Jeffrey's reminded me of what my U.S. History 2 teacher told us one day. It was in 12th grade, and our class was about to start watching movie called "Saving Private Ryan", when my teacher got into topic of people not believing in Holocaust. At first I thought to myself that this guy is just messing with our heads, but he was not.
My history teacher showed us people who were spreading and making their followers believe that Holocaust never happened and it was just a need for Jewish peolpe to receive pity from the World, and for Germans to be viewed as the country filled with hate and racism.
There is too many documents, photographs, movie recordings to think that the Holocaust was made up by the Jewish people. Many other races died in gas chambers of concentration camps that were located in Europe, not only Jews. I have been to one of them, it's in Poland and it's called Auschwitz. I don't ever want to go to tha camp ever again. When I walked around the camp, I felt the chills all over my body. The belongings of dead people, the tons of hair collected behind glass wall, and huge amount of shoes, it was horrifying how many innocent people died.
Jeffrey spoke about topic that I forgot to reseach after my teacher mentioned that day. It was nice to read someone's Blog, who has similar view as me. I will read about the people who wrote the books about concentration camps and holocaust being a lie.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Blog 4:The Allegory of the Cave
Summary:
In a story, The Republic, written by Plato, Socrates is having a conversation with one of his followers. He is talking or more likely, asking questions about how the prisoners would not be able to recognize people or objects that are passing through.
As the prisoners were chained, underground, with their backs to the raised way, where people pass through everyday, they were not allowed to turn their heads towards the passing figures, to see the world, the sun again. They could only hear sound and see the shadows as the fire threw them on the wall facing the prisoners. They could not move their heads, which left only moving objects on the wall and echo of the foot steps that were behind them. They would fancy for freedom, and the sight of sunlight.
The conversation goes on and Socrates tells Glaucon, the follower, what would happen if, for example, one of the prisoners would be let outside. The prisoner would suffer pain in the eyes, he would have to adjust to the surroundings and the light, because he was chained to the darkness in the cave, for so long. The prisoner would contemplate on what are the objects before him. When he will finally get his vision accustomed, he will cherish the freedom and find himself in the right place.Plato's thinks that people in the society sometimes live like they were in the cave for many months and when they come out, they feel blinded by the light. As soon as their vision gets accustomed, they never want to go back to that darkness. The choice to live in the light, truth, is wanted more than living in the darkness, lie.
What the editor says in his note, in the beginning of the story is "It is true that many people around you may think you are weird or even a danger to the society, but you do not care. Once you have tasted the truth, you will not want to go back to being ignorant!".
My Place in the Cave:
If I would be in the Socrates' Cave story, I would be still in the cave, chained to the wall. I am blind, and I don't mean that I'm blind because I wear glasses or contact lenses, I'm blind because I can't tell the true colors of a person. Its like those prisoners, they saw shadows and heard echos of foot steps, I see people who are hiding something from me and lies that are pouring from their mouths, or they are simply protecting me from the truth. Sometimes it all turns into blur.
I guess, me, still chained, is because I'm a naive person. I trust people too fast and too easy. I believe in them and then, its either they will do something against my will, or a thing that will hurt my heart. I can not ever know if my dad is lying to me, he is really great at telling the stories but he does not have the backup for them, always blaming someone else for it and claiming that the evidence got lost so he can't prove it, so I can only trust him, and there, I get burned later on.
This story doesn't end with a prisoner coming out from the Cave and seeing the light and stop being ignorant. Lately I've been wanting the truth from him and some kind of support for his theories about people, and the tales he is telling me. So far he doesn't want to talk to me that much, because he lost a believer, the naive one is still naive, but maybe a little less than before she learned the true colors of her own father.
In a story, The Republic, written by Plato, Socrates is having a conversation with one of his followers. He is talking or more likely, asking questions about how the prisoners would not be able to recognize people or objects that are passing through.
As the prisoners were chained, underground, with their backs to the raised way, where people pass through everyday, they were not allowed to turn their heads towards the passing figures, to see the world, the sun again. They could only hear sound and see the shadows as the fire threw them on the wall facing the prisoners. They could not move their heads, which left only moving objects on the wall and echo of the foot steps that were behind them. They would fancy for freedom, and the sight of sunlight.
