Free Writing

Going off to college is like closing a chapter of one's life and going into the next one. It is a decision that involves commitment and responsibility. College life is a big step in a teenager's life. In college, the teenager begins to experience independence. It is here where teenagers experience total freedom and learn what things should and should not be done in life. It is in college where most people grow into mature and experience individuals.
For me, this past month has been awkward. I left my homeland, my family, and my friends to come to a new place. It's like starting all over again. Getting adapted to the classes has not been hard for me but meeting new people has. I am a very friendly and social person but meeting people is much more than knowing a person's name and hanging out with them. Knowing people is knowing their strengths and flaws and having to go through this is not entertaining. However, everything has been great until now. I have met many interesting people and hope to keep meeting more and more people each day.

Free writing

Most people have ambivalent feelings towards people they know. No one is perfect. Each individual has positive and negative aspects and it is because of this that people will have ambivalent feelings towards a lot of people they know. This is not a band thing because in most cases, it is inevitable. Either because one does not agree with a person's decision or because one doest not like a certain aspect of their personality, one will have ambivalent feelings toward a certain person. It is because of this that one might like a person as a friend but dislike them at times. This situation does not occur with friends, it occurs in a parent-child relationship, teacher-student relationship, among many others. It is only wrong to have these feelings when one does not let the other person know. If people do not let others know how they feel, they are just keeping every emotion to themselves which will only lead to them feeling worse every day.

Graff Piece

Graff's article was mainly about academia. Unlike many other authors and journalists, he did not praise academia but he criticized it. "My arguement in this book, however is that academia reinforces cluelessness by making it's ideas, problems, and ways of thinking look more opaque, narrowly specialized, and beyond normal learning capacities than they are or need to be." To me, this was a very interesting opinion about academia. I had never seen academia through this perspective and it was interesting to see how Graff questions academia's purpose.

Music

In my opinion, music is a universal language. Music transcends boundaries and in result, individuals who are thousands of miles apart bond. Being a form of art, music reaches the deepest parts of individual's hearts. Music is the best medicine one can find. People tend to relate to the lyrics of the song. So, one can relate to a song that hundreds of other individuals are relating to. One does not have to study music in order to understand it. All needed to understand music is a heart. Like any other language, music expresses every type of emotion. The best thing of music is that it does not have certain rules one has to follow. To be involved in music or to just enjoy it, one does not have to be dexterous. A song can be of any topic and it can have any method and rthythm. Because of this, it is not possible for a song to have anomalities. Everything written and any rhythms and melodies used for a song will be considered music.

free writing..

I have nothing to write about today so I am just going to write about my homeland, Puerto Rico. It is a tropical island in the Caribbean with a population over 3,000,000. Puerto Rico is a commonwealth of the United States and it's inhabitants are U.S. citizens. Puerto Ricans are subject to military service and most federal laws. However, they pay no federal income tax on locally generated earnings, but the Puerto Rican government does have an income-tax rate set. Every four years, a governor is chosen democratically. The platforms of the political parties in Puerto Rico are based on the status they wish Puerto Rico to have. There are three parties, the New Progressive Party who want statehood, the Independence Party who want independence, and the Popular Democratic Party who want it's current status to remain. The party in power right now is the Popular Democratic Party and has been in power since the year 2000.

'Round my Way

“Round my Way” by Goldblatt is about the art of writing. There were a couple of quotes that for me were the most interesting ones and that together basically summarize what the article was about. The first one is the following: “I use writer to refer to an individual composing a text, but I reserve the term author for the writer as seen in the social framework of power relationships and cultural institutions…The question, as I see it, is not what genre or mode a writer chooses, but what institution the writing maintains or elaborates or challenges, and how the writer fulfills his or her role as an author within cultural institutions.” For Goldblatt a famous journalist or writer can be just a writer while a young person writing with the purpose of achieving expertise in writing can be considered an author. The profession does not make someone a writer, it is one’s purpose, motivation and persistence in learning that makes one a real author. “To write well is to accept a challenge to participate in the institution sponsoring the writing, even if that institution resists the writer’s contribution. As long as student writers of any background can learn to see writing as an active art, they have a chance of growing individually and altering institutions collectively.” In other words, one is not born being a writer. It is a tool one we can all master. Anyone who gives the initiative to write better and practices the art of writing will some day be able to call their selves an author. Another point that the author makes is how diaries are very effective. Although diaries will not make someone a famous author, it “puts a name and thus a social meaning on our private experience.” Last but not least, Goldblatt pointed out the enormous power that written language has.

Shannon D.

I was looking at people's blogs and although I thought many were interesting, I realized I had a lot in common with Shannon D. Becuase of this, I posted a comment on her blog. If you click here, it will take you directly to my comment on her blog.

I'm Baaaack...

Eventhough music is a huge part of my life, I am not studying music or anything relevant to music. I am studying biology and psychology. Since an early age, I have been very interested in psychology. In my psychology class today, the professor was discussing Sigmund Freud's theories. As a physician, Sigmund Freud had many women patients who went to his office complaning about hearing loss, inability to speak, abdominal pain, hallucination etc. This women were apparently experiencing what today is known as mimesis. They were experiencing many symptons but in reality nothing was wrong with them. However, Freud continued his investigation with the women and after evaluating them using the electrical stimulation of the scalp method, he concluded that many had early inappropriate sex with a member of their families. This conclusion as well as many others are criticized as Freud only had data, he did not have enough evidence to back up his theories. Eventhough, he does not present his theories with enough evidence, his writings and theories are very interesting. If any of you are interested in psychology, I highly recommend Origin and Development of Psycho-Analysis and Interpretation of Dreams.

Welcome !

Hello...Welcome to Marta's Blog !
Before writing about what the blog is going to be out, I would like to introduce myself. My name is Marta Martinez and I am from San Juan, Puerto Rico. Since an early age, I have enjoyed music and dancing. Because of this, I have decided to make Reggaeton the theme of this post. Most of you have already heard several Reggaeton songs and you either love it or you hate it. Reggaeton is very controversial. Many go against it arguing that Reggaeton degrades women. What they do not realize is that reggaeton music is a lot more than what it is said in a song...It is about how life is in the ghetto and in some cases about the singer's past experiences. Other than this, Reggaeton has a very interesting history and background that very few people know about. I will be constantly updating the blog sharing valuable information about me, things I enjoy and/or feel passionate about or just doing my assignments...