Metacognition: Jane Eyre

Alright, well, I set out to make a post as long as Jane Eyre to entertain you, as I know you have no other amusement. My wish did not come into fruition, though, as other stupid things like math homework called out to me. So, in a very much abridged form, I present you with some thoughts on this novel.

I'll just get this out of the way immediately: I was slightly intimidated (not, like, scared or anything) of Jane and her story before we began. Before we started this 'unit,' Jane Eyre was nothing more than an orange-covered hunk of paper in the bottom of my closet. The very bottom. The only remarks I had heard on the book were that Jason Chen himself had read the book at an early age and had found it completely boring. What a goof.

Then, as we began our unit, I was excepting another dive into the literary heart of darkness (do you like that one?). Yes, Joseph Conrad's book was very hard for me to read. So, I was sure that we were in for more complex, thick English language and a lethargic story.

The first few readings were, at least to me, a little difficult to pay attention to. I would read about Jane's cousins and then begin thinking about the Christmas ten Christmases ago, or I'd breeze through a paragraph wondering if anything major had happened (if Jane died, I wouldn't have known). I was, at the story's start, very excited by the scarcity of reading quizzes.

As the book progressed, and Jane's angst-filled childhood came to a close, I felt the book locking in a bit more. The narrative took interesting turns, and Jane's story started to, in the very slightest manner, capture my attention. In terms of language, my fears were met with a relative lack of difficulty and thoughts of Brontë writing the story knowing that I'd read it and didn't want it to be too complex. In fact, I'm pretty sure that's what she did.

In terms of Brontë and Jane being nineteenth-century (our now commonplace pseudo-adjective for her), the only notice I had of it was in setting and character interaction. Obviously, when she goes into depth on bonnets and other silly articles of clothing we can't really relate. Also, when Rochester and Jane converse, we see that he is in a position superior to hers. This hopefully isn't the case in most relationships in our culture, so I found this to be slightly irritating.

Far beyond and more in-depth than the language and character structure, however, are the themes of the novel. I find that, in the same way that Romeo and Juliet's are still applicable, Jane Eyre's come through and shine with modern meanings. Teacher talk: A great piece of literature will have ideas that can last forever, even if the characters or situation don't. So, to me, Jane Eyre and Rochester died some time in the late 1860s of cholera. St. John went out to sea in order to return to England, but was tragically lost on a island. ABC continues his narrative on Tuesday nights at 8:00pm.

In a final move to think about my thinking before I regress to writing stories, I guess I didn't connect with the story. The events in Jane's life didn't really matter that much to me, in terms of what I could get from them. But the themes that Brontë implanted in her characters resonated for me, and I think that's what matters. Culturally, we are very, very far away from where we were in the 19th century. On the basic human level, though, that's a very small window of time and very little has changed. Thus, we still love in the same way and we still hold emotions in a similar fashion. SparkNotes won't tell you that.

360 Degrees: Shaun White (Just kidding, Women's Rights)

Women's rights. I'm going to skip the summary because pretty much everyone knows what I'm talking about here. Yet there are myriad angles to look at, and the prompt calls for me to explore all of them. To brighten up this slightly exhausting task, I shall take on the voice of various historical entities. Then, I shall summarize and talk about what really matters in the end. Let us begin.

White Male, 1850: 'Women do not need rights, they need to continue working. In fact, if there are any women reading this currently, I shall tell them to work.'

Charlotte Brontë: 'My writing and wondrously long sentences will contribute to this cause- one that I find to be particularly interesting, and most important, for all females; we must be empowered; characters like Jane Eyre will show us the way, to true recognition of what society needs.'

Simone De Beauvoir: 'Sartre and I just had a talk, you see. Humans have an innate freedom, and women are not excluded from this. Mais, je ne parle pas anglais."

Modern-Day Female: "Rights have become normal to me. Wait, there was a time without women's rights? How come I don't get paid as much as the men at work?"

White Male, 2010: 'Women have all the rights they-hey, did you see the Blackhawks last night?'

