"How to Tell a True War Story"

Summary: I chose to write about the chapter "How to Tell a True War Story" because I read it agin and it had a different meaning to me. The first time I read it the story of Rat Kiley and Curt Lemon it was a sad story of two best friends that got sadly separated because of death and one of them went crazy. When I read it again to write my in class essay I realized that the author O'Brien explained a lot of his writing in this chapter. O'Brien talked about the happening truth and the story truth. The happening truth is what actually happened and the story truth is what he made up. He goes on to say that sometimes it is hard to tell the difference between two. The things that happened in Vietnam were too hard to talk about so sometimes it was easier to tell a story.

Response: I think that no matter what O'Brien writes about it will have an impact on his reader. Just because he does not tell us exactly how thing happened does not mean his readers did not get an understanding of how difficult it was to be in the war. O'Brien tells his readers that the truth you feel in your gut. I felt every story in the pit of my stomach and even though I was wondering what was true or wasn't by the end I did not care. I enjoyed reading the stories in the book The Things They Carried. It was interesting and it gave me a different outlook on the the soldiers that caught in the Vietnam War.

Proposal for Extended Essay

I have selected to extend my my essay about Social Networking. In my essay I give examples of how web users do not have privacy anymore because they air their whole lives on the internet. I discuss these issues but I do not go into depth. That is why this essay is perfect for expanding. There are so many other examples I can give about the internet and social networks, and I can elaborate more on my personal experiences. I am going to talk more about Privacy settings and discuss the reasons why they do not work. In my mini essay all I do is mention the privacy settings and I do not go into detail. In addition I want to add a new reference. The reference I want to include is the televison show "Catfish" from MTV. "Catfish" is a show that searches different profile users to see if they are real or if someone is making up a profile. This will be a good example of how we are not safe on the web. Another way for me to expand my essay will be to compare and contrast the bad from the good of using Social Networks. I can discuss the benefits of having a Facebook or social media, like being able to stay socially connected to friends and family. Overall this essay will have more detail and will hopefully give my readers a better understanding of my thesis. This essay has a lot of room for improvement and it will be easy to add in more information to expand.


Key Terms:
-Privacy Settings
-Social Networks
-Facebook
-Myspace
-Twitter
-Benefits of social media
-Ways of accessing personal information 
-World Wide Web
-Controlling the Web
-Catfish

"Enemies" and "Friends"

Summary: I recently started reading The Things They Carried, written by Tim O'Brien. I am about half way through the book and there were two chapters that made an impact on me. The Chapters were called "Enemies" and "Friends." In both of the chapters the Author Tim O'Brien is talking about two men that were in his platoon. Their names were Dave Jensen and Lee Strunk. In the first chapter he tells us how they started off being enemies. Jensen and Strunk got in a fight over a missing jackknife and Jensen thinks that Stunk took it. They get in a very physical fight and Jensen breaks Strunk's nose and Stunk ends up having to get flown off to see a medic. When Strunk gets back he his all bandaged up. When Jensen sees that Strunk has returned he gets this nervous feeling that Strunk was going to want revenge. Jensen starts staying up all night and gripping his pistol tighter in fear that Strunk was going to retaliate. The fear gets to Jensen and he ends up going crazy. One day he just fires his automatic gun up in the air till the whole magazine is gone and then he takes his pistol and hits himself over the nose with it. As he was doing this in front of Strunk he asks him if they are even now. Strunk says yes and tells everyone else that Jensen is crazy and that he really did steal his jackknife. In the second chapter O'Brien tells us how Jensen and Strunk become friends. It starts off with them starting to trust each other. Jensen and Strunk start going on missions together and they dig their trenches together and take turns watching one anthers back. They become so close that they make this pact that if one of them gets hurt to the point they are in a wheel chair then the other man has to kill him. After they made this pact Strunk's lower leg gets blown off by a motor round. He is in complete shock and tries to walk on it as if it were ok. Strunk was loosing a lot of blood and was in and out of consciousness. Jensen was kneeling right next to him and every time Strunk would wake up he would ask Jensen not to kill him. Jensen replied every time that he would not kill him. Strunk is begging for Jensen not to kill him because all he can think about is their pact. Strunk is taken off in a helicopter and passes away in the air. When Jensen finds out he is relieved.

