Metacognition: Jane Eyre Writing Assignment

While writing the transcript, it really surprised me how I could transfer the plot into a modern perspective and I could still get the same, if not very similar, message. For example, we made our Jane character and orphan who was living with foster parents and had a somewhat strained relationship with them. With this plot, we were able to incorporate many of the familial conflicts. Also, it made me look at many of the aspects of love in a different way by trying to come up with an examples of lost love or familial love that were applicable and were plausible in modern life.

What I found the most difficult was not being able to match Jane's story perfectly. I faced a similar issue that had come up with Heart of Darkness. Finding an extremely close modern representation of the themes in Jane Eyre that were plausible was my greatest challenge. Many times I had to stop myself and ask the question: Is that plausible?

What I was most impressed with during the writing of this was how focused my partner and I were once we started. We both had the common goal of completing it by the end of the weekend, and even though we didn't accomplish that goal, we had a significant start that only required an hour at maximum of our time during the deadline to polish it. But, being so focused was not something that I was used to. Often I get easily distracted while I am at home trying to do my homework. Many times I think, "If I had been productive with my time then I could have gotten to bed at least and hour and a half earlier." It was motivating knowing that I can sit and focus on one task at hand for a long period of time, and allowed me to think that I could be more efficient with my time.

Metacognition: Reading Jane Eyre

I found reading Jane Eyre to be very relaxing to my brain. The long descriptions, the attention to detail--it made me enjoy doing the homework. This was the moment of my day where I could decompress and finally take things slow. This was not something that I could quickly get through. Each page would take me between 1-2 minutes to read. When we started Jane Eyre I was frustrated that the reading homework was taking me so long. I wanted to get it done. But after the first few, I began to accept that it wasn't possible to accomplish the reading quickly and decided to try and enjoy the chunk of time that I had to set aside to read.

What else I found that was refreshing was that Jane would have a conversation with the reading and would forcefully engage me in the reading. Oftentimes, I feel that authors sometimes neglect the reader and ignore the fact that there is someone on the other side who is reading that story they created. Bronte's attention to the reader really help to keep me engaged and focused in the reading when I became so relaxed that I would realize that I had no idea what had happened in the previous few paragraphs. It was her way of telling me that I shouldn't miss any action of Jane's because the theme of love in the novel was very complex.

The thing that I will take away from reading Jane Eyre is the idea that you should be able to find excitement and enjoyment in the ordinary. Bronte would describe a house or a field with such description and passion and craft in her writing that I would find myself wrapped-up in the story. If I can notice the tiny details and be very deliberate and patient, then life will be so much more exciting. I just need to learn how to slow down the tempo of my life and observe what has always been around me, but what I've failed to notice.

360 Degree: Jane Eyre's Trust

The reading of Jane Eyre has really drawn my interest into the dynamics of trust.

Trust is key in developing who we are. When Jane was little and live at ----shire, she trusted Mrs. Reed to take care of her and supply for her. But, what Jane experienced as a child due to the lack of trust caused her to go into a state of shutting herself off from most human connections. She feared that the hurt she experienced would occur again so it was better to close herself off then to stay open and risk being hurt again.

But then Jane went to Gateshead and through her professional relationship, she began to build bonds of trust with Mr. Rochester. I believe that due to the trust bonds being built, they were able to fall in love with each other. Their love was possible in this period of time where two people of very different class getting married was unheard of because of their mutual trust. Relationship will remain stagnant if there is not some degree of mutual trust.

But then Mr. Rochester betrayed her trust by revealing that he was still married, and in a couple of minutes, he had lost all of the trust that he had spent so much time to attain. And, no matter what his efforts, he could not bring Jane to trust him to the degree that she previously had. She came to the conclusion that she could not be with someone for the rest of her life if she could not know that she could put all of herself in his hands and know that she would be safe. But Jane would never have been vulnerable to this hurt if she had remained shut off from the world and had not allowed Mr. Rochester to breach her defenses. I am curious about whether or not Jane will close herself off even more due to this second betrayal or if she will continue to remain open to other people regardless of the risk of being hurt because of the joy that she had while in Mr. Rochester's presence.

