Blog Post #4

      Living in a nation where there is so much diversity, many families prefer to retain the identities of their homeland by practicing the culture mainly from that place. For example, people from Asian nations such as the Chinese or many Islam practicing cultures come to America and continue to practice their own customs and religion.
      Any child of one of these cultures is growing up in a peculiar situation. Should they practice the culture that their parents instill upon them or do they create and grow up with their uniquely American culture? My thought is that they should do a little bit of both. But is there such a thing as somewhere in the middle and how do these children attain it?
      My idea of accomplishing this is that the children should not be disrespectful of their parents culture and retain some to most of what their parents teach them but look to find their own way through the freedom that Americans possess. If your parents do not allow such treachery the only thing you can do is wait until you're 18 and you can do what you want unless you don't mind getting in trouble for what you believe in.
      In conclusion, due to America being such a ridiculously diverse place everyone has the opportunity to find their own way and break away from the culture they were born into.

Blog Post #3

Edgar Allan Poe is a legendary writer that created masterpieces like "The Fall of the House of Usher", "The Raven", and "The Tell-Tale Heart." All of these works of art would change literature forever and are awesomely influential on today's writings and even movies and TV shows. There are so many thing to love about "The Fall of the House of Usher", in particular, but there are also a few things that I would change about it.

I will start with everything I loved about the story. First, the imagery Poe uses is crazy good. How he describes the house is really good at creating the setting for the story. Next, I absolutely and utterly enjoyed how he mingled the art with reality in the story. It was such a cool concept that only a literary genius could of done so well at. I also liked how the narrator was nameless and mysterious. You knew not much of his past but it almost seemed as if he solely exists strictly to narrate the story. It's really sweet how Poe doesn't care what he throws in his story that might gross you out or creep you out. For example, the (implied) incestuous relationship between Roderick and his sister although the things that imply this could have completely different meanings. The final element I notably enjoyed was the ending to the story. The ending was a perfect combo between suspense and mystery.

These are all the things (listed in the paragraph above) that I would use in a story, if I had to write one similar to Poe's. The reason I would use these in my story is because those are the key elements that work together to make this such a legendary creation. You can't point one of those elements out and expect the story to have the same meaning without it there.

In the end, Edgar Allan Poe wrote an absolute work of art that should not be changed in any way shape or form. My task was to simply pick out the best things that he did and I think that I did a pretty good job. Thank you for your time.