End of the Year Blog

This year was pretty difficult. Most of the time when somebody says that an English class is difficult, they mean that it was a heavy workload. That is not true at all in this case. When I say it is hard I mean that there is a ton of work, more than I think is necessary but that's not the point, and the work you do is very hard to do. So it is a lot of work which takes a lot of thinking. Had I done my homework everyday in every class I had, this class would have easily taken the most time. It took me probably an hour to an hour and a half on average every other day without doing all of the work. That is a lot in my opinion. Also, it's going to be even harder next year because of the new schedule. I think that all teachers, not just Ms Duke, are going to overestimate the amount of time we have for work everyday and assign way too much work. Sure, they will tone it down some from this year but I think that it won't be enough. Next year's schedule is going to suck.
Pretty much what we did this year was read a lot of books with some papers for some of them. The books we read were, Beowulf, Perceval, The Canterbury Tales, Hamlet, Great Expectations, Frankenstein, Heat of Darkness, and for me Things Fall Apart. I'm going to be straight forward and say that most of these books were terrible, because they were British, except for Things Fall Apart which was Nigerian. I learned lots of things from this class but one of the main things is that I do not want to ever learn any thing more about British literature. It's hard to explain but I enjoyed the class, but not the subject of the class. That's probably because most every class somebody got made fun of by Ms Duke. That was pretty funny.
The main movements we studied this year were the Beowulfian and Percavelian eras. I forgot what they are specifically called. Then we went on to Shakespearean, and after that to Victorian, then to Romantic, then to modernism/post colonialism and then finally to post modernism. A few of these were almost exactly the same characteristics as American literature, such as modernism and romanticism.
This was a hard class that involved a lot of work, but it was a very entertaining class.

Outside Reading Progress Report

I have finished the book now and I have to say that I really liked it a lot. It included many interesting facts about the culture of African tribes and other things about their unique life. Last time, I stopped reading after Okonkwo killed Ikefema(sp?). The book got a whole lot better after that because I started to see what happens whenever the tribe's rules are broken. Whenever the men fire their guns at the funeral, it is completely accidental and unlucky that Okonkwo's gun explodes and kills the mans son. According to the tribe rule, Okonkwo must take his family into seven years of exile because of his actions. Then after his exile, the missionaries come to his old town. Whenever Okonkwo goes back, he tries to lead a rebellion by killing one of the head honchos from the missionary. But, nobody follows him and he has to resort to hanging himself to end his guilt or hate of himself.
I think that some good discussion questions would be "Why do you think Okonkwo felt that he had to hang himself?" Also, "What do the missionaries do for the story?" Lastly, "Do you think that Okonkwo turned out a failure like his father?"

Modern Art

This is a painting by Pablo Picasso. I found it using google images after making certain that Picasso was a modern artist. I believe that this painting is in the style of cubism. In cubism, an object is broken up into different pieces that vary by different viewpoints. Like, the back of a guitar will be pictured on the front of the guitar. Cubism also highlights an overall modern topic of breaking tradition. This painting is obviously very non traditional. Also, cubism was known for highlighting alienation, but I have no idea how that correlates to this painting. This painting can represent two things for me. The first is a guitar and was pretty hard for me to see at first. But, the curve at the base of the painting is the curve of the guitar body. Follow that up and you see the neck and the rest of the guitar. The other interpretation of this painting is a person dancing around. The person is kind of shaped like a stick figure and appears to be dancing around. Overall, it's not very colorful, but it is still interesting to look at.

Vocab Internet Thing Part 2

Prevail - "Despite the Barack Obama zeal, I believe Clinton will prevail. And if she is the nominee, I believe she is the most electable and least vulnerable Democratic candidate to face the Republicans." This is just another one of those political websites. I don't think that they have any clue about what will happen. Nobody does. This word will be used quite often.

Putrefy - "Death was once easily recognised by the absence of breathing and heart beat because such people inevitably went on to putrefy." Kind of gross, but it was the only thing that I could find with this word in it. Putrefy will probably be one of those words that I will never use. I will probably just use decay instead.

Salubrious - "Linton had grown tall of his age, still wanting some months of sixteen. His features were pretty yet, and his eye and complexion brighter than I remembered them, though with merely temporary lustre borrowed from the salubrious air and genial sun." This is a quote from Wuthering Heights. I included it because it is a famous book. I might use this word if I need to convince somebody to quite smoking. I could say it is not salubrious to your health.

