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From Aristotle to Saussure...
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| | 0 | 5/8/2012 10:55 PM | Feminist Ryan Gosling I figured some of you might appreciate this...
http://feministryangosling.tumblr.com/ | | | | 10 | 5/6/2012 10:08 PM | Gender Stereotypes Or, specifically, colors.
I know that the current gender-specific colors are pink and blue - pink for girls and blue for boys. However, that wasn't always the case - only a short while ago (I forget the exact timeframe) pink was the boys' color, as it was close to red and therefore "manly". Blue, on the other hand, was for girls, as it was calmer. Think Sleeping Beauty - Aurora doesn't wear the pink dress, she wears the blue, and it's her icon.
I think that's really interesting, especially in thinking about the meanings we put onto each color as a result of their stereotypes. I know that "Tough Guys Wear Pink" and all that, but pink is generally considered a more feminine color. Both colors, by themselves, are gender-neutral but it's not until society places meaning on them that they have that gender-specific meaning and all of the stereotypes associated with it.
Thoughts? | | | | 14 | 5/6/2012 8:19 PM | What is the purpose of feminism? I have heard a number of arguments on what feminism is. Some say it's about women reaching equal standards compared to men in society, while others say it is about embracing and empowering womanly characteristics that differ from men. Also, why is so advocated, even in societies where there is gender equality. What about masculism? Why isn't that ever in play in a conceptual matter? | | | | 4 | 5/6/2012 8:15 PM | Absurdest Short Play The play we read in class on Friday about the two men at the park and a trip to the zoo was still a shocker even after everything that has happened in this class. I feel like I should have seen it coming, there would be no story about the zoo, something completely out of the blue happens, and there really is no closure or ending. But I was convinced throughout the whole thing that there would be an elaborate and detailed story about the mans trip to the zoo, and how it has effected his life and how he got to the park that day. Instead he is accidentally killed by the most innocent man, and seems to be quite pleased with it. No wonder they call it "absurdest." | | | | 2 | 5/6/2012 4:35 PM | Women and world peace This article seemed very relevant to our discussion today. Many countries where systemic violence and unrest are an issue are also countries more deeply and violently biased against women. The effects of extreme patriarchy are apparent in increased instability, warmongering and crime. Which isn't to say that men are the worse sex, but rather that things out of balance always lead to suffering.
I think this is an essential underpinning to any discussion of women's or men's roles or rights. It isn't a fight anyone is seeking to win - though we too often fall into that linguistic pattern - it's a problem we have to work together to solve for everyone's betterment. | | | | 25 | 5/6/2012 4:30 PM | What do relationships mean, other than a change in signifier? Think about it. People are 'in a relationship', then they are 'engaged', then they are 'married'. But what is the difference between these three terms? In the traditional Western sense, all of them man that you are in a committed, monogamous relationship. Now, either stage can mean you live together, have kids, ex-cetera. So what is the point of using different signifiers? The only thing that really changes is that the further you go, the more rings you get. And the more tax breaks. Can we really differentiate, or do we just have useless signifiers and increasingly long and expensive rituals? | | | | 3 | 5/6/2012 12:25 PM | Feminism In first hour today we started our class discussion of feminism in literature. Chisnell began by saying that in order to understand the Marxist view of feminism, we had to forget about the feminist protests that history has presented to us, such as woman suffrage and the idea of women constantly trying to prove that they can do anything men can do. While talking about this, it was suggested that some women believe that there is a sort of secret misunderstood language between women. I didn't really understand how this helped women in their endeavors to prove that they are equal to men mentally and physically. However, talking about feminism, it is very apparent that, when it comes to historical literature, men are much more prominent in writing. When women did write, it was mostly poetry, journals/diaries and domestic dramas, while men were being published for articles and novels more frequently. I think it will be interesting to study feminism in literary theory to get a better idea of what separates men from women when it comes to literature. | | | | 7 | 5/6/2012 11:43 AM | Freud No matter what we talk about in class, I have always liked Freud the best. Although some people think that he is crazy, i'm wondering if they can't understand him because hes to hard to get. The information just wont penetrate into them, and they are left dazed and confused, with some people feeling like something core was just ripped out of them. Freud talks alot about the subconscious, and how that is always comming out through people, which I find very interesting. Do you guys find Freud uncomfortable or satisfying. | | | | 10 | 5/5/2012 10:54 PM | So then what is it not? While talking about deconstruction for the first time, Mr. Chisnell mentioned that because of the inaccuracy of using signifiers to describe something, we can only accurately describe what something isn't, not what it is. I honestly don't understand this, because I believe there exists a border between factual "is" and "is not" that can be debated. I don't see how much more possible it is to describe what something isn't than what it is. Thoughts? | | | | 12 | 5/5/2012 10:41 PM | Me First Culture One of the criticisms that has begun appearing in the last decade or two is the idea that Western society is forming into a "me first" culture, where individuals typically place their own wants above the welfare of the overall group. This theory is only reinforced when you turn on the TV and see things like reality shows, Maury, and Judge Joe Brown, where selfish and narcissistic people complain about how they are constantly being persecuted, but really they are simply incapable of viewing the perspectives of others because they are so self-absorbed. The word "conformity" tends to get thrown around a lot as a bad word, but can society also become TOO focused on individualism? Is there a balance between self-autonomy and interdependence? | | | | 11 | 5/5/2012 8:13 PM | Can Deconstructionists Ever Truly Be Happy? Now that I'm finally getting the hand of deconstructionism, I'm getting more confused about how deconstructionists! The interpretations of deconstructionists are full of judgement. Like when Chisnell drew up a chart for Cinderella-the items that weren't there were hermanphydites, bisexuals, and transgenders. Thus, deconstructionists would be even more frustrated with society-leaving them bitter and pessimistic. And Cinderella is just one example-from art to movies to books to poetry-there is always something that isn't there-constantly adding to the agitation of the deconstructionists. So to further continue this situation-there seem to be two options for these theorists. A) Continue to follow society-even though they have all of this pent up anger or B) Decide to screw society and live in anarchy. But...if these theorists decided choice B-there would be nothing to deconstruct-and their purpose would be gone. Are deconstructionists setting themselves up for disappointment??? | | | | 32 | 4/29/2012 4:10 PM | Slut Connotations This post kind of relates to the swear words post lower on the boards but is is more specific, so there's my justifications for creating a new one. I am constantly annoyed by the fact that there is a greater majority of derogatory terms that apply to women. Think about it, "Slut", "Whore, "Skank", "Bitch". These apply almost exclusively to women. I mean when we think a man is being promiscuous we call him a "man-whore". I can understand why these words evolved, because we lived in a patriarchal society where judging women's actions and labeling them was another way to keep women down. So why do we perpetuate this model? Let me get one thing straight- not really a fan of modern feminism. Aside from the unequal representation in positions of power, I'm pretty okay with the lot girls have been given. But think of what you think of when someone says the word "slut". Yeah, that gender bias bothers me. | | | | 10 | 4/26/2012 10:47 PM | (Neo-)Marxism! To be frank, I loved how much sense neo-marxism made, which astonishes me as it is a cousin of deconstructionism. The thought of what is not said as being so important is really interesting to think about. I think the struggle may be finding things unsaid that are important. Thoughts? | | | | 11 | 4/26/2012 11:54 AM | New favorite argument "A secret does not belong to a person or anything proper" - Derrida.
