Sound and Fury

I found this documentary very thought-provoking. It brought up a lot of points about deafness that I had never considered before. It was interesting to see how the deaf family and hearing family each viewed deafness and deaf culture. I found it difficult to form a definitive opinion on whether it is right or wrong to give a deaf child a cochlear implant and raise it in the hearing world.

Peter and Nita were obviously happy with and proud of their deafness. They loved living in deaf culture and they wanted their family to live in it too. One of the strongest points that Peter, Nita, and other members of the deaf society made is that deafness cannot always be considered a handicap. They were happy with who they were and they had fully functioning lives in the hearing world. They felt that hearing was not necessary for them. They also repeatedly made the point that parents should love their children however they are born, even if they are deaf. The parents should not make the child to get a cochlear implant until he or she is old enough to make a comprehensive decision about it.

On the other hand, Chris and Mari, along with the other families who had children with cochlear implants, had many strong points as well. They believed that being able to hear would make the children's lives a lot easier, because the world does not typically cater to deaf people. It is much harder to find a good deaf school than a good hearing school, so deaf people sometimes do not get great educations. Another strong point that they made was that cochlear implants work the best when children are young. It is much easier for children to develop their language and speech than adults, who might never be able to fully learn how to speak. If a child waits too long to get the implant, it might be too late.

It is hard to say whether it is better to allow a deaf child to grow up deaf, or to give them an implant to make them hear. There are benefits and consequences of both. Many deaf people are proud of their deaf culture and they do not want it taken away from them, but the ability to hear will provide a person with many more opportunities in life. I'd say the best choice is to leave the decision up to the parents, who should be well educated on each stance, and up to the children who are born deaf.

Fear of Spiders

I love to read in my bed. It's warm and comfortable, but is it safe? Not always. Not when, as I turn the page of my book, I see a small dark shape float down in front of my face. When I realize it's a spider, I panic. I shriek, my heart flutters, and I smack the spider out of view. This leads to my next problem: the spider is somewhere in my bed. I stumble out, trying desperately to get away from the horrible creature. Obviously, I'll be sleeping on the couch for the next three days.

I don't understand why I am so afraid of spiders. I know they can't do anything to hurt me, but when I see them crawling around or freaking hanging in the air by their webs, I experience the telltale signs of fear: pounding heart, sweaty palms, short, fast breaths. They are gross and freaky. What are all those legs even for anyway?
Still, my fear is not crippling. I don't faint at the sight of spiders. I'm just wary of them. I try not to be in the same room as them, if I can help it. As long as I have a friend around to squish them or bring them outside or something, I'll be okay.

Assange, Manning, and Snowden

Many people consider Julian Assange, Chelsea Manning, and Edward Snowden to be heroes. Others consider them to be traitors. All three of these people have leaked secret government information to the public, and thus have been accused of espionage and treason. The question that many Americans are asking themselves is: Was it right for these documents to be released, or is it potentially dangerous?

I think the answer to this depends on the circumstances. The First Amendment protects the rights to freedom of speech and freedom of press. These rights are given to us to keep the government from hiding secrets from the public. We definitely have the right to know if the government is committing war crimes or being corrupt. The TED Talks video showed a U.S. airstrike in Baghdad that killed two journalists. Especially now, at a time when the media are more concerned with Miley Cyrus’s VMA’s performance that with what the government is doing in secret, it is important for us to get important information from sites such as Wikileaks.

There is a line that can be crossed, though. Wikileaks and other reporters need to be careful about what information they release. In the article Can the U.S. Bring Assange to Justice? it is stated that one of the leaks “contain[ed] the names of Afghan civilians cooperating with the United States. This can be dangerous for anyone who is named and those close to them. Reports like this should be kept censored so no one can get hurt.

As American citizens, we have the right to know what our government is doing. We should not have secrets kept from us, so for the most part I believe that Assange, Manning, and Snowden are heroes. They do need to be careful, though, of the information they release. Anything that could be dangerous to those involved should be kept secret, or at least censored, so it does not fall into the wrong hands.

