A+Long+Way+Gone



Soraya Benaissa
 * Novel Study

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah**

Ishmael Beah was born in Sierra Leone in 1980. He wrote this autobiography in order to spread the word about the problem of child soldiers in various countries. This book was published in 2007, when Beah was 27 years old.

__Summary__

Ishmael, the narrator of this story, is first introduced to the reader as a high school student in New York City in 1998. His friends are commenting on how “Cool” it is that Ishmael got to see fighting and war.

After this short introduction, he starts his story. It begins in 1993 in Sierra Leone. “The first time I was touched by war I was twelve.” he writes. Ishmael, his brother Junior, and some friends are leaving their hometown of Mogbwemo to enter a talent show in the nearby town of Mattru Jong. When they arrive, they are told that Mogbwemo has been attacked by the rebel militia group, the Revolutionary United Front (RUF). The boys decide to head for the forest to escape the next attack which is expected to be coming their way. As they run through the forest, they come across scenes of absolute atrocities. The air smells of “blood and burnt flesh”; “Mothers…screaming the names of their lost children”; a woman who is running for her life with a dead baby on her back (not realizing that her baby has been shot dead); bodies of men whose genitals, limbs, and hands have been chopped off by machetes.

The boys travel for days, starved and exhausted for the most part. They try to drown out their thoughts and visions by memorizing and reciting their favourite hip hop songs (Sugarhill Gang, Naughty by Nature, LL Cool J, Heavy D, Eric B. and Rakim, etc). The boys arrive in various villages but are always forced to escape after some time.

On one occasion, Ishmael is forced to escape very suddenly and does not have time to go and get his brother or his friends. He travels alone for a month until he encounters a group of boys from his old school. He begins to travel with them. All the while, Ishmael is tormented by the horrifying images he has seen along the way. He also has terrible migraines and cannot sleep at night for fear of having nightmares. He writes, “In my mind's eye I would see sparks of flame, flashes of scenes I had witnessed, and the agonizing voices of children and women would come alive in my head. I cried quietly while my head beat like the clapper of a bell.”

The boys arrive in Yele, a town where the government military is stationed. Just when the boys think that they have been saved, the lieutenant informs them that they will need to join the war effort is if they want to survive. He calls a meeting and at this meeting, shows the blood soaked body of a father and son who had chosen not to join and left. They were apparently shot by the rebels soon after they had left. He tells them “how rebels had cut off the heads of some people’s family members and made them watch, burned entire villages along with their inhabitants, forced sons to have intercourse with their mothers, hacked newly born babies in half because they cried too much, cut open pregnant women’s stomachs, took the babies out, and killed them.” His attempts to brainwash the men and boys begins to work. The boys are given AK 47’s, rocket-propelled grenade launchers, hand grenades, and countless magazines of bullets. They train and eventually become part of the war. In one scene, an eleven year old boy named, Josiah, is given an AK47 which he can barely hold. Ishmael recounts, “Bodies had begun to pile on top of each other near a short palm tree, where fronds dripped blood. I searched for Josiah. An RPG had tossed his tiny body off the ground and he had landed on a tree stump. He wiggled his legs as his cry gradually came to an end.”

For two years, Ishmael is a trained killing machine. In one scene, Ishmael and a few of his comrades have rebel prisoners dig their own graves and then bury them alive. He becomes a junior lieutenant after winning a competition of who can slit a rebel prisoners throat and have him die the fastest. He and his comrades smoke marijuana, sniff cocaine and brown brown (gun powder mixed with cocaine), pop countless pills, watch Rambo movies, and kill. Ishmael writes, "My squad was my family, my gun was my provider and protector, and my rule was to kill or be killed."

One day, some UNICEF workers come by and, after speaking with the lieutenant, take Ishmael and a few of his friends with them. They arrive in Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone. They are placed in Benin Home, a rehabilitation centre for children of war. At the centre, they are at first very resistant and combative. They argue with other boys and even have a fight where six boys end up dead. After much ado and getting over a drug addiction, Ishmael begins to make progress.

He ends up meeting with his uncle and going to live with him when his rehabilitation is complete. He is chosen to go to New York to take part in the United Nations First International Children's Parliament. He meets Laura Simms, a storyteller working at the conference, and forms a bond with her.

When he returns to Sierra Leone, the country is soon back at war. Freetown is attacked and Ishmael fears he will have to become a soldier once again. After his uncle dies, he decides to escape to Guinea. Laura tells him that if he can make it to Guinea, he can fly out of there to New York and live with her.

He successfully makes it to Guinea.

__Grade Level/Course__
 * English, Grade 12, University Preparation (ENG 4U)
 * English, Grade 12, College Preparation (ENG 4C)
 * Studies in Literature, Grade 12, University Preparation (ETS 4U)
 * Studies in Literature, Grade 12, College Preparation (ETS 4C)
 * The Writer’s Craft, Grade 12, University Preparation (EWC 4U)
 * Challenge and Change in Society, Grade 12 University/College Preparation (HSB 4M)
 * Canadian and World Politics, Grade 12 University Preparation (CPW 4U)

I would suggest it for these grade twelve classes on account of the vulgarity of some of the language, violence, and instances of rape.

