I Never know what to expect in my English 203 class. One day we can have a conversation about the material we read. While in another we can talk about MGM’s Leo the lion and the copy cat version using a kitten by MTM. It is always a surprise that I enjoy coming too twice a week.
Continue reading “Never know what to expect”
The Power of Repetition
When a song first plays on the radio, you form an opinion on it. Based on the genre of music, you may love its sound. You could also hear a song for the first time and decide, that song is not for me! Either way, when a song first plays, you form views on it. As time goes on and the radio continues to play the song, your once strong opinions on it may fade. Sure, you might not have originally loved the tune, but now that it’s played so many times, you aren’t that bothered by it. In fact, your opinions on it may start to settle and become less defined. Repetition has changed your perception.
Humpty Dumpty
Alice finds Humpty Dumpty on a wall and tries to give him a compliment even though she knows that he is an egg and he seems to have very different options about what people think about him being a human being and having a hard time being a person. Alice questions what she sees, “I said you looked like an egg, Sir,’ Alice gently explained. ‘And some eggs are very pretty, you know’ she added, hoping to turn her remark into a sort of a compliment,”(chapter 6: Humpty Dumpty of Through the looking glass). She makes the remark because he is dressed up with pants, a shirt and a tie or maybe a belt because his neck is not easily recognizable like a human beings. Alice gets used to the fact that he is an egg, “And how exactly like an egg he is!’ she said aloud, standing with her hands ready to catch him, for she was every moment expecting him to fall,”(chapter 6: Humpty Dumpty of Through the looking glass). Alice gives the egg a personality in her head and he does have a face, arms, legs and clothes getting on but he also is still an egg and can’t really be walking and taking and would also need help up on the wall. “However, the egg only got larger and larger, and more and more human: when she had come within a few yards of it, she saw that it had eyes and a nose and mouth; and when she had come close to it, she saw clearly that it was HUMPTY DUMPTY himself. ‘It can’t be anybody else!’ she said to herself,”(chapter 6: Humpty Dumpty of Through the looking glass). She didn’t realize that he was probably a figment of her imagination and that he was in fact just an egg. An egg is usually a living thing that comes out of birds, snakes, somewhat of a human because of the way that people are able to hold their babies in their stomachs for many days. Humpty Dumpty doesn’t really believe that he is an egg because of the way that he is dressed and can do almost everything that she can,‘“It’s very provoking,’ Humpty Dumpty said after a long silence, looking away from Alice as he spoke, ‘to be called an egg—Very!”’(chapter 6: Humpty Dumpty of Through the looking glass). Non living things are made alive when people believe that the are actually there. Since Alice thinks that she sees Humpty Dumpty he can talk to her and have actual thoughts but if she ignored him and didn’t believe in him because of the nursery rhymes he would of probably just been an egg that was sitting on top of a wall. Overall this book shows that Humpty Dumpty has one of the most confusing personalities because he has accepted the fact that if he falls that all the King’s horses and all the King’s men would put him back together if he fell and broke his body. Lewis wants us to think that humpty is alive by giving him real human like features and giving him a voice for Alice to talk to giving him personalities so people give objects a personality.The norm of the book is for non-living things, normal things and people to become alive and entertain Alice and become reasonable individuals. The people would like to know what would be the best thing that could come out of alice making the best of the next things that was in this imaginary world through the looking glass. The way that people are needed to go around and make sure that they know the difference between what is real and what isn’t real.
School and Accountability
School has always felt like a strange place for me. When people are younger, school is an amazing place. It’s where your friends are, where you learn exciting and new things, and where you really grow up. As we get older, some of us take school for granted. Material becomes more difficult and complex, where it used to be easy and light. I’ve always had mixed emotions about school. Sometimes it was my favorite place to be. Sometimes I couldn’t leave sooner, but in the end, I always went back.
As we get older, things change around us and my attitude towards school changed as well. This change appeared around my third year of high school. In previous years, I had been academically competitive, not the top of the class but always put my best foot forward. I used to read as many books as possible, never skipping a page. I had adored all my teachers (besides my fourth-grade teacher, she was the absolute worst) and consumed all the knowledge they had shared with me inside class. This had been my general status quo in school, but as I said before this had all changed during the last half of my high school experience.