In the docutmentary on Derrida, this was brought up and I think he might have said what a secret "belongs" to or if it does at all but I do not recall. If a secret "belongs", where does it "belong"? and who is who to say that it is a "secret" is "theirs"? | | | | 22 | 4/26/2012 11:40 AM | Meaning of Life Recently I had to participate in a scholarship competition and we had to write a brief essay in an hour. The topic was to write about the meaning of life. it was such a broad question and I couldn't help but think about this class when I was writing it. WHy are we all so interested with this question when it is such a cliche? | | | | 16 | 4/22/2012 5:05 AM | Colloquialisms During the first half of the year, I noticed a trend occurring whenever we discussed a poem. We would always try to describe the theme of the poem with colloquialisms and cliches: "nature vs. nurture", "ignorance is bliss", etc. Why did we do this? Why do humans have such a fascination with cliches? I think humans love cliches because they offer familiar, comfortable, and bite-sized categories that we can place ideas into. What are your thoughts on this? | | | | 9 | 4/21/2012 10:28 PM | Hero Archetype I came across this quaint chart the other day while roaming around the internet. It's not very deep, but it did point out story elements that reminded me of Jungian theories and the hero archetype. | | | | 4 | 3/30/2012 3:23 PM | Hello, New Historicism!! Ok, this is an entirely new concept, and I really want to see what people think of it. I have noticed Murakami used it in WUBC, when Mr Honda talks about war and when his attorney tells his story. But what is it's purpose? We already know what happened in history, so why question it? Why question the very definition of "fact"? It just confuses me. Thoughts? | | | | 11 | 3/25/2012 1:03 PM | Truth and Reality Derrida syas that there cannot be a central truth of meaning since everything written are just signifiers and that words fail reality. I am not going to say I understand everything Derrida says because, lets be honest, I don't think anyone can actually say that - but I do see where this is coming from. Humans always try to put words to everything but if you think about it, most of the time, the words are either "not enough" or "too much" - they can never actually portray what we really feel or the reality of the situation. I find this a little depressing because most of communication between humans are words - we cannot describe the truth that we want to get across to each other. Does this mean we have to rely only on what is tangible to be communications of truth and reality? | | | | 8 | 3/25/2012 12:53 PM | Frustration. So I have a frustration with the theory of deconstruction. Yes, I know it a favorite topic in the modern literary theory world, but I personally don't see it. If you say that words are only built up with signifiers, that they have lost their true meanings and have no meaning any more because of the clouded definitions we give them today, how can we define what deconstruction is in the first place? How can we define something that we can't define things? Someone please give their input on this as I am frustrated ^. | | | | 7 | 3/18/2012 4:16 PM | Meme Theory Alright, it's time to let this bait loose in the waters. We've all seen the outbreak of memes in the past month or so, and I know there has to be a connection to what we'v learned in class! To keep any eyes from rolling, this "meme theory" really exists, and makes a cameo appearance in a USA Today article(http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/story/2012-02-16/college-memes-go-viral/53119156/1).
Thoughts? | | | | 21 | 3/8/2012 10:43 AM | Senioritis So, after learning the different psycological literary theories in class, and talking about how students drop out of school when they think the school has nothing that they want or can't provide them what they want, i think i figured out (if it has been figured out already) a psycological reason for a common illness we like to call senioritis. As seniors, we know we only have one year left of high school, most of us are moving on to a new and better school, or going into the workplace and starting our new lives. Senior year doesnt have much to provide for us. We realize that within a year we will be doing bigger and better things, and we start to not care about high school. We cant drop out because then we would lose those bigger and better things, so we simply put in very minimal effort. | | | | 8 | 3/7/2012 6:03 PM | Scouring the minutia of text Ever since we wrote the Invisible Man essays, I've found myself looking at every single detail within a given text, and trying to find the importance of it. The way Mr. Chiz would pick a random spot from Invisible Man, and relate it to some broad theme that has significance in the book, it has me doing this to every book I read, which might not be a good thing. After all, could every word of all literature be significant? I hardly think so, but I suppose some could argue the case... | | | | 4 | 3/4/2012 12:02 AM | So what's the point in deconstruction? So does anyone else feel like we are "beating around the bush?" I get the point of Derrida's view but isn't that all it is? All this theory is, is his opinion. You can argue that it's not an opinion but honestly it really is. Sure you can say all words are signifiers, and we all agree, but why does it matter. It's the only way we know how to communicate. I don't know | | | | 8 | 3/3/2012 11:13 PM | Objectivism "My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own hapiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute." -Ayn Rand
Do you believe this situation is possible today? With our constant yearning to be accepted by those around us? With religion and emotion getting in the way of reason? Can a man truly be heroic in this sense? | | | | 2 | 2/28/2012 8:00 PM | Signifiers signifying signifiers Okay. So this whole deconstruction thing is working out as fine and dandy in my mind as is possible, I guess, but something that I'm really, truly struggling to grasp is how adding signifiers makes things more abstract. So, say, for example I'm describing a picture. So I start off by saying it's a square. This square could be any size. Now if I say it's a small square, we can't rule out every size square, but we can rule out a few, meaning we've gone from every size square in the world, to a slightly smaller number size of squares. But now if I say a square as large as an iPod Nano 4th generation screen, I've added a ton more signifiers, but this doesn't seem any more abstract to me. We all would have a very similar idea of what size and shape this object is. So how does adding signifiers add to the abstract nature of signifiers? | | | | 5 | 2/26/2012 6:51 PM | Freud v. Derrida While watching the Derrida documentary in class last week, it was brought up briefly that perhaps pieces of Freud's theory, specifically his stages of childhood, may have influenced Derrida's own theory of deconstruction. The film presented different examples of the philosopher's life that may have presented negative experiences, such as his expulsion for being Jewish or his problems with his parents. Perhaps his outlook on these parts of his life influenced how he looked at literature and all of reality. | | | | 1 | 2/21/2012 4:57 PM | Derrida's Theory and The Heart of Darkness Mr. Chisnell drew a diagram if the layer of interpretations on the board last week: along the lines of this:
Outside Influence (which is pretty much infinite) -> Readers-> Conrad -> Narrator -> Marlow's Stories -> Stories of Kurtz -> Kurtz -> "The Horror" -> ?
Derrida says that everything are signifiers - that you can't actually know the meaning or truth of a writing because you can only describe it through signifiers. This diagrams shows that you can get close to the truth but never actually reach it, it is impossible to get at the heart of the writing. In the Heat of Darkness, it is especially true because "the horror" is still a signifier with no real meaning. | | | | 27 | 2/20/2012 5:04 PM | Proof That Stephenie Meyer is Classist and Racist Using Solely Binary Opposition Charts From Structuralism Edward:
White
Christian
Rich
Jacob:
Native American
Religion in question, believes in Native American myths
Poor
Who does Bella choose? Just saying. | | | | 7 | 2/20/2012 12:04 PM | Jacques Derrida Film Maybe I stick out from the crowd a bit here, but I thoroughly enjoyed this documentary. At the very least, I found Derrida's sense of humor to be surprisingly funny, seeing as his life's work is a pretty serious matter, that will obviously go down in history. The film was able to portray his theory in a more accessible way than a textbook, or even Mr Chisnell talking. One of the scenes that stuck out for me was a short clip of a news reporter interviewing Derrida. I can't remember the exact analogy, but she compared his work to a miner who works by destroying the beams that support his mine. In Derrida's world, he is attacking the very basis of literature, and taking the "meaning" away from words. It seems as though doing this would "collapse" the literary process, but lo and behold, Derrida somehow managed to do it. | | | | 16 | 2/19/2012 3:51 PM | AP Lit and Movies I don't know if anyone else has noticed this, but this class has been forcing me to analyze movies. I'll come out of movies with snarky and arrogant comments about how the lack of theme or character development made the movie awful. I've started saying things like "CGI effects don't make a good movie," or "the movie didn't even present the theme until the end, and even then you couldn't find connections to the rest of the film." Has anyone else noticed this?
