Post Twelve: Coming to an End

Science Fiction (LIT2020) Coming to an End: 

This class was a great learning experience and taught me things about science fiction that makes the genre more interesting to me. As I stated in the beginning, science fiction never appealed to me and I never gave it a chance. This class changed my view completely. Yea, it’s not going to be my first choice when reading something, but at least now I won’t completely turn the genre down. Not only did I learn about science fiction its self, but also different styles of viewing the stories and writing about the context and problems displayed in them. Being able to write a good argumentative paper has definitely been a challenge for me, but it made me think in a way I never had before. After reading so many different short stories, I am much better at determining the “novum” and “Marx” throughout. Being able to read and understand what is going on in science fiction, definitely took time to get used to. It makes you think in a way that isn’t used in other genres, but by doing so I am able to find the problem and solution in the novels I read now.

Of all the interesting stories we read this semester, my favorite was “When It Changed.” I don’t know what it was about this story but it just held my attention all the way through, and I could easily pinpoint the power dynamics of relationships going on between the characters. I like how it describes that women can take control and live without men in their lives. They are strong, confident and stand up for themselves and families, which I think is very important for women to know.

 Overall I learned a lot about science fiction that I never would have learned if it wasn’t for this class. AP you did a great job educating each of us and it helped me in more ways than just understanding a story. I look at stories completely different now, and love that my writing skills have broadened. Writing a damn good a paper without just telling a summary of the story felt amazing, and I owe that to you. Again, thank you for being an awesome teacher and helping me when I needed it. Reading a science fiction novel or short story, can officially be checked off my things to do! J

Post Eleven: Setting

Setting:

After discussing setting in class, I have a better understanding why it is so important in a story. The setting is what gives the readers a better sense of the story, because it helps the better visualize what is going on and better understand the characters. Not only does it help readers understand but also can set the mood of the story, and ties the whole story together. The setting doesn’t always have to just emphasize on the time and date the story took place, it can easily tie in the uniqueness of the circumstances and environment where the story took place. Without the setting the story would not make sense and be a bunch of nonsense written down. When writing a short story it is a necessity to have a setting.

Between the two stories we read this past week, both have setting that is easy to understand and made it easier for me to follow along. The story that I decided to go into more detail about the setting is “Bears Discover Fire,” by Terry Bisson. This short story goes into great detail about the surrounding areas, locations, landscapes, and time. It lets us know that Bobby’s house over looks the interstate, and how they are so close to I-65, “that at night sometimes the traffic sounds like a waterfall” (Bisson 378). Although the time is short within the story it still helps with the perception. Development of the characters is another big part in this story. It portrays the grandma to be crazy. Also describes Wallace Jr., and how he may be young but still understands what is going on with his mom. All throughout the story it goes into great detail about the physical location and adjectives; smell, slow, seldom, sad, sound, weather, etc. You never feel like you don’t know where or what is going on in this story.

This story did a great job with the setting and definitely made me feel as the reader more connected to the story. I felt like I knew exactly what was happening and could picture everything they were doing, and seeing. I never really thought much or paid attention to how important the setting was. Once I had to sit down and write about it and actually think about it, I now see why it is so important! 

Post Ten: Nature/Environment

Nature: 

As we discussed last week in class, there is a difference between what we perceive “nature” and “environment” to be. The way I look at nature is it’s considered to be the outside life, living things, animals, the physical world, plants, and different types of landscapes. As for environment, it’s what surrounds us. Where we place ourselves, and things that we are around daily.

When I think about nature, I feel as if things should be done naturally. As nature will develop on its own, grow without adding chemicals or adding other things to it. Even for a person trying to lose weight doing it naturally would be working out and eating healthier or smaller portions, not by taking a pill or any other kind of medicine. The picture that I am referring to is the one about losing weight naturally by taking Collagen Protein. Losing weight naturally would be done without putting an extra chemical into your body. Just like adding chemicals, seeds and other sorts of things to a plant, you are not letting the plant/tree grow “naturally.” Like the picture you showed us in class of the Palm trees in the mall, those trees are unable to grow naturally and aren’t in an environment you would expect them to live. Their growth is determined by maintenance, and will most likely die quicker due to the chemicals they receive.  

