Humanities Portfolio 2012
Diamond Blenman
Introduction
In my 10th grade English and History class we learned about many things that go on in the world. Many problems and many situation past and present. Both of out English and History classes interlaced with each other. Specifically in class we were taught different things about revolution and how they start. We also were taught about how money effects people’s status around in the world. Also we learned about Power in different ways. Clear examples of this were our Haiti unit with Jean Dominique , Papa and Baby Doc, and Jean Bertrand Aristide. That unit showed us a lot of what we’ve been learning about all year. What we have mostly been learning about is Power, money and how many situations in the world are solved that involve those things.
1st General understanding
One of the topics of study that stood out to me the most were talking about a world renowned author named “Edwidge Danticat”. She wrote a book called Create Dangerously that is a collection of essays. The essays were essays she wrote in the past and incorporated in her book. She talks mostly about her life in haiti and in the united states that involves lots of personal struggle. One thing that i noticed from reading this book is that When there is personal Struggle, successful people seek outside help to change their reality. In the first chapter of create dangerously she writes, “Create dangerously, for people who read dangerously. ... Writing, knowing in part that no matter how trivial your words may seem, someday, somewhere, someone may risk his or her life to read them.” When i first read this quote it had me thinking, and that’s exactly what our year had in it, topics that had our brains thinking wildly. I wrote about this quote in one of my journal entries. I said “how about you think deeper than face value, when it first says. “Create dangerously is for people who read dangerously” and before reading anything else in that quote to me it said that the book create dangerously is for people who are willing to risk something and be in danger to read that book, because that’s what it was about. Then later on in that unit the class wrote a letter to Ms. Danticat and in my letter i made an honest statement and said “I have told my grandpa about you and some essays in the book and he seems a little less interested. But then I told him to give reading it a try and he honestly fell in love with it. I barely have time to read it my self, it’s always in his hands.” Now looking back on it i was interested in the book a lot.
2ndGeneral understanding
In my English class we started off the year with an intro mini unit. We had to write a poem about just about anything. I first thought that it would be dumb and boring but when i did it it was wonderful. My feeling along with that tied in with the feeling of the class at first. I thought that everything would be dumb boring and pointless. Even the starting thing off in the class was interesting. That started me off with a new idea of what the class would be like. After that i knew everything would be interesting and a new approach to learning. In my poem i called it the prisoner of love. It was deep and i was new to things in the class. One thing that stands out to me now that i look back on the poem i wrote is a line that says “But love can be thrown out, To express your feeling And rampage can be due to anger, Anger that drives a whole in your heart, And kills love Then there is no show of that feeling, So now there is just hatred and sorrow, And since there is no love, You hold in that anger as if it’s a prisoner, Not just as an angry prisoner, But now A prisoner of love…”. That was how i ended the poem off and it is amazing to know i was capable of something like that in the beginning of the school year. I have learned a lot through the year which is in retrospect a short amount of time but i was capable to get it in and learn and try my best. I had my bad moments in class but in the end i learned a lot and i know it’s going to be helpful in the future, all thanks to my English/History teacher, Mr.Block.
Thesis Paper
Edwidge Danticat Letter
English B poem
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