Welcome to my English portfolio! My name is Jessica Suarez. I am a freshman and just like this class, my whole first year was a learning experience. I live six hours away and I had a difficult time flying out of the nest. I had to learn to be on my own and now I appreciate my family so much more. In this English course I have become a better writer. I also grew to appreciate writing and let it take me on an amazing journey. Writing to me is no longer a tedious job, but a way to express myself and also learn. In my portfolio you will not only see my growing process as a writer but you will also be introduced to some wonderful topics. There are three essays in my portfolio. The first essay is Project Text, Revolutionary Child, which is about a graphic novel that was assigned in class. I learned about a revolution from someone’s point of view. A simple event can affect different people in different ways. The second essay is Project Space, A World like Venice, which is about a place that defines Los Angeles. I am from Northern California so this project gave me a chance to explore a little part of Los Angeles. This project is about how space can affect people or people can affect it. Space is so much more than just a location. The third essay is Project Web, Writing through the Process, where I learned how to integrate pictures, links, and videos into my essay. I enjoyed doing this, because I feel like the picture and video gives my reader a better understanding of my work. Last year if I had to post my essays online I would have been so nervous, but today I’m excited because I have grown as a writer and have no problem sharing my bumpy road with others.
Project Text
Revolutionary Child by Jessica Suarez
Marji's parents did not hide any of
the news or events from her. They did not fully explain it to her, but she knew
enough to go and research on her own. Marji realized she did not understand
everything that was going on so she read to find her answers. “I realized then
that I didn’t understand anything. I read all the books I could”(32). She knew
what was happening in her country, because of what she heard from her parents
but she didn’t always understand. Most children would have just wondered what
they meant, but Marji went out of her way to find out. She learned about the
revolution through books and combined it with the conversations between her
parents. There were times when the only information she could get was from the
television. So, she believed everything that was on the television. This quote
is when Marji tried to give her father some information. "But it's not my fault.
It’s the TV!! Boo hoo!!"(62). He told her how ignorant people are and basically
told her it was not always right to believe what was on the television. This
quote shows how much Marji wanted to know about everything and she was willing
to believe anything she was told. She later was told to listen to the radio
instead, for the real facts about what was going on. Her father told Marji that
the radio would always state what was truly going on.
Marji not only heard and learned about the revolution at a young age, but
she also wanted to be a part of it. “For a revolution to succeed, the entire
population must support it”(17). Marji knew from a young age that everyone must
be a part of the revolution. She thought that meant she needed to be a part of
it too. She didn’t realize how dangerous it was. The fact that she was willing
to protest shows how even as young as she was, she thought she could fight for
her beliefs. Since, Marji was not fully aware about the revolution, she took
some actions that were very dangerous. Marji only knew why people were
protesting, but she did not fully understand the danger of protesting. The day
she protested was one of the most dangerous days to protest."We had demonstrated
on the very day we shouldn't have: on 'Black Friday'. That day there were so
many killed in one of the neighborhoods that a rumor spread that Israel soliders
were responsible for the slaughter"(39). At a very young age Marji wanted to be
involved. She wanted to make a difference or at least know what the revolution
actually was. After she had protested, she realized in how much danger she had
been in. She learned that there were groups of people that would be on the
lookout and arrest her if she didn’t follow the rules. "They were guardians of
the revolution, the Women's Branch. This group had been added in 1982, to arrest
woman who were improperly veiled. (Like me, for example.)"(132). Although these
groups were out there, Marji still rebelled and put her own style in the way she
dressed. As Marji got older, she rebelled even more. She dressed the way she
wanted and listened to the music she wanted. She had grown up learning about the
revolution, so she felt like she did not have to be limited. Her parent's ideas
and protesting had shaped her and the way she thought. The stories she had been
told about her family members who were heroes. The stories showed her how some
of her family members rebelled and didn’t conform to what the government wanted
them to be. She grew up hearing these stories and they shaped her persona and
ideas.