When we talked in class many people had different outlooks on nature and environment, so it is all how you perceive it. I for one don’t agree that taking pills is considered losing weight naturally. Also in the story/article we read in class, it talks about how nature is not just human but also non-human things. Even though it is non-human, I don’t see pills or any kind of chemical to be natural. After reading the article it definitely helped me understand the terms “nature” and “environment” better. Now I understand the actual difference and can distinguish between the two.

Source:  Picture of Lose Weight Naturally With Collagen Protein

http://www.lifenatural.com/images/collagen-weight-loss.jpg

Post Nine: Karl Marx

Marx:

Karl Marx is known as a German philosopher, economist, sociologist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. Not only did he play a huge role in social science but also the socialist political movement. His theories about society, economics and politics are what we know today as Marxism. Marx argues to bring about socio-economic change. He believed that socialism would eventually be replaced by a stateless, classless society called communism. During this section of the course many stories show Marx’s theories and relate to communism and socialism.

            The first story that comes to mind when thinking about the Marxism is “Dead Space for the Unexpected.” The computer at the company, rates the employees on their performance. Main character Jonathan, living a regular planned life gets rated each day he attends work. The same thing is done for Simon, unfortunately his scores were rated too low leading to termination. The way this computer operates it feels as if authority is constantly watching them. After Simon was terminated, Jonathan was sure to do his part in making the company successful. Machines and humans relate in ways that I necessarily don’t believe in or don’t want to think about just because it kind of freaks me out that our world one day could be taken over by robots/machines.

            Another story that may deal with Marxism is “Baby, You Were Great!” by Kate Wilhelm.” The world develops a type of entertainment where people with intense true emotions, place electrodes into their brains and people will purchase these helmets so they can experience the same emotional sensations. People watching each other like this, freaks me out. All this happens due to the technology where signals are sent out in the helmets and people all around the world can sit and watch this so called “reality show”. This story may not be as good as an example as “Dead Space for the Unexpected,” but they both show weird scenarios with technology. Karl Marx seems to have been an intelligent guy, his work definitely is something I liked reading up on.

            

Post Eight: Novum writing

Novum Writing: 

The thought of a novum when producing a story is creating something new and different in the genre of science fiction. Science fiction separates its self in many ways compared to romance, drama, horror, and mystery. It involves creating new invention, discovery, or something technological. The word novum is literally defined as new thing. Knowing what the true meaning of science fictions allows me to distinguish the difference between the genres much more easily.

Due to multiple people not knowing the true definition of science fiction, it always throws them off when watching a movie or reading, because they aren’t exactly sure what science fiction means. When writers write this type of story, considering it a novum is very important because it’s not only what brings the story together but also defines it, because you are creating something new. You have to think about all the major aspects in a story like characters, plots, themes, style, and language when writing a science fiction story..

Science fiction deals with a lot of new technology that has to be presented to our world today. In the story “Burning Chrome,” written by William Gibson, talks about hackers, and technology in ways that we would have never thought of, its amazing how technology can be used in so many ways. “Baby, You Were Great”, by Kate Wilhelm, goes into detail about the character John and how he doesn’t like to be physical he just likes to watch it. Also how technology allows for you to do so much more thank your actual body can do. Is that even possible in our world? Then there is  “The Algorithms for Love” by Ken Liu, which also deals with technology and how she creates her dolls. Talk about creepy. The Asimov’s “Liar,” and how all the doctors deal with robots and their insane intelligence. Can’t forget about “When It Changed,” by Joanna Russ, and how it’s all women who live on this planet, and use test tubes to produce children. Each of these stories creates something new and different, and use technology and science in ways that aren’t possible. That only applies to now, who knows what will happen in the future.

