American Literature Honors 2010-2011

Summer reading- for fun not becasue someone said we had to

2011-06-12T06:37:00.000-07:00

I know I said good bye... but I miss you guys. Besides, who else will talk about books with me? I'm seeking recommendations for good, fun reads. I'm working on two books right now:

Sebastian Junger's War.- He's the guy who wrote The Perfect Storm... great writer. And I feel like I ought to know more about what's happening in Afghanistan. For the most part, I like it. Fast paced, relevant, and interesting. But he uses a lot of military acronyms that I don't know. And there are a ton of places, so I'm continually flipping to the map at the front of the book. If anyone else trys this one, I suggest making a character list to use as a bookmark...because there are many many characters and I'm struggling to keep them all straight.

The Glassblower of Murano- a breezy read that doesn't require much thinking. Perfect for the first days out of vacation.... and on sale at Bookshop Santa Cruz. It's one of those historical fiction pieces that seem to be very popular these days in which there are two parallel stories... one set in the past and one in the present.

So, friends, what do you suggest next? I'm open to anything, but am mostly seeking great Young Adult Fiction.

The end

2011-06-09T13:00:00.000-07:00

I'm closing our blog. Thanks for a great year. Be sure to visit in the fall :)

since feeling is first

2011-06-05T20:13:00.000-07:00

yet another article for the cummings fans among you

If you want to comment, choose a quotation from the text and share your thoughts on it. This is NOT on the final, but may help increase your overall understanding of cummings and his work.

In Just-- and l(a

2011-06-04T19:04:00.000-07:00

Some thoughts on In Just-

An article on the connection between haiku and cummings work, with special attention to 1(a

More on l(a. Interesting, but only for the truly interested.

If you want to comment, choose a quotation from the text and share your thoughts on it. This is NOT on the final, but may help increase your overall understanding of cummings and his work.

Informaiton about the Spring Semester Final

2011-06-04T14:31:00.000-07:00

I just finished writing your final. You will have a packet of poems to refer to during the test. The entire test is multiple choice, ranging from 3-5 possible answer choices per question. The test includes:

5 questions in which you need to identify the vocabulary word that isn't like the others.
7 questions in which you need to identify which pair of vocabulary words does not have the same kind of relationship (synonym or antonym) as the other pairs of words.
13 questions in which you must read a short passage including vocabulary words and then answer questions about the passage.
(In total, I think I managed to include all but 9 of our vocabulary words from the semester)
10 questions base don the poetry vocabulary from the scavenger hunt, in which you must match the term with its definition.
42 questions which require you to interpret the poems.
5 questions based on the notes we took on his life and the literary movements during which he lived.

There is a grand total of 82 questions. The total number of questions on the poems might change a bit between now and the final, as some groups have not yet presented/ shared their sites with the class, and I don't intend to hold you accountable for knowing those poems unless they do one or the other of those things.

Happy studying :)

Anyone Lived ina Pretty How Town

2011-06-03T18:51:00.000-07:00

There is a good article about anyone lived in a pretty how town. The first part of the article is about l(a, but the rest is on this one. If you want to comment on the article, choose a quotation from the text and share your thoughts on it. This is NOT on the final, but may help increase your overall understanding of cummings and his work.

Also, George Lucas (yes, the Star Wars director, not some other person with the same name) made a film version of this poem in 1967. I think it was a project when he was in college. You can see a clip here.

grasshopper

2011-06-02T19:06:00.000-07:00

thoughts on that crazy poem that just looks something like a word search gone wrong. Skim to the middle of the article where you see a familiar poem.

This is NOT on the final... just interesting.

Group Poem Analysis

2011-05-31T17:53:00.000-07:00

As you send them to me, I will add your analysis to the blog. Thus, this post will be continually "edited" to reflect the projects that have been turned in. If yours doesn't show up here by 6/2, it means it has not been turned in and you should get it in. You can continue to update and modify your analysis until 6/2. Your changes should show up here as well. You should read ALL of these, not just the ones done by your classmates, in preparation for the final.

Cambridge Ladies analysis by B4
Cambridge Ladies by B2
My Sweat Old Etcetera by B2
My sweet of Etc by B4
Humanity i love you by B2
Humanity i love you by B4
All ignorance by B2
All ignorance by B4
What if a Much of a Which of a Wind by B4
What if a Much of a Which by B2
pity this monster by B4
pity by B2
Poetry or Beautry Hurts Mr Vinal by B2
n(o)w by B2
n(o)w by B4

NOTE: Given that I am unable to post the analysis by either of the groups doing Jehovah Buried, Satan Dead on time, I will not ask any questions about that poem on the final.

oil tel duh woil doi sez

2011-05-30T19:35:00.000-07:00

Here's what others have to say about this crazy poem.

AP English Meeting

2011-05-30T14:12:00.001-07:00

If you are taking AP English next year, then you need to attend a lunch meeting on Thursday in H11.

Cummings' titles

2011-05-28T20:18:00.000-07:00

A list of Cummings' books and an explanation of how and why he chose his titles, including the book that has no title (often referred to as [No Title])

If you want to comment, choose a quotation from the text and share your thoughts on it. This is NOT on the final, but may help increase your overall understanding of cummings and his work.

Get Your CUmmings-esque Poem Published

2011-05-27T21:26:00.000-07:00

I know that not all of you will be interested, but for those of you who have been patiently waiting all year for us to finally get to poetry, I wanted to pass along a little bit more. There is an entire organization devoted to thinking about Cummings and his work, the E.E. Cummings Society. They publish an annual magazine titled Spring. (Many of the articles linked to this blog come form that magazine.) The magazine includes scholarly articles about Cummings as well as contemporary poetry that is influenced by Cummings. So, if you are interested in submitting your poem to the magazine (what's the worst that could happen?), send a clean copy of your poem, a self addressed stamped envelope, and a brief cover letter to:

Michael Webster
Spring Editor
129 Lake Huron Hall
Grand Valley State University
Allendale, MI, 49401

I strongly suggest taking a few minutes to familiarize yourself with the publication before submitting, so that you can sound like you know a bit about your audience.

the dirt on cummings' marriage to Elaine

2011-05-27T20:29:00.000-07:00

All the gossip about who cummings' relationship with his wife Elaine. Is this relevant to our study of his work?

cummings comic

2011-05-26T20:41:00.000-07:00

Making your poem analysis website

2011-05-25T10:58:00.000-07:00

You are going to work with a group of your peers to create a google docs analysis of a cummings poem and then post it online for the rest of the class to view. I have done one as a sample. There are also directions for how to do this. I had a lot of fun making the sample. I hope you have fun with this too :)

Please either email your link to me or share your document with me BEFORE the start of class on 6/2/11. After I receive them, I will post them for your classmates to read.

Spring Poems

2011-05-24T19:53:00.000-07:00

An article on his spring poems
An article on cummings' diction

These articles are NOT going to be on your final. However, you may find that they help you to better understand the poems that WILL be on the final.

If commenting in response to this post, you might choose a favorite quotation from an article and comment on it. How did it add to your understanding? Why do or don't you agree with it? etc...

life and times

2011-05-24T14:59:00.000-07:00

Whitman Connections?

2011-05-24T08:14:00.000-07:00

Song of Myself
Excerptsby Walt Whitman
(1819-1892)

1
I CELEBRATE myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.

My tongue, every atom of my blood, form'd from this soil, this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their
parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.

Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.

A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands;
How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more
than he.

I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green
stuff woven.

Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropt,
Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners, that we may see
and remark, and say Whose?

Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the
vegetation.

Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic,
And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones,
Growing among black folks as among white,
Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I
receive them the same.

And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves.

Tenderly will I use you curling grass,
It may be you transpire from the breasts of young men,
It may be if I had known them I would have loved them,
It may be you are from old people, or from offspring taken soon out
of their mothers' laps,
And here you are the mothers' laps.

This grass is very dark to be from the white heads of old mothers,
Darker than the colorless beards of old men,
Dark to come from under the faint red roofs of mouths.

O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues,
And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for
nothing.

I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and
women,
And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken
soon out of their laps.

What do you think has become of the young and old men?
And what do you think has become of the women and children?

They are alive and well somewhere,
The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,
And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the
end to arrest it,
And ceas'd the moment life appear'd.

All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses,
And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.

52.
The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me, he complains
of my gab and my loitering.
I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,
I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.
The last scud° of day holds back for me,
It flings my likeness after the rest and true as any on the
shadow’d wilds,
It coaxes me to the vapor and the dusk.
I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun,
I effuse° my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags.
I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love, If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,
And filter and fiber your blood.
Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,
Missing me one place search another,
I stop somewhere waiting for you.

(Note: For some reason the line breaks and spacing aren't formatting quite right on the blog. Sorry.)

Questions to Contemplate. Answer in comments if you are so inclined.
1. What, in your opinion, is the most important—or most interesting, or most puzzling—line in Whitman’s poem? Why? What do you think the line means?
2. Nature: How does Whitman show his connection to the natural world in this poem? For example, what qualities does he say he shares with the spotted hawk? How is or isn't his relationship to nature reminiscent of Cummings' connection to nature?
3. Style: What verb tense does Whitman use in this poem and other selections from “Song of Myself”? How would the effect have been different if the speaker had spoken in a different tense?
4. Self: The first line of “Song of Myself” is “I celebrate myself, and sing myself”; the last line is “I stop somewhere waiting for you.” What do you think this might reveal about Whitman’s purpose in writing “Song of Myself”? What is cummings' purpose? How does each man view himself within the context of the larger world? How do you know? How do they compare?
5: Art: What do you think Whitman means when he describes his own poetry as his “barbaric yawp”? How does this compare with cumming's views on poetry and art?
6. Politics: Some readers of this poem have further taken the meaning of “barbaric yawp” to refer to the way Europeans might have viewed the “American experiment” of democracy. What do you think? Does Whitman express political views? If so, how do they compare with cummings' political ideas?
7. If you have any questions of your own about this poem, please post them in the comments, so that others might attempt to answer them.

next to god of course american i love you

2011-05-24T06:27:00.000-07:00

You probably noticed references to the "Star Spangled Banner." and "My Country 'Tis of Thee", but some say the poem also references Tennyson's "The Charge of the Light Brigade": Do you agree?

Buffalo Bill

2011-05-23T20:45:00.000-07:00

Some interesting background on Buffalo Bill

Can you make sense of this poem

2011-05-22T19:09:00.000-07:00

oil tel duh woil doi sez
dooyuh unnurs tanmih essez pullih nizmus tash,oi
dough un giv uh shid oi sez.    Tom
oidoughwuntuh doot,butoiguttuh
braikyooz,datswut eesez tuhmih.    (Nowoi askyuh
woodundat maik yurarstoin
green?    Oilsaisough.)—Hool
spairruh luckih?    Thangzkeed.    Mairsee.
Muh jax awl gawn.    Fur Croi saik
ainnoughbudih gutnutntuhplai?
                                                       HAI
yoozwidduhpoimnuntwaiv un duhyookuhsumpnruddur
givusuhtoonunduhphugnting

Post your thoughts in the comments. I'll post an analysis in a few days.

Scavenger Hunt Answers

2011-05-21T11:28:00.000-07:00

Allusion	Is a reference in literature to a familiar person, place, thing, or event
Tone	Is the overall feeling, or effect, created by a writers use of words. This feeling may be serious, mock-serious, humorous, satiric, and so on.;
Hyperbole	Is an exaggeration, or overstatement
Metaphor	Is a comparison of two unlike things in which no word of comparison is used.
Metonymy	Is the substituting of one word for another that is closely related to it.

Ballad	Is a poem in verse form that tells a story
Blank verse	Is an unrhymed form of poetry that normally consists of ten syllables in which every other syllable is stressed

Describe this object using two of these devices and bring it to me for your next destination.

My Father was a Farmer: A Ballad by Robert Burns

MY father was a farmer upon the Carrick border, O,

And carefully he bred me in decency and order, O;

He bade me act a manly part, though I had ne’er a farthing, O;

For without an honest manly heart, no man was worth regarding, O.

Then out into the world my course I did determine, O;

Tho’ to be rich was not my wish, yet to be great was charming, O;

My talents they were not the worst, nor yet my education, O:

Resolv’d was I at least to try to mend my situation, O.

In many a way, and vain essay, I courted Fortune’s favour, O;

Some cause unseen still stept between, to frustrate each endeavour, O;

Sometimes by foes I was o’erpower’d, sometimes by friends forsaken, O;

And when my hope was at the top, I still was worst mistaken, O.

Then sore harass’d and tir’d at last, with Fortune’s vain delusion, O,

I dropt my schemes, like idle dreams, and came to this conclusion, O;

The past was bad, and the future hid, its good or ill untried, O;

But the present hour was in my pow’r, and so I would enjoy it, O.

No help, nor hope, nor view had I, nor person to befriend me, O;

So I must toil, and sweat, and moil, and labour to sustain me, O;

To plough and sow, to reap and mow, my father bred me early, O;

For one, he said, to labour bred, was a match for Fortune fairly, O.

Thus all obscure, unknown, and poor, thro’ life I’m doom’d to wander, O,

Till down my weary bones I lay in everlasting slumber, O:

No view nor care, but shun whate’er might breed me pain or sorrow, O;

I live to-day as well’s I may, regardless of to-morrow, O.

But cheerful still, I am as well as a monarch in his palace, O,

Tho’ Fortune’s frown still hunts me down, with all her wonted malice, O:

I make indeed my daily bread, but ne’er can make it farther, O:

But as daily bread is all I need, I do not much regard her, O.

When sometimes by my labour, I earn a little money, O,

Some unforeseen misfortune comes gen’rally upon me, O;

Mischance, mistake, or by neglect, or my goodnatur’d folly, O:

But come what will, I’ve sworn it still, I’ll ne’er be melancholy, O.

All you who follow wealth and power with unremitting ardour, O,

The more in this you look for bliss, you leave your view the farther, O:

Had you the wealth Potosi boasts, or nations to adore you, O,

A cheerful honest-hearted clown I will prefer before you, O.

Personification	Is a literary device in which the author speaks of or describes an animal, object, or idea as if it were a person.
Simile	Is a comparison of two unlike things in which a word of comparison is used.
Alliteration	Is the repetition of initial consonant sounds in words.
Assonance	Is the repetition of vowel sounds without the repetition of consonants.

