Thursday, January 30, 2014

Lit Analysis 1

The book I have read for this literary analysis is Lord Of The Flies by William Golding

1. A plane evacuating a group of school boys is shot down and crashes into a tropical island. The boys evacuate the plane and begin to make a tribe out of themselves, electing a leader, planning a way to be rescued, and hunting food as well. At first what seems like a fun idea of living on their own and not having parent supervision turns the complete opposite. The group of boys eventually split up and form another tribe, both tribes becoming enemies and trying to kill each other, and usually succeeding at it. After a plot of killing a tribe member by filling up an area with smoke, a British naval officer come and rescue the boys, who have become traumatized over what they have done to one another.

2. A theme present in the story is "survival of the fittest". For the story is mainly about the boys on the island trying to survive.

3. The author had a bit of a serious, straight-forward tone in the story

"He was shorter than the other boy and very fat"

"The fat boy looked startled"

"He dived in the sand at Piggy's feet and lay there laughing"

4. The story contains a high usage of imagery used to describe things or situations

"The palms that still stood made a green roof, covered on the underside with a quivering tangle of reflections from the lagoon"

1. The story itself only has one example of direct characterization, the rest of the characters aren't really characterized in the novel. But a character that is briefly characterized is the character, Ralph.

"He was old enough, twelve years and a few months, to have lost the prominent tummy of childhood and not yet old enough for adolescence to have made him awkward."

2. The author has no change in syntax when focusing on certain a character or characters, since the author's tone remains constant throughout the story

3. It wasn't really a certain character, but it was characters that were dynamic. In the beginning, all of the boys were just innocent school kids that were just getting to know each other on the island, but they later became hateful killers toward each other

4. I didn't really get the feeling of getting to know a character well enough in the story, to be honest

Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Lit Terms #4

Internal Monologue- A stream of consciousness that goes through the mind of a character

Inversion- Two expressions switching the order of their appearance

Juxtaposition- The mixing up or scrambling of words

Lyric- Words in a song or poem

Magic(al) Realism- A genre which magic is present in realistic environments

Metaphor- A word or phrase that replaces the real meaning of a word or phrase

Metonymy- A figure of speech in which a thing or concept is called upon by a related term\

Modernism- A genre that reflects movement in art or cultural trends of the current period

Monologue- A long speech by a character

Mood- Feeling created when reading a story

Motif- A recurring, significant symbol in a story

Myth- A traditional story that contains supernatural beings or events

Narrative- A sequence of events presented to the reader in written or spoken words

Narrator- Character or person who is telling the story

Naturalism- Genre that uses detailed realism

Novellette/Novella- Prose narrative that's longer than a short story and shorter than a novel

Omniscient Point Of View- When the narrator know all the thoughts and feelings of each character

Onomatopoeia- Sound pronunciation

Oxymoron- A figure of speech that juxtaposes contradictory elements

Pacing- The way the author delivers the action

Parable- A simple story to teach a lesson

Paradox- A statement that contradicts itself but could also be true


Monday, January 27, 2014

What's The Story?

There could be quite a few reasons to why Dickens chose to write Great Expectations. You could ask different people and probably get an different answer from each one. But I think one of the reasons why is to write story about a changing character. Characterization is a key idea in this. The story begins with Pip as a young child and then goes through to him reaching adulthood. The story shows changes that Pip goes through as he matures into an adult

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Lit Terms #3

Exposition- A statement or rhetorical discourse that is meant to give information

Expressionism- A modernist movement that has a trait of showing the world from a certain perspective

Fable- A story with animals or mythical creatures as main characters

Fallacy- An argument with poor reasoning

Falling Action- Part of story where climax has reached over, and conflict has been resolved

Farce- A comic dramatic work with usage of horseplay

Figurative Language- Describing something by comparing it to something else

Flashback- When a character thinks back to a certain period in their life

Foil- A character that contrasts from another character

Folk Tale- A story typically passed down generations

Foreshadowing- Hinting that something will likely happen later in the story

Free Verse- An open form of poetry that has no rhyme scheme

Genre- Classification

Gothic Tale- Dark, gloomy romanticism

Hyperbole- Exaggeration as a rhetorical device

Imagery- Descriptive language made to have the reader picture in their mind what is being described

Implication- Conclusion that can be drawn from something, but not actually stated

Incongruity- When something is out of place

Inference- Conclusion based on evidence

Irony- Expression of one's meaning that signifies the opposite

Monday, January 20, 2014

Lit Term Remix

For this remix, here's some lit terms with their definition and some video examples to accompany them

