My experience with reading comics has overall been pretty good for me even though it’s been a while since I’ve last done it. Although it definitely caught me off guard getting assigned a comic book, especially on civil rights, in English class. It wasn’t too difficult of a template to adjust to as I used to read some Garfield and I’ve liked Garfield. I found it easier to read than a book as it made it easier to skim through. This was helpful as it allowed me to easily get the main idea due to the images. The only issues I had while reading was sometimes figuring out who said what and occasionally, I’d get lost when the book started jumping around between subjects.

I’d say that I already had a lot of knowledge in the subject as I like history a lot. One effect of this is that I read about American and global history a little bit in my free time. I’ve found school history to be very unreliable and commonly flat out wrong when discussing topics so my knowledge on history has been independently learnt. Due to this I feel like I know more than most people on the subject.

On civil rights specifically I already have lots of pre-existing knowledge. For example, I’ve read lots on reconstruction as well as how segregation became a thing along with similar things that happened in foreign countries. This made it so that I wasn’t really surprised by bad things that were shown in March. I already knew a lot about the Ku Klux Klan, segregation, and the prevalent culture at the time. I also knew about the political parties and the conditions under segregation. In conclusion, I had a mostly easy time reading March and I had lots of prior knowledge on the subject.

Daniel December 5, 2022

Let Freedom Ring: March Book Two

Engl 165-16 Fall '22, March Blog Prompt

Tags: comics, Freedom, freedom riders, graphic novel, March, Senator John Lewis

The pages of this week’s reading in March Book Two were violent to say the least. The images in the comic are hard enough to see, but the images of the event are by far harder.

In reading March Book Two this week, think about the phrase “Let Freedom Ring.” What does that mean? And to who? What would you be willing to go through for the freedom that we all take for granted every single day? Where do you see yourself in this text? Do you believe that people today would be willing to go through these sacrifices for freedom, and why?

It’s a lot to digest, but these events are not just important historically. They are important TODAY!! Why?

If these thoughts do not appeal to you, what about this part of the text does?

[Image on the left comes from https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/18/us/politics/freedom-riders-john-lewis-work.html]

[Image on the right comes from http://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/h-1605]

Dianna September 27, 2022

The Battle of Reading

Engl 165-04 Fall '22, March Blog Prompt

Tags: comic book, comics, March, reading assignments, reflection

I’ve always been deterred from any form of reading. I have been like that since I was in the third grade. Why the third grade you might ask? That’s when they start testing your reading comprehension. Whenever I try to read I tend to notice it’s only my eyes that are looking across the page but I’m not retaining any information my eyes see. My brain will think about anything but. This became a problem when reading assignments became a normal thing as I went up in grades in school.

Textbooks and old English literature aren’t my first choices for entertainment. Therefore my brain would easily get distracted when assigned reading assignments for school. I never really picked up reading as a hobby so there was never really any practice for reading on my own. Comic books were never something I was drawn to either, mainly because the ones I saw were about Marvel Superheroes and such… don’t hate me, I know it’s an unpopular opinion but to each their own.

Getting assigned a 125 page reading assignment from a comic book called March, put a little worry into my head because I know there would be 125 pages worth of time where a wandering thought could lead me to a plethora of distractions. I started off the book on a good note, I was in a quiet room, I was optimistic. Five pages in and my first distraction hits. I find myself texting back to my boyfriend. So I start the book over, this time locked in, allowing myself to really read the words on the page. After that I didn’t need to be strict on myself because once Congressman Lewis started talking about the chickens he cared for when he was a child, my attention was his. I was worried the Comic book format would be too much for my brain to digest because of how busy the page looks but as the story unfolded and the more and more pages I read I found it easier to understand the text. The pictures painted a good image of emotion and reactions each character had, making me more sympathetic to each individual in understadnig what they were thinking and feeling while facing such discriminating behavior they faced from society. The story itself was informative and captivating for me as the reader. Because of March I may have to rethink my opinion of Comic books, maybe evening reading overall.

Write-It

My Expierence with Comics and History

Let Freedom Ring: March Book Two

The Battle of Reading