They Actually Had Netflix in 11th Century Scotland

So, what does Lady Macbeth watch?

NUMBER ONE: Heathers

Heathers is a story of a teenager Veronica who is trying to survive the struggles of high school. She becomes "friends" with the three most popular girls in school known as the "heathers." Veronica then meets a sociopath named JD who spins her life into a cycle of hate, unintentional murder and indifference, and revenge against her enemies, other wise known as her best friends. 

Basically, this is a story of a girl who wants revenge against her evil best friends, so she can be the most popular girl in school. Initially, her and JD are all about revenge and getting power, but later Heather realizes that JD is cray cray and wants to stop killing people. In the end, JD's crazy catches up with him and he gets himself killed.

So power hungry couple who ends up killing a lot of people, girl comes to her senses, guy still crazy and power hungry, guy kills more people, guy dies. Let's be honest, Lady Macbeth can totally relate to this, it's almost exactly what happened to her (minus the witches and suicide).

NUMBER TWO: Scandal 

Scandal is a show about a team of D.C. "fixers" who make scandals disappear. The show centers around Olivia Pope, a former white house employee who has left her post and started her own business "Olivia Pope and Associates." Olivia is considered a very influential person in Washington with even the President of The United States valuing her advice and opinions. While Olivia is never exactly in the spot light, she is pulling all the strings. 

Lady Macbeth can for sure relate to this. First off, she is also an extremely influential person in Macbeth. She calls most of the shots in her relationship with Macbeth and can manipulate him to do whatever she wants. This is essentially what Olivia Pope does with the President. This reveals how Lady Macbeth is driven by her power hungry nature, at least at the beginning of the play.

NUMBER THREE: Gossip Girl

Gossip Girl is a show about the upper east side of New York and a blogger who blogs about all the secrets within it. 

Lady Macbeth Specifically relates to the character Blair Waldorf, the queen bee of the upper east side. The only thing you need to know about Blair is that what Blair wants, Blair gets. God save the soul that dares to cross her. Blair surrounds herself with loyal followers and manipulates anyone to get exactly what she wants.

If Lady Macbeth was an upper east sider, she'd be Blair Waldorf. They are both manipulative and are willing to do whatever it takes to get what they want. 

NUMBER FOUR: The Wolf of Wall Street

The Wolf of Wall Street is based off of stockbroker Jordan Belfort, whose giddy career ended in federal prison. Essentially, it is a story off a power corrupted individual who screws over a lot of people in his path, including both of the women he is involved with.

This relates to Lady Macbeth, who gets screwed by Macbeth when he gets corrupted by power, like what happens to both of Jordan Belfort's wives. This reveals the later part of Lady Macbeth's character, when all the guilt gets to her and she eventually takes her own life.

Darn Those Witches

In my life, I think everything does happen for a reason. I might not think that moment to moment, but when I look at the bigger picture it makes the most sense to me. Bad things happen to teach me lessons, and good things happen because of lessons learned; that's the way I see it. My choices may play some part in what happens, but I do think there is a bigger picture, even if there might be different ways to get to it.

Shakespeare might not agree with that in how he depicts fate in Macbeth. 

In Macbeth, the three witches tell Macbeth a prophecy that he will be king, but they don't ever tell him how, why, or what he has to do, they just know the end goal. Macbeth then decides that to make this come true he must kill Duncan, which he follows through with. The second part of the prophecy states that Banquo's son will become king. Macbeth, trying to stop this from happening, kills Banquo by hiring two murders to do it (and then a third one randomly shows up). The witches then tell Macbeth that he should fear Macduff, so Macbeth kills his family. And lastly, *spoiler alert* (but not really because everyone dies at the end of one of Shakespeare's tragedies) Macbeth dies at the end of the play, so the prophecy should come true. Macbeth was king, but now Banquo's son should be king. 

