No Sugar, tricky prompt

[Evan C]

The school's hit me with a real toughie for our first practise essay with No Sugar. I really don't like just chucking the prompt out here for someone else to do all the work, and believe me, if I knew what direction i wanted to take this prompt in I'd include that with this post. But i don't. So here it is:

"Davis uses theatrical techniques to show the gap between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal worlds?" Discuss.

Don't know if that question mark should be there, just copying straight off the task sheet. Any ideas/interpretations would be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance

[literally lauren]

"Davis uses theatrical techniques to show the gap between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal worlds." Discuss.

Definitely a tough one; there shouldn't be a question mark here but you could easily reword this to:
'HOW does Davis use theatrical techniques to show the gap between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal worlds?'
...which would make it a more conventional structural prompt.

I'm just going to break down what this is asking you to cover, and then if you're still a little stuck, we can address the content and the kind of evidence you might want to use for a topic like this.

So structural prompts are always a variation of the following statement:
How does the author do X to create Y?

eg. 'How does the author use language to reveal the characters' true values?
or 'How does the text use time shifts to establish a sense of confusion and uncertainty?

If both X and Y are present, as in the above cases, then you pretty much just have to focus on connecting the dots; that is, explaining how the evidence (X) leads to the interpretation/ sense/ idea (Y).

But sometimes you can get variations where either X or Y are present, but not both.
eg. 'How does the author use cultural signifiers in the text?' --> X = cultural signifiers
or 'How does the author establish the importance of family?' --> Y = importance of family

These kinds of questions require you to fill in the gaps. So for that first sentence, you'd need to find your own 'Y' to add to form: 'The author uses cultural signifiers in order to...' which would be the basis for your contention. And in the second case, you'd need to find 'X' to give: 'The author uses... to establish the importance of family.' You never have to state things that overtly in your essay, but it's still a useful framework to begin writing.

To return to the prompt you're dealing with:

"Davis uses theatrical techniques to show the gap between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal worlds." Discuss.

X = theatrical techniques
Y = the gap b/n Aboriginal & non-Aboriginal worlds

Now, 'theatrical techniques' is an incredibly vague thing to have to discuss - virtually anything within the text could be deemed a 'theatrical technique.' So aside from restricting your evidence base a bit (and instructing you to use some more obvious metalanguage - i.e. referring to elements of staging or quoting stage directions) we can kind of ignore this for now.

That leaves us with: 'Davis shows the gap between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal worlds. Discuss.'

Does that seem any easier to deal with?

As a theme, the gap/ difference/ disparity/ contrast between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal characters is a tricky one, so perhaps brainstorming this in isolation before tackling this prompt would be a good idea.

Let me know if any of that doesn't make sense!

[meganrobyn]

The school's hit me with a real toughie for our first practise essay with No Sugar. I really don't like just chucking the prompt out here for someone else to do all the work, and believe me, if I knew what direction i wanted to take this prompt in I'd include that with this post. But i don't. So here it is:

"Davis uses theatrical techniques to show the gap between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal worlds?" Discuss.

Don't know if that question mark should be there, just copying straight off the task sheet. Any ideas/interpretations would be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance

I think about this very similarly to Lauren, above, but want to add the language I use to think about it:

Prompts involve characters and/or themes and/or authorial techniques. Characters here are treating the characters as though they are real people rather than fictional constructs, and examining their psychological world usually in terms of how they change or evolve or react to something. Themes are the author's implied values and messages. And authorial techniques are all the writing choices (such as structure, metaphor, language, symbolism, allusion, even characters can be used as symbols if you're concentrating on what they represent and not their 'real person' psychology - and so on) the writer makes to put it onto the page (or screen).

You can get some really simple prompts:

- Tell us about this character or characters.
- Tell us about this theme or themes.

You don't tend to get 'tell us about this authorial technique' because that lends itself to simply a very descriptive essay with no interpretation because techniques are ways of communicating meaning rather than meaning in themselves.

You can also get combinations:

- Tell us how this authorial technique communicates that thematic meaning (or you choose which thematic meaning).

That's what you have here. You're essentially writing an essay on the theme of different worlds (or however you've worded it in your own thematic analysis), but they're asking you to get there *through* the authorial technique of 'theatrical techniques' (which is nice because they've kept it quite broad). For instance, the director could shoot scenes in Aboriginal communities with one colour palette, and scenes in non-Aboriginal communities with a different one [caveat: have not seen No Sugar!]. What would the different colour palettes say about each community, and thus the difference between them?

When you're doing your BPs, you can roughly choose to split them across three theatrical techniques (which I personally don't like), or across three thematic messages the techniques have been used to communicate (which I think is much better for various reasons). These are going to be your easiest split options, because these are the two elements hit in the prompt.

In order to prepare for these kinds of prompts, I recommend two things in your notes:

1. For every theme and character, make sure you have some authorial techniques as prepped evidence.
2. Select a few authorial techniques with a lot of meat on them, and plan how they link to a character's psychology/development and one or more themes.

