Week 5 Analysis: Close Reading of Californian

The story written by Joaquin Miller titled "Californian" which is from "Songs of the Sierra" is a writing that has fantastic imagery within the piece.

"Behold the ocean on the beach
Kneel lowly down as if in prayer.
I hear a moan as of despair,
While far at sea do toss and reach
Some things so like white pleading hands.
The ocean's thin and hoary hair
Is trail'd along the silver'd sands,
At every sigh and sounding moan.
'Tis not a place for mirthfulness,
But meditation deep, and prayer,
And kneelings on the salted sod,
Where man must own his littleness
And know the mightiness of God.
The very birds shriek in distress
And sound the ocean's monotone." (Joaquin Miller, "Californian", 233).

I chose this passage because of the vivid imagery that's used in this passage alone. The imagery and the feeling that this passage creates is truly remarkable. Personally, I imagine a beach like Monterey with its dark almost silvery gray color and the calm waves crashing over an overcast yet beautiful sunset. The feeling that you get while reading this is serenity,  like just looking out to the calm waves and having a cool breeze rolling through with the smell of salt water. The imagery within this passage creates just a beautiful scene in the mind that relaxes you. Another feeling that this passage creates is a sense of powerlessness and tininess. When it talks about realizing the littleness of man and the might of God, it really creates that sense of tininess and powerlessness. He basically states that the power of the ocean shows the might of God and to have that comparison means that we truly are insignificant to the power and might of the ocean. Then it talks about owning our littleness compared to the ocean and that's a phrase that is pretty hard to fathom. It feels mind boggling to realize how large and mighty the ocean is compared to a human, like we are tiny ants compared to the size of the ocean. Overall, I feel like this story had incredibly imagery that invoked a lot of feelings.

Reading Notes W5: Miller Part B

• This story is titled Californian and by reading it you can definitely capture the essence of what it means to live in this beautiful state.
• "The ocean's thin and hoary hair is trail'd along the silver'd sands, At every sigh and sounding moan." (Joaquin Miller, "Californian", 233)
• The quote is basically describing the different sounds and sights that are seen when staring at the ocean.
• The story is calm and you definitely feel at peace reading this, you can imagine the crashing waves the blue sky, wet sand and light breeze.
• The author compares the power of the ocean to the might of God and to show that people are tiny in compared to the magnitude of the ocean.

Reading Notes W5: De Burton Part A

• It talks about in the beginning how William Darrell only meant to take no land but the land that belonged to the U.S.
• He had rallied over half of California's population for the Squatter's Sovereignty.
• It shows the struggle that the people went through to join the U.S.
• It's an interesting point of view that is a lot different from what a text book would say.
• The point of view shows how some of the people really felt about the treaty as opposed as California and the other territories being gloriously acquired by the Government.
• "The government has for sale hundreds of millions of acres, but yet these men must come and take my land, as if there was no other" (Maria Amparo Ruiz de Burton, "The squatter and the Don", 253)

Week 4 Project Planning: The Beauty of The Creation

Topic:
choose one short story or novel excerpt. Write a piece in which you explore the following: 1. In what ways could this story be considered an artifact of history? 2. What does this story teach us about history? 3. How does a story teach us about a time or place differently than a history book?

Short Story Selection: The Creation

1. In what ways could this story be considered an artifact of history?

• The story is an artifact of history in many ways. It was written by the Native Americans to explain how their deities created the world and all of its inhabitants.
• Another aspect could show how it can be considered the Native American history because that's what they believed on how the world was created. 

2. What does this story teach us about history?

• This story teaches us about how the Native Americans believed the world was created.
• It's important to know their beliefs because if we didn't then we couldn't have understood their culture and lifestyle of the past.
• "And then, Earthmaker was standing there alone. Standing there, they say he went somewhere to the south. He went traveling along. Afterwards, going across the rim of the world to somewhere near where the sun floats away, he came elsewhere, into a different part of the country, traveling always from one place to another. And, when the had gone toward where the sun rises, he came to a place where he had once turned aside before, and he stopped and got things ready. Then, he made creatures, two by two" (Maidu,"Origins and the Way of the World", 28)
• The quote highlights the beliefs of the Native American people and how they believed the world was created.

3. How does a story teach us about a time or place differently than a history book?

• The thing about a history book, is that they are very matter of fact, like this is how different events happened.
• The difference that a story has is that it is a primary source of what the Native American people really believed, a history book could skew the beliefs of the people or not be entirely accurate.