Marji had to
read to find her answers, but she was also smart and caught on to a lot of what
adults said. She would share what she knew with her friends, who completely
couldn’t understand. Marji had learned that parents told their
children that someone is on a trip if they had passed away. “Don’t you know that
when they keep saying someone is on a trip it really means he is dead?”(48) When
her friend’s father wasn’t around and was told he was on a trip, Marji explained
that he was dead. Although, that wasn’t the case, Marji was always upfront with
people. Not only was Marji honest but she was proud of her family members who
were heroes. She talked about it with her friends. She shared her knowledge and
stories with them. It was “too much”(61) for her friends, because they did not
fully understand what was happening like she did. Marji was not only forming her
own ideas, but she became a strong individual from everything she was surrounded
with. Her mother wanted her to be able to protect herself, and although she
wasn’t allowed to protest at a young age, her parents didn’t hide the revolution
from her. They let her know a few things that were happening and as she got
older, she had the opportunity to do more. Her mother wanted her to know her
rights and defend them. She told her, “She should start learning to defend her
rights as a women right now”(76). Although she was allowed to join the protests,
she also had to know the reality and how bad it was. She was old enough to know
the dangers outside of her home. Marji’s mother worried that Marji was rebelling
too much and something terrible would happen to her.“You know what they do to
the young girls theyarrest?”(145). Marji’s mother wanted
her to realize that although she had her own opinion, she still needed to
realize that other people could hurt her. Her mother started to see Marji as a
young adult and knew that she could handle the truth. She needed to know what
could happen to young girls like her. Marji had to be more careful, because she
is a female.
This graphic memoir
not only explains what the people had to go through during the revolution, but
also goes into detail about how a young girl grows up during a revolution. Marji
was always observing everything like any normal child does. The thing that was
different with Marji is that her parents explained some of it to her, and Marji
did what could to be involved. She also tried to get her friends involved by
telling them what she knew. Her friends weren’t able to fully grasp her ideas.
The fact that other children didn’t understand shows how not every child was
affected the same by the revolution. At a young age she was involved by reading
and researching through her family stories. As she got older she rebelled and
protested. The memoir shows her journey of growing up during the revolution.
Works Cited
Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis.
New York: Random, 2003. Print.
Project Space
A World like Venice by Jessica Suarez
Most people want to live in a world where everyone can be
accepted. A place where no one is judged and everyone knows how to interact with
each other is an example of Venice
Beach. A space where you can hold anyone’s hand and you won’t get any
stares. No matter how you dress you will fit right in, you can express yourself
artistically and musically. This is a place where people will accept you no
matter how you look, act, or what your opinion is. A place where it doesn’t
matter how much money you have. Venice
Beach is a space where you can go to hang out, workout, or just relax.
There are a few places in the world that are just like this. The only problem is
there are also places which are the complete opposite of this. If everyone was
not so different and open minded then Venice would not be as diverse or
welcoming. People are not only affecting the space, but can be affected as
well.
Venice Beach is
a very different place. For some people it is difficult to understand or even be
around it. Venice has become its own world. It is a place that is very unique.
Venice is a great example of how people can affect a space. Venice Beach could
be like any other beach and just be a place to go exercise, walk around or play
in the water, but it is more than that. The people who go there are what makes
it so special. The beach is so rich with diversity and culture, but also with
new ideas and people with an open mind. There are little shops, food stands,
restaurants, and even a clinic to get a medical card. There’s people selling
their art or playing music. People are riding their bikes, on long boards,
walking, jogging, playing basketball or volleyball, or working out in the
outside gym. There is so much to do and all the activities attract all types of
people. That is one of the reasons why it is so diverse. Not only is there a lot
to do, but everyone is very accepting. People wearing all different kinds of
things, some crazy and some normal, fit right in. No one stares if you are
wearing something crazy or simply holding hands with someone of the same gender.
People can affect space or space can affect their ideas.
Space can
affect people in many ways, including emotionally. According to Pico Lyer
“Airports are among the only sites in public life where emotions are hugely
sanctioned. We see people weep, shout, kiss in airports; we see them at the
furthest edges of excitement and exhaustion”(329). He explains how the space of
airports can cause so many different emotions. A person can be happy to pick up
a loved one, sad to see a loved one go, or excited to go on an adventure.
