Tree Pride

East of Eden.

2008-06-11T19:43:00.001-07:00

Adam, still devoted to his delusions, and Cathy, miserably attempts to lie about the gunshot wound. He tells the sheriff that he accidentally shot himself. However, given that most people aren’t as pathetically devoid of intelligence as he is, the sheriff sees right through his made up story. Given that Cathy was a prostitute, the sheriff and the deputy agree to not tell Adam about his wife/shooters prostitution profession. Apparently, there are three brothels in the area. Samuel, feeling bad, tells Adam to be strong. For the children. Cathy is found by the sheriff, but is allowed to run along as long as she doesn’t make contact with her kids.

What will Cathy do from here?

EAST Eden.

2008-06-11T18:45:00.001-07:00

Samuel and Adam become friendly. Despite Liza’s protests that the Trasks are lazy and representative of wealth, Samuel agrees to help renovate the Trask home. While working on the home, Cathy gives birth. Twins. She is angered at this, resulting in an outburst at which Samuel responds by telling her that he dislikes her. Lee also loathes Cathy. And, in this atmosphere of loathing…Cathy shoots Adam in the shoulder.

How has contempt been brewing throughout the book?

East. Eden. Of.

2008-06-11T18:22:00.000-07:00

Adam’s delusional life is perpetuated in California. He is comfortable. In the zeitgeist of the novel, he hires a Chinese-American, named Lee to serve as a housekeeper. And voila! You have another character with a desire for controlling other people. Lee tells Samuel that he likes having control over his master from the seemingly humble position of a servant. Lee pretends to be a foreigner, to throw off suspicion of him. The chunk ends with an awkward dinner with Adam, Cathy, and Samuel. Samuel leaves the dinner, having been largely ignored. Meanwhile, Cathy tells Adam that she didn’t want to come to California.

Why do you think characters with underlying desires for control are rampant in this book?

East. Of. E..d...e...n

2008-06-04T22:40:00.000-07:00

Hamilton time. The reading essentially focuses on Olive Hamilton, a daughter of Samuel. She was a woman for whom life on the farm was not a very acceptable notion. She instead became a teacher, married a mill owner, and was sure to stay away from her agrarian roots. However, she did retain the rugged, strict, and loving character of an agrarian woman.
Olive sold war bonds during World War One and received an opportunity to fly in an airplane. She ended up sick and bed ridden.
With only a couple pages into the next chapter, it goes back to Adam and Cathy.

Will Olive play any significant role in the book?

East OF E...den

2008-06-04T20:05:00.001-07:00

The Trask brothers' relationship is the archetypal sibling rivalry. Charles attacks Adam's tendency to criticize; while Adam insists that he must criticize Charles for working early in the morning. Adam, in return, goes on long international trips. And into this amalgam of argument and tension, comes Cathy. Long story short, Cathy is cared for, gets married to Adam, and sleeps with her fellow manipulator Charles.
Part TWO! It begins with a discussion on avarice, conflict, and the tendency of people to forget about past injustices and instead looking ahead. Adam and Cathy move to the Salinas Valley (finally...) where she is quick to stir something up and fails miserably in an attempted abortion. Charles drinks himself into impotence. Adam and Sam Hamilton meet and make plans for future dealings.

Will Cathy be able to make things go badly for Adam?

East Of Eden.

2008-06-03T21:43:00.001-07:00

The saga of Cathy Ames is recounted in this 25 page chunk. Growing up sexually promiscuous, with a tendency to provoke violence. Her Latin teacher: dead. Ever the rebellious young woman, she burns down her house, killing her parents, and runs away. Obviously this aggression outdoes anything that Charles could possibly muster in his younger Becoming involved with Mr. Edwards, she too manages to manipulate him. This manipulation however, ends up with Mr. Edward beating her (seems to be a pattern of beatings...) and leaving her alone. She ends up on the verge of entering the already chaotic lives of the Trasks?

Will Cathy Ames seduce any of the Trasks?