Describe something that could happen in this location using two of the above devices and bring it to me for your next destination.

Twisters which also illustrate alliteration:

• Angela Abigail Applewhite ate anchovies and artichokes.

• Bertha Bartholomew blew big, blue bubbles.

• Clever Clifford Cutter clumisily closed the closet clasps.

• Dwayne Dwiddle drew a drawing of dreaded Dracula.

• Elmer Elwood eluded elven elderly elephants.

• Floyd Flingle flipped flat flapjacks.

From John Milton's Paradise Lost:

...the broad circumference

Hung on his shoulders like the Moon, whose Orb

Through Optic Glass the Tuscan Artist views

At ev'ning from the top of Fesole...

In this case, the assonance involves the sound u and o.

Assonance and alliteration often work together.

In "Moby Dick," Melville uses alliteration to build character and to help the reader experience the colorful scene on board a whaling ship. The character, Stubb, for instance, is described as having "rather a peculiar way of talking to them in general," and as saying "the most terrific things to his crew." His use of assonance is part of how Melville illustrates these things. "The devil fetch ye, ye ragamuffin rapscallions," Stubb says, for instance. "Start her -- start her, my silver spoons! Start her, marling spikes!" (In this last quote, we have not only alliteration in the repetition of the s sounds, but also an example of assonance in the words "start" and "marling.")

Caesura	Is a pause or sudden break in a line of poetry
Canto	Is the main division of a long poem

Stanza	Is a division of poetry named for the number of lines it contains Couplet two line stanza Triplet three line stanza Quatrain four line stanza Quintet five line stanza Sestet six line stanza Septet seven line stanza Octave eight line stanza
Heroic Couplet	Consists of two successive rhyming lines that contain a complete thought

Write a short, flattering poem, including two different kinds of stanzas and a heroic couplet about someone you might find in this location. Then bring it to me for your next location.

)when what hugs stopping earth than silent is

more silent than more than much more is or

total sun oceaning than any this

tear jumping from each most least eye of star

and without was if minus and shall be

immeasurable happenless unnow

shuts more than open could that every tree

or than all his life more death begins to grow

end's ending then these dolls of joy and grief

these recent memories of future dream

these perhaps who have lost their shadows if

which did not do the losing spectres mine

until out of merely not nothing comes

only one snowflake(and we speak our names

-by ee cummings

Consonance	Is the repetition of consonant sounds
Rhyme	Is the similarity of likeness of sound existing between two words
End rhyme	Is the rhyming of words that appear at the ends of two r more lines of poetry
Internal rhyme	Occurs when the rhyming words appear in the same line of poetry
Enjambment	Is the running over of a sentence or thought from one line to another

Use two of these devices to describe something that might happen in this location and then bring it to me for your next location.

"Bantams in Pine Woods" by Wallace Stevens

Chieftain Iffucan of Azcan in caftan

Of tan with henna hackles, halt!

Damned universal cock, as if the sun

Was blackamoor to bear your blazing tail.

Fat! Fat! Fat! Fat! I am the personal.

Your world is you. I am my world.

You ten-foot poet among inchlings. Fat!

Begone! An inchling bristles in these pines,

Bristles, and points their Appalachian tangs,

And fears not portly Azcan nor his hoos.

William Shakespeare - Sonnet #18

Shall I compare thee to a Summer's day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And Summer's lease hath all too short a date:

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

And oft' is his gold complexion dimm'd;

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd:

But thy eternal Summer shall not fade

Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;

Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou growest:

So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,

So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Free verse	Is poetry that does not have a regular meter or rhyme scheme
Rhythm	Is the ordered or free occurrence of sound in poetry
Meter	Is the patterned repetition of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line of poetry
Foot	Is the smallest repeated pattern of stressed and un stressed syllables in a poetic line Iambic an unstressed followed by a stressed syllable Anapestic two unstressed followed by a stressed syllable Trochaic a stressed followed by an unstressed syllable Dactylic a stressed followed by two unstressed syllables Spondaic two stressed syllables Pyrrhic two unstressed syllable

Verse

Is a metric line of poetry. It is named according to the kind and number of feet composing it

Monometer one foot

Diemter two feet

Trimeter three feet

Tetrameter four feet

Pentameter five feet

Hexameter six feet

Heptameter seven feet

Octometer eight feet

Choose a type of metric feet and (ex: iambic tetrameter) and use it to describe your own feet. Bring it to me for your next location.

Most poetry has rhythm, and rhythm is achieved by emphasizing or deemphasizing certain syllables in the words used in the lines of the love poem.

The syllables, themselves, are then grouped into two or three syllable units called "feet".

Examples of different types of "feet": (note: all underlined syllables are emphasized)

[My love] [for you] [will al] [ways be,]

The above feet in [ ] brackets are called "iambs" because they are each composed of two syllables with the second syllable of each foot emphasized.

[Slow ly] [soft ly] [and so] [gent ly]

The above feet in brackets are called "trochees" because they are each composed of two syllables with the first syllable of each foot emphasized.

[Sweet heart] [thou art] [al ways] [at heart]

The above feet in brackets are called "spondees" because they are each composed of two syllables with both syllables of each foot emphasized.

[Self res pect] [is a-chieved] [when one leaves] [lust and greed]

The above feet in brackets are called "dactyls" because they are each composed of three syllables with the first syllable of each foot emphasized.

[Dis res pect] [can not be] [for a love] [to be free]

The above feet in brackets are called "anapests' because they are each composed of three syllables with the third syllable of each foot emphasized.

Rhythm, as you can see from the above, depends on emphasized and deemphasized syllables which make up "feet." Taking this a step further, a "line" or "verse" of a poem is made up of one or more "feet."

Examples of Lines (Verses):

Iambic Tetrameter (4-meter)

[My love] [for you] [will al] [ways be,]

This verse has four iambic feet.

Iambic Trimeter (3-meter)

[I kiss] [you in] [my dreams]

This verse has three iambic feet.

Iambic Pentameter (5-meter)

[Thus soon] [I'll need] [the warmth] [of your] [em brace]

Lyric	Is a short verse that is intended to express the emotions of the author
Onomatopoeia	Is the use of a word whose sound suggests its meaning
Refrain	Is the repetition of a line or phrase of a poem at regular intervals
Repetition	Is the repeating of a word or phrase within a poem or prose piece to create a sense of rhythm

synecdoche

Using a part of something to represent a whole.

Use as many of these as you can to write a poem about Harbor High. Bring it to me for your next location.

The Bells (excerpt)

by Edgar Allan Poe

I Hear the sledges with the bells--

Silver bells!

What a world of merriment their melody foretells!

How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle

In the icy air of night!

While the stars that oversprinkle

All the heavens, seem to twinkle

With a crystalline delight;

Keeping time, time, time,

In a sort of Runic rhyme,

To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells

From the bells, bells, bells, bells,

Bells, bells, bells--

From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

II. Hear the mellow wedding bells

Golden bells!

What a world of happiness their harmony foretells!

Through the balmy air of night

How they ring out their delight!

From the molten-golden notes,

And all in tune,

What a liquid ditty floats

To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats

On the moon!

Oh, from out the sounding cells,

What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!

How it swells!

How it dwells

On the Future! how it tells

Of the rapture that impels

To the swinging and the ringing

Of the bells, bells, bells,

Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,

Bells, bells, bells--

To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!

sonnet

A 14- line poem using iambic pentameter

Italian/ petrarchan sonnet: has two parts. An octave and sestet. Usually rhyming abbaabba, cdecde. Often a question raised in the octave is answered in the sestet.

Shakespearian/ Elizabethan sonnet: consists of 3 quatrains and a final heroic couplet. Rhyme scheme is abab, cdcd, efef, gg. Usually the question or theme is set forth in the quatrains while the answer is in the couplet.

Create a mnemonic that will help you to remember the features of a sonnet. Bring it to me for your next location.

"Sonnets are full of love..."

-Christina Rossetti

Sonnets are full of love, and this my tome

Has many sonnets: so here now shall be

One sonnet more, a love sonnet, from me

To her whose heart is my heart's quiet home,

To my first Love, my Mother, on whose knee

I learnt love-lore that is not troublesome;

Whose service is my special dignity,

And she my loadstar while I go and come

And so because you love me, and because

I love you, Mother, I have woven a wreath

Of rhymes wherewith to crown your honored name:

In you not fourscore years can dim the flame

Of love, whose blessed glow transcends the laws

Of time and change and mortal life and death.

cummings inspires music

2011-05-20T06:45:00.000-07:00

LOTS of cummings poems have been set to music. In fact, over 143 composers have put his words to music. Here are a few that you can hear online:
Check out the songs based on cummings poetry... we aren't studying all of these, but many of them are in your packet...
This artist has made love songs out of his poems.
Neither of these poems are in your packet, but they still make beautiful songs.
For the musicians among you, here's the sheet music for o sweet spontanious earth and cambridge ladies.

E. E. Cummings or e e cummings?

2011-05-19T20:10:00.000-07:00

To capitalize or not? The debate rages on... without extensive research, but knowing his poetry, what do you think on the issue?

cummings the artist

2011-05-18T18:54:00.000-07:00

How do the style or content of these paintings reflect the style and content of his poems?

Extra Credit Opportunities

2011-05-16T11:27:00.000-07:00

During our unit on ee cummings, I will post almost daily. I strongly encourage you to take the time to read the posts, as they will augment your understanding of both the man and his poetry. Why? Because your final will be one super awesome test on all things cummings (and vocabulary, of course). In order to encourage your reading, I am offering extra credit to students who post responses to the posts. Responses could be things such as: interesting quotations from articles provided and why you think they're interesting, additional thoughts on a poem, thoughts on a question that is posed, etc.

Also, please remember that you can set it up to have the blog posts emailed to you daily (see the "Follow By Email" icon in the upper right corner).

Sample college admissions essays

2011-05-12T09:52:00.000-07:00

a site with several sample essays
what the college board has to say about essays
popular college essays

Infinite Campus

2011-05-11T18:46:00.000-07:00

I am almost done reading all of the essays that were turned in on the due date... BUT do not freak out if your score isn't entered because I didn't get them all entered before heading to the faculty meeting. I hope to pass them back tomorrow and we can deal with any concerns then. Until then, enjoy reading At the Western Palace.
-Ohana

More Gatsby inspired music

2011-05-07T19:11:00.000-07:00

For those who were absent 5/6/11

2011-05-06T14:53:00.000-07:00

First, we missed you.

Second, here's what you need to know about today's class: There is no vocab quiz to make up. You do need to turn in your vocab and you White Tigers questions. Remember that the work on the other stories is in the folders in the classroom on the orange book shelf. You are responsible for doing anything that should be in the composition book. There will be a Woman Warrior test, so you may want to look at the other material to assist you in preparing for that.

Also, for next class:

Read Shaman
Come by to pick up the College writing packet. We started this on Wed and Monday. If you pick it up Monday, you'll have time to fill out the "Getting to Know Yourself" questions for next class.

Update

2011-05-05T17:59:00.000-07:00

As requested by the B4 class, the blog is now open to all viewers... which means anyone on the big wide web. So don't comment if you aren't okay with having your comments seen... which also means you can how sign up to have posts emailed to yourself.

For those of you who are or have been absent: Don't forget that work is still due as long as you are on campus that day, even if you are taking an AP test. You need to come by the room to get the work from the older on the orange book shelf by the door.

For those of you who are stressing out: It is okay to make tough choices. I will not take it personally if you decided that studying for your AP test is more important than your English homework... yes, you will still get a zero on your homework, but sometimes you really can't do everything and you need to make difficult, but informed and intelligent decisions about how to use your time.

See you tomorrow.

Today's vocab for absent folks

2011-05-04T11:19:00.001-07:00

Anachronistic: out-of-date, not attributed to the correct historical period

Frugal: thrifty, cheap

Obdurate: hardened against feeling; hardhearted, impatient

Craven: cowardly

Obsequious: full of or exhibiting servile compliance; fawning

Quiz next class.

Using Google Presentation for woman Warrior Project

2011-05-01T13:49:00.000-07:00

Something Special for the Edgar Allen Poe Readers

2011-04-28T19:25:00.000-07:00

Silly Huck Finn Video I just found

2011-04-28T19:23:00.001-07:00

DON'T FORGET ESSAY!

2011-04-28T06:44:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since we've worked on them in class, but please don't forget that essays are due on Monday. I look forward to reading them.

Easy A

2011-04-26T18:05:00.000-07:00

I don't remember which of you recommended this, but thank you! It's a great match to our books for this year. All it's missing is a reference to Gatsby :) I know you're probably all cool enough to have seen it already, but if not, it's out on video now.

The LAST independent reading assignment

2011-04-26T17:56:00.000-07:00

What are we reading?
For your final independent reading assignment, read a book by an award winning author. The book you read doesn't have to be the one that won the award.

How do I find a book?
Try one of these links:
Powell's City of books award list
wikipedia's list of winners (yes, I know I'm not supposed to use wikipedia, but it has EVERYTHING!)
info about different awards
amazon's award winner list
Harbor High Library list of award winners
You can also ask Ms. Smith. And if there's a book you really want to read, do some research to find out if the author has won an award. Being an Oprah Book club book or a New York Times best seller is NOT the same as winning a literary award.

How long does it need to be?
You must read 250 pages or a complete book, which ever is MORE. So you can read plays or poems, but you'll need to read several and they should all be by the same award winning author. You can read a 600 page book, but you will need to finish it.

When do I need it?
Get it as soon as you can... why not? Let's say Monday by the latest.

What are we doing with it?
Writing poetry. No, I'm not kidding. After Woman Warrior, we'll be studying poetry and it'll fit in with that unit. More about that later.

Imagine you are a student at Yale and you're attending a lecture about Woman Warrior

2011-04-20T18:44:00.000-07:00

AP CONTRACTS DUE 4/15!

2011-04-14T10:42:00.000-07:00

Don't forget to turn in your AP English Contracts before you go on spring break! You don't need my signature, just your and your parents.

In general, anyone with an A or B in this class is is completely capable of taking AP English, but if you're concerned or worried, come see me and we can talk about it.

Hove Blog Posts Emailed to You

2011-04-11T21:41:00.001-07:00

I'm trying something new... I think if you use the feature on the right, you can have new posts emailed to you, that way if you don't regularly check the blog, the info will come to you :)

I can't figure out how to unsubscribe though... any ideas?

