IT WAS a freebie. I WAS done.

My last and final freebie I shall use on this post.
Thanks Ms. Genesky and everyone else who made these two years of IB great.
That being said, I'm fairly exhausted and wish to leave now.
So without further ado, here is my freebie.

FREEBIE

What the What Was Walt Whitman Writing, and Why?

     When first viewing THE Walt Whitman's notebook I first thought, "Why am I looking at a mangy old book...is it a portkey?" 'Maybe' was the definite answer. When I 'opened' it did transport me into the mind of Whitman and then I thought "He should've been a successful doctor with this calligraphy."


     In the notebook, I could make out various names and numbers. Here they are now:

• Charles
• 10th
• Brochure
• Two <something> <something> of a dialogue between A...
• Lessons for a President elect
• Dialogue between <something> and "President Elect"
• Antique
• Greek
• Classic
• Tenpiece (?) of virtue
• Consequence in these - philosophy
• Questioning reasons <something>
• Christ
• Why now I shall meow (I take it back it says "know")  whether there is anything in you liberated. I shall see whether how much you can stand. Perhaps I shall see the <something> (looks like "crash") - is <something> (looks like "all the lust"...maybe not though). Old England

     And that's just the first four pages. There are lots of other stanzas in here as well. Starting on page 10, Whitman has illustrations that look like self-portraits. Then 'flipping' through some more. it looked like some type of war drawings. Men being shot, generals standing erect, stuff like that. Maybe it's from the civil war...Whitman was alive then...right? I have no idea. I know WWI was 1914-1919 I think, and I know that WWII was 1939-1945. Civil war though, I have no idea. Whitman's birth and death, I have no idea. In the notebook he has an illustration of a sign reading, The Boheamian; Tate Saturdy Press. Finally at the end there's a weird illustration that looks like a skeleton with colonial hair/wig sticking out of a heart that has a sword through it...weird right? Though this one can see that Whitman didn't just write poems consecutively, he went back and forth with disjoint thoughts and lines/phrases. One can also see that the visual was just as important to him as the words on the page, which probably made his poems easier to visualize.


     I kind of understand what some of those inscriptions mean after looking at the examined journal. The numbers and names were addresses. When speaking of dialogues or President Elect, Whitman was speaking of his imaginary conversation with my main man Honest Abe Abraham Lincoln (we both share a birthday). The religious things in there formed his opinion on current day issues like slavery and equality. All the lust = Is all then lost? Very different meanings if I do say so myself. I think that through this we can see that for his poems he was aiming for a more spiritual tone. He also believed in America and wanted to see it prosper. He also pulled a lot o elements from around him when writing. His environment influenced him. This is why Whitman was so successful, he made the everyday things appear extravagant and used things we all know about.


   I'd like to end this post with a poem.


     Roses are red
     Roses are green
     Roses are thorny
     Roses are plants
     Roses are love
     Roses are lust
     Roses are fat
     Roses are skinny
     Roses are tall
     Roses are short
     Roses are infected
     Roses are defected
     Roses are rejected
     Roses are dangerous
     Roses are safe
     Roses are beautiful
     Roses are lost
     Roses are found
     Roses are alive
     Roses might kill
     Roses are Roses
     Even still


     And violets are variations of blue
     But who has the time?


     Answer:


    No one, No body
    

The American Dream

I believe the American Dream is to not have this blog post to do.


Freebie


Yeah, that's a spell.


- Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore

Can You Translate This>>>You Can Put These

Translation #1:


"As Gregor Samsa woke from uneasy dreams one morning to find himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect."


The connotations of this line is that the main character was having a restless and having a violent night. The next part of the line kind of contradicts the violence by saying he "transformed" denoting a beautiful and peaceful, even natural, change. However, the tone dips again by saying a gigantic insect denoting a very large (maybe the size of your hand, or even worse, YOUR FACE) creature that would scare any passing human. The syntax of this line introduces the main character first, the restless night, then the big reveal of the bug situation. The way it is structured it feels as if everything is happening at once there for putting a stressful mood in the air. The use of the word gigantic vs. big in this sentence makes the creature seem very large, transformed vs. change makes it sound beautiful, and insect vs.. bug makes it seem like just a regular creature rather than something to fear or hate. The inclusion of 'in his bed' makes this feel like an invasion of privacy.






Translation #2:


"Gregor Samsa woke from uneasy dreams one morning to find himself changed into a giant bug."


The connotations of this line is that the main character was having a restless and having a violent night. The next part, by saying giant bug, doesn't show the change as a big bug. Although it says giant bug, giant isn't really a powerful word and bug makes it seem small almost like a pest. The syntax of this line introduces the main character first, the restless night, then the big reveal of the bug situation. This line doesn't have a powerful tone though and it almost seems like the change isn't a big deal.






Translation #3:


"When Gregor Samsa awoke from troubled dreams one morning he found he had been transformed in his bed into an enormous bug."


The connotations of this line is that the main character was having a contemplative and tormented night. The translation of 'transformed', I believe, works better for this sentence because it almost sound like a witch waved her wand and transformed the main character as he was sleeping and tormenting him because it was such an evil thing to do. The inclusion of 'in his bed' makes this feel like an invasion of privacy. When the author wrote 'enormous bug', I think the audience would feel like this large creature is still a rather large, but small to a human, pest. The overall effect of this line is that someone launched a personal attack on the main character.






Translation #4:


"One morning, upon awakening from agitated dreams, Gregor Samsa found himself, in his bed, transformed into a monstrous vermin."


