Dante Presentations Reflection

During this past week students have begun presenting their projects on their assigned canto of Dante's Inferno. It has been really interesting to listen to the different sins and punishments of the canto's before mine and getting to see everyone's interpretations of them. One that really stood out to me was the presentation about people who hoarded and focused all of their attention on finding material objects. I thought the contrapasso of people having to carry their possessions on their back and lugging it around because they were never able to recognize what the important things in life were was very clever of Dante. The best part of the presentations for me have been the visual representations. Most of them have been very creative and clever, like making a tree with a barbie doll to represent canto 13 or interpreting canto one as wall street. They have all given me ideas on what I want to do for my visual and how I want to improve my presentation.

After listening to some of the presentations and learning about all the different sins, it makes me think about the sins that I am guilty of. The sins people in Dante's hell committed are sins that millions of people commit every day. Essentially, every person in the world would be in some level of Dante's hell. I do not agree with Dante on most of his placement decisions, such as putting homosexuals in hell because it is "unnatural". I look forward to listening to more presentations so I can learn more about the sins and their contrapassos. I present my canto on Monday, so I am especially looking forward to get my presentation over with. I am nervous to present, but I think overall it will go well.

Hell

We started the new assignment of Dante's Inferno on Thursday and since then we have been researching and typing till no end. Everyone is assigned a different canto, which is similar to a chapter now-a-days. Every canto belongs to a different circle of hell, and a ring inside that circle. There are different sins that lands people in certain levels of hell and punishments that coincide with every sin. The canto I am researching and presenting about is canto XVI. This canto's sin is the act of sodomy, relationship with one of the same sex, and their punishment is to forever walk under the rain of fire. The sin falls under the seventh circle of hell in ring 3, "violence against God".

For the assignment we must paraphrase every line, write a paragraph on every icon and allusion mentioned, create a visual interpretation, and make a digital presentation for our chosen canto. So far I have paraphrased every stanza in the canto which has given me a much clearer understanding of its allegorical meaning. I still have a long ways to go until I become close to finishing this assignment but I have great confidence that I can knock this out of the water by my presentation date. I am excited to continue revealing the underlying meaning behind my canto and gain more knowledge on its significance. The visual interpretation should be fun to create and I am excited to see what I come up with to display the canto's deeper meaning.

Looking Back on the Week

As the tragic hero unit came to a close, the last of the groups presented and a closing lecture was given. I really enjoyed the presentations given by all the groups and was fascinated by how the story lines of all the movies could be so different but still follow the tragic hero cycle precisely. The lecture by our teacher really made me realize how Aristotelian tragedy connects so much to today's society. There are movies being made everyday that exemplify the tragic hero. Like the Greeks that went to the theater to see tragedies like Oedipus Rex to grow as a human being, society today goes to movie theaters and watches a contemporary tragedy that hopefully makes us leave as slightly changed people. This unit has really furthered my awareness on how literature truly is a huge component in society and how it has changed the world.

Now that tragedy, a some what depressing topic, has come to an end, we are taking a turn for an even darker subject... hell. I am a little excited to read more about the scary place in Dante's Inferno, but I have a feeling this class will be dreary which kind of brings down my mood. So far we have only written an "inventory" on what our personal hell would be like. I wrote about how every soul would be punished differently according to their sin. I also created the hell to have no escape; once you are put there, there is no getting out. It was fun in a way that we could be like God inventing a place that punished bad souls. I don't know what our assignment will be for the Dante's Inferno unit but for the most part I am excited.

Personal Hell

I believe that hell is a place that souls are sent to in order to pay for the awful acts they've committed. My hell basically looks the same as the "typical" hell, consisting of fire and a dark, scary demon. There is no way out of this hell since the souls sent to my hell do not deserve redemption. Only the very worst of the worst people get sent to this hell to get punished for their terrible sins.

