Graduation Plan

So, it's time for me to do the ritual I do every semester, once my schedule is finalized and I'm thinking about registering for the next one. I always have this panic when I think of how much I need to do to graduate... but after wrestling with it for about an average, I always get there.

It's tight. I'm not going to lie. And my failure to take a Spanish class here, and maybe even to take one of my Journalism electives (I'll find out soon), has not exactly improved the situation. (In the chart below, I'm operating on the assumption that I'm going to get credit. If I don't, I'll probably take another elective during the fall when I return. I only have 12 credits listed there now, and even with reporting, I won't be working, so I'm pretty sure I can bump it to 15 with something like photojournalism and be fine). It's tight, but doable, and I have two areas of flexibility that I can and will utilize in order to graduate on time, these being:

1.) I can drop the anthropology minor... this will save me a few credits.
2.) I can stay home instead of studying in Norway... if everything goes according to plan, it won't slow me down to go... but if much more goes wrong, I'm going to need to stay home to get Journalism credits.

So, here we go:

Colour Key:

Red – For Magazine Journalism Major
Orange – For Spanish Major
Blue – For German Minor
Purple – For Anthropology Minor
Green – For General Education, Electives, and International Studies Major

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PAST
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Transfer Credit: (37)
Spanish I
Spanish II
Intermediate Spanish I
Intermediate Spanish II
German I
Introduction to Western Art I
Comparative Political Systems
English Exposition and Argumentation
English Literature

Fall 2008: (16)
General Anthropology
Advanced Spanish Conversation
Regions and Nations of the World I
International Relations
Introduction to Psychology
Exploring Study Abroad *

Spring 2009: (16)
Advanced Spanish Composition
Career Exploration in Journalism *
Principles of American Journalism
Intermediate German II - Language and Culture
Introduction to Statistics
American Government

Fall 2009: (16)
Cross Cultural Journalism
Biological Anthropology
Micro and Macroeconomics
Twentieth Century American History

Spring 2010: (16)
Journalism 2100 - News
Anthropological Theories of Religion
Introduction to Hispanic Literature I
Modern German Culture
Catalan Language and Culture
Special Problems in Geology


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FUTURE
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Fall 2010 @ Pamplona: (12)
Cultura Visual
Literatura y Cine
Fundamentos Culturales de la Communicacion III
Introduction to Linguistics

Spring 2011 @ Bonn: (9 +)
German Language @ Bonn
German Culture/History/??? @ Bonn
Spanish Language/Civilization

Fall 2011 @ MU – (12)
Introduction to Hispanic Literature II
News Reporting @ MU
Communications Law @ MU
Intermediate Writing @ MU

Spring 2012 @ Bergen (12 +)
Spanish Language/Civilization
Anthropology
Anthropology
Norwegian Language

Fall 2012 @ MU (15)
Spanish Peninsular Literature
Spanish American Literature
Journalism Solving Practical Problems @ MU
Magazine Editing @ MU
Magazine Design @ MU

Spring 2012 @ MU (12)
Spanish Capstone @ MU
Advanced Writing Capstone @ MU
German Culture/History/??? @ MU
Journalism Elective

Gradution!! (:D :D :D!! …….. O.O)

Ensayo Formal - La Casa de Bernarda Alba

Martirio – Bernarda la Segunda


En el drama “La casa de Bernarda Alba” por García Lorca, toda la acción pasa dentro de una casa en Andalucía que es muy tradicional y dominada completamente por la mujer Bernarda Alba. Parece una tiranta increíble mientras no permite que sus hijas muestren ni sus lágrimas ni su amargura, y da fuerza a sus mandatos con su bastón. Algunos críticos han comentado que Bernarda es tan rigida y cruel que no parece una persona verdadera. Como explica C.B. Morris, “Her credibility has been challenged by those who regard her as… ‘one-dimensional’ (54, p.111)… yet others contend that she possesses a ‘personalidad… compleja’ (93, p.140), that she is ‘ni una caricature ni un monstruo’ (64, p. 65), that ‘no es unidimensional ni completamente negativa’ (57, p.95).” (66) Porque en la vida real, y tambien en los dramas, solo podemos ver lo que hacen y comunican las personajes, hay mucho en el interior que no podemos entender por seguro. Por eso he tratado de entender Bernarda, no como caricature sino como persona. Exploro el personaje de Bernarda Alba y su hija, Martirio, para desarollar una explanación de las acciones de las dos.

Cuando empezamos hablando de la forma de los dramas, yo recordé de repente que en mi clase de antropología, hablamos de la diferencia entre lo que se comunica, y lo que hay debajo, lo que no expresan ni dicen las personas. Tradicionalmente, el drama es diferente que la prosa y la poesía porque solo se trata de comunicación, lo expresado. Imita el mundo real más que la poesía o la prosa, porque cuando se mira un drama normal solo se puede ver en la escena lo que en realidad es posible ver y oír lo que en realidad es posible oír. Nunca es posible saber por cierto lo que pasaba en los pensamientos de los otros, y a veces las personas mismas no son exactamente seguras de lo que están pensando o sintiendo. Tradicionalmente, los dramas dejan estas posibilidades. Tradicionalmente, no hay interpretación, declaraciones sobre los pensamientos, creencias, ni sentimientos íntimos de los personajes representados por un narrador omnisciente. El drama muestra palabras y acciones elegidas por el dramaturgo, y les deja a los actores primero y después los que miran el drama la responsabilidad de hacer conexiones y entender lo que está pasando. Normalmente las personas interpretan los eventos básicos en una manera más o menos similar, porque como en la vida verdadera hay un nivel de incertidumbre inevitable, pero eso no significa que no hay soluciones malas o estúpidas, solo que no hay ningunas que sean seguramente correctas.

En la clase de antropología, mi profesor siguió hablando de este tema, diciendo que no solo las personas no saben lo que piensan, se sienten, y creen las otras personas, y no les importa. Lo que si les importa es la comunicación. Yo pensaba que ésta era muy interesante con relación al drama “La Casa de Bernarda Alba”. Cuando estaba leyendo el drama, el personaje que me interesaba más era la Bernarda Alba epónima, porque en realidad sus niños, aunque tenían muchos años, habían estado atrapados y ´protegidos´ durante sus vidas enteras y se comportan como niños, pero Bernarda es otra cosa. Pensaba que si ella hubiera sido el personaje central de una novela, habría mostrado más complejidad como personaje. ¿Es posible que cualquier persona sea tan cruel, tan insensible, y tan tiránica que Bernarda Alba parece? Muestra muy pocas señales exteriores que tiene un corazón – por supuesto como ella lo quiere.

Cuando hay conflicto, ella se preocupa primero con lo que van a oír o decir los vecinos. Las referencias muy pequeñas y sutiles que sí tiene o entiende las emociones vienen en los avisos estrictos que les da a sus hijas para guardar las apariencias – que no deben llorar por su padre, no deben llorar por Adela, no deben mostrar el amor que sea indecoroso… pero ella permite, admite que no puede controlar las emociones ni los pensamientos. Para mi, ésta es extraño y sorprendemente intuitivo. No solo admite que no puede controlar estas cosas, pero también no parecen importarla. Si, las personas van a tener emociones, pero no deben mostrarlas ni reconocerlas, y es probablemente mejor olvidar estas cosas inútiles, pero esta última no le importa mucho a ella. Lo importante no es lo que piensan o se sienten sus hijas, sino cómo se comportan. Hablando del control que tiene Bernarda sobre sus hijas, Morris dice, ““Other writers have protested, directly and subjectively, at this control of children’s minds and emotions.” (75), pero creo que en realidad Bernarda no puede y no quiere controlar los pensamientos ni los sentimientos de sus hijas, solo sus acciones.

