April 29

AGENDA:

1. Discuss Unit Test
2. Critical analysis paper - see below
3. Go over vocab words

18^th and 19^th C. Galvanism

18^th and 19^th C Body Snatching

Vivisections

Polar Expeditions

Human Genome Project

Visible Human Project

Dolly the Sheep

Frankenfoods

Pharmageddon

Medical ethics

CloningOrgan donation

Genetic screening

Eugenics

Gene therapy

Fetal tissue

Acid rain

Transgenic research

Genetic engineering

Fetal stem research 

HW: Unit Test tomorrow; Lit analysis due tomorrow; critical analysis due Friday by midnight; Vocab Quiz Monday; Extra Credit by tomorrow as well.

Frankenstein

Frankenstein endures not only because of its infamous horrors, but also for the richness of the ideas it asks us to confront — human accountability, social alienation, and the nature of life itself.

When writing about Frankenstein, consider these examples of quotation usage, summary and analyzation.  First a passage from the novel is provided as the inspiration for each of the paragraphs below it. Read each and consider how the writer includes all three aspects listed above in the response and still addresses the “big ideas” that the novel evokes.

Passage A:

But where were my friends and relations? No father had watched my infant days, no mother had blessed me with smiles and caresses; or if they had, all my past life was now a blot, a blind vacancy in which I distinguished nothing. From my earliest remembrance I had been as I then was in height and proportion. I had never yet seen a being resembling me. . . . What was I?

The Monster
Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, 1818

Mary Shelley gave her monster feelings and intelligence. Fatherless and motherless, the monster struggles to find his place in human society, struggles with the most fundamental questions of identity and personal history. Alone, he learns to speak, to read, and to ponder "his accursed origins." All the while, he suffers from the loneliness of never seeing anyone resembling himself and from the nagging of the horrible question “What was I?” with no one who can provide an answer.


Passage B:

I paused when I reflected on the story I had to tell. A being whom I myself had formed, and endued with life, had met me at midnight among the precipes. . . . I well knew that if any other had communicated such a relation to me, I should have looked upon it as the ravings of insanity. Besides, the strange nature of the animal would elude all pursuit, even if I were so far credited as to persuade my relatives to commence it. . . . I resolved to remain silent.

                Victor Frankenstein
                Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, 1818


Abandoned by his creator, the monster takes his revenge on Victor Frankenstein by killing his younger brother, William. Frankenstein's silence, in the face of the monster's murderous actions, exacts a terrible price. His self-imposed isolation from society mirrors the social isolation the monster experiences from all who see him. Frankenstein's decision to “remain silent” about the monster leads to further tragedy.