End of the year Reflection

What has improved the most about my writing techniques since i started the class was my overall ability to construct an academic based argument.  I feel as if i have the tools to succeed now. The most helpful strategies that i found was most helpful was writing the web to start brainstorming and then learning to use the academic databases more deeply. It feels like the easiest paper for me to complete was the Zamatin's We paper. I really thought I had a good topic and it's always easier to write a paper when you have a great topic.  The short story paper seemed to be the hardest. Out of all the lessons we did, I feel as if the lessons we did on plagiarism were the most helpful. I didnt know what plagiarism was have the time. I do feel as if i am more prepared to write college level classes now. Thank you.

April Fools Day! Whoo!!

Just kidding, but you have me wondering if those two songs were an April Fools Joke since the packet is titled "Poetry for April 1st"? 

Well I had the feeling that throughout the Beyonce song, she was refering to how she would treat a woman she was with if she was a man. It seems as if she was envying the way most males live their lifes without confrontation like women have to worry about. For example, If a guy sleeps with a lot of women, he's "The man". But if a woman was to sleep around with a lot of guys, "shes a slut".

Now for "Sold" by John Micheal Montgomery, I am pretty positive he's just personifiying a car that he just bought off the auction block.

"I Want Whats Coming to Me"

MARK but this flea, and mark in this,---she knows shes pregnant
How little that which thou deniest me is ;---she was in denial
It suck'd me first, and now sucks thee, ---Its feeding off her
And in this flea our two bloods mingled be.--- now their bloods are combined
Thou know'st that this cannot be said-- cant be said that
A sin, nor shame, nor loss of maidenhead ;-- maybe its not hers?
    Yet this enjoys before it woo,--enjoys her pregnancy
    And pamper'd swells with one blood made of two ;--2 bloods, from the mom and dad
    And this, alas ! is more than we would do.

O stay, three lives in one flea spare,-- need to get a house
Where we almost, yea, more than married are.-- more than married
This flea is you and I, and this the flea is a product of both parties
Our marriage bed, and marriage temple is.-- their marriage is also
Though parents grudge, and you, we're met,--her parents didnt like him
And cloister'd in these living walls of jet.--they got closer
    Though use make you apt to kill me,--maybe he wants to kill her
    Let not to that self-murder added be,-- maybe they want to gave a abortion
    And sacrilege, three sins in killing three. --but that would kill emotionally all 3

Cruel and sudden, hast thou since-- sudden pain
Purpled thy nail in blood of innocence?-- lost her innocence
Wherein could this flea guilty be,---lost her baby
Except in that drop which it suck'd from thee?--
Yet thou triumph'st, and say'st that thou--- triumpth with the lost?
Find'st not thyself nor me the weaker now.--- she is weaker now
'Tis true ; then learn how false fears be ;-- scared of fears
Just so much honour, when thou yield'st to me,-- all the happy feelings she had
Will waste, as this flea's death took life from thee-- paraished when the baby was lost.

"Operation: Take Over Coporate"

I have written about 2-3 poems for my junior year poetry class. I learned how to spot the structure of poetry and write it effiently. I might need a little touching up thugh before I start. I don't mind poetry but my favorite poet to read would have ot be Edgar Allen Poe. His are the ones that make me think more than others. I think a poem is an artists thoughts cleaverly disguised through words and pose.

"So Dissapointed"

The ending of this story really dissapointed me. It was a great read, don't get me wrong. But It seems like it was a lot of build up for a really crappy ending. The only thing that happened was that he went to hell just as I think everybody thought would happen. It didn't have a big uproaring ending where God came and smacked him around a little like I thought would happen. I guess he was right when he said that God wasn't on his side.

"The Rage Of The Meance"

At this point of the story I believe Faustus has just truely put God to the test. His pride and ego has taken over his logic when he goes to ?rome? and hits the pope. Mephilis. warned him again what not to do, it has to beg the question if he still wants to save Faustus. I think he might have, but not anymore since he already sold his soul.

"Never Met Her Before, But I Think I Like Her Like A Metaphor"

Chapter five was the begining of the end for Faustus.  He started off by questioning where is God, and saying how he feels as if God doesn't love him.  Then entered the good and evil angel where the evil one told him to think of Wealth over Heaven. When Mephistophilis came inot the play he told Faustus that if he made a deal with the devil, he would be safe from God's wrath. But he would have to trade his soul for his services. He then started to deny that Hell exists, which is a conflict because in order to believe in Heaven you must believe in hell. He then asked for a wife and Mephistophilis brought him back a devil wife. Which leads me to believe that Mephistophilis can only half ass Faustus's requests and that they will never be as good as they would be if he followed God.

Doctor Doctor

I believe that Faustus is just getting ready to start his black magic. It kind of shows how he still thinks he his bigger than everything and how prideful he is. But it makes me wonder will reglion play a roll in this at all? we will see.

Reflection

I beleive that the semester went pretty well for me besides the random sickness that set me back a little bit. I like your idea about slowly weening us off of being told what to do. It builds responsibility. I think that the peer reviews can be improved a little bit; seeing as we never have time to fully do them. Whats helped me the most was to highlight the reading to fully grasp the text. The vocabulary was a help to understand the correct words to put in some of the text. For future lessons, I was thinking we should cove contractions, but I believe we already kind of covered those..

"Never Come Down" -- I hope I'm blogging about the right thing.