Por ejemplo, cuando Angustias habla sobre el retrato que le había robado Martirio, ella dice que todos saben que Martirio ama a Pepe, y es a causa de esto que le robó el retrato. Bernarda dice que Martirio había dicho que fue una broma, y esto es el fin – dijo que fue una broma, entonces, lo demás no les importa. Enfoca solo en la comunicación. Dice, “Cada uno sabe lo que piensa por adentro. Yo no me meto en los corazones, pero quiero buena fachada y armonía familiar. ¿Lo entiendes?” (Acto 3, 1047) Otro ejemplo de este reconocimiento de la separación entre los corazones y la comunicación viene al final del drama, en que Adela se mata a ella misma. Bernarda da un grito – eso me parece interesante - tiene sorpresa y también parece estar infeliz sobre la muerte de su hija. Por supuesto, pero hablamos de Bernarda Alba, la tiranta. ¿No es posible que necesite gritar para guardar la apariencia? Creo que no, porque inmediatamente después de gritar, manda que las otras se callen. Por eso me parece que sí tiene un corazón, pero está escondido tan bien que solo se muestra cuando su hija menor se suicidó. Inmediatamente después, regresa a la Bernarda insensible, tiránica. Dice “No quiero llantos.” (Acto 3, 1347) Pero también me había dado cuento que dice, “Las lagrimas cuando estés sola!” (Acto 3, 1348)

Hay pocas pistas que Bernarda nos da sobre ella misma, y de lo que está pensando y creyendo adentro. No sé si ella sabe que es tan cruel, aunque hay poca evidencia a contraria. Ramsden describe algunas de estas pistas que vienen como contradicciones en lo que dice Bernarda. Por ejemplo, que ella no es tan segura de ella misma y arrogante como quiere mostrar, porque tiene malos sueños y es, en una manera, también victima (Ramsden, xl), a veces está descrito como desolada, y ella misma refiere a su propia desolación, pensando en su obligación de controlar a sus hijas (Ramsden, xli), y que ella tiene un aspecto sádico y una necesidad casi patética de saber todo sobre el pueblo y los vecinos (Ramsden, xli). “Is her rigorous mortality then, that of the outsider anxious to be, as Spaniards say, 'más papista que el papa', with the consequent suppression and deformation of her own being?" (Ramsden, xli) Pero si sus pensamientos interiores son tan diferentes de todo lo que expresa, tiene que tener dominio muy fuerte sobre su misma para mantener su foco y no revela nada sobre el interior. Estas son las cosas que demanda de sus hijas también. Dice “Silencio, silencio.” dos veces en el drama – es la primera cosa que dice y la última. ¿Porque es así? Solo le parece importa lo que dicen los vecinos – está tan obsesiva que quiere que la Poncia espie a los vecinos y decirle todo. Solo piensa en la propiedad, en como lo hicieron su padre y el padre de su padre. Es probable que en su infancia había algo de esta misma represión que ahora le inflija a sus hijas, pero en realidad no sabemos casi nada sobre su vida antes del drama.

Morris explica que el drama no nos da mucho información sobre la historia personal de Bernarda Alba. Esto puede ser un problema con el caractarizacion por Lorca, o podría reflejar la constricción de la educación y las experiencias de Bernarda. “If the sayings and axioms she utters tell us that she quotes from a script, we see that she has no training to handle unpredictable situations and impromptu performances that depart from that text. The little we know about her is enough to tell us that the way of life she enforces is the one that was enforced on her, that the values she defends and instills are the ones that were inculcated in her.” (Morris, 66)

Pero, mientras es claro que está repitiendo unas tradiciones de sus padres, no estoy segura que Bernarda era tratada exactamente como ella trata a sus hijas. Maria Josefa, por ejemplo, parece alguien bastante diferente que Bernarda, aunque ella es loca ahora y es difícil imaginarla sana y como madre. Pero ella viene de la costa, “la orilla del mar” (Acto 1, 460) donde quiere regresar, y parece tener opiniones y sentimientos más abiertos que las personas en el pueblo. Y es difícil saber si Bernarda tiene esta influencia de la mar también, porque, como explica Ramsden, “it is she who curses this maldito pueblo sin rio, pueblo de pozos." (xli) Como he dicho antes, Bernarda parece saber que todas las personas tienen sus pensamientos interiores en sus corazones, pero no le importan mucho a ella. Las apariencias y lo que es comunicado es mucho más importante, al punto que parece internalizar esta filosofía y prescindir de pensamientos completamente. Muchas veces dice que es mejor no pensar, y que ella prefiere no pensar, etc. Una vez dice, “No pienso. Hay cosas que no se pueden ni se deben pensar. Yo ordeno." – como si hubieran dos alternativas, y dos tipos de personas – puede pensar o puede ordenar, no es necesario y tal vez no es posible hacer los dos a la vez. “As she appears in Lorca’s play,” explica Baker en su análisis psicológico del personaje, “it is clear that Bernarda Alba is a woman who is preoccupied by the established values of her community and that her thinking function is repressed, while her feelings are predominant.” (1)

Ramsden usa las expresiones distintas de Bernarda para probar que ella ha heredado su sistema completa de moralidad y superioridad.

“Bernarda Alba inherited from her father much more than the house… she inherited words spoken and customs perpetuated in it, habits of mind and dress and attitudes to people and possessions. Bernarda has a supply of sayings, particularly ones applicable to women, which she can utter at any juncture, and always from the angle of her own convenience or self-righteousness… There is no surprise in such saying; it would be surprising if a woman so entrenched in the past did not resort to them, for they are after all a substitute for experience and original thought and repeat what she herself was told. To hear them on her lips is to detect in her mind a great echo-chamber, where we can hear her versions of admonitions and rules of good conduct…” (Morris, 60-1)

Tal vez podemos ver y entender un aspecto de la crianza y educación de Bernarda por la de sus hijas, en particular Martirio. Baker dice que Martirio, de las cinco hermanas, ha sido más afectado por Bernarda. "This type of negative animus opinion is especially evident in Martirio who has been more strongly affected than her sisters by her mother’s rejection of men. (5) Muestra la capacidad por ser como Bernarda con su hipocresía y contradicciones, por ejemplo cuando dice que no puede sentir el calor, y después queja sobre ello mismo, o cuando dice que tiene solo miedo de los hombres, pero admite que quiere a Pepe… su crueldad vindicativa, y su sentido de rectitud, por ejemplo cuando engaña intencionalmente a Adela y dice que “se acabo Pepe el Romano”… por eso Adela se mata, pero Martirio no piensa después que tenga la culpa por decir eso. Sobre Martirio dice Morris,

“Although typical of the exaggerations recurring throughout the play, the indictments of her as ‘maldita’ by La Poncia and as ‘Endemoniada!’ by Magdalena (Act 3, 1065) suggest a complex temperament, a disturbed psychology, which has led one critic to describe her as ‘the most complex’ and ‘the most passionate’ character (27, pp.89, 90) and another as ‘the only psychologically complex character of the tragedy’ (82, p.88). Other critics have commented on her envy and hypocrisy (71, pp.xxxix, xl), her inferiority complex (87, p.8), her ‘fiebre sexual’ (20, p.90), and her similarity to her mother (62, p.260)... The dark thoughts revolving so obsessively in her head that she has the honesty to confess to Adela: ‘tengo el corazón lleno de una fuerza tan mala, que, sin quererlo o, a mi misma me ahoga’ (Act 3, 1062).” (Morris, 54)

