Modernism Theory Analysis

MODERNISM

A Room of One (Novel)

By Virginia Wolf

Synopsis:

The narrator begins her investigation at Oxbridge College, where she reflects on the different educational experiences available to men and women as well as on more material differences in their lives. She then spends a day in the British Library perusing the scholarship on women, all of which has written by men and all of which has been written in anger. Turning to history, she finds so little data about the everyday lives of women that she decides to reconstruct their existence imaginatively. The figure of Judith Shakespeare is generated as an example of the tragic fate a highly intelligent woman would have met with under those circumstances. In light of this background, she considers the achievements of the major women novelists of the nineteenth century and reflects on the importance of tradition to an aspiring writer. A survey of the current state of literature follows, conducted through a reading the first novel of one of the narrator's contemporaries. Woolf closes the essay with an exhortation to her audience of women to take up the tradition that has been so hardly bequeathed to them, and to increase the endowment for their own daughters.

Analysis:

Eco-Criticism Theory Analysis

ECO-CRITICISM 

Rapid Changes in the Arctic Ecosystem During Ice Minimum in Summer 2012 (Article) Feb. 14, 2013 

— Huge quantities of algae are growing on the underside of sea ice in the Central Arctic: in 2012 the ice algae Melosira arctica was responsible for almost half the primary production in this area. When the ice melts, as was the case during the ice minimum in 2012, these algae sink rapidly to the bottom of the sea at a depth of several thousands of metres. Deep sea animals such as sea cucumbers and brittle stars feed on the algae, and bacteria metabolise what's left, consuming the oxygen in the sea bed.

This short-term reaction of the deep sea ecosystem to changes in sea ice cover and ocean productivity has now been published in the scientific journal Science by a multidisciplinary team of researchers around Prof. Dr. Antje Boetius from the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI), Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research and from the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology in Bremen.

Scientists and technicians from twelve nations travelled the Central Arctic on the research icebreaker Polarstern in the late summer of 2012. In and under the ice they used a large number of ultra-modern research devices and methods such as camera-guided sampling devices and an under-ice remotely operating vehicle (ROV). Prof. Antje Boetius, who leads the Helmholtz-Max Planck Research Group on Deep-Sea Ecology and Technology has a first answer to the all-important question of how the Arctic is changing due to warming: "Far quicker than has so far been expected! The seabed at a depth of more than 400 metres was littered with clumps of ice algae which had attracted lots of sea cucumbers and brittle stars," explains the microbiologist.

The algal deposits with diameters of up to 50 centimetres covered up to ten per cent of the seabed. The researchers were able to count them using an Ocean Floor Observation System (OFOS). Also for the first time in the ice-covered Arctic, the Helmholtz-Max Planck researcher Dr. Frank Wenzhöfer was able to measure the bacterial and faunal oxygen consumption directly in the deep sea using micro-sensors. And life was thriving under the algae cover: bacteria had started to decompose the algae as evident from a greatly reduced oxygen content in the sediment. By contrast, the sea bed in the adjacent algae-free areas was aerated down to a depth of 80 centimetres and had virtually no algal residues.

But where do the large quantities of algae on the deep-sea floor come from? Plants cannot grow in 4000 m water depth because there is no light. Using an ROV, the researchers found lots of remains of ice algae everywhere under the sea ice. "It has been known for some time that diatoms of the typeMelosira arctica can form long chains under the ice. However, such a massive occurrence has so far only been described for coastal regions and old, thick sea ice ," explains Boetius. When planning the expedition three years ago the researchers proposed the hypothesis that ice algae could grow faster under the thinning sea ice of the Central Arctic. And the observations now published in the scientific journal Science support their hypothesis: at 45 per cent, the ice algae were responsible for almost half of the primary production in the Central Arctic Basin. The remaining primary production was attributable to other diatoms and nanoplankton which live in the upper layers of the water column.

