An+Unexpected+Love

=An Unexpected Love = By, Mackenzie S media type="file" key="unexpectedlovefinal.mp3" width="240" height="20"

Introduction: The conversation that never happened between Dinah and Shechem depicts the events that surround the rape of Dinah and the circumstances in which it takes place. Shechem and Dinah are characterized in the conversation based on traits drawn from Genesis and a piece of artwork for each. According to the dialogue, when Dinah journeys down to the region of Shechem she meets the price, Shechem, who then proceeds to rape her. It is not until after he has completed the act that he realizes that he loves Dinah and wants to marry her. The personality traits are then analyzed and a dialogue analysis makes clear how the traits are incorporated into the dialogue. Also background is given on the artists and an overview of the project is include

Dialogue:
 * Standing outside a small off white tent, Dinah, the only daughter of Jacob, socializes with the women of the region. In the distance the women notice a man approaching them adorned with a crimson cape that sways in the wind. When the man came near the women quickly noticed that this was no commoner; he was royalty. Shechem, the prince heading towards the women, had his eye on one in particular and was determined to be her suitor.**

Women: Hiya Shechem. How yah doing today. Looking good.

Shechem: Hey ladies.


 * Shechem singles out Dinah**

Shechem: Well helllooo there. Allow me to introduce myself. I'm Shechem, Prince of the region.

Dinah: Hi I'm Dinah. It’s very nice to meet you...your majesty.

Shechem: Oh please just call me Prince Shechem.

Dinah:..Ok.

Shechem: I haven't seen you around before.

Dinah: Oh I'm not from around here. I just came down to visit with the women. Having ten brothers really takes its toll on you after a while.

Shechem: Wow ten brothers...should I be worried about them coming down here and beating me up for talking to you?

Dinah: Well, they tend to be more worried about their own lives then about mine. If they really cared, they would have come with me to make sure that I stay safe.

Shechem: Well if you were my sister I'd follow you everywhere. A woman as beautiful as yourself shouldn't be allowed to wander around the land by herself.

Dinah: Well that’s very kind of you.

Shechem: That’s me...A sweet, caring, SINGLE, loving guy. Speaking of which, would you like to go on a walk with me, there’s a nice little tent over there that we could stop at...if you want.


 * Dinah turns to the women**

Dinah: Do you think this is a good idea? Can I trust him?

Women: Oh yeah Shechem’s great! Any girl would kill to walk with //him//!


 * Dinah turns back to Shechem**

Dinah: Ok, that sounds really nice.


 * Dinah and Shechem walk for a half an hour before Shechem leads her to the vacant tent.**

[Tune that shows that they're thinking this] //Shechem: If I shmooze her enough and make her think that I’m genuinely interested, maybe she'll give me some shnooky.//

[Thinking tune] //Dinah: Wow he seems like a really great guy. And I feel like he actually cares about what I'm saying. But I'm nowhere near ready to take it to the next level with him.//


 * Shechem stops Dinah in front of an empty tent**

Shechem: Well here we are.

Dinah: Yeah I've been thinking about it, and you're a really sweet guy, but I'm just not ready for this right now. I mean we just met and my family’s expecting me home soon. So maybe we can meet up and TALK the next time I come down, but now’s not a good time.

Shechem: Really? I think it’s the perfect time.

Dinah: I really should be getting home.

Shechem: Hey you said that your family didn’t care that much about you. What’s the big deal if you’re a little late?

Dinah: Of course they care about me, but please let me leave.

Shechem: I'm not ready for you to leave yet.

Dinah: Well that’s too bad because I'm leaving.

Shechem: Oh did I forget to tell you, Shechem gets what Shechem wants.

Dinah: Yeah well this “object” that you’re so keen to have is off limits.

Shechem: Maybe you didn’t understand me when I said that I AM PRINCE OF THE REGION.

Dinah: You know I really thought that I could trust you. And to be honest I was excited to get to know you, but now I see you for what you truly are...which is ugly. Mark my words, by the end of the month every woman in the region will know you for what you really are, and you will //never// get a woman again.

Shechem: We’ll just have to see about that.