The conversation goes on and Socrates tells Glaucon, the follower, what would happen if, for example, one of the prisoners would be let outside. The prisoner would suffer pain in the eyes, he would have to adjust to the surroundings and the light, because he was chained to the darkness in the cave, for so long. The prisoner would contemplate on what are the objects before him. When he will finally get his vision accustomed, he will cherish the freedom and find himself in the right place.Plato's thinks that people in the society sometimes live like they were in the cave for many months and when they come out, they feel blinded by the light. As soon as their vision gets accustomed, they never want to go back to that darkness. The choice to live in the light, truth, is wanted more than living in the darkness, lie.
What the editor says in his note, in the beginning of the story is "It is true that many people around you may think you are weird or even a danger to the society, but you do not care. Once you have tasted the truth, you will not want to go back to being ignorant!".
My Place in the Cave:
If I would be in the Socrates' Cave story, I would be still in the cave, chained to the wall. I am blind, and I don't mean that I'm blind because I wear glasses or contact lenses, I'm blind because I can't tell the true colors of a person. Its like those prisoners, they saw shadows and heard echos of foot steps, I see people who are hiding something from me and lies that are pouring from their mouths, or they are simply protecting me from the truth. Sometimes it all turns into blur.
I guess, me, still chained, is because I'm a naive person. I trust people too fast and too easy. I believe in them and then, its either they will do something against my will, or a thing that will hurt my heart. I can not ever know if my dad is lying to me, he is really great at telling the stories but he does not have the backup for them, always blaming someone else for it and claiming that the evidence got lost so he can't prove it, so I can only trust him, and there, I get burned later on.
This story doesn't end with a prisoner coming out from the Cave and seeing the light and stop being ignorant. Lately I've been wanting the truth from him and some kind of support for his theories about people, and the tales he is telling me. So far he doesn't want to talk to me that much, because he lost a believer, the naive one is still naive, but maybe a little less than before she learned the true colors of her own father.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Blog 3:Things I Need to Remember When I Write Summaries
Writing a summery has rules. I would have to follow specific guidelines in order to succeed in summarizing. It similar in a way to an essay that needs to be cited, and the information of the author that I provided, must be accurate.
While I'm reading a passage, I should underline either the main idea that I will summarize, or underline the quote or phrase I would be using. It would help me to focus later on to write the paragraph on the subject of the part that I picked. I would be writing mostly in my own words, explaining the idea, or what the quotation, picked by me, means. Including the author's name or any other information that will give the idea for the reader that my information has a background, even though it will not look like the regular essay.
When I will have an outline I should start drafting the summary in chronological order. It should make sense, be reasonable, and include some parts of the passage and support it. It will be a combination of one or two sentences and they should be stretched out and explained without repetition.
My summary should be comprehensive, reasonable, support my point of view, and cited in a way that is suppose to be while writing a summary.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Blog 2: What I need to do to pass the CATW--seriously
There is many steps to successfully write a CATW essay. What I need to do is, prepare myself, read carefully, outline, make a draft, and check my grammar.
Reading passages in the CATW reading sections are from 250-300 words, which are very short. I should be prepared to write an essay, which is 90 minutes long, by getting a lot of rest the day before and not overreacting and stressing out. I should split my time right, so I will have enough for every section. While I'm reading, it is necessary to underline or highlight important facts or key words. it is also important to understand the passage. It will be helpful, when later, while writing I would need to explain in my own words the examples that I am referring to. The examples have to be in chronological order, because I don't want to confuse my reader/grader with jumping around the passage instead of following one by one.
To write a great essay, which doesn't have to be a specific amount of words or pages, I will need to cite my information. I don't want the reader to think that my informations are taken from the sky and are inaccurate.
When I will be ready and done with reading the passage, finally i can start the outlining my essay. It should have a topic, thesis, and an introduction. Then the body of my essay should consist of facts, citation, and main idea of my point. My conclusion should refer to the thesis and introduction, it should be supporting my point of view and end the essay.