East O' Eden 51-75

2008-05-31T21:13:00.000-07:00

Adam is discharged from the military, and afterwards longs for his regiment. He ends up going back. His attachment to something that typically requires aggression is curious given his earlier beatings by Charles, which gave the impression that he was certainly deficient in much aggression.
The relation between Adam and Charles enters a new phase with the death of Cyrus. With the death came a large sum of money; a fortune that surprises them. It is worth noting that the impression by this point is that the hostility between Adam and Charles seems to have gone away.

Steinbeck decided to throw in another character. Cathy Ames. She is an odd character who uses her sexuality to get two boys in a barn severely beaten. Yup.

What could be expected from the introduction of Cathy into the story?

East O' Eden. 26-50

2008-05-26T20:19:00.000-07:00

Sibling rivalry makes up part of the second block of reading. Cyrus tells Adam that he loves him more than Charles. Charles becomes jealous. This jealousy is not at all eased by the birthday of Cyrus, where Adam's gift far exceeds that of Charles. Thus comes yet another beating of Adam by Charles. Further down the reading, Adam ends up entering the army, and Charles, partly out of punishment for his beating of Adam, works at the farm.

What could the scar on Charles' face mean for his future?

East of Eden

2008-05-23T09:34:00.001-07:00

Beginning with a vivid description of the Salinas Valley, John Steinbecks East of Eden goes from the intricacies of the landscape, to the nature of families. Readers are introduced to Adam Trask. Adams father, Cyrus, a stern man and Civil War veteran, is contrasted with his wife, a devout woman who commits suicide. Adam's tumultuous life is further shown with his relations to his brother, Charles, who physically lashes out at him for beating him in a game. Another family, the Hamilton's are introduced; they are Irish immigrants. The wife, Liza, is a humble woman, and the husband, Samuel, is a hard-working fellow who has difficulty making ends meet.

How do the families compare/contrast with the surrounding landscape?

The Road Not Taken

2008-05-06T21:53:00.000-07:00

Robert Frost's poem "The Road Not Taken" is an affirmation of the value of personal choice, and the reflection upon one's choice regarding one's life. Using the metaphor of two roads diverging, Frost expands the notion of choice upon the greater concept of life. In this representation, there are two roads: one being the more comfortable and attractive one, and the other the more rugged though possibly more beneficial path to take. The absolutism of making a choice of direction, that there is no turning back, pervades the poem. I liked it. Not verbose, not excessively emotional. Simple.

Question: Which road do you prefer?

Mythology.

2008-05-04T08:31:00.000-07:00

Edith Hamilton's Mythology is a collection of the broad spectrum of ancient Greek, Roman and Norse mythological tales. Ranging from ancient creation stories to the Trojan war and beyond, the work is marked by varying themes depending on the tale at hand. The capriciousnesses of the god's was demonstrated throughout the collection; Zeus carelessly threw thunder bolts towards earth; Saturn ate his children. Conflict and overcoming obstacles was demonstrated in the stories of Hercules, the Trojan war, and just about all the tales regarding Hades. There was a tale regarding the lust for wealth: Midas turned everything gold. The collection of mythologies is simply full of themes.
I detest the reading of mythology, simple on the grounds that it is mythology and therefore irrelevant to anything. Sure, one can find "meaning" and moral lessons, but still, it's mythology. However, in my schizophrenic manner, I also find the work useful, since I can now use analogies to mythology.

What stories had the greatest relevance to you, as a person? (answer in vivid detail, and include a quote from an 80's television show or song lyric)

Freakonomics. Chunhgck Trees.