An Inconvenient Truth: Grades Matter

It is unfortunate that your learning and progression has to quantified.
This constant evaluation has the capability to make many dislike school and the learning that comes with it. Who enjoys doing homework, especially when it is "busy work"? Even the most assiduous student would become irritated and slack. I know that homework is given to reinforce what was previously taught and to practice concepts and apply them, but most people don't see it that way, and even the ones that do don't receive enjoyment from doing homework. This is one of the reasons that some student don't apply themselves. Why should anyone do something that they don't enjoy especially when there are options more appealing?

Some people say that your grades now won't matter once you get into college, but how you do now affects your future. Your grades and test scores determine your options for college and which college you go to determines your career. The better your grades, the more option and choice you have. So if you act immaturely now and are lazy and slack off because you dislike school and all of its responsibilities, then you are severely limiting your future.

I know that now, our school system is dependent upon grades, but I don't feel that a grade should represent your knowledge or intelligence. It should instead represent your growth and progression. By measuring this, you showing the passion and effort that has been applied. And, if you put in passion and effort you will gain a lot. There would no longer be the added stress of memorizing information. Doing things this way would create a system in which people would be enjoy learning more.

Dialectics: Foolishness and Bravery

In order to be brave, one must take a certain amount of unnecessary risk. If you don't take risk, then what is there to be brave and courageous about. When you don't take risk, then you live life without excitement because we all get excited and enjoy and remember the times when we took risks, not the times when we lived safely. But then what is foolishness? Isn't foolishness when you do or act in a stupid way? So foolishness would be excess risk or even attempted bravery that failed. Or you could define bravery as foolishness that is acknowledged and accepted by society and those around us.

But not everyone is brave. So there is something that is preventing many from becoming brave, and that is fear. If you fear the risk or see the risk as too great, then you won't take it. This is reason overcoming foolishness. Then do you have to lack reason to be brave? Because with reason, there comes fear of the consequences.

But bravery and courage may not be terms that even apply to modern life. Many times I associate bravery and courage with times in the past. I don't feel that those definitions apply anymore. There is a slightly different association to these words now. They are used more in the sense of overcoming challenges. Foolishness seems to have been taken out of the equation, but it has retained the same definition and associations. What seems to have taken the place of foolishness is fear. You fear failing at overcoming the challenge, so you must have to the courage and bravery to overcome your fear. When you overcome challenges, you create opportunity. I am sure that we have all seen what happens to people who are too foolish to face their fear and overcome challenges and have limited opportunities before them.

Blogging Around

Roman's Best of the Week blog entry about the idea of epiphany in Cathedral.

Roman, I really like how your described the experience of an epiphany, how language actually limits the description of an epiphany and takes away from the experience. It reminded be of the idea that in order to completely understand something you have to experience it. Even when I write about experiences that I have and try to convey them to other people through words, I find that they never sound quite right. I feel that I am doing a disservice to the moment. The only way that anyone could know what I was talking about would be being with me for the brief moment on a peak, or finding the flower that you've been searching for for years (for me it was the calypso lady slipper). That is why we have other modes of expression like music or art. Like you said, some things just can't be explained with words.

Merrick's Best of the Week blog entry about assisted suicide.

Merrick, I, like Taylor, do honor your opinion, but I have to disagree.

Say that your grandma had Alzheimer's. Would you rather slowly and painfully watch her deteriorate mentally or would you rather let her make the choice while she was still your grandma to end her life? I don't understand how this could be a selfish decision. She would be trying to save you and your family from the pain that they would experience seeing her slowly become someone else, someone who forgets who you are. This could go on for who knows how long. I really liked how Taylor put that they are only existing and not really living.

I do feel that their should be a thorough process that each individual must go through in order to end their life. Their must be a certain amount of counseling as well as doctors, both medical and psychological agreeing that the patient can pursue this option, and they should be able to do this without the fear of putting their career on the line. Their should also be family consent and they should be involved in the entire counseling process because like you said, this decision affects friends and family as well. All in all, suicide should be an option available, but not for the victim of a recent break up.

