Vocabulary #4

Fallacy-1a: obsolete b: deceptive appearance 2a: a false or mistaken idea b: erroneous character 3: an often plausible argument using false or invalid inference.
This advertisement for Camel cigarettes from the 1950's is full of fallacies because it is falsly showing people that it is healthy to smoke. By having a doctor be the model in the ad, its providing the public a false sense of security surrounding a cigarette.
Vacillate- 1: to sway through lack of equilibrium 2: to waver in mind, will, or feeling: hesitate in choice of opinions or courses.
In the Hindi film, Jab We Met, the main character, Geet, vacillates in her feelings towards Aditya, her good friend. He tells her that he loves her, but makes sure that she doesn't feel obligated to love hime back. Aditya is the sweetest person who is so caring and loves Geet so much, but he knows she loves her ex boyfriend more. When Aditiya rescues Geet from a deep depression after her boyfriend broke up with her, she started to fall for Aditya, but her boyfriend came back for her and she was unsure who to choose.

Desultory-1: marked by lack of definite plan, regularity, or purpose. 2: not connected with the main subject. 3: disappointing in progress, performance, or qualitiy.
The new Porsche Panamera is a very desultory automobile. Its a four door Porsche which makes the car immediatly ugly and obviously slows the car down because of its weight. Its a car made for boring people who want a Porsche but really don't care about the looks or the performance. The Panamera is the ugliest Porsche to date, and its really a step back for the company.

Despondent- 1: feeling or showing extreme discouragement, dejection, or depression.
In the book, The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway, the main character Jake is a very despondent person. It focuses on the "Lost Generation" and how everyone really has no hope after the first world war. None of the characters really feel happiness, and it focuses in on how their relationships suffer and how nothing really is meaning full to this generation anymore.

Heritage- 1: Property that descends to an heir. 2: Something transmitted by or aquired from a predecessor. 3: Something possessed as a result of one's natural situation or birth.
The Queen of England's heritage is has been royal throughout time. Due to her blood lines, she became England's monarch, and not through proper election. Her royal blood has allowed her to be a very wealthy, respected, and powerful woman of the world.
Intrepid- Characterized by resolute fearlessness, fortitude, and endurance.
Asoka the Great Emperor of India was an intrepid leader. He fought in all the battles and demanded respect from his followers. He was ruthless and never stood for disobediance. In the mist of his career he suddenly saw what he had become and decided to become a buddist monk that spread the word of peace all around India.

Abstract

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch
Resources are in question right now due to the over use of them throughout the centuries, and right now, this abuse is catching up to itself and is quickly destroying the Earth. Pollution is a major factor in the destruction of nature and global warming, plastic is the highest physical form of pollution that is plaguing the oceans of the world. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a prime example of this plastic waste and all of its effects on nature. Plastic is a material that does not decompose and thus never goes back into the Earth, and instead, it is poisoning marine life, and eventually poisoning humans. If the amount of waste that’s being put into the oceans is not reduced soon, there will be major consequences. There is an island of trash, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, that’s floating around the North Pacific Ocean and its growing rapidly each day, and soon will consume the rest of the world's oceans. If plastic production is not regulated soon, there will be a worldwide catastrophe at hand.
Not very many laws concerning plastic production have been passed due to the power of plastic lobbyists. Congress has failed to make plastic regulation a priority, and it’s mostly due to the influence of the plastic companies and their lobbyists. People are not aware of the consequences that happen when they litter, and need to be shown what happens in the oceans, and how much marine life is killed when they do. Congress has not set an example for the American people to follow by making it a primary concern of theirs, and if it is not taken up soon as one, pollution will be shoved in their face like a very forceful wake-up call. San Francisco put a ban on plastic grocery bags, and it has really encouraged people to start using many more forms of recyclable materials. Since the local government in San Francisco encouraged their citizens to take control of the plastic situation, people are willingly accepting of helping the environment. The bottom line is that people need to be educated in order to act. If people’s government isn't educated on plastic pollution, then how can the citizens are expected to do anything about it if they aren't educated too? Laws concerning stricter recycling systems need to be in placed around the world.

