Beowulf

When reading Beowulf, I actually started to really get into it. I liked the story more than the movie that was made. With the story, everything was just so much more in depth and more descriptive. I found it easier to understand what was happening with reading the story than to watch the story as a movie.

F. Scott Fitzgerald

Something that Fitzgerald included in his writing was the wide gap between himself and the rich. He was born into a family that had social pretensions but not enough money to live up to that. "In his writing, the rich and the "liberated" were to become symbols of the death of the "old America" in the dawn of an age of moral irresponsibility and mindless selfishness." 

When his wife suffered a nervous breakdown, Fitzgerald focused onto his writing more and let that motivate him because he wanted to make more money to pay for his wife's bills. "He worked feverishly at his writing, trying to put his life in order and to earn more than he owed."

"F. Scott Fitzgerald" (Holt, Rinehart & Winston/Holt, Elements of Literature)

Reflections of American Culture

From the books that we have read this school year, it has made me realize that American culture tend to change a lot and change dramatically. Also it shows the different time periods that American culture had to go through. From slavery and through different wars that affected us. It tells us that every time we had to go through something negative, our culture would change and society would change as well. 

Progress, Technology and Science

With science and technology, new outbreaks are to help live life a lot easier and to help people enjoy it better too. But with new technology and science, there is also a darker side to it. New technology led to society being more reliable on it, thusfar, making human beings lazier. They tend to use it every day and make it a habit and without it in their lives, they can feel very miserable. With science comes with new medicines and etc. This can allow people to live life easier and longer but than again, some people take it to their advantage and over use such medicines and etc. I think it does change who we are because we start to depend on this types of science and technologies to be happy with life when back then, people were just happy to be alive. I think if you simplify life, you'll be able to enjoy it more and not take things so much for granted.

The Power Of The Individual.

In all of the books that we have read this year in class, it seems as though there is always an individual that is outcasted from society. They either did something bad or they choose to outcast themselves. Each character has their own way with dealing with in. Some lie and try to be accepted by society and some try to run away from it. In Huckleberry Finn, Jim escapes and tries to go to the northern states where he can be free.

They do change society because their society do get affected by their actions. Some of the effects are positive but some are also negative.

I believe that these books really do connect with real life and that it is really true. I don't find it too exaggerated and I can really see it happening in real life to certain individuals through time.

Yeah, I believe a strong willed and strong minded individual is able to change society in a positive and a negative way with their words and actions.

Forbidden Topics.

I think that schools should be allowed to teach any sort of topics that they pleased but teachers themselves should not teach on their own opinions. It should be straight forward and just be facts. Students can form their own opinions towards that certain topic. That way, they won't be influenced by a certain person on certain topics.

Debate Reflections.

I think that our team was able to work very well with each other. We starting working right away and gave each other a lot of ideas. We were able to support each other and to help each other out.

My job for our team was to do research. I was able to find some really good information on true stories on about how the book was banned from schools and why it was banned.

Ryan really stood out on our team. He gave a wonderful speech and came up with a lot of different, unique ideas. With the other team, Truong really stood out. He had a lot of energy and really caught my attention.

I didn't change my opinion on this topic even though I was on the other side of my opinion. I still stand for the fact that I believe that this book should not be banned from school.

Race Relations Today.

I think Jim and Huck would be really surprised at how society is today with race. I'm sure that they won't be shocked to know that they are still some bit of racism left but to see whites and blacks having the same jobs and opportunities will surely be out of their minds. In the book, Jim is a slave and works for a white family. In society today, both race can have the same jobs and to have the same earnings. It's more of an equal society now and the issue with racism is slowly getting better.

To Teach Or Not To Teach.

Positives:

• teaches about slavery
• allows students to see how it was to live in that time period
• allows students to think and comprehend about slavery
• teaches students to treat people equally

Negatives:

• discriminates against black people
• vulgar language

I think the side that favors in teaching the book is more convincing because I believe it's alright to expose students to books like this. It would allow them to have a different sort of understanding towards that time period and about how slavery used to be like.

Another Version Of Huck Finn.

Jim is pretty much portrayed the same way. The way he talks still shows that he is uneducated but in this version, Jim seems to be more in depth as a character with more emotions and is more interesting. The screenplay allows you to look at the story at a different point of view. In the novel, you go through the plot in Huck's point of view and you get to see how he feels and how he thinks. In the screenplay, you're able to have your own emotions as you see each character.

Banned.

I think most books/music that are banned in the USA are looked at by most people as "being too much of something bad" to society. Most books are banned from school because people believe that it will teach kids these days a bad lesson or expose them to something that they shouldn't be exposed to.

I do believe it can be beneficial to our society but I do also believe that sometimes it is taken way too over the top.

One of the major patterns that caused books to be banned was "sexually explicit". I think those books are banned because people in society don't want their kids to be exposed to such information.

Human Nature.

There are many flaws that a human can have. From anger, jealousy, envy and dishonesty. Some things that I would really like to change about human nature at times is the aggressiveness that humans can have. Getting angry and sometimes turning violent is a huge flaw that tends to never end up with a happy result. Also with dishonesty, it's something that humans should not have. To lie to someone and to feel fine with it afterwards is just horrible. Being dishonesty starts with one lie and then it creates another and so on and on.

Satire.

Satire is the use of irony or sarcasm.

The articles on that site are considered satire because they take the truth and they either exaggerate it or put in false information for humor. They're not necessarily 100% the truth but also not 100% false.