Week 4 Analysis: Old Monterey

Nostalgia is defined as a sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past (Dictionary.com). That is precisely the feeling that you get when you read the short story "Old Monterey". It's a story that starts off with waves crashing on the beach and an almost light-hearted and nostalgic feeling about it. What is really interesting is that the nostalgia hits from almost two angles. One angle is about how it is more of a historical nostalgia, he talks about how he could've imagined how troops met and mingled and fishermen mending their nets in the sun. This is totally nostalgic of history and its almost fascinating on how the reader feels like they are feeling reminiscent of history like they've been there before. On the other angle, the nostalgia reaches me personally. As a child, I've had memories of walking on the Monterey beach during the sunset and playing in the sand with my little brother. I find it amazing how the author was able to create two different senses of nostalgia, and when you read the story you start to feel a smile forming and its because the author makes you feel warm and fuzzy while you read. The setting of the story is honestly one of my favorite settings because personally I love the beach. The setting captivates the audience and gives the imagery of a smooth sandy beach with calm waves rolling and crashing on the sand with a thin fog flowing over the water moving inland. This setting really heightens the theme of nostalgia through the story. The historical aspect is also crazy because it fits in with the theme as well. It talks about the Mexican troops mingling and the fading of the old, old Spain and also the pursuit of treasure. The pursuit of treasure is incredible because it's basically talking about the gold rush where people were leaving everything in hopes to become insanely rich by mining gold.

Reading Notes W4: Old Monterey Part B

• I really liked this story, it made me feel nostalgic towards being on the beach. A big part of my life when I was a kid was going to the beach so this really hits home for me.
• The whole story seems to be reminiscent and also kind of a feeling historical awe. You could tell that the narrator was in awe of the historical events that could have happened on that very beach.
• He talks about the fishermen mending their nets and seals barking and fog sweeping over the rocks, it really reminds me of the northern coasts.
• "Dream of the splendid trappings of the troops that met and mingled-- Mexican cavaleros and hidalgos of old Castile:" (Charles Warren Stoddard, "Old Monterey", 226).

Reading Notes W4: Twain Part A

• The story is basically about a man who goes to a western mining town and speaks with a man named Simon Wheeler in order to ask for someone named Leonidas W. Smiley. The man believed that the name may be a myth, but Wheeler tells a long winded tale about Jim Smiley who would bet on absolutely anything. At the end the man realizes that his friend may have intended him to suffer through Wheeler's tale.
• "he was the curiousest man about always betting on anything that turned up you ever see, if he could get anybody to bet on the other side; and if he couldn't he'd change sides." (Mark Twain, "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" 206)
• The setting of the story seems like it was set around a small mining town in the mid-1800s and the tale of Wheeler was in about 1849.
• You could tell that it was really satirical, the whole point of the story was to find a maybe made up man but ended up listening to a pointless tale about Jim Smiley.
• The story was pointless, because it was just about a man who would bet on anything then got cheated on the frog jump bet.

Feedback Strategies

I chose to write about the artice "How to Craft Constructive Feedback"

I feel like this article would be a huge help to anybody who has trouble giving people feedback. Personally, coming from an artist's point of view, I don't have trouble giving constructive criticism because that is literally what we would do everyday in class. However, other people really need the help to give that type of feedback because its very hard for people to take or give criticism and reading this article would be a great help to them. I feel very confident in giving constructive feedback because like I said earlier I've had numerous art critiques over the last 6 years so its something that doesn't really bother me too much. Something that I could recommend someone who has trouble with giving constructive feedback, is see what they have done wrong or messed up and try to give some help of what could have been done better.

Topic Research

The topic that I choose to write about is:
choose one short story or novel excerpt. Write a piece in which you explore the following: 1. In what ways could this story be considered an artifact of history? 2. What does this story teach us about history? 3. How does a story teach us about a time or place differently than a history book?

I will write about the short story The Creation.

Week 3 Analysis: Self-Reliance

For this weeks analysis, I did a close reading of a passage from James Monroe Whitfield's "Self-Reliance". I decided to take a closer look at the excerpt

                                                          With nothing to allay the smart

                                                    His dearest friend, or direst foe,

                                                    Seeks out the brave and faithful few,

                                                    Who, to themselves and Maker true,

                                                    Dare, in the name and fear of God,

                                                    To spread the living truth abroad!