Dinah: AHH! Let go of my arm! Someone help me!

Shechem: No one’s going to help you now you little princess.

Dinah: No! Please! Stop! What will my father think!

Shechem: I think that this could be the beginning of something special.

[Scream]
 * Shechem grabs Dinah and pushes her into the tent.**

-- [Musical Interlude] --

[Thinking tune] //Dinah: How am I supposed to face my father now? I’ll get a bad reputation because of this! What am I going to do! This is not my fault!//

Dinah: I'm really late. I need to go home.

Shechem: Are you kidding me? That was so amazing. I've never felt this way about someone before.

Dinah: Get off of me!

Shechem: No! I don't want to lose you!

Dinah: Yeah well holding me here isn't going to make me want to stay.

Shechem: Something’s happened to me! I feel like I have beetles in my stomach and heart shaped objects blurring my vision, and every time I think about you I can’t contain my urge to shower you with my affection. Oh Dinah!

[Sing Dinah]

Shechem: Did you hear that?

Dinah: The sound of my father’s heart breaking?

Shechem: No...I heard someone singing you name.

[Sing Dinah]

Shechem: There! There it is again! SERVANT!

[Sound: brrring]

Servant: Yes your majesty?

Shechem: Did you hear what I just said?

Servant: Which part sir?

Shechem: The part where I described how I am feeling for this goddess of a woman.

Servant: Yes sir.

Shechem: What do you think is wrong with me?

Servant: Well from what little knowledge I have of the subject I would say that you're in luuuvvv.

Shechem: Luuv? What kind of sick disease is that?

Servant: No sir, love.

Shechem: Me? In love…with Dinah?

[Sing Dinah's name]

Shechem: Did anyone else hear that?

Servant: (under his breath) or maybe you're just insane.

Shechem: Dinah [sing Dinah] ahh stop it! Huhh OK Dinah (whisper) I have come to realize that I am in love with you. I want to spend the rest of my life with you and never leave your side again. I have never felt this way about anyone before.

Dinah: (under breath) ah great.

Shechem: I need to speak to my father at once!

[Music: do dly do]

Shechem: Father I have fallen in love with Dinah. Get me this girl to be my wife.

Character Analysis:
Dinah’s social personality leads her to enter situations that put her in danger and evoke her fear. When Jacob and his family stop safely in Shechem on their way to Paddan-aram, the redactors say, “"Now the daughter of Leah, whom she had borne to Jacob, went out to visit the women of the region" (Gen. 34.1). This excerpt from the book of Genesis expresses Dinah as sociable because she journeys out on her own to visit with the women of the village. Dinah, having ten brothers, needs to get away from her testosterone filled family, and have some time for herself. When Dinah separates herself from her family she then meets Shechem, who in turn rapes her. Just as curiosity killed the cat, sociability killed Dinah’s confidence. In an image of Dinah after Shechem has raped her, she is portrayed with her legs held close to her body and with her arms covering her face. Dinah’s body position makes her look as if she is trying to hide from the world and is scared of how her family, as well as others, will judge her. An example of how quick people are to judge is when it is learned that Tamar is pregnant, in Genesis 38, everyone is convinced that the right thing to do is kill her because they don’t know that she is carrying her father-in-law’s baby. If people were that quick to judge Tamar, who knows what they are going to do to Dinah, and she is scared to find out. The significance of this part of Genesis to the whole is to provide another example of male dominance over women and to convey the thought that when woman are sociable trouble comes to them, as seen when Eve talks to the serpent in the Garden of Eden.

Shechem appears to be a caring person, but in truth he is a sexist, power hungry, demanding, and arrogant man. An artist portrays Shechem in a 13th century French miniature painting as a kind-hearted protector because he shields a woman from danger. The way that Shechem places his body between the woman, possibly Dinah, and the sword, makes him a caring man, but in fact he does not care much about anyone besides himself. After raping Dinah, Shechem develops feelings for the girl and comes to realize that he loves her and tells his father, “‘[g]et me this girl to be my wife’” (Gen. 34.4). Shechem fells that because he is a prince and therefore better then everyone else, that he can have whatever he wants. Shechem feeds his hunger for power by raping Dinah, but he also exposes his possessive self by making this demanding request to his father. Because he is a prince Shechem thinks that he can have whatever he wants, so as soon as he realizes that he might like Dinah he automatically demands her without any additional thought to her own feelings. If he were truly in love he would care about what she thought and want to make her happy.