I am still not sure why I did it or for what reasons, but I allowed my academic career to start slipping from me. I barely managed to keep my head above water junior and senior year of high school. Math and science (which have never been my stronger subjects) had started to really take a toll on myself and my grades. My stronger classes like English, history, and foreign language had all taken a drastic turn. I was becoming less prepared for the future and I felt my academic progression all together stop. I was able to pull myself together for a short time, passing my classes by the skin of my nose and receiving credits for the accelerated classes I had took. During this time, I had somehow managed to be accepted into a university and thought a fresh new start would be the right thing I needed to get my academic career on path.
Coming to college I expected myself to be capable of handling myself and staying on track with new aspirations and desires to succeed. At first this seemed possible, but I had quickly realized this was not the case. My first semester had mimicked my last two years of high school, missing assignments, poor participation, and an inadequate attitude. These actions had terrible consequences as I soon realized. I had fallen so far behind and buried a hole that I thought I couldn’t get out of, I started to believe I wouldn’t be able to pursue my academic dreams and goals.
I was given a second chance. I had started to realize the opportunity given to me could not be taken for granted again. I stuck to it my second semester at school. I had started to realize the work and time I needed to put in to be successful. I also realized that what I wanted in life I had to work for, instead of waiting for everything to fall into place like a row of dominos. These thoughts and ideas followed me into my next semester, and I soon started to rebuild my academic composure and feeling better about myself.
Why is any of this important though? These were all my personal experiences and maybe most readers haven’t experienced the same situation as me. So, who cares?
I didn’t write this post for sympathy or to portray myself as overcoming difficulties in my life. I still struggle with the same tendencies every once in a while. I wrote this post because sometimes you just need to look in front of you to see your issues. I am able to come to terms with my personal struggle with responsibility. I feel it is important that people come to terms with their struggles and flaws if they wish to grow from them. Cliché, right? I would almost agree if I hadn’t taken the time to realize my own flaws. Realizing and addressing one’s flaws opens the possibility to fix these mistakes and improve one’s own outlook. If Pentheus had realized his own hubris would he have lived in The Bacchae and Frenzy? If Joker had put aside his bigotry from the start would he and Noah escaped successfully? Hubris and bigotry contribute to one’s flaws and insecurities and can be detrimental if not properly addressed and corrected, as seen in the outcomes of these two characters.
Everyone says we learn from our mistakes, but how often is this true for some people?
Holding ourselves accountable and realizing our own mistakes makes us grow as people. Learning from these experiences pushes us to do better if we want to succeed. I didn’t realize this at first, but this idea has developed into an important lesson I think about every day.
In the end, it is really our actions that define our outcome. We can either realize our flaws and accept and correct them, or we can choose to ignore them and hope they work themselves out. It is a person’s accountability and responsibility to hold themselves together and work out their issues. Everyone has flaws to their character, it is how we address these flaws that define our outcome.
What’s in a Word?
This week, I’ve decided to finally buckle down and put some thought into a recurring quote from our class. All semester, Dr. McCoy has told us in various contexts “[i]t is incredible that a sentence is ever understood”, a quote from Percival Everett’s Erasure. I think, at last, the quote is beginning to resonate with me, especially as our class nears the end of another Everett novel, I am Not Sidney Poitier. The book and quote combined have me considering language itself: the weight of our words, the importance of our statements, and the unpredictability of meaning.