Airports are not the only spaces that can affect people. Venice affects people,
but not all in the same way. Some people can be afraid or even feel out of
place. Some may fear change or something different. That’s what Venice is all
about, change, changing society to accept even if they don’t agree. Some people
learn to understand that in this world, everyone should be accepting and
accepted.
In Venice the
sidewalk becomes a space where people walk around together. According to Pico
Lyer, “perhaps the most familiar form of transit space is the urban sidewalk,
where many of us spend a good deal of time walking about or hanging out.
Sidewalks become a world of their own, with complicated human movement and even
more complicated forms of behavior as people jostle one another in crowds and
make snap decisions on when to step aside and when not to”(326).
How human movements are complicated is a great example of how a space can be
similar to how the world is seen. In Venice people are riding bikes, walking,
jogging, walking their dog, or on long boards, but somehow they know how to move
around each other. There aren’t any collisions. The collisions can represent
violence or judgment. If the world was more like Venice, everyone would be able
to interact together without any problem. Public spaces are not the only spaces
that shape or affect the world.
Spaces can
include imagination, a sacred space or a sports place. These places make up the
world. People in these spaces can change the world or think of ideas of how they
want the world to be. Stephan Dunn explains how even a car can be a sacred
space, “who understood the bright altar of the dashboard / and how far away / a
car could take you from the need / to speak, or to answer, the key/ in having a
key / and putting it in, and going” (321). A car can take anyone to a new place,
a place to be accepted. A person can drive around to clear their head or go to a
place where they know will make them feel better. A car is a space that can be
controlled, and the person in control can decide where to go. That is how people
want to live, in control. They want to be in control of the world, not always in
a negative way. In control of how society should be. People can affect space and
make it how they want to be. Venice Beach is a great example of how people are
in control. They control how open Venice is and accepting. Venice accepts anyone
and the only way it can be like that is if people accept each other. The world
should not be controlled by a couple people, but by everyone, controlled in the
sense that the people decide what to accept and to allow everyone to their own
opinion and “style”. The style of life they want to live and make them happy is
an example of being in control of their life. Spaces that contribute to the
world do not have to be actual places. They can be places we think
about.
Most people
have an image of what the world should be like in their mind. Some are affected
by their experiences and shape the world in their mind based on those
experiences. According to Lynda Barry, “We speak of our ‘inner self’, of
feelings ‘deep inside’, of a ‘voice within’, and we frequently make a
distinction between our ‘internal’ and ‘external’ identities. Yet what exactly
is inside us- what images, thoughts, words, dreams, and experiences that make up
our interior life?” (335). The world is affected by people’s ideas. Some of the
major changes that have been made are usually thought out by someone. The
imagination is one of the most important spaces that affect the world. A person
can come up with inventions that can contribute to the world or ideas to help
people get along with each other. Many ideas for different issues or topics are
created in the imagination. A person can come up with a way the world should be.
For example Abby Kinney had a dream of creating a “Venice of America” and that
is how Venice Beach was started. The imagination can create stories, inventions,
music, art, or even just a made up world. In Venice Beach, there are performers,
art and music. Venice is a place where all of this can be presented without
judgment. It is even possible that someone or a group of people created an image
like Venice Beach in their mind and thought how amazing it would be if every
place was like that. The ideas and imagination of a perfect world can also be
put into music.
Music is also
an example of a sacred space. Music is an art which can have many different
emotions and affects. Music can express experiences or issues that are going on
in the world that affect most people. According to Luis Alfaro, “Songs about
love and loss, working the land and missing home. How come I know that feeling
and I ain’t even lived yet?”(15). Music can make people understand situations
that they have not gone through, because people connect to emotions. A story can
be told through music and can be understood, because people listen to the lyrics
and go through the experience in their mind. Music shapes the world, in a
different way any other art can. Music can unite people and bring them together.