| | | | 18 | 2/19/2012 11:46 AM | The S Word In my class and in others I have heard a lot of the 'S' word. And I mean 'society'. We seem to blame it for everything. Every time that something bad happens or we discover a metaphor in a poem it is always the fault of 'society'. Society is making the girl feels this, is labeling this person as that. What exactly are we calling society? I feel like we just throw around the word. Are we labeling peer pressure as society, or the general attitude of the entire populace? We don't know what it means and we don't define it. We just defame it as some sort of fire-breathing opponent of the individual. Every time we don't know the meaning of the poem someone hollers that it is a commentary on society. Additionally, why is everything society's fault? If a girl jumps off a cliff or feels ugly in a poem we say that society made her do it. Even though we think that society is an attack on the individual we never realize that an individual is acting themselves and has the free will to resist the mysterious 'society'. | | | | 10 | 2/19/2012 12:07 AM | Center vs. Limits Okay! So I was incredibly displeased the other day with the conclusion that we reached in my 6th hour regarding the center of the story, and its outer limits. In the Fur Elise discussion we decided that the same notes, just rearranged, still equals Fur Elise. I personally disagree with this sentiment. If a song is recognizable, I think that it is still considered to be the original piece. For example, that awful bastardization of Fur Elise would still be considered Fur Elise, until you can no longer pick out the original melody. The sentiment that "The limit does not exist", is false! The limit does exist, and that limit is the recognizable melody. | | | | 30 | 2/18/2012 8:21 PM | Names In 6th hour yesterday, we came to the realization that a person's name is, in essence, their signifier. If a person does not know their name, they are missing a part of themselves. Thoughts? | | | | 0 | 2/5/2012 8:54 PM | some stuff in here about archetypal imagery and heros quest in heart of darkness (no text) | | | | 16 | 2/4/2012 9:33 PM | What causes rivalry? I want to know why people become so passionate about things they cant control that they fight eachother over the outcome. College rivalries are what made me think of this, and I want to know why people act the way they do. Michigan vs. Michigan State vs. Ohio state... there are so many combinations.
But why do people do it? I could go to UofM, but I dont suddenly feel animosity towards someone who will go to State. And I know people who didnt go to either and yet support one vehmenently over the other. Is it on principal? or are people just bored enough that they need something to do and argueing with eachother is the best solution they could find? Its not like either side can control the outcome of a football game or something. Its the same with high schools. Why do we hate places like troy or country day just because they once beat us in some sport? They are people too.
I just want to know what causes rivalries. | | | | 16 | 2/3/2012 7:37 PM | Society, Human Nature, Lying In class Mr.Chisnell asked us if society made us liars or if it was just human nature? I personally think lying is a part of nature. Animals deceive their pray in order to eat them. Leaders lie in order to stay on top and get what they want. Children lie before they are even aware of how society works. Survival is something humans and animals want, society or no society, and one way to survive and prosper is to lie and deceive. | | | | 11 | 2/3/2012 7:34 PM | Phenomenology: If a book lies in the middle of a forest with no one to read it, does it have meaning? | | | | 17 | 1/24/2012 6:52 PM | Theories The more theories we discuss the more it feels to me like literature is mathematical instead of a freedom of expression. Everything is so broken down to follow patterns and codes and rules. No one ever thinks to say it may be possible that the author didnt intentionally do something. Any thoughts? | | | | 14 | 1/15/2012 7:11 PM | Mherioretical Monday! Okay, so I don't have notes from the lecture from today so, the whole phenomonomoenomoene or whatever it's called will just be referred to as the theory becaus eI'm terrible and don't have the notes with the spelling, but I wanted to post on this as soon as I could before I forgot or the impact of today's lecture faded. Discussing how we have our ideas and how we will actually ignore things and how desperate we are to shelter these beliefs got me really thinking. We've all had soething that we were vehemently against, and then we try and it and find out that it's not what we expected; or we find out that it is exactly what we expected. Anyways, what struck me is that either way we realize has significant meaning on our understanding. I don't knonw, I just really appreciated how relatable this theory was. | | | | 14 | 1/9/2012 9:06 PM | Puns! As Punmania has been taking over our literary lives recently, I decided to question why certain people find puns absolutely hilarious, and why others find them dumb. I am biased, of course, so I am attempting to justify why puns are funny to me.
Puns play on words and require a certain amount of wit to create. When a pun is uttered, all of the literary minded people laugh! Where as the others, are simply vapid, sacs of cells who can't appreciate the genius that is a well-crafted pun. I am looking at you, Chisnell. Although, I may just be bitter because only a handful of people actually appreciate my comic genius. And I am just wondering, why that is. Thoughts?
*disclaimer: I am being moderately facetious, and Katie needs to stop correcting me over my shoulder... | | | | 8 | 1/8/2012 4:06 PM | Christmas Music After listening to the song "Baby, It's Cold Outside" and seeing the version of Little Red Riding Hood in class awhile ago, the song began to take on a new meaning. The woman singing wants to leave the mans house, but he keeps insisting it is much too cold to go out and she must stay. At one point in the song, she questions "what's in this drink?" that the man gives her. She goes back and forth, deciding whether she should stay at the mans house for the rest of the song, and at the end you never really know if she left or not. I think she knew the whole time that the man was trying to seduce her throughout the night, and when she threatened to leave, he roofied her drink so she would be forced to stay. Like in Little Red Riding Hood, she knew all along what the man was going to do to her, but she was playful and went along with it in a hard-to-get manner. This class is really messing with my mind... | | | | 20 | 1/8/2012 11:56 AM | Phallic Symbolism and the Church '
so I saw this image in a conservative blog post about the "pray to end abortion" campaign, and was struck by the obvious phallic imagery, made especially prominent by the contrast and framing of this shot. The author of the post describes "The tower stand[ing] in stark contrast to the dark, threatening clouds that are swirling around in the sky.", and this seemed to me like the epitome of the church's views on the male and female.
The hard, white man is "standing firm" against the dark, threatening mystery of womanhood - underscored by the discussion of abortion taking place elsewhere in the post. I am I simply reflecting a subconscious obsession with male anatomy, or do other people see this concerning parallelism as well?
check out the post here
| | | | 7 | 1/8/2012 11:47 AM | New Criticism and religeon What ive been wondering throughout learning about this theory is how people of religeon take it. If feelings and beliefs are taken out of the equation to a new critic, and the truth is in the facts or text, do most new critics not believe in religeon? Correct me if im wrong here, but most religeons are mostly based of the belief of something is out there higher than us, and there is never really any physical evidence besides the Bible, Koran, etc. so how do New Critics look at the bible? | | | | 6 | 1/8/2012 10:50 AM | Perception So today's poetry presenter was Frieda, and her question involved perception. It showed me how everyone, and I really mean everyone, has a different perception and point of view after reading the same book, or poem, or short story. I've thought about it before, I'm sure we all have. It's just it really clicked today. | | | | 15 | 1/7/2012 10:42 PM | What makes things "funny"? Going off another post, I started to question why things are considered funny. Also, why are they only considered funny at certain times, in certain places, and with certain audiences? To add on to that, why do people have differing views on what is funny and what isnt?
This also made me think of something I heard once about true laughter. The source claimed that it is impossible to fake sincere laughter, and that people dont really have full control over how they laugh. Does that mean laughter is tied to the subconcious? What would Freud have to say about that? | | | | 0 | 1/2/2012 8:26 PM | the Girl With the Dragon Tattoo First warning, I haven't finished this book yet. Honestly, I haven't gotten far at all.
Second warning, the movie was amazing!
