Quotes
-“Maman died today. Or yesterday maybe, I don’t know.”
-“It seemed to me as if the sky split open from one end to the other to rain down fire. My whole being tensed and I squeeze my hand around the revolver. The trigger gave.”
-“When I was a student, I had lots of ambitions like that. But when I had to give up my studies I learned very quickly that none of it really mattered.”
-“Everything was happening without my participation. My fate was being decided without anyone so much as asking my opinion.”
Conflicts
-man vs. society
-reason vs. emotion
-complacency vs. active participation
Vehicles
-imagery
-diction
-tone
-irony
Subjects
-alienation
-detachment
-death
Plot Summary
Meursault, an emotionally detached man living in Algiers, gets involved in the murder of an Arab man who stalks his friend Raymond shortly after the death of his mother. He is arrested and goes on trial, but the prosecutors focus on his lack of emotion after his mother’s death more than his actual actions. Meursault is sentenced to death.
Themes
-The death of the individual affects no one outside of the individual, as the world continues on just as it did before.
-Society is disrupted by any action that has no reason or meaning.
Title Significance
Both Meursault and the Arab are “strangers.” Meursault is a stranger because he has no real part in society and has different notions and ideas behinds his actions than the majority of the world. The Arab is a stranger because he and the motivation behind his actions are unknown and unknowable to Meursault.
Characters
Meursault
Raymond
Maman
Salamano
Marie
Perez
The prosecutor
The magistrate
The Arab
Friday, May 8, 2009
Sunday, May 3, 2009
SMELL- Oh my! Oh me!
Makers of commercials and advertisements continually find new innovative ways to sell products to their target audiences. The senders of these messages seek to entice potential buyers and to convince them that their product is the best on the market. Companies use a variety of ways of doing so. In their commercial for lunchmeat, Hillshire Farm employs catchy language and visuals to appeal to the ethos, pathos and logos of their audience to convince them to purchase their product.
Hillshire Farm, the sender of the message, uses ethos to persuade the audience of the commercial that buying their meat will make them a better person and that the company is only selling their product to help consumers, not to make a profit. The song sang by the actors in the commercial contains simple and rhyming language that portrays purchasers of the product as moral people. Viewers of the commercial will want to buy Hillshire Farm products so that they, too, can be moral people and so that they will have the ability to burst randomly into rhyming and catchy lyrics like “Special request! Cracked- pepper turkey breast!” All of the people in the ad are depicted as good people who consumers should try to emulate.
The maker of this commercial persuades the viewers to buy Hillshire Farm products by using pathos, or emotions, to make the viewers envious of the people in the commercial who have the lunchmeat. All of the people in the advertisement are of a higher status than the ordinary commercial watcher. The ad features a celebrity who calls the meat “glam,” upper-class women who deem it “bourgeoisie,” and secret service men and a politician. All of these people believe the lunchmeat is the best and endorse it, and their status as rich and upper-class makes viewers want to buy the food so that they can be like the people in the commercial. Viewers want to buy the product and be like the people in the commercial because they are jealous of their status and want to be more like them.
Hillshire Farm combines the use of pathos and ethos to appeal to the logos of the viewer to show them that their product deserves to be bought. Since the viewers want to be more moral people and they want to have a higher status and since eating this lunchmeat makes someone these things, the next logical thing to do is to buy and eat Hillshire Farm’s lunchmeat. Eating their food will make the customer happy and an altogether better person. When presented with the ideas behind this commercial, the viewer realizes that there is no better option than to buy their meat. Consumers want to be bourgeoisie and glam to be happy, and buying this lunchmeat will enable them to achieve this goal.
Hillshire Farm’s advertising techniques prove very effective in relation to this commercial. The song is very memorable and many people find themselves singing it to themselves and telling their friends about it, which is the exact aim of the company. When viewers remember a product, they are more likely to choose that particular item when presented with several choices at the store. By adding a catch phrase that is played at the end of every different commercial for the brand furthers the brand recognition for Hillshire Farms. The announcer encourages the audience to participate in the song by saying, “When I say Hillshire, you say Farm. Hillshire! Farm! Go meat!” This audience participation cements the idea of buying the product into the consumer’s mind, effectively utilizing the techniques of advertising.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Song Explication
Again and Again by Keane
Was it all in real time
Or was it just in my mind
Or was I just a ghost passing through you?