Truth and Beauty: A Friendship

Truth and Beauty by Ann Patchett is an amazing book. It is funny and thought-provoking and heartbreaking all in one. This book tells the story of Ann and her best friend Lucy Grealy. The two women went to college together, but did not truly get to know each other until they both attended a writer’s workshop together in Iowa. Since they could not afford to have their own apartments, they decided to live together in a condo. This was the moment their whole friendship began unfolding.

Lucy was diagnosed with cancer as a young girl. During her early years, she experienced several treatments, including operations and a lot of chemotherapy. Her surgeries left her with a chunk of her jaw removed from her face. Throughout her life, she received numerous ultimately unsuccessful operations to reconstruct her face. This left Lucy with very low self-esteem.

Lucy and Ann were unlikely friends. In college, Lucy was extremely popular. Ann knew all about her, but Lucy had no idea who Ann was until they began living together. The two had very different personalities. Lucy was outgoing and eccentric while Ann was more calm and down-to-earth. Ann compares their friendship to the fable of the Grasshopper and the Ant. In this story, the Grasshopper spends the summer singing while the Ant stores food for the winter. Come winter, the Grasshopper has no food and depends on the Ant to survive. Ann says that she and Lucy were like the Grasshopper and the Ant. Lucy was the whimsical one and Ann was the hardworking one. They needed each other to survive.

Following the workshop, Ann and Lucy remained friends. They were separated for a long time when Ann moved to California and Lucy moved to Aberdeen, Scotland. They would still call each other and write letters. I found the letters to be one of my favorite parts of the book. It gave me a wonderful insight into Lucy’s life, and I loved how she put her heart into the letters. The two each moved all over throughout the rest of their lives, but they never lived together again.

Both being writers, the two women applied to numerous workshops and publishers. For a long time, neither of them was accepted, but still they persevered. Finally, Ann was accepted into a workshop in Princeton, Massachusetts and Lucy was accepted into a Yaddo workshop in New York. From there, their careers took off. Lucy published her only book, Autobiography of a Face, in 1994. She also published other works, including poems and essays. Ann wrote a few novels and did some teaching. Their stories prove that one can accomplish their goals through hard work and perseverance.

Lucy was a difficult friend at times. Because of her low self-esteem, depression, and appearance, she faced a hard life. She often felt unloved and unwanted. She would try to use sex to make men love her, but it always left her heartbroken. She also had a habit of needing a lot of attention, and often turned to Ann. She would get jealous of Ann’s boyfriends, and always wanted Ann to say she loved Lucy more. Despite this, Ann was incredibly patient with her. She loved Lucy with her whole heart.

Lucy’s depression led her to become addicted to drugs. She died of an accidental heroin overdose in 2001. She thought she since she survived her cancer and all her operations, she was invincible. Ann says that her biggest mistake is that she had come to believe this too.

This whole book was captivating. It was a beautiful story of two women becoming friends and making their ways through the world. While Lucy’s death was heartbreaking, Ann and Lucy’s friendship will live on forever.

Feminism Essays

I really enjoyed reading these essays about feminism and women’s rights. It was interesting to see how the arguments for feminism developed over time. The first essay by Mary Wollstonecraft was written in 1792. It was a bit hard to get through because the language was so different back then. I was able to get Wollstonecraft’s point, though. She talked mostly about education. During the late 18^th century, women had little to no education, as stated by Wollstonecraft when she says, “the education which women now receive scarcely deserves the name.” She believed that boys and girls should get the same opportunities for education— they should be in the same classes together and learn the same material. She says this would help young men and women learn how to be together in a purely platonic way. During this time period, women were treated like slaves “in a political and civil sense.” Wollstonecraft believed that women should be allowed the same education and government opportunities as men. She acknowledged that these changes would take some time for the world to get used to, but stressed that they were necessary changes to make.