How to use google docs and google presentation

2011-04-11T20:31:00.000-07:00

Gatsby Paper Thoughts

2011-04-11T13:51:00.000-07:00

There are lots of ways to generate ideas, such as discussing the book with friends, meandering through the posts on this blog, rereading favorite passages, etc.
You can continue to work on your papers during STAR testing... you can comment on them via google docs, or simply help each other during break. My room is open if you need a place to meet with a friend to discuss your paper.

Literary Magazine- Call for Submissions

2011-04-11T12:23:00.000-07:00

Ms. Rummens sent this out, and so I'm sharing it with you. Please consider submitting.

Harbor High School Literary Magazine

The Publications Class has a very, very short period of time in which to design, produce and print a Literary Magazine that will be published in color by the end of the school year.

We are seeking student work including poems, photographs, art work, digital media,
short stories and other pieces to be considered for this publication.

All files must be submitted in digital format. Acceptable files are jpg, gif, tiff, and pdf. Digital files should be high resolution, 150-300 dpi, cmyk

Written work can be submitted in Word, InDesign, or Google Docs.

Pieces must be submitted by: Friday, May 1 (but the sooner, the better).

Space is limited.

Submit digitally as an attachment to: missrummens@gmail.com

Joy Luck Club Resouces

2011-04-10T17:29:00.000-07:00

Thank you to Rylee for putting this together. (So far she's the only one to take me up on the extra credit offer which will expire in a week, when we finish our books)

1) The Joy Luck Club Summary and Study Guide: This website will give you a brief summary about what Joy Luck is based around.

2) Knowing more about the Japanese Invasion will give the reader an idea of why women in China created the Joy Luck Club. This historical website will tell you in depth how devastating the attack was on Chinese civilians.

3) Understanding the high context and low context cultures between Chinese and Americans is very essential in this book. This website explains the distinction between the two clashing cultures and helps the reader comprehend why the daughters have a hard time with their mother’s cultural values.

4) Having an idea of what the authors’ point of view of the book is extremely crucial. This websites goes in depth about Amy Tan's life.

5) Here are some quotes that emphasize the topic of language and communication throughout Joy Luck. These will help you understand the main theme of the book.

6) A clip from an important part in the book: Waverly Jongs’) mother goes around bragging about her daughters’ gift of playing chess. This displays one of the many points Tan makes about mother daughter relationships- frustration. This makes me want to watch the whole movie!

7) Here is another clip by 4 girls and their mothers imitating the Joy Luck Club but revised into a reality show where they display the real relationships between mothers and daughters.

8) Reading Anna Blights paper could help you extend your thinking about the book. Is there more than one theme? A mother and daughter relationship; or cultural values?

Shcolarships and Contests

2011-04-04T14:58:00.000-07:00

Penguin Publishing Group has an annual essay contest... read a book, write an essay, win some cash!
Yes! offers a chance for you to read an article, write a response, and possibly get published! If you want to enter this one, you need me to read over what you've done, so let me know.
Thank Ms. Kipps for telling us about these :)

Concordance

2011-04-01T20:54:00.000-07:00

A concordance is a source that lists all the references to a specific word within a text.. and thanks to the internet, we now have hyper concordances. So, if you're reading along and you get the feeling that something might be important, and wonder when else it's referenced in the book, but don't want to reread the book, you use a concordance.

To use the one linked here, go to Authors and scroll down until you get to American Authors, then select Fitzgerald, Scott (you might want to notice all the other authors listed here-- super useful for future studies or for those of you who might want to compare an aspect of Gatsby to an aspect of another text). Select the title. Type in the word under "query"...enter.

Did you know he used the word "phone" 6 times? "red" six? "money" six? This is a great tool for looking for patterns.

Learn to dance like a moth at Gatsby's party

2011-03-29T06:53:00.000-07:00

Extra Credit

2011-03-24T14:52:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I intended to give you extra credit for researching and explaining allusions in The Hollowmen, however, someone beat us to it! When I looked up the poem to provide a link to an electronic copy for folks who lost theirs, I found an annotated version. Check it out! It answers every question you never had about the poem :) More importantly though, I think that by reading the annotations, it becomes clear that while the specific references do not pertain to Gatsby, the theme of the empty modern man ties the two texts together.

That said, there is another extra credit opportunity listed on the blog that no one has jumped on yet-- will you be the first one from your reading group to find it?

Gatsby Reading Schedule

2011-03-22T14:53:00.000-07:00

Because you look tired (I mean that in a loving and supportive way), I thought it might help to have a schedule of the reading, so that you can make choices about when to read and when to sleep.

Chapter 5 is due 3/24
6 due 3/28
7 due 3/30. DO NOT READ PAST 7 UNTIL AFTER CLASS ON 4/1-- I MEAN IT!!!!!
8 due 4/5
9 due 4/7 (we'll also talk about the essay on this day...it will be due 4/28--why so long you ask? Because of spring break and STAR testing.)

Gatsby Resources

2011-03-18T19:23:00.000-07:00

There's tons of material out there on the big wide web that relates to Gatsby. I encourage you to make the most of your reading to explore some of the materials out there.

ebook - nice if you lose yours or for cutting and pasting rather than typing out quotes.
source for primary documents about the 1920s, so you can better understand the cultural context of the book
a goofy little interactive "game" about life in the 1920s.
NY Times article about relevance of Gatsby's dream today.
Index of where to find key words and ideas from the novel. This could help you to notice patterns and potentially save you TONS of time when writing a paper. I'm not sure if the page numbers are the same as yours, but if not, they're close enough to still be worth it :)
Several critical essays that might help stretch your thinking about the book-- like what does it have to do with Oz? and was Fitzgerald anti-semitic?
Our library also has a great book with SHORT critical essays to help you consider the book from different perspectives-- how would a marxist read this book? a feminist? etc..

If you read through this whole post, then you deserve an extra credit opportunity. The first person in each reading club group may receive extra credit by putting together a list of online resources that would add to a reader's experience. When done email me the write up of the list (use this list as a model). I will publish it as a post, so that other group members can post comments. Please do not include sites which require you to pay, offer free essays to students, spark notes, etc or you will not be eligible for the extra credit.

Thinking about Japan

2011-03-17T18:42:00.000-07:00

I can't stop thinking about Japan... and wanted to recomend a book for anyone else who is thinking about it.
Hiroshima by John Hersey is a very short read-- it's a journalist's account of what happened in Hiroshima when the atom bomb was dropped. It follows the story of several survivors as they deal with a variety of issues from fire to radiation sickness. I'll bring my copy tomorrow if anyone would like to borrow it. I believe we also have several copies in the library.

How did I do on my speech?!?!

2011-03-16T14:53:00.000-07:00

I am reading, scoring, and entering speeches as they come in. When yours shows up on IC, yo umay look in the black box for it. Please return it to the red tray though, so I can file it in your portfolio (there are too good to let them vanish into the pit of your bedroom!). They are out of 65 pts and 5 of those points are for the works cited. If you didn't turn in a works cited, you may still do so for up until the last day of speeches. Another thing to note is that the rubric score only represents your work on the first 3 rows, since the district doesn't include public speaking in the persuasive paper. However, your work on the last row of the rubric does go into your overall points... it's confusing, but you're smart-- you'll get it :)

English Placement Test-- any day now!

2011-03-10T10:26:00.000-08:00

Next week we will be taking the English Placement Test for CSU.

I STRONGLY encourage you to take a moment and use the resources under "Standardized Test Prep" on the right of this blog to familiarize yourself with the test. You will have 45 minutes to read a short passage and write an essay in response. The passage will be MUCH shorter than the articles we read in class (those are more like what you might expect for the UC equivalent test.)

Literature Circles

2011-03-10T10:17:00.000-08:00

Assignment and Reading

In preparation for each group meeting, you will:

Reading to the agreed upon page
Write two open-ended questions about the reading, which you look forward to discussing with the group. (How? Why? Questions can be about content, such as plot, character development, etc or about stylistic choices such as imagery, figurative language, etc)
Choose two passages that you feel are interesting, important, or confusing.

During each meeting, you will:

Take turns asking your questions.
Each contribute as you discuss your group member’s questions.
Jot down notes about the answers to your discussion questions and/ or thoughts on other people’s questions/
Share the passages you chose, explain why you chose them, and comment on each other’s choices. Why are they interesting, important, or confusing? If confusing, help each other to better understand them.
Jot down notes on your passages or on those of your group members.

Book Discussion Work Sample

Meeting	Open Ended Questions	Passages
#2 Prep work	1. Why is Jim so patient with the boys’ escape plan? 2. Why does Twain bring Tom into the end of the book? What function does this serve in the message of the novel?	Tom said it warn’t borrowing, it was stealing. It ain’t no crime in a prisoner to steal the thing he needs to get away with, Tom said (223). “Here a poor prisoner, forsook by the world and friends, fretted out his sorrowful life” (236).
Notes	Maybe Jim is giving up at this point? Maybe he feels like he needs to stick around for Huck? Tom’s moral values highlight how much Huck’s have changed. Susan asked why Twain would have a section in the book about pretending to escape when the whole book is really about escape- Jim from slavery and Huck from alcoholic father. We think it’s similar to why twain brought Tom back… shows the difference between how they faced their problems at the beginning and now. However, by killing pap and having the Jim freed, it’s also like saying the escape wasn’t even needed. Twain sort of sends a mixed message.	“Forsook” means forgotten. It’s ironic because Jim isn’t forgotten. They’re working to get him out. Paul noticed that Jim calls Tom “Mars Tom” as a sign of respect, but just calls Huck by his name. We think this is maybe more about familiarity than respect, because Jim obviously respects and loves Huck.

Final Project

Your group will create a presentation of the book, which includes the following:

A VERY short play version of the book, using the passages your group members selected prior to your group meetings as the basis for your script. You will not use all of the lines you’ve collected, but the body of your play can ONLY use the lines you’ve collected.

Character actors who may play multiple characters, will use simple costumes to high light features of their characters, and will read the passages chosen by the group.

A narrator who will open the play with basic information about setting, characters, title, etc so that viewers can tell what’s going on. The narrator will also close the play by clarifying the ending of the story if the play is unclear, commenting on how the book fits into the larger context of American Literature (How does it relate to the history, themes, styles of other books?)

An analyzer who will periodically interrupt the flow of the story (which will have a very odd flow anyway given that it’s made up of the passages you chose) in order to comment on the stylistic significance of the lines from the book. The analyzer must comment on at least four lines and must discuss at least two of the three topics (tone, character development, and theme).

Optional: You are welcome to add other features, such as props or sound track, so long as they do not detract from the required elements.

*Some books are collections of stories, rather than one longer story. In that case, you are responsible for highlighting the style and central themes that unite the collection. You may need to be creative in how you do this.

Reading Schedule

1. Date: 3/4

Task: Planning

2. Date:3/14

Read to page:

3. Date:3/22

Read to page:

4. Date:3/28

Read to page:

5. Date:4/5

Read to page:

6. Date:4/13

Finish the book

During this meeting you will write your script, choose your roles, rehearse, etc.

7. Date: 4/15

Present

Assessment

	Book Club Discussions	Final Presentation
You could teach a class on this book. Want my job?	· Shows deep understanding of what you read · Always completely prepared with written work and reading · Helpful to group members and on task the entire time	· Provided accurate, creative, and condensed version of the book, reflecting thorough understanding of plot, character, themes, tone, style, as appropriate. · Presentation of role was creative and thorough, as appropriate. · Helpful participation in assisting group to prepare for all aspects of the presentation
Good. You are ready for next year.	· Shows solid understanding of reading but lacks insight · Almost always prepared with written work and reading · On task	· Provided accurate and condensed version of the book, reflecting understanding of elements of plot, character, themes, tone, style, as appropriate. · Presentation of role was thorough in covering all requirements. · Participated in assisting group to prepare for all aspects of the presentation
Okay. Hope you enjoyed the book.	· Shows a basic understanding of reading · Mostly prepared with either written work or reading · Mostly on task	· Provided condensed version of the book, reflecting basic plot, character, themes, tone, style, as appropriate. · Presentation of role covered basic requirements of the role. · Participated in assisting group to prepare for all aspects of the presentation, but primarily focused on only what your own job.
At least you know how to use Sparknotes	· Shows a basic understanding of part of the reading or does not demonstrate knowledge beyond Sparknotes level · Occasionally prepared · Occasionally on task.	· Provided condensed version of the book, but may fail to include much more than plot. · Presentation of role left out essential elements. · During preparation time, worked only on your own job.
Let’s practice the alphabet song.	· Didn’t read · Consistently under prepared · Distracting during discussions	· Excessively confusing. Does not reflect even a basic sense of the book. Fails to follow the directions. Chaos abounds.

Oh no!

2011-03-08T18:04:00.000-08:00

I knew I forgot something! I just posted grades and then realized that I'd forgotten to include Extra Credits for my eager bloggers who earned a few points by suggesting new texts for next year. I have now added the points. They will show on IC and will go into the next 6 weeks-- I'm really sorry. If any parents need notes, just let me know.

I also just wanted to let you know how AWESOME the speeches were today! My poor family has had to hear about them all through dinner.

Public Speaking

2011-03-04T06:20:00.000-08:00

If you're worrying about your speech, you might consider the following:
1) Review the transcript of the speaking movie
2) Ask a friend to look it over again. Just becasue we're done editing in class, doesn't mean you have to stop.
3) Practice... do it in front of a mirror, in front of your parents, in front of your dog... dog's really like the attention and they appreciate an animated speech, but then so do people.

Great Gatsby Here We Come!

2011-03-03T18:41:00.000-08:00

We'll be starting The Great Gatsby next week. It's a great book and has a little bit of everything adultery, murder, gangs, gambling, baseball, cars, drunks, jewlery made of human teeth, ... and a 3D movie version coming out in June 2012! Gatsby Movie
But if that isn't enough to get you interested, there's also a video game.. seriously?! a video game!? One of you will have to try this out and tell me what it's all about (it's for NES, whatever that means...)

Grading Period Closing Friday

2011-03-03T06:15:00.000-08:00

This is just a reminder to check IC before Friday. If there are any mistakes, I need to know about them by then.

Also, I would like to remind you that there is NO guarantee of credit for work turned in late. You MIGHT get partial credit, but I make no promises. The later you turn it in, the less likely you are to get partial credit. Thankfully, you have the option to use your one time good deal extension if you think you won't be able to get something done on time.