But, is all this really fate? Let's all take a second to look at the three witches. First off, they tell Macbeth that he will be king, which gives him the idea of killing Duncan to make the prophecy come true. Secondly, they tell him that Banquo's son will be king, which gives him the idea of hiring murders to kill him. When this happens, a third murder shows up that the others didn't know about. It could have been one of the witches making sure that everything went as planned. Lastly, the witches make him suspicious of Macduff, which leads to him killing his family. All of these things lead to Macbeth's downfall and ultimately make the prophecy come true, like the witches intended.

So this all boils down to one thing; it wasn't fate, it was the witches convincing Macbeth to do all this crazy stuff. Macbeth is already this easily influenced person with an incredibly guilty conscience, so it was all to easy for the witches to influence him and in turn make him go crazy. Poor Macbeth, he got taken advantage of by three crazy witches with a devious master plan. 

So... In the wise words of a meme stolen from Mrs. Genesky... 

IB Student Takes On Modern Art

Israel Meza Moreno

Miradas I

Mexico

2012

My sad attempt 

2. This piece was originally created in Mexico City in 1978. It's ultimate goal was to illustrate that it is hard to tell what a criminal looks like or who exactly could be a criminal.

3. This piece was originally a zoomed in/extremely pixelated photo of a group of convicts that the artist then took black acrylic paint and painted over everything except the eyes of the criminals. The artist wants to expose the "windows to the soul" by only leaving the eyes exposed. Eyes reveal a very personal aspect of a person, so by the artist doing this, it gives the viewer a more personal relationship with the piece and equalizes the criminals.

4. This piece is arranged so that only the eyes of the convicts are the focus.While you can still make out the shapes of the people if you look closely, it does not catch your attention at first.The artist uses a more transparent black paint so you can still see general shapes, but it is all fuzzy and black. There are boxes around the eyes instead of just random shapes to give the piece more structure and uniformity.

5.The overall message of this piece is the idea of equalizing these convicts so they are not just thought of for the crimes they have committed. There identity is no longer "criminal" but "human being." The artist focuses on how intimate eye contact can be and uses that to reveal his message. The viewer sees a more personal side of the people in the piece instead of their ulterior self. The people in the picture have a more intimate side revealed by having their eyes exposed (eyes are the window to your soul aren't they?). So the artist created a more personal feeling both ways.

What happens when you have a horse show and it's the last day of the fair...?

Freebie!

Fancy Language Outcast?

After reading the Jane Eyre excerpt from chapter 7, I chose to answer the question...

How do the elevated diction and elaborate syntax contrast with the feelings of the narrator in paragraphs 11-12?

I think that elaborate syntax and elevated diction is something readers expect with more formal things. For example, a textbook, poem, a speech from a president, an academic journal, etc.. But we have Jane as a narrator, who in all seriousness, is just a girl who doesn't want to be called out and wants to be left alone. I think that's a rather normal feeling amongst people. So it is a strange contrast to have an ordinary girl with ordinary feelings using all this elaborate speech (she's not in IB, she doesn't need to sound fancy). I think the fact that Jane does use all this "fancy" language adds to the idea of her being "abnormal." She is literally put on a stool and made to feel like an outcast, so it is possible that her syntax and diction are supposed to add to that idea.

 Any thoughts? Comment below!

Your Name & Your Niche: Good or Bad?

My parents gave me the name Sophia, but I usually go by Sophie. When I became older, I asked why I had been given this name. Like many people, I was given a family related name, more specifically, my father's grandmother's name; but I never knew what my name actually meant. "Sophia" and "Sophie" are both defined as meaning "wisdom." My first thought was that this didn't relate to me at all. How could I have wisdom? I didn't even know what I was going to wear tomorrow morning. Obviously this name must not relate to me. But then I started to notice something about my friends and me: They always asked me for advice. Whether it was something I had personal experience with or not, they asked me. I found myself enjoying this. Not enjoying that my friends had problems, but honored that they decided to come to me. That's when I realized that my name, for some strange reason, actually does define me. I think I am the sort of person that wants to be confided in, not because I want to feel like I'm smart, but because I want to help people through things. I think that the definition of my name actually made me come to terms with the fact that I sometimes look out for other people more than myself. It's a good thing to be able to come to terms with who you are, and your name can often give you insight into yourself. 