Clinging to the wreckage
Until I got the message
Hanging at the edge of the room
Give me something to dream
Give me half of your bitterest pill
Something from under the surface
You actually feel
We say these words again and again
But they still sound the same
It was in your eyes, in your eyes
They were just easy lies
The lightest words are heavy
And promises are easy
And no one's ever happy or sad for very long
But just because I said it
It doesn't mean I meant it
I guess that was the way all along
I'm just shaping the sound
I'm just turning the syllables round
Dipping my toe in the water
And watching you drown
We say these words again and again
But they still sound the same
It was in my eyes, in my eyes
They were just easy lies
And it's been a long time waiting
And it's been a lifetime in the making
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
We said when you are alone and afraid
I will come to your aid
Was it just a dream, just a dream
Or was it real to me
We say these words again and again
But they still sound the same to me
Say these words again and again
And again and again
People tell lies for various reasons- to hide something that they have done, to protect someone, or to protect themselves. However, these deceits lead to even more deceits and end up ensnaring everyone involved in a tangled web. Whether or not the truth ever comes out, the lies hurt all parties because the truth was hidden and knowledge withheld. Keane uses repetition, metaphors, and paradoxes in “Again and Again” to demonstrate that, although easily told, lies often inflict more damage than was originally intended.
Throughout the song, the singer frequently repeats phrases and words to show that words can be twisted without difficulty and that they can take on different meanings based on context and intentions. The song’s repeated words imitate their meaning. The singer says that, “we say these words again and again.” He repeats the word “again” to show that lies can be said over and over, but they will not change and cannot be unsaid. However, the lies can be interpreted differently depending on who says them and when they are said. The singer understands this because he has been lied to in the form of broken promises. He conveys that these promises are lies by repeating “In your eyes, in your eyes, they were just easy lies.” He emphasizes the fact that point of view matters when lying through this repetition; it is only “in your eyes” that the words are not the truth- to anyone else, including the vocalist, they are what they seem to be.
By using metaphors, the singer compares his situation of discovering truth about a lie to other things to illustrate that the lie hurt him just as something physical could hurt him. The lie causes the singer to question his relationship with the liar from the very beginning. He likens himself to a ghost with no corporeal effect on anybody by asking himself, “Or was I just a ghost passing through you?” When the subject of the song is caught in his lie, he cannot use any more words to save himself, and the singer does not try to help him either because of the suffering he has endured. The subject entangles the singer in his falsehoods, but the singer cannot be made to forgive his betrayer. With the lines “Dipping my toe in the water and watching you drown,” the singer compares being lost in a tangle of lies to drowning. Thus, the original untruths cause damage to their teller in addition to the vocalist.
By placing contrasting words and ideas next to each other, the singer demonstrates that telling lies distorts reality. This distortion of reality can subsequently disturb the perceptions of those involved, making them act differently than they would had they known the truth. When lying, “The lightest words are heavy and promises are easy.” Since light words should have light meanings and promises can be hard to keep, the singer seems to be presenting the idea that being deceitful is taking the easy way out. Instead of confronting the truth, the liar invents events and actions and tells “easy lies” to avoid a situation that to him would be distasteful. The deterioration of the relationship between the singer and the subject of the song is displayed through the use of another paradox. The singer and the subject will never have the same trust in each other again. Both will in the future question the words they hear from the other because they now know that “Just because I said it, it doesn’t mean it.”
In “Again and Again,” Keane calls to the audience to learn from his experience with lies and to avoid them so as to be able to keep relationships. The lies told between the singer and his friend nearly destroyed their bond and hurt both of them deeply, enough to write a song about their struggle. The lies that were initially told did not have the intended effect, as the liar did not save himself or his friend from any trouble, but he merely cause more emotional and mental hurt. Though lies cannot be completely avoided and should in fact be used in certain circumstances, “Again and Again” advices listeners against building any kind of relationship on a foundation laced with deception.
Was it all in real time
Or was it just in my mind
Or was I just a ghost passing through you?
Clinging to the wreckage
Until I got the message
Hanging at the edge of the room
Give me something to dream
Give me half of your bitterest pill
Something from under the surface
You actually feel
We say these words again and again
But they still sound the same
It was in your eyes, in your eyes
They were just easy lies
The lightest words are heavy
And promises are easy
And no one's ever happy or sad for very long
But just because I said it
It doesn't mean I meant it
I guess that was the way all along
I'm just shaping the sound
I'm just turning the syllables round
Dipping my toe in the water
And watching you drown
We say these words again and again
But they still sound the same
It was in my eyes, in my eyes
They were just easy lies
And it's been a long time waiting
And it's been a lifetime in the making
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
We said when you are alone and afraid
I will come to your aid
Was it just a dream, just a dream
Or was it real to me
We say these words again and again
But they still sound the same to me
Say these words again and again
And again and again
People tell lies for various reasons- to hide something that they have done, to protect someone, or to protect themselves. However, these deceits lead to even more deceits and end up ensnaring everyone involved in a tangled web. Whether or not the truth ever comes out, the lies hurt all parties because the truth was hidden and knowledge withheld. Keane uses repetition, metaphors, and paradoxes in “Again and Again” to demonstrate that, although easily told, lies often inflict more damage than was originally intended.
