December 21, 2014
"We come from people who had a lot of pride... We are very proud people."
I will never forget the day when my father said that to that old Mr. Lindner. At the time I really hadn't an idea of what he was saying. All I was thinking to my childhood self was how excited I was to tell grandmama that the moving men came. Took a couple years but grandmama told me about what really happened on that day that changed our lives. I still remember what grandmama been telling me about how father almost gave up the whole house for the money he lost. But even now I can still remember that that day my old man changed. He changed how he raised our family and how he raised me, and even though he ain't here anymore, what he taught to me later on changed how I lived and how I treated the children of my own.
From that day on mama and papa and grandmama and even aunt Bennie changed. They stopped caring so much about the money and the taking and started caring more about the love of the family. Papa raised me to be honest and to have integrity, just like that moving day a long time ago. We stopped worrying about the money and focused on pride, something that's been in this family for seven generations now. My father taught me to be strong and take care of family more than anything. He showed me that money ain't nothin without the people that you love, and to this day I believe it. I even raised my own kids that way, with pride and honesty. And even though being a black kid in a white place made it hard to fit in, hard to show them white people who I was as a person, I wouldn't go back to change any of it. Cause it was people like my dad and me who made the possibility of whites and black being equal.


Thanks mama and papa, grandmama and Bennie. For everything.
-Travis (not so) Younger

While others might say that Langston Hughes utilizes his poetry solely to emphasize blacks' points of views during various time periods, all of his poems-"I,Too," "The Negro Speaks of Rivers," and "The Weary Blues"- tell stories that elucidate the struggle, oppression, and ultimate beauty of blacks and black culture in history. In "I, Too," Hughes narrates as a defiant black man who is determined to have people "see how beautiful" he is. The narrator is determined to witness the end of the ongoing racism and to experience triumph. Like Morta of the fates, he is determined to see the end of a life. But unlike Morta, who cuts the thread of life and determines death, Hughes is determined to "cut" a life and mentality in society that is characterized by segregation."The Weary Blues" is a poem that documents the firsthand experiences of the solemn nature and emotion that a jazz musician expresses. The impact of jazz, unlike the high-volume rock n roll music of Jimi Hendrix, was of sorrow and dismay, leaving black American community with a constant feeling of hopelessness. In "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" Hughes describes himself as one who has experienced the "rivers" of oppression throughout history that causes his soul to grow "deep". The oppression following blacks across history is similar to the fire that follows Jeanette Walls in The Glass Castle; both blacks and Walls want to rid themselves of their troubles. However, unlike Walls' motif of fire, Hughes implies that there has not been a complete end to the oppression of blacks. Although he witnesses "the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to the New Orleans," Hughes repudiates the full understanding and appreciation of African Americans.

Blacks have experienced oppression and struggle throughout history and still do today. With each of his poems, Hughes questions the prevalence of black oppression in today's society as well as in history. He challenges our understanding of beauty of black culture and questions whether racism is a thing of the past or a matter that is ongoing like the infinite essence of outer space.

"What place does a dream have on one's life?"

We all have dreams. Whether it is to become a doctor or to become a star on Broadway, we all want things, and we dedicate our lives and our time to fulfill them. The goal, of course, is to achieve,to overcome obstacles and become successful. Our visions and dreams drive us to try time and time again until we succeed. But what happens after we do succeed? What happens after we get the job or when we receive the letter of acceptance to our school of choice? Everyone likes to believe that the answer is eternal happiness. Once we achieve our goals, we are content and blissful. But this is often not the case. Unless our dream is fulfilled the moment before we die, we all face life after success, and during this life we continue to want more and more and to have the desire for perfection, which leads to a sad truth; simply fulfilling our dream is never enough.