Response: The reason these chapters had an impact on me was because it is crazy to me how things were in Vietnam during the war. These chapters show how you could not trust anyone, not even the soldiers fighting with you. At first Jensen was so scared that Strunk was going to get him back for breaking his nose. I believe he went a little psycho when he smashed in his own nose but it showed the readers how difficult it was for all of them to be out there. It also shows that Jensen was just being paranoid because Strunk really did steal his jackknife. Normally these two men would never be friends outside this war but because they were forced to be in the same platoon they ended up being able to tolerate each other and then become friends. It was nice to see them have each others backs even though at first Jensen was scared of Shrunk retaliating. In my opinion they made the pact to kill one another because they were too afraid of the outcome, but when it came down to it I somehow knew they would not be able to go through with it. That is exactly what happened. Strunk was scared and did not want to die. Jensen was no longer there too kill his friend that was in pain but he was there to keep him company when he was dying. Although Strunk did not die in front of him, Jensen was there with him towards the end of his life to give him hope. Jensen felt a relief that Strunk died because if Strunk were to live then Jensen would have to confront him with knowing that he did not obey their pact. Everyone of those soldiers in this book and that went to Vietnam were such brave men and I am glad we had them fighting for our country but it is a terrible the things that they had to go through.

"Slang Does the Trick"

Summary: In the book They Say I Say by Gerald Graff and Cathy Birkenstein there is a section called "Ain't So/Is Not,"that talks about using informal language in your writing and when to use it. Your academic writing should flow easily and be relaxed but that does not mean you have to use scholarly words and phrases the whole time. It depends on what your writing about and who your audience is. You can should be able to use everyday conversation in your writing. You can also use slang words or combined languages but it is still recommended to use big words, long sentences and complex sentences. An informal language can help relate the target reader and you can connect with them on a personal level. They give an example of a title of a book that combines scholarly worse with slang words. The title of the book is Frequency of Formal Errors in Current College Writing or Ma and Pa Kettle Do Research and it was written by Andrea Lunford and Robert Connors. The title makes the reader understand and relate to the subject they are writing about. In conclusion know your audience and be a little more relaxed with your writing but just don't go too over the top.

Response: I completely agree with the authors. I believe that if it is appropriate to your writing you should always make it feel more like a conversation. If you use everyday phrases and words that you might use it might make you point come out more clear. I love when writers put a little slang or accent in their writing it makes me more interesting in what they are talking about. If i was the target reader, which is a college student in her twenties, it would be perfect to be a little informal. On the other hand if i was a middle aged college science professor that is looking for accurate facts and scholarly writing I would probably want to reframe from using slang or mixed languages. I would use informal writing on my personal essays or an essays that I wanted to make people laugh. Most of the essays I write today are in my english class and we share them with our piers and our professor. If I were to judge my classmates and my professor I would be safe to assume that it would be ok to be a little informal as long as my essay made sense and flowed with ease. I want people to understand the messages I'm trying to get across and sometimes slang does the trick.

Maya Angelo

Summary: Maya Angelo talks about her expierence graduating grade school in her book "I Know Why the Cage Bird Sings" She is one of few people of color graduating. Even some of her teachers haven't went on to High School. She sits in her seat during the graduation contemplanting the things the speakers were saying. The first speaker that had an affect on Maya was Mr. Edward Donleavy. He talked about how the "central" (white) kids were going to succeed and get many prvilages and that the black males were going to become athletes like "Jesse Owenses and Joe Louises" (179), but Donleavy said nothing about the black girls. After everything he said the audience would say Amen and every time they did Maya choked on the words. Everything he said made her sick and angry. Maya argued the fact that blacks were only meant to be "Maids and farmers, handymen and washwomen," and anything they did would amount to nothing. She continued to tell us about how she wished certain black movement people would of died or never caught for black rights out of anger. It wasn't till Henry Reed gave his Valedictorian speech that changed Mayas persprective of her graduation day. He actually spoke to everyone and made her feel like she accomplished something and she was ready to move on to her next chapter of her life.


