Memory in relation to Jordan, Mary Ellens Balanda My Year in Arnhem Land

Memory in relation to Jordan, Mary Ellens Balanda My Year in Arnhem Land Balanda: My Year in Arnhem Land is Jordan Mary Ellen’s personal reflections about her experiences back in Arnhem Land, a region in northern Australia that is inhabited by Aborigines. As such, the book assumes a more personal tone and the author confesses that any lack of objectivity is deliberate.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Memory in relation to Jordan, Mary Ellen’s â€Å"Balanda: My Year in Arnhem Land† specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Within this book the author selectively chooses what to write about her past, what it was to live among the Balandas in Maningrida, her transformation and lesson learnt. Since this book is about the author past, the author has to rely heavily on her memory. She has to recall what happened and put it in the context of her story. As such, Balanda: My Year in Arnhem Land is a splendid exhibition of the power of writing memory. In this story, the author uses the power of memory to reveal to the reader not only her past experiences, but also make the reader to live through those experiences. Memory works in different ways bringing in different results in Jordan’s work. Not only does the author use memory to imaginatively recreate and reconstruct her past, but also as a device through which the past is brought to bear on the present. Furthermore, Jordan’s memory acts as a reservoir, a rich source of historical facts from where the reader learns a lot about the history of the Aborigine as well as the relationship between Aborigines and the Balandas. Jordan tries her best to put pieces of facts together to compose the whole story. Despite the fact that the story is based on factual information, it has a fictional ring to it. The fact that this story is told from first person point of view means that it is subjective and as such not far from fiction. As such memory bears strongly on Jordan’s work. Balanda: My Year in Arnhem Land is a very useful personal account that presents memory as a tool that imaginatively reconstructs Jordan’s past experiences. The story reconstructs Jordan’s amazing and unanticipated discovery of long running intercultural differences between the Balandas and the Aboriginals. Even though this story is a recreation, Jordan tries her best to make her recreation as truthful and factual as possible. Jordan remarks that this story is about her and the time she spent living and working in Maningrida and that the story is a personal account of her experiences in Arnhem Land (2005, p. vii). This means that the story is not about facts that have been gathered and proven empirically.Advertising Looking for essay on american literature? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More Even though she might have taken notes (about actual occurrences) and involved the Balandas and the Aboriginals in as much dialogue as possible, all these are stored in her memory and only retrieved during the time of writing the book. Furthermore, Jordan states that she chooses what to write about based on how she could interpret those facts, how interesting the events were to her and how the events shaped and fitted into her story (Jordan 2005, p. vii). From this confession, the reader concludes that Jordan’s works are based on two things; what she could remember and how it fit into the story she wanted to tell. As such the reader concludes that Jordan’s historical representation is based on memory and that this is intended at fulfilling Jordan’s present need to retell her story. Why say that Jordan’s works are an imaginative reconstruction of memorable facts? There are a number of aspects in this book that are purely fictional. Jordan has deliberately made them so, for a number of reasons. In the story, all the characters are based on real people from Arnhem Land. However, Jordan out of her ne ed to protect the real identities of the real characters she uses â€Å"changes their names, and also blended them with her story, stripped them back and changed them completely† (2005, p. vii). She claims that she is doing so, to successfully attain her goal of creating characters that are as similar as possible to the real people she encounters in Arnhem Land. This implies that Jordan’s characters in this story are just an imitation of the real people that. Her story characters are therefore fictional and created from her recollection, through memory, of the real ones she encountered. In this case, thus, her idea of memory in relations to writing is to help her to recollect and recreate what she can remember so as to suit her present intensions. Another of the aspect of fictionalization of her works is seen in the very first line of her book. At the beginning of Chapter One, Jordan claims that â€Å"just after the small town along dirt road that is otherwise seen as the highway, the Aboriginal world begins† (2005, p.1). This is fictional since she implies that the beginning of the aboriginal world is limited to small geographical location. In the real sense the Aborigines have a rich history which cannot be limited to a singular location, especially one that has a physical dimension. This limitation is work of the limited understanding of human memory. Yet through her memory she imaginatively recreates a fictional Aboriginal past.