Emma’s Blog

When listening to the podcast there were some things that i noticed that paralleled both the book, and the movie we watched. During the movie when Willard had to go down the river and search of Kurtz he struggled with emotions that he may be in some way LIKE Kurtz. The same was with Marlow when he went down the river in search of Mr. Kurtz who was the head of the company that distributed Ivory. Both of those men struggled with coming to terms with themselves and realizing that there wasn’t much that seperated them from the man that they were “hunting” down.  

When i was listening to that podcast it made me think a bit. These men that went to war and were committing acts of torture are not far from the person we are here at home. The people we go to school with, work with, see in shopping malls, grocery stores, the post office. They are ALL normal people who have been put into an abnormal position in abnormal circumstances. When a person is in a position of power it is very easy to abuse it and react in a fashion very unlike the way they are brought up to act. They way the men talked it was as if they were in third person. As if it was an out of body experience for them. They remember being there, they are now forever changed from the person that they were, but they now have no where to go because at home they will never be the person they used to. And they can never go back to war and be comfortable doing what they have done before. 

What struck me was how a perfectly sane person can do acts of torture to another. The pressure in a place so unfamiliar from what they know and the people around them creates a habitat where the right things aren’t so clearly defined as they once were. What it comes down to is a person become insane from these acts when they realize that they do not know or understand themselves. They have done things that disgust, haunt, and scare them. But the thing is they don’t understand it because they never knew themselves to be capable of it. Then it confuses them. So really insanity is when you let yourself freak out, because you don’t know or understand yourself. This is what happened with Marlow, Willard, and these men who have come back from Iraq. They don’t understand themselves, or the actions that they have done and they start to lose it.

In the novel Heart of Darkness a reader may not realize at first the rarity in which Conrad speaks of women. But as they say hindsight is 20/20 I now see what I did not realize in the beginning. In his whole novel Conrad brings into the readers minds only five women. Two of whom don’t have much significance to the story, the two women who are knitting at the station. Whose women are only brought up and talked about for ½ a page. The rest are Marlow’s aunt, and Kurtz’s mistress and his intended.

In each of these cases it seems like he uses the women to make us understand the men of the story, Kurtz and Marlow. Marlow’s Aunt is the one that hooks him up with the job; she has the connections to get him places. Without her the story would never have taken place.

Next is the Mistress to Kurtz. She comes in on pg 98. Not he gives a very descriptive explanation of the way she is dressed and how she carries herself. It is almost as if the fact that she carries herself like a warrior (like a man would) that she is talked about more then the others. Her role is to be Kurtz mistress and is dressed in all fine jewelry and clothing. It is very apparent by the way that she is described that Conrad took much time and thought into her character.

Last is Kurtz’s intended. Conrad never once names this lady. She is just plainly portrayed as the depressing sad lady back in England that whole-heartedly believes in the man she thought Kurtz to be. Even a year later when Marlow comes to give her the letters she is still in mourning.

Overall these are the two women that Marlow spends his most time on. Which at the is very minimal. They are, although they are foils of one another. One being exotic and abnormal to what Marlow has ever experienced, and the other completely dressed like Marlow is accustomed to and talks in a way he can understand. Although she may be depressed she is much more to his normal way of thinking then the African woman.

No matter what you can tell that Conrad had something against women in this piece of writing. He was very scarce in their descriptions and narrow minded when it came to them. African or not both were written about in the same light.

What is plagiarism? Well in my mind I thought it was just the coping of some one else’s writing/movie/art ect… and calling it your own. Although, this may indeed be the case, there are many rules and regulations that slam down on exactly what plagiarism is what qualifies, and what does not. When you take a persons ideas, thoughts, or whole written work and try to pass it off as your own, that is 100% plagiarism. Something that caught me off guard was if you take a sentence change the wording, but keep the main structure and idea, that also constitutes as plagiarism. Also, if the government publishes it, it can be copied, if the facts used are not original to that work (ie. 50 states, California is in the west, winter is cold, ect…)

Things that surprised me were:

1.    When you site the name of the author but don’t footnote is also a “nono”

2.    When a writer uses many citations and barely any work of their own. It is on the large scale all others writing and none of their own.

3.    When you write a paper, cite a source, then paraphrase it in another paragraph.

So after reading these things and learning from them the biggest thing I got out of it was to make my own opinions of things. AND cite the work I use to make my opinions, and what I base them from.

P.S.!!!!!!!! were i got my information was from http://www.plagiarism.org/

and

http://www.indiana.edu/~wts/pamphlets/plagiarism.shtml

OUTLINE!!

Question: Who would be a better USA President, Barack Obama or John McCain?

Intro: (thesis) In more ways then one Barach Obama is the better choice for America’s next president.