2008-03-12T20:02:00.000-07:00

Levitt and Dubner turn their final sight's on the touchy areas of parenting and naming. The nature versus nurture argument is analyzed with a clear conclusion: Head Start programs dont work, special programs dont work, limited video game/TV activity does nothing...Essentially, nature is what wins out. Special parental attention plays a much smaller role than is popularly accepted. All data available show that heredity is a more influential factor than the aforementioned programs and parenting strategies. In the final chapter, Would a Roshanda by Any Other Name Smell as Sweet?, the two seek to answer the dilemma of whether or not a persons name will affect their future. Using the example of "Winner" and "Loser", they conclude that (on the basis that Loser was successful, while Winner was not) the name of a person does not play a role in ones success. However, they do make the conclusion that names are an indication of a persons ethnic, and financial background. In closing the book, Dubner and Levitt make one last stab at the parenting issue; they point to a wealthy white child, and a poor black child, both of whom went to Harvard. The poor black child went on to become an eminent economist, and the wealthy white child was Ted Kaczynski

Tone: Straight forward, blunt, scholarly

Rhetorical strategies:
Appeal to logic: statistical data on names divided by racial and socio-economic conditions.
Antithesis: Kaczynski versus economist...

Question;
Why would nature trump nurture?
Why am I unable to remember the name of the "economist"?

Freakonomics. Part Too.

2008-03-05T19:07:00.000-08:00

Dubner and Levitt turn their unorthodox sights on drug dealing and crime. Using the statistical findings and records of Sudhir Venkatesh, Levitt reasons that drug dealing is similar to any business, and thus, hierarchical. Due to the hierarchy of gangs who peddle drugs, the demonized drug dealers are actually making very little money--the perks of drug dealing apparently involve a high chance of injury or death, and less than minimum wage earnings. Thus, the answer to the age old question "why do drug dealers live with their moms?" is relatively simple: they make less than the standard of a poor life--burger flippers. Levitt and Dubner make their more controversial claim in respect to crime and abortion. Using the example of Romania under Communism, they point to the increase in crime 16 years following an abortion ban as evidence that the prevention of abortion leads to higher crime. The flip side, that abortion eventually reduces crime, is demonstrated using statistical data in the United States. While "experts" laud the more mainstream reasons for lower crime rates (more prisons, more police, stricter laws), Levitt and Dubner one by one refute their infallible appearances.

Tone: straight-forward

Rhetorical:
1) Logical appeal. See: every page.
2) Statistics: used in discussion of drug trade, crime, and abortion.

Questions.....?
Why does conventional wisdom falter under such simple analysis?

Freakonomics. Chunk. Uno.

2008-02-20T20:35:00.000-08:00

Freakonomics, a collaborative product of economist Steven Levitt and writer Stephen Dubner, applies economic principles in analyzing a broad scope of dilemma's (often with controversial conclusions). The work begins with a general summation of what lies ahead in the book-grabbing the readers attention with a correlation of high abortion rates with lower crime rates. The authors then delve into their primary assumptions when analyzing a situation: that economics is the study of incentives, and that economics is a representation of reality regardless of conventional morality and thinking. Chapter one is made up of (primarily) two studies in cheating: sumo wrestlers and teachers.Based on empirical data, the authors conclude that both groups are willing to (and do) cheat to make themselves better off--in the case of the teacher, standardized test fraud is the means towards a higher pay, while competition fixing is a tool of the "honorable" sumo wrestlers. Chapter two surrounds the manipulation of information in the KKK, real-estate dealers, and online dating The Klan kept its organization through the control of who knew what, real estate dealers controlled description and price information to maximize profit, and online daters inflated their attributes to seem more attractive.

Tone: Scholarly

Rhetorical whatnot:
Allusion:"Remember Terry Malloy, the tormented former boxer played by Marlon Brando in On the Waterfront? As Malloy saw it, all his troubles stemmed from the one fight in which he took a dive. Otherwise, he could have had class; he could have been a contender."
Assault on logos: Charts on lynching, homicides, sumo statistics, etc.

Application: How can Freakonomics be applied to everyday occurrences?