__Textual knowledge__
 * autobiography
 * first person point of view - the author tells his story
 * the text sometimes jumps from present to past but it remains, for the most part, in chronological order
 * vivid descriptions of the author’s thoughts and feelings - the reader is taken along on Beah’s journey
 * words that are spoken in Krio (the language spoken by most Sierra Leoneans) are italicized and the meaning is given either in brackets or at the bottom of the page (i.e. crapes - sneakers, waleh - slate, sleepers - flip flops, lappei - a cotton cloth that women wrapped around their waste, leweh - rice paste)
 * the vocabulary is easily understood making the story an easy read

__Social knowledge__
 * Beah’s story is written in order to create awareness of the injustices that are taking place in the world
 * From the age of twelve up until the age of seventeen, Beah was a child soldier, being trained to kill and watching everyone around him die
 * The reality is that child soldiers exist today all over the world - in Columbia, Russia, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Sudan, Ivory Coast, Congo, Rwanda, Angola, etc.
 * Canadian students who lead a privileged life in comparison might not know that children who are their age and younger and toting AK47’s, being exposed to death, killing, and are fighting for their lives
 * Making students aware of such injustice and atrocity might spark the social activist within them

__Cultural knowledge__
 * Beah provides mouth-watering descriptions of the different Sierra Leonean dishes (I.e. cassava leaves, plantain, mango, okra, fish, groundnut, etc.)
 * Many words are spoken in Krio (I.e. “You peekin dem dae feel betteh, right?”; “Watch wussai you dae go“; “Me na sorry sir”; “Me body fine en waitin you dae do na ya so me pekin?”) and the tribal language Mende (“Bu-wah. Bi ga huin ye na.”)
 * Students are exposed to a different way of living (I.e. huts, dirt floors, whole villages consisting of ten homes)
 * When Beah arrives in New York, the cultural differences become even more apparent (I.e. no music or dancing on the bus, crowded streets where people do not know one another, different foods, etc.)

__Topic knowledge__
 * Historical: students learn about the history of Sierra Leone from both the story as well as a chronology of events in the back of the book
 * Geographical: students are taken through various towns, villages, and cities in Sierra Leone (I.e. Mogbwemo, Kabati, Mattru Jong, Kamator, Yele, Freetown, Kambia) as well as Guinea
 * Social Justice: students become aware of the issues related to war and child soldiers
 * humanity and survival
 * English: students see how language (through reciting and memorizing hip hop lyrics) can rehabilitate; it might help them get through their own issues in their own lives

__Challenges__
 * Sensitive issues such as:
 * coarse languag
 * scenes of violence
 * death
 * blood
 * killing
 * weapons
 * drugs
 * rape
 * forced incest
 * The story can evoke various emotional responses.
 * Students may be left feeling guilty, sad, mad, disgusted, happy, etc. It will be important to take up these feelings with your students. Some of them may be able to relate to what Beah has seen or felt. Exploring these emotions in a safe and respectful environment can help to bring students closer together.
 * If you have students in your classroom who have come from war torn countries who have seen some of the atrocities Beah describes, this could be problematic. It would be important to check for this before beginning the book with your class.
 * You will also need to take a closer look at Sierra Leone and all of the different facets of the people, the culture, the land, the war, etcetera
 * It might be good to meet with teachers from other subject areas (I.e. History, Geography, Social Sciences, etc.) and try to teach different the different aspects accordingly

__Possible Assignment/Activity__

(READING) In the story, Beah loves hip hop music. It seems to be one of the only comforts that he has in his chaotic life. When he wants to drown out the images of war, he listens to or sings his favourite songs. When he becomes a soldier and is stripped of his tapes, he feels like crying. During his rehabilitation, he is given a walkman and a RUN DMC tape. He is told to write the lyrics of the songs out so that he can learn to sing them. The music ends up helping him to work through his memories and rehabilitate himself.

(WRITTEN) In your class, you can have students write autobiographies based on their favourite songs. Say for example you want them to write about their childhood. They would have to choose one of their favourite songs and explain how it relates to their childhood memories (in the process, providing autobiographical information about their childhoods).

As a media component, you could have students use Movie Maker to place their text over visuals while playing the music in the background. In order to do this, you would need to liaise with one of the tech teachers and maybe have them teach a lesson on how the program works. You would also need to have access to the computer lab for at least three or four classes. (MEDIA) (ORAL) As a final component of the assignment, you could have the students create their own song, poem, or spoken word piece for one part of their autobiography. They could then present it to the class as an oral component.

This is a culminating activity that I think would be most appropriate for a Writer’s Craft class; but it could work in any English class.