blog for today

So...I can't remember...were we supposed to write about an example where we felt we couldn't be ourselves or whatever as we actually are? Anyway, the best example I have of a time where I felt like that was when I went to Sycamore. Lots of really smart people go there. I never felt very intelligent and in fact pretty much got the idea that I was one of the dumber kids around. My grades were okay, I was terrible at science, was in the lowest math level (and got Cs), and was just average at like everything else. So it was kind of a shock when I went to other schools, like in Hong Kong and here, and kind of found out that apparently I wasn't that dumb after all. This sort of doesn't relate to the poem because the poem talks about how we fear being too good at something more than being terrible at something and that example of mine is more about the other way around. But I've never felt like I was too good at something to the extent that I fear it or whatever, (not that I was ever really afraid of not being intelligent, it wasn't a good feeling, but I wasn't afraid or anything), so oh well.

The Veldt

The veldt is more similar to Brave New World than 1984. It has technology and the concept of a house used to increase pleasure and decrease work. However, unlike Brave New World, the people in it still have negative emotions and it is these emotions that control the story. In Brave New World it is the outsider that tries to kill people and feels emotion. In this story, the 'insiders'- the children who embrace the technology- are the ones with the strongest negative emotions and kill people. (Not that the parents don't have 'dark' emotions either- also a difference). Also, the Veldt reads more like an attack on technology rather than a portrayal of a dystopia, since the psychologist and the parents are free to turn off the house and believe that the house is wrong without any negative consequences from outside society. The negative consequences come from their children, who are addicted to the nursery. This is not like a dystopia, where the way of life is a certain way and one isn't able to deviate from it that easily. Also, apart from the fact that the nursery has unleashed the children's darker side (like the Party does in 1984- turning the kids into spies), this is not like 1984 much.

The Lady and the Tiger

The ending is ambiguous. Whether the princess decides to kill her lover or lose him to another woman depends on the woman. I think the author of this story intends for her to tell him to open the door with the tiger because he writes about how the woman is having a crisis of heart and all that and the darkness of the human soul and so on. So if she picked the lady it wouldn’t talk about all that because she would have a good and noble soul and could bear losing her lover and care about making him happy. But he keeps referring to her being ‘semi-barbaric’ and all that so I think he intends for her to tell him to open the door with the tiger. But since whoever wrote this can’t write and is nuts and not subtle at all, it could secretly be the other way around. Personally, I think the ending should go like this:

’Without the slightest hesitation, he went to the door on the right, and opened it.’

Immediately there sprung out of the door on the right a tiger of a most ferocious sort. There was a crazed gleam in its eyes and its mouth opened and closed, foam making its way down its jaws. The semi-barbaric princess sat forward on her semi-barbaric parapet and allowed a semi-barbaric smile on her semi-barbaric face. Her bland and genial and truly semi-barbaric father, the king, let forth a furious cry from his parapet in his beloved arena.

The tiger, though most ferocious, was quite small. In fact, its appearance seemed to be that of a cub, not more than a week old at most. Its teeth had been pulled and its claws had been clipped. (and who but a semi-barbaric princess could bear to bribe someone to do such a thing to such an animal?)

The lover, following the instructions the princess had sent him whilst he languished in his damp holding cell, procured a muzzle from within his garments and proceeded to end his peril. However much the small and ferocious tiger leapt at him, he bore no more than a few unimportant bruises at this assault.

But the semi-barbaric king was forced to abide by the terms of his law, as the tiger was ferocious, and the lover had survived, and thus everyone lived happily ever after and ate pheasant.

Fairy Tale

The story I chose is the real, not Disneyfied version of the Little Mermaid. The value I got out of it while thinking about it wasn't exactly gender-specific in my mind, but I suppose it might be to others.

Anyway, the real version is not at all like the Disney version. The mermaid has to marry the prince to achieve an immortal soul or die. Then at the last moment, she gets an option- to kill the prince and live for 3 hundred years without such a soul. She chooses to die and because of her good deeds becomes a 'daughter of the air' and has to serve 3 hundred years doing good deeds. Then she will get a soul.

