250 words~
The author begins with an anecdote, and quickly morphs into the subject of how innocent someone might think the Arabian Nights really is. He starts talking about a story in the Arabian Nights – the story of the fisherman and the ifrit, or a jinni. The story seems innocent on the surface, but he author then tells us how these stories actually tell us a dark and cruel tale. We learn how this is a story told by Shahrazad to the King to prolong her life, and she was telling a story of sexual betrayal and infidelity. Daniel Beaumont critiqued the story, saying how there is racism involved, as the infidelity is worsened by the men being black. This racism is shown towards blacks, jews, Persians and europeans. The story is not only racist, but also sexist and mysogynystic.The thousand and one nights has been rewritten by many anonymous authors and though some of the story are just folk tales, many are reflections of scholarly and courtly preoccupations. The author mentions this to tell us that there is no consistent racism, and some stories portray blacks in a positive light. He then mentions a story in which blacks are portrayed in a positive way – The story of al-Ma’mun, the Yemeni and the six slave girls.
The author then moves onto talking about the role of Jews. In some stories they’re considered equal to the muslims, but not so much in the later stories. He discusses various examples as to how Jews were cast in a negative light in many of the stories. We also discuss how the racism and sexuality in the stories translated by the French and British were heightened. Many of the translations had been introduced with nègres and négresses, and had anti-semitism hidden in them. In recent times, everyone writes about how racism originated from the west, but racism is a crime without a history. The author concludes by asking if the reason why the Arabian nights is so popular is because of all these discriminatory subjects.
150 characters~
The author talks about The Arabian Nights which is actually dark and cruel. He talks about racism, sexism and infidelity, along with various examples.
Paraphrasing and Summarising~
Paraphrasing and summarising, though they seem similar on the surface, are quite different. Paraphrasing is capturing the entire essence of the sentence or the passage by writing it in different words. Summarising is the act of briefly letting the reader know what is happening, and they might omit some details they might think are unnecessary, just to give a gist of the passage. In paraphrasing, synonyms are used a lot, and usually nothing is omitted because the key point of paraphrasing is to rewrite everything in different words. Summarising may use words directly from the passage, or may be written in any way the writer pleases. Another difference is that paraphrasing doesn’t necessarily mean the new passage or sentence is shorter. But in a summary, the words are lesser and the passage is compressed to make it easier for the reader to get a general feel of what the passage is about.