I found this topic online today when looking at movie reviews and I found this very interesting. The comparison of Lindgren's characters to Pippy Longstocking (Lisabeth Slander) and Kalle (Mikeal) seeps into the novel and I find it very interesting that a novel of crime and corruption of modern day Sweden portraid by unusually charcters, are connected to a children's novel. Kind of weird, but for those of us who actually had the time to read the book, is this comparison legitimate? | | | | 6 | 12/17/2011 11:06 PM | Freud in real life My mind is officially blown. I had a true example of Freud in my life yesterday. My friend took my phone so I immediately locked it. Then he went to unlock it and saw it had a passcode. I was soooo relieved cause I hate when people get in my phone. He asked how many letters it was and I told him there were four. It took him to tries to guess "toes." I thought I just picked it because it was a short, weird word no one would guess, but when I asked him why he guessed that he said it was because he knows how much I absolutely hate it when people touch my feet. Then he said his first guess was feet, which was my old passcode. Maybe there's more to these theories then we think. Needless to say I changed my passcode immediately. | | | | 6 | 12/17/2011 10:55 PM | "Who's Your Daddy?" Has anyone realized how disturbing this phrase is? This phrase is a rhetorical question and used as a boastful claim of dominance over the listener, typically a woman. This was brought to my attention by How I Met Your Mother. It reminded me of when Chisnell talked about Freudian Theory and how daughters fall for men like their fathers. Of course Chisnell put it in a more disturbing view, saying that we are in love with our dads. This phrase not only supports the theory, but shows how men dominate in the relationship. Fathers protect, husbands protect, boyfriends protect. What I'm trying to get at, is how this commonly known phrase is just so openly accepted? There are so many disturbing qualities to it, and it almost always exerts dominance over woman. Here are some other terms used to describe a male: sugar daddy, pimp daddy etc. It's just interesting how society accepts the term "daddy" as a more sexual term, than a parental term. | | | | 5 | 12/17/2011 4:21 PM | My Sad Revelation So-- On Friday night, I went to Stagecrafters to see "Cinderella." It was a great production! But as I looked around me at the 2 and 3 and 4 and 5 year olds sitting in the audience, their wide eyes mesmerized by the action on stage, I realized that the archetypal beautiful woman subdued by a prince is still penetrating our society and corrupting our youth!!! <--- That may be a little extreme, but to some extent it is true!!! We may think that we have gone somewhere since the days of the Brother's Grimm, but indeed we haven't. When I look at what the media teaches kids, when I remember what I was taught as a little baby child, it makes me sick! What is the message? That ladies will only get their prince if they're beautiful and if they have a fairy godmother? That men will only get the beautiful maiden if they are a prince? Maybe I am overreacting, but it just really struck me and I wanted to get my feelings out.
Here's my real dilemma though: I don't know what to do about it-- or if there is anything to be done. If we switch the archetypes, its obvious. If we change the story altogether, it's no longer beloved. If we delete it, what do we have? Nothing. It reminds me of Invisible Man, he must accept where he came from (slavery) as deceitful as it is, or else he has no history. He is no one. As much as the archetypes are embarrassing, we still have to accept that they are part of our history. But now what? Is continuing to tell them bad? Let me know what y'all think! | | | | 6 | 12/16/2011 10:50 AM | A Film that Doesn't Fit the Monomyth? In our sociology class we just finished up the movie Castaway, a movie with Tom Hanks about how he gets stranded on a desert islnad, learns to survive there for years, and finds his way home eventually. The movie ends in a peculiar way though. Before he got stranded he proposed to his girlfriend right before he left on a business trip, thinking he would be back in a few days. After four long years on the island, he comes home to find the woman he once loved married to another man. Everything has changed for him. He has to get used to this new world that he has been thrust into, on a social and physical level. The movie ends with him standing at a 4-way intersection in the middle of nowhere, showing him being alone and not really knowing where to go. Endings like this show the reality of things that happen everyday. People move on, things change, unexpected things happen. We often don't want to see these realities, especially in movies. We like to see things how we wish they were, but not how they actually are or how they will always be. | | | | 2 | 12/11/2011 1:46 PM | Structuralism Although we've not learned too much about structuralism, I already like it. It essentialy makes english like math. To find the underlying meaning of a story, you must find the signifiers and add them to the characters. Then you find patterns to get the correct equation for the story. I know this sounds really nerdy, but it's how I see this theory. | | | | 13 | 12/11/2011 10:18 AM | Words Are Only Representations Okay, when we learned about our newest theory I was a little...unamused. Only because what we were learning was obvious. Of course a tree is only the representation for what we know as a tree. Do trees know they are trees? No. But we know them as such becasue that's the art of language that is the way we communicate. I don't know, any thoughts on this? | | | | 9 | 12/8/2011 9:16 PM | Little Red Riding Hood I was completely fascinated by the French version of Little Red Riding Hood we watched today. To be completely honest, I actually really liked it. Beside the obviously creepy parts (Red eating the flesh of her own grandmother, for instance), I think the message of this story wasn't entirely bad. Of course, it was very different from what I (and I'm sure most people) was expecting, but who really needs another story about male dominance and their ability to trick and manipulate little girls? We all know this is true, we see it time and time again not only in stories, but in real life as well. What we don't see nearly as often is the independence of women! It does exist, as much as society often tries to suppress it. I think this story made us so uncomfortable because it highlighted the power that women do have. This is an archetype that we're not very familiar with, and therefore made us uneasy. The thought that Red knew it wasn't her grandma in the bed from the beginning and therefore gave into the wolf's demands because she WANTED to and not because she HAD to is a strange concept to an audience expecting the poor, defenseless girl to get raped and killed. The fact that Red was aware of herself and her surroundings and not completely helpless is weird to a society that is used to stories about innocent little girls completely ignorant to anything dangerous or impure. It is not often that a woman's sexual prowess and independence is highlighted in a story without her being a villain--in fact, who would you even consider the "villain" in this story? | | | | 0 | 12/7/2011 11:26 PM | Oh hey look here I stumbled upon my older notes on New Criticism from the start of the year and felt they needed to be shared:
"Effective Fallacy- what the poem makes you feel = meaning of the poem. FALSE. Your feelings mean nothing.
Intentional Fallacy- Knowing the author's intent when writing. NO, who are you? You don't know the author's intent. Don't ask.
Texts are created by author's ideas [insert strange doodle I can't even begin to decipher].
Literature exists only through meaning- can be personal. Learn meaning through what SPEAKER says, not the author. So kill the author.
Heresy of the Paraphrase- using a paraphrase of the work and saying that's the meaning. FALSE. Your thoughts, unless they correctly convey the meaning, mean nothing.
[Insert pen drawing of a praying mantis wearing a top hat and monocle] New Criticism Praying Mantis agrees that your feelings mean nothing."
I hope others will get a kick out of this like I really did. | | | | 17 | 12/3/2011 10:30 PM | Taboo four-letter words... It's interesting to me how four-letter words (essentially swear words, but look it up, I'm not gonna foul up the boards by listing them here) are considered so wrong. They're merely letters, but because society has deemed them wrong, they are. We're offended by them only because they have been given a negative connotation. It's kinda funny how these words are offensive to so many people and break so many people down, when they are only vowels and consonants strung together. Does anyone see a "better" reason as to why these words are considered taboo? | | | | 7 | 12/3/2011 9:21 PM | A word on Freud. Several people on here have talked about how they disagree with Freud, because his ideas are gross and of course I'm not in love with my [insert parent]!. I think we need to give him more credit, though. He's not the be-all, end-all of psychology, but he was one of the first to try to make sense of it. Not all of his theories are valid, but before dismissing them as "disgusting", might I suggest we look at them rationally?
Perhaps not everyone has a sexual love of their opposite gender parent, but girls tend to marry men that are like their fathers, and boys tend to marry women like their mothers. This doesn't necessarily mean they were "in love" with that person, but when you grow up in a household, you tend to see said household as something "normal". Even without realizing it, even if you think your parents are insane, you know them as being "normal", and so when you're looking for a spouse, why wouldn't you want to model them after the people you know that well?
This, obviously, is taking only one of his "theories", but it seems to be the one that people take the most offense to. I'm not saying that every one of Freud's theories is correct, but I don't think we should be so quick to cast them off as "gross".