Por supuesto, Martirio no es ya exactamente Bernarda – no ha aprendido esconder sus sentimientos ni olvidar sus pasiones - pero es capaz de llegar a ser como ella, y Bernarda está tratando de reproducir su personalidad y morales en sus hijas. “With a few predictable words like respetar and decencia, Bernarda transfers to her daughters her own indoctrination, which was a form of malnutrition; of her we could say, in the words of Adrienne Rich, ‘Like the traditional foot-bound Chinese woman, she passes on her own affliction.’ She bequeaths simple standards that depend on suppressing information… on purveying misinformation… or on composing a brittle surface out of words that are misused. A major casualty of her demand for ‘buena fachada y armonía familiar’ (Act 3, 1046) is truth; another casualty is spiritual integrity…” (Morris, 67)

Martirio ya ha desarrollado algunas características que me hace pensar en Bernarda. Por ejemplo, le gusta espiar en su hermana Adela. Según Morris, la protesta de Adela - “Adela’s “Durmiendo o velando, no tienes por qué meterte en lo mío!” (Acto 2, 1012) – muestra que Martirio es como una sombra que siempre está mirando a su hermana. En Acto 3, ella mira “hacia la puerta del corral” (1051) y sigue Adela mientras Adela “desaparece por la puerta del corral” (1057); “her confession in Act 2 – ‘He visto como te abrazaba!’ (1038). This role, in itself sinister, is made all the more insidious by the way she uses her knowledge, by her style of malevolent obliqueness, which fuels tensions and increases suspicions.” (Morris 53)

En el comentario por Morris veo también la semejanza entre la propensión de madre e hija responder a muchas situaciones con las mismas ideas y proverbios no originales.

“From the beginning her voice is heard as the bleakest, lamenting first her status as an automaton – ‘Yo hago las cosas sin fe, pero como un reloj’ – and contending, on the evidence of her eyes: ‘Y veo que todo es una terrible repetición’ (Act 1, 992, 993). Such complains are not original, nor does Lorca mean them to be: they echo what so many other women have said, expressing a common resentment…” (Morris, 53)

Últimamente, estoy de acuerdo con C.B. Morris cuando dijo que Bernarda no era “ni una caricatura ni un monstruo.” Creo que las acciones de Bernarda Alba son la resulta trágica de un tipo de crianza y unas circunstancias en un tipo de personalidad especifica, y tal vez esta combinación repetirá en su hija, Martirio.







Obras Citadas:


Baker, Armand. "Lorca's La casa de Bernarda Alba and the Lack of Psychic Integration" 2006. May 11th, 2010. http://www.armandfbaker.com/lorca_alba.pdf

Departamento de Lengua C. y Literatura. “La casa de Bernarda Alba.” IES La Aldea de San Nicolás May 11th, 2010. http://www.ieslaaldea.com/documentos/doculengua/bernardaalbatex.pdf

Morris, C. B. Critical Guides to Spanish Texts: La casa de Bernarda Alba. London: Grant & Cutler, 1990.

Ramsden, H. La casa de Bernarda Alba, Volume 1983, Part 2. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1983.

Seybolt, Richard. “Characterization in CBA: the case of Martirio .” Garcia Lorca Review. 8 (1980): 82-90

Lorca, Garcia . "La Casa de Bernarda Alba." Aproximaciones. 'Ed'. Mike Ryan. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2008. Print.

Finals Week

Yikes yikes. I need to not freak out - I can get it all done if I don't waste time. I did the Catalan presentation and the rough draft of the Spanish paper, and I'm not worried about those exams. So I put in an hour to spruce up the paper and I'm covered in those classes. In German I have a paper due tomorrow but it's nothing exceptional, so I'll knock it out tonight with no trouble. Even the profile isn't too bad, just gotta get down to business. It's due Friday at 3. I just finished all my News stuff, and that's a big weight off my shoulders - profile and convergence projects vanquished as of fifteen minutes ago! I'm not much worried about the Anthro final either, and there's no German final or News final.

So, basically, I have a week to do my VISA paperwork and write two research papers. The papers aren't supposed to be all that long and they wouldn't even have to be perfect, except that my teacher's expectations are crushing me. I'm still not 100% sure what I'm going to do for the Catalan paper and I'm worried that a certain percentage of it is going to be bullshit, that I'm not going to be 100% proud of the result. But maybe I'll surprise myself if I just dig in up to my elbows and focus. The Nihonjinron paper I'm more confident about, but I still hope I can give it what it deserves. Both of the teachers are excited to see it and are even talking about trying to get it published, and I haven't even written the papers yet!! O.O It's a lot to live up to, I wish they'd keep their mouths shut and afterward either say, "okay, it's adequate" or "sorry, I can't give you credit", or, if it at that point warrants the praise, "this is brilliant Miranda, let's publish".

To do: (not in order, except for #1)

1.) Figure out what I need from mom and dad for the VISA, send them the information for that. (est. 1 hour)
2.) Write the Nihonjinron paper (est. 6 hours)
3.) Organize Catalan ideas (est. 6 hours)
4.) Write the Catalan paper (est. 6 hours)
5.) Do work stuff like being on call, etc (est. 45 hours)
6.) Put in a bit of time studying for Anthropology (est. 2 hours)
7.) Put in a bit of time studying for Spanish (est. 2 hours)
8.) Revise Spanish paper (est. 1 hour)
9.) Do my paperwork for the VISA (est. 2 hours)
10.) Random commitments like EI, banquets, mom, saying goodbye to friends, packing??? (est. ???)

I say I have a week. I actually have almost two. The goal is to get everything done by next Thursday, but I have the next weekend if I absolutely need it. I've also talked to Palmer, at least, about how I'll probably turn in a rough draft and make edits over the summer. Maybe Monica will accept that too?

Spring Festivities

It's a lovely time to be alive and on campus and not such a lovely time to be bogged down in papers. Today I neglected to bring my camera with me and I was kicking myself all day.

First I passed "Captain America" with his American Flag pants and bandana, his t-shirt with an American flag logo, and the American flag poking out of his army-camouflage backpack. I saw his bike not far away - it's one of those short 'trick bikes' or whatever, all American-flag style too, with flags attached to the basket and the seat. Closest we have to a national costume, folks, look close - I hope it takes it's rightful place next to the Bunad, Kimono, Ledehosen, Sari, and Kilt soon! :)

There was also a little carnival going on at Lowry Mall, the same one I passed through when I toured Mizzou, either through luck or lack thereof (not sure how fair it is to have something like that going on for your first impression of a school!). I had my pockets full of cash from my camping-deposit refund, so I bought a number of honey sticks, (planning to send some of them to Liisa and Rinna... maybe Uni too if he likes), and two deep fried Oreos. At 2 for a dollar I thought it was worth the experience. They were kind of what you'd expect - a little moist cookie wrapped in carnival dough and abused. Strangely, although it was supposed to be sort of a Farmer's Market, there was no produce to be had - only some beef, pork, lots of honey, jam, baked goods from the Amish, (one of the girls had a mustache... I know I shouldn't laugh but it was hilarious), and potted herbs. No basil though.

On the quad there was a little bitty book sale from the Art History department. Very random selection of books. I picked up On a Pale Horse because someone recommended it to me a while ago (I'm thinking Jorge?) and it was a whole dollar.

I finished my profile for Journalism just in time, I think it was fine too even though it was way over the word limit. "Katfish Katy" proved to have a far more interesting life than I had imagined, and I'm not terrible at people writing so I was prepared and ready to work with much less. Our group project is also going well, I feel that for once I haven't helped out that much, haven't taken much of a leadership role, but then I often do in group projects and I am awfully swamped right now. Still, I keep offering my help and my two partners don't seem very bothered. The teacher says we're actually ahead of the other groups which I think reflects more poorly on them than it does well on us, but still. So, with Journalism taken care of, most of my stress right now is on Spanish. I have to whip up about 5 pages of analysis on La Casa de Bernarda Alba tonight. It's for a rough draft, but still.