As you can see novum becomes a huge factor in all of these science fiction stories. There is always something new being created, or something having to deal with technology and things that have yet to be introduced to in our world. I can most definitely say that I most likely would have never known the proper meaning of novum without taking this class, and now that I know about it, its that much easier to understand why science fiction is so different than other genres,

Wow! Not that I didn't realize this before, but the stories we read are really really weird/bizarre/creepy/ and did I mention weird? ha (This crazy technology stuff gives me the creeps)

Post Seven: Close Focus Reading

Close Focused Reading:

For my close focused reading I chose to write on “Flowers for Algernon,” post 9 (April 20) and 11 (April 21):

“I didn't know what to do or where to turn. Everyone was looking at me and laughing and I felt naked. I wanted to hide. I ran outside and I threw up. Then I walked home. It's a funny thing I never knew that Joe and Frank and the others liked to have me around all the time to make fun of me. Now I know what it means when they say, "to pull a Charlie Gordon. "I'm ashamed.”

-Charlie

The same thing is being illustrated in this text from Charlie’s 10^th post. Because the experiment was to help increase his intelligence, he now puts two-and-two together that Joe and Frank were only out to embarrass him and were amused by it. Before Charlie could never understand what was going on, therefore it didn’t affect him. Now, its hurtful, rude, and makes him upset when they do these kinds of things. In this section he likes to be around Ellen, but Ellen is too into being “cool” to realize her feelings for him.  It’s a shame to see how people treat others, just because they are dumb and don’t understand things or have as good as an IQ as you. Making fun of someone for doing something stupid is shameful and rude. Charlie should be upset and offended by the way these two boys have been treating him. Now its time for him to show them up, by all the progress he makes.

           

 “I think it's a good thing about finding out how everybody laughs at me. I thought about it a lot. It's because I'm so dumb and I don't even know when I'm doing something dumb. People think it's funny when a dumb person can't do things the same way they can.” 

-Charlie 

Through out the beginning Charlie was always getting picked on and made fun of by other employees. Dr. Strauss decides to run an experiment on him to see if he can increase Charlie’s IQ level.  I chose this section of the story because it is when Charlie realizes how people really feel about him, and he actually understands it now. I’m going to do my best to explain what I think each sentence means, although the story was easy to read and understand, it is kind of confusing for me to know if I actually understand what he is saying.

At first when he mentions that he thinks it’s a good thing that he can understand why he gets laughed at, I think he feels like he is finely happy to know the real reason they are laughing and not feel dumb for not knowing. Even though being laughed at is hurtful and demeaning to him he would rather understand the reason behind it, than to be clueless. He finally realizes that they were never his friends and didn’t respect him. What the other employees didn’t know was that Charlie was making an incredible come back and was becoming smarter everyday.

           

            In conclusion, this story is very inspiring and enlightening to me, I love how he works hard to become smarter, and as you read you can see his progress. I enjoyed reading it, and there are multiple parts in the story that I could pick out to close read, just because there is so much going on and a lot of good points are made throughout the story. 

Post six: Interpretation

Interpretation:

I’m not quite sure how to explain my experience or reaction after reading “When It Changed” because everything came so unexpected to me. While reading this story it seems that men are the dominant one and women are not. The men try to come in and take over and rule their world, when the women are doing perfectly fine without them. Who cares about the society norm, if a women wants to be in charge she should be allowed to. I like how “When It Changed” is different from other stories. These women don’t believe in having men around, hence they consider them aliens, but also they depend on one another. The women of this planet know what they are doing and how to keep their world running smoothly. They have figured out ways to reproduce without using men, they raise their children just as they would if there were a man in the house, and they don’t care about the society norm. Because these women took control and believed in one another, made this story interesting to me, I like how it was not original and reminded me that there is no norm, we can do whatever the hell we want (well kind of).

Anyways, when the men come to their world and try to tell them that they need to have men in their lives, and need to reproduce the right way, it made me angry. No woman needs a man in her life, especially the women of Whileaway, because they have gone almost 30 generations without them. Needless to say this story at times did make me feel a little uncomfortable, but I liked it at the same time. It made me think outside the box more, and I wasn’t so quick to judge the women, because they had good morals and were happy with their way of living. Other stories that we have read these past weeks were just as good and interesting to me, especially “The Fact of Blackness”. Let me tell you, talking about that in class, was a bit weird to me. “When It Changed” for some reason just grabbed my attention the most, and changed my outlook on certain things.