The second essay by Margaret Fuller was a huge rebuttal to the arguments that men made about women’s rights. Like Wollstonecraft, she remarks that men see women as slaves. The men try to justify their treatment of women by saying that giving them rights would cause problems. “The beauty of the home would be destroyed, the delicacy of the sex be violated, the dignity of halls of legislation destroyed, by an attempt to introduce them there. Fuller retorts that women have proven themselves able to “express publicly the fullness of thought and emotion, without losing any of the peculiar beauty of her sex,” as shown by actresses and female Quaker preachers. Fuller goes on to say that women should be the ones representing themselves in the fight for women’s rights, rather than men, because men will not be able to represent women with justice to their concerns. She says that if women gain rights, many problems would be solved and it would “bring forth ravishing harmony.”

My favorite essay was “If Men Could Menstruate” by Gloria Steinem. I had read this essay before, but I was able to gain some new perspective by reading it after the other two essays. I loved Steinem’s use of humor to get her point across. One line that stuck out to me, and sets the stage for the rest of the essay, is this: “Whatever a ‘superior’ group has will be used to justify its plight, Black men were given poorly paid jobs because they were said to be ‘stronger’ than white men, while all women were relegated to poorly paid jobs because they were said to be ‘weaker.’ Logic has nothing to do with oppression.” The privileged groups in power often try to find ways to rationalize and support their power, even if the reasons are completely arbitrary. Steinem says that if men could menstruate and women could not, then men would use their periods as a way to validate their power. They would say things like only men could serve in the military because “You have to give blood to take blood.” Sanitary supplies would be readily available for free. Men would find ways to use science against women by saying that since women don’t biologically measure natural cycles, they wouldn’t have the same sense of time, space, and mathematics as men. One of the most thought-provoking excuses that I read was that religions would say, “Without a monthly purge of impurities, women are unclean.” I found this curious because in real life many religions say that women are unclean when they are menstruating. It’s interesting to think how this would be turned around if men were the ones who menstruated. This whole essay brings up a great point-- that we can’t let people justify their supremacy through completely superficial reasons. We have to stop thinking we are better than others and instead strive for equality.

Is Google Making Us Stupid?

I did not find this essay as interesting as the others. I understood what the author was saying, and there were certain parts that I agreed with, but for most of the essay, he makes the same point over and over again. Carr states that because of the internet and its easy access to short articles and other pieces of writing, people are no longer able to focus on anything longer than a couple of pages. He says that the internet has changed the way we think. We get distracted more easily, so we can’t concentrate on long pieces of writing. He backs this up with a few research studies and quotes from writers and professors.

Carr also connects the way the minds of computer-users connect to Taylorism. He talks about how peoples’ minds are becoming more and more like machines-- we try to find the quickest and most efficient way to get information, but we aren’t really able to think about it. Carr includes an unsettling quote by one of Google’s founders, “Certainly if you had all the world’s information directly attached to your brain, or an artificial brain that was smarter than your brain, you’d be better off.” It is slightly troublesome how they want peoples’ brains to be more like machines.

I thought this essay brought up an interesting point; however, I didn’t like how Carr repeated his point so much. Some of what he says is true-- it can be hard to focus on long works, and perhaps that comes from the convenience of search engines. But I find that it is easy to concentrate on long pieces of writing if I find them interesting. The hard things to concentrate on are writings that I find boring. The lack of concentration there does not come from the length of the work, but from my lack of interest.

The Ethics of Living Jim Crow

Although the events in the story were horrible, I found this essay to be intriguing. I’ve heard a lot about the lives of black people in the South during the early 1900’s, but this story is different. It’s much more personal than the descriptions I’ve heard in history classes. Wright gives the reader insight into his life and the racism he had to experience.

A common theme throughout this essay is violence against black people. Even at a young age, Wright experienced violence from kids his own age. Young boys threw broken bottles at him and his friends, and it resulted in Wright having to get stitches. Violence continues throughout his life. At his first job, he is beaten and run out by is coworkers for wanting to learn more about his job. At his second job, a black woman is beaten badly for not being able to pay her bills. Instead of helping her, a police officer arrests her. Wright is hit with a bottle for not saying “sir” to a white man. A black boy who was caught in bed with a prostitute was castrated and run out of town. Wright states that he even saw someone get hit in the face for saying “Thank you” to a white man. The most troubling thing is that Wright, along with all the other black people in the story, grew to expect this treatment. They would tell themselves they were lucky to be alive after these encounters.

