Our Humanities class is a blend of History and English, and centered around the driving question: “What does it mean to be human?” We explore texts, documentaries, and other artifacts throughout history to learn multiple perspectives and ideas. I enjoy this class because we do not research for the sake of writing essays, but to gain a greater understanding of the world and ask thought-provoking questions.
We started the year by reflecting on Henry David Thoreau's novel Walden and created a skit to mock an aspect of the novel. My group applied the structure of the Christmas Carol, and created a “Walden Carol”. I played Henry David Thoreau and my group members were the three ghosts of past, present, and future. I really enjoyed working with my group to not only highlight the themes of Walden in a creative way, but encourage the audience to reflect on their own actions and values. Here is our script.
Next, we analyzed the education system and wrote an essay exploring a change or issue we are passionate about. I appreciate the creative freedom we are given in selecting topics and structuring our work. Throughout the year, we have engaged with thought-provoking texts like *Sapiens*, *The Tell-Tale Brain*, and others, which have helped shape our perspectives on critical social issues. My essay focuses on the educational experiences of students from marginalized communities.
This essay explores the impact of book bans on shaping perspectives around identity, particularly among students with diverse, intersectional backgrounds. With book bans on the rise, the essay examines how these restrictions affect students' sense of visibility and belonging, often erasing narratives that reflect their experiences. By analyzing historical patterns and comparing them with today’s context, the essay seeks to uncover how book bans attempt to limit diverse perspectives and restrict open exploration of identity, ultimately questioning their role in modifying societal understanding of complex identities.
The Arcadia poetry collection presents a journey through themes central to Tom Stoppard's play, such as chaos theory, entropy, the balance between human emotion and reason, and the unending pursuit of knowledge. Each poem progresses from structured, ordered forms to increasingly chaotic layouts, echoing humanity's descent into disorder and the inevitability of entropy. The collection opens with "Waltzing Away," which captures the harmony and predictability of waltzing, only to later hint at how these seemingly organized patterns can unravel into chaos, as reflected in the fractal shapes formed within its visual structure. As the poems evolve, motifs from Arcadia emerge—such as the apple symbolizing knowledge, and equations nodding to Newtonian determinism—all of which build toward a crescendo of disorder in the final poem, "Noise." Here, text and form disintegrate, embodying the concept of irreversible chaos. Each poem serves not only as an homage to Arcadia but also as a reflection on the tension between order and disorder, love and knowledge, inviting readers to question and find meaning within this unpredictable universe.