Huckabee highlights pro-life hypocrisy

2008-01-06T07:48:00.000-08:00

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/web/la-oew-slosar4jan04,1,7481717.story?ctrack=2&cset=true

Elliot Slosar's Los Angeles Times Editorial "Huckabee highlights pro-life hypocrisy" critiques the "pro-life" stance of Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, whose stance is complemented with a staunchly pro-death penalty position. Huckabee often speaks of the intrinsic worth of all human beings and their god-endowed right to life. However, his Presidential plank includes a strong support for the death penalty, under the banner of justice. Herein is the contradiction, and hypocrisy, of the pro-life stance of Mike Huckabee. Slosar writes of the hypocrisy of on one hand speaking of the inherent worth of human life, and on the other, justifying the killing of human beings on the grounds that their life is no longer as valuable.

Tone: critical

Application question: Is it truly hypocritical to be "pro-life" and for the death penalty?

Reflection on Guatemala....

2008-01-04T17:35:00.000-08:00

Rustic buildings stoically face down the pompous glares of the privileged. They stand and serve their purpose in defiance of the rusty screws, the dilapidated components, and the awe that human beings can reside inside of them. The buildings fundamental indifference to all stands in direct contrast to the emotions they evoke in the "superior beings" upon the planet.
The people are a whole other story. The repression and exploitation etched into every wrinkle of indigenous women selling their cloths scream to the deepest chasms of the soul of the privileged. The sweat and dirt on the flesh of children of poverty reflect struggles that the privileged will never know.
Rustic buildings, sweat, dirt, wrinkles--things not considered "beautiful" in the arbiter of all that is aesthetically worthwhile, the American media, certainly do reveal beauties we have all forgotten about; beyond our privilege, we have solidarity with those without; beyond the superficial feigns of concern, there are feelings of deep sympathy; beyond the distance of our nations, we are all human; and those, are beautiful.

About tolerance, 2007

2007-12-25T15:02:00.000-08:00

Author: NO name Given!
Where:http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-ed-tolerance25dec25,0,4199048.story?coll=la-opinion-leftrail

The Los Angeles Times editorial "About Tolerance, 2007" reflects upon a year full of religious and ethnic strife, while looking forward to the looming new year and the opportunities for progress and unity following a sustained global period of violence. The political squabble in the United States demonstrates that religion has become a political tool for undermining opponents--with Mike Huckabee's smearing of Mitt Romney's Mormonism serving as an example. Abroad, 2007 was a year of violence and suppression. In Iraq, the ethnic and religious divisions continue to ravage the country. In China, the Communist government has continued its assault on Tibetan Buddhism. Further, the cohesion of human rights and religion have also reached a crossroads--in Saudi Arabia, a girl who was raped and condemned by the courts to hundreds of lashes, and in Sudan, an English woman's death was called for when her students named a stuffed animal "Muhammad"--such examples show the increasingly uneasy relationship between Western standards of rights, and religiously influences reality. In the midst of such a destructive year, however, the writer sees optimism and hope for a better year...

Tone: Serious...

Application: How does religion influence you, personally?

"The walls around Bush's Iraq strategy"

2007-12-20T11:28:00.000-08:00

Rosa Brooks' Los Angeles Times Opinion article "The walls around Bush's Iraq strategy" (http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-brooks20dec20,0,4654247.column?coll=la-opinion-rightrail)
raises the issue of the Iraq's occupiers latest (and more successful) strategy for containing violence: building walls to divide communities in Baghdad. While keeping apart rival ethnic and religious groups, thus contributing to the decline in violence, the walls also serve to create "prisons" across Baghdad. Further, the walls segregate Iraqis from each other, thus aggravating the already prominent problem of warlords and sectarian strife in a nation already struggling to have a central government.Brooks concludes that, while the wall-building strategy successfully reduces violence, it may also contribute to am Iraq with indefinite US troop presence and a literally walled Iraq, which is clearly a sign of US failure in Iraq.

Tone: Critical.

Application: How is the literal walling of Iraq symbolic of US foreign policy?

Yah

2007-12-13T22:38:00.003-08:00

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