The Informal Curriculum that I chose to do was the art museum on campus. In all honesty, it was tough to go to the ones throughout the semester because of baseball practice, so I was planning on intending this one because it was available when I was as well. I have never been to this part of the campus and I was shocked by all the art work that they had and would have never guess this was here.

The way this museum worked was that we got split up into three groups and there were three rooms. Each of these rooms had different art work and each had a woman, who was Hispanic, would read something to us and afterwards would let us look at the art work that was present. I really liked the set up because each woman who led the room with a reading and some even gave use personal background, it allowed us to have some idea of what we were going to see and how these images of art portrayed a message. What was probably the downfall of this event being that the women would read poems which I am not a fan of. I kind of just wanted to look at the art and try to figure out what the artist was trying to portray. This was also a really cool experience because being Hispanic allowed me to understand most of the stuff the women would say and saw familiar artwork such as the Lady of Guadalupe. I believe having this background allowed me to have a good experience about this because I felt like this was a part of me was on display for people to see on campus.

I love going to museums because it allows people to have their own personal thoughts on what the meaning of the art work is. Everyone sees things differently. I can compare it to the modern museums I have been too and realizing simple art work can have different meanings to different people. So, attending this museum was a cool experience not only because of the cool artwork but because my culture was on display on campus which was awesome.

The WordPress blog post really helped me develop skills I did not think was going to help me become a better reader and student in seminar. There were many areas that I improved in when writing these blog posts. One was being able to actively read and understanding how to do it. Knowing that I needed to write these posts forced me to underline, highlight, and write notes in the text to understand main points and develop thoughts or questions. Usually I do not actively read but ever since the blog post, I do it more frequently so I am prepared for the next discussion in class. It also gave me a purpose to read these texts and figure out the deeper meaning. Since understanding the deeper meaning of the text made it easier to write these blog posts, it forced me to analyze important quotes in the text therefore having a better understanding of the readings as a whole.

I believe I did a decent job with the blog posts but once I found a way to pick out important quotes and tie them to something it made it easier for me to write. In the beginning, I was having a hard time tying quotes or explanations to the text but once things started to get relatable and the readings got more interesting, I thought I was able to become better at writing these blog post. Some of the blog posts I thought I did a good job tying things from the text to my personal life and how I felt about the meaning of the quote. Especially a text such as Meditations, I was really able to connect to my life and see if I agreed to what the author was saying or if I disagreed.

What I need to work on is being able to make better connections between different texts and have better explanations. I have never really excelled in writing or reading so these types of classes are always tough. Having an idea of what I need to work on, allowed me to really work on these blog post throughout the year. Going back to the first few blogs and realizing what I could do better and trying to implement that into my current blog. I really believe that these blog posts have benefitted me because it allowed me to see what I can do better, which is a lot of things, and try to improve with every blog post.

In these canto 13 through 17, we are understanding the punishments of the second and third terrace which are the Envious and the Wrathful. The second terrace’s punishment was that “their eyes, sewn so atrociously”. They had to be in this terrace with their eyes shut with iron wires. So, they are not able to see anything and would have to rely on their other senses to understand what is going on around them. I thought this was very intriguing because if my sight was taken away from me, I would be very miserable. Not only did they get their vision taken away but they had iron wires being sown into their eye lids to shut them together. At the end of Canto 13, there is an image of a person with their eyes sown shut and I thought it was a very dark image and showed how horrible it looked. I know that they are souls, so they do not feel pain, but just imaging how that feels and how it looks like was not a pretty picture in anyone’s head when reading this. What I thought was most interesting was how the third terrace’s punishment was “smoke as black as night; and there was no place where we could have avoided it.”. Here we see two terraces having very similar punishments but one is more gruesome than the other. The black smoke was so bad that Dante’s “eyes could not endure remaining open” therefore forcing the people in this terrace to close their eyes. Even though these punishments were for the souls that have sinned, it made me realize how grateful I am to be able to have good vision. I feel like most of us take for granted the gift of vision we have because its normal to be able to see. So I believe these punishment are rough because it takes away the most important human sense, in my opinion, which is vision.

Now in Cantos 28, we are in The Earthly Paradise and everything seems to be perfect. There was a completely different image being portrayed when we enter this level because before The Earthly Paradise, everything was so dark and horrible. This is why it’s called paradise because there is nothing bad about this place. The imagery that Dante uses is very delightful in a way. He states that there is “A gental breeze” and “they were not deflected with such force as to disturb the little birds upon the branches in the practice of their arts”. Personally, that seems like a beautiful place to be having the birds sing. A breeze that is nice and calm. It puts an image in my head like I am in Hawaii, sitting on the beach with the wind calmly blowing in my face. He also uses great imagery words throughout the beginning of the canto enabling the reader to picture an amazing forest or in this case The Earthly Paradise. I thought it was necessary to add some good imagery after the whole book leading up to this was very dark.

The image at the end of cantos 29 was very interesting because I feel like there is a lot of meaning behind it. There are angels, heads, and a bird all in the same image. So I was wondering if there was a deeper meaning to this image or if it was just those things showing what is on The Earthly Paradise.

 

Nearing the end of the novel, I am really enjoying this reading even though at times I have to reread certain things to understand what the true meaning is. Also, using the notes at the end of the book have been really helpful to understanding the deeper meaning of the cantos. Canto was a very interesting read because of the punishment on the sixth terrace which is the Gluttonous. The punishment was that “All of these souls who, grieving, sing because their appetite was gluttonous, in thirst and hunger here resanctify themselves”. Personally, this might be the toughest punishment because the feeling of being very thirsty and starving is the most uncomfortable situations one can be in. Not only was that they couldn’t eat anything but they also had fruit and water in front of them that was not allowed to be used. Dante described a fruit tree that “cried out: ‘This food shall be denied to you” which I thought was very interesting.  Found this interesting because it reminded me of the story of Adam and Eve and how they were not allowed to eat the forbidden fruit. There was somewhere in the canto that talked about how this tree was a copy of the one from the bible. So, I thought it was a pretty cool connection between Dante’s fruit tree in this canto and the one from the bible.