Normally, the small phytoplankton cell sinks only very slowly through the water column and is largely consumed already within the ocean surface layer. By contrast, the long chains of algae formed by Melosira arctica are heavy and can quickly sink to the bottom of the sea. In this way they exported more than 85 per cent of the carbon fixed by primary production from the water surface to the deep sea in summer 2012, just before the expedition. The researchers suppose that the algae had actually grown recently because they found only one-year old ice in the Central Arctic, and because the algae extracted from the guts of sea cucumbers were still able to photosynthesise upon return to the ship's laboratory. The good nutritional state of the sea cucumbers was also evidence of the massive food supply: the zoologist Dr. Antonina Rogacheva of the P.P. Shirshov Institute of Oceanology found that the animals were larger than normal and with highly developed reproductive organs -- an indication that they had been eating abundantly for some two months.

The sea ice physicists on board investigated why ice algae are able to thrive beneath the thinning Arctic sea ice, and how they may also lose their habitat quickly due to the increasing ice melt. They determined the ice thickness with an electromagnetic probe dragged by a helicopter and by ice drillings. They also used an underwater robot (ROV) to view the ice from below and to measure how much light penetrates through the ice. Dr. Marcel Nicolaus from the Alfred Wegener Institute explains: "At the end of the summer we still found a lot of ice algae remains, and could quantify them by using an under-ice ROV. The increasing cover by melt ponds permits more light to permeate the ice, and makes the algae grow faster." However, since the ice has become so much thinner in recent years, and the Arctic so much warmer, the ice algae will melt out more quickly from the ice and sink.

"We were able to demonstrate for the first time that the warming and the associated physical changes in the Central Arctic cause fast reactions in the entire ecosystem down to the deep sea," summarises lead author Boetius. The deep sea has so far been seen as a relatively inert system affected by global warming only with a considerable temporal delay. The fact that microbial decomposition processes fueled by the algal deposits can generate anoxic spots in the deep sea floor within one season alarms the researcher: "We do not know yet whether we have observed a one-time phenomenon or whether this high algal export will continue in the coming years." Current predictions by climate models assume that an ice-free summer could occur in the Arctic in the next decades. Boetius and her team warn: "We still understand far too little about the function of the Arctic ecosystem and its biodiversity and productivity, to be able to estimate the consequences of the rapid sea-ice decline."

Analysis:

The essay is under the eco criticism literary theory because it talks about the Rapid Changes in the Arctic Ecosystem During Ice Minimum in Summer 2012. Meaning, this article shows the interrelationship between the ecosystem and literature for whatever that is happening on our environment  is being written and published to the public.

Romanticism Theory Analysis

ROMANTICISM

At First Sight (Novel)

By Nicholas Sparks

Synopsis:

There are a few things Jeremy Marsh was sure he’d never do: he’d never leave New York City; never give his heart away after barely surviving one failed marriage; and never become a parent. Now Jeremy is living in the tiny town of Boone Creek, North Carolina, engaged to Lexie Darnell, the love of his life, and anticipating the start of their family. But just as his life seems to be settling into a blissful pattern, a mysterious and disturbing e-mail sets off a chain of events that will change the course of this young couple’s relationship. How well do we really know the ones we love? How do we handle the inevitable doubts, fears concerning parenthood, and stumbling blocks that are sometimes placed in our way? Continuing the story of the young couple introduced in Sparks’s bestselling True Believer, this novel captures all the heartbreak, tension, romance and surprises of those who are newly wed. An astonishing tale about the love between a man and a woman and between a parent and a child, At First Sight is about endings that bring new beginnings . . . tragedies that lead to unexpected joy . . . and, most of all, the magic of everlasting love.

 

Analysis:

In this literary piece, I can say that it is under the romanticism theory approach. It is because the story focuses on the emotions of the text rather than the intelligence. It also shows the love for each other that whatever it is they’ve been through, they’re hearts will still leads them to where they belong. This novel wants to emphasize the true meaning of love by giving us the realizations in life (what is really happening in our lives) also, forgiveness and fidelity to each other, to the person you love. That Love, is the greatest gift among all.  

 

Territorialism Theory Analysis

TERRITORIALISM

Specials (Novel)

By Scott Westerfeld

Synopsis:

The novel in the Uglies series begins two months after events in Pretties, when Tally Youngblood has become a member of an elite group of "Specials" - surgically enhanced super-humans - called the Cutters. The Cutters were originally founded by Shay, who invented the use of ritual self-harm to become "bubbly" and clear-headed in spite of brain lesions used to make her pretty-minded. All of the specials in this group were able to get rid of the brain lesions on their own, and now live in the wild. They were adopted into Special Circumstances and given enhanced senses, strength and reflexes, and are among the youngest agents working for Dr Cable.

