Bildungsroman 5/15/18

In today's class Mr.Rivers handed out our new books, The Catcher in the Rye by J.D Salinger. Before going into our lesson he said that this book has been banned in other schools because many people find it disturbing. People think at a young age, students should not be reading books about alcohol, drugs, prostitutes, and using curse words. However, this book gives the students an opportunity to see the character really learn from his mistakes. After discussing the book, and what we will see throughout it, Mr. Rivers went over the IWBAT. The first IWBAT is use the bildungsroman to distinguish between modern and romanticism. A bildungsroman is a coming of age story, many people can see it in books, movies, and even TV shows. The next IWBAT is analyze how pre-modernist philosophers like Sigmund Freud influenced modernist writing. Before we got into Sigmund Freud we went over the 4 analysis that we said yesterdays. We had to pick whether they had  more of a modern side or a romantic side.

1. Adults undermine children, which destroys innocence and the free-spirit of childhood (ROMANTIC)

We said this was a romantic because it was free-spirited and it connected with childhood. Another reason why we said it was romantic was because it was a binary, it connected adults to a child.

2. Children become adults after a certain age or events pushes them forward (ROMANTIC)

We also said this one was a romantic because it distinguishes the fact that you either have to be an adult or a child you can't pick both. And the last reason was it was that when you are a child you go in a linear movement. You go from a child to a teenager to a adult etc.

3. Adulthood is difficult to define because one might be independent but not mature (or vice-versa) (MODERN)

We said it was modern because it is difficult to define adulthood. The last reason would be that it questions definitions, so it is hard to understand what is actually being said.

4.Becoming an adult means making difficult decisions between want and needs (which is therefore determined by perspective) (MODERN)

We said it was modern because it is in the gray area because of the fact that perspectives change for each person.

After that we went over Sigmund Freud. Freud was a psychologist that discovered that ones brain is more complex than we really think. Freud says that humans constantly have internal conflicts, that leads to your subconscious, and conscious. A symbol that he used to explain this was an iceberg. The iceberg can resemble someones thoughts. For example, the iceberg underneath the water (things we can not see) is your subconscious that is beyond our reach. The top of the iceberg is an example of what we see and how we react to it whether it is good or bad. However, other people see it as a stream where everything is constantly moving in the same direction. It is considered to be more real than realism and it reveals truths through subtext. It also questions the traditional forms of writing.

Overall, what we learned today in class can be used in the outside world because as we read Catcher in the Rye we can detect the mistakes the character made and make it into our own. Meaning if someone every encountered a difficult situation they will know right from wrong. Learning about Sigmund Freud is helpful in the long run because we can now know consciously what we are doing and how we act. For example, animal v. non-animal, we humans are similar to animals but we are more able to control the way we feel.