2: Education policies

3:Economy issues

4: Ethics

Conclusion: tie it all together

Normal
0

Standing in an isle at my church 7 different
kids began jumping on top of me. This seemed to be the never ending game. How
many kids can fit on a 5foot3 inch 16 year old girl? At that point in time it
had reached 5 one on my back and two on either side and one attached to each
leg. As their laughter filled the air I knew they were having a good time.
That’s what this week was all about for these kids. But this morning was a
little different. I had a new girl in my group. She was short and very small
for her age. She seemed to be swimming in what looked like oversized hand me
down clothing. A purple hoodie with stains down the front, shoes that drug
behind her as she walked, and her eyes weren’t as bright or playful as the
other kids. As we went from station to station the kids didn’t include her as
easily as the rest of the group to I devised a plan. I started to give her a
little bit more attention. To see it the rest of my “crew” would follow my
lead. It worked. By the end of the week this young girl that came looking as if
the wind had blown her through our door was bright eyed with laughter ringing
in the air from her high-pitched happy voice. It was a scene that was burned
into my mind. She got half way through the large swinging double doors and
turned around to run and tackle me with one of her hugs before she left. It was
a moving experience.

Vistas: A distant view or prospect, especially one seen through an opening, as between rows of buildings or trees.

Torpid: inactive or sluggish.

Spectation:regard; aspect; appearance.

Timbre:Acoustics, Phonetics. the characteristic quality of a sound, independent of pitch and loudness, from which its source or manner of production can be inferred. Timbre depends on the relative strengths of the components of different frequencies, which are determined by resonance.

Ruinous:bringing or tending to bring ruin; destructive; disastrous

Electrolysistic: ??????

Ruminative: to chew the cud, as a ruminant.

Derisive: characterized by or expressing derision; contemptuous; mocking.

Sangfroid: coolness of mind; calmness; composure.

Persona: he mask or façade presented to satisfy the demands of the situation or the environment and not representing the inner personality of the individual; the public personality.

Tactical: of or pertaining to tactics.

Interface: a surface regarded as the common boundary of two bodies, spaces, or phases.

Creosote: an oily liquid having a burning taste and a penetrating odor, obtained by the distillation of coal and wood tar, used mainly as a preservative for wood and as an antiseptic.

Crespuscular: pertaining to twilight, esp. in dimness.

Gibbous: convex at both edges, as the moon when more than half full.

Astral: pertaining to or proceeding from the stars; stellar; star-shaped.

Quonset: A trademark used for a prefabricated portable hut having a semicircular roof of corrugated metal that curves down to form walls.

1. Through the first paragraph it seems to be more of a simple explination. Although, on the other hand that second paragraph was more sophisticated sounding and educated. It asked a rhetorical question that i understood where as the first paragraph just confused me with their rhetorical question.

2. The second set of paragraphs i noticed that like the first, the “smarter” paragraph was longer then the first one. Not only was it sounding more educated then the first paragraph too, but it seemed like they knew more about what they were talking about.

3. While reading the first paragraph it made me feel like they didn’t think i knew the people they mentioned were great writers. They had to use in ()’s to tell me that the people that they listed were “great writers”. While on the other hand the second paragraph didn’t and just assumed that i knew what they were talking about. Also through all of the second paragraphs in each groups of two, they were quoted as who they were and where their article were found.

VOCABULARY:

Monstrous: frightful or hideous, esp. in appearance; extremely ugly.

Pillaging: to strip ruthlessly of money or goods by open violence, as in war; plunder.

Glutting:to feed or fill to satiety; sate

Summary

This essay is the autobiography of Malcom X. He takes his time explaing/telling us about how he learned all that he has and how he has become the man he is(was). By starting off in the prison we see not only how he learned the things he did but also where he came from to the place he ended up before he died.

 Questions:

1. Did he  at any point think that he was going to go crazy?

2. What made hium want to write an autobiography?

How where and when did the aids epidemic begin?

    There are many things in life that people enjoy doing, but only a few handfuls of people know what they are meant to do. For the most part I am an outgoing and ambitious person that loves to help people. Everyday I try to make it my goal to make at least one person smile. Whether it is something silly to helping a friend in need. Making people smile is what I love to do. For the past few years I have been working every summer at a VBS (vacation bible school) and each summer I am blessed with having the opportunity to be in charge of these little kids.

There was one incident that sticks to me through the years. It was the second year that I was a counselor and in my group I had a young girl who was about 7 years old. Her neighbor, who also worked at the camp, would bring her along every day and she was assigned to my “crew”. The first day was a little shaky. She was dressed in what was obviously too large hand-me-down clothing. She wasn’t very talkative, and it was hard for her to join in with the group during recess time. So, as it being my nature I wanted to help her out and put a smile on that face. I wanted to let her get to know me and be comfortable in a new place.

Some days I would bring a little candy to slip to her when the other kids weren’t watching, or I would give her piggy backs to the different stations we rotated through. By the end of the third day I could already see the difference. Because I had accepted her so had the rest of my “crew”. She opened up and was talking with the others and by the end of the week it seemed like they all had been friends forever. To this day her neighbor brings her to church and when I see her I get a big hug.

        In life it is not about picking favorites. It is not about shoving people away and below you, but rather about helping them up and opening doors for one another. My dream job is to be a teacher. Not an educator, but a teacher. I want to be the one teacher that kids come to school excited for that class. I want to be the one teacher that helps them feel comfortable being themselves and opening doors for hidden opportunities they haven’t seen yet. To me being a teacher is not something that I would enjoy doing, but is something I am meant to be.