Me: Alright, now that I've gotten some of the goofiness out (there are a few words of value up there, they're just sporadic and hard to find), I must declare that I do think this is a very serious and current issue.

Women were not granted rights, so to speak; rather, a certain group of women fought very hard and long to win rights. From a male standpoint, I wouldn't argue that there's any loss to what we're able to do. Perhaps some males fear the empowerment of women (I don't, but I grew up in the 1990s, not the 1900s).

We're at the point now where rights are pretty close to being even here. This probably can't be said about most of the world, however, and it seems some places are lagging behind in the kind of progressive thinking that brought us here. I mentioned Simone, but many other philosophers joined her: Mary Astell, Mary Wollstonecraft, and William Godwin were just a few.

From the perspective of art and philosophy, it appears natural that women eventually gained some rights. Art is always on the forefront of progression, philosophy is usually either further ahead or just behind. In some cases, philosophers were also scared of female power but often they greatly aided the cause.

In essence, women's rights had to happen here eventually. Stretching all the way back to the enlightenment we saw ideas of basic human rights. Early American doctrines often spoke of equal rights among [white males]. The logical progression to pay attention to the other 52% of the world and welcome females to the table. So, all perspectives tended to clash on the issue; I hope none do now because that's just silly.

The female rights movement was one of the single most important historical events in America. The addition of females to political and social ventures has surely changed them greatly. Whether you're Beauvoir, Brontë, or some silly 1850s guy, you've got to agree: we couldn't really do anything without them.

An Inconvenient Truth: Environmental Issues, Again (By Al Gore)

During my trip to Colorado this break, I was certainly struck by how awesome the world around us was. We went to Beaver Creek, an area surrounded by other mountains. The scenery is picturesque and the views are amazing.

And you won't hear about Colorado without mention of the 'mountain air.' It does seem to be true-- there's something better about being in the mountains. The ironic thing was that, throughout this trip, I noticed a large number of things that conflicted with Colorado's natural beauty.

First of all, I realized that while snowboarding is fun, we're only able to do it because someone came along and wrecked a bunch of trees in order to form trails. Also, the mountain's maintenance each year requires deforestation and surely the pushing away of animals.

Also, the amount of smokers and people who litter on the mountain is ridiculous. If the mountain air is so brilliant, why smoke out chemicals and carcinogens into it? And the litter is terrible at times; I've gone down runs filled with Candy bar wrappers, old ski equipment and other garbage. It's disturbing how some people thing the world is one big trash can.

To top off the environmental issues going around in my head, I woke up one day in the middle of the week and went out to the hotel room door. There, on the cover of a complimentary New York Times, was a headline stating that Obama had cleared close to 130 million acres around Alaska for oil drilling.

I haven't been to Alaska but most of my family has, and from what I've heard, it is one of the most amazing places on the planet. I understand from the article that Mr. Obama is being careful in choosing exactly where the drilling occurs, but this still angers me greatly. We've reached the point that our use of resources is truly out of hand. Now we must turn to tearing apart natural habitats in order to satisfy oil needs.

This is the center of the issue, in an Ishmael-like fashion: humans tend to think that their lives are more important than those of any other species. It's a want for instant gratification, I think. I may go through my whole life trashing the planet, but that's okay, because I won't be around to deal with it.

I dare you to carry this attitude into an episode of Discovery's new Life, essentially Planet Earth part two. Both series are, in my opinion, some of the most amazing things ever to hit television. Ignore Oprah's (annoying) narration and witness the animals around us; you won't believe some of the things that they're capable of.

Clearly I'm on the side of the nature activists here, but that doesn't mean I'm perfect. I have littered, I have destroyed nature, surely. I can see that side of it as well: we do need oil, we need resources, and we are always wanting more. With a stance strictly based on progression of humanity, deforestation and trashing of the planet are perfectly fine. That is, until we reach the point that we've destroyed ourselves.

This is an issue that I won't solve, and it doesn't look like Mr. Obama will either. It's going to exist for a very long time, as future people struggle to find the balance between animal and human. What we need to realize first, though, is that there isn't a huge difference between the two.