BLOG #2

Ernest Hemingway describes a hero as someone who has “grace under pressure” and also as someone who isn’t afraid of a challenge. I think this is the ideal thought of a hero: being brave, unafraid of challenges, and being able to handle pressure. 

Romero displays the qualities of those of Hemingway’s ideas of a hero in The Sun Also Rises.  Romero takes on the bulls head-on, and actually fights them as an occupation. The other bullfighters of the time put on a show for the crowd, and make the fight more dramatic than it really is.  Romero puts on a real show for the crowd by taking away the fakeness, because they actually like better.  The fake bull fights are just made to try to attract the attention of the crowd, and lure them into believing these men were heroes of that time period.  Romero poses as the “real” hero of the time period by putting up real bull fights, and to not try to fake his job of fighting bulls for show. 
Even with the peers, Romero shows qualities of a hero. He shows this by being chased by women and looked up to by men.  He is seen as a living immortal in the eyes of others, and they look up to him for being fearless, and taking the bull head –on.  Romero is very confident and even walks with a swagger no matter who he is around.  He shows true heroism in the ring, putting up a real fight instead of faking the drama of the fight just for attention.
The ideas of a “hero” have changed from that time period to present.  Back then, a hero was a figure everyone looked up to and tried to imitate, in order to be great.  These heroes once faced a great challenge, took it head on, and ended up doing wonders with the task at hand and put out great outcomes.  They had great poise when surrounded by pressure, and dealt with the factors they had to in order to do great things.  However; our thoughts of a hero nowadays have changed drastically. Now, anyone can be a hero regardless of past actions or background. Nowadays, people can perform one action, and be looked at as a hero by many.
The description of a hero varies immensely. The ideals of a hero have somewhat disappeared, since it is so easy to be looked at as a hero nowadays. Most likely, a person like Romero wouldn’t be considered a hero today; instead he’d just be another bull fighter doing his job. People these days are all about the show and could probably care less whether Romero was actually fighting the bull or just putting on a show. These days, a person has to accomplish a feat of saving someone, or a feat of great success in order to be considered anything near a hero.  People these days have fewer expectations of heroes then they did back then.  Now, heroes are so common, the story of them are overrated, unlike those stories of the old Greek heroes who accomplished feats no others will come close to.  People now have “heroes” all over TV, so now the thoughts of heroes changed from immortals to sport stars.
Hemingway’s ideas of a hero are the original ideas of a hero, and those ideas of a hero should be carried on from generation to generation.  Heroes should be rare and be looked at by everyone, not just thought about for a week then passed by as another citizen.  Heroes never die, their story lives on forever in the generations. Heroes aren’t forgotten. Romero is the type of hero that people wish still existed today because he is so pure. Even though we lack this type of hero in the bullfighting scene, there are heroes like him in our everyday world. They don't have the cool costumes, capes, or gadgets but they still fight for what the love and believe in all of the time.  People like the firefighters, policemen, teachers and volunteers all work to save lives from misery and suffering but don’t get the credit they deserve.

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Blog #1

When I was working on my blog, the cord got unplugged and I lost all my work... I will rewrite it after school and add the rest of my 450 words. Hope that is ok.

In Turgenev’s essay, he uses a strong tone, vivid purpose, and an inside point of view to validate his argument concerning capital punishment. He describes the construction of the guillotine, the narrator’s thoughts during the final minute of the execution, his tortured, and his guilty thoughts that he is witnessing another murder because he wants to supply people who are opposed to capital punishment and public executions with evidence in great detail.

He uses many persuasive words to make the reader think about their view on capital punishment. I didn't find very many weaknesses in his writing... It sure got me to think about my own view on capital punishment. After reading his essay, I understand where he is coming from. The whole mentality of killing the people who killed others makes more murderers in our world. It does seem brutal, but with our present economy, I kind of think that capital punishment wouldn't be so bad for the people sentenced to life imprisonment. It would save space, food, and money to have them gone. It probably sounds inhumane but it could be logical in some senses. 

Blog #15

Ehrlich describes cowboys a bit differently than the stereotypical view us Americans tend to have. Instead of describing them how the typical Marlboro advertisement does, she describes them as sympathetic and admirable, determined and courageous, selfless and tender. They are the tough guys who go out and save animals when they are in trouble, after they go and nurture the newborn calves or lambs. Cowboys are also polite to women but in reality, they just don’t know how to channel their emotions after being out in the fields with all men or animals all day, everyday. She seems to have a lot of respect for these men and also admiration.

The tone of her essay is full of admiration. Throughout the whole essay, she explains many different admirable situations cowboys go through each and every day. From their gentle, care-giving side to their strong and rugged side, Ehrlich has a wonderful example of each. She points out their positive qualities and also the negative...but each negative has a positive and logical reason for it which ends up making it an admirable quality.

I think her tone throughout this essay really helped prover her point. I'm sure many people are second-guessing their impression of cowboys after reading this essay. She got her point across very strongly and told America what a real cowboy was.

