OnlineconferencewithGeneYang

On-line Conference with Gene Yang I thought that the on-line conference with Gene Yang was both worthwhile and interesting. He seems to be a likeable person, especially when he said “hello” after we introduced ourselves. I found some of his answers to the questions interesting. For example, when Meredith asked why he had Jin get a perm he said it was based on a friend from the 8th grade. His friend got a perm and was teased about it. It seems the friend is now a physician living in New York and is aware of the “tribute.” What surprised me was that Yang wanted to be an animator for Walt Disney when he was young. I can’t think of a way that __American Born Chinese__ could be a Disney product because it might be considered hurtful and racist for young children. It impresses me that he went from wanting to be an animator to a comic book writer while a fifth grade student because he realized he wouldn’t have control of a story from beginning to end as an animator. What helped me understand the book better was when Abby asked Yang what the moral of the book was. When he said that there are parts of us that we chose and parts of us that are given to us, I was able to look at the stories in a different way. For example, in the book, the Monkey King was born a monkey and wanted to transform into a human or at least become more human like. He cannot ever become fully human because his monkey-like head was given to him from Tze-yo-tzuh, a fact he cannot change. Other things in life, like the paths we choose, can be changed. In my opinion, on-line conferences with authors are a great idea because the students can ask the author personal questions about the book and can understand what the author was thinking when he wrote the book. In this way, students can take more away from the book that they have read. I personally would look forward to future conferences.