Week 8

What each must seek in his life never was on land or sea. It is something out of his own unique potentiality for experience, something that never has been and never could have been experienced by anyone else. –Joseph Campbell
 

Good day to you all. I hope you had a nice weekend.  

Today we will spend some time reviewing classwork and exercises before turning to the week's assignment, which is described below, and due in class when you return week 10.  If we do not get to it today, we will address it next week.  It is not due until week ten, at the beginning of class.  Our final is scheduled for week 10 also, although we can push it ahead to week 11, to allow for more review.

Note:  To all of you in Monday night's class, as indicated on the syllabus, we will not be meeting next week as it is the Memorial Day holiday. 

 

Essay #7:  In 350-500 words address address an idea that you hold as an article of faith or philosophical belief, using narrative or descriptive examples to support and flesh out the basis of that belief.  I have several examples to give you from a book collection called This I Believe II:  The Personal Philosophies of Remarkable Men and Women, but more can be found at thisibelieve.org.  The site supports a public forum on personal belief, and opportunity to upload your essay for publication.  It also allows you to explore topics and examples going all the way back to the 1950's, when the project itself first began. 

 The guidelines for writing the essay are much like those we have been following in class, keeping to 350-500 words in a voice that is personal and original.  The following URL within the site describes in detail what the editors want in terms of style and development:   http://thisibelieve.org/guidelines/.   You may summarize and quote from any one of the published essays as a lead-in to your piece, or structure the piece as a response to any of the examples, though neither summary nor response is a required element of the essay.  The topic you address should reflect your particular experience and corresponding beliefs or concerns–whether of religion, money, virtue, vice, growing up, growing old, love, death, sickness, health, the meaning of life, the nature of existence, the human condition, the fate of life on this planet, etcetera.  Your statement of belief should be articulated in a sentence or two.

Week 7

                                                       

        The groves were God's first temples.  ~William Cullen Bryant, "A Forest Hymn"

Good afternoon.  I hope that you are all well today, feeling good  . . . about life and, oh, I dunno, your place in the world.  

Monday class, I want to announce that next week we will not meet in class because I cannot be here for class.  I will post next week's assignment next week, and you can follow the link I post for clear examples of the topic's execution.

Today's class work (#6) allows you to choose between the following two options.  

    

 Essay 6:  The first option involves exploring the meaning of a word that has some significance in your life, in your behavior or practical life,  in your thoughts and, perhaps, spiritual practice.  I use the phrase spiritual practice in no particular religious sense but loosely to refer to the many ways we attempt to bring ourselves in to harmony with the world, the people we share our lives with, and, perhaps most importantly, with our own self.  The essay involves defining the word you have chosen in an extended fashion.  That is, you might employ a simple dictionary definition of the word's most common meaning in use, or the secondary or tertiary meaning, as listed in a dictionary entry.  The development of the essay will proceed with narration, description, and/or illustration of the meaning the word has in your life.  The following is a list of abstract words (i.e. they cannot be physically seen or touched as say an apple or a diamond or a tree can) that you might choose from:  

Attention

Beauty

Compassion

Devotion

Faith

Grace

Justice

Peace

Reverance

Silence

Wonder

With abstract words or concepts, one must bring them to life by means of the concrete, the tangible, the three-dimensional world we live in.  Our notions of beauty, for example, derive from the visible, the audible, the tactile–the world of the senses–even as we also comprehend abstract notions such as truth and peace as being, in a real sense, manifestations of beauty.  So the assignment requires you to define a word as you have come to understand its meaning.  I want you also to use one quotation, either as an epigraph (appearing just below the title of the essay) or somewhere in the text of the essay.  A simple google search of the word plus  key word "quotations" should provide you an array of choices.  Write this essay in 350-500 words.

You might choose a concrete word, rather than an abstract.  Again, you have the dictionary to supply an essential definition but you provide description of appearance, constituent parts, function, historical and cultural and personal significance.  What is a tree?  Clearly, it is a living organism, with certain characteristic features (depending on species), an ecological role to play, an historical and cultural role in the life of humankind, and so on.  Trees are also symbols of strength and shelter and wonder and beauty and mystery.  We've all admired trees, played among them, climbed them, photographed them, too, perhaps.  What is it about trees that makes us love them so?

The second option is to write about your academic or career goals:  In an essay of 350-500 words, with introduction, body of 1-2 paragraphs, and conclusion, describe the skills that you are practicing in your studies at AiFl.  Identify for readers what the associated field requires of its professionals in skills and aptitudes, and the particular challenges and rewards you see now in your coursework and personal projects or work. Describe the peculiar fit you find working in the field for which you are training, and opportunities for growth short and long term.   I want you also to use one quotation, either as an epigraph (appearing just below the title of the essay) or somewhere in the text of the essay.  A simple google search of the word plus  key word "quotations" should provide you an array of choices.

Week 6

Welcome back to class.  Hope you had a good weekend,  Today we'll finish some practice work and get to the essay work I assigned last week, and for which I set aside time today to complete.

Here I have reposted the essay assignment that will be due at the end of class today:

Essay 5:  In 350-500 words you are to explore a hypothetical scenario, that is, one that  never actually existed, in terms of its effects, past, present, and future.  You will find yourself using the subjunctive and conditional verb forms as well as others to express time and effect. You might imagine that you or someone else had been born under or into circumstances other than existed; for example, a different place and/or historical era, a different family, a different body (or species), or that you or another had done something differently.  Describe what childhood was actually like, and what might  have been); what the present might be like (as opposed to what is actually happening); and what you imagine happening in the future.   Title the essay.  Proofread it to make sure you have a clear central idea and adequate support.  Edit your sentences for clarity of expression and grammatical correctness.      You might start in this way:  Had I been born an only child, instead of being born the fifth child  of six, I might have got more attention than I did.  I might have been spoiled!  My parents, particularly my mother, had little time and attention to spare, afterall . . . Or:  If I were given the chance to rewrite some chapter in my life, or to relive some moment now  resigned to the past, what revisions would I make, or what insight would I bring to the moment now?   What lessons are there in wondering, what if . . . ?