Well, as of late I've learned some interesting things. After reading "Death of a Salesman" and annotating it, I feel that I actually know how to annotate. I'd never been taught how to annotate, heck, I was still at the "If you write in a book you will be struck down by lightening!" point of my life, but I now understand how to annotate well (and that writing in a book will not result in being struck by lightening). Also, analyzing the play in class was really interesting. I'm not the person to say much in class disscussions, but listening to other people's ideas about the play was cool. A lot of people had different views on it than I did (which is probably why I didn't pitch in to the conversation), there was one day when it actually turned into a yelling match between a few people because they wouldn't accept anyone else's idea. That's one thing I wish I could change about AP Lit, everyone's attitude toward other people's input. But anyways.
Everything else that I've learned in class lately was through the eras presentations. I had a lot of fun with that project. My group got Romanticism, which I abolutely love :). I did a lot of research on it so I guess I learned more about it from that, but the sad thing is I already knew most of what I found. Watching other groups' projects was intriguing. The Renaissance group had a cool video about authors of the time.
I'm really excited about reading Ceremony and can't wait to get farther into it :) So, yeah that's about it. Have a good Thanksgiving break! :)
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Close Reading, November 20
In the above article, “Animals Used for Experimentation”, the author uses diction, details, and language to really help get their point and opinion across to the reader. The author’s point is that animal testing needs to be stopped.
The author tries to show the reader why animal testing is bad, and as such, why it needs to be stopped. They use carefully selected diction, pejorative words that make everything seem worse. The author tells us how “After enduring lives of pain, loneliness and terror, almost all of [the animals] will be killed.” If they had chosen instead to simply say that after living painful lives the animals would be killed, the sentence would not elicit so emotional a response. When we hear the word endure we know that the animal lived through something absolutely horrible. The same sort of thing happens when we hear the word terror, we know that the animal is beyond frightened. The use of these pejorative terms makes us side more with the author than with the scientists harming the animals.
The author also uses details to get the reader on their side. One example of a detail that the author uses is that “Exact numbers [of animals used for testing] aren't available because mice, rats, birds and cold-blooded animals—who make up more than 95 percent of animals used in experiments— [go uncounted]”. In that one sentence the author shows us multiple details that promote mistrust of the industry. The previous sentence the author wrote tells us that more than one million animals are tested on each year, and those are only the counted animals. Once you see these details juxtaposed you start to understand the magnitude of this industry and how truly unregulated it is. These details help push the reader even farther onto the writer’s side.
Throughout the article the author uses academic language. It is slightly elevated, which helps us to see the audience that the writer wants. The author wants more intelligent people to agree with them so they try to make the article sound smart and scientific. At the same time, the author wants most people to understand, and that’s why the language is only slightly elevated. This is a good way of catering to a large audience. Also, we see that the author wants to be taken seriously, that is another reason for them to write in this slightly elevated academic language.
And so we understand why the author writes in the way they do. They use diction, details, and language to cater to a wide audience and to persuade people to agree with them on the matter of animal testing.
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Open Prompt Response, November 13
2003. According to critic Northrop Frye, "Tragic heroes are so much the highest points in their human landscape that they seem the inevitable conductors of the power about them, great trees more likely to be struck by lightning than a clump of grass. Conductors may of course be instruments as well as victims of the divisive lightning." Select a novel or play in which a tragic figure functions as an instrument of the suffering of others. Then write an essay in which you explain how the suffering brought upon others by that figure contributes to the tragic vision of the work as a whole.
To bring suffering accidentally upon others is a sad thing, but to do it while trying to ease their suffering is a tragic thing. This is what happens to Oedipus in Sophocles' "Oedipus Rex", the more he tries to ease the pain of the people of Thebes, the more he harms them, which makes the work significantly more tragic.
As Oedipus is told by the Oracle of Apollo, he must rid Thebes of the killer of the previous king to lift the current plague that they are living with. After hearing this, Oedipus begins his desperate attempt to help the people by finding the king's killer. This is when Oedipus's hamartia is first revealed. His hamartia is his pride, and here it is demonstrated by his believing that he can fix something that is being done by the gods.
Oedipus continues to live with his pride blocking his way, and thus he makes the people suffer more. This is shown when Oedipus is told that he is the one who killed the king, but Oedipus refuses to believe that any of the men he killed could have been the king. His hamartia continues to affect the Theban people until he finally sees the truth.
Sophocles uses Oedipus's hamartia to make the people of Thebes suffer more, which leads to the work being even more tragic. All Oedipus ever does is try to find the cure to their problems but he only creates more problems. Oedipus had just defeated the Sphinx and therefore stopped unnecessary slaughter, but then by living there he brought about plagues. Sophocles wanted to make the work as tragic as he could, for the more tragic it was, the more the Greeks would pay attention to it. This was something Sophocles wanted because the more people paid attention to it, the more people got his meaning out of it. His meaning throughout the play as a whole was largely not to defy the gods. This was a common theme in dramas of the time and it was something that most of the original audience would pick up on right away. A slightly more in depth meaning the Sophocles wanted people to see was not to have a hamartia. He used Oedipus's pride to show that.
Overall, Sophocles uses Oedipus's hamartia to show us not to defy the gods, and also to not have too much pride, or we will bring suffering on those whom we most desire to keep from suffering.
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