Fesmerization and Control
Lyndsey Prince, Molly Byrne, Darby Nagpaul, Emma Mandella, Daina Almonte, Chaim Green
Franz Anton Mesmer was a German-born Viennese scholar with many different educational backgrounds. He studied philosophy, law, theology, and eventually medicine. After practicing medicine for ten or so years, Mesmer realized in his forties that he did not like the concept of medicine in his day, and thought that it’s solutions to health problems were too painful and unnecessary. Using all of his previous knowledge and experience, Mesmer created a new study of hypnosis and hypnotherapy. Hypnosis is a state of consciousness in which someone voluntarily gives up control, and becomes more prone to suggestion and direction. Growing from this idea, Mesmer began practicing new therapeutic techniques such as hypnotherapy or animal magnetism as ways to cure illnesses. He altered modern medical practices, such as draining blood from the body. Mesmer was able to cure one patient, Fraulein Oesterline, by creating that same sensation with animal magnetism and taking the illness away without the intrusiveness of the physical procedure. Additionally, to cure one of his patients, Mesmer used a magnet to disrupt the gravitational tides that he believed were affecting her. In his novel I am Not Sidney Poitier, Percival Everett introduces a new concept similar to this called “Fesmerization.” Continue reading “Fesmerization and Control”
Fesmerization: Understanding the Absurd
Toby Youngman, Jessica D’Antonio, Madison Jackson, Kaila McKiernan, Connor Skelton
Franz Mesmer was a German doctor that lived between 1734-1815. This was a time of great change within European history. Ideas from the Enlightenment prompted social upheaval and changes in scientific thinking across Europe. Embracing these ideas, Mesmer theorized the concept of animal magnetism. Mesmer believed in a living natural force possessed by all animate beings that could be manipulated to cure people of disease. To further his understanding, Mesmer conducted strange and intimate sessions with patients that resulted in tremblings, trances, and seizures. Mesmer gained a reputation as a talented physician and was sought out by many important figures in Enlightenment-era Europe. However, rumors began to spread of his unconventional practices leading to a formal investigation by King Louis XVI of France. This investigation badly hurt Mesmer’s reputation and led to his exile. His successor, Armand-Marie-Jacques de Chastenet, continued his work despite criticism. Today, Mesmer is considered one of the founders of modern hypnotism, also affectionately called “mesmerization.” Continue reading “Fesmerization: Understanding the Absurd”
Writing Expectations
We all have expectations, but perhaps the most important ones are what we expect from ourselves. In one of our classes, the idea of expectations was brought up. In my group, we not only talked about our previous expectations on a film we had watched, but new expectations as we began reading Percival Everett’s I Am Not Sidney Poitier. It occurred to me we all had expectations, even if they were different, were there nonetheless. Although I did have an idea of what I might expect from the text, what I had not expected is what actually ended up that actually allowed me to enjoy reading it more.
When I started to read, I expected it to start a certain way, to go a certain direction, and to tell more as to why this man has such a comical name. All my expectations failed to be met as the text was nothing like I imagined it would read. It has been quite a long time since I last read for a class, and actually laughed to myself out loud as I read the text. It lacked the serious tone I was expecting at some point, even when talking about serious events that happened like the death of Not Sidney’s mother. Everything either felt comical or natural, and even if it did not meet my original expectations for the story, I certainly was not disappointed. However, failing to meet certain expectations does not always go so well.
As I thought more about the idea of expectations, and how we all have it, I started to think about my expectations for myself rather than the ones I had for the outside world. How time has flown, being already halfway through the semester as a college freshman, and I wondered if I had met my expectations for myself when I first came here. Just like with reading about Not Sidney, my expectations were not met. Time and time again, I have expected myself to do something instead of actually doing it. When expectations, especially of themselves are not met, people tend to beat themselves up over it. I know I’m guilty of doing that just about every time. But at the same time, it’s important to think about the expectations you did meet. Even if none of them were met, that also just means there is something to improve and that’s only natural. Contemplating further, I realized the same concept applies to when I fail to meet my expectations of myself in class, whether it is with papers or studying for tests. We’re all human, and it’s okay to mess up so long as you learn something from it. We all have expectations of our own writing, but the only way to make sure it gets better to meet your expectations, is by writing again even when you fail to meet an expectation.
Who’s Missing?
I’ve always been interested in Transcendentalism. It was a trend that began in high school, when I was first introduced to authors such as Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson. Because of this, I originally planned on attending the Thoreau-Harding lecture by Dr. Spencer Crew out of sheer interest, and debated even writing this response to it. However, Dr. Crew covered topics far beyond my expectations, which prompted me to make this post.
Pushing the Envelope
As I read books by Percival Everett, I find myself feeling uncomfortable. I know becoming more engaged with topics like race and sexuality is beneficial, but I’m still hesitant. Why? One reasonable explanation is that I’ve not been exposed to these themes enough. I honestly don’t think that’s the case considering the media I’ve been digesting for years. Many contemporary creators seek to “wow” their audience through pushing the envelope. Everett definitely fits into this category since he chooses to dive into rough concepts and ideas while making constant scatological jokes and references. Although this could be seen as crude and vulgar, I believe it to be entertaining and meaningful. My feelings of awkwardness must derive from discussing I Am Not Sidney Poitier with my peers in an academic setting. Everett is probably seeking to legitimize these subjects through satire, which makes him a great author and activist.