October 2009 Essay

<p>I hate Obama, but I sucked up to his foreign policy ideas because that’s what they want to read. “He’ll use humor as a mechanism of peace!!!”. I died a little inside.</p>

<p>I said no, that humor only makes you avoid problems for the time being, not really solving them.</p>

<p>i only really had one example and 3 things within it.
i talked about how the media mocks our government/pop culture
(tina fey, SNL, michael jackson parodies, and octomom) and while this is funny, it doesnt solve the problem at hand.</p>

<p>i dont know if i did this right.</p>

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<p>Do you mean Tom Hanks in Castaway?</p>

<p>a 12 on the essay comes down to how fast you can think and how well you write stylistically, not necessarily how good your examples are. my examples are never fully related (nor accurate, for that matter) and i’ve gotten 12’s every time.</p>

<p>I got the humor essay. Pretty much I just said that doctors use humor to deal with the pain of a patient dying(or something along those lines) and that families use humor to relive the good times of a dead relative…</p>

<p>For the family/network prompt, I used the Iliad and The Metamorphosis by franz kafka.</p>

<p>does it have to be humor or can it be amusement?</p>

<p>I used satire/A Modest proposal, and two personal experiences I think. last two paragraphs were ****.</p>

<p>For the family essay, I used Hamlet.</p>

<p>I had humor. I used Utopia (the scene with the Cardinal and lawyer and other folk, the scene with the merchants wearing gold in Utopia, etc.) for literary. For current events, I talked about the success of Jon Stewart (America’s most trusted newsman), and also SNL’s very recent ridicule of Obama’s inaction, using humor to talk about an otherwise depressing topic (at least for those who voted for Obama, haha). I got a 10 in March, 780 overall, so I’m not too worried about how well or how poorly I did on this.</p>

<p>Wow I used the exact same example as 1294739! I wrote about how Twain used satire/humor in the Grangerfords vs Shepherdsons chapter to expose the folly of Sothern chivalry. Then I embellished a personal anecdote about a friend breaking a leg then using humor to effectively deal with the situation, inspiring others, blah blah blah.</p>

<p>Interesting, I got a prompt about whether you should gather as much info as possible before taking any action. It was one of the easiest prompts I’ve ever seen.</p>

<p>I heard another prompt was about family being detrimental. I wish I had that one, as I planned on using The Brothers Karamazov as an example haha.</p>

<p>Hmph… for me, I noticed the prompt contained the word “network” as well as family, so I just talked about networks in general. </p>

<p>I used Vietnam War companies (The things they carried)
and then the formation of the U.S. constitution</p>

<p>should be fine, no?</p>

<p>i used a personal story
i made up a book called “Humor isnt all Fun and Games” by Julia Goldstein (LOL!)
i also made up a story about a fake experiment at an organization named Kinderheim 511 (monster lol)
completely filled both pages, pretty confident i got a 12</p>

<p>If I only used one example, but I really went into detail about the juicy and complex example and wrote very well, is that a dealbreaker when it comes to a 12? My rationale was that I’d rather really explain and interpret one example thoroughly than do a flimsy and superficial job of a few just for the sake of fitting more in. Hopefully the graders will realize that, I guess I’ll have to see.</p>

<p>I had the “Does everyone need a family or network?” prompt. I said no, and that people may want one, but they don’t need one. I used a personal anecdote about how homeless people don’t always need the support of a family and The Count of Monte Cristo as my examples.</p>

<p>dubbyah- they prefer your example(s) to be well thought out. 1 thorough example> 3 examples with superficial analysis</p>

<p>i said people do need a family/network, used the puritans and the bean trees.</p>

<p>For the family/network prompt, I said yes</p>

<p>My examples were a bit weak though…</p>

<p>I used Grapes of Wrath, how they needed to rely on eachother to survive
How Edmund Dantes in TCMC depended on the gleam of hope that the man in the adjacent cell provided
& how poets and poetry often have feelings of despondency if they lack human connection: loss of love- Edgar Allen Poe’s works.</p>

<p>Bah.</p>