Alliteration

 

Alliteration refers to the repetition of the initial consonant sound, like ‘Peter Pan picked a peck of pickled pepper’. One important factor of alliteration is the fact that it depends not on the letters but on the sounds. Therefore, ‘know-nothing’ is alliterative, whereas ‘chemical change’ is not. The purpose of alliteration is to create a consistent pattern that will catch the eye of the mind of the readers. Therefore, writers aiming for a way to draw readers’ attention to a particular scene usually use alliterative phrases in order to focus the readers' attention. Alliterative phrases are used occasionally in poems, song lyrics, tongue twisters, quotes, and even in brand names.

 

 

Let me give you some examples of alliteration. Firstly, let's look at the poem 'The Raven', written by Edgar Allen Poe. In this poem, there is a phrase saying, 'doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before'. In this phrase, the same initial consonant sound repeats, making a rhythm that acts as an efficient way to draw the readers' attention.

 

 

Alliteration is also used in tongue twisters, as it can easily make rhythms that can sound fun. One famous example is 'Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked. If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, how many pickled peppers did Peter Piper pick?'. Additionally, alliterative phrases appear in many quotes, such as 'Busy as a bee', and 'Make a mountain out of a molehill.'

 

 

As alliterative phrases can draw people's attention easily, it is used frequently in brand names. Famous companies like Coca-Cola, Dunkin Donuts, Best Buy are perfect examples of this. Many bands also use alliteration for their band name. Good examples of this would be 'Franz Ferdinand', 'Foo Fighters', 'Beastie Boys', and so on.

 

 



Oxford University

It would be good for me to firstly talk about going to Oxford University. Before I actually went there, I imagined that Oxford University would consist of old-fashioned buildings, a beautiful campus like many other universities in Korea and America. This imagination broke apart even before we arrived in the destination, when the tour guide told us that the university is composed of diverse colleges located independently in the city of Oxfordshire. Therefore, there wasn’t any ‘campus’ that I have imagined of, which disappointed me at first. Luckily however, I could easily become so excited to find out that Oxford was more beautiful than I imagined.

Just after arriving at the city of Oxfordshire.(This building is one of the oldest museum of U.K)

 

I don't exactly remember why I took this picture, but anyway, I'll post this here.

 

As I expected, there were a lot of beautiful old buildings, letting me imagine about what they would have looked like when they were first built. It is quite well-known that the university has a history of 1000 years, enhancing the human civilization by producing countless scholars who strived to deepen the knowledge of mankind. Scientists would have verified their hypothesis, and philosophers would have expressed their opinions freely throughout the history of Oxford. I came into thinking that this was the Great Britain could have the glory it had throughout its history, as the works of these scholars would have surely led to various technological and social advance. The buildings of the university looked so beautiful and meaningful for me now that I had these thoughts. Of course, there were also modern buildings which added to the beauty of the university.

 

I don't exactly remember where this picture was taken

 

This is a library.

 

Some parts of the movie 'Harry Potter' was filmed here.

 

I was also impressed by the system of the university. Oxford University was quite different from other universities that I knew of, most of which are located in Korea and America. Firstly, as I have mentioned, the university composes of colleges, and in order to enter Oxford, students should apply to a specific college. Secondly, Oxford has a tutorial system. Students have a tutorial class every time, and by doing the work that the tutor demands, students can improve their skills by great extent. This factor made me feel as if Oxford University has more interest to every individual student.

Trinity College

I might have mentioned earlier in this blog that I am planning to go abroad after I graduate from this school. Since I had that plan, I have only thought of going to a university in America, mainly for three reasons. First, I had more information about American universities. Second, I have experienced education system of America. Third, I have an American citizenship, which makes me feel at least a bit comfortable about America. However, by going to Oxford University, I came into thinking that planning to go to Great Britain for university might be a good choice too.

 

The city of Oxfordshire itself was also beautiful.

 

 

 

 

 

The start of the vision trip-May 8th

On the 8th of May, which was roughly about 10 days ago, I took a flight heading towards London, the capital city of the United Kingdom. The flight was quite enjoyable, and I spent time watching a few movies like Banchanggo(반창꼬), Wolf Boy(늑대소년), Hobbit, and some documentaries about soccer and American football.