It is so much more powerful then weapons and the negativity in this world. Music
gives people hope that one day the world can be a better place. Also music can
be comforting, “thanks to all those records, every single day that I get ready
for high school, I feel like I know who I am, more and more” (16). For Alfaro
music is his sacred space, because it helps him find who he is as a person. He
figured how to accept himself and go on with his day. Although his life was not
easy, music made everything better. He felt like the music he listened to
belonged to him. The way people should feel about this world. People should feel
a part of this world and that it is theirs.
Venice Beach,
public space, imagination, and music shape our world or the way we think of our
world in one way or another. These spaces tie in with different issues, but all
these issues contribute to society and our world. Venice Beach is a great
example of how the world should be and maybe gives people hope that one day it
will be like that. Venice Beach is a creation of society created by the people.
The people who walk around the beach are what make it different. It’s Los
Angeles most famous beach because the culture and diversity it has. It’s a place
that represents the whole world in the way that everyone is open minded and
accepting. If people could interact together in the way people interact on
Venice Beach, then our world would be better. People could affect all the spaces
in the world and change them. This way the world can be changed and everyone can
get along with each other.
Works
Cited
Iyer, Pico. “Piece Name”. Convergences. Macmillan
Higher Education, 2008. 325-335. Print.
Alfaro, Luis. “Minnie Riperton Saved My Life” Another
City: Writings from Los Angeles. Ed.
David L. Ulin.
San Francisco: City Lights, 2001.13-18. Print.
Westland Network. Birth Of “Venice of
America”. Venice History. Westland Network. 1996-
Project Web
Writing through the Process by Jessica Suarez
Before I had even started this course, I knew I
would not enjoy it very much. Since I could remember, I disliked writing with a
passion. I did not only hate to hear that I had an essay due, but it made me
angry. All I could think about was how many hours I would have to sit in front
of the computer just staring blankly, because I had no idea what to type or how
to word it. What I hated most about writing essays was that I always felt so
unintelligent after writing them. I would read them after I was done and I felt
as if the essay was terrible. I knew what I wanted to say but putting it on
paper was easier said than done. Once I did put it down on paper, my ideas did
not sound as great as they had before. During the course of the year I felt as
if my writing skills had improved greatly. Not only have my essays made more
sense but I don’t spend hours in front of the computer. I definitely don’t love
writing after this year, but I have a better respect for it. My writing and
essays have improved, because in this class I learned how to work with my ideas
to lead up to an essay and also view things and ideas in different ways. My road
to becoming a better writer was not easy, from reading and writing about a poem
to writing about space, I have learned a lot and have pushed myself to write
better essays.
The first assignment I had to do in this class
was read a poem. My first thought was “great another thing I dislike”. Poems are
usually difficult to understand, that is the main reason why I dislike them. I
read the poem “It’s a Women’s World” by Eavan Boland , at first I did not
understand it at all. I read it over and over again, alone and in class. I broke
it down into parts and tried to figure out what each part meant. It was very
frustrating. I kind of understood some parts, but I didn’t completely understand
the poem as a whole. The class was assigned letters to write, first to the
speaker of the poem, the author, and then to a family member explaining what we
understood about the poem. The first two letters were difficult, because I
didn’t really understand the poem. After reading my classmate’s letters, I
understood the poem better. During the course of these exercises we would view
pictures, links, and videos that had something to do with the poem. They all
shared a common idea.
I then had to write an essay about an issue
that was related to the poem. I had the poem, links, videos and picture we had
seen while reading the poem to use as resources for the essay. If Kitty had just
presented the poem and asked us to read it and write an essay I would have
written the worst essay ever. Since, she had given us writing exercises and
showed us different visuals that made us think, it made it easier. The whole
process lead up to the essay and even though I went through all these steps, I
still had a difficult time writing the essay. Since it was the first essay of
the year, it was the hardest but I learned a lot from it. I learned what Kitty
expected from me when I wrote my essays. This essay was a glimpse of what I
would have to do the whole year. At the time I was dreading this class, thinking
how am I going to get through this. There was so much writing and I felt like
there was no way I could get better at it. Quickly I learned that not all the
essays we would write would be this difficult.
