Whitman's Journal

While beginning to read through Whitman's journal i realized how much my teachers must hate me because it is almost impossible to read other peoples bad handwriting. About half way through the sample texts i began to be able to make out some lines. On some of the later pages Whitman dedicates half of a page to this "ship". Repeating lines such as "Ship of the world, Ship of humanity, Ship of the ages...Ship of promise." These could be ideas for different types of metaphors about ships for different things. Later it might lead into a topic of something along the lines of his "ship" needing a leader( O captain my captain?). I was also able to make out part of the last poem speaking of "the hills of Brooklyn...here stood Washington...The last war."but I am unsure of the meaning of this.

After reading through the interpretation of Whitman's journal, some things became clear that were not before. The first is that part of the beginning, unreadable, sections speak about religion and Whitman's views on the subject. The second observation, and more important, is what comes directly before the section i read. The pages before the except about the ship talk about a conversation between Abraham Lincoln and Walt Whitman. This confirm my suspicions about the ship. Whitman was taking notes talking about Lincoln driving the country and how he guides the "Ship of humanity," or in other words, holds the future of the people in his hands. I also learned the poem at the end reads "The Hills of Brooklyn, Here roamed the newly landed Hollander, Here stood Washington, The last war" Which I am still unsure about the true meaning.

IS!

It was. The first thing that popped into my head was obviously the opening lines to Charles Dickens A Tale of Two Cities "It was the best of times, It was the worst of times." This is, although what I would consider a literary masterpiece that has indeed withheld itself throughout the test of time, an extremely overused and I refuse to succumb to such temptations.
Instead i decided to analyze the semantics of the phrase "It was." When people generally describe things such as school they use the phrase "It was." The problem with using this is the tense of the verb indicating "to be." Was, being a past tense verb, implies that the action or scenario being described has already finish and is unalterable. By describing scenarios with "It was" it limits you to the past and doesn't give the opportunity to make changes. an example of this could even be the prompt for this blog post that is given. We are told to speak our minds of anything pertaining to the phrase "It was" and presumably I gathered from the title we are to do this in reference to this school year. this, however, limits us to reflect and speak on the times that have passed instead of even acknowledging the month and a half we still have.
After re-watching Dead Poets Society today to prepare for this blog post several poems came to my mind that really stuck with me. The first of course is the poem "To The Virgins, To Make Much of Time" by Robert Herrick which was partially recited in the movie. This poem though made me think of a poem that is much less well know. "Jet" by Tony Hoagland is a poem written in the early 1950's which gives the same message as Herrick's poem which is "Carpe Diem." The last stanza in "Jet" reads:

no one really hears. We gaze into the night 
as if remembering the bright unbroken planet 
we once came from, 
to which we will never 
be permitted to return. 
We are amazed how hurt we are. 
We would give anything for what we have.

This poem speaks well of what my intentions of dissecting the phrase "It was" is. High School is a wonderful time where we forge friendships that will last a lifetime. It is also one of the last times we have before we enter full on adulthood all by ourselves. Instead of living life in the past and remembering what "It was" or only looking forward into the future where school is over with, we should live in the moment and learn to enjoy every moment of it. These are some of the best days of our lives and we don't get them back. Instead of wasting all the small moments in life everybody should try to take it all in. Not to sound cliche but this really is our only chance at living our lives and we should try to enjoy every minute of it so instead of asking or describing to somebody what "It was" you should enjoy your life and describe what "it IS." 

On that note I hope everybody enjoys every moment for the rest of their high school career :)               (I will miss all of you so much next year!)

Also for nostalgia purposes here's my favorite song as a kid which also really drives home the message.