                                                    Armed with the same sustaining power,

                                                    Against adversity's dark hour,

                                                    And from the deep deceitful guile

                                                    Which lurks in pleasure's hollow smile,

                                                    Or from the false and fitful beam

 At first read, this passage doesn't stand out too much, however, while diving deeper into this, I've found that it really has a lot more significance. I feel like the way the author used a different style than the rest of the story has a greater impact. He ends each line with words like "God", "power", "guile", and "smile", and the use of these words creates a feeling of hope in times of despair. Two lines that stand out the most are "Armed with the same sustaining power, Against adversity's dark hour". These lines convey that through the power and glory of God that anyone can overcome dark times and great adversity. You could really see how this passage is directed toward slavery and slave owners. It is meant to give the slaves hope and to persevere but you could tell that he is also criticizing slave owners for practicing slavery. The entire excerpt is a metaphor that entices the reader to compare good vs. bad and slaves vs. slave owner, it was brilliantly accomplished within this passage. When you break down this passage and read it with the difficult words translated into simple words, you can really appreciate the lengths that he is going through to tell everyone to keep on persevering.

Reading Notes W3: Self-Reliance, Part B

• The story is basically about living a moral life and also shows hints of criticism towards slave owners during the civil war.
• It talks about persevering during the hardest of times and basically things will get better eventually.
• The theme is heavily based off of morality in hardship, which was a great message for people during slavery.
• "His dearest friend, or direst foe, Seeks out the brave and faithful few, Dare, in the name and fear of God, To spread the living truth abroad! Armed with the same sustaining power, Against adversity's dark hour, And from the deep deceitful guile Which lurkes in pleasure's hollow smile, Or from the false and fitful beam." (James Monroe Whitfield, "Self-Reliance")
• It seems like the indented parts and the non-indented parts are different point of views.
• The indented seems more dark while the non-indented parts feel a tad bit lighter.

Reading Notes W3: Shoshone Land, Part A

• The story is about the land of the Shoshone through the eyes of Winnenap' who was a Shoshone that lived as part of the Paiutes.
• It's a very interesting plot because its from the point of view of one of the Shoshone as opposed to a lot of the other texts that show the point of view of the settlers.
• It also highlights a lot about the customs of the Shoshone and the proper etiquette when interacting with them.
• The theme seems to be something almost like reminiscent of the past, sort of light-hearted in a way.
• It also talks about the different medical problems, broken bones and bullet holes.
• "broken bones and bullet holes the Indian can understand, but measles, pneumonia, and smallpox are witchcraft" (Mary Austin, "Shoshone Land")
• It's crazy because the disease is something that was unknown to the Native Americans and was brought by the white man.
• They considered the diseases to be witchcraft and the medicine-man didn't know how to cure it because it was foreign to them.

Feedback Thoughts

Personally, I feel like there can really be no improvement without feedback. Being someone who wants to create artwork for a living, all that we get is feedback and criticism. Getting any possible feedback helps tremendously because you can figure out what you have been doing wrong and tweak it to make it look a whole lot better. When it comes to criticism, it has to be constructive because that way you are given the ideas of how someone else would approach a piece and that could greatly help you improve your craft. I remember in high school I had AP studio art, and each week we had critiques on our work and I remember someone telling me that they liked what I made but thought if i tried a different way of shading it would look a lot better and when I applied that idea it really did make huge difference. That same year there was also a time where I showed my piece and this kid looked at it, then looked me in the face and said that he hated the piece. That was a different thing to me because all the feedback I got was constructive but to have someone just say they hated it was huge. I feel like that experience gave me a tougher skin to what others thought about my work because you got to learn to not take things like that to heart. But, overall, I feel like feedback and criticism really help you develop different skills more effectively.

Topic Brainstorm

Topic 1: Compare and contrast elements of two different texts.

This topic seems interesting because I think it would be a lot of fun to compare a couple texts' different plots. I think it would be neat to see their similarities and differences, and if they possibly line up or are completely different. In high school, I had AP English and we would do a lot of comparing and contrasting to a few different texts or excerpts. I really hope to learn how to distinguish the differences in a few different stories' plot without having to really dive deep into both of their plots, so I feel like this topic would really help with that.

Topic 2: choose one short story or novel excerpt. Write a piece in which you explore the following: 1. In what ways could this story be considered an artifact of history? 2. What does this story teach us about history? 3. How does a story teach us about a time or place differently than a history book?

History has always fascinated me and I feel like exploring different texts that have been written throughout history would be really cool. I would like to believe I have a pretty good knowledge of history but I feel like I could really learn something I didn't know about it. I hope to learn about the way people of different cultures went about story telling or just significant things that they decided to keep permanent in writing.