Gatsby experiences success when after five long years, he finally finds his way back into Daisy's heart. They fall back into love with each other and Daisy agrees to leave Tom for Gatsby. Gatsby's vision to be with Daisy is fulfilled and his dream comes true, but like many who succeed, this simply is not enough to make him happy. He needs more. Not only does he need Daisy, he also needs her to convince herself and others that she never loved Tom. Gatsby's longtime vision makes him hungry for everything to turn out perfectly, and consequently when Daisy says that she did once love Tom, but that she loved Gatsby too, her words "seem to bite physically into Gatsby" (133). Gatsby cannot grasp the idea that not everything worked according to his desire, and at that point he loses Daisy.

We like to believe that success makes us happier and accomplished, but often success drives us mad; it makes us obsess over perfection. Desire for success can motivate us, but after fulfilling our dreams we are never quite satisfied. Like Gatsby, we are accustomed to need our visions to work out perfectly. Whether the person who got accepted into a top college or Gatsby himself, we all have the desire to want more, and desire can often be costly.

Throughout 11 AP, we have read many books and passages about women in society. In The Scarlet Letter, we witnessed an adulteress in a Puritan society, which shames her and deems her a sinner. In The Bluest Eye, we witness Pecola's as well as other black females' oppression that results from the judgments of a society ruled by white beauty standards. In both instances, women are oppressed by societies that are dominated by beliefs held during specific time periods. Within the first couple of chapters, it becomes apparent that The Great Gatsby is yet another novel that, like The Scarlet Letter and The Bluest Eye, emphasizes how women are oppressed in a community where unfair standards persist.
In The Great Gatsby, it becomes apparent that Daisy's husband, Tom, is cheating on her. In today's society, we would be surprised if a woman were to stay in a relationship with someone who is unfaithful, but in a setting during the period of Modernism, where people began to become more and more materialistic, the reason for Daisy's choice to stay with her husband is quite evident. Daisy reveals her knowledge that women in the 1920s are oppressed. She tells Nick that the best thing a girl can be in the world is "a beautiful little fool." By expressing her belief that women can only have value if they possess beauty, she reveals that knowledge and wisdom are irrelevant; the only trait that matters is being beautiful, for men will choose to marry those who are. I began to question Daisy. She is aware of the shameful idea that women are seen as objects of physical attraction just like she is aware of her husband's cheating, yet she never feels the need to leave Tom. As quick I was to hate Tom, with his "supercilious manner" and his hubris, I realized that it is not just Tom's fault that Daisy lives an unhappy life, but rather the materialistic nature of women during the time period of Modernism and Daisy herself. The only thing that keeps Daisy in her relationship with Tom is her obtainment of the luxuries that Tom offers. She is comfortable with her lifestyle because she has been given riches.
 
After asking myself why Daisy can't just leave Tom, I began to realize that Tom, whose riches are shared with Daisy, isn't forcing the relationship to continue, but rather Daisy's need to live a high-end lifestyle. Like many women during the 1920s, Daisy's life revolves around the riches that are provided by her husband. The influence of materialistic needs during Modernism keep Daisy trapped in her unhealthy relationship and oppressed women like her.

In a society where everyone has their own perceptions and opinions,the use of punctuation is changing in order to more effectively convey ideas and creativity. The freedom from punctuation dogmas give writers the ability to express their emotions and perceptions more effectively. Whether using simple applications of punctuation, less common types of punctuation for excitement, or eliminating punctuation as a whole, a writer uses punctuation to reflect tone and emotion. In fact, varied applications of punctuation is often used depending on different writing styles. Emily Dickinson, an acclaimed poet, support the notion that people should have the freedom to apply punctuation to their individual pieces of writing. The different types of writing that a writer utilizes, poetry in Dickinson's case, is a freedom that every author has. Dickinson believes that her freedom to write without being limited to certain aspects of language allows her to "dwell in Possibility." She is free to explore different types of writing that strays from typical grammar rules and allows her to discover infinite possibilities. Her type of writing avoids the confines of punctuation rules and is "more numerous of Windows." Dickinson believes that her methods of writing poetry allow her to see more just like a window allows people to see more. These "windows" allow her to look out, see, find, and discover more with her style of writing. Not once in her piece does she use a period, a semicolon, or a comma. Rather, she separates each of her thoughts with dashes to elaborate on how her writing and her use of language separates herself from the binding rules of punctuation and how it truly allows her to dwell in possibility.

