Educated: Week 2 Discussion

Please use a different color font for answers.

Roles

List any absent group members:

● Facilitator: Connor
● Recorder: Hailee
● Prioritizer: Mary
● Connector: Dallin
● Questioner: Anika

Notes

1. In the Author’s Note, Westover cautions that this memoir is not about Mormonism or “any form of
religious belief,” and that she rejects a negative or positive correlation between believing or not
believing and being kind or not being kind. But her father Gene’s faith is a sort of character in this book,
informing how he sees the world. What did you make of Chapter 8, “Tiny Harlots,” which moves from
Gene’s distrust of Westover’s dance recital uniform to his pride over her singing in church?
Father would mention that the whole family was blessed instead of just acknowledging her gift, taking
pride over something that he could control. Also was affiliated with church as opposed to dance that
was more secular, whereas the singing was affiliated with the church and so it guided what he liked and
didn’t like. The father was mostly interested in taking credit for her gains.
Connection: Communists would try to satisfy those that were suppressed by letting them go to church,
where the father would let her go to sing in the church as an escape from the tight restrictions he has on
her.

2. In Chapter 9, the anticlimactic passing of “Y2K” confirms that Tara’s home is a place ruled by her
father’s grand—but false—delusions. Tara is beginning to grasp the fact that her father doesn’t know
everything, and that his ideas and beliefs may actually be harmful. Tara’s father seems “smaller” to her
—she can see the “childlike” disappointment in his features as he reckons with the fact that the world
has continued spinning on. Why do you think this realization is happening now? What is it that is making
Tara start to question those beliefs and values?
He is depressed after the passing but also never admits that he was wrong, he just straight up passes
over it. I think that that makes her realize that she never gets any justification so he seems to be less
validated, his rules always just went based on what he said. She also becomes more exposed to outsider
opinions and she is able to corroborate facts versus opinions. WHile he was focused on the end of the
world she still went about her life, practicing for the recital and everything while he panicked. When her
dad was talking to everyone at church everyone there also passes over it, even in church she gets
different perspectives on how the world around her works.
Connects to the 2020 election where there were prophecies that Trump would win for sure and then
after Biden won they didn’t acknowledge their failures and moved onto the next conspiracy, just like
Tara’s father who moved on to continue prepping for the end of the world.
3. By Chapter 12, “Fish Eyes,” we are introduced to Shawn’s abuse of Westover and the other women in
his life, which recurs throughout the book. When Westover starts crying over one of these early
incidents, she writes that she is crying from the pain, not from Shawn hurting her, and that she sees
herself as “unbreakable.” She also writes that his abuse not affecting her “was its effect.” Why is this
insight important?
Her whole life she has endured abuse, every action was dictated. That trauma made it so that more
abuse didn’t affect her because she was so used to that behavior. To her, this lifestyle isn’t weird, it is
normal and almost comfortable. He always came back to apologize and told her he was doing it for her
own good. She asks him to protect her from becoming a whore, she doesn’t even see the abuse, it is
supposed to be holy. There is a lot of obligation to stay in the situation, such as when her grandma
offered to enroll her into school the first time. THere isn’t context in Tara waking up to being strangled, I
think that there’s a lot of mental issues but also he’s grown to be super misogynistic by growing up with
his dad.
Connects to battered wife syndrome, wives return to abuse because they think that they love them and
are protecting.

4. In Chapter 14, Shawn has a major accident and gets a head injury. Tara explains that she has heard
conflicting accounts of Shawn's fall. At the end of the chapter, Tara talks about how she convinced
herself that "any cruelty on his part was entirely new. I can read my journals from his period and trace
the evolution--of a young girl rewriting her history. In the reality she constructed for herself nothing had
been wrong before her brother fell off that pallet" (131). Why do humans often "rewrite" their history?
Is it a function of memory? Does it have something to do with the brain? Why did Tara ultimately
"rewrite" it?
She still loves her family at the end of the day, especially her brother that just returned. Especially after
his injury she wanted to blame it on someone else, not the person that she loved. Further, when we look
back on memories they have often been distorted even subconsciously so adding that trauma just
makes her block out more. It’s easier to believe that things that were traumatizing were not as bad
because it is just a survival thing so that those victims are able to cope with living better.
Even just in world history a lot of historical recounts are sugar curated so that that country looks good in
the eyes of its people, many historical accounts are distorted to make things look less intense.

5. Shawn is an interesting character in this novel, with his nature being sometimes charismatic,
sometimes excessively violent, sometimes painfully manipulative, and sometimes, overly apologetic. It
makes it difficult to put a reading on what he actually feels about the world and his family. How do
people like that have such a hold on those around them? Shawn was able to command Sadie the first
day he met her, and Tara constantly forgave him. How are abusers so easily able to get away with their
actions?
Shawn’s personality changes a lot, there has to be some mental things going on. To get what he wants
he is very manipulative, even in apologies it is just a way to manipulate. Even when Tara is being abused,
she justifies it because she knows that he will come to apologize later. Tara also doesn’t have a way out
so it is just easier to live with it instead of realizing the intensity. This also just adds to the level of
misogyny because the mom wasn’t able to stop the violence, I’m sure she would have been condemned
for intervening because I believe in the father’s eyes this violence is validated and maybe even holy and
a positive thing.

Summary:
This household is full of misogyny which was passed down from the father, there’s also some mental
illness in the family for sure because they are so back and forth in their actions. COntrol is very
important to the men, the dad doesn’t have humility and can’t own up to his own mistakes. WHat he
says goes.