Anna Quindlen said "there are two me's, the me who is the individual and the me who is a part of a family of four..." I think we all have different versions of ourselves based upon our names. For me, Sophia and Sophie are two different sort of people. While they have the same dictionary meaning, they mean different things to me. Sophia is what I usually go by from teachers, someone who has just met me, or someone who flat out doesn't know me that well. Sophie is what my family and friends call me. Sophia is quiet, respectful and reserved, and Sophie is loud, talkative and extremely opinionated about virtually everything. I think we all develop different versions of who we are to fit certain situations. For example, if I was going in for a job interview, I would be Sophia. If I was having a sleepover with my best friends, I'd be Sophie. These dual identities we have are all part of us fitting into society, feeding the bigger picture. If we were all the Sophie versions of ourselves all the time, we wouldn't fit our niche in society. We need the quiet and reserved versions of ourselves to go out into the world and get a job, get into college, etc., and we need the loud and opinionated version for our friends and family. That is how most of us function in society. 

Is it a negative thing to have different versions of yourself, and why or why not? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!

Who Are "The Others"?

Author: Jay

Date: 2012

Place of Publication: 38th & Chicago, South Minneapolis, MN.







DENOTATION:
          Pictured is a younger adult black man. He is wearing a baseball cap, has gold teeth, flashy chain necklaces with a cross, tattoos down his arms, and his hair is dreaded/braided. He is sitting in what looks to be a relatively urban area.There is some over-growth of grass coming out of the pavement, as well as cracks in the paved wall on which he sits. His demeanor is relaxed and maybe even playful. You can tell that he is laughing at something or someone. 

CONNOTATION:
           By looking deeper into this image, one can make a number of inferences. First, that the location is not a nice part of town because of the cracked pavement and over-growth of grass. Second, one could guess that the man is not very well off or doesn't have a very "serious" job because of his gold teeth, tattoos, and way of dressing. Those things would not typically be seen in a "sophisticated" work place. These inferences illustrate stereotypes. The fact that he's not in a nice part of town fits into the idea that one tends to see more black people in "sketchy" parts of town. His general appearance definitely fits into the "the way black people dress" stereotype. People tend to assume that black people have lots of tattoos, dreaded hair, big gold necklaces, etc. The way he's dressing also adds fuel to the stereotype that black people are not seen in positions of power. Although we see less and less of this stereotype day to day, it is still present. 

"OTHERING"
            Margaret Atwood and Wing Young Huie both use image, layout and language to alienate a group of people. Atwood uses the image of the handmaid's attire to alienate them from society. They are forced to be covered completely in a red dress and headdress to separate them as a different group of society. Huie uses the stereotypical black man attire to alienate the man in the picture from the upper class society. Both authors use a stereotypical image to "other" these groups, like the stereotypical idea that women should be "covered up" and dressed appropriately or that black men always have tattoos and gold chains. Layout is used to stereotype or labeling is used to isolate a specific group. The layout of the handmaid's life revolves around reproduction. This separates them into a small group labeled "fertile vessel." The layout in Huie's picture puts him into the "sketchy black person" stereotype. He already has the typical black man attire stereotype, so throw in the fact that he looks to be in a sketchy part of town, and boom, he's a sketchy black person. But Atwood and Huie do not use language in the same way. Language shows how one group is separated from another. In The Handmaid's Tale, the specific language used by a group is gained through public information. For example, the handmaids are only permitted to talk about certain things based upon their knowledge from public information. This automatically changes the language they can or cannot use and separates them from different groups. In Huie's photograph, the black man's body language is gained from public information. To expand upon that, stereotypes are public information to which everyone is exposed. Whether we like it or not, sometimes we conform to these stereotypes without even knowing we're doing it, just because it's out there everywhere. The man in the photograph has very relaxed body language, and it is generally a stereotype that black men sit really relaxed with their shoulders slumped, etc. It can be assumed that this man is just a victim of conformity to his stereotype. But are these stereotypes gained from public information always negative? You decide and leave your response in the comments.