SLG NO.

2: INTRODUCTION TO LITERARY GENRES

Understanding Conventions of Fiction
SUBJECT TITLE: CREATIVE NONFICTION
SUBJECT CODE: HUMSS04
TEACHER: MS. MISTY MARIE ROSAL

1ST QUARTER PERFORMANCE STANDARD:

At the end of the quarter, the learner will be able to clearly and coherently use multiple elements
conventionally identified with a genre for a written output.

LEARNING CONTENT

Fiction and Creative Nonfiction

Fiction is easy to distinguish – the storylines are invented by the author, the characters are not
real, nor have they ever existed.  Alternatively, there are works of fiction, which use characters
from the real world, and there are stories that take place in real cities. In this case, the characters
are fictionalized, and the places described in the novel don’t necessarily have to be real and
really belong in the city. These days, writers, intending to make a story more realistic, will
describe a city exactly as it is, but the characters, the people and the story are not real.

Autobiographies, memoirs, and biographies are very often described as literary nonfiction, due to
the fact that they employ a fiction-like writing style, to improve on the flow and the narrative.
However, the storylines are not invented; the people and places exist in real life. There are strict
guidelines today for nonfiction, and if a memoir, autobiography or biography doesn’t relay the
facts and events exactly as they happened, it will be labeled as a piece of fiction based on a true
story, or true events, but it will not be nonfiction.

Source:shttps://writingtipsoasis.com/the-key-differences-and-similarities-between-fiction-and-
nonfiction
 SELF-LEARNING ACTIVITY (ASSIGNMENT FOR MODULAR AND ONLINE STUDENTS)
(Deadline of submission: August 30, 2021. Don’t forget to comment your FULL NAME,
SECTION, and DONE in the CORE01 FB Group after submitting your output to messenger. FB:
Misty Marie Rosal)

 Activity 1 Elements of Fiction

Reading 3 Read the sample creative nonfiction text below about the narrator’s reflections on the
changes that had happened in her hometown. Analyze the selection based on the elements of
fiction.

My Hometown
Yasmin D. Arquiza

A five-star hotel has risen on the very spot where our house in Davao City used to be. I literally
grew up in that place, having spent the first 18 years of my life there. Since I left, I have travelled and lived
in various places, but I’ve been back almost every year. There’s a tinge of irony in how my roots and
peripatetic ways seem to be reflected in the fact that the hotel was named after Marco Polo, one of the
most well-known travelers in history.
Happily, some of the old landmarks are still there. Despite the entry of numerous shopping malls,
the bargain hunters’ paradise called Aldevinco shopping center has survived and remains in the same
location. During my elementary and high school days, “sa harap ng Aldevinco” was my stock answer
whenever somebody asked where I live.
Another building that withstood changes in community is Ateneo, although some of the store
surrounding it have come and gone. Because of its proximity to our house, and the fact that it offers the
highest quality of college education in Davao, I would have studied in Ateneo except that they would not
give me a scholarship. I landed in UP instead, and began my journey to other cities and other worlds.
Childhood memories came back when I noticed, with a chuckle I might add, that this tiny eatery
called Pilotos managed to stick out like the proverbial sore thumb right beside the high wall of Marco Polo
Hotel. I asked my sister what happened to the filthy canal at the back of the eatery that wended its way
through a row of squatter shanties. She said the hotel had placed culverts and conveniently covered the
muck. I remember our entire brood making a pilgrimage to Pilotos for its special haluhalo on summer
afternoons when we were kids. Once, my brothers raced me to Pilotos from our house and I fell from the
single plank that we had to negotiate to cross the canal. There I was, hanging with both hands on the
plank while my ankles and feet got soaked in the brackish waters with its yucky creatures. That’s the
origin of my phobia of flimsy bridges, which is a real hassle in Palawan where we usually have to walk on
slippery logs and broken planks to cross rivers and streams.
These days, there are more changes than familiar places in the neighborhood. A bakery and
coffee shop have replaced Dueñas store and the old beerhouse has gone through several incarnations,
from restaurant to something else, before it became the landscaped garden in front of the hotel. Two
decades ago, there were an ally between Dueñas and the beerhouse that led first to our house, and then
on to other houses in the small neighborhood sandwiched between C.M. Recto and Ponciano streets.
The area was razed in the late ‘70s, forcing residents to scatter elsewhere. There were rumors of arson,
but as far as I know, this was never proven. All the things I wrote in my first 18 years were lost in that fire.
To this day, I still get nervous whenever I smell something burning.
A small shopping mall has long replaced the old boy scout building (although old timers still refer
to the general area as boy scout), and the post office has since undergone a much-needed facelift. The
“island” between the hotel and the mall is now called Clifford Park. This used to be the playground of most
kids in the neighborhood, the only open space where they could fly kites and watch the stars in the
evening.
On the street where I grew up, jeepney drivers impatiently honk their way and try to outmaneuver
each other in the one-way traffic. This is certainly a far cry from the days when the jeepney driver would
wait for us as we straightened our pleated uniforms and slowly sit down before setting off again. Up to the
early ‘80s, I still remember describing Davao City as a quiet place with a very slow pace. These days, it is
the same old rat race one finds in Manila, Cebu and other big cities.
Revisiting my hometown has made me rethink the concept of home. It is funny how a place can
be so familiar and yet so remote. The sight of the ICC building (now UIC since it became a university) on
the hilltop near Bankerohan market brought back nostalgic memories of medals won and speeches
nervously delivered. Traversing the same old streets in speeding jeepneys and taxis, I looked for scenes
from the past but found myself getting lost in the vastly changed cityscape. In the street and the malls,
faces from my childhood and the not-too-distant ‘80s called from the sidewalk and the stalls but I could no
longer relate with them. The past seems so far away, and the present has become a stranger. I find
myself wondering if it is possible not to feel “at home” in one’s hometown. The thought almost
sacrilegious, knowing the Filipinos’ deep sense of affinity to family and one’s roots.
In the era of space travel and migration, whether forced or voluntary, there are growing numbers
of “citizens of the world” whose concept of home must have shifted from the traditional view to a purely
personal definition. Home is where the heart is, the romantics would say. For people who are used to
“living out of a suitcase,” home is wherever they are at any given time. It is like the T-shirt I once saw that
read “Wherever you go there you are” or something like that. It is a popular phrase in the US where travel
and moving to other places is a way of life for many people.
It is funny how we can feel so at home in far-away places and not in our own hometown. It could
be the sign of the times, and then again, maybe it is just me.

(This essay was published in Bandillo ng Palawan Magazine, July 1999 issue)

Elements Aspects Answers/Explanations

Point of View From whose experience is
the text being written
about?

What grammatical point of

view is used to show the
person’s experience?

Character Main Character

Setting

Atmosphere Tone (What do you think is

the general attitude of the
character as he/she
related his experience in
the text?)

Mood (How do you feel

about the experience of
the character based on
his/her tone?)
Symbol/s What object/s in the text
is/are representation/s of
the character’s feeling as
he/she revisited his/her
hometown?

Irony What statements in the

text are opposite to the
character’s expectation in
revisiting his/her
hometown?
Theme What experience is the
character trying to relate to
the readers? Have you felt
similar situations in your
life in the past and in the
present?