The American Dream

The american dream is the belief of achieving ones goals no matter what adversity you face. The american dream is the ability to make anything of yourself regardless of race or social status. anybody in the United States is able to do whatever they want as long as they work hard enough to get it. There is nothing such as a caste system to prevent people from achieving their goals. To me wealth consists of not only the physical cash you own but all of your assets. this ranges from physical assets to ideologies and emotions. American's generally apply the american dream to themselves and when they see wealth they see a person who has worked hard and earned it and on the flip side see people in poverty as people who dont work hard. I think that the american dream is an allusion however and that although to an extent a person can get fairly far on their own, without connections you wont fully achieve your potential. also just because a person lacks money doesnt mean they are poor because some of the happiest people on earth that are rich in spirit have next to nothing.

Why do I do these? they don't matter anyways.

While observing the four different translations of the text I found some significant differences in each translation. The first one has specific diction usage saying as he awoke, uneasy dreams, and gigantic insect. It gives it a proper feeling to the story and shows his more composed reaction to the situation.  The structure goes from him waking up to the bad dream reference to him being a bug. The second quote gives a more objective point of view using the phrase Gregory Samsa woke. It also uses the same structure of waking up, then referencing the dreams, then referencing the bug. The third starts off by saying when he awoke which puts more emphasis on the bug part but follows the same structure. The last one has a slightly different structure referencing waking and the dreams almost simultaneously and not even pointing out he is in his own bed until after he is awoken.

By each text being translated differently it gives each one an emphasis on a separate part. The first one seems the most objective laying each out piece by piece in an organized manor. The second one, while similar to the first has a style that is much more clear cut and to the point. The third one gives off a much more objective and third person omniscient feeling than the rest. The last one, using many more commas and a more displaced version of the words, gives a much more confused feeling helping you relate to the character. I think second is the most effective because of its concise yet effective approach. This shows how difficult it can be to read a translated book because often the original meaning is hard to interpret and can be lost in translation. Each translation gives the sentence a different feel to the beginning of the book.

IOC (International Olympic Committee)

My Recording:

My Document:

Grading:
Criterion A: 6
I gave a brief and accurate description of the text and used somerefrences to the text. However I gave a poor background introduction of the book. (mostly because i dont know about the bachground)
Criterion B: 4
I referenced Tone and diction somewhat while elaboration on my excerpt however i didnt expand much past that except for the text structure.
Criterion C: 4
I was fairly organized while elaborating using the same tructure for depicting several aspects of the text.
Criterion D: 2
I became flustered and used 2nd grader language.

Once Upon a Freebie

Freebie

CAM this post be any later?

Artist: Moris

Title: Miridas I

Date: 2012

Size: 69” by 117”

Medium: Pixelated photograph covered in black acrylic paint

^My artistic rendition^

This particular artistic piece was created recently in Mexico City, Mexico. Mexico is generally considered worse off than America, it's neighboring country. This is caused by the lower living conditions and the majority of the population being lower payed blue collar workers. In Mexico drug cartels are especially a problem. They can traffic drugs and terrorize the lives of others while running their organization. This specific piece in a way represents this.

Miridas I is special because it puts a new spin on a slightly older artistic style. The picture is a more common style pixelated photo. what makes this artwork different is how it is changed from its original for. The photograph is painted over in black except for where the eyes are in order to create a new treatment of a traditional art piece. The photograph was pixelated almost in a cartoon manor and then printed on a canvas sheet. The artist then used black acrylic paint to apply even layers across the entire art piece except for the peoples eyes. The actual picture contains what appears to be criminals likely from a cartel based on the historic background of the painting.

At first glance it appears that the meaning of the photograph is to display the anonymous features of the criminals but a deeper look would suggest more. I believe that this picture has chosen to emphasize the eyes because of something along the lines of the eyes being the ateway to the soul. When you keep this in mind you can see more of the criminal malice in the picture. This artwork really raises an awareness of sorts on the problems going on in Mexico every day that we don't experience in the United States. People in Mexico, where the creator is from, experience hardships and threats of danger from cartel members regularly and this picture when analyzed properly can really bring out this meaning.