Throughout the song, the singer frequently repeats phrases and words to show that words can be twisted without difficulty and that they can take on different meanings based on context and intentions. The song’s repeated words imitate their meaning. The singer says that, “we say these words again and again.” He repeats the word “again” to show that lies can be said over and over, but they will not change and cannot be unsaid. However, the lies can be interpreted differently depending on who says them and when they are said. The singer understands this because he has been lied to in the form of broken promises. He conveys that these promises are lies by repeating “In your eyes, in your eyes, they were just easy lies.” He emphasizes the fact that point of view matters when lying through this repetition; it is only “in your eyes” that the words are not the truth- to anyone else, including the vocalist, they are what they seem to be.
By using metaphors, the singer compares his situation of discovering truth about a lie to other things to illustrate that the lie hurt him just as something physical could hurt him. The lie causes the singer to question his relationship with the liar from the very beginning. He likens himself to a ghost with no corporeal effect on anybody by asking himself, “Or was I just a ghost passing through you?” When the subject of the song is caught in his lie, he cannot use any more words to save himself, and the singer does not try to help him either because of the suffering he has endured. The subject entangles the singer in his falsehoods, but the singer cannot be made to forgive his betrayer. With the lines “Dipping my toe in the water and watching you drown,” the singer compares being lost in a tangle of lies to drowning. Thus, the original untruths cause damage to their teller in addition to the vocalist.
By placing contrasting words and ideas next to each other, the singer demonstrates that telling lies distorts reality. This distortion of reality can subsequently disturb the perceptions of those involved, making them act differently than they would had they known the truth. When lying, “The lightest words are heavy and promises are easy.” Since light words should have light meanings and promises can be hard to keep, the singer seems to be presenting the idea that being deceitful is taking the easy way out. Instead of confronting the truth, the liar invents events and actions and tells “easy lies” to avoid a situation that to him would be distasteful. The deterioration of the relationship between the singer and the subject of the song is displayed through the use of another paradox. The singer and the subject will never have the same trust in each other again. Both will in the future question the words they hear from the other because they now know that “Just because I said it, it doesn’t mean it.”
In “Again and Again,” Keane calls to the audience to learn from his experience with lies and to avoid them so as to be able to keep relationships. The lies told between the singer and his friend nearly destroyed their bond and hurt both of them deeply, enough to write a song about their struggle. The lies that were initially told did not have the intended effect, as the liar did not save himself or his friend from any trouble, but he merely cause more emotional and mental hurt. Though lies cannot be completely avoided and should in fact be used in certain circumstances, “Again and Again” advices listeners against building any kind of relationship on a foundation laced with deception.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Sestina
"Resolution"
Calmness comes to my eye
As I sit against my tree;
I feel its roughness against my back
And the warmth of the air.
I feel the hardness of the ground
And am entrapped by a ring.
The sun glistens off the gold in my ring,
But it only succeeds to blind my eye.
My decision has nailed me to the ground.
It’s the last time I will see my tree,
Breathe in this open air,
Before to him I must go back.
I love this feeling against my back,
Hate the feeling caused by my ring,
Love the kiss of the blowing air,
Hate that he was the one to catch my eye,
Love the shade provided by my tree,
Hate to pick myself up off the ground.
So I let myself fall asleep on the ground,
And just like that, my mind takes me back,
Back to when I would always have my tree
And on my finger there was no ring.
Everything in this dream world pleases my eye,
But I know this vision’s thin as air.
Soon I feel a change in the air
And I am back on the hard ground,
But a vision clouds my eye
In which I am able to come back.
I will simply be rid of him and his ring,
For this cannot be the last time I see my tree,
My proud and peaceful companion, the tree.
Again I will feel this air,
No more will I wear this ring,
I know I will once more sit on this ground.
Nothing can hold me back-
There now must be a steely glint in my eye.
I set the ring beneath the tree,
Lift my eyes up to the air,
And leave the ground, but to him I go not back.
Calmness comes to my eye
As I sit against my tree;
I feel its roughness against my back
And the warmth of the air.
I feel the hardness of the ground
And am entrapped by a ring.
The sun glistens off the gold in my ring,
But it only succeeds to blind my eye.
My decision has nailed me to the ground.