The connotation of the dream part is a bit different this time around. Agitated isn't as powerful as troubled because it sounds like he was just uncomfortable the way he was sleeping. Almost as a small hint to what is coming. The almost excessive use of commas create a certain tone of suspense. The line that says 'in his bed' makes this feel like an invasion of privacy. I think it might also denote that Gregor Samsa is still himself on the inside with thoughts and feelings, his physical appearance is the only thing that has changed. "Transformed" denotes that the change is very grand. Finally the use of 'monstrous vermin' denotes that Gregor is a beast of some sort that would terrify anything that crossed its path. It also makes his seem disguising because of the use of vermin. The syntax of the line introduces the day first which speaks to the existentialist 'one day at a time' theme. Overall, I believe this is the most powerful and remotely existentialist line.






Grand Analysis:


Word choice affects meaning because if an author uses a less powerful word in a sentence that is supposed to shock the audience, the sentence will lose its grip upon the audience and the effect will be lessened. Word choice also affects meaning in the example of using insect vs. bug vs. vermin vs. pest. The meaning of the sentence changes from scientific to nothing to worry about to something extremely repulsive to something of an annoyance which one could arguably hate. Syntax shifts meaning because it shows what is important in the sentence. The author could want the reader to focus on the day while another author could want the focus to be the main character or the transformation. This makes the reader focus on the element throughout the text and also try to find it's deeper meaning. Punctuation affects meaning because it separates what the author wants the audience to focus on from what is ordinary. It also can make a sentence seem more suspenseful, to excited, to questioning. Finally, imagery shifts meaning by helping the audience to imagine what the author wants us to see. The more specific the author becomes the more detailed these visions become.


I believe word choice, out of all of these stylistic features, is the most effective. This is because the simple changing of words, from powerful, to weak, to slang, to very proper changes the meaning of a sentence drastically. Yes, punctuation and syntax tell the audience what to focus on, but if those words are not speaking to what the author is trying to relay, the focus has lost its purpose. Word choice also helps shape how specific the imagery is.


This exercise shows that translating texts can be detrimental to the reader because meaning is lost in what the original author was trying to accomplish. There are so many synonyms in English as well as words that don't translate into English. This problem between languages makes the translated text be to be interpreted many different ways.

Practice IOC

Well, here's a practice IOC that apparently I suck at, so yeah...

Grades


A: 5 - I explained things about the text as well as the extract and made sure that was detailed.
B: 3 - I guess I'm not too clear on literary techniques.
C: 2 - I didn't develop much of a structure. It was intro, a bunch of information, then an end.
D: 2 - Knowing all of the above I was extremely flustered.


Final Comments
I kinda hate oral presentaions and examinations,  I need time to prepare a spectacle...

Analyzing Storytelling Tech Rhetorically

Here's  the Ted Talk just in case...


https://www.ted.com/talks/joe_sabia_the_technology_of_storytelling#t-919


     This Ted Talk focused on the evolution of the story. The speaker, Joe Sabia was arguing the point that stories, however difficult and "new-seeming" they were, they had been recycled. However, the way we convey these stories has changed and evolved throughout time, like books, to pop-up books, to performances, to radio, to film, to the internet. He finally argues that this was due to the man who progressed the idea of story telling forward, a German named Lothar Meggendorfer.


     Sabia uses ethos,although he doesn't mention his credibility, if one were to know who he is and what he does one could see how he was qualified for this talk. He has been creating stories and has worked on projects big and small.


    Sabia uses logos by explaining a sequential cause and effect narrative, thereby arguing his point that (a) story telling modes have evolved and (b) Lothar Meggendorfer was to thank for that. He says that is Lothar hadn't have invented the pop-up book, people wouldn't have thought of other ways to "preserve the story". However, I do not believe this argument is completely sound. As technology advanced I'm sure it would have not been long before someone had come up with a new way to entertain the masses. How long would it have been before people read such books before a radio audience, therefore moving into radio performances. I don't believe Meggendorfer was to thank for the evolution of story. Another one of his points (that stories stay the same and ways change), I agree with, however he gives no solid evidence that their are basic stories. One could disagree with this because the language isn't precise enough. He could mean to say that stories and the ways of telling a story change, however there are only a few common themes which are reflected in the numerous stories told.


     I believe that Sabia uses pathos to influence the audience as well. He mainly uses comedy to incite happiness to make the audience agree with him more easily. Examples of this are when he shows comical clips of video that seem halfway out of place but relatable to the situation. He also shows comical images, one being of Meggendorfer with shades to make his vintage picture seem cooler. Finally, he uses a dramatic and exaggerated storytelling voice for otherwise not super interesting topics. This contrast allows for comic relief.


     [Another way Sabia gets his point across is demonstrating his point by using a compilation of applications to give his talk and tell a story.]


     I chose this talk because I love storytelling (I wish to become a great filmmaker someday) and I wanted to see the evolution and the technology of the story. A concept we will be covering in the next unit is what it means to be human. One of those things is relaying our lives or messages to teach others something, or, storytelling.


     Through this Ted Talk I believe Sabia's intention was to (a) credit Meggendorfer (or anybody) with the evolution of the story saying he was the beginning of new ways to tell stories and (b) to show how integral storytelling is to our society and human nature as a whole. I believe that he got his point across but it wasn't heavily supported by enough facts to validate all of his claims.


He's just an average JOE telling a story!

Double Double Toil and Indemnity - Noir Film Questions

Freebie.


What sayeth thee?


Nothing.


But seriously.


Freebie.