Response to Course Materials

     Over the past few weeks, our class has had many different accomplishments. We finally finished discussing Edward Albee's play, The American Dream, and I am happy to say that we are starting a new play, Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller. We also read the book, The Nuts and Bolts of College Writing by Michael Harvey, which we were able to put to use when editing our college essays.

Summary and Analysis of The American Dream by Edward Albee

SETTING
The American Dream, by Edward Albee, set in an urban-American apartment,  "A living room. Two armchairs, one toward either side of the stage, facing each other diagonally out toward the audience. Against the rear wall, a sofa.  A door, leading out from the apartment, in the rear wall, far stage-right. An archway, leading to other rooms, in the side wall, stage-left" (Albee 1).

CHARACTERS

• Mommy: dominating and hypocritical in nature, exemplifies the materialistic customs of her society. Degrades everyone else for her benefit, self-centered and greedy.
• Daddy: emasculated and submissive.  conforms to Mommy’s oppressive control consistently; he even undergoes a sex change on her command and depends on her for reassurance and direction.
• Grandma: witty, manipulative, old, and not oblivious. Has an intuition of the changes in society being portrayed in the play, she constantly voices her grievances. The only character that interacts with the audience.
• Mrs. Barker: proud and hypocritical, she belongs to many different organizations but does not to take any substantial action in them (emphasized by her general confusion). The representative through which Mommy and Daddy adopted their first and second "bumbles". 
• Young Man: Handsome, superficial, hollow, damaged, vindictive. The twin brother of Mommy and Daddy's first adopted child; Represents the New American Dream and is the result of Mommy's symbolic actions of mutilation and torture to his brother. 

PLOT

• The play begins with Mommy and Daddy discussing their grievances, and their difficulties in getting satisfaction. 
• Grandma enters with many mysterious boxes and the three of them begin to discuss various topics concerning societal obligation. 
• The doorbell rings and a woman named Mrs. Barker arrives, who is the head the adoption agency that Mommy and Daddy had worked with in the past. Mrs. Barker makes herself comfortable by removing her dress and exchanging subtle sexual commentary with Daddy, to which Mommy reacts defensively. 
• Apparently, the party has no idea why Mrs. Barker was called to the house, except for Grandma. 
• When Mommy and Daddy leave the room, Grandma explains to Mrs. Barker that her purpose is to legitimize a second adoption for the married couple, and also explains how the first adoptive child was mutilated to death for its normal, child-like, behavior. 
• The doorbell rings again, and the Young Man enters. Grandma labels him, The American Dream, after commenting on his “clean-cut, midwest farm boy type”. 
• Grandma then hires him and convinces Mrs. Barker to give the Young Man to Mommy and Daddy as their second adoptive child.
•  After Grandma exits on the pretense of being taken away by “the van man”, the Young Man is presented to Mommy and Daddy. A detail that is not directly explained during the play is that the Young Man is there to murder Mommy and Daddy, and it is assumed that Grandma is an instigator. 

Close Reading Response to: It's Decorative Gourd Season, Motherfuckers.

     Satiric works of the twenty-first century commonly use offensive and provocative content to assist the development of their central ideas and purpose. Although considered unsophisticated and vulgar, the use of this content is extremely effective when pointing out societal flaws to the public eye. Common examples of this can be found in the popular late-night program, Saturday Night Live, where absurd skits are used to portray American tendencies that are commonly criticized. In the article, "It's Decorative Gourd Season, Motherfuckers.", Colin Nissan uses bold diction, details, and language to express his strong negative opinion toward seasonal enthusiasts in an offensive, but effective way.

Response to Course Materials

     To say the least, my mind has been blown over the past couple of weeks. Learning how to analyze literature using DIDLS (diction, imagery, details, language, and syntax) has proved to be so important to performing successfully at a college-level in this class. Never before had I been exposed to methods, let alone acronyms, that actually help me in the process of analyzing text. Let's say, for example, you are reading a poem very much like the one that we read in class last week, "My Father's Song", and you are told to make an analysis based on DIDLS. In this poem, you find that the author uses diction to describe both the stature and personality of his father, syntax to emphasize the tactile imagery that was so important to him, and symbolism to explain his feelings toward cultural traditions and parenthood-- quite frankly, it's a rhetoric rager! All of this helps you, as the reader, to receive more from the poem than just lyrical pleasure.

Close Reading Response to: Ask Jeeves

          In the article, “Ask Jeeves”, Alex Soojung-Kim Pang reports on the introduction of a robot-butler, named Botlr, to Silicon Valley’s Aloft Hotel, and comments on how the introduction of human-interface robotics has not had the expected influence on society. The use of diction, figurative language, and syntax in the article evidently help express Pang’s argument that it is almost impossible to imitate or manufacture the complexities of occupational interaction.

          An example of diction that can be found in the article is in a sentence that is used to describe the appearance of Botlr, “Its painted white shirt and bow tie, its measured pace, and the high-pitched ‘beep boop’ noises it makes when interacting with guests remind one equally of P.G. Wodehouse’s Jeeves and Wall-E’s Eve.” The reference to the name, Jeeves, brings cultural baggage to the reader in the form of connotation. Jeeves, a well-known character from the short novels of P.G. Wodehouse, is iconic for his formal speech and personality, which is commonly associated with the nature of a valet or butler. The author uses this reference to help describe the demeanor of Botlr, which is similar to that of Jeeves.