Grammar is important in the essay, same as the meaning of the words that we use. If I won't know the meaning of the word and used it wrong, the meaning of my essay would lose it sense and it won't be as strong as I am wishing for to be. That's why it is important to understand the passage that I am reading.
When I'll follow my instructions, read carefully, make and outline, draft, and check my spelling and if i used the words right, I should start writing it down as my final draft.
Reading passages in the CATW reading sections are from 250-300 words, which are very short. I should be prepared to write an essay, which is 90 minutes long, by getting a lot of rest the day before and not overreacting and stressing out. I should split my time right, so I will have enough for every section. While I'm reading, it is necessary to underline or highlight important facts or key words. it is also important to understand the passage. It will be helpful, when later, while writing I would need to explain in my own words the examples that I am referring to. The examples have to be in chronological order, because I don't want to confuse my reader/grader with jumping around the passage instead of following one by one.
To write a great essay, which doesn't have to be a specific amount of words or pages, I will need to cite my information. I don't want the reader to think that my informations are taken from the sky and are inaccurate.
When I will be ready and done with reading the passage, finally i can start the outlining my essay. It should have a topic, thesis, and an introduction. Then the body of my essay should consist of facts, citation, and main idea of my point. My conclusion should refer to the thesis and introduction, it should be supporting my point of view and end the essay.
Grammar is important in the essay, same as the meaning of the words that we use. If I won't know the meaning of the word and used it wrong, the meaning of my essay would lose it sense and it won't be as strong as I am wishing for to be. That's why it is important to understand the passage that I am reading.
When I'll follow my instructions, read carefully, make and outline, draft, and check my spelling and if i used the words right, I should start writing it down as my final draft.
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Blog 1: Hype? Or just being naive?
The passage Hype introduces and explains the way advertisments and commercials influences our lives. It's not only in North America but probably the entire world that struggles, because it is a struggle to keep up with them, with the invasion of the unreal world played between our favorite television shows. Colorful advertisements took over the landscapes and our minds. They are everywhere, in stores, on billboards, television, radio, ect,. Our minds are constantly preoccupied with new technologies, food, or places that are being shown. Even when we don't want to see them, when we try to escape from them, there is always a way that the company payed enough money to introduce their product to the world. I know how it is, because I travel to school everyday and I see in the bus or the subway how phone companies or other products are advertising their best products. It somehow influences our minds and we demand that specific electronic devices, or are wishing to travel to that beautiful place, or we start craving that delicious pie that is so beautifully shown on the poster. I read about the tricks that advertising companies use to get the society to buy more things and follow the so called, American Dream. America is a country where most of the world wants to live. Is it the freedom? Or is it the access to so many privilages for not a big price? It is, I'm sure for the freedom, but also the demand, the hunger for objects, that brings people here. Everyone wants to taste the life of an American society. People go to work to earn money for whatever new products are on the market. They feel as if owning something expensive or new, it will make them feel better about themselves. Usually, at the end of the day, we might feel as if our minds had too many products introduced to us, and more has to come while we are watching television or useing computers. For example, Wendy's, the fast food restayrant, introduces the consumers to their cheap and delicious menu. But no one shows how many calories that meal has, from what and how was it made, or how many people were regreating that burger beacuse now they are obese. From what I observed, it's a chain of never ending benefits for corporations. First you eat those burgers and slurp on those milkshakes, then you get a heartburn and gain weight, so then it comes the turn for the heartburn medicine corporation to benefit from that, and later on, YMCA or other gym will step in to help you with fixing your self-esteem. The advertising business is smart because they show a happy family when they purchase a nice, big screen, television, or a group of friends eating pizza and having a blast, and everyone is wishing for that happy, filled with laughs, time with your family or friends. But in reality, nothing is that easy or we don't always smile. It only lasts for a little, then we get bored. And that magical time, that was shown in the commercial, was only for 30-60 seconds. After that another, and another advertisement was playing. The magic, the smiles, and the happiness will go away, that's when the emptiness comes, and later demand for another product will approach, and that demand is a cry for happines.
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