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Memory in relation to Jordan, Mary Ellen’s â€Å"Balanda: My Year in Arnhem Land† specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Despite the fact that Jordan’s idea of memory in writing can be termed as an imaginative work that helps to reconstruct the past, it heavily relies on historical facts. As such Jordan memory draws a lot of inspiration from real life facts that happened in Arnhem Land. Therefore, Jordan’s writing memory is a reservoir of historical facts (Larson 2007, p. 35). It is a rich field within which lie innumerable artifacts, all of which have been stored there through memorization. As such her memory acts as a treasure house, rich in valuable historical artifacts. Such treasures can only be retrieved through a process of remembering. Jordan uses her memory to retrieve to the reader valuable factual information about the intricate Aboriginal-Balanda relationship, the aboriginal culture as well as the way of life and the various meanings of various symbols that do exist within the Aboriginal world. Through her memory the reader can be able to see the Aboriginal lifestyle as depicted through certain features such as their utilitarian houses. The reader is also able to see that the dilapidated nature of their life depicted by the waste and dirt spread all over in some places such as the school and the art centre (Jordan 2005, p, 8, 13 and 14). Jordan’s nar ration recollects her experiences of her life with the Aborigine in a span of just one year. As such she only recollects her memories about life in Arnhem Land from one strategic point; her own experiences are limited to a very short period of time. Larson (2007, p. 67) explains that when writers recollect small and minute bits of their past from one strategic location, they act like archeologists. This means for Jordan to tell her story she has to go, through memory, into her past and excavate as much detail as she can regarding her own experiences. Like an archeologist, Jordan exposes to the reader small bits of her recollection, one at a time, and tries to piece all them into a final and complete story. Jordan does this without laboring too much, yet maintaining her involvement in the whole process. She keeps the reader active by narrating in first person point of view, a style that asserts more claim to the assertion that she behaves like an archeologist. Within the book Balanda : My Year in Arnhem Land, the reader is able to identify two aspect of time: the present and the past (Larson 2007, p. 31). Within the book, the present exists now and the readers can be able to experience it. The present is depicted in the context in which Jordan narrates her story.Advertising Looking for essay on american literature? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More The past is depicted in the artifacts that Jordan exhumes and narrates: she narrates them in past tense. There is a missing link between these two aspects of time. There is no connection between the present and the past. However, the author tries to bring the past to bear on the present through memory. Thus, as Cixous (1997, p. 33) argues, memory makes the things past to become meaningful on the present time. Cixous (1997, p. 33) asserts that memory is the â€Å"present of the things past† as such the writer who relies on memory tries to make the past have meaning in the present circumstances. Since the writer cannot re-live the past in any other way, then memory becomes the only vehicle through which the writer goes back in time and recollects what happened there. Jordan makes her past experiences bear on the present by reciting to the reader her own past experiences of her life in Arnhem Land. The author remembers some useful facts about her experiences such as the aborigin al form of English, their form of lifestyle, the strained but tolerable relationship between the Balandas and the Aborigines and in her own words makes them relevant to the present time (2005). Jordan thus sees memory as a bridge between the past and the present, a bridge that not only makes the past known but adds meaning to it and makes it relevant to the present. Jordan goes to Arnhem Land willing to serve the aboriginal but at the end of it all, she discovered that their culture runs deep and is un-transformable. Instead of transforming the Aborigines, in her words, she explains that instead her cultures are transformed (2005, p. 3). Jordan narrates her cultural transformation experience through a recollection of memorable events. Through out the story the reader sees Jordan slowly change her attitude towards the aboriginal way of life. The changes are evident in so many memorable events such as when she visits the art centre. The place is strewn with dirt (the word dirt is init ially used in the novel to depict her un-approving attitudes about Aborigines, but is eventually dropped from her choice of words as the story progresses). Initially she used to notice the litter strewn all over but with time she becomes oblivious of it. This is a signification of the fact that she has involuntarily imbibed new attitudes, attitudes that made her ignore things she could not. So much is her transformation that at the end of the novel when she recollects feelings of the time she is about to leave for Melbourne, she claims that it had been a pleasurable experience living alongside another culture. She also recollects that as she was preparing to leave this land she had â€Å"packed her Maningrida life away† meaning that she had already adopted Maningrida’s way of life (Jordan 2005, p. 212). Larson (2007, p. 164, 165) explains that in this manner, memory is a depiction of a world that a person inherits. Through these memorable narrations, Jordan is able to narrate to us a world in which she had inherited: the art, the culture the language and the attitudes of the aboriginals. Jordan work is an exhibition of memory at work. This assertion is further enhanced by the fact that she confesses that she selectively chooses what to write. As such her story relies heavily on recall of her past experiences. Jordan uses memory effectively in combination with imagination to recreate her past experience in the land of Arnhem. Through this creative memory the reader is able to see her life as it was in Arnhem Land. That Jordan relies on memory does not mean that her work has lost any artistic appeal to the reader. On the contrary, it is within the use of this combination that her book gains the artistic appeal. So powerful, is the power of memory that she is able to recreate even the minute detail about her experiences. Even though the events of this story are a re-creation of the author, the power of memory is so powerful that through it the reade r can identify the subtle nuances on the meaning of life to the Aboriginal and the Balandas. Reference List Cixous, H. 1997. Rootprints: Memory and Life Writing. New York: Routledge, 33. Jordan, M. 2005. Balanda: My Year In Arnhem Land. Sydney: Allen Unwin, vii – 212. Larson, T. 2007. The memoir and the memoirist: Reading and writing personal narrative. Athens, OH: Swallow Press, 35 – 167.