Dialogue Analysis:
Due to her social personality Dinah finds herself in situations that bring out her fear. Because she is social she ventures out into new areas without much thought of her safety, and makes acquaintances with strange people who she does not know much about. When Shechem approaches Dinah she acts in a friendly and open way with this total stranger. The women that Dinah has been socializing with are warm to Shechem when he nears, so Dinah assumes that since they know his that he has the makings of a good man, though this proves not to be the case. When Dinah and Shechem first meet, Dinah tells him almost immediately about her life by saying, “’Oh I'm not from around here. I just came down to visit with the women. Having ten brothers really takes its toll on you after a while (Sikora 1).’” Dinah gives a lot of information about herself to Shechem in that sentence and Sikora’s use of “visit” emphasizes Dinah again as a social person. By being so social and friendly to him, Shechem takes advantage of Dinah and makes her believe that he is a friend as expressed when Dinah thinks, “’Wow he seems like a really great guy. And I feel like he actually cares about what I'm saying. But I'm nowhere near ready to take it to the next level with him’”(Sikora 2). Sikora’s use of “Seems” although it is a poor verb choice, makes it sound as if Dinah truly believes that Shechem is a good person, and that she believes that he will not do her harm. All of this trickery on Shechem’s part is due to Dinah’s social personality, and it is thanks to her gregarious nature that Dinah faces extreme fear. After Shechem rapes her, Dinah must face the world on her own, as well as her father. Dinah’s thoughts are expressed when she thinks, “’How am I supposed to face my father now? I’ll get a bad reputation because of this! What am I going to do! This is not my fault!’”(Sikora 3). Dinah now has to face the consequences of being raped, and she knows that only bad things can come from this. She realizes that people will judge her, but not Shechem for doing this and that she will be the one to receive the penalty. So because Dinah’s social personality causes her to venture out on her own, she therefore sets herself up to enter a dangerous situation, like the one with Shechem, and she must then face the consequences on her own.

Artwork Information:
In the 13th century French miniature painting of Shechem, he appears to be pictured with Dinah, one of Dinah’s brothers and two other unknown figures. The painting looks as though it was painted in the renaissance style with acrylic paint, though the true medium is unknown. The artist uses an interesting imagery of depth, with Dinah and Shechem pictured in the foreground and the other figures in the back. This was accomplished by painting the figures of Dinah and Shechem larger so they look like they are in front of the others. Dinah juxtaposes the other men in the painting because she is wearing a printed dress while everyone else is wearing solids, but she does match the background, which could make an interesting point of analysis on gender rolls. Terror, panic, resentfulness; all of these emotions lay on Dinah’s face in an artists interpretation of what she would look like after she has been raped by Shechem. It appears that the artist, whoever they are, roughly sketched the figure and then scanned it onto a computer to add some coloring and shading there. With the use of dark, solemn colors, a melancholy mood radiates from the piece. Dinah looks as though she is going to melt into the background, which helps to emphasize the mood of the piece even more.

Reflection:
After getting the assignment I ran through all of the scenes in Genesis that I thought would be good to use for this project. I thought about the obvious ones like Adam and Eve, and Noah on the ark, and Abraham and Isaac after the sacrifice attempt, but I wanted to be original. So with that in mind I decided to use the part of Genesis when Dinah gets raped. This was a bad decision. Not only is this section miniscule in comparison with the other sections, but also the characters have barley any characterization and there are few available pictures of them. So when making the Webspiration chart I had to dig deep to come up with traits for Dinah and Shechem, and the search for pictures and artist information was extremely difficult and hard to come by. I enjoyed writing my script but I hate how it sounds on the recording. Another difficult part of the project was the analyzing. I admit that I am not a very good analytical writer but I believe that I have improved over the course of the entire project.



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