A Feminist Viewpoint

My attempt in analyzing this type of topic falls into feminism. I may not have a strong perspective based on what the significant concepts are within feminism and "Things Fall Apart", but I strongly evaluated the certain circumstances within the novel in how men are taken for granted to be the "rulers"--or put in a more clear relation--more important than women in society. In the Igbo world, women are also taken for granted to be obedient in cooking, cleaning, and nursing. It is "supposed" to be common or normal for each sex to take their his/her own role in society, but as time elaborates on, roles slowly alter and may even switch. The clan in the Igbo society have men who commonly look down on women. "Century after century, male voices continue to articulate and determine the social role and cultural and personal significance of women" (Feminism 171). Although, in the past where women were commonly ranked lower than men, through growing history, women began to rise with their strong determination in education and successful career. To contrast this, "No matter how prosperous a man was, if he was unable to rule his women and children he was not really a man" (Achebe 45). In the novel, the men have a compelling amount of pride where that respect to their own women and children do not take in account at all in being a good role model to other young men or "agbalas"--men who have not taken a title. Similar to the knowledge of the men of Igba, "Woman is a slave whom we must be clever enough to set upon a throne" (Feminism 169). In society, there many bounds where sexist boundaries are met and are used against and for each gender. However, in a feminist outlook, women are strongly looked down upon, cursed at, taken for granted, and overall misunderstood. For some reasons, there are areas where women cannot meet certain criteria as men do but it is the exact same for men also who cannot do things in which women can. In this world, men and women are different, but it doesn't require to choose which one is best to pick on or be biased on. Life in certain portions  should not be played like a deck of cards where men are kings and rule the world just as they please where women's queen role has no particular importance or say at all. "Feminism is a political mistake. Feminism is a mistake made by women's intellect, a mistake which her instinct will recognize" (Feminsim 170). Women seem to be inevitably played like dolls where one may propose that women cannot think intellectually for themselves where they consistently need a hint to have a chain reaction happen in their brains. However, women in "Things Fall Apart" do play a bold and important role for their men where men cannot do for themselves. So, what I'm trying to come across is that  men and others complain so impulsively about women and how they are intensively emotional, but overall, men would be nothing or won't have much without the existence of women. Women are just as important as men.

Technocracy becomes Technopoly...

In Neil Postman's chapter of From Technocracy to Technopoly, it formally discusses the type of society was held in 1700s to 1800s of England. Technocracy is significantly placed in the people's religious beliefs, rituals, and etc.
When Neil Postman wrote the book Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology, he had in mind the idea of showing the faults of technology in our lives and showing us how to combat the fact that we as a society are becoming dangerously dependent on our technology. His basic idea is that the United States has become a "Technopoly," a dangerous state of affairs where our culture, our ideas, and our very lives are becoming subservient to the technology we use. Through the book, Postman intended to show the dangers of this idea, and how we could stop them.
He intended to accomplish this by first giving a history of our civilization, especially our nation, in terms of our ascendency from a tool-using culture through "technocracy" to Technopoly. After this overview, he would get to the meat of his overall theses, by discussing the world in which we live and how impossible and strange it is. Following that he attempted an analysis of the now-defunct defenses against Technopoly, such as school and religion. Then he continued by providing specific examples of how technology has worked for the worse in computers and medicine. He then made a very lengthy discussion on so-called "Invisible Technologies," the covert attempt to turn human nature into an efficient, countable machine. He raged against such things as the zero, the public opinion poll, and statistics. After a discussion of the ideas of science solving all our human nature problems (he ridiculed the so-called social scientists) he ended with a discussion of the loss of meaning through technology and finally, in a single chapter, what we as people can do to stop the spread of "Technopoly."
It also refers to Brave New World where the people in the society become overly dependent with technology. It seems quite unreal to have an artificial but "efficient" way of producing humans in a scientific way. It only shows that this novel is a perfect example of technocracy evolving into technopoly. Technopoly is something of which technology becomes a vital and positive source and system to the people.