The first essay that I wrote that changed my mind about writing was when I was given the assignment to take song lyrics and analyze them and turn it into a story. It was
the first essay that didn’t take me hours to write. It was still a difficult essay to write since
it was assigned to me in the first semester. It was also the first time I enjoyed writing an
essay and I was surprised. I think the main reason I enjoyed it so much was because at
the moment the song I wrote about was one of my favorites. I felt like it had a strong
message and I was excited to share it with my professor. I knew she was very diverse in
the music, so she would understand it and appreciate it. The song I analyzed was “Family Affair” by Wale. I still had a little bit of trouble putting my thoughts on paper, but since I was passionate about what I was writing I did not let it frustrate me too much. I began to realize with this essay that I had to learn to have better transitions leading into a new paragraph. I would just jump from one idea to another. Also I saw things about the lyrics that I had not noticed before. This is because I had been learning that there are different ways to view things and how to take them into consideration. I had seen little details that I had skipped before that were very important to the story.I think the main reason that this essay was easier was because I knew what I was talking about and I was actually interested in writing it. As I wrote this essay I started to notice that writing wasn’t too bad and for once I felt proud of an essay that I had written.
the first essay that didn’t take me hours to write. It was still a difficult essay to write since
it was assigned to me in the first semester. It was also the first time I enjoyed writing an
essay and I was surprised. I think the main reason I enjoyed it so much was because at
the moment the song I wrote about was one of my favorites. I felt like it had a strong
message and I was excited to share it with my professor. I knew she was very diverse in
the music, so she would understand it and appreciate it. The song I analyzed was “Family Affair” by Wale. I still had a little bit of trouble putting my thoughts on paper, but since I was passionate about what I was writing I did not let it frustrate me too much. I began to realize with this essay that I had to learn to have better transitions leading into a new paragraph. I would just jump from one idea to another. Also I saw things about the lyrics that I had not noticed before. This is because I had been learning that there are different ways to view things and how to take them into consideration. I had seen little details that I had skipped before that were very important to the story.I think the main reason that this essay was easier was because I knew what I was talking about and I was actually interested in writing it. As I wrote this essay I started to notice that writing wasn’t too bad and for once I felt proud of an essay that I had written.
My writing at this point had improved but there
was still a long way for it to go. The last essay I had to write was a difficult
one, but it did not seem as difficult after everything I have done all year. We
wrote about space and Los Angeles. Each essay seemed difficult when it was first
assigned, but after a few exercises it always seemed achievable. We learned what
could be defined as a space and what it can mean to people. Space can affect
people emotionally. Also people can affect space and make it their own. In the
process of this essay I had to visit a location in Los Angeles. Since, I am not
from here I visited a few locations before I chose which one I thought made and
described Los Angeles. Venice Beach was a space that I thought made Los Angeles
what everyone loved about it. I learned so much from this experience. Venice
Beach is such a beautiful place to experience. It is so diverse and accepting
just, like Los Angeles. After reading about Los Angeles and learning about
space, I viewed the space differently. Writing that essay was one of the
easiest, because through the whole year I had learned how to analyze. Also I had
actually grown to be comfortable writing essays instead of being annoyed by
it.
Throughout the whole year I have learned so
much about myself and writing. What helps me write better and the steps I need
to take to get there. The main lesson I learned throughout this year is that
writing an essay is easier if I research and do exercises to lead up to it. It
is so much harder when I just jump into an essay. I have also learned how to
better analyze everything and research for my paper.
When I have all these
resources at hand, writing is not as stressful anymore. I have also learned a
lot about myself through writing. I learned what issues and ideas affect me and
inspire me to write. This course hasn’t only taught me about writing, but about
things going on in the world. How you can view different issues in different
perspectives. That’s how I am looking at writing now, in a different
perspective. Everywhere I go I see everything different, I look at how people
act and respond to different places. Writing is not my favorite thing in the
world, but I can always get better and it will teach me a lot. Writing is not
only something you learn about but something that gives you knowledge. That is
the most important thing I have learned in this class that even if you don’t
enjoy doing something it doesn’t mean you can’t get better at it and maybe learn
to enjoy it just a little bit.
