a. Over the past few weeks, we have talked about traditions and routines, and also about the particular things we do that other people may find strange. Today, I want you to consider a similar topic: At some point in your life, someone has probably given you advice. What was the advice, and have your found that is has been particularly useful? It is also possible that you have been given bad advice, and that you made a bad decision or two as a result. You could also focus on the bad advice you have been given.
3) Group Work:
Get into your groups. For the next five to ten minutes, I want you to identify some of the Specific ideas that govern your life that you are aware of on a day-to-day, or week-to-week basis. These are the primary notions or thoughts that shape how you see the world, and what your expectations are of the world.
4) What is your GUT reaction to Ralph Ellison’s Battle Royale
1
2
3
4…
5) What are some important specific details.
1
2
3
4…
6) Who are the major characters?
1
2
3
4…
7) What is the plot?
8) Now that we have thought a little about the basics of the story, we are going to think about something a bit more complicated. This story as MOTIFS. A MOTIF is a recurring subject, image, idea, ect. What do you think one or more of the MOTIFS are in Battle Royale?
9) What is the speaker right about? What is the speaker wrong about?
Today’s Video:
Here are some other optional videos:
1
2
3
4
5
Click here for the final optional video
Read this for next class:
Edgar Allen Poe: The Fall of The House of Usher
Write one page on motifs in “The Fall of The House of Usher”
My mom a few years back gave me advice that helped me a great deal. She told me that we live in the world to please outrselves and nobody else. I am the type of person who loves to help other people and loves to make others happy, at my expense. It was making my life a living hell. People took advantage of that and I became behind in things and very mad and then wondered to myself what was happening. So thats when my mother decided to give me some advice. From then on I have put forth, at times, myself before other people, and I have made myself happy. It has made a tremendous impact on my life that I wish I would have had a few years back. It has made me realize that there is crude people in the world that pretend to care, and really do not. I am not the type that cares only for myself, I still help others out, but I make sure it’s something that will not impact what is happening in my life, such as school, a great deal so that I can stay on track and not venture away because of someone who wouldn’t do the same for me if the situation were reverse.
Comment by Jen Campbell — October 21, 2008 @ 4:42 pm |
When I was considering join the military I was given lots of advice, mostly it was to not join because of peoples general negativity on the subject. However, I chose to listen to someone who has actually been there and done that. His advice was to definitely to do it. Not only would it help me to pay for my education but it is also a good experience to have. Without taking that advice, I wouldn’t have joined and I would probably be in a completely different point in my life than I am right now. It has made a large difference and opened up opportunities across the board. Not just militarily but also for civilian jobs. Some still may consider it bad advice because of the current situation but I believe that it was the right thing to do and can only benefit me.
Comment by Gabe Cheney — October 21, 2008 @ 4:43 pm |
10/21/2008
I think the best advice that someone has given me is to stay on task during the week and the weekend is for fun. I try to follow it but there is some times that I stray from that advice. As I look back on it I think that I could do a lot better in that field, my freshman year at college I messed around a little too much and my grades were impacted by this. I soon started to realize that I could still have fun but I needed to go to class and get my homework done before I did what I was going to do for the night. So I think that the advice was good but I could have followed it a little closer than I did. If I would have followed this a little closer I wouldn’t be taking a math class over. I think if I would have done this I wouldn’t be struggling to keep my g.p.a. up last year and this year. The other thing that this did is to set me back from my class. This class should have been done over two semesters ago. But instead of paying for a class that I need I’m paying to retake a class that if I would have just buckled down and did the home work I would have passed.
Comment by Michael Austin — October 21, 2008 @ 4:44 pm |
family obligations (communicating)
work to pay for school, bills, car, and others.
school to make money in future and present.
socializing for pleasure.
telling the truth.
organize day to make sure things get done. (timeline)
Comment by Jen Campbell — October 21, 2008 @ 4:56 pm |
The grandfathers meaning was to tell his grandson to never back down, let them degrate you and make you suffer until you rise aboe them and they are sicken by it. He is saying that dont let them bring you down to where you give up, keep your head up and you will not drown, you will survive it. The advice i think was good, and useful.
Comment by Jen Campbell — October 21, 2008 @ 5:43 pm |
The Grandfather’s curse was really just of submission. To him, the only way to “keep up the good fight” would be to submit to the figures of authority. Now the narrator took it to heart as many young children do with senseless things. Presently this seems like completely foolish advice but at the time, maybe the Grandfather thought that it was the only way to live and stay alive.
Comment by Gabe Cheney — October 21, 2008 @ 5:44 pm |
Gabe Cheney
Adam Crowley
EH 112
23 October 2008
“The Fall of the House of Usher” Edgar Allen Poe
I think that the motifs of this particular narrative are fairly easy to decipher. Sometimes the motifs are difficult to identify but Poe makes these ones very apparent right from the beginning. One of the motifs is gloom. Everything that the narrator describes has a depressing feel to it. The house of Usher is covered with fungi, dark, mysterious, decaying, all descriptive words used by the speaker. Inside is no different, the paintings hung on the wall, the drapes, all put him on edge. The temperament of Usher is similarly gloomy. The narrator even goes as far as to compare him to a cadaver. “Luminous beyond comparison.”
Another motif is fear. Usher’s main problem is fear of that is going to happen to him. All of the other Ushers have passed and he is the only one left and that worries him. Obviously towards the end, the fear that both the narrator and Usher feel escalates quite a bit with the storm, the story, and the resurrection of Madeline. The narrator also feels fear because he is slightly taken aback by Ushers behavior and probably by the setting as well.
You could also make and argument for friendship. The reason that the narrator is there in the first place is because he was asked to come by Usher. He came to try and help his old friend. He helped him bury his sister and then the last night he was there when Usher came into the speakers room, he read him a story, which only made things worse, to try and calm him down.
Comment by Gabe Cheney — October 23, 2008 @ 2:31 pm |
Jennifer Campbell
EH112
October 23, 2008
“The fall of the House of Usher”
Throughout the whole story, Poe describes a place he was familiar too during his boyhood. He remembers how is looked as a child and in seeing it again years after relates the changes and decaying to the family. The family used to be a large number of people, and by reading it, all from the same family tree. He describes the hallway of pictures and how he remembered it. Poe is famous for using gothic like scenes in his stories, almost as if he is scaring his readers.
One of the motifs in the short story “The fall of House of the House of Usher” is the memories of his boyhood. He describes many times about things from his boyhood and what it is like now. For example, he describes how his friend has changed his personality and his way of thinking or delivering himself to others. So the motif that comes up many times is the about his boyhood and his memories of the house, and the people that lived in it.
Another motif that I found was of darkness. A lot of what he describes is dark and dreary. Poe touches on the dark side of things, more than the happy parts. He touches on his memories and what he remembers of the dark house, but why doesn’t he write about the memories that were good that happened here? The darkness then occurs again in the dungeon that his friends sister is put in, and how they could be so dark and cold hearted to put her in there, ALIVE! When I think of that scene, I think of a dark person, someone who is black and cold on the inside and could care less about others and their feelings.
In conclusion I found that the narrator’s boyhood and the darkness were a few of the motifs in the short story “The fall of the House of Usher.” This story was interesting and very hard to follow, but after many readings you could then get a mental picture of what was happening and all the things that reoccurred.
Comment by Jen Campbell — October 23, 2008 @ 5:35 pm |
[...] Tuesday, October 21 [...]
Pingback by Welcome to Eh 112: Approaches to Literature « Approaches to Literature, Fall 2008 — November 13, 2008 @ 2:20 pm |