In a forum post, reflect on a concept, quotation, question, or general idea outlined in Murray Sinclairs speech that you found personally impactful, hopeful, evocative, or thought-provoking, and comment on its greater significance to the major theme of what it means to be human that we have been pursuing in this course.

Truth and Reconciliation Forum
In a forum post, reflect on a concept, quotation, question, or general idea outlined in Murray Sinclairs speech that you found personally impactful, hopeful, evocative, or thought-provoking, and comment on its greater significance to the major theme of what it means to be human that we have been pursuing in this course.

Your reflection could be prompted by one of the questions for consideration you were asked to think about as you watched the video, or might go in a totally new direction.

Since Reconciliation is a sensitive topic in Canada that elicits strong opinions from a variety of political viewpoints, please remember to keep your post respectful, objective, and generous to the human parties involved. This is more of a personal response forum to the human ideas of Sinclair’s speech than it is about the specific policies, spending, and workings of government.
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Sufjan Stevens Response Questions

1. Select five words that were unfamiliar to you as you read How I Trumped Rudolph Steiner and provide a definition for each (in your own words), supplying the name of the dictionary or website you consulted for the definitions.
2. Research three of the regional references Stevens uses in the piece, and provide a short description of each one, supplying the name of the site(s) you consulted. (E.g. Ronald Reagan, Mount St. Helens, Kmart, Super K, Aretha Franklin, the New York Times Magazine, etc.)

The use of specific regional references helps situate a writers location in the world, with small details helping to bring verisimilitude to their work. If you were writing a short memoir, what regional details might you include in it to make your work more specific, precise, and robust?
3. Stevens uses hyperbole to significant effect in this piece. Identify two instances in the text where you sense an extreme form of exaggeration, providing quotations and page references for them.

How does Stevens use of hyperbole enhance or compromise the non-fictional quality of the piece? In other words, do you think extreme and even untrue exaggeration of this kind blurs the lines between non-fiction and fiction, or makes you question the reliability of Stevens as a narrator? What does his use of hyperbole add to your enjoyment of the piece, or how might it detract from it?
4. Briefly identify one or two moments in the text that struck you as capturing the human experience in a compelling way. Perhaps you can relate to Stevens reflections on bullying, parental conflict, or learning challenges. How was your experience of reading about these in a work of non-fiction different from reading about similar struggles in works of fiction? Does the true quality of these events actually happening in real history change their effect on you as a reader?

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