Author: Emma

Brave New world

In a nutshell, Brave New World is a book…a book people might call horrifying or magnificent, but in reality, it is more than a book. It is an experience. Despite my best efforts, I will never be able to fully understand this experience. A book that I hated so much has never connected with me so deeply. It’s strange to feel so many emotions at once, but that’s what brave new world provides a rollercoaster of emotions.

  As much as I felt so many different emotions while reading this book, I felt hatred the most. I hated the fact that the book made me recognize something I have been ignoring for a long time. Whether we like it or not, the fact is that our society is just as horrible as the brave new world society. As a society, we treat our women as though they are objects and have never reached the true equality we hoped for. As a result, we exclude the people who act differently, speak differently, or look different from us. In order to relieve our pain, we drug ourselves.

In spite of that, we judge this novel as if this society is incapable. The idea of a society filled with sex and drugs is grotesque. However, is this not the way our society is now? Despite the fact that this may not have been my favorite book, I do appreciate what it taught me and I hope that one day we can be the kind of society that grows and learns and develops as we go along.

I Wonder – PW6

I wonder;

I wonder why I show up to this place every day,

I wonder why they say they are preparing me for life but within these four walls, all I do is suffer.

I wonder why I do this for my parents and for my teachers, but why they never think of me

I know one day I will get out of this place, but I was taught to take the suffering and pain, put my emotions in a box and lock them away.

I wonder if I can ever unlearn their ways.

Brave New World IRJE 1

So far I find Brave New World a very interesting and intriguing book. As much as it is a fiction novel, it is relevant to today’s society. For example, the hookup culture we have nowadays is somewhat like the view on sex in Brave New World.  For example in chapter 3 they say,

Do you mean to tell me you’er still going out with Henry Foster    (P. 33)

But everyone belongs to everyone else (p. 34)

By saying that he was saying it is strange to be committed to someone and not just hook up. The outlook Brave New World has on sex is not identical to our society but very similar.

 

The one thing that specifically stuck out to me was the way they talk about drugs they say,

He dose look glum (p. 45)

Take it insisted Henry Foster take take it (p. 46)

He was looking sad so what did they do to help they offered him drugs. That stuck out to me because in today’s society, when someone is sad they go to a doctor and what do they get to make them feel better pills. Not always do these need the pills, sometimes they just need someone to comfort them. Most of the time they will get drugs whether they need them or not. Overall I am interested to find out more about the society in Brave New World and see how it compares to our world today.

“How To Read A Difficult Book”

As it says in chapter five

text books are hard to read. The material is dense there is a lot of information packed into relatively few words.(p. 90)

A strategy that can help with that is outsmarting your brain, using comprehension to fit the material you are reading and the goal you have for reading it.   Another strategy that can help is not just reading and highlighting you won’t get the important information.  Make sure you compare your information or perilously have knowledge about the topic you are reading so you are not just randomly highlighting the information you don’t know about.

Overall there are many strategies that can help with better understanding your book. This hole book more spasticity chapter 5 is very helpful.

PW #4: A Chapter In Your Story

Was I at least a chapter in your story,

Was I worth that much to you

Or maybe I was just worth a sentence.

I believe I deserve more than a seven-letter line for the suffering you caused me,

Did you ruin me for fun, was it all a game

Did I really mean that little to you?

I accepted the love I thought I deserved

it turns out I deserve so much more.

IRJE – Girl in Pieces

This book has a lot of references to how the arts can be a great coping mechanism. At this point in the book she finally left the hospital to move to her friend’s house. She is alone and feels empty but she will not let herself go back into that place so she uses art as her coping mechanism. She says

I draw where I am. I put myself at this new beginning, surrounded by the comfort of someone else’s easier life.

This quote stuck with me because art has always been an escape for me. You can get away from reality and draw what you feel. I do believe that as much as you wish you could be someone else, and have someone’s easier life you never what they’re going through. As much as their life seems like a perfect movie you never see the behind-the-scenes.

Reflection Unit 1

I believe this unit one final gave me an accurate way to represent most of my skills. It allowed me to plan and analyze in a short amount of time, giving me practice for when have to do a longer essay. One of my best qualities when writing this essay was spending a lot of time proofreading. I made it so I had little to no grammar or spelling mistakes. When being graded on this I was told I had very good attention to detail. I need to improve on generalization and focus on one specific topic. Overall I think this test was a wonderful way to test my skills.

My Utopia

The definition of a utopia is “an imagined place or state of things in which everything is perfect“. A utopia is not known to ever exist, but many people have tried to create them in movies and tv shows. If I had to create my ideal utopia the main idea would be peace. To make everything “perfect” I believe you would need peace and to have that everyone would need to be equals. Within that, we need no knowledge of good and evil. Yes, people may flaws but not pointing out flaws or putting peoples in groups make society better as a whole. Having a diverse world with no judgment, stigmatism or inequality would ideally bring peace.

Humans have an idea of mortality, that can have a big strain on our minds and soles. In my ideal utopia humans could be at peace with their mortality. Having freedom is very important, not having violence and having rules is important, but having freedom on who you are and what you do is ideal. One of the ideas that would make my utopia perfect is having money. Everyone having money, no poor people or homeless, and having equal funds. The last idea I have for my ideal utopia is to have a perfect ecosystem with no climate change or world pollution.

I believe one day maybe in another universe a utopia could exist. I don’t know when or how long it will take the world to change its whole way of thinking.  I hope someday further in the future that my children could experience the peace of a utopia, and have the freedom that they deserve. I hope I can experience that kind of freedom someday. In till that day comes we have television and movies. I don’t know when that day will come but I sure hope it’s soon.