1. What do you have to do to get into your hell? In order to get into my hell one would have to crossed the boundary of morality. They basically have no good intentions and commit the worst of the worst acts. Someone in my hell could have betrayed the ones they love like committing adultery. Murderers who kill intentionally would be in my hell too. If you murdered someone unintentionally like in a car accident you would not be in my hell because you didn't want or mean to kill someone. One individuals that carry out truly atrocious acts are planted in my hell.
2. What are the punishments? In my hell, the punishment would be only having the feeling of misery and never getting to experience the feeling of happiness. You would be trapped in the fiery pit of hell with a demon flying over always watching you. Every soul that enters my hell gets the punishment of their greatest fear. If the person's strongest fear was drowning, they would have the sensation of drowning until the end of eternity. If they feared spiders, they would forever feel spiders crawl under and on top of their skin.
3. What does it look like? My hell looks like a dark and fiery pit under the universe. It seems like it would be scorching hot but it is the coldest place you can image. Your skin will always hurt due to the burning icy air. The sounds of screaming and gnashing of teeth surround every soul in the flaming pit. Everything is overcome by darkness. There is no end, no way out, and absolutely no hope for returning.
4. Can anyone escape (if yes, who? if not, why not?) Nobody can escape my personal hell. It is really hard to get sent to my hell and only the worst people who commit the lowest acts are sent here. Since the acts committed are so horrendous, there is no escape from this hell. They will pay for their wrong doing by being trapped in my hell for eternity.
5. What would be a symbol to represent your hell? The symbol that represents my hell is this infinity sign. This symbol is the perfect representation because the people in my hell are stuck there for infinity. There is no escaping this hell and their torture will endure for eternity. The infinity sign has no end just like there no end to the suffering of the people in my hell.

6. Who is in your hell? The people in my hell are the most nauseating and villainous individuals in the universe. They have committed acts that have surpassed the borderline of morality. Leaders like Hirohito, Pol Pot, Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin are in my hell. They were all ruthless rulers that killed millions of people with intention. The shooters that murdered many people in shootings like Adam Lanza in the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting and James Holmes in the Premier of  The Dark Night. Ignorant rednecks that believe that men are superior to women and whites are superior to people of race are in my pit of hell. I am a very big feminist and the imbeciles that believe in inequality have a reserved spot in my hell.

Reflection of the Week

This past week has been a chaotic but entertaining one to say the least. It was quite funny to see and listen to other groups come up with last minutes improvisations to cover up minor but important details and a very different, stressful situation when my group was in the middle of a poster-life-threatening crisis too. I never knew an accidental blob of black paint on white paper could cause so much fear and distress. Shards of glass get scattered, a box-jellyfish is assembled and before we know it our poster is 3/4 finished with only five minutes of class remaining. With an IRS badge thrown here and a Will Smith photo slapped there, a breath taking poster was created before our eyes. I am incredibly proud of my team for putting in the work to produce the finished product that we did. I didn't know exactly how we were going to pull it off, but I'd say we did a mighty fine job.

Through this period of intense pressure and the on the verge of tears moments, my group gained a greater sense of unity, dedication, and overall appreciation for our films and our partners. There is no better feeling than the relief of completing a difficult task with your best effort put forward. I can honestly say we gave everything we had into this assignment and the loss of sleep we all experienced was worth it. I feel our presentation went very well. Every group member had their aspect of tragedy down to the t. It has been exciting to see the other groups' creative and unique ideas and compare them to my own groups'. I look forward to continue watching the presentations of the last of the groups in the class.

A Week of Work

This week was entirely dedicated to planning and executing our tragic hero posters. My group came up with some really unique and awesome ideas. Our movie of choice was Seven Pounds which happened to be one of my favorite movies of all time. The protagonist, Tim Thomas, fit the shoes of a tragic hero perfectly and although the story line is incredibly sad, I enjoyed analyzing the movie in great depth. This week was very stressful for us and made us portion our time wisely throughout the week. We dealt with problems from group members forgetting to bring supplies to freaking out over a paint smudge. On Thursday when we completed the poster at the ring of the bell, I was so relieved and genuinely proud of every one of our group members. We overcame the stress and produced a stunning work of art.

This assignment not only taught the four of us how to work as a whole and overcome stressful situations, but it ultimately made us learn Aristotelian tragic hero more in depth. We all had to write an essay on an aspect of tragedy, but creating the poster made me understand and comprehend the idea on a whole different level. This project has definitely been my favorite assignment we have done so far in this class and Aristotelian tragedy has been the most intriguing thing I have studied during the year. Overall, this project is clever and fun to execute, but also strengthens the skills of teamwork, excellence, and the knowledge of the tragic hero.