journey through junior year

In the quote we were given by Jim Powell in his book Postmodernism for Beginners, it says "... any art attempting to represent the Holocaust should continue to haunt us with its inability to represent the unrepresentable." This means that since the Holocaust was so extreme and inhumane, no form of writing or art will be able to accurately represent it in its entirety. Simplifying a huge event to just words on a paper causes it to lose meaning. Although I agree with this, I still think it's necessary to write about history because it's the only form of documentation we have. This got me thinking- what would happen if we couldn't rely on written history to look back on past events? If we somehow lost all memory and knowledge on history, would we repeat it because we are unaware of the consequences? Humans have truly come a long way in a relatively short period of time. Take the Holocaust, for example, this genocide in WWII happened only 80 years ago. For some reaso...

"That is real freedom." In this quote from This is Water ,   I believe that Wallace is referencing one's mental freedom. Throughout his speech, one main message is fighting your brain's "natural, hard-wired, default setting". When you aren't making a conscious effort to think about your thoughts, you'll go into an automatic state of mind where it's nearly impossible to control your thoughts. Other than mental freedom , this idea reminds me of your mental strength.   One of the most important lessons I've learned throughout my sixteen years is that the most limiting factor in life is truly your mind. I first realized this when playing sports. I've done gymnastics and dance and color guard and synchronized swimming and throughout all of these, I found out that no, it wasn't my physical abilities that were holding me back from performing at my greatest potential, it was always my mental ability. My coaches always told me that every ...

lying (v.) : saying things that aren't completely true but should only be said for a positive purpose Ever since the third grade, I’ve always disliked history class. From memorizing the difference between all the crusades to learning when Rome was built, it all just seemed beyond pointless to me. Just last year I only saw history class as a place to test your memorization and to fill your brain with useless dates and dead people, but after this week of English class, I’ve realized that it’s so much more. In the poem, The History Teacher b y Billy Collins, the teacher’s attempt at oversimplifying history in order to protect his students’ innocence, proves to only backfire and hurts them more in the end. He makes up stories like that "the Ice Age was really just the Chilly Age, a period of a million years when everyone had to wear sweaters." Instead of keeping the children blissfully ignorant, failing to educate them on the real meaning behind historic events just le...

july fourth (n.) : a day spent with friends, filled with s'mores, barbecue, music, and all around happiness. Throughout his speech "The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro" , Frederick Douglass describes how differently slaves and white citizens experience this day. On complete opposite ends of the spectrum, white citizens see this holiday as a time for celebration, while slaves don't even view it as a holiday. Instead, it's just another day that reminds slaves of the "immeasurable distance" between them. Douglass wrote, "This Fourth July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn." This quote truly represents the different meanings the day holds for each individual. While the Fourth of July came to be to celebrate the freedom of the United States as a whole, ironically, the country was still filled with people with zero freedom at this time.  Nowadays, people seemed to have forgotten the original meaning behind Independence Day. ...