Although I was not present for Wendsday's class discussion, I had someone give me the gists of what we had to write about for this blog and how the class discussion went. We then proceeded to rediscuss the topic. I feel as if what you did as far as bringing up racism was a great idea because it is a touchy subject that most people do not like to hit on. While on the contrary, I have this same discussion all the time with people around me. I feel as if there is racism all over the world; not necessarily in everyones hearts. There is for sure sterotypes in everybody. And a very thin line that seperates the two from each other. While It pains me to admit it, alot of sterotypes are true. Now this doesn't mean that I go around sterotyping people because I know for a fact that there are expections to EVERY rule. If you looked at me, I would be that exception to about a good three fourths of the black sterotypes but some still hold true. In short, juding people off what color their skin is, or where they are from is completely wrong and inhuman. Whats even more sad to say is some people never change.

"Its Not You.. Its Me!"

One thing that really struck home with me that I picked up the second time around but not the first time was the fact that he was not concerned with the fact that he was a bug. It started to make me think why that was? I thought it was because he thought that maybe it was all  a dream but then he put that theory to bed the first couple of pages.

"First of All, Benjamin Franklin Was Never Elected."

Amey, Michael D."Living Under the Bell Jar: Surveillance and Resistance in Zamyatis "We". Critical Survey 17.1.  2005:  22-39. Academic Search Premier. Web. 30 Janurary 2011

Hutchings, William. "Structure and Design in a Soviet Dystopia: H.G. Wells, Constructivism and Yevgeny Zamyatin's "We". Journal of Modern Literature. 9.1. 1981: 81. Academic Search Premeir. Web. 29 Janurary 2011.

Zamyatin, Yevgeny. We. New York: Moden Library, 2006.

"Im Worst at What, I Do Best. And For This Gift, I Feel Blessed"

The purpose of an act is merely determined by the eyes of those who eyes are engaging in the act.

I chose to use that as my topic sentence because there are so many different situations where things could of have been taken either way, depending on who's eyes you were looking through. If its from I-330 chosing D-503 or D-503 pushing O over ther wall with the unnumbered people. Everything can be taken a certain way.

"I Found It Hard, It's Hard To Find. Oh Well, Whatever. Nevermind"

What really grinded my gears in this story was how D-503 was used by I-330 throughout the whole book only because he was the first builder. As someone said in our class earlier, it reminded me of how Eve tricked Adam into biting the fruit of knowledge. In a sense I-330 did the same thing to D-503. We have to ask ourselves now, what is absolute happiness?

"Nature Is A Whore; Bruises On The Fruit; Tender Age In Bloom

The worst aspect about the story in my opinion is how everybody in the story are basically the same person.  Even though they have a alotta time where they can be their self, there isn't any privacy time.  That is the worst thing in my opinon that I couldn't see myself doing. Everything in the story was open to the prying eyes of their neighbor. Although, it would destroy envy in society, their leaves no room to be an individual; which is one of the things I strive to be.

"You Know You're Right"

The Literary Canon applies to this story in the aspect that WE is currently not accepted by the Canon. There is widespread controversy to why it is not accepted but the general reasoning behind it is because the book was originally not written by an American.

"With the Lights Out, It's Less Dangerous"

Style: The style Yevgeny Zamyatin chose to use in this book was that of sophistication. I believe that throughout the book, he made D-503 speak to the reader directly in a town that gave the impression that he was superior to the reader. It makes me wonder though, he's talking to the reader as if we were from the ancient times. But in theory, If we read it after he wrote it, wouldn't we be more advanced than he was in the future?

Tone: I think the tone of D-503 was one of superiority. He spoke as if he was better than the rest of the world.

Irony: I found irony in the story when he couldn't fornicate with O. Thats what he wanted this whole time but after his "incident" he couldn't do it anymore.

Plot: The plot of the story thus far is D-503 is just an average being in the State when he starts to feel "sick". Its not a sickness, he's just having feelings for I330 that goes against the way things are supposed to be in his society.

Characterization: Zamyatin showed characterization by giving the characters in the story problems that we face in everyday life. He's trying to make us connect with the characters to give them that "real" feeling.

Setting: The setting takes place in One State, a place in russia that everybody has everything controlled and decided for them.

Point of View:  The story is told in First-person fashion.

Symbol: I believe that this whole book serves as a symbol. The way that society is controlled in the story, reflected the way Russia was being controlled during the 20's. I also believe that the Two-Hundred-Year-War was a symbol in it's own way. I see it as addressing the issues of the Christian Crusades because they both eliminated any and everybody who didn't conform to their beliefs.

Theme: The central theme of the story is to show the flaws that Russia had with it's government during the 20's. They wanted to strip away freedome and individualism from their country to eliminate crime. Although, this book is showing how unsuccessful the system was.

"I have so much energy, Red Bull should sponsor me!"

Good afternoon!

My name is Tobaria Tre'vell Ruffin, and I am currently a freshman here at the university of South Dakota. I came all the way from Chicago to attend school here, I'm crazy right? Thats the usual response that I get when I tell people where I'm from. My favorite band would have to be Nirvana, Kurt Cobain is just pure energy behind a microphone! My interests are aviation, sports, Madden and music. I listen to any and every genre Except country. I just never could get into that type.Oh, and I hate Will Smith with a passion... Seriously.. he is just not funny!