What do you guys think about all of this? | | | | 3 | 12/3/2011 1:58 PM | Pour Soi and Peer Pressure I saw this on one of the posts where someone connected peer pressure to pour soi thinking. This is blatantly untrue because you are choosing to give in to the whims of others. Giving in to peer pressure is not an example of pour soi thinking, it is an example of being en soi and choosing to do stupid things. So this goes on to my rant. Peer pressure is not an excuse to do anything. I really hate that this still exists as a justification after all of our fourth grade health videos told us that giving in to peer pressure was wrong. News flash: you can say 'NO'. I'm just tired of everyone using this as a cop out. If you drink or smoke have the gumption to admit that you choose to undertake these actions a.) because you really wanted to, or b.) because you valued the happiness of the group of people you were with over your own health and morals. Or you can go existentialist on everyone and say: I made a pour soi decision. Rant done. | | | | 11 | 11/27/2011 2:31 PM | Are "literature experts" just really depressed? I've noticed that most of the things we've discussed in the class has put humanity in the wrong. I'm not just talking about poetry day, where there has scarcely been a poem with good connotations, but all of the theories too. Every single theory has a dark side to humanity, but also a good side. Every single time we talk about this, the conversation is always on the dark side. Humanity has done some amazing things! We aren't just awful people looking to enslave people or kill people. There are really good things out there today and you don't have to go far to find them, but we have these literature experts trying to tell us that humanity is awful and that they are in some way superior because they found some magic key to unlock the way we think. | | | | 5 | 11/27/2011 12:10 PM | Words are just words Something about this recently discussed theroy really blew my mind. We were dicussing in class about how words are given to put a lable on an object but only because some guy gave it this name and we decided to carry this on. So simple yet crazy to think about. If I wanted to call a pen a bunny would I be wrong? Or would I simply just be renaming the signified with a different signifer but in this case no one would ever start doing this because everyone is framiliar with calling a pen a pen and not a bunny or a shoe. The study of semiology is really intresting to me because before we discussed this in class I never really though about words just being symbols that we gave them by choice and decided to follow and even many years later we are still calling objects by the same ol' names. | | | | 9 | 11/27/2011 11:12 AM | A Tree...? The discussion about reality and how we label things based on our society really confused me at first, but got me thinking a lot. It's very weird to think that our society labels things on a broad scale, and most everyone agrees on it (for example, calling a tree, a tree). But these broad terms can be broken down into sub-groups that not everyone may agree on, like the class activity we did today when people drew different types of trees. Everything we see has been labeled as something by someone many years ago, and the majority of society chose to agree that it would be labeled as such from then on. Usually things we see everyday are just as we take them. From the time we were born, a pencil was a pencil and a football was a football. Now that we are breaking down words, objects and cognitive processes that go along with them, everyday objects have a whole new and strange meaning. | | | | 10 | 11/26/2011 10:23 PM | EXISTENTIALISM! The question that was raised in class by Mr. Chisnell about this theory was: "How do you know that you are human, in contrast to... lets say, a dog!?" Of course the obvious response would be physical ones, but they cannot be true. He gave an example of the fact that we can't be dogs because we have opposable thumbs... he responded "okay.. i just cut your thumbs off. Does that mean your a dog now?" After a few awkward silences we came up with the idea that we, as humans, have a greater sense of logic and rationalism that we can connect with our lives, that we can act freely and choose how we wish to exist.
Well.. of course that discussion always leads into something different. I was actually interested in this conversation we were having too, so when the subject was about to change I found myself going "great... now were gonna talk about another dead guy who thought he was some big-shot, and blahblah... I'm just gonna go to sleep (sorry chiz)". But it was impressively interesting. The ideas that we can act freely as humans and choose how we wish to exist is differentiated in two categories: En Soi, and Pour Soi. En Soi meaning In/of itself (ie a rock... its only purpose is to do what it really is, be a rock) and Pour Soi which is acting for itself (ie mostly what humans are -some will argue that- being what we are to the fullest and making our own decisions).
Anyways, after all that blabbering... here's my question: Can there be a true balance between both? We can wake up one day and decided that I'm just going to ignore every one and black every one out and sit here and be En Soi and just play video games all day... but because we made the decision to do that, doesn't that mean we are Pour Soui? ( I asked Chisnell this in class... but there wasn't really a straight forward response).
Pleaseeeeee tell me your thoughts! | | | | 4 | 11/26/2011 12:59 PM | Bilingualism Talking about the meaning of words got me thinking about something I wonder about sometimes. I've had some experience with people who speak two languages, and I always wonder which language they think in! I don't consider myself a fluent German speaker, but I do know enough about the language to carry a conversation, and I know that a lot of things said in German do not translate into English. Speaking with a German, they say things they think translate that really don't (for example, they say "make a party," instead of "throw" or "have"; "stand up" instead of wake up, etc), which then gets me wondering why we use the words we do! Why everyone uses the words they do. I think language is the most fascinating thing. It really is like a verbal contract, a mututal understanding between all peoples that each thing has a word, and that each word means something. I just always wonder which language truly bilingual (or multilingual) people think in. If you can speak multiple languages equally as well, which language do you choose to label things in your own head? Does it switch? Or do you always think in your first language? Is it different for everyone? | | | | 7 | 11/26/2011 11:57 AM | Words/symbols and reality I found the disscusion we had today in class very interesting. We talked about how words are really just symbols for things in reality, and we all live in our own deluted reality. In our own minds we have perceptions of things that others might not. I watched the political debate, like Mr. Chisnell said, and noticed how they each point fingers at the other side. They both agree on the problem, but they don't agree on who caused it, and how to solve it. Both parties believe their way is the right way, and depending on how we percieve things in our reality, we pick sides. | | | | 9 | 11/26/2011 11:04 AM | archetype vs. stereotype I understand the concept of an archetype, and I know what a stereotype is, what I don't know is the difference of them. An archetype is something that everyone, everywhere thinks the same thing of an object. An example: people think scary things when a dark forest is presented. And a stereotype is when people think the same thing about one group, right? I know people can be stereotypical of one another, but the two are just so similar. Is it that an archetype is more symbolic? But so is a stereotype right? Thought anyone? | | | | 13 | 11/21/2011 8:12 PM | It's all in your mind The best thing I've found about existentialism so far is this: It doesn't matter what you do, what matters is the thought process that surrounds the decision/action and leads to it. For example, listening to a band if you a) listen to the band because everyone else says they are good then you are ensui. But if you b) don't listen to the band because everyone else listens to them, your still ensui. But if c) You listen to them because you have decided to give them a chance and then make a decision you are por sui. and if d) you decide that you won't listen to them because you simply are not interested, you're also por sui. It doesn't matter at all WHAT you do, mearly WHY you do it. The existentialists are interested in your actions, but in your minds and morals and judgement. This will be interesting to compare I feel, with additional philosophies that care about people's actions, not their reasonings and define humanity on the end results rather than the justifications. | | | | 10 | 11/20/2011 8:09 PM | Film One thing that I thought was really interesting was how basicaly every single film ever made follows the same structure. It doesn't matter about the different characters, plot, director, or location of the film. They all follow the same format which fits the way our subconcious works. I never noticed this before with any movie. After Mr. Chisnell pointed it out though, the past few movies I've watched I've noticed have followed the same format. It seems that it may be near impossible to create a successful movie that doesn't follow this, and I would like to find one that doesn't. | | | | 5 | 11/20/2011 11:18 AM | More por soui en soui... A few days ago in clas while discussing the por soui en soui, Mr. Chisnell had brought up something that I thought was pretty interesting. He brought up how people "wait" for something to happen, and by waiting you're not really living within yourself, and it got me thinking of one of my favorite movies, Serendipity (which is one of the best Christmas movies EV-ER, just saying). It's about how two people who literally meet on accident (thus the movies called Serendipity) and they let fate decide whether or not they're mean to be together. I've been thinking, an if people believe in fate and let it take it's course, does that mean they're truly not living for themselves? I guess I'm still just a tab confused on this whole thing so some one please clear this up! | | | | 6 | 11/19/2011 10:25 PM | En soi, Por soi, oui oui So ever since we learned about En Soi, acting on the things around you or acting because of another thing, and Por Soi, acting because you are choosing to act that way, ive been questioning everything I do and everything the people around me do. No one wants to be en soi, everyone wants to be an individual and to be seen as a leader, not a follower. I dont want to say its wrong to be en soi, but is it? If everyone in the world were por soi, then I feel the world would be filled with arrogant people and we would essentially fail as a society one way or another. In contrast if everyone in the world was en soi, then we would have a world full of followers and a lack of new ideas. We need a balance of both in the world to function, and most people if not everyone needs to be both somewhat por soi and en soi. | | | | 4 | 11/19/2011 8:50 PM | Erik Erikson
Erik Erikson's Eight Stages of Development really surprised me, our whole life is planned out through these stages, that displays human development and how we mature. The fifth stage is what we are all in right now Identity and Identity Confusion. We are all experiencing new things, trying to find our place in society and working to build self esteem and confidence. Reading the excerpt from the course pack makes me realize that this is probably the toughest stage that makes or breaks a person. People need to push back the lows of society and realize there is something to do with their life and someone to love and something to believe in. | | | | 10 | 11/19/2011 8:44 PM | The Subconcious The subconcious rules over what we do, every step of the way, dictating our conversations and actions. We may not realize it, but our actions are made by it, whether an unwanted phrase slipping from someones lips, or hitting someone before you realize what youre doing. | | | | 7 | 11/15/2011 4:26 PM | Analysis of Sweet Charity For those who dont know, Sweet Charity is the musical being put on by the ROHS Drama Club currently. I am in the pit, so I get to watch the same lines over an over again, making me very familiar with the story line. It also made me wonder what applications that particular story has to some of the lit. theory we've been talking about lately.