It’s the last time I will see my tree,
Breathe in this open air,
Before to him I must go back.
I love this feeling against my back,
Hate the feeling caused by my ring,
Love the kiss of the blowing air,
Hate that he was the one to catch my eye,
Love the shade provided by my tree,
Hate to pick myself up off the ground.
So I let myself fall asleep on the ground,
And just like that, my mind takes me back,
Back to when I would always have my tree
And on my finger there was no ring.
Everything in this dream world pleases my eye,
But I know this vision’s thin as air.
Soon I feel a change in the air
And I am back on the hard ground,
But a vision clouds my eye
In which I am able to come back.
I will simply be rid of him and his ring,
For this cannot be the last time I see my tree,
My proud and peaceful companion, the tree.
Again I will feel this air,
No more will I wear this ring,
I know I will once more sit on this ground.
Nothing can hold me back-
There now must be a steely glint in my eye.
I set the ring beneath the tree,
Lift my eyes up to the air,
And leave the ground, but to him I go not back.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Fem/Masc Found Poem
Hers
A tangerine joy fills meas I notice that in this chapel of love,
with friends and family abounding,
my eyes are drawn solely to him.
A luminous moon highlights
the fierce panes of his face,
as everything else is tinged
with dark lights.
I thought I was a wild thing,
but he has tamed me,
made it so even I
don the age-old cliche-
something borrowed, something blue.
And then I see
his aqua chrome eyes.
There is no horizon in sight;
I am done for;
I am his.
His
I swear she has done something,
magic, voodoo, or prayers,
to set what some called
my ferrari black heart
in motion.
I feel her essence before
I see her; I smell her
sandalwood scent,
that essential contradiction
of her polished nature
and the woodsy smell.
But when I glimpse her,
finally,
a paradiso inferno is set alight
within my soul, and I know
this is no longer
just a one man show.
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
Vocab Poem
Senescent: growing old; aging
Soigné: carefully or elegantly done
Fugacious: fleeting; transitory
Leonine: resembling or suggestive of a lion
Inure: to accustom to hardship, difficulty, pain, etc
Incinerate: to burn or reduce to ashes
Ebullient: overflowing with fervor, enthusiasm, or excitement
Ceraceous: waxlike; waxy
Aphotic: lightless; dark
Languid: lacking vigor or force; slow
Ebullience was the last thing I could detect in the room. I recognized most of my relatives and many of my friends. All of the decorations, very soigné, including the many flowers, looked as though the family had been preparing for this moment for ages. They all moved languidly, as if nothing in the world could convince them to continue onward. They congregated around an object in the front that I could not make out. When I moved closer to everyone to decipher the reason nearly everyone I knew had congregated, I first saw a halo of leonine hair. The ceraceous skin beneath that halo next appeared. Whoever the person was, she had most certainly begun to senesce, as smooth skin no longer stretched across her somewhat sallow face. Her beauty was still obvious despite the equally obvious display of death. They told me her body was to be incinerated within the next few days. I hardly knew this woman, but I still felt pained when I realized she was now in an aphotic void, from which she could never return. I had never before understood the fugaciousness of life. My parents had taken me to this place so that they could pay their respects to my relative, though she was unknown to me, but, to me, this event had more of a lasting impression. I could never become completely inured to the loss of life, but I could always pick up the pieces and persevere.
Soigné: carefully or elegantly done
Fugacious: fleeting; transitory
Leonine: resembling or suggestive of a lion
Inure: to accustom to hardship, difficulty, pain, etc
Incinerate: to burn or reduce to ashes
Ebullient: overflowing with fervor, enthusiasm, or excitement
Ceraceous: waxlike; waxy
Aphotic: lightless; dark
Languid: lacking vigor or force; slow
Ebullience was the last thing I could detect in the room. I recognized most of my relatives and many of my friends. All of the decorations, very soigné, including the many flowers, looked as though the family had been preparing for this moment for ages. They all moved languidly, as if nothing in the world could convince them to continue onward. They congregated around an object in the front that I could not make out. When I moved closer to everyone to decipher the reason nearly everyone I knew had congregated, I first saw a halo of leonine hair. The ceraceous skin beneath that halo next appeared. Whoever the person was, she had most certainly begun to senesce, as smooth skin no longer stretched across her somewhat sallow face. Her beauty was still obvious despite the equally obvious display of death. They told me her body was to be incinerated within the next few days. I hardly knew this woman, but I still felt pained when I realized she was now in an aphotic void, from which she could never return. I had never before understood the fugaciousness of life. My parents had taken me to this place so that they could pay their respects to my relative, though she was unknown to me, but, to me, this event had more of a lasting impression. I could never become completely inured to the loss of life, but I could always pick up the pieces and persevere.