The value, or sort of value, I got from this was - be a good person and all will turn out (mostly) all right in the end, even if not completely, or not the way you thought it would. It turned out all right for her- after 3 hundred years she gets half her deepest wish- to get a soul. The story is sad, but it doesn't have a completely sad ending. I didn't think that when I was a little kid and read it, but I see it now. I think that sentiment applies to all fairy tales and so forth, though. We discussed this in class, too. When you are a little kid, you don't analyze anything. You just read/watch/listen to whatever story it is and are usually entertained by it. Anyway, I sort of disagree with what I learned from it. Things don't turn out all right just because you are a good person. But that's what the story is saying.

Emerson on Nature

I know we were only supposed to do 2 lines, but I have sort of a lot, because Emerson writes the longest, most drawn-out flowery phrases for the simplest things. Anyway:

As fast as you conform your life to the pure idea in your mind, that will unfold its great proportions. A correspondent revolution in things will attend the influx of the spirit. So fast will disagreeable appearances, swine, spiders, snakes, pests, madhouses, prisons, enemies, vanish; they are temporary and shall be no more seen. The sordor and filths of nature, the sun shall dry up, and the wind exhale. As when the summer comes from the south; the snow-banks melt, and the face of the earth becomes green before it, so shall the advancing spirit create its ornaments along its path, and carry with it the beauty it visits, and the song which enchants it; it shall draw beautiful faces, warm hearts, wise discourse, and heroic acts, around its way, until evil is no more seen. The kingdom of man over nature, which cometh not with observation, -- a dominion such as now is beyond his dream of God,-- he shall enter without more wonder than the blind man feels who is gradually restored to perfect sight.'

So. Basically Emerson is saying that you should remake the world the way you want it- rid it of bad things and eveil things- and rule nature (because you are nature, if one takes into account what he says before in the essay.) in a good way. Now, what first struck me about this is the bolded part. It reminds me of global warming and how different Emerson sees the warming and 'greening' of the world than (some) people do today. This is most likely because of science and so forth, but I still found it interesting. He thinks when snow melts and bad things recede (odd how he says swine- doesn't that mean pigs?-don't people eat pigs?-is he a vegetarian?) then good things will fill in everything. Now, we are more scientifically savvy and know that when you remove or alter part of a system (eco or otherwise) it alters good things as well- we all have niches we must fill. Most specifically, this applies to his statement of 'swine, spiders, snakes, pests'. Also, he assumes that if man desires and achieves a certain amount of control (or coexistence) with nature and thus himself, he'll get rid of crime. This makes it seem as if he believes in the innate goodness of human nature. Something I disagree with.Anyway, this whole passage is about man fixing things to make it better- it is my opinion that he should just leave it as it is- it is better that way.

Art

I found it very difficult to find an art piece I 'connect' with, simply because I can't connect with pictures. My mind works in words- I can relate to writing, but pictures are just, well, pictures. Just images, just colours (or hues, if black and white and gray) on a surface. Sculpture is sort of the same. I admire people who can create art- but I can't connect with it. Therefore, I have chosen this piece:



I have no emotional connection to this painting. It does bring a memory to mind. My art teacher once told us that a famous artist (I forget who) drew a dot on a blank sheet and it sold for millions of dollars. At the time, I didn't really think much about it- I was more concerned with chewing on my fingernails. Now, it strikes me as unfair that normal people scorn the idea of buying a dot and that normal people wouldn't be able to do that. The things fame can do for you seem unfair. Even the disadvantages of fame (paparazzi, etc.) can't counteract all the good things it can do. Rich or famous? some people ask. The obvious answer is that if you're famous, it's easy to get rich (unless you're famous for being Gandhi or you're posthumously famous). When you're rich, unless you're also famous, it's not as easy to get famous, unless you're VERY rich. Wealth has degrees.