"The damage done was total. She spent her days, her tendril, sap-green days, walking up and down, up and down, her head jerking to the beat of a drummer so distant only she could hear. Elbows bent, hands on shoulders, she flailed her arms like a bird in an eternal, grotesquely futile effort to fly. Beating the air, a winged but grounded bird, intent on the blue void it could not reach-could not even see-but which filled the valleys of the mind."
This exert, as well as the entirety of the novel, has been an emotional roller coaster for me. This book is one of few that has changed my perception of the world, and this paragraph offered a range of dismal emotions for myself.
In this passage, we witness the future Pecola, I had to look up the definition of a tendril, which is illustrated below.

The moment I saw an image of a tendril, I couldn't help but relate the endless curls of the plant with Pecola's life. Walking back and forth in an infinite cycle, Pecola lives a life of emptiness and lack of love. Consequentially, she is both mentally and physically drained. I disconvered the most grieving instance when Morrison describes Pecola as a bird that fails to fly. Pecola, who has always wanted to be beautiful, who yearns to have blue eyes, but is raped and shunned from society, is incapable of escaping the judgement and racism of others. She is unable to achieve her "blueness," her beauty, and while she has wings, she is grounded. Her life was not set to fail, but her circumstances and society's loathing of blacks lead to her downfall. And although none of her oppression was her own fault, the hatred that whites have for blacks and the self-hatred that the blacks have of themselves lead Pecola to become a flightless bird who has no one to love and support her.

This week we discussed different characters in The Bluest Eye. We analyzed several black characters whose age wealth varied. Throughout the novel, blacks encounter racial prejudice and other hardships that target them because of their race.

One of these characters is Pecola. She is teased at school and, being a black girl, is at the bottom of the demographic hierarchy. Her family is poor and her parents often neglect her. In contrast, we also are introduced to the character of Geraldine, who comes from a community where black women strive to manifest an identity epitomized by white standards. She constantly worries "about the edges of [her] hair" and is taught about the "careful development of thrift, patience, high morals, and good manners";however, she is incapable of experiencing love in her life with her husband and even her own son. Her life, like Pecola's, is filled with rejection and inability to fit the standards of society. 

However, Pecola and Geraldine are very different in the sense that Geraldine, unlike Pecola, is a wealthy adult. 

What struck me as sad is that in The Bluest Eye, all of Morrison's characters experience oppression. I came to a disappointing realization about society in the novel; if you are black and poor, you lose; if you are black and rich, you still lose. The oppression that the characters experience made me feel a sense of hopelessness. I wondered what the cause of this could have been and after pondering for some time, I realized that the oppression isn't due to wealth or age, but rather the white standard of beauty that blacks have.

One particular part of the novel that I found disheartening was when Pauline, a black woman, calls her own daughter ugly. Like the rest of society, even Pecola's own mother marks her as someone who is ugly. Even blacks in the novel have succumbed to white beauty standards. In a society where being black automatically deems one as ugly and less superior, there is no way to live a life free of oppression because of genetics: something that no one has control over. 

A Twisted, Sexualized Society
Earlier during the week we analyzed a piece titled "Our Barbies, Ourselves". This piece discussed how Barbie has made women have impossible standards for their physical characteristics. One part that I found particularly compelling was when Prager introduces the fact that Barbie has "humongous breasts," but her male counterpart, Ken, only possesses a "truncated, unidentifiable lump". She states that Barbie, with her big breasts and perfect physique, urges females nowadays to feel the need to show off their bodies for men, who are protected from the need to divulge their "lumps". Prager believes that this stigma has lasted even in today's world- a world with "movies and videos... filled with topless women and covered men." 
Prager claims that women feel the need to expose their bodies to please men. She suggests that men have expectations that their girlfriends and wives feel pressure to fulfill. However, in many instances in today's society, the opposite of Prager's claim is true; men nowadays are put in a position where they must please the expectations of women. 
Take for example a Twitter post depicted below. As I was dragging through my Twitter feed, I stumbled across a post that brought up a very good point. In the tweet, Nick Jonas and Miley Cyrus are compared, introducing a double standard that proves that men are victims of sexual exploitation. 



