Circumlocution- The usage of many words in attempt to be vauge

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCK3EbjpjE0

Cliche- A phrase or opinion that is overused

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgJVBBxhTv8

Elegy- Mournful or gloomy poem or narrative

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6U-CRhnDyK8

Epithet- Adjective or phrase to describe someone or something

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5govtsJnnII

Euphemism- A word or phrase that represents something else

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WkKyd8E1ZKE

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Lit Terms #2

Circumlocution- The usage of many words in attempt to be vague

Classicism- Styles and ideas that reflect ancient Greece and Rome

Cliche- A phrase or opinion that is overused and does not contain thought

Climax- Turning point where the action begins to rise

Colloquialism- A phrase usually use in everyday conversation

Comedy- Discourse of work that is meant to be humorous

Conflict- Incompatibility between two or more forces

Connotation- A feeling that a word in addition to its original meaning

Contrast- The state of being different from something else

Denotation- The literal primary meaning of a word

Denouement- Final part of a play or movie

Dialect- A form of language used in a specific region or social group

Dichotomy- A division or contrast of two things that are meant to be different

Dogmatic- Inclined to lay down principles incontrovertibly true

Elegy- Mournful or melancholy poem or narrative

Epic- A lengthy narrative poem

Epigram- Interesting, memorable, or surprising statement

Epitaph- A short text honoring a deceased person

Epithet- An adjective or descriptive phrase expressing a quality characteristic of the person or thing mentioned

Euphemism- A word or expression used as a replacement of another word

Evocative- Bringing strong images, or memories to mind

Sunday, January 12, 2014

Lit Terms #1

Allegory- A story, poem, or picture that can be interpreted to reveal a hidden meaning. Typically a moral or political one

Plato's "Allegory Of The Cave" is a good example of an allegory

Alliteration- The repetition of a letter or sound in a phrase

"Alice's aunt ate apples and acorns around August"

Allusion- An expression designed to call something to mind without mentioning it specifically

"With all the lies he said, I'm surprised his nose didn't grow"

Ambiguity- Uncertainty or inexactness of meaning in language

"Each person saw her duck"

Anachronism- A thing belonging or appropriate to a period other than that in which it exists

From Julius Caesar:

"Brutus: Peace! Count the clock

Cassius: The clock has stricken three"

Analogy- A comparison of two different things

"He felt like a fish out of water"

Analysis- Detailed examination of the elements or structure of something

Anaphora- Repetition of a word \or phrase

"I needed a drink. I needed a break. I needed to get out of there"

Anecdote- A short and interesting story about a real person or event

People who give speeches might use an anecdote in their speech

Antagonist- The "bad guy" in a story that the reader is supposed to be against

Claudius can be considered the antagonist in "Hamlet".

Antithesis- A parallel sentence in which two opposite idea are put together to make a sentance

"Speech is silver, silence is gold"

Aphorism- A statement of truth or opinion used in a witty matter

"The simplest questions are the hardest to answer"

Apologia- A formal, written defense of one's opinion or conduct

An example would be Bill Clinton's 1998 apologia about The Monica Lewinsky affair

Apostrophe- A figure of speech represented by exclamation

"Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" is an example of an apostrophe

Argument- A work in where an author brings up a topic and convinces the reader to agree

Assumption- Assuming that something has or will happen

Audience- Intended group of readers

Characterization- The explanation of a character that progresses throughout the story

Chiasmus- When two or more clauses are balanced against each other by reversal of their structures

"Love as if one day you would hate, and hate as if one day you would love"








Thursday, January 9, 2014

AP Prep Post 1: Siddhartha

All questions were found here:


1. What does Siddhartha decide to study? How is that the one field he has been ignorant in?

He begins to start studying himself, though he didn't study himself through other people around him.

2. Why does he feel an “icy chill”? He compares himself to a star. How is that so? 

He feels an icy chill because of how he now alone in the world

3. How is he different now?

4. What is the “Self”? Why has it occupied Siddhartha so? 

5. When Siddhartha “awakes” from his dream, what does he see for the first time?

To answer the last three, I think we could read a bit more into Siddhartha, and have peer to peer discussions with their interpretations on what they have read, and maybe try to answer some other questions people have posted, or just general questions that one might have.

Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Hacking My Education

One thing that I want to know in June that I might not know today is how I can use some of the things we've learned to use in my future, like college, or even in my everyday life. Some skills I'd like to show in my blog is collaboration with other people. Not just other peers in each class, but showing the people we've had Google chats with, we can show how successful we've been with getting in contact with people around the United States. An experience I'd like to have as a result with this is that I'd like to get the word of our open source learning and see if it can spread on and be used by other people or classes.

What's In This For Me?

My goal this semester is to try not to over-stress on anything that to me might seem (to me) very important. A common thing to feel as the high school student is, well... stress. There are times when I think that I might be at peace, but then something else gets thrown right on top of it. We feel stress over a lot of things. For example, (this year especially) we have college applications, deadlines to those applications, scholarship applications. Then on top of that, we feel more stress over the "am I gonna get accepted to that college?", "will I get that scholarship?", "what if I don't get that scholarship? How am I going to go to college without those scholarships?!". Then we have the other things on our minds too, like the SAT or ACT (even though those are behind us now), or that big test you really need to study for that may or may not put your grade into danger, or that project that you need to get done for your econ class. Then just when you think it'll get better, BOOM! big midterm or big final(s) that you need to study for and do well on. I don't want to feel that way anymore. Instead of having that feeling of stress, I just want to sit down and just think to myself, "You know what? It'll be just fine. You got this". I want a way to completely eliminate all the stress that I have and be able to get done with what I need to get done. Now, we love that feeling of getting done with something that has been stressing us completely. But wouldn't it be a  better feeling if we just weren't stressed about it at all in the first place?