Extra Credit Opportunity

2011-02-20T19:09:00.000-08:00

I'm almost done reading your responses to Paine and while you all did a very good job, it's clear that very few of you feel that what he says is still relevant today. It looks like I should've chosen something more relevant to today's issues (Obama, JFK, Chavez, Malcom X?). I don't want to make next year's students read irrelevant texts, so next year I'd like to use a different text for our final assessment... which brings me to my request.

If you have come across any persuasive texts that you think are particularly good for students of American Literature to read, please let me know. I'm open to just about anything as long as it's school appropriate and 4 pages or less. You might look for texts that have universal themes, but contemporary application. You might also consider texts that students wouldn't otherwise be asked to read in school, but which you feel are important to understanding the American experience. You are not limited to the speeches on this site, or this one, or this one, but I thought they might be a good starting place.

I am offering extra credit to students who provide a link to the text and an explanation as to why they think it should be used.

Unfortunately, I won't be able to tell you which text I choose, as some of you may have friends enrolling in the class next year. This is your chance to help create the curriculum for next year!

SSR

2011-02-17T14:35:00.000-08:00

Since so many of you lost your independent reading handout... and since it's due 3/4... and since you'll probably need to be working on it over the long weekend...I've tried to post the handout here.
But the blog is being silly and won't let me cut and paste into a blog post. It will, however, let me post it as a comment (does anyone know why? I'd love to solve this problem.) So, read the first comment for the directions.

Sources of articles about our topics

2011-02-17T10:41:00.000-08:00

If you find any good online places to find articles about the topics we're researching, please post them in the comments section. Who knows, the credit fairies might just reward you for your helpfulness. I've started our list:

New York Times
pro/ con articles on controversial issues
Santa Cruz public library (you need a library card and pin number-- which you got when you were in 9th grade.) Check out opposing viewpoints link.
List of organizations connected to a variety of controversial topics. This will not lead you directly to articles, but might lead you in the right direction.
Harbor Library. Yup, that's right! Our own library has great resources. Check out the links on the left side for "News Online" and "Research Tools"

Let's hear about the sites you find!

Do you get locked out of the blog?

2011-02-17T10:22:00.000-08:00

A number of people are telling me that they can't access the blog. Here are the most common problems and solutions:
1) Problem: You forgot what email address you used or your password. Solution: Write it in your planner.
2) Problem: You click on the invitation in your email to access the blog, but have never become a follower. Your invitation expires, and then you can't access the blog. Solution: Click on the button that says "follow" on the right hand side. Follow the directions.
3) Problem: You've tried the solutions above and still can't make it work. Solution: In the short term, you can have a friend email you a post by clicking on the little envelope under the post. In the long term, send me an email and ask me to re-invite you. Then, make sure you follow the directions for problems #1 and 2, so it doesn't happen again :)

contests with prizes!

2011-02-16T15:02:00.000-08:00

As we're starting to talk about public speaking, I thought you should know that there are a number of contests out there that deal with public speaking.

This one is a short essay about the benefits or problems of using visual aids... and it has a $1000 prize! You don't actually give a speech, just write a 300 word paper.
This one requires you to give your speech as a historical character. If anyone wants to do this for their final speech, so that they can enter the contest, just let me know and we'll modify the assignment a bit.
The local Lions club has an annual speech contest. We're a bit late for it this year, but you might want to keep it in mind for next year.
Public Speaking that relates to California history. You'd have to make sure your speech was focused on Ca history, but hey, for $500, maybe it's worth it.
A site that has info about speaking contests on a variety of topics from cattle to forensics. (Not a bad site to check out in general because it's a database of college scholarships.)

If you find any others, please post information in the comments.

HOMEWORK: Contemporary speech analysis

2011-02-08T10:26:00.000-08:00

Choose one of the following:
Obama after Arizona shooting
video

Mubarak's speech about political change in Egypt
(I can't find a video, but if anyone does, please post)

Obama's state of the union 2011
video

Brown's state of the state address 2011
video

Jan Brewer on Arizona's AB1070
(I can't find a video, but if anyone does, please post)

Bachman's response to State of the Union
video

When possible, I've given you both the text and video. It's worth looking at both, since how one holds their body can do a lot to instill confidence in the viewer.

Read the speech and write an evaluation of the speech:
a) Start with an introduction in which you identify the speaker, the reason for the speech, the intended audience, any necessary context of background information, and the main idea of the speech, along with your opinion on the quality of the speech.
b) Then write several paragraphs, in which you support your overall opinion of the speech's quality, with claims about its ethos, pathos, and logos. Paragraphs must include evidence. (Excellent paragraphs have 3 CDs, good ones have 2, mediocre ones have 1.... I mention this because in other homework assignments some people are getting a little lax on the evidence.)
c) Don't worry about a conclusion, just tie back to your overall opinion of the speech at the end of your final paragraph.

Notes:

If there's another speech that you want to do, which was given within the last few months, just let me know.
As you're evaluating the speech, it's likely that you will consider the issues of the speech, which we will discuss next class, however, for the write up, please focus on ethos, pathos, and logos.

I can't wait to talk about all of this next class!

And for those of you who asked, here is the complete text of Martin Luther King Jr's Letter From Birmingham Jail.

logic puzzle solutions

2011-02-07T14:16:00.000-08:00

Solution to the Puzzle of the Hyena's Alias: The Hyena's alias is "James Wilson". There are several ways to solve this puzzle, but perhaps the simplest is to realize that, if the fourth informant is correct, then the Hyena's alias must be either "John Moore" or "James Wilson". This is because each of the first two informants must be right about one of the names but not both, therefore one must be right about the first name and the other right about the surname. Then, the third informant's information allows us to eliminate "John Moore": since we've already ruled out "Taylor" as the last name of the alias, the third informant must be right that the first name is not "John".
Source: J. A. H. Hunter & Joseph S. Madachy, Mathematical Diversions (1975). The puzzle is based on one from page 49.

Solution to the Puzzle of the Masked Men: Benjy shot the guard. There are only eight possible distributions of truth-values, given that either all but one of the statements is true or all but one is false: four for each of the two possibilities depending on which of the four statements is the odd man out. So, to solve the puzzle, you can go through these possible distributions of truth-values until you've eliminated all but one.
An easier approach is to recognize that since Denny denies what Benjy said, their two statements must have opposite truth-values. This means that the other two statements are either both true or both false, thus eliminating four possible distributions. Suppose that Benjy spoke the truth and Denny was wrong. Then Charlie must be the guilty party, since Benjy accused him truly. That means that Charlie's own statement must be false, in which case Alfie's statement must also be false. However, since Charlie is the guilty party―and only one of the robbers shot the guard―Alfie is innocent, so his statement would be true. It's impossible for him to be both innocent and guilty, so the assumption that Benjy spoke the truth and Denny didn't must be mistaken.
Therefore, we can conclude that Benjy was wrong and Denny spoke the truth. So, Charlie isn't guilty after all. Suppose that Alfie and Charlie's statements are both false: then Alfie must be the guilty one, since he falsely claims innocence. However, if Alfie is guilty, then Charlie's statement was true, not false. Thus, the only remaining possibility is that all the statements were true except Benjy's. So, it's true that either Alfie or Benjy is guilty, since Charlie spoke the truth. However, it's not true that Alfie is guilty, since he correctly claimed innocence. Therefore, the guilty party must be Benjy.
Acknowledgment: The puzzle was suggested by one from Marilyn vos Savant's book Of Course I'm for Monogamy: I'm Also for Everlasting Peace and an End to Taxes (1996), pp. 164-165.

Solution to the Puzzle of the Dead Presidents: Johnson.
If the lie detector is accurate, then each of the five criminals said one truth and one falsehood. So, let's start by assuming that Kennedy's first statement is true and his second is false, and see what happens.
If Kennedy's second statement is false, then either Reagan or Johnson is the lookout. However, given that his first statement is true, Johnson is the mastermind. Thus, Reagan must be the lookout. Since Johnson is the mastermind, it follows that Kennedy isn't, which means that Nixon's second statement is true. Hence, Nixon's first statement is false, but that means that Nixon is the lookout. This contradicts the previous conclusion that Reagan is the lookout. Therefore, our original assumption must be wrong, which means that Kennedy's first statement is false and his second true.
Since Kennedy's first statement is false, Johnson is not the mastermind, and since his second is true, neither Reagan nor Johnson is the lookout. Because Kennedy's second statement is true, Ford's second statement is false, which means that his first is true. Since Ford's first statement is true, Reagan's second statement is false, which means that his first is true. So, Nixon is not the lookout, and his second statement is false, meaning that Kennedy is the mastermind. Since Nixon is not the lookout, it follows that Johnson is not the wheelman, by Modus Tollens from Ford's first statement. So far, we have been able to conclude that none of the following is the lookout: Kennedy (since he's the mastermind), Reagan, Johnson, and Nixon; this leaves only Ford. Thus, Johnson's second statement is true and his first is false. The only way for Johnson's first statement to be false is for neither Nixon nor Johnson to be the safecracker. So we now know that Johnson is not the mastermind (Kennedy), the lookout (Ford), the wheelman, or the safecracker. Therefore, Johnson is the triggerman.
By continuing this reasoning, you can determine the remaining two positions in the gang, but I'll leave this as an exercise for the reader.

Thoreau's Civil Disobedience.

2011-02-04T09:33:00.000-08:00

This website has the complete text, with notes. The notes are mostly paraphrase, but you might want to check it out.

This site has critical interpretations of the text. If you click on the different segments of the text, it also has some pretty detailed text notes, explaining references, etc. Are you starting to get the idea that this text was a pretty big deal? This text has inspired many famous people. Can you think of anyone in particular?

If you're interested in learning about Thoreau, please do. I encourage you to share anything you learn in the comments.

If all you want is the absolute minimum in order to complete the assignment, use the excerpt here (beware, it's still pretty long):

I heartily accept the motto, "That government is best which governs least"; and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe — "That government is best which governs not at all"; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which the will have. Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient. The objections which have been brought against a standing army, and they are many and weighty, and deserve to prevail, may also at last be brought against a standing government. The standing army is only an arm of the standing government. The government itself, which is only the mode which the people have chosen to execute their will, is equally liable to be abused and perverted before the people can act through it. Witness the present Mexican war, the work of comparatively a few individuals using the standing government as their tool; for in the outset, the people would not have consented to this measure.

This American government — what is it but a tradition, though a recent one, endeavoring to transmit itself unimpaired to posterity, but each instant losing some of its integrity? It has not the vitality and force of a single living man; for a single man can bend it to his will. It is a sort of wooden gun to the people themselves. But it is not the less necessary for this; for the people must have some complicated machinery or other, and hear its din, to satisfy that idea of government which they have. Governments show thus how successfully men can be imposed upon, even impose on themselves, for their own advantage. It is excellent, we must all allow. Yet this government never of itself furthered any enterprise, but by the alacrity with which it got out of its way. It does not keep the country free. It does not settle the West. It does not educate. The character inherent in the American people has done all that has been accomplished; and it would have done somewhat more, if the government had not sometimes got in its way. For government is an expedient, by which men would fain succeed in letting one another alone; and, as has been said, when it is most expedient, the governed are most let alone by it. Trade and commerce, if they were not made of india-rubber, would never manage to bounce over obstacles which legislators are continually putting in their way; and if one were to judge these men wholly by the effects of their actions and not partly by their intentions, they would deserve to be classed and punished with those mischievious persons who put obstructions on the railroads.

But, to speak practically and as a citizen, unlike those who call themselves no-government men, I ask for, not at one no government, but at once a better government. Let every man make known what kind of government would command his respect, and that will be one step toward obtaining it.

After all, the practical reason why, when the power is once in the hands of the people, a majority are permitted, and for a long period continue, to rule is not because they are most likely to be in the right, nor because this seems fairest to the minority, but because they are physically the strongest. But a government in which the majority rule in all cases can not be based on justice, even as far as men understand it. Can there not be a government in which the majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but conscience? — in which majorities decide only those questions to which the rule of expediency is applicable? Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward. It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right. The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right.
....
It is not a man's duty, as a matter of course, to devote himself to the eradication of any, even to most enormous, wrong; he may still properly have other concerns to engage him; but it is his duty, at least, to wash his hands of it, and, if he gives it no thought longer, not to give it practically his support. If I devote myself to other pursuits and contemplations, I must first see, at least, that I do not pursue them sitting upon another man's shoulders. I must get off him first, that he may pursue his contemplations too. See what gross inconsistency is tolerated. I have heard some of my townsmen say, "I should like to have them order me out to help put down an insurrection of the slaves, or to march to Mexico — see if I would go"; and yet these very men have each, directly by their allegiance, and so indirectly, at least, by their money, furnished a substitute. The soldier is applauded who refuses to serve in an unjust war by those who do not refuse to sustain the unjust government which makes the war; is applauded by those whose own act and authority he disregards and sets at naught; as if the state were penitent to that degree that it hired one to scourge it while it sinned, but not to that degree that it left off sinning for a moment. Thus, under the name of Order and Civil Government, we are all made at last to pay homage to and support our own meanness. After the first blush of sin comes its indifference; and from immoral it becomes, as it were, unmoral, and not quite unnecessary to that life which we have made.
...

I meet this American government, or its representative, the State government, directly, and face to face, once a year — no more — in the person of its tax-gatherer; this is the only mode in which a man situated as I am necessarily meets it; and it then says distinctly, Recognize me; and the simplest, the most effectual, and, in the present posture of affairs, the indispensablest mode of treating with it on this head, of expressing your little satisfaction with and love for it, is to deny it then. My civil neighbor, the tax-gatherer, is the very man I have to deal with — for it is, after all, with men and not with parchment that I quarrel — and he has voluntarily chosen to be an agent of the government. How shall he ever know well that he is and does as an officer of the government, or as a man, until he is obliged to consider whether he will treat me, his neighbor, for whom he has respect, as a neighbor and well-disposed man, or as a maniac and disturber of the peace, and see if he can get over this obstruction to his neighborlines without a ruder and more impetuous thought or speech corresponding with his action. I know this well, that if one thousand, if one hundred, if ten men whom I could name — if ten honest men only — ay, if one honest man, in this State of Massachusetts, ceasing to hold slaves, were actually to withdraw from this co-partnership, and be locked up in the county jail therefor, it would be the abolition of slavery in America. For it matters not how small the beginning may seem to be: what is once well done is done forever.
....