I would be interested in hearing what other people think.
Basic story line: Main character Charity is a dance hall hostess (she is paid to dance and talk with guys at this dance hall). In the first scene she is talking with her current lover, who then ends up stealing her money and throwing her in a lake. After being rescued and interogated by some well-meaning cops, she goes to her place of work and tells everyone all about it, albeit with a twist of denial. She refuses to believe that he could ever do such a thing, and tells her co-hostesses such.
They tell her that she is stupid, she getts out of her stage of denial and into the stage of depression, all while giving away all her money to con-men. Then Charity has a run-in with fame, literaly, as she gets knocked over repeatedly by a famous movie star who is in his own slump with his love life. He spends the evening with Charity as compensation for his missing love (and knocking her over), takes her back to his apartment, gives her a few momentos and his autograph, then hides her in the closet while he makes up with his drama queen girlfriend. She goes back to her work the next day and tells them all about it, again they dont believe her, and then she decides that she needs to be more cultured and goes out seeking a way to get more cultured. She ends up being stuck in an elevator with a super conservative tax accountant named Oscar, who has claustrophobia, and Charity has to deal with that. After they finally escape from the elevator, he invites her to go to a church with him which ends up being a hippie-fest with jazz flair. Wierded out, she still agrees to go on another date with him, and finds out that she really likes him. He is under the impression that she works at a bank however, which puts a flaw in their relationship. She tries to tell him, fails, gets depressed at her job, decides to leave her job and get out, finally tells him, finds out that he already knows and "dosent care", he asks her to marry him, she says yes, her work throws her a party, he shows up at the party then later decides he cant marry her based on her past, and in the course of telling her, throws her in the lake. So the whole thing comes full circle, the only upside being that this time she didnt lose her money as well as get thrown in the lake.
That probably isnt enough detail to get any good analysis out of, but if you have seen it or know the story at all, then maybe there is something that you can come up with. | | | | 8 | 11/13/2011 10:52 AM | Rallying Behind a Cause Something Chisnell said when we were talking about Halloween yesterday got me thinking. We discussed how Devil's Night is uniquely specific to Detroit, and how people used to come from all over the world to cover the destruction Detroiters inflicted on their own city. Then one year, the mayor decided not only to change the name, but to get people to help him protect his city. And people did! People patrolled and walked around in the city, preventing pointless crimes and protecting their homes. I think this is amazing, but I have to wonder why a.) a mayor never thought of this before, and b.) why no one did it on their own. Why did it take an elected leader to say "hmm, I guess we should do something about people randomly burning down buildings the night before Halloween" before anyone acted? Why did people live in fear instead of doing something about it? If all it took was a group of people with the same goal to accomplish a dramatic decrease of crime, why didn't someone step in much sooner? The mentality behind rallying for a cause is really interesting to me, because I don't think it always needs to take an elected official to make things happen. | | | | 7 | 11/13/2011 7:55 AM | Is Campbell's Monomyth ALWAYS applicable? As we read over Campbell's Monomyth (the circular journey in which the main character of every book and movie goes through) in class the other day, Chisnell seemed to think that literally every book and movie goes through this process. I was immediately skeptical of this idea, as it seems to be a very broad generalization. There are plenty of books and films that don't precisely follow the pattern, and even some that intentionally stray from it. In Twelfth Night for example, the hero isn't even particularly clear, and definitely does not follow the typical monomyth. A more modern example of this would be Napoleon Dynamite. This is a movie without much of a plot line, and seriously lacking in depth. How could such a film be labeled as following a particular path, that has ties to the myths of thousands and thousands of years ago? | | | | 3 | 11/12/2011 10:25 PM | Thomas Burke: Is there a true reality? The discussion of Thomas Burke and his veiw on what reality really is came up in class a few days ago. Mr. Chisnell told us that Burke says that reality in any ones eyes is a biased view, and it is impossible to view reality without having your ego or bias come in the way with that. Well my thought on this was "How can someone tell what reality TRULY is then?" If no matter who is saying it (whether it be Burke himself, or Joe-Shmoe on the street) is there a true perception? Because if we all have a skewed perception of what reality is and what it holds, doesn't that mean that a true reality doesn't exist... thoughts?! | | | | 3 | 11/9/2011 7:54 PM | Generalizations- No me gusta. This will probably be rambly. So, I don't like all of the giant sweeping generalizations that are used in Lit. "All art is born from pain", "This can be applied to all literature", "Every book ever has these archetypes", "This is art." I mean, in a super literal sense, how do we actually know that these things apply to all art and literature. In reality they don't. I think you can always find someway to break the mold of an archetype or find sects of literature that can't be classified. Unless you analyze every piece of art ever, you don't know this. Also, everything is subjective. Oh goodness, now I'm getting into the 'how to interpret books' thing again. For the purposes of discussion, I think that we should conform to the curriculum. I just don't like the assuredness of the people who come up with these theories and their ability to brand the whole world of art with them. Whine, whine, whine, whine, whine. | | | | 2 | 11/6/2011 7:42 PM | Star Wars Archetypes After all of the discussions in class I've begun to think differently. Not necessarily change my opinion on past thoughts, but notice things. My friends and I were watching Star Wars the other day and Dustin was realizing that each character followed one of the hero archetypes. Keep in mind we were watching "The empire Strikes Back", here were some observations; Luke is an orphan, he looks to Yoda for answers when he is having trouble with the force, and he has to overcome the fact that Darth Vader is his father, Han Solo on the other hand is a wanderer, he seeks to be independent and tends to run off on his own, Yoda is obviously a magician, he seeks balance within the force, and as far as physical health, he's looking pretty good for being in all the Star Wars movies and dying at 896 years old. Looking into past movies we can see other hero archetypes too, like Anakin started out as a martyr but as he grew up and gained more of the force he became a warrior turning him into Darth Vader.
I was just curious, has anyone else been able to see other hero archetypes in movies? I feel like after learning about these archetypes I'll be able to identify these archetypes a lot. | | | | 4 | 11/6/2011 10:47 AM | Subconscious and new/old brain I like that I'm taking Psych this year, because it's really helping when we're discussing psychological theories. (Not really a huge shocker, I suppose.)
The subconscious kind of reminds me of "new" and "old" brains. To put it simply, I was taught that "new" brains are what allow us to reason and control our actions, while our "old" brains are more animal-like, and cause us to react based on sheer impulse. Our subconscious reminds me of the "old" brain - we aren't necessarily aware of our actions or the reasons for them, they just occur automatically.