I wish I could go outside and enjoy the cool breeze. :D And apparently there was an event today where you could climb the Alpine Tower for free. Ju called and invited me but regretfully I had class. ;_; Too bad, I've been meaning to get up there. One of these days/years...

Stress and Excitement

I am too busy to blog guilt-free these days. (I'm stealing time to write this in an awkward half hour between classes). I'm really too busy to do much of anything except write papers, but you know what? I have A's in all classes right now. And I'm not going to be here next year. So I need to take at least some personal time, say goodbye to friends and to Missouri. I'm going camping this weekend despite the nagging - no, threatening and trembling - voice telling me I'd be better off staying home and locking myself in. I also need to pack and blah blah blah. Luckily I am at least one step ahead because my room is cleaner than it's been most of the semester, and I'm going to really try to keep it that way.


So yeah, stressful times, but it's mostly good stress. I like most of the papers I'm doing - especially the Nihonjinron one. This can actually be sort of a problem - as much as I'd love to shut myself up for a week (or longer) with it, do field work even, come up with something publishable - it's not in the cards, it's not in the schedule. And that's okay, I guess. :) I kind of wish they would give me June to keep working on it, but less as an extension because I procrastinated and more because I want to devote my full attention to it and make it as good as it can be. And so I can procrastinate, too. ;)



The other two papers are the one for Catalan and the one for Spanish. I think the Catalan paper is going to be about Andorra - perceptions of Andorra from within and without and what it means to be Andorran and how it's shown in media and what people think about it. Again I could go much further with the topic, but in the end I'm just going to read a few books and put together 20 pages of a beginning. The Spanish paper is a bit yucky... we'd only read two plays in class when we started working on it, and I wasn't very enthusiastic about either of them. Two plays later and if I switch topics now I have more work, plus I'm only mildly enthusiastic about one of the plays out of four. I guess drama just isn't my favourite genre. If I don't switch topics, I'll be writing about The Man Who Turned into a Dog and what this means about professions and castes and blah blah blah, especially in a down economy. I'm not excited about it at all, but I could do research about how the current recession and the Great Depression were dehumanizing. If I do switch topics, I'll write about how drama is a more realistic medium than prose or poetry. Not that it's better, just more realistic because it shows us communication - and communication is all we know of people in reality. I'm more interested in that topic, especially for a shorter essay, but I actually think the first one might be easier. There's one more informal essay coming up, so I might write the informal essay about my new idea and see how that goes.



Anyway. I need to say goodbye to Ju and Prite in a manner of speaking, and I'm not going to be seeing any of the others - Zahra, Laura, Tabi, etc for another year as well. Thus the camping. It's going to be awesome and I'm very excited. I'm excited about other stuff as well - Liisa's visit this summer and Scotland and Spain. Still, it's planning and money and stress, however nice. Lucia and Allan and I got together in a three-way chat and started hammering out the 'details'. I'm a bit nervous becuase I'm not 100% when I need to report for my VISA or even what the EU entry requirements are... what if by some awful chance I won't get the VISA until late August and can't enter the EU until then? Honestly? I'd seriously consider hopping to Norway and back or something like that. What are the other non-EU countries that are close by and cheap? Ooohhh... what about Iceland? Not that it's cheap, but I'd actually love that. Well, jk, ideally I'll have the VISA tucked away neatly by the time I take off.



I would tell the details of the plan but this is an ugly stresspost and I don't want to put the details in now and create a redundancy when I repost them with glee later on. Suffice to say that it's all going to be awesome... we've booked the first element (hostel in Valencia for Tomatina)... we've planned an epic six day walk across Scotland... and Lucia won't shut up about Nessie or dressing up as Vikings. Liisa and I have a Skype Date set for tomorrow morning and I should have some idea about what distance we're heading in at that point. :)



So, basically lots of excitement and also a lot of stress. What else is new? :)

Busy, Busy, Busy

Two friends had their birthday parties this week. My E.I. for the semester is on Monday. I've been trying to organize AMG's volunteer week at Hickman High School. News Class is bogging me down in tons of work and obligations. I'm trying to get paperwork for study abroad figured out. Oh, and I somehow ended up signing up to be a captain for the food drive on Friday. Go me. :) Luckily classes haven't been too bad this week or I'm not sure I'd be able to cope. As it is I'm treading water, and only regretting that I can't spend a bit more time enjoying the weather.

Uni's Spanish is progressing nicely! By the time he leaves Spain I think we'll be able to have conversations. He's hard on himself but he's really doing well. Today I taught him my secret for past tense, since he hasn't learned it yet and I remember how frustrating it was to be forced to live only in the present. ;) (The secret is to use the pluperfect... haber conocido, etc, forms. Not 100% accurate, but gets the point across better than saying conozco ayer or something.)

Drama - More Scientific, More Realistic

In Spanish class they asked us to think about the difference between drama and straight prose, and after a bit of internal grumbling, because, after all, I've always preffered prose because I love words, the more of them the better, the rich descriptions of landscapes and psyche and so on, preferred these to the transcript-style of drama, especially when read.

But after that, I just thought about Belief vs. Communication, Anthropological Theories of Religion. Only one of the two is scientific... Communication.
After all, who can prove who believes in what?

But when we read we know, we're in someone else's head, we hear their real thoughts or so we think... in fiction we can accept it, in creative nonfiction we have to realize that the re-imagined thoughts are basically remixed communication from what they once said.

And it's interesting, because drama isn't like this. Drama is all communication. We guess at thoughts, motivations based on communicated words and body language and actions, just as in the real world.

So drama is more scientific, more realistic...
Not to say it's BETTER,
Ordinary prose just gives more of an insight, a window into another perspective, allows for commentary, and explanation, in a way that isn't fully testable, and so, it's an interesting thought, isn't 100% verifiable or trustworthy.

La Infinita

This is not my best Ensayo Informal. It's a bit too short and not super organized. But it's my Birthday, what do they really expect/want from me?

Ideas y Preguntas sobre La Infinita por Pablo Neruda

La idea de hombre poderoso y experimentado que se siente pequeño ante una mujer no es nueva. Para dar solo un ejemplo, hay la canción “A Thing Called Love”, por Johnny Cash, en que dice, “I saw that giant of a man brought down to his knees by love.” Para mí, es interesante que en el poema “La Infinita”, Neruda no especifique lo que es sobre la mujer que tiene este efecto en él. No habla de la personalidad de la mujer, tampoco describe su inteligencia ni su ingenio. A decir la verdad, habla tampoco sobre su belleza. Habla de su cuerpo, por supuesto, sobre como precioso y fascinante el cuerpo parece a él, pero no sobre su belleza necesariamente, que creo que es interesante.

En este sentido, es similar a los otros poemas y canciones que me parecen tener la misma tema, por ejemplo la de Johnny Cash, y también “Esta Canción es Para Amor” de la película El Rey León, en que dice, “It's enough for this restless warrior just to be with you.” E otras cosas así. No sé porque ningunas de estos ejemplos usan descripciones específicas para hablar sobre la mujer. Las canciones son muy vagas y pueden aplicar a cualquiera mujer. Siempre había supuesto, entonces, que había un amor verdadero en estas canciones, que las chicas tenían personalidades fantásticas y no importaban tanto los hombres que necesitaban cantar sobre la piel blanquísima y la cara perfecta.

Pero el poema de Neruda es interesante, porque habla del cuerpo pero todavía está vago. Es fácil decir que es superficial porque habla sobre el cuerpo de la mujer y nada más, ¿pero que dice exactamente?

