Posts

This I Have Learned

  Looking back on my K-12 journey, the most important thing I’ve learned, and the most important advice that I would take away from it to give to other students, is to not look back. To be specific, I learned that looking back on the little details and mishaps throughout my career ended up being more detrimental than I thought it would be, contrary to the advice most people gave me. “Practice makes perfect,” “mistakes breed success,” etc. These people weren’t wrong, but the thing is, these sayings are really vague when it comes to the intensity of scrutinizing mistakes, and I learned that firsthand. Beating myself up over simple mistakes, like a bad test or forgetting to turn in a homework assignment, probably wasn’t the intention of the people who made those sayings. Fundamentally they aren’t wrong, since humans are indeed social creatures who grow from social interactions, but those people also didn’t consider that humans aren’t limitless, and often they don’t even know where their l
Post a Comment
Read more

Blackout Poem

Image
 
Post a Comment
Read more

Inherited Trauma And Structure

 In class we read the play "Fences" and analyzed its structure and its characters and their relationships, which play a tremendous part in making the play have its style, voice, and message. While we analyzed the story, the term inherited trauma was introduced to us, which means that traumatic events experienced by humans can be passed on to their offspring. In "Fences," inherited trauma is a major theme around the characters Troy and Cory, and the relationship between them, as both go through a flawed father-son relationships and it reflects on their character. Troy experiences trauma throughout his childhood as he is forced to live with a neglectful father with more than 10 siblings and survive on his own after his father beats him to take his girlfriend away from him when he was only 14. Troy experienced hardships on the streets and in jail, and was never able to experience the change that black culture saw in his era. Cory, on the other hand, is trying to live h
Post a Comment
Read more

What is Oedipus' Hamartia?

Image
It is held as common knowledge that in the tragedy Oedipus Rex , Oedipus falls from power because of his hamartia, or his main character flaw that will eventually lead to his tragic end. However, it is hard to determine what Oedipus' hamartia might actually be, since there are many reasons why he blinds and exiles himself, both in and outside his control. He obviously has hubris, but hamartia isn't just limited to the character themselves. His fate decided at birth could also be his hamartia because it is the mistake that was made to cause his tragic flaw. To figure out what Oedipus' hamartia really is, lets take a look at another "hero" who has an unexpectedly similar flaw to Oedipus: Walter White from the TV show Breaking Bad . Walter is a character who, like Oedipus, had a "prophecy" that he would die due to lung cancer, and as a result, he starts making meth to provide for his struggling family. However, he gets caught up in all of the drugs, lies, a
Post a Comment
Read more

Who is Your Perfect Partner?

Image
After reading the New York Times article "Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person" by Alain de Botton, I learned a few things. Granted, most of the content in the opinion article was opiniated, but I still managed to glean the overall message of the writer. The article was about how our romanticized society changed how we decide who we're going to spend the rest of our life with, and more often than not, we will regret our decision later. The author says that pessimism is our only way to relieve ourselves of this bias we have towards choosing the "wrong person."  "Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person": https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/29/opinion/sunday/why-you-will-marry-the-wrong-person.html# He may have a point that I agree with here and there, but in my opinion the article's writer, funnily enough, views humans much too positively, especially for someone who advocates for pessimism. He expects humans to be able to control who they love and have the ju
Post a Comment
Read more

What would I fight for?

Image
What would I fight for? If I had the choice and the ability to fight for anything I wanted to, I would probably fight for the approximately 19.3 million people that get cancer every year, and the 10 million people who die from said cancer. For most people, testing positive for cancer will be the most discouraging part of their life. Knowing that your fate is already decided and your days are numbered because you tested a few months late will cause despondency, especially at younger ages. It is definitely unfair and purely based on luck, or genetics, and things that people can't control. I always wonder if those people believed they were destined to die before they could accomplish their goals. But if there is one thing I believe, it's that fate isn't predetermined, and if there's a will, there's a way. If I really want to improve society in my own way, then fixing the things which cause despair in people through scientific research and reasoning is what I would do.
Post a Comment
Read more