Does anyone agree, or am I stretching too far here?
| | | | 10 | 11/6/2011 10:00 AM | Good vs. Evil, Mankinds Biggest Struggle So I brought this up in first hour, but i want to see what people here think. What exactly determines "good" and "evil"? We know what society thinks is right or wrong, and we base many of our actions on that, but just because society says its wrong, is it? My example was the Showtime television series Dexter, where the main character is a serial killer who only kills serial killers. If there is one thing we can all deem evil i think it would be taking another persons life, but Dexter only takes the lives of people who are guilty of taking innocent peoples lives. Is Dexter good or evil? What are some of your thoughts on this subject? | | | | 9 | 11/6/2011 9:03 AM | Freud and Using him in Literature I am a believer in some of Freud's theories but now I am having a hard time applying them to books. We can not always know a character's past so how can we analyze them through Freud's eyes? Unless an author wrote their book using Freud's theories, it's very hard to apply them. We can easily identify a character's personality. Like we can say, that character is always angry and has anger problems but how can we indentify why the character has those anger problems unless the author gives us their specific history. It's very hard to use Freud in literature because not all characters have detailed backgrounds that we can analyze. | | | | 0 | 11/5/2011 11:42 PM | Crud Okay, so now I really hate that post about Generalizations I made two seconds ago, because it gives people the right to get mad at me and call me hypocritical when I get mad at them for being pissed off about literary theories violating their right to interpret books their way and be original and sunshine and rainbows and 'Everybody's right boys and girls!" I still think people are wrong and can't just make up stuff that they see in text that is clearly ludicrous. But I do think that the method of choosing your interpretation of the text is up to you. But when we are in a certain mode of interpretation, stick to it. I suppose I really just don't like the classifications of art that literary critics conform to. | | | | 4 | 11/5/2011 10:11 PM | Continuing narcisism... So, this is just kind of continuing my original discussion on Freud's narcissism, but with a different idea. Earlier we were talking about masks, and how we put them on to "hide the real us". Then, I thought about how Mr. Chisnell had told us about that girl who would make out with her boyfriend in the hallway everyday and her dad never knew about it. I know so many people who are like that. Even me and my sister are like that! Sometimes we don't tell are parent's that we bought a new dress because we don't want them to be mad that we just bought one more thing that we don't need. We're all so obsessed with our images, that sometimes we can't even fess up to our parents. | | | | 4 | 11/4/2011 8:45 PM | The three Stages of Freud Freud focuses on the structure of the mind and development in his work, expecially in the three stages that he discusses, oral, anal, and genital. I want to focus on the oral stage. This shows a babys dependency on a person, the need for sucking, the primary source of time spent as a newborn is spent doing this. Is a newborn baby has some trama in their lives that ruins their oral stage, they can become fixtated with that when they become adults. The dependancy that they should have felt as a newborn will be pushed into their adult years, and they will become dependent on people in their adult years. | | | | 0 | 11/2/2011 8:31 PM | Evolving Archetypes Today, in 3rd hour, we discussed the concept of walking into a sanctuary of any given religious branch and becoming silent. Based on Jung, that's because we are psychologically predetermined to have respect/awe to a higher power/what have you. I'm curious though, can archetypes change with time? I kept thinking about Darwin's theories regarding humans changing in order to best survive and how our genetic makeup has changed dramatically over the years. Why can't this morph into psychology? I should probably share the line that led to this thought. I'm not a very religious person to say the least, but I know I certainly get dead silent as soon as I walk into a church. Could I tell you why? Definitely not. My beef with this thought though is that if I walk into a modern church, I don't get that feeling. Today, with religion seeming to creep towards the back burner in our society (relative to the middle ages or other time periods in history) churches and religious acts seem to have less significance. However, when I walk into an old church I am overwhelmed with this sacred feeling. With that laid out and my previous questions asked, with the changing of the meaning of certain aspects of society since Jung's time, will his archetypes change as well? | | | | 0 | 10/31/2011 4:22 PM | Halloween nonsense Does this belong on the Literary Theory board? I hope so, because I'm putting it here anyway.
Despite the fact that Chiz attacked me with a clown mask on this morning and I wanted to cry, today's discussion was very interesting to me. I was unaware of the ancient Celtic cultures surrounding their death god Samhain and the traditions at the end of their harvest. However, I knew it would somehow link into the conversions of other cultures to Christianity and the witch hunts. The ignorance that drove the early followers of Christianity to convert other cultures is not surprising. The Celtics saw their bon fires and death-related ceremonies as the beginning to a new harvest and an event to bring together warmth and community. The Christians saw it as evil demon-worship. Again, it's not as surprising to me as the ignorance of today. Back then, to the Christians, religion was law. To act against faith was the same as committing a terrible crime.
This relates to Psychoanalytic Literary theory through the use of archetypes. The Celtics related the fire they used in their ceremonies and praise for Samhain to warmth, community, and a welcome for the spirits of their ancestors. When the Christians came along and saw their traditions, they related it to destruction and demon worship, like the fires of Hell. We also use archetypes when analyzing literature, such as Chisnell's example last week with water, which could represent both death and survival. | | | | 4 | 10/30/2011 2:30 PM | I don't care about feelings and I'm not sorry. Okay. So. I know that emotions are really important and people want to feel things when they read and connect to the text with things from their life. But at this point, I honestly don't care. This is English class, not feelings class. We've all had people in our classes present totally random ideas that just come out of no where, because they feel it. But no one can follow or knows what the heck they're talking about. When we interject our emotions into poetry and literature during class it stunts our discussion because we aren't actually talking about English, we're talking about how people feel. Go home and read stuff and feel connected to it and think about your emotions. That's great, I encourage that. I don't always want to dissect things that I read for pleasure either. But just because it's summer in the poem doesn't mean the speaker is thinking about swimming and going to the beach. No, no, you as a reader just enjoy nautical excursions. Maybe I connect summer to rampant killer clowns. If we're discussing the poem in class both of these interpretations are equally valid. BECAUSE THEY ARE BOTH EQUALLY IRRELEVANT. Other people don't understand your personal feelings. If you want to share them, fine, but you can't consider them substantial remarks in graded discussions, because they cannot be supported by anything. | | | | 10 | 10/30/2011 1:35 PM | Narcissism! Today whilst talking about narcissism and Erikson, and Mr.Chisnell had said that we all put on a mask so we don't let people see who we really are on the inside. Well, it got me thinking... A wile ago I dated a guy... Who was narcissistic. From what I remember, he was kinda full of himself and he thought he was so talented and smart and blah blah blah. Not to mention, he hated my make up, didn't like that I don't go to church, and absolutely HATED my taste in music. And after discussing this today in class, it made me think that possibly, he had on a mask that hid all of his insecurities. I mean, I give him credit, he admitted to having an ego, but this made me realize that this possibly could just be a show he's putting on. | | | | 4 | 10/30/2011 12:29 PM | Narcissism When we first began discussing narcissism I thought it was just some weird theory that made no sense. Then, after we got into it, I realized that so many people are narcissistic! It made so much sense why some guys act like such tools, because they are narcissistic. I just thought they were jerks who only cared about themselves when really they are putting up a mask to hide so no one ever see's who they are. I think that everyone is a little bit narcissistic, maybe not all the time, but in some situations we might try to be something we are not. | | | | 1 | 10/30/2011 12:18 PM | My Beef with New Criticism Don't get me worng, I'm actually quite a fan of new criticism, for it gets rid of all the crazy theories deried from readers adding their emotions or going all Freaud-like on the author. However, the only struggle I have with this theory is that it neglects the time period in which the piece was written in, which I find useful in some cases for understanding a piece, especially with works from Old English. Some words used commonly used in literature back then have different meanings and reactions in modern times (i.e, virgins) It is hard to understand what the text is implying when the context could be known for having a completely different meaning! | | | | 1 | 10/30/2011 11:50 AM | Still Arguing... Okay so this week in class I debated a point with Mr. Chisnell and he immediately came back with "you're wrong." Although my example sucked and I was, in fact, wrong, I still think my initial point was right. I don't think it is adequate to rely just on new criticism. I think you need to know some background of a piece to interpret it correctly. For example, a poem may mention the name George, or speak of a person who never tells lies. A reader could interpret that the author was alluding to George Washington and therefore the person in the poem was a great leader and trend setter. This absolutely affects the tone of a poem, unless the poem was written in the 1600's, before he was born. Sometimes you need to know what has or hasn't happened to prevent a wrong interpretation of the poem. | | | | 9 | 10/30/2011 10:28 AM | EMOTIONS. I am not upset about "new criticism". I am upset because we are judged by new criticism. English is not math. I hate math. I read to feel emotion and to relate to characters and analyize books or poems froms my own point of view. I know there are other theories and I don't have to agree with this particular theory. I read to feel and to use those feelings to come up with my own themes and ideas about a book by using the text. I don't understand why if I write an amazing paper or essay about a book or poem that is well thought out, original, and well written, I will get a bad grade but when another student writes an essay that follows the guidelines of new criticism but is completely unoriginal and generic, will get an excellent grade. THAT'S what bother me. | | | | 3 | 10/30/2011 10:16 AM | My Initial Thoughts Freud's Ideology Ironically enough, on Friday my psychology teacher (Ms. Ross- Blair, of course) mentioned how in the future we would touch on Freud's theories. She then went on to say how much of a lunatic she thinks he is- a statement that didn't surprise me as Mr. Chisnell said that psychology teachers would either hate or love Freud.
