Pseudo Book Club: Animal Farm

Written & Photographs by Tan Hong Kai (1A321)

On 23 April, HCI’s Library Club conducted a meeting of the Pseudo Book Club at Jurong Regional Library from 3:00 to 4:30 pm, on George Orwell’s acclaimed novel Animal Farm. The objective of the PBC was to give a presentation on the content of a selected text and discuss it with the attending audience. This time round, students from Hwa Chong Institution, Nan Hua High School and Methodist Girls’ School were present for the discussion.

The presentation on the novel explained several important details so as to provide sufficient contextual knowledge for the participants, covering the main characters in the story and the underlying important themes (such as democracy and corruption). The main presenters were Yau Chun Shin (4H131) and Kervin Tay (2I323). The presentation utilized the first half of the meeting time (about 45 minutes).

During the second half, the participants were split into two groups. One group had to create a mind map based on the theme of Democracy, while the other had to create a mind map based on Corruption; both groups presented their mind maps at the end of the discussion, which included definitions of the given topic, and also the questions posed in the presentation. For example, does democracy refer to freedom? Can corruption be overturned? etc. The participants actively and enthusiastically engaged themselves in the exploration of such questions, and gave relevant examples based on current affairs.

The Pseudo Book Club is a recurring event, held every month with a new text for discussion.

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