It's all about cross-referencing

[Evan C]

That leaves us with: 'Davis shows the gap between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal worlds. Discuss.'

Does that seem any easier to deal with?

As a theme, the gap/ difference/ disparity/ contrast between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal characters is a tricky one, so perhaps brainstorming this in isolation before tackling this prompt would be a good idea.

Yes! This makes what to do so much clearer and brainstorming really helped. Thanks heaps!

That's what you have here. You're essentially writing an essay on the theme of different worlds (or however you've worded it in your own thematic analysis), but they're asking you to get there *through* the authorial technique of 'theatrical techniques' (which is nice because they've kept it quite broad)
In order to prepare for these kinds of prompts, I recommend two things in your notes:

1. For every theme and character, make sure you have some authorial techniques as prepped evidence.
2. Select a few authorial techniques with a lot of meat on them, and plan how they link to a character's psychology/development and one or more themes.

It's all about cross-referencing.

Thinking about things this way makes a lot of sense, i'll definitely heed your advice. Thank you very much

[Evan C]

So I thought I'd be able to handle the rest of task myself. but I'm a bit stuck. I'm trying to break down the prompt by asking those questions like:
What influence does one class group have on the other?
Is the aboriginal world controlled by the Aborigines and how is it being changed by the new settlers?
What are the unique values/traditions of the Aboriginal way of life that Davis is conveying?
Is Davis also implying that the humanity of both the indigenous and white Australians ultimately unites their worlds?

Are these the "right" questions to be asking? Am I missing any that would be useful to include in my essay?

Based on these, the ideas I came up with were
1. The Aboriginal world is constantly being shaped to mirror that of the white settlers'
I wanted to look at the attempts at "civilising" the aborigines, giving them rations and changing the physical landscape around them so that their traditional ways of hunting/gathering can't continue.
2. Davis emphasizes truly unique aspects of aboriginal culture, namely their values of family and connection to each other and the land.
Here i wanted to bring in different stage directions like the dance they perform and I wanted to discuss their dialect.
3. While they have different ways of living, Ultimately Davis unites these seemingly dissimilar worlds through their humanity.
I wanted to show how all of the characters are annoyed by being forced to do things they dont want to and the similar ways the great depression impacts the characters, as well as that though the aborigines have different methods of doing things (like washing and midwifery), they still aim to achieve the same result.

Am I on the right track? Am I straying too far away from the topic? Are my ideas ok (as in not too narrow/broad) and able to argued with some evidence?
Thanks!

[literally lauren]

So I thought I'd be able to handle the rest of task myself. but I'm a bit stuck. I'm trying to break down the prompt by asking those questions like:
What influence does one class group have on the other?
Is the aboriginal world controlled by the Aborigines and how is it being changed by the new settlers?
What are the unique values/traditions of the Aboriginal way of life that Davis is conveying?
Is Davis also implying that the humanity of both the indigenous and white Australians ultimately unites their worlds?

Are these the "right" questions to be asking? Am I missing any that would be useful to include in my essay?

Those sound excellent! There's no real end to the kinds of questions you could ask, though I'd say this should give you a pretty substantial base to draw upon. Perhaps thinking about 'how this gap manifests itself in the text' would be of use, but that's got more to do with evidence than ideas (i.e. it's the kind of question you pose/answer within your body paragraphs rather than at the start).

The only other thing I can think of (which wouldn't be compulsory but may be beneficial) is dealing with the nature of a power imbalance, since that's quite a big thing in No Sugar. So you could consider the ways in which there is a 'gap' between the social power and thus political advantage of the non-Aboriginal characters, and the comparatively limited capacity of the Aboriginal characters.

I'd also definitely talk about the language gap and the use of Indigenous language --> i.e. how that creates a sense of a divide between the characters, and perhaps even between them and the audience? This is more like evidence within a paragraph though; bit tricky to structure a whole paragraph around this one concern.

Based on these, the ideas I came up with were
1. The Aboriginal world is constantly being shaped to mirror that of the white settlers'
I wanted to look at the attempts at "civilising" the aborigines, giving them rations and changing the physical landscape around them so that their traditional ways of hunting/gathering can't continue.
2. Davis emphasizes truly unique aspects of aboriginal culture, namely their values of family and connection to each other and the land.
Here i wanted to bring in different stage directions like the dance they perform and I wanted to discuss their dialect.

Both of these are good, but are they not slightly contradictory? Are you arguing the Aboriginal world is changing, or isn't? Is it forced to be a facsimile of the white settlers', or is it its own unique thing?

3. While they have different ways of living, Ultimately Davis unites these seemingly dissimilar worlds through their humanity.
I wanted to show how all of the characters are annoyed by being forced to do things they don't want to and the similar ways the great depression impacts the characters, as well as that though the aborigines have different methods of doing things (like washing and midwifery), they still aim to achieve the same result.

So is this a challenge paragraph then? Are you suggesting Davis is bridging the gap between the two worlds?[/quote]