was like a bar of gold resting in a mountain of dung.” (p.435 in WitW). Not only did Noriyaki facilitated the acquiring of the laptop but also took his time to teach Valentino how to use the laptop to do the accounting amongst other things. I think this gesture gave Valentino hope that there is humanity out there in a world he described as an inferno.
ReplyDeleteThe “Blue Dog” that was seen by the Lost Boys was something about the transformation of the dog into something that is gruesome. Normally dogs would not eat humans, especially if they are raised by humans. It is the urgency of the situation that caused the dog to eat human body parts along the way. It was the only way for the dog to survive.
It is also symbolic of what the Lost Boys had become. For instance, the eating of the elephant, such a sacred animal to the Lost Boys of Sudan, is pivotal because it meant doing something that they would not normally do.
He described it as some boys were in a daze, ripping and biting the meat out from the animal, some eating the meat raw, not bothering to even cook it, one boy even put his whole arm into the animal “had grabbed whatever meat he could and was eating it, raw, his face dripping with the animal’s blood”. Another boy “was tearing the elephant’s ear. He had climbed onto the head of the beast and was ripping the elephant’s ear from its skull.”(p.150). At that point they were so hungry and tired from walking that they had lost their minds. Just at the mentioning of “meat” they did not care what kind of meat was it, just fresh meat for them to feast on. At that point they were becoming little savages that would even eat an elephant (a sacred animal) and in such a grotesque way.
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ReplyDeleteMy thoughts on the laptop were that they represent prosperity in his future. The laptop has the meaning of what the future shall bring to Valentino and his family. They treat the laptop as if it were heavens gift on earth. In America we see the laptop as an everyday item that we have in our life but to the Sudanese this means the world to them. For Valentino I believe he feels like the most important man in Kakuma right now being able to have such an electronically device in his possession. Not does he have a laptop but he works along side with one the most loved man in Kakuma. (NOUARI not sure his name) is a gift to the refugees living in Kakuma when to us he is just a good person doing his job. The refugees in Kakuma admire him and Valentino wishes to be like him. Not once did Valentino believe that the so called powers that NOUARI has would work on getting him the laptop. As Americans I think we need to start appreciating the little things in life that we take for granted like our phones and laptops.
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