June 6th Class Summary

On Friday Mr. Laz told us that we will be wrapping up our Romanticism discussion and we should finish up by reading Song of the Open Road. He also gave us a new book called the Woman Warrior and we should finish the first two chapters by Wednesday or Thursday. Soon he's going to be giving us a lecture to make us depressed about literature for next year. And I know we are all looking forward to it.

Ashley started off our discussion with her thoughts on the line 'what's true for you is true for everyone', she felt that it was thoughts like these that caused wars and oppression. However Laz clarified that Emerson believes that we are all in touch with the Truth (with a capital T) but we never actually know what that Truth is. He also noted that this is part of the reason why Romanticism always fails, because it is ideological not practical.

Amy talked about how the youth is used because kids are more honest than adults. Laz also clarified that by justifying that kids don't necessarily speak the truth all the time, but they say exactly what they feel without filtering themselves or thinking about it too much.

A few people also brought up the use of 'is-of-identity' and his emphasis on being direct. Paige said she enjoyed his direct approach because it made it more powerful, but Ashley disagreed because she felt it left his argument full of flaws because it was without any qualifiers.

We ended our discussion when we talked about how much we rely on technology. Many people felt that we are too dependent on technology and that we need to become well rounded. I brought up how we seem to sell the human race short in terms of adaptability and if push came to shove we would be able to adapt to a new environment.

Ashley ended the discussion by comparing captive animals that are set free to humans with technology. I feel that the flaw here is that those are animals and we are human beings. The reason we have been able to survive is not because we have natural instincts that tell us how to hunt and where to hide, but we have learned these things over time and have developed the ability to adapt to them. Most people wouldn't think of the tools of prehistoric man as 'technology' but they are technology, even the simplest arrow head. Man was able to survive climate changes, changes in food sources, and eventually able to adapt from hunters and gatherers to an agricultural society. These are huge leaps and bounds that animals have failed to do. I truly believe that if something were to happen and we were to lose all modern luxury, the human race would certainly survive. Some people might not LIKE or WANT to live without their everyday comforts of modern society, but when push comes to shove I bet that they would to survive.