I have paid no poll tax for six years. I was put into a jail once on this account, for one night; and, as I stood considering the walls of solid stone, two or three feet thick, the door of wood and iron, a foot thick, and the iron grating which strained the light, I could not help being struck with the foolishness of that institution which treated my as if I were mere flesh and blood and bones, to be locked up. I wondered that it should have concluded at length that this was the best use it could put me to, and had never thought to avail itself of my services in some way. I saw that, if there was a wall of stone between me and my townsmen, there was a still more difficult one to climb or break through before they could get to be as free as I was. I did nor for a moment feel confined, and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortar. I felt as if I alone of all my townsmen had paid my tax. They plainly did not know how to treat me, but behaved like persons who are underbred. In every threat and in every compliment there was a blunder; for they thought that my chief desire was to stand the other side of that stone wall. I could not but smile to see how industriously they locked the door on my meditations, which followed them out again without let or hindrance, and they were really all that was dangerous. As they could not reach me, they had resolved to punish my body; just as boys, if they cannot come at some person against whom they have a spite, will abuse his dog. I saw that the State was half-witted, that it was timid as a lone woman with her silver spoons, and that it did not know its friends from its foes, and I lost all my remaining respect for it, and pitied it.
....
The night in prison was novel and interesting enough. The prisoners in their shirtsleeves were enjoying a chat and the evening air in the doorway, when I entered. But the jailer said, "Come, boys, it is time to lock up"; and so they dispersed, and I heard the sound of their steps returning into the hollow apartments. My room-mate was introduced to me by the jailer as "a first-rate fellow and clever man." When the door was locked, he showed me where to hang my hat, and how he managed matters there. The rooms were whitewashed once a month; and this one, at least, was the whitest, most simply furnished, and probably neatest apartment in town. He naturally wanted to know where I came from, and what brought me there; and, when I had told him, I asked him in my turn how he came there, presuming him to be an honest man, of course; and as the world goes, I believe he was. "Why," said he, "they accuse me of burning a barn; but I never did it." As near as I could discover, he had probably gone to bed in a barn when drunk, and smoked his pipe there; and so a barn was burnt. He had the reputation of being a clever man, had been there some three months waiting for his trial to come on, and would have to wait as much longer; but he was quite domesticated and contented, since he got his board for nothing, and thought that he was well treated.
He occupied one window, and I the other; and I saw that if one stayed there long, his principal business would be to look out the window. I had soon read all the tracts that were left there, and examined where former prisoners had broken out, and where a grate had been sawed off, and heard the history of the various occupants of that room; for I found that even there there was a history and a gossip which never circulated beyond the walls of the jail. Probably this is the only house in the town where verses are composed, which are afterward printed in a circular form, but not published. I was shown quite a long list of young men who had been detected in an attempt to escape, who avenged themselves by singing them.

I pumped my fellow-prisoner as dry as I could, for fear I should never see him again; but at length he showed me which was my bed, and left me to blow out the lamp.

It was like travelling into a far country, such as I had never expected to behold, to lie there for one night. It seemed to me that I never had heard the town clock strike before, not the evening sounds of the village; for we slept with the windows open, which were inside the grating. It was to see my native village in the light of the Middle Ages, and our Concord was turned into a Rhine stream, and visions of knights and castles passed before me. They were the voices of old burghers that I heard in the streets. I was an involuntary spectator and auditor of whatever was done and said in the kitchen of the adjacent village inn — a wholly new and rare experience to me. It was a closer view of my native town. I was fairly inside of it. I never had seen its institutions before. This is one of its peculiar institutions; for it is a shire town. I began to comprehend what its inhabitants were about.

In the morning, our breakfasts were put through the hole in the door, in small oblong-square tin pans, made to fit, and holding a pint of chocolate, with brown bread, and an iron spoon. When they called for the vessels again, I was green enough to return what bread I had left, but my comrade seized it, and said that I should lay that up for lunch or dinner. Soon after he was let out to work at haying in a neighboring field, whither he went every day, and would not be back till noon; so he bade me good day, saying that he doubted if he should see me again.

When I came out of prison — for some one interfered, and paid that tax — I did not perceive that great changes had taken place on the common, such as he observed who went in a youth and emerged a gray-headed man; and yet a change had come to my eyes come over the scene — the town, and State, and country, greater than any that mere time could effect. I saw yet more distinctly the State in which I lived. I saw to what extent the people among whom I lived could be trusted as good neighbors and friends; that their friendship was for summer weather only; that they did not greatly propose to do right; that they were a distinct race from me by their prejudices and superstitions, as the Chinamen and Malays are that in their sacrifices to humanity they ran no risks, not even to their property; that after all they were not so noble but they treated the thief as he had treated them, and hoped, by a certain outward observance and a few prayers, and by walking in a particular straight through useless path from time to time, to save their souls. This may be to judge my neighbors harshly; for I believe that many of them are not aware that they have such an institution as the jail in their village.

It was formerly the custom in our village, when a poor debtor came out of jail, for his acquaintances to salute him, looking through their fingers, which were crossed to represent the jail window, "How do ye do?" My neighbors did not this salute me, but first looked at me, and then at one another, as if I had returned from a long journey. I was put into jail as I was going to the shoemaker's to get a shoe which was mender. When I was let out the next morning, I proceeded to finish my errand, and, having put on my mended show, joined a huckleberry party, who were impatient to put themselves under my conduct; and in half an hour — for the horse was soon tackled — was in the midst of a huckleberry field, on one of our highest hills, two miles off, and then the State was nowhere to be seen.

This is the whole history of "My Prisons."
....
The authority of government, even such as I am willing to submit to — for I will cheerfully obey those who know and can do better than I, and in many things even those who neither know nor can do so well — is still an impure one: to be strictly just, it must have the sanction and consent of the governed. It can have no pure right over my person and property but what I concede to it. The progress from an absolute to a limited monarchy, from a limited monarchy to a democracy, is a progress toward a true respect for the individual. Even the Chinese philosopher was wise enough to regard the individual as the basis of the empire. Is a democracy, such as we know it, the last improvement possible in government? Is it not possible to take a step further towards recognizing and organizing the rights of man? There will never be a really free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly. I please myself with imagining a State at last which can afford to be just to all men, and to treat the individual with respect as a neighbor; which even would not think it inconsistent with its own repose if a few were to live aloof from it, not meddling with it, nor embraced by it, who fulfilled all the duties of neighbors and fellow men. A State which bore this kind of fruit, and suffered it to drop off as fast as it ripened, would prepare the way for a still more perfect and glorious State, which I have also imagined, but not yet anywhere seen.

Patrick Henry

2011-02-04T09:32:00.000-08:00

Sorry I missed today's class. I'm sure all went well, though as you are an awesome bunch of students.

Read Patrick Henry's speech, listen to an actor read it out loud, and learn a bit about the man and the situation which provoked him at this website.

logical fallacies

2011-02-01T14:38:00.000-08:00

If you want to know more about logical fallacies, check out this online fallacy quiz.

logic puzzles

2011-01-31T14:11:00.000-08:00

So you like logic? Try these:

The Puzzle of the Hyena's Alias

The Agency for Counter-Terrorism (ACT) has received information that a European terrorist known as "the Hyena" has entered the United States under an assumed name. Unfortunately, ACT has also received conflicting reports of the Hyena's alias, making it hard to track him down, especially since each of the names is a common one. Four informants were questioned and gave the following information about the alias:

John Wilson
James Moore
Denied that the first name was "John". Last name: "Taylor".
Stated that the previous three informants were each right about one name and wrong about the other.

According to the ACT, the fourth informant is the most reliable. Assuming that the fourth informant is correct, what is the Hyena's alias?

The Puzzle of the Masked Men

During a bank robbery, one of the masked robbers shot a bank guard. The police caught all four robbers and interrogated them in an attempt to determine which was the shooter. Each was questioned while attached to a lie detector machine and testified as follows:

Alfie: I'm innocent.
Benjy: Charlie is guilty.
Charlie: Either Alfie or Benjy was the shooter, I'm not sure which.
Denny: Benjy didn't tell the truth when he said that Charlie did it.

According to the lie detector operator, either all but one of the robbers lied or all but one told the truth―he couldn't tell which―and this was confirmed by subsequent evidence. The police are confused and come to you as a logician for help. Can you determine who shot the bank guard?

The Puzzle of the Dead Presidents

After your first success in helping the police crack a bank robbery (see the Resource below), they turn to you for help with another case: A gang of five men wearing masks of five former presidents have committed a series of armored car robberies.
During one of the crimes, the driver of the armored car was shot and killed by a robber. There are no witnesses to the shooting other than the five criminals involved. The gang was caught while still wearing their masks and have refused to reveal their identities, so the police know them only by the name of the president each impersonated. The police determine that each member of the gang had a specific job: the mastermind, the lookout, the wheelman, the safecracker, and the triggerman. Unfortunately, the police aren't able to figure out which role each "president" played. The police are especially interested in who killed the armored car driver, namely, the triggerman.
The members of the gang were questioned individually while attached to a lie detector, and each criminal made only two statements. Assuming that the lie detector is accurate, each criminal made one true statement and one false statement, but the operator of the detector couldn't tell which was which. As usual, the police are baffled.

Kennedy:
1. Johnson is the mastermind.
2. Neither Reagan nor Johnson is the lookout.
Johnson:
1. If Nixon is not the safecracker, then I am.
2. Ford is not the wheelman.
Nixon:
1. I am not the lookout.
2. Kennedy is not the mastermind.
Ford:
1. If Johnson is the wheelman, then Nixon is the lookout.
2. Kennedy's second statement is false.
Reagan:
1. Nixon's first statement is true.
2. Ford's first statement is false.

Can you determine who the triggerman was?

I will post answers next week. Feel free to post your solutions in the comments.

Declarations

2011-01-31T13:52:00.000-08:00

Declaration of Independence. When you go to this site, feel free to play around, learn some things about one of the most important documents in our nation's history, and then click on "read transcript" in order to get a legible version to work from. If for some reason, the link I've provided does not work, you must still do the assignment. this is a popular enough text, that you should be able to find it without trouble.

The Declaration of Sentiments,
Seneca Falls Conference, 1848

Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott, two American activists in the movement to abolish slavery called together the first conference to address Women's rights and issues in Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848. Part of the reason for doing so had been that Mott had been refused permission to speak at the world anti-slavery convention in London, even though she had been an official delegate. Applying the analysis of human freedom developed in the Abolitionist movement, Stanton and others began the public career of modern feminist analysis

The Declaration of the Seneca Falls Convention, using the model of the US Declaration of Independence, forthrightly demanded that the rights of women as right-bearing individuals be acknowledged and respectd by society. It was signed by sixty-eight women and thirty-two men.

The Declaration of Sentiments

When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one portion of the family of man to assume among the people of the earth a position different from that which they have hitherto occupied, but one to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes that impel them to such a course.
We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights governments are instituted, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of those who suffer from it to refuse allegiance to it, and to insist upon the institution of a new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer. while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their duty to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of the women under this government, and such is now the necessity which constrains them to demand the equal station to which they are entitled. The history of mankind is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations on the part of man toward woman, having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over her. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
The history of mankind is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations on the part of man toward woman, having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyrranny over her. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has never permitted her to exercise her inalienable right to the elective franchise.
He has compelled her to submit to laws, in the formation of which she had no voice.
He has withheld from her rights which are given to the most ignorant and degraded men--both natives and foreigners.
Having deprived her of this first right of a citizedn, the elective franchise, thereby leaving her without representation in the halls of legislation, he has oppressed her on all sides.
He has made her, if married, in the eye of the law, civilly dead.
He has taken from her all right in property, even to the wages she earns.
He has made her, morally, an irresponsible being, as she can commit many crimes with impunity, provided they be done in the presence of her husband. In the covenant of marriage, she is compelled to promise obedience to her husband, he becoming, to all intents and purposes, her master--the law giving him power to deprive her of her liberty, and to administer chastisement.
He has so framed the laws of divorce, as to what shall be the proper causes, and in case of separation, to whom the guardianship of the children shall be given, as to be wholly regardles of the happiness of women--the law, in all cases, going upon a flase supposition of the supremacy of man, and giving all power into his hands.
After depriving her of all rights as a married woman, if single, and the owner of property, he has taxed her to support a government which recognizes her only when her property can be made profitable to it.
He has monopolized nearly all the profitable employments, and from those she is permitted to follow, she receives but a scanty remuneration. He closes against her all the avenues to wealth and distinction which he considers most homorable to himself. As a teacher of theoloy, medicine, or law, she is not known.
He has denied her the facilities for obtaining a thorough education, all colleges being closed against her.
He allows her in church, as well as state, but a suborinate position, claiming apostolic authority for her exclusion from the ministry, and, with some exceptions, from any public participation in the affairs of the church.
He has created a false public sentiment by giving to the world a different code of morals for men and women, by which moral delinquencies which exclude women from society, are not only tolerated, but deemed of little account in man.
He has usurped the prerogative of Jehovah himself, claiming it as his right to assign for her a sphere of action, when that belongs to her conscience and to her God.
He has endeavored, in every way that he could, to destroy her conficence in her own powers, to lessen her self-respect, and to make her willing to lead a dependent and abject life.
Now, in view of this entire disfranchisement of one-half the people of this country, their social and religious degradation--in view of the unjust laws above mentioned, and because women do feel themselves aggrieved, oppressed, and fraudulently deprived of their most sacred rights, we insist that they have immediate admission to all the rights and privileges which belong to them as citizens of the United States.

Emerson

2011-01-27T13:41:00.000-08:00

Ralph Waldo Emerson: Self-Reliance (1841) excerpt

Emerson is the seminal intellectual, philosophical voice of the nineteenth century in America. Although readers today may find his thought slightly facile, even unrealistic--times do change--his influence among his contemporaries and those who followed immediately after him was enormous. Emerson was the spokesman for the American Transcendentalists, a group of New England romantic writers, which included Thoreau, who believed that intuition was the means to truth, that god is revealed through intuition to each individual. They celebrated the independent individual and strongly supported democracy. The essay "Self-Reliance," from which an excerpt is presented here, is the clearest, most memorable example of Emerson's philosophy of individualism, an idea that is deeply embedded in American culture. His variety of individualism grows of the self's intuitive connection with the Over-Soul and is not simply a matter of self-centered assertion or immature narcissism

Consider what Emerson says about the importance of non-conformity and independent beliefs and contrast this with the prevailing attitude in contemporary America.

