Black and White

Author's Note: This essay is written to show my understanding of text analysis. Make sure to pay attention to my introduction. 

‘“After you, my dear Alphonse,”  “No, after you, my dear Alphonse,”’ equal outlooks on race are obviously shown through the this text by the two little boys in the story “After you my dear Alphonse,” by Shirley Jackson. Showing that without a influence by a parent, teacher, or towns people children don’t notice the difference between black or white. How a child often shows more respect or gratitude than an adult of more than twice his age is shown very much in this piece. 

In the story "After You, My Dear Alphonse", Mrs. Wilson is a very judgmental person, she makes a lot of assumptions that are not true. Just saying these few words gave me an idea that she is an example of reverse racism; meaning she doesn't try to be racist but it comes out sounding that way. "Boyd, Johnny has some suits that are a little too small for him, and a winter coat." Mrs. Wilson wasn't trying to entail that but ended up sounding like that. 

In another line Mrs. Wilson was trying to force Boyd to eat stewed tomatoes because she thinks that he is so poor that he will eat anything that he can get. To me it sounds like she is trying to help him but yet she is saying it in a not so nice way. Reverse racism doesn't just happen in stories or novels, it happens here in Pewaukee, it happens in Waukesha, it happens everywhere in the world. 

There are many times in the story that Mrs. Wilson sounds rude. In this line: "And he certainly has to be strong to do that -- all that lifting and carrying at a factory." Mrs. Wilson is implying that Boyd's father is a poor man who has to work in a small factory and make very little money. It was only till Johnny said "Boyd's father doesn't have to, he's a foreman." that Mrs. Wilson thought she knew everything about Boyd and his family.  

The short story, "After You My Dear Alphonse," children seem to show more respect and make less assumptions than the adults do. There are many lessons that can be learned from this story. Overall I think that the main lesson here is to try to teach not only kids but also adults to not judge other people by what they look like. You always want to get to know someone before you give them a "name."

After You, My Dear Alphonse Analysis

5/1/13

Write an analysis of how this story relates to the topics of naive and reverse racism. How does it compare and contrast our society in Pewaukee? Other areas of the country/world? What lesson do you think Shirley Jackson is trying to teach us? 

In the story After You, My Dear Alphonse Mrs. Wilson is a very judgmental person, she makes a lot of assumptions that are not true. Just saying these few words gave me an idea that she is reverse racism. "Boyd, Johnny has some suits that are a little too small for him, and a winter coat," In another line Mrs. Wilson is trying to force Boyd to eat stewed tomatoes because she thinks that he is so poor that he will eat anything that he can get. This doesn't just happen in stories or novels, it happens here in Pewaukee, it happens in Waukesha, it happens everywhere in the world. 

There are many lessons that can be learned from this story. Overall I think that the main lesson here is to try to teach not only kids but also adults to not judge other people by what they look like. You always want to get to know someone before you give them a "name". 

A Clean, Well Lighted Place 2 paragraphs

When I pictured the cafe, I pictured it as a small little shop that was near other shops and it was gonna be really light and comforting. Then I watched the film and the cafe was dark, pretty big for a cafe and it didn't seem so comforting when the one of the waiters was yelling at the customer to leave and be done so that he could leave. In the beginning of the film they showed the cafe with a few lights on outside, it looked kind of like one of the little shops that you found driving in the middle of no where that sits on the side of the road. Also when starting the film the music the director choose was kind of creepy and depressing, that definitely made me think different things about the film. 

Overall I thought the short story had a good point to it, but personally I didn't really like the story. I thought the overall point was that you should have patience because there are people less fortunate than you, are lonely and who want someone to be with. I didn't like the story because I am really interested in mystery books, so I guess the story didn't really grab my attention. 

Two things that I liked about the movie, were the characters and the cafe. I liked the choice of the characters because I feel like it was interesting to have sottish characters. I liked the cafe because I think that it was a nice big area to film a movie.

Two things that I didn't like about the movie, was the setting and the lightning. I didn't like the setting because I feel like it was in the middle of no where. I did't like the lighting because I think that it was too dark for a movie to be shot. 

A Clean, Well-Lighted Place Comparing to something else

The impatient waiter from the short story reminds me a lot of my sister because my sister is a very impatient person. Just like the waiter she does not like waiting too long for other people, appointments or movies to start in the theaters. The impatient waiter also reminds me of violet from Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory. Violet is a little impatient girl who does not like waiting for things. She was told specifically not to eat the gum because Mr. Wonka hadn't fixed all the glitches yet. What does she do? She goes ahead and eats it. Like the waiter she is a very impatient person.