Response: Maya was such a strong women and she deserved to have a graduation she could be proud of. Reading this chapter made my heart hurt for Maya. She has come so far already and now she had to sit there and get all her hopes and dreams crushed by Mr. Edward Donleavy. This was her graduation too and she worked just as hard as those white kids, if not harder. As he spoke you can see her build up anger. Although she was in a mixed racial school it was still segregated and made people with color think that they would not succeed in life. The anger made her think things that were hateful, like when she talked about how she wished Gabriel Prosser and Nat Turner were killed and that she wished Abraham Lincoln was assassinated before the Emancipation Proclamation. My interpretation was that she thinks they would be better off if no one tried to make blacks equal and why did they even do it in the first place. It didn't change anything, they are always going to be looked down upon. Her future was dwindling away listening to Donleavy speak but Maya comes through at the end of the chapter when one of her peers gave his speech. Henry Reed turned away from the audience during his speech  and concentrated on the graduating class, all of them. He said a poem that moved Maya and showed her that there was a light at the end of the tunnel. Tears fell down her face and then just like that her spirits were lifted and her hope was back. I could not even imagine being around in a time where there was so little respect for black people. I can't wait to continue Mayas journey with her, even after "I Know Why the Cage Birds Sings."

Privacy

Summary: In the book "Signs of life in the USA" there is an article that talks about what is private and public on the web. Everyone these days has some kind of social media that they are checking constantly. You might be doing this from home or outside the confines of your home but how do you know who is in your personal space. Nothing is private on the web. Even though you might have all your settings set to private there is always a way to get in. In your own space you can set up guide lines and have rules but once you post things on the internet is not longer your personal space. The book adds that, "You don't insult people in their own homes, but online flaming occurs all too often." Meaning the web is a wide open space that you cannot control what people say. Unlike your home where you can kick someone out, the web is a place where there are no real rules. "Many sites and forums where people socialize and communicate are described as being like the Wild West." In other words even though the web is meant for socializing you still have to be careful of the gun slinging.

Response: No matter what you put on the web anyone can get into it and I know this personally. I had an issue with my work and the social network Facebook. Even though my page was set to private and I had my coworkers blocked, somehow they still got in. Not only did they get in but they posted mean things on my page. I had no control of what they wrote but as soon as I saw it I deleted it. I still don't know how they got in but it doesn't matter.  My personal opinion is if there is something you don't want aired publicly you should not put in online because it will finds its way to the public. I agree with the article that we do not have our own personal space anymore. Everyone is always on the web and now they can do it from anywhere. You can go on from your phone, laptops or tablets. A lot of places even have free WiFi, so you don't have to even pay for a data plan. All you have to do is have something that gives a access to the internet. Our whole world is changing and technology mistaking over. We might have some privacy now but I believe that pretty soon all our privacy rights will be gone for good unless we live in the middle of a Jungle.

Targeting an Audience

      This last week I was introduced to the book "Signs of life in the USA." In this book there was a section on the way the advertisers target their audience. The author Steve Craig talks about "The economic structure of the television industry had a direct effect on the placement and content of all television programs and commercials"(187). In other words, advertisers feature their products during times of the day that relate to the viewers. For example; during sports games they have beer and car commercials. These commercials usually feature strong, tough men or beautiful women with little clothes. Craig tells us that the "Camaraderie in all-male or nearly all-male groupings is a staple of weekend commercials, especially those for automobiles and beer"(190-1). Therefore the advertisers are showing a man's man or a man's women to target their main audience. This goes the same as for a women's women or a women's man. Targeting specific audiences work and it's something that's going to continue thriving because of the outcome the advertisers get for their products.