These laws and potential laws should be in place because it’s concerning the health of the planet. If the global community doesn’t step up and reduce their output of pollution, the Earth will be permanently damaged. The effects of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch are already showing through the decrease in marine life, more and more incidences of poisoning in people, and the overall look of the oceans. Plastic does not belong in the ocean, especially in a great patch, swirling around. If the production of plastic is not reduced and recycling programs are not enforced, the oceans will not be oceans, and without those major resources the ocean provides, the world will be at a loss. Without nature, nothing can function and the world is going to slowly self destruct. Education is key in halting this process and with this education comes the demand for legislation and eventually the decrease in world pollution.

Vocabulary #3

Vehement- 1: Marked by forceful energy (powerful) a: intensely emotional b: deeply felt/forcibly expressed c: bitterly antagonistic.

In Wuthering Heights, Heathcliff was a vehement lover, who became obsessed with the idea of winning his true love back. This picture shows Heathcliff deep in thought on the rough moors. His expression is so full of passion and yet it is terribly bitter at the same time. Cathy broke his heart by discarding his love for status and wealth and that choice changed molded his entire life and to reach a status worthy of Cathy's love became his obsession. Heathcliff is the ultimate image of a vehement lover, with his truly victorian nature.

Blatant- 1: Noisy especially in a vulgar or offensive manner 2: completely obvious, conspicuous, or obtrusive especially in a crass or offensive manner.

Lindsay Lohan's tweets at Samantha Ronson were blatantly a plea for attention. Twitter is a new phenomenon of updating the world with every single move you make. This is a favorite form of communication for celebrities, and especially Lindsay Lohan. Here she is tweeting to her girlfriend Samantha Ronson about how their love for each other is forbidden by Sam's family, but that they will continue to love each other. To tell the world these personal issues of yours, you are very blatant with your individual problems.

Alleged- 1: Asserted to be true or to exist 2: questionably true or o a specified kind 3: accused but not proven or convicted.

In the famous British television series, Footballers' Wives, Joan Collins guest stars as Eva De Wolffe, a wealthy woman who is very much senior to her alleged footballer boyfriend, Paulo. Paulo is the newest member of the team and everyone is perplexed by his relationship with this old woman who he claims to be in love with. Tanya Turner, another footballers' wife starts wooing Paulo and the whole story of him and Eva unravels. It turns out that she adopted many boys when they where young and brainwashed them into thinking that they loved her.

Factoid- 1: an invented fact believed to be true because of its appearance in print 2: a briefly started and usually trivial fact.

In during the trial on Mrs. Leighton's murder, the defense lawyer started spewing many factoids about his client's past to hopefully buy some time. A good defense for someone is to show the jury and the judge that their client is in fact a human still, and it will force them to relate to the person charged.

Flout- 1: to treat with contemptuous disregard (scorn) 2: to indulge in scornful behavior

Governments all over the world have started to look upon smoking with flout and ban it in most public places. The idea of dancing in a smoky disco has become unappealing to people of late, and as more and more medical studies come out showing the side effects of smoking, it becomes less and less glamourous.

Jeremy White's Biography

In class we interviewed our teacher's old friend to get a feel for what kind of person he was, and to get enough information out of him to write a short bio on him.

Jeremy White, a 33-year-old native Sacramentan whose dreams have yet to be completed. White started out as a boy growing up in Sacramento, he made some of his greatest friends, endured a divorce, had big dreams of being a drummer and had a phobia of sharks. As a young boy, Jeremy White had a reoccurring dream, one that would never end well. He would be swimming in a large tank of water and when he would look down, there would be sharks swimming beneath him, waiting to attack. This dream haunted Jeremy all his life and eventually became the underlying pressure in all his decisions made in life.