Lost my voice PW 3

I feel like i have lost my voice

not in a literal sense, I can still speak but no one can hear me and if they can they don’t care for what i l have to say. I suppose what I am saying may not be important but i am starting to feel as if i am not important. All admit when I speak to her I feel as if anything I say is used to start a war where every word is twisted and she has little regard for empathie and I am left with pain and damage. She builds up my story’s like sky scrapers and when i get to the top there is endless beauty and then she pushes me off and it all evaporates. She wins and yet agine I am left with no voice. So I put my pain in paragraphs and my sorrows in sentences and I one day I will speak and she will hear me.

Independent reading (girl in pieces) IRJE #4

In Girl in Pieces by Kathleen Glasgow  her life is entering a new chapter, a better chapter. Yet we still don’t know too much about her we have found out her name is Charlotte/Charlie. She’s trying to explain how she got to this point in her life and she put it in a poem that she reads. In one point of the poem she says

Girl listens to radio. Girl finds music. Girl has whole other.               world.

Girl slips on headphones. World gone

Girl draws and draws and draws. World gone. (Pg.82)

In this specific part of the poem I felt very touched sort of understood. Not only was she stating how music and the arts as a hole can affect your life, personally she was talking about the things I love. I listen to music 99% of the time and when you really listen to it it feels like the whole world can disappear, it’s an escape from reality. Not only that but art is a way of expressing your emotions. Sometimes explaining how you feel it’s too hard to put into words, and in this book she has mentioned that before for example.

I wish my eyes could tell her sorry because I had no words (pg.19)

For meany girl such as Charlie and I instead of using your body or your eyes to tell someone what you’re trying to say we use art. This book portrays arts not only as a pass time, Or a creative outlet but away of communication and within it’s a hole world.

Independent reading girl in pieces IRJE #3

At this part in the story we have almost no backstory of the character. She barely talks and we don’t even know her name. She’s going back to how she ended up here and talking about her family specifically her mother. She says

my mother was like a crab: she tucked every thing inside and left only her shell. (pg.28)

I know a lot of people deal with emotions differently and this quote specifically stuck out to me because showing your emotions can be a very vulnerable thing. Being open and honest about your trauma in your past makes you very vulnerable to another person. So I think it’s sometimes seems easier to “tuck things inside”. I believe that she is just describing small part of who her mother was, but it helps you understand the character a lot better. And how the way she coped with things shaped her as a person.

Independent Reading Girl In Pieces IRJE #2

For my independent reading book I am read a new book named Girl in Pieces By Kathleen Glasgow.  It’s about girl who is trying to cope and has been though the most painful things. In this quote she talks about how she is in the hospital and she genuinely wanted to say something but couldn’t.

I wished my eyes to tell her sorry because I had no words. (P.19)

It connected to me specifically because there’s some things you wish you could say but hope they just understand by the way that you’re looking at them. I think facial expressions especially what you’re saying with your eyes can sometimes mean a lot more than words. Sadly many people are scared to use the words, due to the vulnerability they feel when speaking. I think this quote tho it is small it sends an extremely powerful message.

Reflection

Overall I enjoyed both the book all quite on the western front and the video they shall not grow old. Although I believe they do have a lot in common they both deglamorize the war and give more of a real perspective. Although I think the book was more real and Honest about the true pain and suffering in the war . I personally felt like the video was more impactful even though they were actors being able to view it  made more of a picture in my mid. Imagining it made better understand happened and tell what they were truly going through.

Independent reading IRJE #1

For my independent reading book I have been reading “Emma” by Jane Austen. The book is about Emma a young woman who is very bright and very beautiful and about her coming of age. She is so beautiful and so smart things are just hand it to her it’s about her being able to see things truly. There is one quote in the beginning book  that spoke to me. In this part of the book Her dad and his friend are having a conversation about how she’s becoming a young woman and should find  the right man. Throughout the whole Conversation they discuss how being smart is not enough for a young woman of her age and she needs to settle down. He says,

At ten years old, she had the misfortune of being able to answer questions which puzzled her sister at seventeen. (p. 29)  

It spoke to me because by saying it was a misfortune she was that smart is saying she is not good for anything but her looks. Now although that is disrespect towards her. The fact is she’s never been the type to take it personally she would never get offended. She knew that most people are jealous of how she was smarter than them or prettier than them. She wouldn’t take it to heart because at the end of the day she knew she could be both an independent strong woman and have a lovely and caring man.

All Quiet On The Western Front

    Overall, I enjoyed the book, I thought it was a good read, it deglamorizes the war and shows you the real struggle. To be more specific I paid very close attention to the language. The way Erich Maria Remarque was able to use eloquent and old-fashioned language and gorgeous metaphors. For example, in (chapter1 pg9) He says “Around us stretches the flowery meadow. The grasses sway their tall spears; the white butterflies flutter around and float on the soft warm wind of the late summer.” His writing perfectly displays a picture in your mind of what that exact summer day looked like. His language contributed greatly to the effect the book had on you. The old-fashioned language transported you almost like you were there in real-time.  

   The second thing I noticed well reading the book. Was the plot Erich had a very realistic plot. But at times it was somewhat confusing. And at times I found often I was having a hard time keeping up, whether he was on the front line on leave or where he was along the timeline. For example, in (chapter10) when they found all that amazing food and the two pigs the timeline of when and where they were was not very specific and I had trouble keeping track. Overall, I did very much enjoy the book and it made me feel many different emotions. I would deftly recommend it to a friend. 

 

About Me

Hey, my name is Emma. I am from Calgary but live in Duncan and I am moving to Victoria in a few months. I like art and fashion, and showng my personality through my clothing and makeup.

I also love to write poetry. So I hope to read and write a lot of poetry this year in English and expand my point of view on literature around the world. I am excited about all the new things I have to learn.