"Ne te quasiveris extra."

"Man is his own star; and the soul that can
Render an honest and a perfect man
Commands all light, all influence, all fate;
Nothing to him falls early or too late.
Our acts our angels are, or good or ill,
Our fatal shadows that walk by us still."
--Epilogue to Beaumont and Fletcher's Honest Man's Fortune

Cast the bantling on the rocks,
Suckle him with the she-wolf's teat,
Wintered with the hawk and fox,
Power and speed be hands and feet.

I read the other day some verses written by an eminent painter which were original and not conventional. The soul always hears an admonition in such lines, let the subject be what it may. The sentiment they instil is of more value than any thought they may contain. To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men,--that is genius. Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universal sense; for the inmost in due time becomes the outmost,--and our first thought is rendered back to us by the trumpets of the Last Judgment. Familiar as the voice of the mind is to each, the highest merit we ascribe to Moses, Plato, and Milton is that they set at naught books and traditions, and spoke not what men, but what they thought. A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty. Great works of art have no more affecting lesson for US than this. They teach us to abide by our spontaneous impression with good-humored inflexibility then most when the whole Cry of voices is on the other side. Else, to-morrow a stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another.

There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better for worse as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried. Not for nothing one face, one character, one fact makes much impression on him, and another none. This sculpture in the memory is not without preéstablishcd harmony. The eye was placed where one ray should fall, that it might testify of that particular ray. We but half express ourselves, and are ashamed of that divine idea which each of us represents. It may be safely trusted as proportionate and of good issues, so it be faithfully imparted, but God will not have his work made manifest by cowards. A man is relieved and gay when he has put his heart into his work and done his best; but what he has said or done otherwise shall give hint no peace. It is a deliverance which does not deliver. In the attempt his genius deserts him; no muse befriends; no invention, no hope.

Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string. Accept the place the divine providence has found for your the society of your contemporaries, the connection of events. Great men have always done so, and confided themselves childlike to the genius of their age, betraying their perception that the absolutely trustworthy was seated at their heart, working through their hands, predominating in all their being. And we are now men, and must accept in the highest mind the same transcendent destiny; and not minors and invalids in a protected corner, not cowards fleeing before a revolution, but guides, redeemers, and benefactors, obeying the Almighty effort, and advancing on Chaos and the Dark. (Chaos and the Dark is a reference to Milton's Paradise Lost. Feel free to look it up online. Post your discoveries as comments.)

....

These are the voices which we hear in solitude, but they grow faint and inaudible as we enter into the world. Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members. Society is a joint-stock company, in which the members agree, for the better securing of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the eater. The virtue in most request is conformity. Self-reliance is its aversion. It loves not realities and creators, but names and customs.

Whoso would be a man, must be a nonconformist. He who would gather immortal palms must not he hindered by the name of goodness, but must explore if it he goodness. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage of the world.

....

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day. — 'Ah, so you shall be sure to be misunderstood.' — Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.

If you recall which author we've studied was friends with Emerson, please post in comments. What was the nature of their relationship? Is there anything interesting we should know about Emerson? If so, post in comments.

Ben Franklin

2011-01-27T13:33:00.000-08:00

from The Autobiography
Benjamin Franklin
I have been the more particular in this description of my journey, and shall be so of my first entry into that city, that you may in your mind compare such unlikely beginnings with the figure I have since made there. I was in my working dress, my best clothes being to come round by sea. I was dirty from my journey; my pockets were stuffed out with shirts and stockings, and I knew no soul nor where to look for lodging. I was fatigued with traveling, rowing, and want of rest, I was very hungry; and my whole stock of cash consisted of a Dutch dollar, and about a shilling in copper. The latter I gave the people of the boat for my passage, who at first refused it, on account of my rowing; but I insisted on their taking it. A man being sometimes more generous when he has but a little money than when he has plenty, perhaps through fear of being thought to have but little.
Then I walked up the street, gazing about till near the market house I met a boy with bread. I had made many a meal on bread, and, inquiring where he got it, I went immediately to the baker’s he directed me to, in Second Street, and asked for biscuit, intending such as we had in Boston; but they, it seems, were not made in Philadelphia. Then I asked for a three-penny loaf, and was told they had none such. So not considering or knowing the difference of money, and the greater cheapness nor the names of his bread, I bade him give me three-penny worth of any sort. He gave me, accordingly, three great puffy rolls. I was surprised at the quantity, but took it, and, having no room in my pockets, walked off with a roll under each arm, and eating the other. Thus I went up Market Street as far as Fourth Street, passing by the door of Mr. Read, my future wife’s father; when she, standing at the door, saw me, and thought I made, as I certainly did, a most awkward, ridiculous appearance. Then I turned and went down Chestnut Street and part of Walnut Street, eating my roll all the way, and, coming round, found myself again at Market Street wharf, near the boat I came in, to which I went for a draft of the river water; and, being filled with one of my rolls, gave the other two to a woman and her child that came down the river in the boat with us, and were waiting to go farther.
Thus refreshed, I walked again up the street, which by this time had many clean-dressed people in it, who were all walking the same way. I joined them, and thereby was led into the great meetinghouse of the Quakers near the market. I sat down among them, and, after looking round awhile and hearing nothing said, being very drowsy through labor and want of rest the preceding night, I fell fast asleep, and continued so till the meeting broke up, when one was kind enough to rouse me. This was, therefore, the first house I was in, or slept in, in Philadelphia. . . .

Arriving at Moral Perfection
It was about this time I conceived the bold and arduous project of arriving at moral perfection. I wished to live without committing any fault at any time; I would conquer all that either natural inclination, custom, or company might lead me into. As I knew, or thought I knew, what was right and wrong, I did not see why I might not always do the one and avoid the other. But I soon found I had undertaken a task of more difficulty than I had imagined. While my care was employed in guarding against one fault, I was often surprised by another; habit took the advantage of inattention; inclination was sometimes too strong for reason. I concluded, at length, that the mere speculative conviction that it was our interest to be completely virtuous, was not sufficient to prevent our slipping; and that the contrary habits must be broken, and good ones acquired and established, before we can have any dependence on a steady, uniform rectitude of conduct. For this purpose I therefore contrived the following method.
In the various enumerations of the moral virtues I had met with in my reading, I found the catalog more or less numerous, as different writers included more or fewer ideas under the same name. Temperance, for example, was by some confined to eating and drinking, while by others it was extended to mean the moderating every other pleasure, appetite, inclination, or passion, bodily or mental, even to our avarice and ambition. I proposed to myself, for the sake of clearness, to use rather more names, with fewer ideas annexed to each, than a few names with more ideas; and I included under thirteen names of virtues all that at that time occurred to me as necessary or desirable, and annexed to each a short precept, which fully expressed the extent I gave to its meaning.
These names of virtues, with their precepts, were:
1. Temperance. Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.
2. Silence. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.
3. Order. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.
4. Resolution. Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.
5. Frugality. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing.
6. Industry. Lose no time; be always employed in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.
7. Sincerity. Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
8. Justice. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
9. Moderation. Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
10. Cleanliness. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, clothes, or habitation.
11. Tranquility. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
12. Chastity. Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another’s peace or reputation.
13. Humility. Imitate Jesus and Socrates.
My intention being to acquire the habitude of all these virtues, I judged it would be well not to distract my attention by attempting the whole at once, but to fix it on one of them at a time; and, when I should be master of that, then to proceed to another, and so on, till I should have gone through the thirteen; and, as the previous acquisition of some might facilitate the acquisition of certain others, I arranged them with that view, as they stand above. Temperance first, as it tends to procure that coolness and clearness of head, which is so necessary where constant vigilance was to be kept up, and guard maintained against the unremitting attraction of ancient habits, and the force of perpetual temptations. This being acquired and established, silence would be more easy; and my desire being to gain knowledge at the same time that I improved in virtue, and considering that in conversation it was obtained rather by the use of the ears than of the tongue, and therefore wishing to break a habit I was getting into of prattling, punning, and joking, which only made me acceptable to trifling company, I gave silence the second place. This and the next, order, I expected would allow me more time for attending to my project and my studies. Resolution, once become habitual, would keep me firm in my endeavors to obtain all the subsequent virtues; frugality and industry freeing me from my remaining debt, and producing affluence and independence, would make more easy the practice of sincerity and justice, etc., etc. Conceiving then, that, agreeably to the advice of Pythagoras in his Golden Verses, daily examination would be necessary, I contrived the following method for conducting that examination.
I made a little book, in which I allotted a page for each of the virtues. I ruled each page with red ink, so as to have seven columns, one for each day of the week, marking each column with a letter for the day. I crossed these columns with thirteen red lines, marking the beginning of each line with the first letter of one of the virtues, on which line, and in its proper column, I might mark, by a little black spot, every fault I found upon examination to have been committed respecting that virtue upon that day.
I determined to give a week’s strict attention to each of the virtues successively. Thus, in the first week, my great guard was to avoid every the least offense against temperance, leaving the other virtues to their ordinary chance, only marking every evening the faults of the day. Thus, if in the first week I could keep my first line, marked T, clear of spots, I supposed the habit of that virtue so much strengthened, and its opposite weakened, that I might venture extending my attention to include the next, and for the following week keep both lines clear of spots. Proceeding thus to the last, I could go through a course complete in thirteen weeks, and four courses in a year. And like him who, having a garden to weed, does not attempt to eradicate all the bad herbs at once, which would exceed his reach and his strength, but works on one of the beds at a time, and, having accomplished the first, proceeds to a second, so I should have, I hoped, the encouraging pleasure of seeing on my pages the progress I made in virtue, by clearing successively my lines of their spots, till in the end, by a number of courses, I should be happy in viewing a clean book, after a thirteen weeks’ daily examination. . . .

I encourage you to learn a bit about the man, as well.Ben Franklin Biography
Feel free to post anything interesting you learn about him in the comments... for example, what was his position on the national language? How "moral" was his life? Besides flying a kite in a thunder storm, what makes him important? (ah... wouldn't it be cool to start the new semester with extra credit for extra blog participation)

Are you serious? You already want to start thinking about second semester!?

2011-01-20T10:53:00.000-08:00

Because people are already asking, your next SSR book will be a non-fiction (true), non-narrative (not a story) book. Don't groan. There are some really interesting books out there. Here's how to find them:

Ms. Smith in the library has a list of ideas for you guys.

Talk to each other. Post recommendations here. If you've read anything good that fits the bill, let us know. In the past books like "Reefer Madness", "Reviving Ophelia" and "Botany of Desire" have been popular.

Earlier this year I posted some math and science related books. If you're a "math and science person" you might look back at that list. It's in the archive from Sept 2010.

Talk to your teachers or the other adults in your life. Ask what they're reading or what they would recommend, especially if you share their interests. For example, AP US History student might read something that Ms. Gaimes recommends. (You may not read a textbook for another class.)

Follow your interests. If you are an ambitious person, you might read "Outliers." If you love forensic science, you might read "Diagnosis From the Dead." If you enjoy politics, you might read a book by any number of political figures. If you enjoy cross country, you might read about how to train for a marathon.

Still stuck for ideas? Check out the New York Times non-fiction bestseller list, but please note that some of these are narrative (biography or autobiography) and so would not work for the assignment.

Jon Stewart talks about Huck Finn

2011-01-20T06:56:00.000-08:00

Check out a bit of satire about one of the greatest satires!

vocab for the final

2011-01-14T14:49:00.001-08:00

FISRT SEMESTER H.A.L. VOCABULARY
Good/ Bad Words
Malefactor: culprit; evildoer
Beneficent: beneficial; characterized by performing acts of kindness or charity
Depraved: morally debased; wretched
Noxious: harmful to living things; injurious to health
Mercenary: motivated only by greed
Slothful: lazy
Altruistic: concerned unselfishly for others’ welfare
Magnanimous: generous, noble in spirit
Virulent: extremely infectious; irritating, harsh or hateful
Malevolent: ill-willed; causing evil or harm to others
Diabolical: fiendish; wicked
Demagogue: leader, rabble-rouser, usually appealing to emotion or prejudice
Reprobate: morally undisciplined person
Profligate: corrupt, wasteful, extravagant
Invidious: likely to provoke ill-will, offensive
Infamy: reputation for bad deeds
Boon: blessing, something to be thankful for
Amenity: the quality of being pleasant or attractive; agreeableness
Munificent: generous
Malignant: disposed to do evil; injurious
Nefarious: vicious, evil
Odious: hateful, contemptible
Indolent: habitually lazy, idle
Benign: of a kind and gentle disposition; favorable
Philanthropic: humanitarian; charitable

Friendly/Unfriendly Words
Provocative: tending to provoke a response, e.g., anger or disagreement
Compromise: to settle a dispute by terms agreeable to both sides
Mitigate: to soften or make milder
Collaborate: to cooperate, work together
Camaraderie: trust, sociability amongst friends
Calm: peaceful
Tactful: considerate, skillful in acting to avoid offense to others
Reclusive: preferring to live in isolation
Misanthropic: characterized by a hatred or scorn for humankind
Affable: friendly, easy to approach
Placid: undisturbed; calm quiet
Empathy: identification with the feelings of others
Winsome: charming, happily engaging
Querulous: complaining, irritable
Rancorous: bitter, hateful
Deleterious: harmful, destructive, detrimental
Convergence: the state of separate elements joining or coming together
Benevolent: friendly and helpful
Compassion: sympathy, helpfulness or mercy
Congregation: a crowd of people, an assembly
Suppress: to end an activity, e.g., to prevent the dissemination of information
Antagonist: foe, opponent, adversary
Incompatible: opposed in nature, not able to live or work together
Amicable: friendly, agreeable
Reconciliation: the act of agreement after a quarrel, the resolution of a dispute