Best of the Week: The View of the Black Slave in Heart of Darkness

I believe that the best idea stated in class was whether or not the view of the black slave could be worked into Heart of Darkness. The most interesting idea that I though was offered was making the narrator black and have him expressing his views based upon the actions of Marlow and those around him. But this would not have worked because it takes away from the integrity of the novel and alters Marlow's true experience because Marlow is using this story to reflect and find inner meaning. With all of the other examples that were offered, there was some reason that it couldn't be worked in without changing the story in a profound way. This then made me realize the importance of the history of the author and time period of publication. In Conrad's time, racism was still an integral part of all societies. Even a person like Conrad who was writing this story and being abnormal for his time would have found a book with the view of a black man to be too revolutionary. To further demonstrate Conrad's racism, I would like to point out that there is not a single point in the novel when a black man is not portrayed as being inferior or savage. It has rarely occurred to me that these two aspects were that important, but this book has really shown how changing when the book was written would affect the overall product. Even if the book isn't historical fiction, you still need to do your research to fully understand and comprehend the deliberate decisions that the author made.

Captured Thought: The Media Loves a Bad Story

As I was watching a recent episode of the Simpsons in which Homer and Marge went to the winter Olympics and won the gold medal in curling, a sarcastic comment was made by a sportscaster. "This is the sort of bittersweet melodrama Olympic coverage feeds on," is what he said after Marge hurt her shoulder sweeping too hard. Then it dawned on me how one of the few things I remember about the last winter Olympics is Lindsay Jacobellis's showboating incident that cost her the gold medal in snowboard cross. But it's not only sports, but all types of media, magazines especially, that envelope themselves in what is considered "trash". But then if it's trash why do people keep wanting to read about the latest development in Brangolina's relationship status? An then it occurred to me that all the people on the news are famous and have an aura of perfection surrounding them and that when these people act like normal people and make mistakes, we can relate to them. We want to see these people act human. In a sense, the media is doing us a favor by broadcasting this "trash". The media is giving us what we want, what we need. And even though we know that we shouldn't find pleasure and comfort in another's misfortune, it's what we want to read, and we get it.

Connection: Postmodern View of Memory to History

As we were discussing memory and why there is a frame narrator in The Heart of Darkness in class it dawned upon me how just like the frame narrator is making Marlow a part of memory, so to are we a part of history. Marlow needed to be a part of the memory because this memory was too important to be one person's memory alone. His story and similar stories were all experienced in the jungle he calls the heart of darkness. We, and all the people of the past are a part of the great memory referred to as history. But, all history is based upon the writings and discoveries of those that experienced it, so it is not truly postmodern memory. Where is the purely objective history? Where is a record of all the events and cultures of the past without judgments or a point of view? The answer quite simply is that it doesn't exist. History is from everyone, and although everyone is a part of history, the vast memory called history is shaped by the ones that are a part of it. It is in the gray area between the modern and postmodern views of memory. But as I reflect back on The Heart of Darkness I realize that Marlow's feelings and observations are a part of the dialogue of the frame narrator, therefore the frame narrator is not entirely postmodern because an entirely postmodern frame narrator would eliminate the feelings of the people that are a part of memory because it is not a personal memory.

Metacognition: The 1st Semeter

As I progress through the year, I continuously feel that the area in English that I need the most work on is writing, and even more specifically clarifying my thoughts and formulating an effective opener. Maybe the issue with clarifying my ideas is that I am both my worst and best critic. I hold myself to high expectations, but then when editing I am too easy on myself and I miss many opportunities for improvement things. Sometimes I have a difficult time letting go of what I believe is a really creative introduction that doesn’t necessarily have perfect relevance. More frequently though, I find that for my opener, it comes out with a mystifying tone and overall feels forced.

Something else that I’ve discovered is that I prefer to demonstrate understanding and creativity in a theatrical way or with a presentation rather than with prose writing. I enjoy the interactions with other people that projects offer and like to test my comfort limits by presenting. So far this year, the King Lear skits have been my favorite assignment because it suited my preferences. I want to start to enjoy prose writing but I don’t how to start to have fun with it, especially when it is an assignment.

But, I have always enjoyed both reading and writing poetry. As I was doing Tuesday night’s homework I discovered that many of the poems have effective rhyming. I know that when I have written poetry, I have also done free verse writing because then I could just divide the words and organize and phrase the words where they seem to naturally fall. Whenever I have tried to rhyme it has always felt forced and it seems to break up the natural rhythm and flow of the poem. One thing that I really want to get out of this poetry unit is how to rhyme effective because when used effective rhyme is an incredibly powerful tool.