El dice que su pecho es como “las palomas gemelas”, pero esto puede describir más que un tipo de pecho. De “Pequeña, grano de trigo, alondra…” podemos ver que ella es pequeña… o, por lo menos, que parece pequeña a este hombre poderoso, que ha hecho la paz y la guerra y ha medido la tierra. Después, las descripciones son más raras y dicen menos sobre un cuerpo verdadero. Por ejemplo, “La luz de tu cintura.” y “Eres blanca y azul.” – ¿Porque tiene una luz en la cintura? ¿Por lo menos podía imaginar cómo podía un orificio, como la boca o, aun mas normal en la poesía, los ojos, tener luz… pero la cintura? ¿De dónde viene la luz? Ojalá que la mujer no esté azul de verdad.

Lo que sí puedo decir sobre las descripciones, es que nunca mencionan la belleza ni la edad de la mujer. Al contrario, dice, “andando, andando, me pasaré la vida.” – Entonces, va a explorar su cuerpo a través de las vidas de las dos, no importa la edad, la condición superficial del cuerpo. ¿Si solo le importa la belleza, porque está con la misma chica en la juventud y también en la vejez, a través de la vida? Hay más aquí que la lujurio.

No estoy segura que entiendo la parte sobre la mar y la vendimia. Esta parte es difícil entender para mí, pero la vendimia y los racimos tienen que ver con las uvas, y las uvas y la mar son cosas muy importantes y simboles de Chile. El poeta, Pablo Neruda, era de Chile e incorpora cosas de su país en muchas de sus obras. Entonces, creo que está comparando la mujer a su país, una comparación que da mucho honor a la chica, si es verdad. Chile es muy importante a Neruda, y no queremos nuestros patrias con lujurio, sino las formas opuestas del amor. Muchas veces no hay una razón concreta porque amamos nuestros países, pero parece un lugar muy bien, la parte más bella del mundo. ¿Dice Neruda que ama a la mujer como ama su país?

Tengo muchas preguntas sobre este poema. ¿Porque muchas poemas y canciones con esta tema no describen mejor la mujer? ¿Porque tiene Neruda esta obsession con el cuerpo, y que quiere decir con esta obsesión? ¿Es algo superficial? ¿Solo le importa el cuerpo? ¿O es el cuerpo un tipo de metonimia?

High Grammar as a Second Language

I'm studying now for my grammar exam - the exam no Journalism student at the University of Missouri is allowed to go into sequence without passing. I'm not too worried - I've taken the practice exam twice and scored about 90% each time, and I've brushed up on the things that do confuse me a bit.

I have a good ear for grammar in general, and it's almost amusing to me that I don't score 100%. After all, English is my native language, I'm a better than average writer, and I study languages. But some of the examples on the test are just silly - horribly written with or without the corrections, just constructions that no native speaker would try to push through. (For example, "The thief was he."

Actually, I'm curious as to how learning foreign languages, and general linguistics, impacts my English grammar. I think it does more good than harm, ultimately, but I also think that, contrary to what any Latin teacher will tell you, it goes both ways. Learning languages teaches me the fancy words and distinctions that many of my classmates are struggling with, for example. My scores on case-identification and voice-identification sections are flawless. On the other hand, learning different languages strips away the sense of objectivity that grammarians try to cloak their subject in.

Take, for example, these two examples: The Dread Double Negative and The Dread Passive Voice. For many grammatical no-no's, Grammarians admit that "it's just the way English works", but for these two they provide more logic than usual. The say that Double Negatives simply make no sense - If you haven't got no cheese, you must have SOME cheese, right? And passive voice makes sentences wordy, weak, and dull. Sounds pretty convincing to me, except that these logical conclusions aren't cross-linguistically applicable.

In many languages, such as Spanish, double negatives are totally acceptable, sometimes even recommended.
Ex. - "No tengo ni idea - I don't have no idea."

In Latin, using passive voice was considered more refined and sophisticated than using active.
Ex. - "Liber Caesari a regina donor - The book was given to Caesar by the Queen."

While some might shift uncomfortably at the first example and scramble to think of a non-racist and non-ethnocentric way to suggest that hispanohablantes might just be a bit ignorant, most people hold Latin up as THE most perfect, most logical literary language, so it's preference for the passive voice doesn't do much to support their claim for the intrinsic superiority of the active.

But what does all this mean for students of languages and linguistics, such as myself? It could go either way, I suppose. We might get so confused by all the possibilities, struggle to remember which rules belong to which language, even be driven into apathy by the subjectivity of it all. But generally, I find, increasing our useful knowledge only gives us an edge.

As for myself, I find the who-whom debate to be silly. People never, or at least very rarely, use whom when speaking. It's dying, if not dead, and there's little use in weeping over it. It'll hardly be the first or the last tragedy of an ever evolving language. I use who 99.9% of the time when speaking, and my knowledge of linguistics and foreign languages has only strengthened my resolve to do so, since I realize that using whom would be useless and a bit confusing at best, and arrogant at worst.

But today I have to take a grammar test, and they're going to test me on who-whom, and they're handing out the grades, those nassstttyyy grammarians, so I'll play their game tonight. And I'll play it well, too, because I know the answers, having taught myself Grammatical English as one of my many secondary languages.

Update: I got 99% on the test. I'm pretty sure the one I got wrong was about politics - whether the word politics is singular or plural. :P

Ensayo Informal/Rima LIII

Another informal response-to poetry essay for Spanish literature class. :) This time we're looking at Becquer's Rima LIII

Love Makes Everything a Weapon

Pensamientos sobre Rima LIII - Las Golondrinas y Las Madreselvas

El amor mejora todo, y después, hace toda un arma. Cuando leí el poema “Rima LIII” por Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, reconocí esta idea. En este poema, la voz narrativa dice a una chica con quien está enamorado que la primavera si volverá. Será bellísima. Pero no será tan bella como era – cuando estaban juntos. Y encontrarás el amor otra vez, pero nunca alguien que te ama tanto que te amo yo.

Creo que Bécquer usa los imagines naturales de la primavera, porque quiere decir que la vida si continua después del periódico más duro después de la relación. Si, continúe, y las golondrinas volverán y las madreselvas también, pero hay aspectos que no volverán, y en alguna manera las que si volvieran traen con ellas memorias dolorosas. La primavera no es el invierno - hay vida en primavera, pero no la abundancia de vida que viene en el calor del verano. La primavera es algo más frágil y más vulnerable, como un corazón que todavía se esté recuperando. Por la conexión íntima entre las imágenes de la naturaleza y la relación, parece que el amor, para él, primero ha mejorado y después ha dañado a todos los aspectos de la vida, ya ha convertido todo en un arma que puede causar dolor. Esta es una sensación que he sentido yo también.

La primera vez que leí este poema pensaba de una canción de música del campo un poco tonto. Era “Please Remember Me,” por Tim McGraw. En las dos obras, hay una voz poética que habla con una chica, y usando las imágenes de procesos naturalezas que continúan para hablar del fin de una relación, pero los sentimientos son diferentes. Tim dice a la chica que ella debe continuar con su vida y encontrar más felicidad, un amor mejor y más fuerte, y solo la pide a recordar a él. Su tono apesta al martirio, pero la idea es que él quiere que ella este feliz. En contraste, Bécquer parece un poco amargo cuando dice, “Desengáñate: ¡Así no te querrán!”

Me gustan mucho los dos poemas. Los tonos son completamente diferentes, y a veces puedo entender uno más que el otro, y el próximo día es el opuesto. Pero los dos expresan un sentido que el amor cambia todo – lo hace mejor y también peor que antes.

Me parece cuando estamos enamorados, ponemos nuestro amor en todo que vivimos. Todo se pone más bello a causa de este amor, más bello y también más poderoso. Gritamos más, reímos más, sentimos todo con esfuerza. Entonces, cuando la relación llega al fin, todo está de repente algo doloroso. Hay las sombras y los ecos de nuestras memorias por todas partes.