Succulent - "On my first few visits to Hong Kong, I explored the fabulous universe of Chinese food: Succulent Peking duck, delicate Cantonese, fiery Sichuan, rich Shanghainese, exotic Chiu Chow and that world unto itself, dim sum. It ruined Chinese food at home forever." This is a quote of a guy talking about how good the Chinese food is in China. This is a word that I use often as it is today.

Tundra - "Research from ancient sediment cores indicates that a warming climate could make the world's arctic tundra far more susceptible to fires than previously thought." This is another one of those saves the trees topics. I don't know what to think. I guess I would use this word whenever I am talking about the arctic.

Unequivocal - "In a bleak and powerful assesment of the future of the planet, the leading international network of climate change scientists concluded for the first time Friday that global warming was "unequivocal" and that human activity was "very likely" to blame. The warming will continue for hundreds of years, they predicted." This quote is another global warming topic blaming people and not doing anything about it. But I guess they might not be able to do anything. I would use unequivocal when I am trying to prove a point.

Vicissitudes -"The film - written, directed and narrated by documentary filmmaker Martyn Burke, and produced by Frank J. Gaffney Jr. and Alex Alexiev of the Center for Security Policy, a Washington think tank - portrays the vicissitudes of genuine Muslim moderates who support Western freedoms and oppose terror. It also details the lengths to which radicals have gone to suppress their Muslim critics." This is a review or summary of a film about the muslim way of life. I might use this word if I am trying to sound smart. Other than that, I might not use it very much.

Works Cited

Cliffsnotes. “What Does it Mean to Be Salubrious.” Cliffsnotes. 2008. 6 Apr. 2008 .

James, Jamie. “Travel and Food.” Salon Travel. 2000. 6 Apr. 2008 .

Rosenthal, Elizabeth. “Global Warming Called Unequivocal.” The Herald Tribune. 2008. 6 Apr. 2008 .

Tobin, Jonathon. “View From America: The vicissitudes of genuine Muslim moderates.” Jpost. 2008. 6 Apr. 2008 .

Wade, Derrick. “The Dis-Integration of Death.” Science Direct. 2002. The Lancet. 6 Apr. 2008 .

“Warming Climate May Cause Arctic Tundra to Burn.” Science Daily. 2008. Science Daily. 6 Apr. 2008 .

Vocab on the Internet

mAttenuate - "Regular use of a hand cream can attenuate skin dryness and roughness caused by frequent hand washing." I thought that this was pretty interesting. I didn't think that you could wear your skin down that much by washing your hands. I guess you could use this word while working on making any type of craft that needs sanding.

Behemoth - "I have traveled many miles by air during my working life and the A380 symbolyzes all the worst aspects of air travel. Overcrowded passenger areas, lugage delays, security farces, and lines of people for every service, from toilets to rental cars. I wonder if the marketers ever asked any passengers before they came up with this behemoth of an airplane." This is about the gigantic airbus plane. This guy obviously does not like it at all. This word would be pretty easy to use. Anytime you want to describe something huge, this word would be perfect.

Disinter - "Southern Baptist officials today denounced efforts by leaders of a small south Georgia church to disinter the body of a mixed-race baby who was buried last week in the church's all-white cemetery." This I find disgraceful. I can't believe that some crazy baptists are going to dig up an infant because it is not white. Unbelievable. I don't think that I would ever use this word. I would just say dig up a body. Too many people I think would not know what it means.

Impinge - "Shoulder impingement syndrome is caused by compression of the tendons of the rotator cuff between a part of the shoulder blade and the head of the humerus. This can become a chronic inflammatory condition that may lead to a weakening of the tendons of the rotator cuff, a situation that may result in a torn rotator cuff." This peaked my curiosity because it sounds like it could be an injury from baseball. It also sounds pretty painful. This word could be used very often. Whenever someone or something gets to close say, "hey your inmpinging me again.

Multifarious - "Euglena Light-Harvesting Complexes Are Encoded by Multifarious Polyprotein mRNAs that Evolve in Concert." This was one of the only site that I could find this word on that was not a dictionary site. I have no idea what this sentence means. All I know is that it has something to do with chromosomes and biology. I don't think that this word will be very useful later in my life.