Throughout the story, Wright talks about his “Jim Crow education.” I interpreted this as how black people were “supposed” to act around white people. He learned that there was little he could do to make his life better. He had to address white people a certain way, act polite, and not speak out. The black people could not defend themselves against injustices; they had to be completely submissive.

Something that bothered me about this story is that I could make connections to things that are still happening today. Racial profiling is a big one. In the story, Wright was making deliveries for his job, and a police officer stopped him because he was in a white neighborhood after dark. That sort of thing still happens today. Police officers will stop people of color for looking “suspicious.” Another event that this story reminded me of was the murder of Trayvon Martin. It proved violence against black people is still happening, and the perpetrator can still get away with it. Even 75 years after this essay was written, some things are still the same, and this needs to change.

Talk of the Town

Since I was so young when it happened, I remember very little about 9/11. Most of my knowledge of the event comes from what I have learned over the years in school, from the Presidents’ speeches, and from stories like these ones. I found these essays interesting because they are so vastly different.

John Updike’s essay focused mostly on his emotional response to the destruction of the World Trade Center. He talks about how it seemed unreal-- almost like a dream. The way he writes seems surreal and dream-like as well-- explaining how the tower “fell straight down like an elevator,” and how the sky was pure blue, save for the huge cloud of smoke coming from the site of the crash. Everything seemed like a nightmare that could be fixed by waking up. But then he came to realize that it could not be fixed. America would never fully recover from this hit. We would always remember that there is risk in freedom.

Susan Sontag’s article was a much more political response to the events of 9/11. She argues that America had this coming to us because of the bombings and attacks we have led in Iraq. She states that rather than this being an attack on civilization, liberty, humanity, or the free world, this was an attack on the power of our country. It was a retaliation rather than an unjustified invasion. She also criticizes the leaders of our country for hiding the truth from the public and feeding on peoples’ emotions. She says the leaders try to manipulate peoples’ responses to keep them from finding out the truth of the attacks. Sontag wants us to learn for ourselves about the attacks, rather than blindly trusting the government.

I thought both of these essays gave good perspectives to the events of 9/11. Updike’s essay was a more personal experience that gave me insight into what 9/11 was like, and Sontag’s essay reminded me to learn more about what happens in our country and think for myself, instead of trusting what our countries leaders say without a second thought.

About me

Hello friends and fellow bloggers! My name is Sarah and this is my AP Composition blog. I am 17 years old and I will be a senior this year. Despite my difficult schedule, I'm very excited for my final year at MHS. Now I suppose I should talk about my life.
I was born in Watertown, Wisconsin. When I was about a year old, my family moved to Black River Falls, and when I was four, we moved to Shawano. Finally, we moved to McFarland when I was seven. This August will mark our ten year anniversary in McFarland.
My family consists of my mom and dad, my two brothers, my dog, and my fish. My mother works at Care Net Pregnancy Center and my father works at Dean Health. My brothers and I all work at the Angie O'Donnell Aquatic Center-- also known as McFarland High School's pool. This job will take up most of my summer. I teach swimming lessons and lifeguard. Along with this, I am also on the swim team, which I have been a part of since I was 12. I spend about 8 to 12 hours at the pool a day, with a week off between swimming lesson sessions. Despite the long days, I love my job. I have found teaching to be very enjoyable, and I would like to continue it in the future.
Art has been a huge part of my life. I love creating all types of art, including drawing, painting, ceramics, and photography. This is something I've been doing ever since I was little, and I will continue it as long as I can. I plan on getting a degree in Art Education in college. Last year, I was in an art competition called Visual Arts Classic (VAC), for which I received two first place awards. I hope to enter this competition again this year.
I am a fairly introverted person and I enjoy spending a lot of time on my own. I like to just relax and read, draw, or watch TV shows and movies.
My senior year will be very busy. I will be taking four AP classes, along with swimming this fall, working with our school's GSA and Driftwood, competing in VAC, working at the pool, and getting ready for college. Senior year, bring it on.