Understanding the Big-Bang Theory

Understanding the Big-Bang Theory The big-bang theory is the dominant theory of the origin of the universe. In essence, this theory states that the universe began from an initial point or singularity, which has expanded over billions of years to form the universe as we now know it. Early Expanding Universe Findings In 1922, a Russian cosmologist and mathematician named Alexander Friedman found that solutions to Albert Einsteins general relativity field equations resulted in an expanding universe. As a believer in a static, eternal universe, Einstein added a cosmological constant to his equations, correcting for this error and thus eliminating the expansion. He would later call this the biggest blunder of his life. Actually, there was already observational evidence in support of an expanding universe. In 1912, American astronomer Vesto Slipher observed a spiral galaxy- considered a spiral nebula at the time, since astronomers didnt yet know that there were galaxies beyond the Milky Way- and recorded its redshift, the shift of a light source shift toward the red end of the light spectrum. He observed that all such nebula were traveling away from the Earth. These results were quite controversial at the time, and their full implications were not considered. In 1924, astronomer Edwin Hubble was able to measure the distance to these nebula and discovered that they were so far away that they were not actually part of the Milky Way. He had discovered that the Milky Way was only one of many galaxies and that these nebulae were actually galaxies in their own right. Birth of the Big Bang In 1927, Roman Catholic priest and physicist Georges Lemaitre independently calculated the Friedman solution and again suggested that the universe must be expanding. This theory was supported by Hubble when, in 1929, he found that there was a correlation between the distance of the galaxies and the amount of redshift in that galaxys light. The distant galaxies were moving away faster, which was exactly what was predicted by Lemaitres solutions. In 1931, Lemaitre went further with his predictions, extrapolating backward in time find that the matter of the universe would reach an infinite density and temperature at a finite time in the past. This meant the universe must have begun in an incredibly small, dense point of matter, called a primeval atom. The fact that Lemaitre was a Roman Catholic priest concerned some, as he was putting forth a theory that presented a definite moment of creation to the universe. In the 1920s and 1930s, most physicists- like Einstein- were inclined to believe that the universe had always existed. In essence, the big-bang theory was seen as too religious by many people. Big Bang vs. Steady State While several theories were presented for a time, it was really only Fred Hoyles steady-state theory that provided any real competition for Lemaitres theory. It was, ironically, Hoyle who coined the phrase Big Bang during a 1950s radio broadcast, intending it as a derisive term for Lemaitres theory. The steady-state theory predicted that new matter was created such that the density and temperature of the universe remained constant over time, even while the universe was expanding. Hoyle also predicted that denser elements were formed from hydrogen and helium through the process of stellar nucleosynthesis, which, unlike the steady-state theory, has proved to be accurate. George Gamow- one of Friedmans pupils- was the major advocate of the big-bang theory. Together with colleagues Ralph Alpher and Robert Herman, he predicted the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation, which is radiation that should exist throughout the universe as a remnant of the Big Bang. As atoms began to form during the recombination era, they allowed microwave radiation (a form of light) to travel through the universe, and Gamow predicted that this microwave radiation would still be observable today. The debate continued until 1965 when Arno Penzias and Robert Woodrow Wilson stumbled upon the CMB while working for Bell Telephone Laboratories. Their Dicke radiometer, used for radio astronomy and satellite communications, picked up a 3.5 K temperature (a close match to Alpher and Hermans prediction of 5 K). Throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s, some proponents of steady-state physics attempted to explain this finding while still denying the big-bang theory, but by the end of the decade, it was clear that the CMB radiation had no other plausible explanation. Penzias and Wilson received the 1978 Nobel Prize in physics for this discovery. Cosmic Inflation Certain concerns, however, remained regarding the big-bang theory. One of these was the problem of homogeneity. Scientists asked: Why does the universe look identical, in terms of energy, regardless of which direction one looks? The big-bang theory does not give the early universe time to reach thermal equilibrium, so there should be differences in energy throughout the universe. In 1980, American physicist Alan Guth formally proposed inflation theory to resolve this and other problems. This theory says that in the early moments following the Big Bang, there was an extremely rapid expansion of the nascent universe driven by negative-pressure vacuum energy (which may be in some way related to current theories of dark energy). Alternatively, inflation theories, similar in concept but with slightly different details have been put forward by others in the years since. The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) program by NASA, which began in 2001, has provided evidence that strongly supports an inflation period in the early universe. This evidence is especially strong in the three-year data released in 2006, though there are still some minor inconsistencies with theory. The 2006 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to John C. Mather and George Smoot, two key workers on the WMAP project. Existing Controversies While the Big Bang theory is accepted by the vast majority of physicists, there are still some minor questions concerning it. Most importantly, however, are the questions which the theory cannot even attempt to answer: What existed before the Big Bang?What caused the Big Bang?Is our universe the only one? The answers to these questions may well exist beyond the realm of physics, but theyre fascinating nonetheless, and answers such as the multiverse hypothesis provide an intriguing area of speculation for scientists and non-scientists alike. Other Names for the Big Bang When Lemaitre originally proposed his observation about the early universe, he called this early state of the universe the primeval atom. Years later, George Gamow would apply the name ylem for it. It has also been called the primordial atom or even the cosmic egg.