As a teenager in high school, White started to develop his musical ear due to his good friend pushing him to discover his inner talent. With this support from someone who was dear to him, he gained confidence in his musical ability and decided that music was his dream career. He became a drummer for multiple bands and eventually started touring with some. Life on tour was a hard one; never any stability and Jeremy often wondered if this display of his talent was even worth the worry he went through. During this time in Jeremy’s life, he started getting the reoccurring dream more and more frequently and caused him to finally put an end to his unstable life. He felt like he was swimming in a tank with no lifesaver and just a cloud of sharks, music sharks, about to pounce on him. This made him see the reality of living in the rock star dream, and how demanding that life was and yet he never really got much back from it.

Eventually Jeremy went into the stable life of a financial planner. He realized that what people needed was that support or lifesaver to save them from the sharks, and he wanted to be that. He makes peoples futures stable and creates an environment of safety around his clients. This dream that haunted him throughout his life has decided on some of the most major decisions in his life for him, and he followed. So while this dream made young Jeremy White scream on all of those nights, it truly has helped him see the path in which he sincerely felt more secure going down.

Vocabulary #2

Empathy- 1: the imaginative projection of a subjective state into an object so that the object appears to be infused with it. 2: the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings or thoughts of another of either the past or present without having those feelings or thoughts fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner.

In the film Bright Star, the two characters Fanny and John Keats, are involved in a deeply victorian romance. Keats is an impoverished poet, and Fanny is an aspiring dressmaker. Keats develops an intense case of tuberculosis and is very weak and ill, but because Fanny has this deep love for him, she empathetically takes care of him and feels a worse pain than him, but in her heart.

Deduct- to take away (an amount) from a total

Workers across the country are having work days deducted each month from their schedules. These are called furlough days, in which an employer makes each employee take an unpaid day off each month to save more money in these times of need. This is an image of someone's work schedule and as you can see, friday the 14th is not a working day, but a furlough day.

Recapitulate- 1a: to restate briefly b: to give new form or expression to 2: to repeat the principle stages or phases of

This is a screen grab from a gossip blog called Posh24. Each week they recapitulate the best dressed celebrities from that week and have the readers vote on who they thought was best dressed. The celebrity photos can be from totally different events, they are just recapitulating which celebrities successfully achieved a glamourous look that week at the various events around the globe. The reader gets to reflect on all of the stars outfits from that week at once and form an opinion of them based on what others are wearing.

Precipitous- 1a: very steep, perpendicular, or overhanging in rise or fall. b: having precipitous sides c: having a very steep ascent

The Grand Canyon is one of the largest and deepest canyons on land. The walls of the Grand Canyon are painted with natures pallet, and are vastly precipitous. It takes one several hours to climb through the switchbacks in order to get up or down the canyon. The high walls of canyon where formed from an ancient river that used to flow through it, now the Colorado river flows straight through the canyons floor.

Incognito- 1: One appearing or living incognito 2: The state or assumed identity of one living or traveling incognito

In the film Vertigo, Kim Novak portrays Madeleine Elster, a young wife obsessed with her great-grandmothers suicide. She ends up committing suicide off a bell tower, and leaves the private detective hired by Madeleine's husband to follow her in shambles. Months later the detective sees a woman very similar to Madeleine walking down the street and it turns out that she never was the real Madeleine Elster, but Judy Barton. She was hired by the husband to cover up the fact that he murdered his actual wife. Judy Barton became Madeleine Elster incognito to cover up a murder. In this picture, the detective is rescuing "Madeleine Elster" from her first attempt at suicide.

Vocabulary #1

guerrilla- 1: a person who engages in irregular warfare especially as a member of an independent unit carrying out harassment and sabotage.