Monday, November 24, 2008
Musical Review
"Bathwater" by No Doubt
You and your museum of lovers
The precious collection you've housed in your covers
My simpleness threatened by my own admission
And the bags are much too heavy
In my insecure condition
My pregnant mind is fat full with envy again
But I still love to wash in your old bathwater
Love to think that you couldn't love another
I cant help it...you're my kind of man
Haunted and adored by attractive women
Bountiful selection at your discretion
I know I'm diving into my own destruction
So why do we choose the boys that are naughty
I don't fit in so why do you want me?
And I know I can't tame you...but I just keep trying
'Cause I love to wash in your old bathwater
Love to think that you couldn't love another
On your list with all your other women
But I still love to wash in your old bathwater
You make me feel like I couldn't love another
I can't help it.. you're my kind of man
Why do the good girls always want the bad boys?
And so I pacify problems with kisses and cuddles
Diligently doubtful through all kinds of troubles
Then I find myself choking on all my contradictions
'Cause I still love to wash in your old bathwater
Love to think that you couldn't love another
Share a toothbrush...you're my kind of man
I still love to wash in your old bathwater
Make me feel like I couldn't love another
I can't help it... you're my kind of man
No I can't help myself
I can't help myself
I still love to wash in your old bathwater
No Doubt- you’ve heard them many a time, but you’ve probably never given the band from Anaheim, California a second thought. Composed of Gwen Stefani, Tony Kanal, Adrian Young, and Tom Dumont, this not-so-new band continually churns out songs that most certainly do not disappoint, and its newest endeavor, in the works now, will undoubtedly please. Formed in 1986, the band has since won two Grammys and sold over 27 million records. Though they had little popularity at first, especially due to the trendy status of the grunge movement in their early years, No Doubt steadily gained fame as they toured and released more albums. Whether you love them, hate them, or hate to love them, you simply cannot deny that No Doubt has wrought a great influence on the music industry.
Though most generally classify the group as ska, No Doubt tries to break away from that idea and actually spans several genres. They combine ska, pop, reggae, dance, and alternative rock to create a new sound that is uniquely theirs. They often include horns, keyboards, complex vocals, and guest singers. No Doubt purposely chooses to ignore the boundaries surrounding musical genres so that its members and its audience can expand their tastes and never feel confined. Lead singer Gwen Stefani successfully enthralls her listeners in all songs; her voice ranges from soft to longing, from hateful to scathing. She engages the audience, lets them feel the emotion behind the song, while all other instruments add even more passion to the songs. In the single “Bathwater,” written by Stefani, Kanal, and Dumont, Stefani lays bare all of her insecurities about a boyfriend, asking, “I don’t fit in so why do you want me?” She sings of a situation that she and many others have been in before, playing on the insecurities of listeners to connect them to the song in a true way, all the while showing her supporters that she and the other members of the band are real people who still doubt themselves, despite what their name might suggest.
No Doubt weaves many varied messages throughout their songs, and they communicate their ideas very well. As they usually write their own songs, the band members choose topics to write about that they know and understand well. Their songs chronicle Gwen Stefani and Tony Kanal’s relationship and their subsequent break up and later chronicle Stefani’s relationship with Gavin Rossdale. “Bathwater,” from the album Return of Saturn, shows lovers’ ability to accept each others’ shortcomings. The line from the refrain, “I love to wash in your old bathwater,” implies that the singer tolerates her beau’s faults so well that she even would not mind bathing herself in his used water. In other songs, No Doubt criticizes society; in “Just a Girl,” the singer complains of societal restraints placed on her because of her gender, saying “I'm just a girl, all pretty and petite/ so don't let me have any rights.”
The group’s ability to cross genres and to promote certain views has influenced other artists and their works. Recently, Paramore lead singer Hayley Williams cited No Doubt as one of their influences and as a guide for the development of her band’s career. The similarities between the album covers for No Doubt’s Rock Steady and Paramore’s Riot! evidences the sway that No Doubt has had. Just as the band influences others, Madness, Fishbone, The Smiths, and other New Wave and British artists inspired and still inspire Stefani, Kanal, Dumont, and Young. Some of these influences are even heard in Gwen Stefani’s solo career, successful due largely to her exposure as the lead singer of her original musical venture.
No Doubt will unquestionably continue their greatly successful musical career, and they will never stop inspiring old and new bands alike. They have attained commercial success, but, more importantly, No Doubt has created music that they love and that enables the band’s members to express themselves, all the while entertaining and teaching its devoted followers.
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