Blog #14

Sante uses his arguments about secrecy and examples of the breakdowns of secrets (Soviet Union, the media, and the internet) to explain to us that our society thrives off of secrets. Secrecy has become an extremely important part of American culture. I think people are constantly searching for secrets because it gives them the satisfaction of knowing something that other people don’t have a clue about. It is a feeling of being better than one another.

I do agree that the internet is a “nemesis” to secrecy. The famous people throughout the world are constantly having every aspect of their lives in the public eye…there is always an article or picture of something supposedly going on in their life. But the internet doesn’t only invade these famous people’s secrecy. Social Networking Sites, like MySpace or Facebook, create situations for the average person to invade the secrecy of others as well as put every detail of their life on blast to the whole entire world in a matter of seconds. I understand that it is the person’s choice to choose what to and what not to put on these social networking sites, but our society has created such a demand for these things that most people don’t even think twice about the fact that they are diminishing their own secrets post by post.

Blog #13

Whether it is in a public or private school setting, I think all young students need to learn ethics and personal values to make them better people in the future. I don’t think that teachers need to go overboard on these lessons, but if the children are paying attention then they should pick up on just a few of the many necessary lessons that are used in the world all around them.

In order to produce “good citizens”, schools should teach a few values to make their kids stand above the rest. Students need to be taught to always have a good character. Values like respect, responsibility, fairness, citizenship, trustworthiness, and compassion are very important in creating a “good citizen.” Each student needs to respect others opinions, be responsible for their own actions, make decisions without favoritism or prejudice, respect authority and law, tell the truth, and care for their surroundings. However, I don’t think it is only up to the teachers to teach these children lessons. I believe that parents play a huge part in teaching these values and school is just a place to practice them for the real world.

I think that any subject is fair game to be taught in school provided that it follows state standards. People freaking out over whether or not it is ok to talk about religious beliefs are just wasting their time. I believe that as long as the class learns about a wide variety of the different religions it should be ok for a classroom. When these kids are out in the “real” world, they will have to handle risky situations or touchy subjects just like these. Every person in this world is unique and they all have their own opinions…religion is just one of them.

Blog #11

Culminating Writers Profile

1.     Before my time in this class, writing was pretty easy for me. I didn’t have to think too hard to write essays or do work in my previous English classes. I was getting A’s without even trying my best. Since we have covered many new topics (most of which I have never heard of), I am beginning to change. I’ve learned that writing a strong essay takes lots of time and effort and that the little things are what makes it stand out above the rest.

2.      I think I have a good voice in my writing and the readers usually understand exactly what I am trying to say. I can paint pictures with my words.

3.     My weakness as a writer is whipping out an essay to high expectations in a timed situation. I need to get better at writing under pressure. I also need to have a better word choice to show that I am well-educated and learn to go deeper into what I am writing instead of being clear and straight to the point.

Evaluating your writing process

1.    If I had more time to write another draft of this essay, I would switch some things around and go into more detail on my examples.

2.   After receiving peer feedback, I found it easiest to improve my word choice and the structure of my essay.

3.   The biggest problem I had in writing and revising this essay was deciding what to write about. There was such a broad range of topics that I felt would be sufficient and it was hard to narrow it down. Once I finally chose a word, it was kind of hard to piece it all together.

Evaluating Your Successes

1. I didn’t really revise a whole lot. After receiving the grade, I assure you that revision of this essay will be in my near future!
2. I found it challenging to combine these three elements (descriptive, narrative, and illustrative) into my essay. Once I got a good train of thought, it became easier.
3. I thought I did pretty well with addressing my audience throughout the whole essay. I think I had a little bit of something that most people could relate to.

Being Honest with Self

1. I was most intimidated by the fact that there weren’t strict guidelines to write by. It seems as though there are specific things supposed to be included in essays and this one had a wide open topic. I got over this little by little as I kept writing because I gained confidence in my essay.
2. I really tried hard to focus on not using a lot of “to be” verbs, being more descriptive, and going deeper into all of my topics.
3. After reading student essay examples, I picked up on some ideas which were the springboard for my essay. I really enjoy reading the example essays because they help me understand what is expected for the essay.
4. A peer told me I should use a higher level of vocabulary to improve my essay.
5. Well currently, I am no where near where I’d like to be at the end of this year as a writer. I really hope this class will help me to not be a surface writer but instead go very deep into the subject.

Blog #10

           King defines “nobodiness” as the feeling of being completely ignored, having no authority, and as invisible. An example of that is when he talks about some African-American women not being referred to as a “Mrs” just because of the color of their skin. This shows the huge lack of respect given to them. These women feel extremely degraded and as if they aren’t even there, or simply put as a “nobody”. This sense of “nobodiness” was really common during the time that our country was working on segregation.

      
            Other times when people feel like a “nobody” could be at school. A kid could walk from one class to another and not one person would acknowledge him/her. This poor child probably feels horrible and like he/she is invisible to the rest of us. Imagine how that would make you feel… Alone, depressed, and a “NOBODY”. Getting into stereotypical situations, the popular crowd and the athletes usually would describe people less fortunate than them or the nerds they see at school as “nobodies” just because they feel as though they are more superior to them because of their social status.