Che Guevara was the leader of the guerrilla army during the Cuban Revolution. This is an iconic image of him during the Cuban Revolution, this picture of Che has become a sort of symbol of counterculture in society today. Che was the leader of the guerrilla army whose purpose was to over throw the U.S. backed dictatorship, and free Cuba from any ties to the U.S. They succeeded and thus making Che an icon.

tempo - 1 : the rate of speed of a musical piece or passage indicated by one of a series of directions (as largo, presto, or allegro) and often by an exact metronome marking 2 : rate of motion or activity

In the second movement of Mozart's sonata, the tempo called for was allegro. This image demonstrates the tempo in Mozart's Rondo in A minor. This is a graph that was created when a recording of Rondo in A minor was played. It shows how the tempo changes according to the crescendo of the song. Tempo can variate in a song based on how the composer wants the audience to feel when listening.

flourish - 1 : to grow luxuriantly 2 a : to achieve success b : to be in a state of activity or production c : to reach a height of development or influence
During the industrial revolution in the United States, business flourished and created many jobs. This photograph is a prime example of the industrial revolution and it really shows how much the cities flourished. You can see trollies have been built, taking people to new jobs in factories around the city, hundreds of people bustling around the city, and trucks filled with materials that where to be processed in that city. One can almost feel the buzz from this rapidly growing and flourishing center.

symbiosis - 1 : the living together in more or less intimate association or close union of two dissimilar organisms (as in parasitism or commensalism) 2 : a cooperative relationship (as between two persons or groups)

The Swedish House Mafia is a group of three DJs who perform in symbiosis at clubs. This photo shows Axwell, Steve Angello and Sebastian Ingrosso all working together on one controller. This is a perfect example of symbiosis because it is showing three human beings understanding each other and trying to create something beautiful together, music.

tumult - 1 a : disorderly agitation or milling about of a crowd usually with uproar and confusion of voices b : a turbulent uprising 2 a : violent agitation of mind or feelings b : a violent outburst

Hester Prynne was engulfed by a tumultuous crowd when she stood in front of the angry townspeople for her public punishment. This photo shows an angry society heckling a woman for being human. She was caught in the act of having a lover by becoming pregnant. Society was angry because this was something they tried so hard to repress, passion. This photo shows a hateful and spiteful crowd, crushed together, watching the woman who represents all that is wrong and thus making the event very tumultuous.

Renegade- 1 : a deserter from one faith, cause, or allegiance to another 2 : an individual who rejects lawful or conventional behavior.

Joan of Arc was a renegade because she was the leader of the Anglican resistance in France.

Repose - 1 a : a state of resting after exertion or strain; especially : rest in sleep b : eternal or heavenly rest

2 a : a place of rest c : a harmony in the arrangement of parts and colors that is restful to the eye 3 a : lack of activity b : cessation or absence of activity, movement, or animation 4 : composure of manner

As Catherine approached the carriage after the ball, she immediately decided that she would repose on the way back to the Mildusk Manor.

Stereotype- 1 : a plate cast from a printing surface 2 : something conforming to a fixed or general pattern; especially : a standardized mental picture that is held in common by members of a group and that represents an oversimplified opinion, prejudiced attitude, or uncritical judgment

Antione soon realized that everyone in high school is stereotyped into specific groups.

Tariff- 1 a : a schedule of duties imposed by a government on imported or in some countries exported goods b : a duty or rate of duty imposed in such a schedule 2 : a schedule of rates or charges of a business or a public utility

One of the causes of the American Revolution was the fact that England put outrageously high tariffs on all of the American imports.

Tranquil- 1 a : free from agitation of mind or spirit b : free from disturbance or turmoil 2 : unvarying in aspect

Margaret sat beneath her blessed fir tree in a divine state of tranquility.

Tundra- 1: a level or rolling treeless plain that is characteristic of arctic and subarctic regions, consists of black mucky soil with a permanently frozen subsoil, and has a dominant vegetation of mosses, lichens, herbs, and dwarf shrubs; also : a similar region confined to mountainous areas above timberline

The jackrabbit rapidly burrowed under the tundra's icy soil to escape the hungry wolves.

Unanimous- 1 : being of one mind 2 : formed with or indicating unanimity : having the agreement and consent of all

Cults leaders brainwash their members into thinking unanimously with them.