This image, which shows the headlines of two different articles, illustrates the crude differences in how the bodies of women and men are demanded by society. Miley Cyrus is criticized for showing off her body, but Nick Jonas is praised and even receives a "You've Gotta See This New Pic!" This article headline is relatable to the constant buzz for One Direction or Five Seconds of Summer or of course, everyone's favorite wildcat. Twitter profiles like "Total Man Candy" constantly post pictures of half-naked men.
 It seems that in "Barbie's world," Miley is simply doing what every woman in today's society strives to do; but she gets criticized constantly and gets ridiculed when she does put clothes on. In Prager's piece, women are forced to expose themselves to appease the standards of men. But if you ask me, these two articles show that the opposite is true. Contrary to Prager's claim,  it is evident that men have become objects of the impossible expectations for the boy-band fan girls and the "Man Candy Monday" followers. 

Synthesis Essay: Something New
Like others in the class, I decided to write a body paragraph in the form of a synthesis essay. Because I wanted to be cool and I didn't want to conform, I decided to write a piece that challenges our prompt that we received during the week about how the othering people leads to the dehumanization of the oppressed and the oppressor. However, I am not sure if it is all that great. Anyways, I decided to give it a try.
Sidenote: This body paragraph does not necessarily support my actual views in real life. Also, I found it difficult to incorporate a picture that fit the paragraph so I decided to post a picture of Ellen, cause who doesn't love Ellen.



However, very often it is not always others who lead to the dehumanization of the oppressor and the oppressed, but the oppressed themselves. Unlike in Staples' and Hawthorne's pieces, in "There is No Unmarked Woman," the separation of a group of people from society results from Tannen's observations. The idea that women do not have the freedom to be unmarked shows that the female race is oppressed. Tannen reaches this hypothesis by scrutinizing each of the physical traits a group of women have. She examines the makeup, clothes, shoes, and hair of each women,but she does this in a way that objectifies them. She refers to them as "No. !", "No. 2," and "No.3" (Source C). By doing this, Tannen oppresses females. Rather than calling them their names, Tannen assigns each woman a number. She, rather than other people in society, becomes the source of the females' dehumanization.Whereas in other pieces where white women oppress black men and society oppresses Hester, Tannen leads to the dehumanization of the female race.

Dimesdale and Uncle Creon
This past week in class we had a brief discussion about who the protagonist of The Scarlet Letter is. Although Hester is the main character in The Scarlet Letter, the class discovered that she remains very static throughout the novel. She seems to possess confidence and beauty, but we never see a change in her personality nor do we see her experience an epiphany. However, we see Dimesdale experience a dramatic change in character from the beginning of the book to the end. Through the death of Dimesdale and the revelation of his scarlet letter, Hawthorne teaches his audience to take responsibilities for their actions and to refrain from secrecy. Ultimately, the audience discovers the theme of The Scarlet Letter through the actions of Dimesdale, despite the fact that he is not the main character.
This occurrence also appears in Antigone by Sophocles. Last year in 10 Honors we learned that although Antigone is the central character of the play, Uncle Creon is the tragic-hero. Unlike Antigone, Creon changes his views and experiences an epiphany. Whereas Antigone remains rebellious and obstinate, Creon becomes aware of his wrongdoings, which eventually leads to the death of Antigone, his son , and his wife.


When Ms. Valentino referred to Dimesdale as the character that teaches the audience a lesson, I immediately made the connection to Uncle Creon. I found it interesting that often, it is the character that experiences consequences  that conveys the theme more than the main character does. Although some may believe that authors utilize the central character to convey theme, very often the character that experiences a change of heart more effectively teaches a lesson.