Me and Woo-Hyeon at the Incheon airport

 

Waiting to get into the bathroom

Although the movie was fun, the superior external feature of the actor Song Joong-ki made me feel inferior.

 

It was about 6 o’clock in the afternoon when the plane arrived in London, and we went to a restaurant where we ate dinner. Although I remember the meal to have been quite good, I do not remember what we ate that day. I do have pictures I took in the restaurant, so I will post some of the pictures here.

 At the restaurant

 

 

Hello, Seok-Jun!

 

After dinner, we went to the hotel where we would spend two days. It was not a bad place to sleep, except the fact that I could not use the Internet. Therefore, I turned on the TV and watched a comedy program which I don’t remember the name of, which was funny enough to let both me and my roommate to spend some time laughing. I remember to have fallen asleep in the middle of the show. What a peaceful night to start a trip!

Nacirema-What it tells us

The essay about the Nacirema describes how cruel and hideous the civilization is. According to the article, people from the civilization often commit cruel acts, believing that it is good for their body. Therefore, members of the society of the Nacirma go through magical procedures in order to protect their bodies from illness. The article states with examples that a certain amount of sadism is involved in this procedure, and that most of the population shows masochistic tendencies. The procedure usually involves harming people in immoral ways, such as poking them with sharp object, and making a hole through their teeth.

Reading this article brought total disgust to me. Therefore, as I was writing the in-class essay, I kept on writing about how cruel and inhumane the culture of Nacirema was. However, I also considered the concept of cultural relativism, and therefore stated that we need to understand this culture. I thought that as we have a ‘superior and civilized’ perspective, we could not truly understand the culture of Nacirema, which I considered to be uncivilized and inferior compared to our modern society.

However, what Mr. Menard told us few days after we wrote the in-class essay brought total shock to me. He told us to read ‘Nacirema’ backwards. It is quite evident that I, like all the other students in my class, was impressed to find out that ‘Nacirema’ was ‘American’ spelled backwards. We couldn’t say a word, and Mr. Menard just kept laughing at us, looking as if he was extremely pleasured.

Everything in the article of ‘Nacirema’ became so clear at that instant. We could easily find out that all the inhumane acts committed by the fictional civilization were just sarcastic parodies of the daily routines of the American culture. For example, the shrine represents the bathroom, and the holy-mouth-men represent dentists. All the features of the civilization of Nacirema that have brought unpleasant emotions to me all proved to be features of American cultures. The only difference is that the culture was observed in a different perspective, a perspective presuming the American culture to be an ancient culture.

As I have read this essay, I unconsciously thought that the culture of Nacirema was full of violence and irony. It is probably because I unconsciously had the prejudice that I was living in a ‘superior’ and ‘civilized’ culture. However, reading this article, which observed America in a different point of view, I started to feel a sense of disgust without an objection. Therefore, I came to a conclusion that my perspective of ‘civilized’ and ‘superior’ was somehow wrong and quite prejudiced.

At the end of the essay, the writer states that it is easy to think of the Nacireman culture to be cruel when we try to observe them in a higher position. Therefore, I believe that from the writer was trying to tell us that we are usually wrongly prejudiced in diverse situations, and that in order to fix this problem, we should try to observe these matters at a different point of view. Furthermore, this essay was written in 1956, which was the time when many incidents related to ‘prejudice’ happened, especially the ones related to racial segregation. For example, in 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested in Montgomery for refusing to give her seat to a white person, which led to Montgomery bus boycott. In the same year, a fourteen year old teenager was killed for not showing respect to a white woman. It was an era when many people suffered from racial prejudice. It was also an era when these issues started to turn into serious social problems. Therefore, it was becoming necessary to get rid of these prejudices. From this evidence, we can conclude that the writer would have wanted to convey the importance of thinking in other points of view to get rid of prejudice. Through his essay about Nacirema, the writer showed to us how our prejudices can block us from making wise decisions, and also the fact that we need to change our points of view to stop those prejudices.