In Defense of Food

Why do people choose to eat products that are unhealthy for them?
Well, I think it’s either that people don't care about what they eat, or they are not fully aware of the consequences of eating unhealthily. Education is the key for a smart living and healthy society. When people are unaware of how many unnatural chemicals and ingredients are in the chips and candy they buy, they continue to purchase and ingest these unhealthy and potentially unsafe foods. If people are not educated about the effects of these fake and not whole foods, they will slowly poison themselves. The food giants that sell the public these fake foods, realize their demographic and try to make them think they are eating healthy by making labels that claim things that are hardly true. People need to be educated on the problems with the food they eat, and so they can make conscious choices of becoming healthy of staying unhealthy.

What roles/responsibilities does the government have in framing your choices?
Once again the idea of educating the public on the foods that surround us is the responsibility of the government. If people are not aware of the problems around them, how can they be expected to teach themselves? The government needs to guide the public in education and needs to get the ball rolling so to speak with promoting the concept of eating healthy. Thanks to food lobbies that have a strong grip on the government’s opinions of food regulation, they don't implement education programs. The government needs to start sorting out its priorities and understand that the public’s general health is much more important than staying friends with a powerful lobby.

Sociology Project

For a sociology project in my government class, my group and I decided that we would reenact a kidnapping. We went into target, had someone filming us, one of the members was "the mother", and I came in and roughly took the baby out of its stroller and walked away. We wanted to see what people would do when they saw something strange like this happening, and surprisingly they did nothing

Gun trafficking from the U.S. to Mexican drug cartels

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/15/us/15guns.html?pagewanted=1

Over the past couple of years there has been major drug wars going on between cartels in most border towns and various places in mainland Mexico. The cartels are fighting over turf in border towns because of easy access to their biggest clients, the United States. There has been hundreds of shoots killing thousands of people, wither they got caught in crossfire or were targeted victems from rivaling cartels. The big question is where do these cartels get so many guns to supply to all of there members and to maintain power, the answer once again is the United States. In the U.S. the purchase of firearms is quite easy, as long as you have the cash and don't have a criminal record you can buy yourself a small pistol all the way to an AK-47 without even a blink of an eye. Cartels have set up gun smuggling groups mostly in Texas, Arizona and New Mexico who go into each of the thousands of gun stores and can purchase two or three firearms without it even being suspicious. I think it is so irresponsible of our government to allow for there to be non licensed sellers who can sell to anyone, and I think it's wrong that we even have such relaxed laws for the licensed sellers. These gun sells contributing to thousands of deaths in Mexico and its all because some Texans want the right to keep a rifle in their house just incase they need to kill someone. I think the United State's laws on gun enforcement need to become much stricter, by not allowing machine guns or powerful rifles to be sold, and designating only one or two gun sellers in a city or town. The government needs to be able to see if people are buying suspicious amounts or rifles, and check up on them, rather than having to rely on the salesman to inform the government of strange purchases. The United States needs to do this for Mexico's well being and it will hopefully reduce the number of guns owned and as a result, less shootings and deaths.

The Alabama Dream

Barder had spent many a nights dreaming of this day. The day that he could fly. The day he could leave this small south Alabama town forever. He spent most of his nights sleeping in the bayou, warding of mosquitos with his tail and keeping one eye open on the crocs. He would sit on the banks and watch the frogs leap into the sky, their webbed feet as parachutes. Barder was mesmerized by the frog's ability to effortlessly fly across the swamp, catching one fly after another. Now, about this time of year, the leaves start changing color and it just starts getting colder and colder. It was time for Barder to leave his bayou refuge, and move into the streets of town. There were hardly any dumpsters around town and so the competition for them was tough. Other feral dogs were much more aggressive than Barder was, so he hardly ever got a nice warm dumpster to sleep in. One night, just before the first snow, Barder decided that he needed a dumpster and was going to fight for it. A pack of dogs were lurking around, eyeing the potential beds and starting to growl at one another. Barder slowly approached, his neck low and a guttural growl came out, the pack immediately focused on him and started to encircle him. The fight for territory had begun and the animals were a cloud, biting and tearing each other. Barder got bit more than once and was bleeding all over, he noticed that his body felt strange and his mind was going places he couldn't stop it from going. His mouth started foaming uncontrollably, and he started barking crazily at the others. They sulked away and left the dumpster for Barder. 'Finally' thought Barder hazily, it was about time he got a bed. Stumbling around the ally he tried to jump in the dumpster but didn't have any strength to do it and at this point his mouth was a river of foam. Barder's vision started to tunnel and he passed out on the pavement.

