Adieu, adieu!

"Shutup I'm Reading" by smilelonger

Before this class, I wasn't able to "talk back" to my reading or to think critically about it because I didn't know I was supposed to. I thought that I was supposed to read something, remember key facts, and then take a quiz on it. Before, I didn't know that texts had underlying themes that I could relate to my real life. I thought that the more thy, thee, and thine put into a work meant that I would never be able to understand let alone apply it. But now, I can question the book and think about what the author is really trying to say. I am so happy that I can now read a book, figure out its underlying themes and ideas, and relate it in some way to today's society or how the author envisions society in the future if it doesn't fix itself now.


Of the books that we read, I think that my favorite was Feed because I found it to be grossly interesting in the way that M.T. Anderson envisioned our future society. It makes me wonder if, in the future, people will be so disconnected from real communication, from the environment, from each other...and if all they will care about is staying on top of the latest fads. It seems as though we might already headed in that direction, according to Thoreau, Emerson, and Kalle Lasn...While I've always been an outdoorsy-type person, the value I place on the environment has been heightened thanks to these authors touching on topics to make us realize how much we need to enjoy and preserve it much better than we have been.

(I hope you all watch this because it's hilariously ridiculous!)

Of everything that we encountered this semester, two things really hit me hard: the realization that people care more about themselves than anything else, and the lack of open-mindedness many people seem to enjoy. When watching about the preacher in Florida and the most hated family in America (MHFA), I wondered "HOW can those people justify what they are doing? There is no logical explanation for lumping people together and treating them like shit." I don't understand how the MHFA could protest at military funerals on the basis that they hate homosexuals and that somehow, apparently everyone in the military is homosexual. And the preacher!? "Oh, sure, come to America and practice your religion, but I'm still going to burn your Koran because you're a bunch of fucking sons-a-bitches compared to my perfect Christian ass." Yeah, OK buddy. -___-

Lastly, I want to thank Shannon for making this literature class the most entertaining, engaging, and applicable literature class I have EVER taken!I remember at the beginning of the year her asking us why we should take gen eds. This class is the reason we should take them--even in literature we can find themes that relate to our everyday lives, TV shows, and music. It's wonderful being able to watch or read something, and be able to "talk back" to it instead of sitting there being a non-thinking consumer.

So, goodbye everyone! Thank you all for making this class wonderful. Remember to make the most of your life, question everything, and push every one of your limits. ♥

Censorship and Books

"Where they have burned books, 

they will end in burning human beings" 

Heinrich Heine

A world without books would be quite dismal and boring...Libraries and bookstores would be non-existent. The shelves in my dorm and at home would be filled with meaningless trinkets, not intriguing books. The creativity and imagination of the world would be gone. The fantasy worlds only found in books would be lost, and generations growing up in such a world would be stone cold. I would personally miss books, even the textbooks used in classrooms. There is so much knowledge out there that a single person would never be able to obtain it all and teach others within their lifetime. Books offer a place of escape--when having a bad day, I can read a book, get lost in it, and never remember why I was upset in the first place. Books let my imagination run rampant trying to picture the scenery, characters, and actions within their pages.

We metaphorically burn books when we choose to watch TV show or movie based on a book rather than reading the book. We justify ourselves by saying, "Oh, well it's so much quicker and more fun to watch the movie than read the book." Yes, it's quicker to watch a movie of a 1,000 page book. But more fun? Eh, not so much. Watching only the movie restricts our imagination to visualizing the characters as they are portrayed. It's nice to have a "tangible" representation of the world we have in books, but there is so much limitation when shoving a single large book, or long book series into a 1.5 hour movie. Important facts or characters, interesting scenes, or controversial themes may be cut out of the movie just to make it "appropriate" and fill the time constraint. I remember reading the Guardians of Ga'Hoole book series in middle school for fun, and absolutely LOVED it. Recently, though, it was made into a very disappointing movie because important scenes were cut out or changed, especially when it came to the battle scenes--the book was gruesome in explaining them, but there were no feathers or blood flying around in the movie.

Books--by themselves, without words are ideas--are harmless. The words and ideas found hidden or apparent within the pages of the book are what most dangerous. Ideas in books have the power to change lives, start wars, influence morals. Kill the book, kill the man who wrote the book, but its ideas will live on. Ideas cannot be destroyed by a simple flame.

"...but he who destroys a good book, 

kills reason itself, kills the image of God..."

Hunger Games

"The Hunger Games" by Rikku017 on deviantArt

I think that this was a great book, even though it wouldn't have been something I would've picked up myself because I don't like books that revolve around last-man-standing themes, so I'm glad I had to read it! I thought it was disgusting that the government put its people in such horrible circumstances because I believe that the government should take care of the people (which would probably reduce the chances of them revolting in the first place). In light of what we've been discussing in class, it was amazing to me how Collins weaved in so many "problems" of today's society and other authors' ideas into the book, particularly with the idea of "big brother" and reality TV.

Both 1984 and The Hunger Games had ideas revolving around the government needing to control and reinforce its control over the people. In 1984, the people were being controlled by Big Brother via telescreens. The Capitol showed its control over the Districts by having these games, which proved that the Capitol could force them to do even the vilest of evils, thus reinforcing that power.

I think that the idea of reality TV is pretty prevalent in this book, as we had talked about in class. The people would view the games, regardless of how gruesome it was, and even insisted on more creative ways of death just to keep them interested! It reminds me of the "jolting" that Lasn talked about in Culture Jam--the people got used to a certain number of jolts, and would easily tire of it. To keep ratings up, the companies had to add more jolts. Thinking about that, the gamemakers had to make more jolts by adding drama and controlling how they could or could not die (like not allowing people to freeze to death because that's a "boring" way to die). In real life, we watch reality TV--the more scuzzy the TV, the more interesting and more happy viewers there seem to be.

Throughout the book, I was more interested in the love (or lack of) between Peeta and Katniss than anything else. I thought it was pretty shitty that Katniss had to pretend that she loved Peeta just to increase her chance of survival. When Peeta ultimately learned of this, he was heartbroken (since I guess he didn't realize it was a ploy?), and I definitely feel bad for that! I'm sure that killed him a little on the inside...But I'm interested in reading the rest of the books in the series to see if anything happens between Peeta, Katniss, and Gale.

The Hunger Games reminds me of Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. If you haven't seen it, the basic idea is the Scott Pilgrim has to defeat Ramona Flowers' 7 evil exes before he can actually date her.

JUST FOR FUN! I just watched this episode of Futurama the other day, and found it hilariously applicable to what we've talked about in previous classes about the mentality of today's consumers. This is just a clip, but hopefully you get the feel of what it's aiming at!