Willy Wonka part, credit to : Madison Moroder

Mean Girls

Author's Note: In this essay I am trying to show my understanding of text analysis and word choice/ context. Make sure to look for how I make real world connections.

Imagine mean girls tearing apart your decisions and actions every day, most people don't even have to imagine this because they live it every day of their lives. Girls can be rude and horrible to each other, this is true and it proves itself many times in reality and fiction. Just like in the book, The Clique, by Lisi Harrison. In the book, Massie and her friends are mean to the new girl Claire because she isn't like them, she’s not rich and she doesn’t care about her image as much as Massie and her clique do. This kind of judging and meanness happens everyday in real life, and in school. One of the most popular movies in America is Mean Girls, and you can tell by the name that this movie, similar to Clique, is about girls and their rudeness towards other girls. This movie is based off of making fun of girls behind their back and talking bad about them and putting this all into a book. In Mean Girls,  in The Clique and in life there is no way to avoid “mean girls”, they are all around.

The book, The Clique, is a good example of how mean girls can be. Girls say snotty things about other people behind their back. In this quote the four girls in their clique went to the principal to expose their ex-best friend for cheating during the uniform contest. The quote “ My mother came with us and made it very clear that if they went forward with your idea, she would expose the entire scandal on The Daily Grind,” (125) shows how mean the girls in the book can be. There are many more rude and unkind things that the girls say in the book that really hurt people.

Like in the book, The Clique, the girls in the movie mean girls are horribly cruel to each other. In the movie, Mean Girls, Regina George is one of the rudest girls at North Shore High School. She can be mean to your face or she can be mean behind your back. For example, she told this one girl that she liked her skirt and then turned to her friends and said that is the ugliest skirt I have ever seen. This proves that mean girls can hide their meanness from people, but show it to their friends.

Not only do you encounter and have to deal with mean girls like these in movies and books like The Clique and Mean Girls, but also in life. I have definitely had my share of mean girls in my life. They are rude, they are annoying and they think that everyone and everything should revolve around them. Girls like this are self-centered people who are mainly rich snobs. I’ve learned that in the society we have today you get out -casted for the simplest things, for example if you don't have long bouncy, vivacious, blonde hair, or if you don't wear makeup. Living in the society we live in you learn early in life that there will always be those mean girls who will try their very best to make yours and many other peoples lives as miserable as possible, but you have to realize that there will always be those girls and you can’t start believing what they say.

In conclusion I think that I can say that everyone has interacted with a mean girl at least once in their life, some people more than others. There is no way to avoid “mean girls”, they are all around: in books, in movies, in life, the only thing you can do is ignore them.

Short Response Post

This story is about a young boy named Bill got got kidnapped by these 2 guy and they decided to write a letter to his father to pay them money and the father wanted the kidnappers to pay him money for kidnapping his son. I think that the most interesting thing about the story was how the kid didn’t want to leave the kid. I think this because if I was in that kids position I would be freaking out and I would try to escape from the cave. I am not a person who likes being away from home for too long. 

The Song

Author's Note: In this essay make sure to look what I thought the tone was. 

Think if you were on the ocean, catching some waves, I bet you could feel the wind blowing in your face. When I read the poem "Song for a Surf-Rider," by Sara Van Alstyne Allen I felt that there was a lot of tone and figurative language within it. When you run through this poem and go back to how you felt when you were reading this you will be reminded of how vibrant the poem really was. 

There was different kinds of figurative language in this poem, one of the main kinds was personification; it helps give a clear image of what's going on. The author really wanted us to feel like the wave was a human. To show how she did this she referred to the wave saying him or he. Another example is when she said "We race together, the sea and I." When I read that personification I really felt like the wave was a human. 

One other kind of figurative language that was used in the poem was metaphors. The author really compared the waves and sea to a horse, "I ride the horse that is the sea." The quote, “His hoof beats echo on the sand,” shows how the author uses personification to make it seem like the sea is a horse. These two kinds of figurative language are used a lot through out the poem. 

Tone is how the writer feels and how they show their attitude toward something through their writing. Tone helps the reader understand how the author feels and possibly get the feeling of how the author is feeling themselves. Within this poem the author used tone. The tone of this poem I would have to say is friendship. Sara Van Alstyne Allen wrote this poem to show friendship, like how the sea and the person work together. Great writers use tone, they use it to make people feel emotion within writing. 

Tone and figurative language was shown a lot throughout this poem. Remember to always look for figurative language and tone in poems and short stories that you read. Look for how the tone really affects the piece and see how it makes you feel about that story. The tone can really change how you feel about the story.