While I have not had much education in Freud's ideology, I do have some thoughts based off of the brief discussions I have heard about him. I believe that Freud's theories on the subconscious leaking out through the conscious is true in many scenarios. However, it seems to me that there are also many occasions where Freud over-analyzes actions of a person, and does not leave room for coincidence. | | | | 1 | 10/30/2011 8:45 AM | Present Day Coming of Age Rituals: The American Style When discussing Erikson's theory today, we talked about coming of age rituals. I think they are important for teenagers to experience, so they know that they can make their own decisions, have respect for their decisions, and discover who they are. But today, thousands of dollars are spent on sweet sixteens, weddings, and maybe even graduation parties (there might not be a show about that, but I bet people do this!) These coming of age people then learn the opposite of what should come out of these rituals: selfishness and whining to get what they want. Then, the audience of these TV shows is more susceptible to obtaining these characteristics, leading to the whining for his/her own huge party (this excludes people who watch these shows in order to laugh at how ridiculous they are). If the Americanized way of preparing for enjoying celebrations interferes with the rituals of other cultures, will all original purpose of these rituals be forgone? | | | | 4 | 10/29/2011 11:28 PM | Evil and Good I think that even before we addressed this topic we all had a basic understanding in some way of the simplistic interpretation of it: with light comes dark, with summer winter, with yin comes yang. So the underlying theory of dualism is not so strange or far fetched, or so difficult to follow. But my prediction is that even with this pseudo-eastern Philosophy basis, a lot of us are still going to have trouble internalizing it through out the year: accepting that what is evil is not necessarily wrong, just id and impulse. I'm interested in seeing how that will play out, especially amongst those of us who have strong moralistic, religious or ethos of sharp division: how will the reactions to this philosophy go once we apply it more to literature and our own lives? none too smooth-just as a hypothesis. | | | | 12 | 10/29/2011 10:13 PM | Social Taboos One part of Freuds ideology, according to MR. Chiz, is that social taboos help shape minds. I completely agree with this statement. How would we know what is right and what is wrong if it were not for the beliefs our families and society have imposed upon us. This explains the different thoughts believed in other parts of the world i.e China, Europe, the South, tribal communities- they are all raised under different social taboos, therefore their thoughts and lives are diverse from ours in the Midwest.
Another thing I wonder about is what would happen if we grew up without any social taboos. Would we be amoral beings with nothing but primal instinct, or are we naturally born with morals in us? | | | | 4 | 10/29/2011 9:11 PM | Id, Ego, and Superego...AKA a Long, Confused Rambling In sixth hour the other day, we discussed Freud's theories of the id, ego, and superego, and I had so many questions. Chisnell gave an example of Girl Scout cookies... When the Girl Scouts come to your door, your id tells you that you want their cookies, so you should mug the Girl Scouts because you know you can take them and those cookies should be yours! But your superego tells you that is wrong, that you'll get in trouble, that stealing is bad. Chisnell said our superego tells us this because of social constructs, that we grow up learning that stealing cookies from little girls is wrong, and therefore most of us won't do it. However, I have to wonder, then, where traits like compassion, sympathy, and understanding come in. If your primal id is telling you to attack these little girls, and your superego is saying "uhh no, you'll go to jail," what part of your brain is telling you that those poor girls don't deserve to be attacked, that stealing cookies is not only lawfully wrong, but morally, as well? Where are your morals? If someone grew up in a society where killing people was okay, where you could kill your neighbor if you liked his car and everyone would understand and be okay with it, would your superego tell you that this is acceptable behavior? Are humans really inherently selfish? Does your id only tell you selfish things, and does your superego only yell at you things that it's learned from civilization? I have a hard time believing humans don't have a primal compassion; I find it doubtful that all humans only have a sense of sympathy learned from society. | | | | 4 | 10/29/2011 9:09 PM | Our Greatest Triumph? Today in class when discussing Erikson's 8 stages of development, we began to talk about mid life crises and how and when they come about. We also talked about when the greatest moment of our lives are, and how do we know when they are? We would either have to look into the past or the future to see when this moment was in our life. Not to be a downer, but what if our greatest achievement was when we were 10 years old? What if the rest of our life can never live up to that moment, and we don't know it yet? Thoughts like these can drive a person into depression, rage, and even suicidal thoughts. Something to think about...or not think about for that matter. | | | | 1 | 10/25/2011 4:37 PM | Erickson Today's discussion was probably my favorite yet. It was just very interesting and gives you a new perspective and it allows you to reflect upon your life. The whole deal on finding out your greatest time in your life is like asking "would you rather go back in your past or go in the future?" Either way you're cheating life. Like Chisnell mentioned, if you follow Erickson's stages and you reflect on where you are, and if you haven't exactly accomplished the things you should have by your age, then what are you doing wrong? Sometimes you need to stray away from the rulebook and DO YOU. I absolutely love Enxhi Merpeza and the fact that she took off her first semester of college and spent time traveling and finding herself, she's become an even better person and more experienced and developed before entering college. I think if this suits you, then do whatever you need to do to feel complete. | | | | 0 | 10/24/2011 9:04 PM | Psychological Studies Before asking Mr. Chisnell this question, I was confused as to how psychologists like Erikson and Freud went about conducting their studies. Did they just come up with these ideas based on life experiences, or did they actually study seperate people and record their findings until they came to a conclusion? I was happy to hear that they studied thousands of people intensively before coming to conclusions, which is why so many people agree with their theories. These are still "theories" because there are still some exceptions to how humans behave, these are just how the general population acts based on their studies. One of my big questions is, how would these studies differ if they were conducted for the first time in todays society? How would they differ if millions were studied, instead of thousands? | | | | 0 | 10/24/2011 4:49 PM | Erikson vs. Freud After learning about Erik Erikson I prefer Erikson's thought's and theories over Freud's any day! I like how Erikson was one of Freud's students and has complete different thought on psychology and Literature. I like Erikson because all of his theories aren't about sex, or sexual things. I like that he came up with'how can you love anything or anyone if you don't love your self?' His 8 stages of development are a lot more thought out, and realistic compared to any of Freud's theories. My favorite is the Identity vs. Identity Confusion stage 5. This theory states at about 12 years of age, someone can find out who they are and what their purpose is in life. How can one find themselves and how do they do it. This part is about what you have to do to find who you really are. I know I went through lots of 'stages' in middle school and now I know who I am as a person. I love this theory because it applies to everyone.. Everyone goes through this and can relate. In third hour Mr. Chisnell had an example of a freshman girl with tons of make-up on. Over her four years she had less make up because she learned that she didn't need all of it. I hope we learn more of Erikson's theories! | |
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