The first snow had come. It gently laced everything with white dust, including Barder's unconscious body. Now, dogs were not the only homeless beings in this small town, there was some little children who wandered the streets day and night, looking for anything to help them out. There was one little boy who always had an orange scarf wrapped around him like a blanket, probably from his long dead mother. He was wondering the streets that morning of the first snow, relishing the beauty that surrounded him. The orange scarf had turned into a turban to keep his tiny head warm from the bitter cold. He came across Barder's blood-caked body, laying partially buried in the snow, and started to pet him. Barder awakened with a fright and bit the child's hand. The boy started weeping and slowly he started to foam. Barder lay back down, delirious and dying, only dreaming of those frogs way down in the bayou. The little boy sat down on Barder's back and then fell over into the snow, scarf still tightly wrapped around his head, uncontrollably foaming and convulsing. They both lie there dying, dreaming of flight, in the fresh white snow.

*Image taken from JanVonHolleben.com

Writing in Reverse- Vedo's Crossword

The following short story was written as a creative writing exercise. By observing photographs of people on the subway we were able to create stories surrounding their subway ride.

Vedo Giudice was a Jersey man, he lived across the Hudson with his wife and boys. Most of his extended family, consisting of brothers, brothers in law, first cousins, second cousins, cousins once or twice removed, all lived in the SoHo/Little Italy district of Manhattan. The family business was a decent restaurant called 'Giudice's Italian Cuisine' and this was where Don, the Boss, lived and ruled. He was a second cousin once removed of Vedo's and was the top dog around. The Giudice's had long been a mob family, spanning many generations, so basically everyone who was related belonged. Vedo wasn't the toughest guy there ever was, so he was never one to talk and sort out things, he just had to clean up.

Every morning Vedo had to cross on the Staten Island Ferry over too the Manhattan harbor and from there walk to the station that went strait to SoHo. It was his morning routine to do the New Jersey Chronicle's crossword puzzle to, you know, keep his mind nimble. On this particular April morning, Vedo was fading, he could hardly keep his eyes open, let alone do the crossword. The night before he had to work overtime because there were too many bodies for one person to get rid of, so Vedo had to come along and dispose of the bodies. The men that he had to saw up were some of the brothers of the rivaling Don and it was a messy death they met. So anyways, Vedo was tired and not looking forward to having to go to Giudice's. As he started walking down in to the harbor subway station he smelt a wave of fresh coffee floating below his nostrils. Now usually Vedo just ate at Giudice's but sometimes he would treat himself to some stand coffee and he felt that today was the day. The coffee immediately made him feel like himself again and so he started down into the station, caught the train heading south. He sat by the door rocking side to side with the movement of the train feeling rather depressed about his lot in life, disposing of bodies, when he had arrived at his station. He got back out into the crisp New York air and slowly started walking towards Little Italy, as he walked he heard a lot of shouting and scuffling, but that was the normal background noise in this part of town. As he approached Guidice's he noticed how everything was silent and it seemed as though no one was inside. He got closer and realized that there was blood splattered on the window. Vedo froze, this could only mean one thing: a shootout. He slowly opened the door and gazed at the massacre of his entire family. There were bullet holes in every part of their bodies and not a breath was issued. Everything started making sense to Vedo, he had a feeling that the rivaling Don was not going to take the previous night's excursions lightly and sure enough, he didn't. Slowly Vedo turned around, closed the door and started off back to the subway station headed towards the harbor.

*Image taken from BillSullivanWorks