Oxymoron - " The juxtaposition of two contradictory ideas is oxymoron, from the Greek words for "sharp" and "foolish." Everybody's favorite examples are facetious ("military intelligence"), but poets can often use oxymoron for striking effects (such as Milton's "darkness visible")." This quote is mostly a definition but it also gave me where the word came from. Also, military intelligence is kind of funny. Maybe. Whatever, I use this word from time to time.

Plenitude - "CFD Elettronica's Plenitude Premium is an embedded Linux-based home intrusion detection system with cameras tripped by infrared sensors. It includes 32 fully wireless sensors with a claimed battery life of three years, and can send images to mobile phones using any of three wireless protocols." This is an advertisement for some security system. Maybe they mean the there is an ample amount of protection. I can see using this word more frequently in the future.

Postulate - "The theory of special relativity can be derived formally from a small number of postulates. The fundamental postulates of special relativity can be expressed in various ways; you may find different versions of them in different books." This quote just says that the theory of special relativity is made up of several postulates or hypothesis. I might use this word is AP Bio or AP Physics next year.

Works Cited

“CFD Elettronica Plenitude Premium wireless home intrusion detection system.” Linux Devices. Linux Devices. 6 Apr. 2008 .

Koziol, Adam G, and Dion G Durnford. “Molecular Biology and Evolution.” Oxford Journals. 2008. Oxford Journals. 6 Apr. 2008 .

Lynch, Jack. “Oxymoron.” Oxymoron. Rutgers University. 6 Apr. 2008 .

Matlack, Carol. “Airbus’ Behemoth Hits Turbulence.” BusinessWeek. 14 June 2006. BusinessWeek. 6 Apr. 2008 .

Medical Internet Solutions. “Shoulder Impingment Syndrome.” Shoulder Solutions. 2001. Medical Internet Solutions. 6 Apr. 2008 .

Nature.com. “Commensal anaerobic gut bacteria attenuate inflammation by regulating nuclear-cytoplasmic shuttling of PPAR-big gamma and RelA.” Nature Immunology. 21 Dec. 2003. Nature.com. 6 Apr. 2008 .

“The Postulates of Special Relativity.” The Postulates of Special Relativity. 1998. University of Colorado. 6 Apr. 2008 .

Sack, Kevin. “Anger Over Effort to Disinter An Infant of Mixed Race.” The New York Times. 6 Apr. 2008. The New York Times. 6 Apr. 2008 .

Outside Reading Interpretation

I think that "Things Fall Apart" is a very interesting book because it presents a different style of writing from what I am used to. Most of the books I have read have been very well written and seem to flow perfectly from one sentence to another. In "Things Fall Apart," the sentences seem much more choppy than other, say English literature books. I think that the author is using this effect to possibly represent how the tribe memberes interact with each other. I also find it interesting how the author always describes things in a unique way. Instead of saying that something was blue and leave it at that, this author says "something was as blue as the sky on a day during the harvest season" or something like that. I guess what I am trying to say is that he uses lots of natural and physical objects in his similies and metaphors.
As well as the interesting similies, this book has an interesting way of characterizing different characters other than Okonkwo. It seems as if all the other characters are compared to Okonkwo and that is how the reader gets their ideas about a certain character. How they differ from Okonkwo. His father was not like Okonkwo, his son was not at all like himself. Different things like this. Mainly though, this only applies to the male characters, it is kind of hard to compare and contrast a man and a woman in this culture because the serve such different purposes.
The last thing I will talk about is the culture of this book. It is a real shock how they live there. Killing an innocent boy from a neighboring village because his dad raped a daughter of Okonkwo's village seems a little bit extreme. I also find their gods and religious traditions to be somewhat interesting to read about. It is strange that everyone has their own chi or their own personal god. There must be thousands of gods over there. Lastly, it was a little difficult to get the names down at first but I think I can pronounce them in my head now.

Third Quarter Reflection

I thought that third quarter was much harder than second or first quarter. There was a lot more work and most of the work was more difficult. First semester, the blogs were easier, the topics were not as in depth as they were for third quarter. The third quarter blogs were mostly on an assortment of topics mainly about the book we were reading about. They were difficult because they asked us to discuss and analyze the books we read. Some of the time, they were more difficult because I had not done the reading. That makes it a little more difficult to complete the assignment. They are a lot harder if you just skim. But that wasn't the whole reason this quarter was harder. Most of it was because of the layer project. I was surprised how quickly the work caught up on me. Pretty much, third quarter was difficult because I made it difficult. That will not happen this quarter.