Why Can You Raed Tihs So Esaliy?

      A researcher at Cambridge University had an idea about how the human brain reads words. Eventually, he realized that even if the word's letters are rearranged, as long as the first and last letters were in the correct place that the word could be easily read. The human brain is still able to easily recognize the word. Other people started realizing the same thing to when they were faced with passages like this. For example, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. This specific passage was taken from the Cognition and Brains Science Unit (MRC) of the United Kingdom. The above panel from the second part to Maus is from page 58. In this panel, the word "selektion" is used instead of "selection". "Selektion" is a very similar to the word "skeleton" since it has almost the same exact letters and the first and last letters are the same. Spiegelman used "selektion" many times as he was describing this scene and how people would be selected and sorted into different groups very often. Each time I read "seleketion", I always thought it said "skeleton". Only after seeing it a couple more times and noticing the fact that the word "skeleton" didn't really fit Spiegleman was trying to say did I realize that it said "selektion". It is very obvious that he did this on purpose. In this specific panel all the Jews are completely white and each drawing of them have line marks to represent how skinny and bony there are, just like a skeleton. Everyone else is wearing clothes are are shaded in darker which is in a stark contrast against the Jews. Spiegelman deliberately uses an icon of skeleton in order to truly convey the atrocities that the Jews had to face during this time period. Just like McCloud states on page 27 of his book, "Icon is an image used to represent a person, place, thing or idea," and this image of the Jews clearly represents the image of a skeleton. They are basically already dead because of all their emotional and physical suffering. Spiegelman effectively accompanies this illustration with the word "selektion" to even further represent the Jews as real skeletons and how much the holocaust took away from them. 

The Curious Relation Between Maus and The Things They Carried

     Even though both these books are about completely different stories, they both share some common ideas of humanity making it a very interesting relationship. In The Things They Carried, Norman is one of the soldiers from Alpha Company who seems to suffer from post traumatic stress disorder. All he can remember is the time he spend in Vietnam and all the horrors he had to suffer and endure, especially the death of his friend Kiowa. In Maus, Vladek always remembers his wife and how she was lost. Both Norman and Vladek continuously relive their terrors over and over again. Vladek doesn't like his new wife most likely because she reminds him of Anja, who he lost. He doesn't let her have any of his money and always thinks that she only with him for money. He even burns Anja's books because those memories of her are too much for him. Norman relives his experience in Vietnam continuously as well. As he circles the lake in his own town again and again while pondering about the experiences he had in the war, he really is reliving those experiences over and over again. He even feels like a tourist in his own town, especially because no one seems to listen to him. This idea is also similar to Maus because Artie never really listens to Vladek in order to help him. He only does it so he can write his story. He doesn't actually seem to care about helping his father cope through his problems. When Vladek was on the roof and almost about to fall off, Artie didn't even think twice about going to help him. Both Norman and Vladek are people who continue to endure the horrors of their experience especially because no one really cares enough to actually support them and guide them through their problems. 

Malvolio Became Too Curious!

     After Malvolio scolds Sir Toby Belch and friends, Maria devises a plan to mess with Malvolio. In order to get revenge, she brainstorms the devious idea of forging a letter that makes it seems as if Olivia is in love with Malvolio. Malvolio's own curiosity prompted to pick up the letter and open it even though he couldn't even be sure it was his letter to open at first. Then his own thoughts beguiled himself into thinking that the letter had to be from Olivia and that it only expressed her passionate love for him. All he ended up doing was making a fool of himself. He acted like a crazy person in front of Olivia by doing things like always smiling and wearing those ridiculous stockings. Not only did his curiosity cause him to ridicule himself, he had to undergo emotional torture since everyone decided to treat him like a crazy person. He was trapped in a dark room and treated poorly because Maria and company decided to continue the hurtful prank on Malvolio. This situation Malvolio finds himself in displays how curiosity can sometimes become detrimental if it isn't used in the proper way. It also reveals how cruel some people can be to one another and how others are selfish and believe that everything in the world revolves around them. So it's important to remember to always be careful with curiosity because it is such a powerful and important part of life. 

PRANK GONE WRONG!!!! (COPS SHOW UP)

     In the play Twelfth Night, the characters are constantly making jokes and tricking each other. However, one of these pranks went a little too far. Maria, Sir Toby Belch, Sir Andrew, Fabian, and the fool all help pull a prank on Malvolio that ends up in him going crazy. Maria writes a letter to Malvolio that seems like a love letter from Olivia. In this letter, "Olivia" asks Malvolio to do ridiculous things in hopes of them becoming lovers. Malvolio wants to love her so much that he convinces himself that the letter has to be from Olivia and the tricksters watch and laugh as he ridicules himself. When Malvolio was finally going to directly ask Olivia about the letter, Sir Toby Belch and friends tie him up and lock him in a dark room. Even after all that, they try to convince everyone including Malvolio himself that he is insane. When Malvolio is finally released, he vows to get revenge on the people that did this to him. Obviously, this prank went way too far. Not only did they play with his emotions and make him do ridiculous things, but also kidnapped him and locked him up which is insane. I love to trick and prank people myself, but in my opinion, the prank should have at least stopped after Malvolio dressed up ridiculously. Playing with someone's emotions is already bad enough, but they also kidnap him and try to make him believe that he is insane is definitely taking it way too far. They had already gotten their laughs from him romanticizing over Olivia when he first got the letter and the prank could have easily ended right there. Now, they have a very upset Malvolio on the loose looking for revenge which may come back to haunt them in the end.  

Modern Dating Is Actually Better???

     In this "new" world, access to technology has made dating, in my opinion, a lot easier to do. People all over the world can easily start talking to each other using many things like social media. However, Aziz Ansari's article called Modern Romance discussed how the common use of technology in today's society has made dating a lot harder because people don't know what they should do face to face and what they can do over text. In this article, Aziz mentions a survey conducted in 2013 that asked Americans on Match.com how they would ask someone out on a first date. For asking over text, there were only 8% of people over 30 while there were 32% of people under 30 showing how much of an effect smartphones have had on the younger generation. Aziz discussed the complications that this produced, such as lack of confidence and just overall just becoming more dependent on technology. I refused to believe that the lack of courage to ask someone out face to face was the only thing that caused a significant shift to relying on text messages, so I pondered on all the possible ideas that could do this. I came to the conclusion that text messages are a really efficient and effective way of communicating with others most of the time. Anyone can text someone else at their own convenience and that other person can also respond at their own convenience. This also gives each of the time to think how to respond to other person's message, while asking over the phone or face to face might actually create awkward gaps between the conversation. This same concept also easily applies to social media and if anything, being able to use technology can easily create more self confidence. Anyone can easily ask someone else and even if they get rejected, it's really easy to meet new people on the internet and keep trying. In the end, someone could become confident just because of repeated trial and error about what to do over technology and what to do face to face. In the end, the use of technology is actually very beneficial and actually helps people with their relationships.