Putting on a show for others

One of the questions we were left with at the end of class on Tuesday was one that has always struck me. Is everything you do a type of performance?

To me, I would have to say 80% of the time, yes and 20% no. Usually for class, I try to most importantly perform to the best of my ability for the teacher and then because I want my classmates also to think I am somewhat intelligent. Like someone else mentioned in class, our papers for our teachers are performances in a way, too. How we dress and present ourselves in class is another type of thing we do that shows that everything is a performance. If a student is attentive and shows respect towards others and the teacher, she will portray a much better image than one that is sleeping and shows no class participation.

Out of the classroom and in social environments, I would agree that that is its own performance as well. If your just sitting in a corner all alone and not socializing it does not give off the same type of vibe as if you were up and about talking amongst others.

With parents or siblings, there is always competition. Brothers and sisters, or sisters and sisters or brothers and brothers are always wanting to do better than the other. There is most of the time a want from children to perform to their best of their abilities to impress their parents. Sometimes this is not the case, but also if the child is lazy or just unmotivated that would be a type of performance as well. They are showing their parents they do not care about the particular thing.

So when asked the question is everything you do type of performance, I would have to agree. Do any of you ever have to compete or put on a performance for your parents? or teachers? or siblings?

This Blessed House

I thought this story was really interesting. I thought the actual read was good, but I couldn't understand some of the personalities of the characters. The thing that I thought was the most important was the vinegar. I thought although it was found in the pantry at first, I feel like it was an important metaphor. I feel that it was not only put there for the cooking aspect, but I feel like something in the couples live might have been missing and the vinegar symbolizes it a little bit. I'm anxious to go to class because I want to get some of my questions cleared up about the story, which might help me analyze this metaphor, but I do not think the vinegar was just there as a cooking ingredient. Does anyone agree or disagree with this statement?? I'm not too sure if this was right, but I took a guess.

Sports and Othello

After watching the movie "O", we discussed the how the producers chose the sport of basketball instead of any other sport. I was really intrigued with this discussion because I really love sports. I thought that one other sport that could have been played throughout this movie that would have brought out all of the same qualities would be football. With football, you have somewhat of the racism aspect but also some of the aspects with the "star player."

Even though I was very involved as a child and teenager in sports, I never really stood back and looked around to see what was happening besides the actual sport being played. Sometimes, the "star player" gets all the glory, while the person with the assist does more work than the them. But no one on the team realizes that expect the person that assisted the "star player".

Throughout my childhood and teenage years I played golf. Golf to most people is an individual sport, but in highschool it turns to a team sport. The top four scores are always counted and then compared with another teams to see who won. Although this was basketball like in the movie, "O", I still tried to compare golf with it. I compared it a little because sometimes our high school team had one star player, who always got the lowest score. The coach would always praise her for all her hardwork, even though everyone else put in the honest effort just like she did. And all of our scores also counted towards our Regional Championship Title. In some ways, other girls on the team felt left out, while the girl who got all the media press and praise never felt that way, at least to the outside world.

Has anyone ever been involved in a sport other than basketball or football that they tried to relate this movie to it? I know it was kind of difficult to, and maybe I didn't do it the right way, but I tried.

Othello

In the clip we watched in class, I began to notice many different things about the movie and how the producer wanted each particular character to be portrayed. I started looking at the camera angle and lighting, the background music, the costumes and the makeups on the characters, and even the color pallet. I never really began to notice these things until they were pointed out to me. In the Othello movie of 1995, I noticed through the camera angle that it focused mainly on the characters faces, and got very close. The color pallet was much different then most movies now; red, white and black.

In movies now, I think I will try to look at all of these factors while watching the movie because it gives the movie/play more meaning then what it originally has for its audience. If everyone watched movies in this particular fashion, people would see movies much more differently.

Displacement

Displacement has many different definitions. In class, we identified displacement as: geographical location/place, value systems, family ties, companions, style, possessions, class, religion, education, nationality, sexuality, language and even accents. The most controversial identifications of displacement is race.

Race is socially constructed. Usually when most people talk about race, they are talking about either black and white, Hispanic or American etc. Race does not allow for mixture, but in a sense creates a community. Race can be a good thing but also a bad thing.

In Othello race seems to be a big issue. Shakespeare always is hinting at the color or Othello. It is strange to think that back then people were talking about it and now people are still talking about it. There are many people in our world today that do not take race into account, but there are some people that are still stuck in their ways. I think race will always be an issue in our world, but I do not think it should effect the types of things we all do. Just because some people are a different race then ourselves does not mean that we should treat anyone differently, although some people still do. Have you ever been involved in a type of racial issue as either a minority or majority?

Girl Inturrupted

While I was on my way to watch the film, Girl Interrupted, I wasn't sure what to expect. Many of my friends told me it was a good movie, but that's all they really mentioned. A classmate of mine told me a little of what was to come in the movie, but I really didn't know what to expect.

After viewing the movie, I came out of the Vander Vennett Theater sad and uptight. Many of the characters seemed to have gone through the same thing that Gilman went through when she was writing. Angelina Jolie's character scared me at first, but throughout the movie more of her true self came out. To me, her character stuck out the most as being trapped in "a room." She was trapped in her body, which was full of evil. The one quote that stuck to me the most was when Winona Ryder told Angelina that she had no heart and that she really was not alive. After their close friend committed suicide, Angelina had no feelings and only cared about taking her money. I feel that Angelina needed Winona to tell her that so she could truly get better. That point in the movie seemed like the turning point for both of them.

This movie made me really upset because I know that there are people out in our world suffering like these young women did, but they can't do anything about it. To "normal" people, these women in the mental institute seemed "crazy." But did anyone ever care to ask these women what their true problems were? Did they even give them the time of day? No. Many people who are associated with mental hospitals are always labeled as crazy.

Usually people sit back , judge other people and assume things they think in their mind they think are right, when in reality, they are clearly wrong. All these women really needed was someone to be their friend and love them.

The Yellow Wallpaper

While reading and analyzing The Yellow Wallpaper for the second time, I've realized a few things. During the time that this was written, a lot of industrialization and technology advancements were being made. Women during this time were not treated with the same respect men were treated with. But during the story as well, women were discouraged from writing.

I felt sorry for Gilman in this story because her husband was always shushing her and never really letting her do what she wanted. I feel as though sometimes women and even men these days are shushed for their true feelings and beliefs.

Sometimes I get nervous to tell the people I care for the most, what I am truly passionate about and what I really think about a certain subject. I'm usually scared that I will make them either mad or frustrated. I have been trying to tell people how I truly feel about certain things. Its getting a little better, but I am still nervous.

I feel as though in The Yellow Wallpaper, Gilman had the same type of problem. I think this type of problem has always existed and will always exist. Some people have certain ways of dealing with their kept secrets and opinions such as diaries and blogs, and others just keep to themselves.

Does anyone have issues or problems trying to tell the people they care about what they really think? Or are Gilman and I the only ones?