Another thing that I have noticed from Dante’s Purgatorio is that the images after some of the cantos are very dark. Showing us how bad the punishments are and what the people look like that are stuck on that terrace. Such as the one after the sixth terrace, it is a person who is very boney, hungry, and looks like he is about to die from starvation.

Dante’s Purgatorio is a very interesting read but I have been having trouble understanding some of his points and how he is explaining things. Even with some of the notes it has been tough to fully understand what he is saying. When reading Cantos 16, we are still in the third Terence, The wrathful, and Dante is being spoken to by Marco. Marco states “If this were so, then your free will would be destroyed and there would be no equity in joy for doing good, in grief for evil.” ( line 70-72). I was very intrigued by this statement because personally, I believe God has a plan for me and the path of my life is already set. Even though I have that path set for me, I can do bad things which will cause me to go another direction and end up being punished for the actions I have done. Vice versa, if I do good deeds then I will allow myself to continue on the journey of my life, the way God intended me to have. So, I agree with what Marcos is saying because it is ultimately yourself who has the choice of ruining what you have or making the right decisions and no be punished.

Reading about Dante’s three visions in Cantos 17, it was very interesting how Haman was illustrated at the end of the Cantos. When reading the three stories, I thought the second story which was about Haman, was the most wrathful because of his anger towards the Jews. The illustration makes him seem as like a demon that is hanging from a cross, making it seem scary. Therefor making the reader have an imagine in its head, knowing that he was a horrible human and what his punishment was.

Just like all the other poems we have read, I found myself having a difficult time reading this because of my disinterest with poems. In “The Lais of Marie de France” showed many themes but the most noticeable was love. We start to see the presence of love when Guigemar is thinking to himself on a sleepless night how “her words and appearance, the bright eyes, the fair mouth whose sweetness had touched his heart. Under his breathe he cried for mercy; he almost called her his beloved.” (415-420). Knowing that Guigemar lacks love in his life, this is an important part of the story because he finally has love for a woman. He does not know how to react or do with the love he has for her. Also, the way Marie explains his love is very deep and detailed so that the readers understand what he is feeling. She does a stellar job of creating an image of the moment he is in. What made this part very enjoyable most was the uncertainty from both Guigemar and the lady. They did not know whether the other had as much love. Even though the reader understood that they had the same kind of love for each other creating some love drama. For example, right after we have discovered how Guigemar feels toward the lady, the lady returns from mass and thinks to herself “whether the man whom she couldn’t help loving was awake or asleep.” I like reading these types of stories because of the curiosity of what is going to happen next. Are they going to tell each other the love they have for one another? Or are they just going to dismiss these feelings and go about their lives? We find out that they tell each other creating this love story which I enjoyed.

Confessions by Saint Augustine was very difficult for me to understand because I couldn’t analysis the text as compared to other readings. There were a few things that I found interesting and was able to somewhat analyze was when he was talking about sinning and childhood. Saint Augustine states, “Who can recall to me the sins I committed as a baby? For in your sight no man is free from sin, not even a child who has lives only one day on earth.”. When I read this quote, I had to reread it again to fully understand what he was saying. I believe he is right when he states this because everyone sins even if they are the most perfect person. From physical sins to mental sins, no one doesn’t sin. Even children sin because of their actions. Therefore, if children sin, without having the knowledge of what is right and wrong, or even what a sin is, means everyone who is living on earth sins. Minor things such as thinking about stealing someone’s toy or even doing it is a sin for a child even though they have not been taught that stealing is wrong, there is an understanding of sin that the child just committed. Augustine also states how if an adult throws a tantrum it would not be acceptable therefore proving that if a child threw a tantrum it would not be right, leading it to be a sin. This quote explains how sin is all around us even though we try to live perfectly as it was indented to be. But no one can escape sinning which is why Saint Augustine is telling us to be with God.

Don’t let negative comments put you down, let them fuel you to be better and to prove the critics wrong.

Find a way to benefit from every experience, even if the experience was good or bad. Always learn from them.

Definitions, Postulates, Common Notions and Propositions 1-3 from Book 1 by Euclid took me back to freshman year in high school in geometry class. So, understanding how points, lines, triangles, and circles pushed me through this read. Having the interest in mathematics helped me get through this read. When reading, I tried to think about why the school is having us read this book about lines and circles when a line that Euclid stated about how “Things which are equal to the same things are also equal to one another.” (page 71). Knowing that Euclid was talking about geometry, this can be analyzed in a greater context than just math. In today’s society, because of our president, racism has become very popular and has been brought to a nationwide problem. When reading this heavy line, I realize how this could be related to humans and the racism problem we are dealing with today. When Euclid explained how if something is equal to other thing then they are also equal to each other which I believe people need to start realizing. The people that live on this planet are all humans. People are all the same and created the same way therefore, there should not be any hate towards one another. Yes, maybe past events created this hatred towards each other but we now live in a society that should not have problems with either because we all have equal rights. Which makes us all equal to each other.

Another statement made by Euclid really stood out to me in a non-mathematical way was when he stated, “The whole is greater than the part” (page 71). This stood out to be because it reminded me about how in sports people say how one must go through a rough path as we call the process of “sweat, blood and tears” in order to get to the end goal. Once the goal is reached you understand that the process was nothing but only a part of the goal and when you make it, the feeling will be greater than all the suffering. So reading this I found statements that I could relate to life today which was tough but I was able to stretch the meaning of the statements.