True/ False Words
Exorbitant: extravagant, greater than reasonable
Prevaricate: to quibble, evade the truth
Probity: complete and confirmed integrity; uprightness, honesty
Rectitude: moral uprightness; honesty
Hypothesis: assumption, theory requiring proof
Candor: honesty, openness
Furtive: secret, stealthy
Hyperbolic: purposefully exaggerated language
Feign: to pretend, give false impression; to invent falsely
Fawn: to flatter excessively, seek the favor of
Vindicate: to clear from blame r suspicion
Covert: hidden, secret
Toady: flatter, yes-man, hanger on
Dupe: to deceive, trick
Enshroud: to cover, enclose with a dark cover
Sycophant: self-serving flatterer; yes-man
Beguile: to deceive, delude, cheat
Abscond: to depart secretly
Substantiate: to verify, confirm, provide supporting evidence
Surreptitious: secret, stealthy
Spurious: lacking authenticity, false
Illicit: illegal, improper
Mendacious: dishonest
Perfidious: faithless, disloyal, untrustworthy
Pretentious: pretending to be important intelligent or cultured

Respect/Disrespect Words
Defame: to slander, speak evil of, to libel
Disdain: to regard with scorn or contempt
Denounce: to accuse, blame
Deride: to mock, ridicule, make fun of
Supercilious: arrogant, haughty, overbearing, condescending
Lionize: to treat as celebrity
Castigate: to punish, chastise, criticize severely
Discredit: to harm the reputation of, dishonor or disgrace
Haughty: arrogant and condescending
Irreverent: disrespectful
Rebuke: to reprimand, scold
Depreciate: to lessen in value, belittle
Decry: to belittle, openly condemn
Denigrate: to slur someone’s reputation; attack one’s character
Condescending: possessing an attitude of superiority, patronizing
Revile: to criticize with harsh language, verbally abuse
Censure: to find fault with and condemn as wrong; blame
Sardonic: cynical, scornfully mocking
Adulation: high praise
Disparage: to belittle, speak disrespectfully about
Diatribe: bitter verbal attack
Absolve: to forgive. Free from blame
Venerable: respected because of age
Ignominious: disgraceful and dishonorable
Berate: to scold harshly

Words relating to literature and language
Aphorism- old saying or pity statement
Apocryphal-not genuine, fictional
Allusion-indirect reference
Banal-trite, overly common
Banter-playful conversation
Articulate-well spoken
Cogent-logically forceful, compelling, convincing
Coherent-intelligible, lucid, understandable
Colloquial-characteristic of informal speech
Construe-to explain or interpret
Dictum- authoritative statement, popular saying
Dissonant- harsh and unpleasant sounding
Elegy- mournful poem, usually about the dead
Equivocate-to intentionally use vague or ambiguous language
Importune-to beg, ask repeatedly
Implicit-implied, not directly expressed
Invective-verbal abuse
Lampoon- to attack with satire, mock harshly
Lexicon- dictionary, list of words
Cajole- to flatter, coax, persuade
Malapropism-humorous misuse of words
Opine- to express an opinion
Pastiche-piece of literature or music imitating or made up of other works
Platitude-stale, overused expression
Raconteur- witty, skillful storyteller

Economy+ Money
Avarice- greed
Benefactor-someone giving aid or money
Covet-to desire strongly something possessed by another
Cupidity-greed
Fallow-uncultivated, unused
Fecund-fertile, fruitful, productive
Gross-total before deductions
Husband-to manage thriftily
Impecunious- poor, having no money
Indigent- very poor
Scintilla- trace amounts
Dearth- lack, scarcity, insufficiency
Jaded- tired by excess, cynical
Paucity-scarcity, lack
Ponderous- weighty, heavy, large
Accretion- growth in size or amount
Lassitude-lethargy, sluggishness
Manual-hand operated, physical
Mendicant-beggar
Opulence- wealth
Ostentatious-showy
Palatial- magnificent, like a palace
Parsimony- stinginess
Quiescence-inactivity, silliness
Remuneration- payment or reward for work

New York Times invites student opinions on the new edition of Huck Finn

2011-01-12T13:33:00.000-08:00

You can go to link to NY times or read the article here (if you follow the link, you can comment on the site)

Should the Racial Epithets Be Removed From ‘Huck Finn’?

By KATHERINE SCHULTEN

Questions about issues in the news for students 13 and older.

A new edition of “Huckleberry Finn” removes the 219 uses of the word “nigger” in the novel and replaces them with “slave.” The professor who proposed the idea said he did it because he was hesitant to pronounce the word when he was teaching the book, and because he wanted an edition “not for scholars, but for younger people and general readers.” What do you think about tinkering with a literary classic like this? Have you studied “Huck” in school? How did your teacher handle the language?

In “Publisher Tinkers With Twain,” Julie Bosman writes:

A new edition of “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” is missing something.
Throughout the book — 219 times in all — the word “nigger” is replaced by “slave,” a substitution that was made by NewSouth Books, a publisher based in Alabama, which plans to release the edition in February.
Alan Gribben, a professor of English at Auburn University at Montgomery, approached the publisher with the idea in July. Mr. Gribben said Tuesday that he had been teaching Mark Twain for decades and always hesitated before reading aloud the common racial epithet, which is used liberally in the book, a reflection of social attitudes in the mid-19th century.
“I found myself right out of graduate school at Berkeley not wanting to pronounce that word when I was teaching either ‘Huckleberry Finn’ or ‘Tom Sawyer,’ ” he said. “And I don’t think I’m alone.”
Mr. Gribben, who combined “Huckleberry Finn” with “Tom Sawyer” in a single volume and also supplied an introduction, said he worried that “Huckleberry Finn” had fallen off reading lists, and wanted to offer an edition that is not for scholars, but for younger people and general readers.
“I’m by no means sanitizing Mark Twain,” Mr. Gribben said. “The sharp social critiques are in there. The humor is intact. I just had the idea to get us away from obsessing about this one word, and just let the stories stand alone.” (The book also substitutes “Indian” for “injun.”)

Students: Tell us how you feel about removing this word from “Huckleberry Finn.” Do you agree with those who say it is “censorship” and that the words of a literary icon like Twain should not be altered, or do you think this new edition is a good idea? Do you find the word offensive in the context of “Huck Finn”? Do you agree or disagree with the English teacher in the article who said, “If it’s too offensive, it doesn’t belong in school, but if it expresses the way people felt about race or slavery in the context of their time, that’s something I’d talk about in teaching it.”
Is the use of this racial epithet in the classroom different from its use outside the classroom? How?

New Eddition of Huck Finn coming out 2/15/11

2011-01-05T16:26:00.000-08:00

The New Edition of Huckleberry Finn will not use the N word. Check out what people have to say about it! article about new Huck Finn

Maps of Huck and Jim's journey

2010-12-08T18:16:00.000-08:00

Thank you, Aleksandra, for requesting this :)

What exactly am I supose dto do for Tuesday the 7th?

2010-12-06T19:34:00.001-08:00

Good question... in class I mentioned that you didn't need to finish the satire work becuase the mini-essay was plenty of work. But then later, I realized that I'd already guessed that we'd need extra time for satire (gee, guess there's a reason people say you should write things down), so I'd already pushed the next reading/ mini-essay back to the 9th. So what does this mean for you? Essentially, that you have no homework due tomorrow. I know you're disappointed, but you can always use the time to get ahead :)

VERY Useful Site

2010-12-04T18:50:00.000-08:00

As you're writing your mini-essays, are you finding yourself wondering exactly where in the book the hair ball was mentioned? Or maybe you're thinking about our conversations about race and want to look for a pattern in how certain words such as black, white, or n--- are used? Check out this site where you can type in specific words or phrases and the computer will search the whole book and tell you where they show up.

Still want to know more about Twain?

2010-12-03T18:37:00.000-08:00

Check out this interactive scrap book. What new information did you learn and how does it inform your understanding of Huck Finn's adventure?

Times Magazine on Mark Twain

2010-12-01T18:29:00.000-08:00

Time Magazine compares Twain to some contemporary stars

Read the article above and weigh in... which points do you agree with? Which don't you? Why?

Vocab for B4

2010-12-01T12:24:00.000-08:00

Fecund-
fertile, productive (adj)
gross-
total before deductions (n)
husband-
to manage thriftily (v)
Impecunious-
very poor, without money (adj)
Indigent-
impecunious

What should you do since we didn't have class?

2010-11-29T18:23:00.000-08:00

First, debrief about the day... talk to your parents, read the news, do what you need to do to feel normal again... then:

Follow your reading schedule and write the mini-essay due Wed.
I know you missed today's conversations, but you can still write the min-essay. Wed is a minimum day, but we;ll work hard to get you guys caught up, so don't worry :)

Please pass the word along to your friends who might not think to check the blog. See you Wed.
-Ms Ohana

What others have said about Twain

2010-11-25T15:51:00.000-08:00

".the first truly American writer, and all of us since are his heirs."
-- William Faulkner

"All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called "Huckleberry Finn." all American writing comes from that. There was nothing before. There has been nothing as good since."
-- Ernest Hemingway

"The mark of how good '"Huckleberry Finn" has to be is that one can compare it to a number of our best modern American novels and it stands up page for page, awkward here, sensational there - absolutely the equal of one of those rare incredible first novels that come along once or twice in a decade."
-- Norman Mailer

"I believe that Mark Twain had a clearer vision of life, that he came nearer to its elementals and was less deceived by its false appearances, than any other American who has ever presumed to manufacture generalizations, not excepting Emerson. I believe that he was the true father of our national literature, the first genuinely American artist of the royal blood."
-- H.L. Mencken

Do you agree with these people? Why or why not?

What did Twain sat about Thanksgiving?

2010-11-25T10:31:00.000-08:00

Here's what Mark Twain wrote about Thanksgiving:

"The observance of Thanksgiving Day--as a function--has become general of late years. The Thankfulness is not so general. This is natural. Two-thirds of the nation have always had hard luck and a hard time during the year, and this has a calming effect upon their enthusiasm."
- Following the Equator
"Thanksgiving Day, a function which originated in New England two or three centuries ago when those people recognized that they really had something to be thankful for--annually, not oftener--if they had succeeded in exterminating their neighbors, the Indians, during the previous twelve months instead of getting exterminated by their neighbors, the Indians. Thanksgiving Day became a habit, for the reason that in the course of time, as the years drifted on, it was perceived that the exterminating had ceased to be mutual and was all on the white man's side, consequently on the Lord's side; hence it was proper to thank the Lord for it and extend the usual annual compliments."
- Mark Twain's Autobiography
"THANKSGIVING DAY. Let us all give humble, hearty, and sincere thanks now, but the turkeys. In the island of Fiji they do not use turkeys; they use plumbers. It does not become you and me to sneer at Fiji."
-The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson
"No one ever seems to think of the Deity's side of it; apparently no one concerns himself to inquire how much or how little He has had to be thankful for during the same period; apparently no one has had good feeling enough to wish He might have a Thanksgiving day too. There is nothing right about this."
- A Thanksgiving Sentiment

Things for true Twain fans

2010-11-24T15:47:00.000-08:00

Would you like a Mark Twain screen saver?
To watch Ken Burns movie about Mark Twain (in 24 parts, but still good)?
Play a Mark Twain trivia game?
Visit the Huck Finn web page?

Thinksgiving Reading

2010-11-24T10:18:00.000-08:00

You have been given quite a few pages to read over Thanksgiving. What questions come up as you're reading? How is Huck changing? Does anything strike you as strange in the story? Post questions and comments about the reading in response to this post. I encourage you to comment on your classmate's comments.

Twain's Other Works

2010-11-24T09:40:00.000-08:00

Read another text by Twain ( He wrote TONS of material--I suggest an essay or short story). Comment on it:
Ideas:
Was it funny? If so why?
How did it relate to Huck Finn?
What did it reveal about Twain?
What was the theme or message of the piece?
How does the way he wrote it relate to his message?

Other Things by Twain

Mark Twain in the News

2010-11-23T09:35:00.000-08:00

Even though he's been dead for decades, there are still regular mentions of Twain in the news. Whether it's the publication of his autobiography, a new book about his affair, a bit about Tina Fey winning the Mark Twain Prize for humor, or an allusion to one of his short stories in a local newspaper, he's everywhere! Find a contemporary news text which refers to Twain and post the link in the comment section for all of us to see. Along with your post, give a brief (1-2 sentence) explanation.

Reading Schedule

2010-11-22T12:40:00.001-08:00

Huck Finn Reading/ Writing Schedule

	Date due	Chapters Read	Mini-Essay Topic
1	11/18	1-3
2	11/22	4-7	Voice and style of the storyteller
3	11/29	8-18	Please note this is DOUBLE the reading, so you are NOT required to write anything.
4	12/1	19-22	Jim and Huck’s relationship
5	12/3	23-28	The Significance of a Minor Character (anyone other than Jim or Huck)
6	12/9	29-33	Directions (N,S,E,W)
7	12/13	33-38	Ethics
8	12/15	39- end	Theme

Instead of writing a final essay on this book, you will write many mini-essays, one for each night that you are reading Huck Finn. Each mini-essay should be 1-2 pages typed and double spaced. It should express an opinion on the given topic, as related to the reading, and support that opinion with evidence and analytical commentary from the text.

Ideally, this frequent writing will give you a chance to explore lots of different ideas and also polish your writing skills. Sometimes the topic will build off of the previous day’s discussion, inviting you to apply the ideas to a new section of reading, and sometimes it will help to prepare you for the topic of the following class meeting. The extra special benefit of this is that there will be NO reading or writing assigned over Winter break, since we will have already done all of our reading and writing for Huck Finn.

Because this is a lot of writing, I will not be reading all of your pieces. I will read approximately 1/3 of the pieces turned in at a time, but not disclose which 1/3 I am reading until everyone has had a piece read. This means that 1/3 of your pieces will be read by me, but as you don’t know which, it is in your best interest to consistently do your best work. If your piece is chosen to be read, and if you did not do the piece, you will receive a zero. Though I will not read all of your pieces, other students will occasionally read your work.

2010-11-22T09:30:00.000-08:00

Read the attached letter to the editor that Twain wrote. What does it tell you about him? What kind of obituary do you think he's looking for? Either comment or attempt to write an obituary that would make him proud!

Letter to the Editor

Twain's Ideas about humor

2010-11-21T09:22:00.000-08:00

Read this essay by Twain about humor and then decide if you think Huck Finn fits his definition? What contemporary texts (books, magazines, TV shows) fit it?