Erase una vez, estaba enamorado y sentí ese amor poner su proprio color en todo en mi vida. Entonces, por semanas después, la cosa más sencilla y delicada – una camisa cierta rayada, la monotonía de las aspas del ventilador en mi techo, una brisa fría que venía del norte, y no puedo mencionar todas las mil palabras, incluso idiomas enteras – todos eran dolorosos, algo que parecía cortar mis tendones de Aquiles. Aun ahora, años después, no hay ningún día en que ninguna cosa hace que pienso en el.

La primera imagen que usa Bécquer es la de las golondrinas que cuelgan sus nidos en el balcón. Estas líneas, de las golondrinas, son mis favoritas en el poema. La imagen de las golondrinas volviendo a sus nidos es fuerte y también da un sentido de ser colocado y en casa, seguro y feliz. Tal vez la pareja del poema tenía sueños de tener un hogar junto, y ahora nunca realizarán esta idea. Las golondrinas que no volverán, dice Bécquer, son las que “el vuelo refrenaban tu hermosura y mi dicha a contemplar.” La palabra dicha me gusta mucho. Es de alguna manera una palabra llena del sol. Solo en leer estas líneas, sentía que podía ver la pareja, riendo juntos en un cuarto asoleado, con las golondrinas pasando afuera.

Después, habla Bécquer sobre las madreselvas que escalan las tapias en el jardín, y aquí soy menos segura de lo que me hacen sentir las imágenes. Es algo más sombrío, más adulto. También hay hermosura, pero menos sol. Me gustaría saber más sobre estas líneas.

Es difícil para mí también entender los sentimientos exactos de la voz poética hasta la chica con quien habla. Esta triste, ¿pero que mas? ¿Hay amargura también? La línea repetida, “Esas… ¡no volverán!” tiene una esfuerza considerable y parece enfadado. Y la línea final, “Desengáñate: ¡Así no te querrán!” no solo tiene esfuerza pero también un sentido de la mofa. Al mismo tiempo, no hace ningún secreto, ni por su orgullo ni su amargura, de que feliz era, cuando estaba con ella, y como toda la naturaleza ha convertido en un espejo por ver el amor que no tiene ahora.

Meeting Professors

This definitely hasn't been one of my easier college weeks. I had a German project, a Spanish paper, a bunch of reslife stuff, and a bunch of other stressful things that popped up to make my life somewhat miserable. Needless to say I wasn't getting my nightly eight hours, and it wasn't by choice.

But things have been getting steadily better since Monday. I'm all set for one of my two honors-by-contracts, and the other is in the works and should go through fine, meaning that I get to stay in the Honors College. I actually met with my Spanish and German teachers to brainstorm and feel better about those projects, and it's amazing how much that helped.

As it's ended up I've now gotten to know four of my six professors reasonably well (aka better than most students). Admittedly one of them was Monica, who I had first semester Freshman year and immediately got along well with. But my Anthropology Professor, Dr. Palmer, is awesome too, very funny, and I'm looking forward to working with him on the honors contract. My German teacher, Franzel, is quite nice as well - not Megan, but who is?

I was also really happy to meet my Spanish teacher during his office hours. He hadn't impressed me overly much in class and I have to admit the possibility that I was holding a grudge against him for being a gringo. It's the truth - I hate fake Spanish accents, and not just the language Spanish, but particularly Spain Spanish, and particularly when spoken by American males. But honestly, what would I prefer? That he spoke with no attempt to disguise a heavy American accent?

What I found out is that he's a pretty cool guy by my standards. He is learning Chinese and apparently at least conversational in it (doing it for his wife, too ^^), has huge German and Italian dictionaries on his shelf (and by huge I mean, no one has a dictionary that big if they're not really doing something with the language), and is obviously familiar with the basics of untranslated Latin poetry. Oh, and he likes Lord of the Rings.

Getting to know professors is really a great idea - It makes me at least feel more responsible for preparing for class and working hard, participating, etc. It might be as simple as not wanting to disappoint someone I've established a personal contact with.

Ensayo Informal/Soneto XXIII

The assignment was quite vague, and I may go over this tomorrow after re-rereading the instructions that were given to us. We were basically supposed to write about our feelings and observations from a poem we read in class, and use this writing almost as brainstorming to come up with a good question-topic for a more formal essay to be written later in the semester. I chose Garcilaso de Vega's Soneto XXIII and compared it's interpretation of the Carpe Diem theme with both the original Carpe Diem poem by Horace and modern usage of the term. There was no length specified in the papers, which is mildly unsettling, but this comes in at precisely a page of solid text, slightly over 500 words, and I'm hoping that's about right. Oh, and finally, yes, I had to use that exact structure and style in framing my investigation topic. I'm not happy with that sentence at all but that's what happens when you try to force Miranda to use a rigid format. (bad things)

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Cuando decimos “Carpe Diem”, también decimos “Memento Mori” (Recuerde que morirá). La idea de Carpe Diem, después de todo, es que debemos vivir cuando estamos viviendo, porque en el fin todos vamos a morir. Sin embargo, normalmente este tema de Carpe Diem no es algo espantoso ni macabro, sino una exhortación sencilla a gozar, tomar riesgos, y vivir como si no hay mañana.

La frase Carpe Diem viene originalmente de un poema por Horacio, Carmen XI en Liber I de su Carmina. El hablante trata de convencer su amiga, Lucenoe, a gozar la vida, vivir en el momento sin pensar en el fin de la vida, no importa cuándo viene. Dice “Sé sensata, filtra tus vinos, y adapta al breve espacio de tu vida una esperanza larga… Carpe diem, no te fíes del mañana.” El poema no está espantoso o aún verdaderamente triste - habla de muerte como algo natural, asumido, e inevitable, si viene repentinamente, o como pendiente gradual en vejez. Este poema de Horacio parece algo familiar, porque incorpora el tema de disfrutar de vida antes de que sea demasiado atrasado, y la subestimación de la muerte, que son partes significativos de nuestro uso moderno de la frase Carpe Diem.

Quince siglos después, el poeta español Garcilaso de la Vega utilizó el tema de Carpe Diem en su Soneto XXIII. En contrasto con la poema original de Horacio, el Soneto XXIII tiene un aspecto amenazante y oscuro, una urgencia y una violencia que desarrolla durante las cuatro estrofas. El narrador todavía está hablando a una muchacha, usando imágenes de la naturaleza y de la realidad de la brevedad de la vida para convencerla disfrutar de su juventud, pero del viento que primero disturba el pelo de la muchacha, y luego el sonido áspero del comando, " coged" , y especialmente a la línea, “Marchitará la rosa el viento helado”, con su imagen algo violenta de vientos helados que destruyen la belleza, este soneto todavía tiene la idea de disfrutar de vida, pero añade este miedo de la muerte e incluso de la vejez, que se considera como enemigo violento.

Este poema no parece tan familiar como lo de Horacio. Al principio sentía que su tono oscuro y espantoso eran las resultas de una interpretación única del tema por Garcilaso de Vega. Cuando pensaba más en esto, me parecía que ni el poema original de Horacio ni la interpretación relativamente moderna de Garcilaso de Vega era exactamente igual con cómo utilizamos la expresión “Carpe Diem" hoy. Siento que nuestro uso moderno comparte una urgencia y un sentido de exhortación más fuerte con el poema de Garcilaso de Vega, pero falta su sentido del miedo y de la violencia.

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Pregunta de Investigacion:

Investigo las tres diversas interpretaciones del tema de Carpe Diem en el poema original de Horacio, el soneto de Garcilaso de Vega, y uso de la frase como cliché moderno, porqué quiero saber cómo cada poema expresa su interpretación, y cómo las tres interpretaciones se relacionan el uno al otro, con el fin del comprensión del desarrollo de este frase y concepto a través de su historia y con respecto a otras temas similares.

