By Joseph Bruchac Incorrect Format When you do your MLA Journal please do not number the entries For example do not write 1 Bone Girl Looking at Literature Twelve Short Stories a Play and a Novel ID: 746189
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Slide1
MLA Journal Help
Bone Girl
By Joseph
BruchacSlide2
Incorrect Format
When you do your MLA Journal please do not number the entries. For example, do not write:
1. “Bone Girl.”
Looking at Literature: Twelve Short Stories, a Play, and a Novel
. Ed. Yvonne
Collioud
Sisko
. New York: Pearson, 2006. 72-77.
2. The main characters are the narrator, Russell Painter and the ghost, The Bone Girl.Slide3
Correct Format
Instead, your MLA Journal should flow, like an actual journal entry For example:
“Bone Girl.”
Looking at Literature: Twelve Short Stories, a Play, and a Novel
. Ed. Yvonne
Collioud
Sisko
. New York: Pearson, 2006. 72-77.
There are two main characters in the short story: the narrator, Russell Painter and the ghost, The Bone Girl. We never meet the supporting characters in the short story who include the narrator’s creative writing instructor, his nephew Tommy and his friends, and his wife Mary. Slide4
Setting
Remember what we talked about before we read the story. The last stories we read were all about character. This section is all about….what?
SETTING!
That’s right.
Look at question 4. Where does this story take place?
Read the first 4 lines of the story on page 72, that’s the major part of the setting.
Could this story happen ANYWHERE ELSE & BE THE SAME STORY?
Of course not….Slide5
Sequence
This is a hard story to sequence because the narrator tells the story in circles. He says he does this because that’s how Indians tell stories.
Just because he tells stories in circles, doesn’t mean we will.
The story happens in a line.
He tells it in a circle.Slide6
Sequence
Use these questions to help you as you write your sequence. Don’t just write the answers down as your sequence!!!
What does the narrator introduce first by comparing them?
What story about his nephew and friends does he tell?
How is the narrator telling us this story? (remember he’s in a creative writing class)
Why does the narrator’s wife leave him?
Who does the narrator meet on his way home?Slide7
Sequence
What does he think about the girl as he’s walking with her?
Where do he and the girl go?
What happens when he tries to kiss the girl?
Who does the narrator think the bone girl is?
Why is this important? Slide8
Plot
Keep it simple and accurate. Write a one to two sentence summary of Bone Girl.Slide9
Conflict
What’s the problem here
? It’s unusual
(it has nothing to do with Indians being moved to reservations by the white man!).
Think about what Russell Painter said that Indian ghosts do for the living.
(hint: look on page 75, bottom of paragraph 8-that’s not the exact conflict, but it tells you a lot about the conflict—think about it!)Slide10
Significant Quotations
“But even with that, I don’t think that Indian ghosts are outsiders”().
This has got to be an easy one for you-think about the conflict. Think about how his experience with the bone girl changes his behavior—he stops drinking. Think about the difference between Indian ghosts & white ghosts, who are restless because white people never stay “put.” So they’re never connected. THINK
Slide11
Significant Quotations
“I think it is because Indians stay put and white people keep moving around” ().
Hmmmmm
! Wow, seems like we’ve heard these ideas before. When the Indians stay put, who do they stay connected with? When the white people move around, who do they lose their connection with? Why might that be important, in your opinion? In the narrator’s opinion?Slide12
Significant Quotations
“Huh?’ his friend answered. ‘I don’t know what you mean. The guys are all here’”().
Why did the narrator tell this story? What had his nephew Tommy seen before he called the guys? If it wasn’t the guys who is the narrator suggesting it was? What lesson was Tommy being taught? Slide13
Significant Quotations
“Come on, honey, you want a drink, huh?” ().
Who is asking whom for a drink? What is the situation here? Why is it important? What is about to happen to the character?Slide14
Significant Quotations
“I dropped the bottle and let go of her” ().
Who dropped what bottle and let go of who?
Why is this important? What lesson was the speaker being taught? How does this fit into the bigger message of the story?