Philosophy is everywhere?

Complaining about reading and writing philosophy blinded me of something that was revealed last night as I wrote about my personal ideas about having a moral responsibility to people who live in extreme poverty. Yes, three months later but its never too late to understand what I learned.

After squeezing in my creative flare into a big chunk of my essay, I realized that writing with a purpose is what I needed in everything I have ever written. There's an art to the mundane but sometimes I desired to move people or offend them but I couldn't. In class as we discussed Gloria Anzaldua's Borderlands, a lot of people questioned whether Anzaldua should be considered philosophy. Many agreed that she wasn't. That she was clearly a folklorist and an artistic writer. I agreed instantly. She wasn't at all a philosopher because I finally felt at ease and comfortable.

There are clearly some philosophical ideas in Borderlands (as several of the excessive Talkers in class mentioned) but why weren't we giving her credit? Was it perhaps because she develops a style that masks what she wants to tell by creatively showing us through story? That's creative writing 101 for you, show don't tell... because it's boring! Personally, that's what I was missing all semester long. The only other writer whose form was admirable and poetic, in my opinion, was Henry D. T. There is something in Anzaldua's writing that I want to imitate because as creative as Borderlands may be in a philosophy class, the opening chapters are a collection of essays... period. There are philosophical ideas in a lot of things from art, poetry, music, politics, religion... Philosophy is everywhere! Actually, if philosophy is absent in writing then I believe its hard for the writing to be meaningful. There's a purpose in the Giving Tree, right? What about anything by Dostoevsky? Orwell's 1984 or Huxley's Brave New World? Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol to make people want to give to the poor. (We could have read that for ethics!) These are all novels and have philosophy somewhere embedded in them. It's our job to go from there. I don't understand what the fuss is about. Ease up on the analosity. Just enjoy Anzaldua and all her spiteful brilliance.