Lope de Vega in Norway

Today in Spanish class we were talking about love and obsession, the line between them, what separates them, and so on and so forth. One student tried to go down the line of reasoning that if you love someone and they don't love you back, that can be obsession. Most cases of obsession do have that element, but obviously that's not the full story. The teacher then put forth a hypothetical scenario: He has a wife, they're very happy, they love each other... then one day the wife leaves and says she's never coming back and doesn't love her anymore. If he still loves her, is that no longer love? Does love absolutely require reciprocation?

And so on and so forth. And suddenly I remembered something very strange that I saw in Norway. It would have been perfect to use in the discussion, right down to the fact that we're studying literature, even literature by the author of the line that came into my mind. I almost spoke up - but the problem is that I know the line only in Norwegian, and that might have been a bit awkward.

Ubesvart kjærlighet er som blomster dekket av rimfrost.

- Lope de Vega

I found this in Sandefjord, which is sort of the whaling capital of Norway, in a little 'castle' made of boards and such in their park. As you can see, it's laminated and stapled on somewhat randomly... You may understand that when I saw it, it threw me back a few feet. Who put it there? And why?

Strange as it was, I hadn't thought much about it in the intervening year and a half, (I can almost say years... :P), until now. At the time I hadn't even known who Lope de Vega was, but the quote came back to me word for word in class today. Now I'm very eager to find out what play it's from, and how it's said in Spanish. Google has failed me so far. Any help?

Elision

My Spanish is a bit rough around the edges after taking a semester off, but thankfully we've started the semester with something that evens the playing field: poetry. And, in particular, metrics... counting syllables and rhyme schemes and everything else, making note of stress and hiatus and synaloepha.

... Synaloepha? Yeah, that's what I did, too. Called Sinalefa in Spanish, they try to translate it into some overly Greek word I've never seen before. But you know, they longer they talk about it, the more it sounds like good, old, familiar, Elision.

And before I know it we're scanning lines of verse, counting out syllables and bridging vowels together and marking whether each line is llano, agudo, or esdrujulo, and it almost seems strange to me that we're not also making short and long, not looking for double consonants that are one of our best hints, not separating the line into dactyls... because I can do this, because this is an old game.

And suddenly it's hard to make out the Spanish, hard to keep scanning lines of

Desmayarse, atreverse, estar furioso,
áspero, tierno, liberal, esquivo,
alentado, mortal, difunto, vivo,
leal, traidor, cobarde y animoso

Because as I read I feel the pounding of waves, and Lope De Vega is morphing into Virgil.

Postquam altum tenuere rates nec iam amplius ullae
apparent terrae, caelum undique et undique pontus,
tum mihi caeruleus supra caput astitit imber
noctem hiememque ferens, et inhorruit unda tenebris.

And then, it's almost as if I'm back in Latin class, and we're teasing Mir Inaamula about wanting a "good wife" more than a sports car, and some boy I really don't like and whose name I don't remember putting candy on my desk, and it's gross and sweaty from his hands, and Mr. McAllister is trying to explain things but we're all being obstinate, and then Colin (or was it the other one?) is going over to the board and writing a parody of some pop song - I don't know where he comes up with these things - and collide is becoming elide and poor McAllister thinks that's the way the song really goes and suddenly, briefly, has respect for pop culture until we all start laughing, but afterwards I can never hear the song without thinking of it. And one cold day when I leave school late and I'm the only one left in a lot too large to walk through alone, and the song comes out of the big football speakers for some reason, with a hollow sound, and scares the nearby birds into taking flight...

Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the wrong words seem to rhyme
Out of the doubt that fills my mind
I somehow find

You and I...
Elide

Second Day of the Semester

Yesterday was a very different day than Tuesday - my classes started early and got out early. And, I had all language classes, which made for an interesting day.

Introduction to Hispanic Literature was fine. I mean, it scares me a little bit, like News, because I know all the assessments are subjective... and there is quite a bit of work. I somehow felt that I was done with structured and graded literature analysis after high school, and then I realized that if I want a Spanish major I was very, very wrong about that. So, here we go again. I keep reminding myself that my experience in AP English has prepared me better than most students in the class. Also, the teacher seems way better than the one I had last Spring that nearly made me lose my affection for the Spanish language.

German was pretty good. I didn't know the class would be taught in German until I picked up the textbooks last week, actually, and now I find out that not only is the class taught in German, we cover some German grammatical concepts and stuff in there. The good news is that it is evidently at the right difficulty level for me, since my friend from Intermediate German II, Cori, is in the class with me. It's nice to start out with a friend. The class size is quite small, which is to be expected of the language class it is, but not really whatever it was I expected... a gentle lecture on German Christmas traditions? XD Actually I have no idea what I thought, but I have to admit this is much better for me right now, especially if I'm going to be studying in Germany. My first impression of the teacher is that I like him, but maybe not as much as Megan from last Spring. She was just awesome. Strangely I came away from the class with a strong feeling of motivation to start improving my German. I really need to beef up my vocabulary - I'm going to grab my store-bought vocabulary cards from the lake next time I go, and start using them religiously.

Catalan was awesome. I'm so excited to be in that class. The class size is surprisingly large considering that the first time the course was offered it had to be canceled for lack of interest. Here we are at take two, and not only is the room full, most of the people seem to have genuine reasons for being there. One guy is a super language geek and majoring in Spanish and French. I'm there more than anything to support the movement to advance a (any) minority language. One girl is there because her boyfriend is Catalan and his parents don't even speak English! She knows how important it is for him, and... well, how romantic, right? Another student is trying to get a grant to go to Barcelona and study the relationship between the Catalan language, politics, and football, of all things. So, this should be a good time. It's great to have Monica as a teacher again, she's one of my three favourite professors at MU. Teach Yourself Catalan is our textbooks. We're trying to get another one imported from Spain too, but just the idea makes me giggle. This morning we got an email saying to read pages 1-19 from teach yourself as homework tonight - I've never thought in terms of page numbers in Teach Yourself before... Another surprise? The course is going to be taught in Catalan. We're managing to follow it pretty well, and of course she's speaking slowly, and it's crucial that all of us have an unmentioned background in Spanish. She says it's to get us used to the sounds and feel of the language, that she knows that 3 hours a week of speaking mostly English won't get us good enough in time, that we're not expected to produce Catalan right away... which is hard, because when she asks us a question we're all super trained to reply in like form, and when our brains realize they can't do Catalan, they switch to Spanish, and she says that's worse than English... which makes sense both politically and linguistically, but try to tell my brain, or that of any other student, so.

Monica has big plans for Catalan at MU. She dreams of adding an intermediate class, maybe even a small advanced class, if there's interest. She has an idea of another teacher who could join her and supplement the department. This year we're having a Catalan Symposium here at MU! It's all very exciting, even if I'll graduate before it really comes to fruition and miss a lot of the intermediate stages while I'm abroad. I hope her plans all succeed - and it's an odd feeling knowing how much depends on this, the first class. The fact that so many people signed up is a very good start - now if we all work hard and do well, that can only help the program.

C'est la vie

Since I stalkerishly keep track of the Google searches people are using to get to my blog, I've noticed in recent days that a number of people have been ending up on the posts I wrote last Spring about my Spanish Composition class. Their search terms? "Latigosa translation" "Meaning of Recontrafranco" "Viboresca Spanish definition".

... Suddenly I realized. These are college students, using the same textbook I used, using Google as a Dictionary. And here I've provided them a neat little roadmap: my comments on most of the stories, my translations of a few key lines and difficult words, etc. :P

C'est la vie...