The Cutters disguise themselves as Uglies in order to crash a party in Uglyville and search for members of the New Smoke. Tally successfully finds a girl giving out pills which cure the pretty lesions, which she encourages the Uglies to take to the Crims - Tally and Shay's old clique. The Cutters attempt to capture the girl, but she escapes on a hoverboard with David's help. Giving chase, the Cutters are ambushed by Smokies with unusually advanced technology, including infra-red masking sneak suits and electrical weapons. The Smokies kidnap Fausto, one of the Cutters, and leave Shay and Tally injured.

Hearing that the pills are intended for Zane, Tally insists on going to see her boyfriend, who suffered brain damage in New Pretty Town and has been hospitalized since Tally turned Special. Tally discovers that while Zane is free of the pretty lesions, his brain has been damaged and his physical infirmity now disgusts her.

She begins to wonder if she received a brain operation when being made Special which has given her feelings of superiority.

Eager to show Dr. Cable that Zane is cured so that he will be made Special, Shay and Tally break into the city armory to steal something to cut off Zane's tracking necklace. They succeed, but in the attempt, they accidentally destroy much of the armory, putting the city on high alert. Then, they begin to secretly track Zane and the Crims as they journey to the New Smoke, although the pair split up when Tally receives a guide to the New Smoke from her friend Andrew Simpson Smith, an escapee from a reservation of primitive culture. Shay follows the guide straight to the Smoke, but Tally insists on staying with Zane.

On the journey, Zane notices Tally and confronts her about her reasons for following him. The pair kiss, but Tally is still repulsed by Zane's tremors and runs away from him. Tally continues to follow the group to the New Smoke - a city called Diego, which accepts runaways freely, having widely adopted the pretty cure and rejected the rules about surgery, allowing anyone to look how they please rather than following the international standard. Tally is amazed by this, but horrified to hear that Diego is beginning to expand into the wild, clear-cutting forest like the Rusties did.

Tally finds Fausto at a party for newly arrived runaways, but realizes his Special brain surgery has been cured. He had given informed consent before he became special to take a "cure" for having a special brain. Tally only just escapes being forcibly injected. Her escape attempt leaves her helpless, as she jumps off a cliff with only crash bracelets to catch her fall. She is picked up by Diego's authorities and locked up for her lethal strength and weapon-sharp teeth and fingernails, which they insist on removing. The doctors inform her that she has received brain surgery to give her flashes of anger and euphoria, along with feelings of superiority, although they will not change this without her consent. With Shay's help, Tally escapes just before the surgery begins.

Shay and the other Cutters have all been cured by Fausto, but they want Tally's help to protect Diego from imminent attack by Dr Cable, who is blaming the so-called New System for the attack on the armory. Tally assists in the evacuation of the hospital, but learns after the attack that Zane, having just received surgery to cure his tremors, died of complications during the confusion of the attack. Grief-stricken, Tally leaves immediately to tell Dr Cable the truth about the attack on the armory. Just before she reaches the city, she meets David, who took a helicopter to talk to her in time. He tells her that he still believes she can think her own way out of her brain surgery, but gives her an injector full of the cure so that she has the option of curing herself.

Arriving at Special Circumstances headquarters, Tally finds Dr Cable and the Specials have taken control of the city. Dr Cable knows that Tally was responsible for the attack, but has chosen to use the attack as a way to seize control over both this city and Diego. Tally tricks Dr Cable into stabbing herself on the injector, and is imprisoned underground for a month, watching the feeds as Dr. Cable slowly loses her grip on the city and the cure begins to spread. Diego publishes scans of Tally's Special body, calling her a "morphilogical violation," and the world is outraged by Dr Cable's "secret" experiments on unconsenting teenagers.

Eventually, Tally is taken as the last remaining Special to be "despecialized", but she resists the surgeons and breaks out with Dr. Cable's help, becoming the only true Special left. She returns to David, still waiting at the Rusty Ruins, and realizes that her other friends have all found their places in the New System. She decides that she wishes to remain in the wild, free from surgery, and with David she will form the "New Special Circumstances", ensuring that nature is protected from mankind's excesses.