How to Tell a Story

THE HUMOROUS STORY AN AMERICAN
DEVELOPMENT.--IT'S DIFFERENCE
FROM COMIC AND WITTY STORIES. I do not claim that I can tell a story as it ought to be told. I only claim to know how a story ought to be told, for I have been almost daily in the company of the most expert storytellers for many years.
There are several kinds of stories, but only one difficult kind--the humorous. I will talk mainly about that one. The humorous story is American, the comic story is English, the witty story is French. The humorous story depends for its effect upon the manner of the telling; the comic story and the witty story upon the matter.
The humorous story may be spun out to great length, and may wander around as much as it pleases, and arrive nowhere in particular; but the comic and witty stories must be brief and end with a point. The humorous story bubbles gently along, the others burst.
The humorous story is strictly a work of art,--high and delicate art,--and only an artist can tell it; but no art is necessary in telling the comic and the witty story; anybody can do it. The art of telling a humorous story--understand, I mean by word of mouth, not print--was created in America, and has remained at home.
The humorous story is told gravely; the teller does his best to conceal the fact that he even dimly suspects that there is anything funny about it; but the teller of the comic story tells you beforehand that it is one of the funniest things he has ever heard, then tells it with eager delight, and is the first person to laugh when he gets through. And sometimes, if he has had good success, he is so glad and happy that he will repeat the "nub" of it and glance around from face to face, collecting applause, and then repeat it again. It is a pathetic thing to see.
Very often, of course, the rambling and disjointed humorous story finishes with a nub, point, snapper, or whatever you like to call it. Then the listener must be alert, for in many cases the teller will divert attention from that nub by dropping it in a carefully casual and indifferent way, with the pretense that he does not know it is a nub.
Artemus Ward used that trick a good deal; then when the belated audience presently caught the joke he would look up with innocent surprise, as if wondering what they had found to laugh at. Dan Setchell used it before him, Nye and Riley and others use it to-day.
But the teller of the comic story does not slur the nub; he shouts at you--every time. And when he prints it, in England, France, Germany and Italy, he italicises it, puts some whooping exclamation-points after it, and sometimes explains it in a parenthesis. All of which is very depressing, and makes one want to renounce joking and lead a better life.
Let me set down an instance of the comic method, using an anecdote which has been popular all over the world for twelve or fifteen hundred years. The teller tells it in this way:
THE WOUNDED SOLDIER In the course of a certain battle a soldier whose leg had been shot off appealed to another soldier who was hurrying by to carry him to the rear, informing him at the same time of the loss which he had sustained; whereupon the generous son of Mars, shouldering the unfortunate, proceeded to carry out his desire. The bullets and cannon-balls were flying in all directions, and presently one of the latter took the wounded man's head off--without, however, his deliverer being aware of it. In no long time he was hailed by an officer, who said:
"Where are you going with that carcass?"
"To the rear, sir--he's lost his leg!"
"His leg, forsooth?" responded the astonished officer; "you mean his head, you booby."
Whereupon the soldier dispossessed himself of his burden, and stood looking down upon it in great perplexity. At length he said:
"It is true, sir, just as you have said." Then after a pause he added, "But he TOLD me IT WAS HIS LEG!!!!!"

Here the narrator bursts into explosion after explosion of thunderous horse-laughter, repeating that nub from time to time through his gaspings and shriekings and suffocatings.
It takes only a minute and a half to tell that in its comic-story form; and isn't worth the telling, after all. Put into the humorous-story form it takes ten minutes, and is about the funniest thing I have ever listened to--as James Whitcomb Riley tells it.
He tells it in the character of a dull-witted old farmer who has just heard it for the first time, thinks it unspeakably funny, and is trying to repeat it to a neighbor. But he can't remember it; so he gets it all mixed up and wanders helplessly round and round, putting in tedious details that don't belong in the tale and only retard it; taking them out conscientiously and putting in others that are just as useless; making minor mistakes now and then and stopping to correct them and explain how he came to make them; remembering things which he forgot to put in in their proper place and going back to put them in there; stopping his narrative a good while in order to try to recall the name of the soldier that was hurt, and finally remembering that the soldier's name was not mentioned, and remarking placidly that the name is of no real importance, after all,--and so on, and so on, and so on.
The teller is innocent and happy and pleased with himself, and has to stop every little while to hold himself in and keep from laughing outright; and does hold in, but his body quakes in a jelly-like way with interior chuckles; and at the end of the ten minutes the audience have laughed until they are exhausted, and the tears are running down their faces.
The simplicity and innocence and sincerity and unconsciousness of the old farmer are perfectly simulated, and the result is a performance which is thoroughly charming and delicious. This is art--and fine and beautiful, and only a master can compass it; but a machine could tell the other story.
To string incongruities and absurdities together in a wandering and sometimes purposeless way, and seem innocently unaware that they are absurdities, is the basis of the American art, if my position is correct. Another feature is the slurring of the point. A third is the dropping of a studied remark apparently without knowing it, as if one were thinking aloud. The fourth and last is the pause.
Artemus Ward dealt in numbers three and four a good deal. He would begin to tell with great animation something which he seemed to think was wonderful; then lose confidence, and after an apparently absent-minded pause add an incongruous remark in a soliloquizing way; and that was the remark intended to explode the mine--and it did.
For instance, he would say eagerly, excitedly, "I once knew a man in New Zealand who hadn't a tooth in his head"--here his animation would die out; a silent, reflective pause would follow, then he would say dreamily, and as if to himself, "and yet that man could beat a drum better than any man I ever saw."
The pause is an exceedingly important feature in any kind of story, and a frequently recurring feature, too. It is a dainty thing, and delicate, and also uncertain and treacherous; for it must be exactly the right length--no more and no less--or it fails of its purpose and makes trouble. If the pause is too short the impressive point is passed, and the audience have had time to divine that a surprise is intended--and then you can't surprise them, of course.
On the platform I used to tell a negro ghost story that had a pause in front of the snapper on the end, and that pause was the most important thing in the whole story. If I got it the right length precisely, I could spring the finishing ejaculation with effect enough to make some impressionable girl deliver a startled little yelp and jump out of her seat--and that was what I was after. This story was called "The Golden Arm," and was told in this fashion. You can practise with it yourself--and mind you look out for the pause and get it right.
THE GOLDEN ARM Once 'pon a time dey wuz a monsus mean man, en he live 'way out in de prairie all 'lone by hisself, 'cep'n he had a wife. En bimeby she died, en he tuck en toted her way out dah in de prairie en buried her. Well, she had a golden arm--all solid gold, fum de shoulder down. He wuz pow'ful mean--pow'ful; en dat night he couldn't sleep, caze he want dat golden arm so bad.
When it come midnight he couldn't stan' it no mo'; so he git up, he did, en tuck his lantern en shoved out thoo de storm en dug her up en got de golden arm; en he bent his head down 'gin de win', en plowed en plowed en plowed thoo de snow. Den all on a sudden he stop (make a considerable pause here, and look startled, and take a listening attitude) en say: "My lan', what's dat!"
En he listen--en listen--en de win' say (set your teeth together and imitate the wailing and wheezing singsong of the wind), "Bzzz-z-zzz"--en den, way back yonder what de grave is, he hear a voice!--he hear a voice all mix' up in de win'--can't hardly tell 'em 'part--"Bzzz-zzz--W-h-o--g-o-t--m-y--g-o-l-d-e-n--arm?--zzz--zzz--W-h-o g-o-t m-y g-o-l-d-e-n arm?" (You must begin to shiver violently now.)
En he begin to shiver en shake, en say, "Oh, my! Oh, my lan'!" en de win' blow de lantern out, en de snow en sleet blow in his face en mos' choke him, en he start a-plowin' knee-deep toward home mos' dead, he so sk'yerd--en pooty soon he hear de voice agin, en (pause) it 'us comin' after him! "Bzzz--zzz--zzz--W-h-o--g-o-t--m-y g-o-l-d-e-n--arm?"
When he git to de pasture he hear it agin--closter now, en a-comin'!--a-comin' back dah in de dark en de storm--(repeat the wind and the voice). When he git to de house he rush up-stairs en jump in de bed en kiver up, head and years, en lay dah shiverin' en shakin'--en den way out dah he hear it again!--en a-comin'! En bimeby he hear (pause--awed, listening attitude)--pat--pat--pat--hit's a-comin' up-stairs! Den he hear de latch, en he know it's in de room!
Den pooty soon he know it's a-stannin' by de bed! (Pause.) Den--he know it's a--bendin' down over him--en he cain't skasely git his breath! Den--den--he seem to feel someth'n c-o-l-d, right down 'most agin his head! (Pause.)
Den de voice say, right at his year--"W-h-o--g-o-t--m-y--g-o-l-d-e-n arm?" (You must wail it out very plaintively and accusingly; then you stare steadily and impressively into the face of the farthest-gone auditor,--a girl, preferably,--and let that awe-inspiring pause begin to build itself in the deep hush. When it has reached exactly the right length, jump suddenly at that girl and yell, "You've got it!"
If you've got the pause right, she'll fetch a dear little yelp and spring right out of her shoes. But you must get the pause right; and you will find it the most troublesome and aggravating and uncertain thing you ever undertook.)
--October 1895

Disliking Books- One critics views on Huck Finn

2010-11-19T09:19:00.000-08:00

This is one of my all time favorite critical essays. I strongly encourage you to check it out! Graff talks about why he hated reading as a kid, how he learned to love it, the importance of talking/ arguing about what we read, and of course, Huck Finn. Read and discuss:
1) In what ways do you agree or disagree?
2) How has your own journey as a reader been similar to or different from Graff's experience?

Disliking Books At An Early Age

First Mini-Essay

2010-11-18T14:45:00.000-08:00

Stuck for ideas? You might discuss:
An illustration
Sentence or paragraph length
sentence structure or length
chapter organization
dilect
topics of speach
imagery
literary devices (metaphor, symbolism, etc)
what aspects of a story are included/ excluded
diction/ word choice

got other ideas? then share them...

Huck Finn- What did people think of it when it first came out?

2010-11-18T06:51:00.000-08:00

Follow this link to read reviews of the book when it first came out. HF Reviews
If you see anything interesting, feel free to comment. You may also get ideas for your min-papers.

Writing Help for College Essay (and other things)

2010-11-17T06:45:00.000-08:00

A friend of mine, who is a writing teacher, has started doing college essay coaching. If interested, please check out her blog: Chloe Miller: Writing Coach You can also reach her at chloemiller@gmail.com. Mention that you saw her blog post, and she'll give you a free 20 minute consultation (online or via phone because she isn't local). We will be doing a unit on this in the spring, when you are closer to applying, but I know that some of you are super conscientious and are already thinking about it, so here you are :)

Another English Resource

2010-11-10T14:08:00.001-08:00

Alise is friend of mine, who volunteered in my class, so many of you met last year, has started a blog devoted to helping students be successful in English. Feel free to use it. Post questions, etc. Alise is very excited and eager to help you! My guess is that if you asked, she would be more than happy to help edit drafts of papers etc.
English Nerds

Optional Source for Crucible Essay

2010-11-03T18:17:00.000-07:00

I thought that some of you might want to use the Weschler/ McCarthy script for your Crucible essay, but of course it isn't available on line.. so I scanned it into the computer... but of course blogger doesn't let me attach pdf files... so I had to use another site in order to post them.. which means that if you want to access them, you'll need to click on the links provided in the 3 unlabeled posts containing the links W and M p1, p2, and p3.

If anyone finds other sources that might be helpful,or if you'd like to swap ideas about possible things to relate to the crucible, please feel free to post them. I look forward to your ideas.

I also found this and thought you might be interested:
patriot act

On another note, if you get stuck writing your paper, please go back to the journal we did in class on Monday. You should be able to pull a thesis out of the work you did on an event that's similar to the Crucible. It's best if a theme/ message from The Crucible can also be applied to the event (then you won't have the "so what?" factor). You should be able to pull your topic sentences out of the specific commonalities you found (consider aspects of setting, character, and plot). Apply everything you've learned about essays so far... and since it's an at home essay, please make sure that it's in MLA format. You can review it using the links in the sidebar. If you have any questions, please post them. I will be camping for the weekend, so won't be able to answer questions until I return, but I encourage you to help each other in working through questions and confusions.

American Literature Honors 2010-2011

Summer reading- for fun not becasue someone said we had to

The end

since feeling is first

In Just-- and l(a

Informaiton about the Spring Semester Final

Anyone Lived ina Pretty How Town

grasshopper

Group Poem Analysis

oil tel duh woil doi sez

AP English Meeting

Cummings' titles

Get Your CUmmings-esque Poem Published

the dirt on cummings' marriage to Elaine

cummings comic

Making your poem analysis website

Spring Poems

life and times

Whitman Connections?

next to god of course american i love you

Buffalo Bill

Can you make sense of this poem

Scavenger Hunt Answers

cummings inspires music

E. E. Cummings or e e cummings?

cummings the artist

Extra Credit Opportunities

Sample college admissions essays

Infinite Campus

More Gatsby inspired music

For those who were absent 5/6/11

Update

Today's vocab for absent folks

Using Google Presentation for woman Warrior Project

Something Special for the Edgar Allen Poe Readers

Silly Huck Finn Video I just found

DON'T FORGET ESSAY!

Easy A

The LAST independent reading assignment

Imagine you are a student at Yale and you're attending a lecture about Woman Warrior

AP CONTRACTS DUE 4/15!

Hove Blog Posts Emailed to You

How to use google docs and google presentation

Gatsby Paper Thoughts

Literary Magazine- Call for Submissions

Joy Luck Club Resouces

Shcolarships and Contests

Concordance

Learn to dance like a moth at Gatsby's party

Extra Credit

Gatsby Reading Schedule

Gatsby Resources

Thinking about Japan

How did I do on my speech?!?!

English Placement Test-- any day now!

Literature Circles

Assignment and Reading

Notes

Final Project

Reading Schedule

Oh no!

Public Speaking

Great Gatsby Here We Come!

Grading Period Closing Friday

Extra Credit Opportunity

SSR

Sources of articles about our topics

Do you get locked out of the blog?

contests with prizes!

HOMEWORK: Contemporary speech analysis

logic puzzle solutions

Thoreau's Civil Disobedience.

Patrick Henry

logical fallacies

logic puzzles

The Puzzle of the Hyena's Alias

The Puzzle of the Masked Men

The Puzzle of the Dead Presidents

Declarations

The Declaration of Sentiments, Seneca Falls Conference, 1848

The Declaration of Sentiments,
Seneca Falls Conference, 1848