Also, I think it's a sign of my disconnect from the artistic world, that I was scornful of and amused at the description of the picture, which reads:

Newman proclaimed Onement, I to be his artistic breakthrough, giving the work an importance belied by its modest size. This is the first time the artist used a vertical band to define the spatial structure of his work. This band, later dubbed a "zip," became Newman's signature mark. The artist applied the light cadmium red zip atop a strip of masking tape with a palette knife. This thick, irregular band on the smooth field of Indian Red simultaneously divides and unites the composition.

I noticed several things. First: how on earth is a line on a page an artistic breakthrough? Anyone, even me, with no artistic talent, could do that. Second, it says 'belied by its modest size'. Size? Not belied by its simplicity, but its size? To me, that's very strange, that small paintings could be considered less important, but lines are not. Third, I find it very silly that people honour this painting for being the first to have a vertical line in it. Also, the last sentence seems overanalytical and also very silly. A line 'simultaneously divides and unites the composition'? Of course it divides: the page in half. You'd have to be stretching to get the unites though. Or at least, that's how it seems to me.

I suppose you could continue to wax philosophical about it: say it represents a small part of a larger, hidden or secret whole, that it represents contrast and simplicity....etc. To me, though, it represents my general confusion, disinterest and (occasionally) scorn at art.

(And I wrote a lot about nothing, too, it seems)

What to a Slave is the Fourth of July?

What is Douglass saying? How does he support himself through appeals to logos, ethos and/or pathos?

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Douglass is saying that all the ideals that America is built on- equality, the right to the pursuit of happiness, etc.- are hypocrisies because slavery violates all those ideals.

Logos: He says that he does not need to argue some points, such as that slaves are human, but he does, anyway. He points out that everyone already acts as if slaves are human, they just delude themselves into saying that they're not. His logic there is interesting and it makes sense. He uses lists of examples to prove his points as well. He addresses their interests, too. He says that everyone wants abolitionists to persuade people instead of accusing them. He addressed that point by saying that there is nothing to persuade- everyone knows, on some level that slavery is wrong- all he needs to do is make them guilty enough to do something about it. That would fit in with pathos as well.

Ethos: He is a slave. He speaks from experience and is more effective because of that. He also is aware of his audience's feelings and begins and ends on a note that would be taken well by them- praising in hope for America.

Pathos: He lists in graphic detail what slaves have suffered. An example: "...it is wrong to make men brutes, to rob them of their liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters..." He also asks people to have hope by saying the issue is fixable.

Speeches 1&2

I forgot to blog yesterday about this. So I'll just do one longer entry.

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The speeches were actually really interesting. It was cool to see how most people set up things differently. We all had the same basic outlines: History, claim, reasons, backing, qualifier, conclusion, etc. But we all wrote and presented our speeches differently. Some people had more than others and some people had less. Some people relied almost completely on emotion and some people relied almost completely on logic. Most people were in the middle. There were quite a few really good speeches, too. The way people drew upon quotes and personal experiences was interesting, as was everyone's approach to the conditions of rebuttal/qualifier part.

The first day we did it was more interesting than the second, simply because I don't have to ability to focus for that long on the speeches. I kept spacing out and going all distracted. It's not that the last speeches were more boring- it's just that I was losing concentration.

My speech went better than I thought it would. I thought I would fail. I ran out of time and didn't do everything justice. But all in all, I think it went well. I have no idea if that was a problem for other people as well. Five minutes is a lot shorter than I thought it would be. I was also a lot less nervous than I thought I would be. Maybe that was because I was thinking about lunch the whole time.

EDIT: Were we supposed to blog about one person's in particular? I can't really remember what people said what anymore. I do remember that I thought that Brittney and Nick M had good presentations. I know other people did too but I've forgotten anything else. Oops.

Empowerment Organization

The organization I think I'll do is called the Indianpolis Urban League. It uses 5 points to ensure that everyone, especially minorities, get the help they need in order to succeed. It has youth groups and connections out of state. It helps people become more culturally aware- "building brides" between the races is what it says.

I chose it because I didn't know of any such organizations and I found this one on Google. It has a website : here and sounds interesting.