 

Analysis:

In this literary piece, I can say that it is under the territorialism approach for the story shows the relationship between ownership and the construction of one’s self. In the story, The Specials here shows ownership on the Cutters who are surgically enhanced humans in order to control them (intangible in the aspect of controlling their minds through brain lesions). In the later part of the story, it gives us the perception that the main character (Tally Youngblood) struggles on herself as to what she’s going to do in order to save the other Cutters as well as herself from the hands of the New System and the unjustly judgment of others.

 

 

Structuralism Theory Analysis

STRUCTURALISM

Looking For Alaska (Novel)

By John Green

Synopsis:

Looking for Alaska opens with a brief perspective on the main character and narrator, Miles Halter’s, social status at his high school in Florida. His parents, unaware of his limited to no friends, throw him a thoroughly awkward and unattended goodbye party before he leaves his home in Florida to attend Culver Creek Preparatory High School in Alabama for his junior year. When his parents ask him whether he is leaving because of his lack of friends, he denies that question and uses Francois Rabelais’s last words: "I go to seek a Great Perhaps" as his argument for leaving home at such a ripe age in order to seek said perhaps before he dies.

Soon after arriving at Culver Creek, Miles meets his roommate, Chip "The Colonel" Martin. The Colonel soon provides Miles with his very own nickname: "Pudge," supposedly ironic as Miles is tall and slender. The friendship between the two roommates leads to an introduction to the Colonel’s friend, Alaska Young. Alaska is described as an attractive yet emotionally unstable girl. Pushing aside the moments of her rage, Pudge develops his first crush. The eve of his first day at Culver Creek, Pudge is grabbed out of his bed, duct-taped, and tossed into a nearby lake by the "Weekday Warriors," a group of rich, stuck up, Birmingham-area students of Culver Creek. The "Weekday Warriors" earned their title because during the weekdays they stay at the school, while over the weekends, they get to go back to their "perfect, air-conditioned lives in Birmingham." The tossing of new students into the school lake is a customary prank, the duct-taping, however, is not, leading the Colonel to understand that this was not just an ordinary prank. After taking part in a prank war with the weekday warriors, the Colonel and his friends become closer to one another. This leads to a brief relationship between Pudge and Alaska. Then, that same night, he finds himself woken to Alaska's troubled crying. Both the Colonel and Pudge aid her in her escape of Culver Creek. To where or why is still unknown to them. They then fall asleep.

The first chapter of the "After" shows, The Colonel and Pudge Found out that letting Alaska go resulted in her death. Devastated, the remainder of the book revolves around the Colonel and Pudge try to uncover the hidden mystery behind her disappearence and death as well as Pudge and his gang planning one last prank in Alaska's honor. In the end, they find out that she had gone to see her mother's grave, as Alaska felt responsible for her death and had visited the grave every year on the anniversary of her mother's death. As a result of her heavy intoxication, she then crashed into a patrol vehicle and died. The story ends with Pudge's religion final paper, a final goodbye to Alaska Young.

 

Analysis:

In this literary piece, I can say that it is under the structuralism approach for the story is content based. It also had a signifier and a signified. The signifier here is the female character named Alaska. It is because her name and her personality contradict each other. Though her name seems so cool, in contrast, she is an emotionally unstable girl. On the other hand, the signified here is that Alaska Young acted as an emotionally unstable towards others for she was ashamed of herself because she think that she was the one to blame for the death of her mother. Alaska here symbolizes darkness wherein everybody goes through in life.

American Pragmatism Theory Analysis

AMERICAN PRAGMATISM

Upside down (Film)

Synopsis:

In a world that consists of two planets existing one on top of the other, joined by an enormous tower, Adam (Jim Sturgess), who lives in the Below world, sees The Lottery on television, a show that offers people from their world the chance to live Up Top, in luxury and safety.

The girl announcing the winner is his childhood sweetheart, Eve (Kirsten Dunst), and he decides to reconnect with her. In order to do so, he gets a job at the Transworld Patents and Inventions Department, where his plan is to sell his greatest invention and move into the world that Eve inhabits so he can find her.

 

Analysis:

 

In this literary genre, I can say that is under the American pragmatism literary theory for it has the collaboration of science and technology, beliefs and ideals of the characters and the environment they’re living in. The movie shows practicality in the characters.