Topic 3: Choose a reading. In your project, consider the following: What does this work reflect about its historical, social, political and/or economic context?

Like I stated earlier, Historical writings have always fascinated me so I think this topic would be perfect to look at again. I've taken numerous history classes, I've taken a few economic classes and I also took political science, so I feel like looking into the reflection of those issues within historical writings would be neat. Throughout this topic, I hope to learn about the way that different contexts of the writings highlight the period of time that they were written.

Topic 4: Choose a reading selection. Explore the relationship between elements of the selection.

I think this would be really interesting because I always love to see how different elements of a story connect and influence one another. In the past, I've had to read a lot of novels for different English classes and we would always look at this specific idea of how the relationship between different elements of the story. I hope to learn about how a specific setting or plot could really influence different characters in the way the develop.

Week 2 Analysis: Creation Analysis

The story creation is a fascinating tale that the Native Americans used to describe the creation of Earth and all the creatures and people. The story had a very interesting plot, which could really captivate people who heard or read the tale. The plot of the tale was about the character Earthmaker who was essentially bored with traveling the crystal clear water and wanted something to do and explore. He decided to create the land and then proceeded to expand it with the help of Coyote. After that he created creatures in pairs of two along with humans. What I found interesting was how he created things in pairs of two which reminds me of the biblical story of Noah and the Ark where each animal species came in pairs of two onto the boat. I also noticed how the pairs of two symbolized new life, and what I mean by that is that new life usually requires two. Two people, two animals, a male and female that come to together to produce the next generation. People can come to appreciate the way that the plot was simple with not a whole lot going on. The theme, I believe, is about creation. Creation not in the literal sense but more on the spiritual or emotional sense. I believe that creating life is about a spiritual and emotional connection between two people. I think that because creating life usually requires a connection between a male and female and their unity and devotion to one another. What I found interesting as well, was how when Earthmaker made the people, he also outlined their history. He told the people as he was making them that they each had certain countries that were different sizes and how they would act towards one another. He talked about how some countries would have consistent wars or how some would try to expand. I realized that a lot of it predicted some of the historical outcomes without specifically naming which countries or people would take part in some of these prophecies.





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Reading Notes W2: Coyote Cooks His Daughter Part B

• One of the first things I noticed was the amount of repetition that was used in the story.
• "So he kept circling around in a wash, his tail went switch-switch-switch, gallop-gallop-gallop he went, he kept coming along running. And his daughte3r kept coming slowly behind him. So Coyote look-look-looked behind him, his ears he twitch-twitch-twitched And he kept coming, coming, coming, he was jump-jump-jumping, he trot-trot-trotted." (Cupeno, "Coyote Cooks His Daughter", 52).
• The story was very interesting, the plot was about Coyote who went hunting for a very long time with his daughter and how he didn't find anything so he killed his daughter and started cooking her. While he was cooking her, Old Coyote noticed the daughters spirit and burned down Coyote's house while he was in there and he eventually died.
• It was a noticeably short story that seemed to end abruptly. 
• It was interesting how the daughter kept repeating the same phrase after she died and how Coyote's wife didn't notice that her daughter was dead and that her husband was burning.

Reading Notes W2: The Creation Part A

• The basic plot of this story was about how the land was created with all the creatures and people in different areas.
• There were a few different characters that were noted of: Earthmaker, Coyote, and Meadowlarke.
• Coyote talked about painting the land with blood, he talked about every creature no matter what would be created from blood.
• Earthmaker had Coyote lay on his belly to stretch the land to create the world.
• Earthmaker then went and made different creatures, always in pairs of two, throughout the land.
• The use of the pairs of two could be used to symbolize the creation of life and how there needs to be a male and female to reproduce.
• The pairs of two also reminds me of the biblical story of Noah and the Ark and how each animal came in pairs of two.
• Earthmaker is pretty fascinating, he seemed like he was very calm and decisive on how he wanted the earth and the creatures to look.
• The author creates of a visual of an empty body of water and slowly land is produced on top of the water and then a sort of traveler goes around the newly created land to create every little living thing, including people who, some, wouldn't grow or even exist until far later in life or as the author says, winters.
• "And then, Earthmaker was standing there alone. Standing there, they say he went somewhere to the south. He went traveling along. Afterwards, going across the rim of the world to somewhere near where the sun floats away, he came elsewhere, into a different part of the country, traveling always from one place to another. And, when the had gone toward where the sun rises, he came to a place where he had once turned aside before, and he stopped and got things ready. Then, he made creatures, two by two" (Maidu,"Origins and the Way of the World", 28)