Unpredictable World: Singularity

From the article of Lev Grossman in "2045: The Year Man Becomes Immortal," suggests a whole new and unpredictable dimension of computer technology possessing a new type of development that can gravely affect the future of our humanity. Compared to the modern technology today and its past technology, it significantly proves that "computers are getting so much faster, so incredibly fast, there might conceivably come a moment when they are capable of something comparable to human intelligence" (Grossman). The most major concept of this is how this type of new technology can affect the system of our society--meaning that the results may be extremely beneficial for us humans or become a life-threatening system in the future world where humans may not even be in existence in the next 35 years. I find it quite astonishing how fairly accurate how humans can develop great theories in how technology can grow into many types of things dealt into our world as in how flying cars, touch screen devices, robots, etc. With the creation of the computer by the young Raymond Kurzweil in 1965 and the development of the new types of computers to this day is a tremendous improvement in seeing how technology can grow extremely fast within only a small period of time.
In A Brave New World, it shows how technology plays a central role in their society. This type of technology in society compared to "singularity" which is "borrowed from astrophysics: it refers to a point in space time" (Grossman 2). In the novel, babies are not born in the natural way, but developed from scientific technology and produced in test tubes. This conveys how the humans are very dependent on their technology because it helps produce more beings in an astonishing faster way. It portrays how important their type of technology is to the individuals' surroundings of the world and their society. As in singularity, it is said to happen inevitably and will gradually cause a great change to the whole world. These two types of technology share a significant comparison, they both share a great source of language to the people. To live an "authentic existence" it significantly means to live under the law or rules without living with full freedom. It gives the right for an individual to live his/her own life with a side of rules or cultural beliefs to follow. This gives a good demonstration in how technology can gravely develop into within a couple of decades into the future. It can dramatically change the perception of religious beliefs to many people based in how technology can create many things, like for example, in A Brave New World, where mostly everything is fully created from technology. I find it interesting how technology is something that we can all relate to, as in communication/language, understanding, development/growth, connection, etc. all around the world. Technology is something that is extremely difficult to avoid in our daily lives. I realized that each living day, technology is something that can be both beneficial and threatening to each one of us; it has become a sort of addiction in which cannot be brushed off so easily.

Blog 1: Article on A Midsummer Night's Dream

In A Midsummer Night's Dream, I read how Shakespeare distinguished  the creation of love is displayed as a dream-like and enchanting element in romance, by using on imagination, but contrasting it to truth and reason. This is a comparison between the book and the play. Shakespeare's motivation in creating types of fantasy-like love stories helps define and create a type of art in its own form.

Shakespeare's character, Theseus, has a character of only wanting to possess the truth and facts of life. Theseus possesses a kind of characteristic where if there is no fact or type of reason behind a certain quality of something, it cannot be proven to be placed in reality. Imagination and love, for example, plays a significant role in the acts of the play, whereas the book conveys the two dimensions of the Athens' representation of facts and the woods representing love and imagination. Theseus does not wish to possess or encounter any relinquishment of the woods with dreaming of romantic love. In Theseus' perspective, I realized how love relationships could not possibly be a type of fact or truth. It may convey sense of feelings and emotions, but it doesn't necessarily needed to become a case to be proven or solved. I think it is mainly based on how someone interprets in "imagining" love and going forth in a romantic relationship. Facts and reasons are needed to prove or be proven in life, but can just plainly be the basics in life, where Theseus has lived up to. I think love is just an interpretation of one's view and beliefs of how romance should be seen as. I realized that everyone, even Theseus himself, has their opportunity in finding, experiencing, or creating love in their own art form or even from their facts and reasons. Art and proven facts in life can still be familiar or combined in one's experience in his existence.

A day.........

A day with sunshine? Rain? Snow?....What kind of day would you prefer when traveling on the road?