Metacognition: Jane Eyre Mash-up

When first looking at the directions for the Jane Eyre Mash-up project, I was confused how to get started. My group had decided that we wanted to explore love and feminism, but we weren't quite sure how. Our first step was to find all of the quotes in Jane Eyre pertaining to love and feminism. Once we did that we started to make connections to other things that we had seen or heard in our lives.

After we began seeing connections to other songs, videos, and pictures, we found that what we were actually exploring was the status quo of feminism throughout different times in history during Jane Eyre and since. This focused our project and allowed us to find more outside sources.

I found that while doing this project my thinking changed a lot. I began to see aspects of modern feminism everywhere, and I was able to apply those to what I read in Jane Eyre so I could gain a better understanding of it. Just by looking at all the different views of feminism throughout time I saw that while there are many ways women have gained freedom since the 19th century, there are still ways we are held back.

Previous to this project I thought that feminism was something wasn't relevant anymore. I thought that in American society women were pretty much equal to men, but now I see the many stereotypes that are put on women these days, and I understand that feminism is still important.

It Matters: Greg Mortenson

Greg Mortenson, best selling author of Three Cups of Tea and Stones into Schools, has recently been suffering a lot of scrutiny for apparently making up many of the stories that were in his memoirs. The stories were supposed to be based off of his life and tell about his adventures in both Pakistan and Afghanistan building schools for underprivileged children. He is now a world famous public speaker and has his own charity devoted to raising money for more schools. At least, this is what we have been led to believe.

In the past few days, information has been brought to the public's attention that causes us to question how much of these memoirs are true memories, and how much of them were just made up. Even if some parts were made up or exaggerated, should that take away from the parts that were real?

Memoirs, by definition, are usually allowed to be partly or even mostly fabricated, so why exactly are readers so outraged that Mortenson would do the same thing? One reason I am offended is because people are paying money to support his charity, and he has not been honest with the donors about where exactly the money is going. Many of his charity expenses were due to book signings and promotions, not going to helping the actual schools.

When Mortenson takes the novel, and turns it into something that is real, like a charity, he no longer has the right to make up stories no matter how much they may add to the experience of reading the book. He does not have the right to lie in interviews about how many schools were actually build, nor tell stories about kidnappings that never happened. These are no longer just parts of a book, they are lies being told by a man who is taking money from well meaning people and doing what he pleases with it.

This is not to say that Mortenson has not done any good, he has, in fact built many schools in middle eastern countries and is one of the most effective speakers around the world, but in order to maintain that, he has to have credibility. He cannot have news about his lies overshadow news about his good deeds, and I think it is important for Mortenson to recognize his responsibilities as someone that is trying to promote good in the world.

360 Degrees: Literature in the 21st Century

There has been a lot of controversy lately in our class about reading. Mr. Allen has mentioned many times before that the books that we read that were written over a hundred years ago will challenge us, but exactly how much of a stretch is it for our brains to go at this pace?

So, what exactly is the problem? Why can't we adjust to this different way of life? Considering we have been raised in this brand new world where everything is available to us within seconds due to the internet, cell phones, etc. we are used to a very fast pace. So, when we sit down to read, after our long day of activities, between our math homework and social studies project, it is hard for us to devote the kind of time that is necessary to truly appreciate a book like Jane Eyre.

Even if we do find the time to sit down and read, how many of us are actually 100% focused on the book? This is another problem we face with our generation: multitasking is something that is encouraged from the time we are young, it is seen as being efficient. So, we have been raised to think that we can do things just as effectively when they do not have our full attention, but this is just not possible when reading a book from the 19th century.

So should we just give up and accept that these books are just something that are not possible for us to fully absorb? I don't think so. If we disregard all classical literature as being outdated and unnecessarily detailed, then we will just be going backward in our knowledge of language. It is up to us to be able to learn and to teach future generations that sometimes we need to slow down and allow ourselves to be immersed in a world that is different than our own.