Alyssa’s AP Blog

In the story “Good Country People”, by Flannery O’ Connor, a theme of Christian Redemption was found in daily life. At the beginning of the story, Hulga was atheist and didn’t believe there was anything beyond the present life, when everything was fine. Then she had her heart ripped out by Manley Pointer, who was just using her to snatch away her security blanket, her wooden leg. It wasn’t until a time of the worst circumstances that she began to realise that she had to be dependent on someone or something with a greater power.

Alice Walker is a poet, writer and civil rights activist. She was born in Georgia on February 9,1944. Walker watched her parents suffer from the affects of the Jim Crow Laws. She met Martin Luther King Jr. when she was attending Spelman College. She credits him for her involvement in civil rights activism. Her first book was published while she was a college senior at Sarah Lawrence (where she transferred to). Many of her works discuss feminism and racism. She wrote a few novels, but mostly focuses on short stories and poems. One of here more famous short stories is “Everyday Use”. She also wrote the play “The Color Purple” which became a Broadway musical in 2005. Though she has accomplished a lot in her life, she is still live and kicking at the ripe old age of sixty-five.

Forgive me: I don’t know exactly what a plot arc is so hopefully I’m doing it correctly.

The short story”The Most Dangerous Game”, by Richard Connell was a twisted tale about the hunters and the hunted (predators and prey) and fear. The story began with the main character, Sanger Rainsford, having a chat about hunting with a friend on his yacht in the Caribbean. The plot starts to arc when the first conflict arises: Rainsford fell overboard. He couldn’t get the crew’s attention because it was dark and night, so he had to swim to the closest island. Darkness and the color black were motifs throughout the story. The arc continues to build up when Rainsford met General Zaroff on the island and found out that he too is a hunter. The only difference between their hunting styles is that Rainsford hunts big game and Zaroff finds a thrill hunting weak humans. Considering his condition, Rainsford is a weak human and has to experience the role reversal of being the prey instead of the predator. The peak of the arc is when Rainsford is being hunted by General Zaroff. The conflict was resolved and the arc dropped back down at the end with Rainsford killing Zaroff. The “Most Dangerous Game” was a role reversal for the protagonist, so he felt the way all of the game he hunted and killed did.

Magistrale, Tony and Dickerson, Mary Jane. “The Language of Time in “The Great Gatsby.” College Literature 16.2 (1989): 117-128. JSTOR. Web. 25 Aug. 2009.

1. Gut Reaction Words: unaware, interesting, chrono-what?, well-supported, enlightening

2. Thesis: “The narrative structure of Gatsby reveals time as a malleable and fluid concept, juxtaposing past and present in a way that show how they momentarily merge in human memory through the social art of telling stories.” (118)

3. Fitzgerald wrote Gatsby’s character to constantly be fighting the continuation of time, with his obsession with reversing it. He wanted control of time so he could bring it back to when Daisy was so in love with him. Nick was the observer that always was there, but not a part of the situation. Though, his presence effected the situation anyway.

4. I realized that time was important in The Great Gatsby, but not to the extent that it was described! I still can’t quite fathom what Bakhtin’s chronotope theory is. Nick’s ability to be in a situation and still not be involved in it makes him relatable to the reader. Fitzgerald made time references a lot through out the book, and especially in the chapter where Daisy and Jay meet again. I didn’t catch the part about the clock in chapter 5 when I was reading it, but found it very interesting and it made a lot of sense.

In the instructions it said to comment on your post, but I don’t know how to so I’m posting it. I would like to read the rest of the article “The Language of Time in The Great Gatsby”.

As of now, I am kind of worried about how much work this class entails. I know it won’t kill me, and I will be okay once I get a hang of things, but I’m overwhelmed.

           Honestly, why doesn’t everyone just try their best to take care of this environment that we are stuck with until we die? I have been called a hippie and a tree hugger on several occasions just for asking a person to recycle. Our planet is so fragile that we need to be making it better not worse.

          I’ve been brought up with an undeniablerespect for what I have. Earth is no exception. I believe that if everyone would do their simple duty of taking care of what little part they claim to the earth would be in better shape. I know that I am not entirely an environmentalist, but I still put in the effort to give back to the world we are a part of. I recycle religiously and try not to waste energy. There is something about teenagers that automatically refuses the idea of them recycling. Some even take pleasure in watching me squirm when they purposefully throw paper away that I politely asked them to recycle. Paper isn’t the only byproduct that needs to be disposed more creatively. My sister is buying utensils for her wedding made out of plants that look like plastic that don’t take four hundred years to start to disintegrate. Instead of using up another plastic bag every time we go shopping, my familyuses reusable bags. Have you noticed how many school lunches use Styrofoam plates? I don’t even want to get started on how bad those are for the environment. I believe that every little thing counts.

         I feel like global warming is on my peers and myself to fix, and I can’t do it all on my own. I believe that everyone should get to see a polar bear in their lifetime and because their pole is melting, that might not happen for your grandchildren or maybe even your children. As much as critics say global warming is not happening, it is. I have an uncle that lives in Alaska that has been witnessing it first hand by the glacier in his back yard melting more and more every year. We can’t undo the years past but we can try to change what is to come. We are the future of the world and we must keep it around for many more years to come. “We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children.” -Chief Sealth This I believe.

Live Life Like It’s Your Last Day by Samantha

        Purpose                                                                                                   outside: to encourage people to spend everyday like it was their last day on earth                                                                                                                                              inside:the title, the anecdote about her mom, “I believe people should live everyday of their life like it is their last. ”

        Persona outside: teenager:regretful;mournful                                                                                                                                               inside:“I really did not want to go to school”; If I had lived everyday like it was mine or her last, I would have spent every last second I had with her”; “the hardest person to lose in life is your mother.”                                                                                                                

        Audience                                                                                           outside: people searching for meaning in their life that need purpose and are just going through the motions inside: “if i died tomorrow, would i have regretted going to school…”, “There are plenty of reasons to live your life like it’s your last day, but she was mine.”

       Argument                                                                                                                               outside: do everything that you want to do now because you might not get a chance later on                    inside: ”Your mom she…died durring the night”, “you don’t know what you’ll encounter next so be ready for the unexpected.”

Growth That Starts From Thinking by Eleanor Roosevelt

     Purpose                                                                                                                                  outside: to encourgage others to think for themselve and question everything                                          inside:”it didn’t do you any harm to learn those things, so why not let your children learn them? When they grow up they’ll think things out for themselves.”

     Persona                                                                                                                  outside:sage;inquisative
inside: “I came to the conclusion that you had to use this life to develop the very best that you could develop.”; “But as I grew older I questioned a great many of the things that I knew very well my grandmother who had brought me up had taken for granted.”

     Audience                                                                                                        outside: americans, people wanting to think for themselves when everyone else believes there is one right way and that they are correct, non-reigouspeople                                                                                      inside: she is an american icon, “I don’t know whether I believe in a future life.” (relatable to others)

     Argument                                                                                                      outside: be the one thinking for yourself, what is going to happen will happen so let it.                                     inside: “You have to accept whatever comes and the only important thing is that you meet it with courage and with the best that you have to give.”

Slippery Slope, Consistent, and Hasty Generalization.

1. Anne doesn’t recycle, so all of the trees will be cut down.

2. Global warming is melting the North Pole, so polar bears will be extinct in less than ten years.

3. Most people in Hawaii can surf the Pipeline.