Finals Week Update

Allergies are getting worse, not better. The last week has been almost unbearable, and if things don't break soon, I don't know what I'm going to do. Nights are the worst - I can't just sleep through it, I wake up coughing and sneezing, too cold or too hot, and feeling like shit. And it makes it worse that I have a roommate, because, despite her insistence that it never wakes her up, I know I'm coughing really loudly and obnoxiously and a lot of times when it gets too bad I go to the bathroom to do it.

Anyway. This morning the plan was to take the German final, then work all day on my Spanish essay. I woke up on time and went to the German classroom only to see it full of strangers. I was really freaked out and thought that I had somehow missed the exam. Then I couldn't remember what day it was... Tuesdays are hard for me to remember because Mondays are so long, you know? Anyhow, I found out that ALL my exams are actually Wednesday! I thought two of them were Tuesday, haven't the faintest idea why. They were all in my calendar correctly. None of them conflict, luckily.

I started walking back and sat by the fountain for three or four minutes. The sound and coolness was nice. I woke up cold and had worn a long sleeve shirt and a jacket, but suddenly it was unbearably hot. I thought to myself that at least now I was woken up, I'd just pretend for my pride that that's why I had gone out, and I could start my Spanish essay. But I came back and spent an hour or so reading blogs before settling down to begin.

I don't feel like I'm getting that deep into the topic, but I feel like it's kind of difficult to. The topic is to explain the quote, "(something like) stories are fiction, but they reflect the truth.", using stories we have read in class. So far I've been going through and scanning the author bios for some idea about what's important to them, then talk about what problem, idea, or emotion (most common) they are trying to express with the invented elements of their story. I hope this is the right idea, but since there are many stories it feels kind of shallow... I dunno.

Caffeine

I don't normally take in much, if any, caffeine. There is the trace amount in chocolate, but I don't drink soda, or coffee, or chew any of that caffeine gum or anything like that. So it has a profound affect on me.

I'm taking allergy pills right now that make me tired. Last night I got home from an event and fell asleep at 8. Normal bedtime here is 12-2, so that was really weird. Today I took the allergy pill together with a caffeine pill, hoping they would counteract each other.

ONE caffeine pill. It says on the box that it is the equivalent of one cup of coffee. Well, all day I've been jittery and restless, but still a bit tired, which just felt weird. Part of me wanted to collapse and part of me wanted to go for a run. It actually was worse when I moved - typing for example got me all worked up at the peak of it, and when I walked it felt kind of funny because half of me was slouching and taking my time, and the other part of me was shaking. I couldn't eat much for lunch but I ate noodles when I got back at 2 and I started to feel a bit better. I think I should scale back to half a pill next time, if I even follow this strategy again.

All in all it just makes me feel really stressed out, like I do for the hour before a big speaking test or something. But it also makes me want to work on things, which is what I need right now. I scheduled all the stuff I need to do for P.A., worked some more on the Japan itinerary, figured out where and when I'm going to do my last events and my extra credit for Journalism, wrote some emails, figured out meals and events for the lake house this weekend, coordinated rides for all the people going (the number kept growing), and figured out possible times for the proseminar next year, based on my schedule and the schedules of my Figgies.

I got a high B on the last Stat exam. It would have been a high A, but I lost 10 out of the 12 points I lost on a single written answer problem which absolutely stumped me. (But since I showed my work I recovered 3 of the thirteen points the question was worth :D). I can't get an A in the class, but my B is very solid, and the same goes for Journalism. However, I'm doing extra credit in Journalism and I've been to every review section for Statistics, so there's a chance that my grades will be bumped up to B+'s, which are worth more. Poli Sci is the only class I really have to worry about my C is solid, but... I really don't want a C. :( But poor Anlan! She needs an 87% to pass the class and she hasn't done anywhere near that well on the first tests! (well, obviously.). We're reviewing together tonight. She takes great notes, so I'll come up with helpful memorizing strategies for her and steal her notes. :D German and Spanish are A's.

It's an exciting time, but very stressful, and caffeine is either helping or making it worse, I can't tell. :D

Study Abroad Selections

I had a lot of ideas about where I wanted to study abroad. My final list of ideas looked something like this, in order of priority, interest:

Norway
Spain
Germany? Japan?
Italy? Finland?
Latin America?

Complicating matters significantly was the fact that most of these countries offered multiple locations for Study Abroad.

But I sat down with a chart of my remaining semesters and figured it out like an old fashioned logic puzzle.

Firstly, I have to do one of my semesters through the Journalism School, because I can only take one of my years off from the Journalism school and still get a Journalism degree, and I can only get Journalism credit on one of their programs.

So, looking at the options through Journalism, the most appealing one was Spain, because then I could kill two birds with one stone. The Journalism program in Spain is in the University of Navarra in Pamplona, and you can go there for a full year or for Spring semester. Spring Semester it is.

Next. Norway is really important to me, so I looked at it next. Mizzou has one program in Norway - an exchange with the University of Bergen. The weather there isn't great, or so I've heard, but otherwise it sounds lovely. You can go there for a full year or either semester, but Lene recommended (and it makes sense) going in the Spring - that way the weather is getting nicer, not uglier, you have the summer afterwards if you want to go on any trips, and you're there for Syttende Mai! (Not crucial, but nice)

This meant that I only had a fall semester to work with. For some reason, not many schools have a fall semester option. I started thinking about and looking at my other options. The main two are Germany and Japan. The benefits to Germany are that I could take my classes in German, becoming rather fluent in the process, and that Germany has a nice, central European location, so I could go on a lot of awesome weekend trips, etc. The benefits to Japan are that it's non-European, so I would be able to expand my cultural horizons, and gain maybe a working knowledge of Japanese.

I plugged these into search, and there was one possibility in each country for fall semester. However, the one in Japan comes with a strong recommendation that you have studied Japanese in University, and most of the classes offered at that University are about Japanese cultural studies - interesting, but not easy to apply to my degree.

So I think it makes the most sense to go to Germany - Bonn, in particular. Bonn (a former capital of Germany) looks like it has a lot of culture and great access to several cool countries in Europe (the Benelux, Austria, Switzerland...) which I'd like to go to for a weekend or so while I'm there.

So, it's more or less decided:

Pamplona, Spain
Bergen, Norway
and
Bonn, Germany

The only thing that remains to be decided are which semesters are which - since I have two fall and two spring semesters to work with. I think I'll travel the first fall, and be home the second to kind of break things up and keep myself from going crazy. Then there is just the matter of whether I go to Norway or Spain first, but I'm thinking it might be Norway because there could be advantages to starting my sequence before I go to Spain (if I go the first year I'll be admitted to my sequence but I won't have started).

There is also a possibility that I'd be able to take a summer internship in Argentina at some point, which would be great as I could expand my experiences onto another continent. (I want to be a travel journalist, so this is about more than just bragging about how many countries I have hit ;)) If that works out I might make Lucia come down at the beginning or the end of that so we can have our crazy Chile trip. :D

AMG Presentations

I spent all day at the local high school today, mostly giving presentations. 10 in all, half an hour each... and by the end of it my throat was sore, my legs felt as if they might collapse under me, my back ached, and I felt as if I was using the very last of my powers to keep a smile on my face and keep talking about why kids should study languages as if it was the first presentation, as if I was still thrilled and passionate and... ahhh...

It was a long day, but good, and those few good students have the power to encourage you as much as the sleepers discourage you.

One of the teachers actually asked me whether I had taken a speech class! She said that I did a brilliant job with the presentation. :D And the Latin students were really friendly, asking tons of questions, so I felt comfortable around them and it became less of a presentation and more of a conversation. They asked me where I was from with a sort of awe at one point, and I came down to earth a bit and laughed, saying, "Over in St. Louis".

"She seems almost like an alien, doesn't she?" Said the teacher.

But she said it like a compliment. :)

Ah, I came home tired to the bone... you're welcome, AMG!