User:Jleone07/sandbox

Josh Leone is a student in Mr. Schutt's World Lit/Comp class. Josh must do a project about what he learned in World Lit/Comp.

Project: This project is about units such as Semantics, Identity, Personal Strength, Discovering Beauty, Discovering power, Argumentative Essay, Discovering Culture, and Outside Reading Assignment.

Unit 1 (Semantics): I learned lots of information from the first unit this year. The first important piece of text that we listened to in this class was “Danger of a Single Story” by Chimamanda Adichie. This text was referenced several times throughout the year and taught me multiple things. When she is describing her first time meeting her roomate in the US, she mentions, “She asked where I had learned to speak English so well, and was confused when I said that Nigeria happened to have English as it’s official language. She asked if she could listen to what she called my ‘tribal music,’ and was consequently very disappointed when I produced my tape of Mariah Carey.” This quote really opened my eyes. It made me realize that Africa can’t just be generalized as one place where everyone is poor and starving. Everyone can be accused of falling into this trap of a “single story”, whether it is for Africa or something else. It is what we are told to believe, so therefore, we believe it. This can be used later in my life because now, whenever I travel somewhere outside of the US, I know there is more to different cultures than the one story I hear. Clearly, the Semantics unit was a big unit to set up the rest of the year.

Unit 2 (Identity): Throughout the second unit, I was able to broaden my knowledge about identity. In the story “By Any Other Name” by Santha Rama Rau, I learned that identities are precious and they shouldn’t be changed by others. The headmistress was trying to change the kids’ names and she said, "'Let’s see, now—Pamela for you, I think.” She shrugged in a baffled way at my sister. 'That’s as close as I can get. And for you' she said to me, 'how about Cynthia? Isn’t that nice?'” Names are a big part of people's’ identities. The headmistress is changing the two kids’ names and therefore their identity. I can use this knowledge because now I know that it is important to respect others identities and not alter them. This is very important knowledge for now and later in life. Identity is obviously an important and unique aspect of all people.