If Anne Bradstreet came out of the poems....

I am a woman. Is it a reason to be excluded?
I am a woman who is writing poems and even publishing them. Does that sound strange?

I grew up in an England castle where my father worked. I realized that I am very well educated compared to other young English girls. Neither I nor the girls go to school, but I spent much of my time learning in the castle library with eight tutors and my dear father, Thomas Dudley, who was always willing to teach me something new. I admitted that I am a very inquisitive person, so I always tried to satisfy my hunger for knowledge by reading others' works. Thanks to my father, I was privileged enough to have unlimited access to the great library where I embraced myself to the writings of many well known authors.

However, I traveled to the Massachusetts Bay Colony with my parents and husband in 1630. Now here I am, in the New World. Although I have suffered by my sickness, I still take care of my children and my house really well. There is no reason that I can't spend my own time doing my favorite thing -- writing, since I fulfill the "requirement" for a Puritan woman.

I love writing poems about Puritan and my faith. I express my emotion through the poems. (To My Dear and Loving Husband) Sometimes for my husband, my children, or even myself.

I am lucky to be educated, unlike those women around me. I disagree with the critics who put women into secondary category in the society. Women should not be excluded in the intellectual field; in fact, anything! (The Prologue) If a man can do it, a woman is always capable of doing so too.




first publication: The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up 

(NEW WORDS:hoist on your own petard)

Participating in the Project..!

     Our group is responsible for creating the new site, collecting others data, and organized the materials. I was responsible for the organization and edition. In addition, we are also responsible for the "Colonial Era" part. Our group divided the materials into several sections. Demi and Eunji did the research while Jungsoo and I typed and organized the page. Moreover,  I though that it will be easier for us to put everything together on a Google doc, so I created one and shared with everyone in the class.
    Our group is now in the process of changing the document of every group into the same format and putting on the site. So, I think we are in a good shape now!

Ideas? the study guide for D period American Literature

    This is my first time having a class project. At first, it was kind of a chaos since we couldn't came up with a satisfied idea. However, after dividing into groups, we finally had it going on.
    In my opinion, this is a great idea combining everyone's work together, so we don't have to all do it alone. With a common web area that we can share all our work, we all, as a class, can discuss the materials together. Moreover, working as a class can make sure the context of our study guides is precise. On the other hand, doing study guides as a class project required every one of us's hard work. If any group slacks off and refuses to reach the class's expectation, it will cost the other people extra time to do the extra work.
    It is really important that the class is always on the same page whenever we are working on the project. I believe we need  a  calender to follow and even set up the regular format and how detail we want to go.

Mary Rowlandson & the Indians

Mary Rowlandson, a woman that was captured by the Indians for 5 months, wrote a series of story about the captures. It is really different form many of the novels because it is based on a real story and with a objective perspective. She did not write it in the first person, but as a spectator. I found it really interesting that it is not in a journals' form but more like a story book. I am looking forward to read through the whole book and find out more details about this lady.

A Lady with Pride-Anne Bradstreet

     We read about the poems of Anne Bradstreet in class today and  I was impressed by her courage. Back to her time period, it was almost impossible for a woman to speak up. Although it was not her notion  to publish the poems, she later approved it and wrote a poem that indicated the equality of men and women. Her actions inspire me to not be afraid of being the minority and also remind me always let my voice heard whenever it is needed.

Food Inc.

        I watched Food Inc. a long time ago, but once again, I was shocked! We all knew about the process of making meat product is horrible, but we tend to ignore the fact and result he whole immoral treatment to the animals. The stories in the film describe the negative influences of fast food industry and also bad habits of eating, which, in fact, will result deseases and might happen on one of us. Americans generally have worse eating habits than others. Take myself as an example, I have never eat so much fast food in one month. Back in Taiwan, my mom always tried to cook us every meal, so we seldom eat out. However, I have no choice here but eat the food that is provided in dining hall. I realize that the faculties have been trying to improve the food quality in dining hall, but actually, it is still not health at all. Under my observation, first, I think we do not eat enough vegetable a day. Most of the food they served that can make us "feel full" is meat. Although they provide salad bar, it is still very different from cooked vegetables. Second, dining hall ofter serve us food that can fill our appetites in a short term, which we always feel hungry after study hall. This is actually a really serious problem because we will eat a lot of junk food at night which will cause serious health problem in a long term. Food such as rice, noodles that are made from amylum (rice-like food that are made from flour) is necessary in every meal. This category of food maintains our satiety, so we will stay full for a long time.
      Although I am not a vegetarian, I still try to eat less meet, and eat healthier. I understand the importance of eating healthy, and I would like to share with people around me about it.

Christianity + John Winthrop = A Model of Christian Charity

        "A Model of Christian Charity" is a sermon of John Winthrop delivered somewhere on the ocean before the puritans arrived in America. In the sermon, he illustrates the reason behind the Puritans' unwillingness to accept the need for state and church separation. Moreover, Winthrop acknowledged a natural existent of separation between social classes. He believed that God created the separation for a reason, to bring the classes all together and they can help each other.
         I was really confused when I first read it. I couldn't understand the thesis and had no clue what why he wrote this. However, after the discussion with the class, I realized the background differences between now and then; the church was everything back to the time. They were much more into religion, so they believed that god created everything in the world.
         Although I am still not 100% sure about the context, I get the main idea of Puritans' world in the 17th century-the god and the Christianity are everything.