Progress?

Progress? i have made no progress.

Ethanol fuels.

thought about it o' bit

wrote a bit of US History homework

will procrastinate till the weekend


maybe.


that's my progress

..... I'd better not get an F for this post....

Ethanol Fuels

I think i will write mine on ethanol fuel, and whether or not it is an issue to keep using gasoline versus trying to find alternative fuels. I am choosing this because it is a real and solveable issue, albeit difficult and disputed. I also find it interesting, and personally believe that gasoline does have effects on the environment that need to be remedied, and the development of alternative fuels is a very interesting proposal and topic for me to research. Writing a paper about it will help me to understand it and possibly ultimately put it into practice.

Health Care

The essay about the health care system is, in my opinion, very persuasive. It begins with a personal example of a man who injured his back, but has no insurance coverage to heal it. This is a good appeal to pathos. This is a good way of opening the essay, although it isnt nessecarily 100% clear what the essay is about at first- but that is quickly explained. The essay then goes to explain why we have a health care problem and what is causing it. There is a shift to the second person, which bothered me at first (because I don't like to read first or second person in formal writing unless nessecary), but then i realized that he was using a very powerful persuasive tool- making a connection with the reader. However, I believe the most effective part of the essay was his suggestion of how to improve the health care system. Because of this, the reader is not left at a dead end, but instead left with ideas and a motivation for change.

in all, i believe this essay is very powerful, and also interesting.

C.P. Ellis

I believe C.P. Ellis's reasoning for overcoming his prejudice was valid, but i don't know if it is possible in every case. I am a believer in that prejudice springs from fear of the unknown, and usually nothing else can really cause such a hatred for no good reason. Groups like the KKK, in the time period that C.P. Ellis was in it, could be very persuasive, and often times, these groups will make it seem like they very personally want to get to know you and appreciate the joining of a new member, as C.P. Ellis describes. He talks about how it felt like an out for him, and how he needed something to blame and through them he found it. This is how many hate groups function. I don't believe that his way of overcoming it is nessecarily always effective, but it is really the only way that it can happen. The only way to overcome a fear of the unknown is to get to know the unknown, and that is exactly what he does. As soon as he realized that the people that he had directed hate at were just people like everyone else, he realized the danger of such hate groups. However, this can't be possible on a large scale, because it is impossible for everyone to be brought up in accepting families. Many families shelter their children from people whom they deem "unworthy" or even "dangerous", and the child grows up witht these notions. The child will not overcome the notions unless an intercepting force steps in, such as one of the very people that the child is taught to hate. If the hatred is not intercepted, the child will grow up, raise their own children, and the cycle will go on.

mainstream

When he claims that the mainstream is a myth, he is talking about how difficult it is to actually MAKE a mainstream. The mainstream is also difficult to define, which is one reason why it is a myth. There are many different "mainstream's" per se, because there are many different people. This is probably the biggest reason it is a myth- because there is nothing that the myth itself can be based off of.
Seeing as he didn't explain his reasoning for very long about the myth topic, I can't say that he backed up his reasoning very well, and he didn't really provide his definition of what mainstream is (seeing as there ISN'T really a mainstream), I can't say that was extremely persuasive.
As I said before, I can't really define mainstream. I guess it would be the fashion and celebrity bombs that hit the TV and magazines.

Linda

Linda finally manages to go to New York- she has a very small window of opportunity; in fact, it happens sort of as an accident, because she wasn't going to go at first, but then her grandmother thought that Jenny might have caught sight of her, so she tells her to leave. Linda is in Philadelphia for a while and finally in New York- I wasn't completely clear on exactly what happened- she worked for a couple with a baby for a while, lived as someone who was free, and then finally, officially bought her freedom.

I don't understand the questions about mixed emotions- I don't feel like she does have mixed emotions- she seemed pretty sure of her decision. Even when Dr. Flint died, she was no softer toward him. The only thing I can get out of that is that she didn't like the idea of actually purchasing her freedom, or her freedom being purchased period- because it was still the idea about being a piece of property. She wasnt too happy about where her daughter was living, but in the very end they ended up being able to live togther- so, I guess I don't really understand where her mixed emotions would be coming from.

Incidents credibility

It is incredibly hard to pick a passage to blog about, seeing as the entire book is essentially a document of her honesty. However, the passage about her son getting bitten by the dog was particularly resonant with me. She didn't really have a reason to put it in there, other than the fact that it was a very strong memory, because of the effect it had on her child. She wasnt even involved in the event- she was hiding, and she expressed how much she was longing to go to her child. I am obviously not a mother, so i don't really know what this would be like, but I can imagine how horrible it would be to see your child injured in such a way and not to be able to go to him. It, in a way, depicted the sufferings of all the slaves, and how they can't help each other- I guess i am trying to make it into a symbol that it obviously wasn't meant to be, but the fact that she had such raw emotion in the scene adds to its credibility, and evokes sympathy for the slaves- therefore acheiving her goal of rallying the abolitionists.

Incidents

I think that it is extremely important that this book is nonfiction. In fact, that is what makes the book what it is- people can dream up all sorts of horrible things to write about, but in the end, it is still something that someone dreamed up. As I read Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, There are parts of the book that are so shocking or so angering that they make me want to put the book down and walk away. There are parts that, if it were a fictional book, I could say "oh, well this wasnt real; it couldn't really happen" but in the case of this book, I find myself constantly having to remind myself that it was true, because it doesn't seem like it could possibly be- but it is. That is what makes it so incredibly effective. Same with in terms of language- The fact that the language isn't cleaned up makes it extremely raw. Although the author is a very good writer, and the words she uses are not 5 cent words, it is still very obviously straight out of her head and her experiences; her telling the truth exactly how she remembers it.