Educated: Week 1 Discussion

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Norms

Make a list of your group norms below.

- Everyone speaks
- We can’t talk over each other
- TPWK

Roles

List any absent group members:

● Facilitator: Lauren
● Recorder: Sofia
● Prioritizer: Lauren
● Connector: Abigail
● Questioner: Ray

Notes

1. Educated starts with an epigraph from Virginia Woolf: “The past is beautiful because one never
realizes an emotion at the time. It expands later, and thus we don’t have complete emotions about the
present, only the past.” What do you think Woolf meant by this? Why do you think Tara Westover chose
to begin her memoir this way? Woolf is trying to show how people don’t really think of their emotions
when they are in the moment, rather they truly recognize them when they purposefully reflect back on
them. Woolf may also be showing how as we acquire more knowledge when we get older, we can more
easily reflect on our past situations. Westover chose to begin her memoir this way because she wants to
recollect her thoughts and relate back to her past.

2. In the first pages of Educated, we are introduced to the mountain in rural Idaho where the Westover
family lives, described as a dark, beautiful, and commanding form in a “jagged little patch of Idaho.”
How does this setting inform the family’s experience? It helps the readers understand that the family is
from the United States and helps them gauge the historical time period. By having the characters say
that the mountain is a “commanding form,” it shows how the characters care deeply for the area around
them. Tara describes the place as being dark and commanding because that area was the only place she
had ever known her whole life. Most people would say that the universe is dark and commanding
because that’s all they know, but Tara’s knowledge of the world is significantly more limited than the
average person.

3. We are also introduced early in the book to the standoff at Ruby Ridge, a 1992 gunfight between FBI
agents and U.S. marshals and a heavily armed family on an isolated homestead. How does this incident
cast a shadow over the Westover parents and children, and the survivalism that characterizes their
upbringing? At the start of the chapter, Tara’s father takes the experience and purposefully portrays it
as though the family personally experienced it. The story illustrates how isolated the Westover family is
because Tara’s father relates their own family to this family in the story. It is also used as a form of
justification for how withdrawn the family is from society; it helps the family justify why they don’t send
their children to school and why they don’t even have birth certificates. The father portrays it as a life or
death struggle against the government or urban society.

4. In Chapter 5, Westover’s brother Tyler announces that he’s going to college, something none of her
other siblings have done. Why does Westover’s father, Gene, object to formalized education? How does
Tyler’s leaving have an impact on Westover? Gene objects to formalized education because he doesn’t
consider education to be the “correct” way of life. He isn’t used to this different lifestyle, and the radical
ideas that can be taught in formalized education scare Gene. Gene also wants to keep his control over
his children and when they get a formalized education, he loses that realm of power. Tyler leaving
shows how the option of education is there for Tara and it somewhat alters Tara’s sense of reality. This
impacts Westover because it blurs the lines between right and wrong when it comes to education.

5. Does Faye's introduction of the outside world as a midwife affect Westover's perception of
education? Faye’s introduction to the outside world as a midwife affects the entire family because it
shows how education is important. It can also be inferred that Tyler made Faye proud since he was the
one who decided to get an education. It also made Tara view education as important and she felt proud
and smug when Faye taught her about the aspects of being a midwife.