AP Summer Assignment Part 3- The Second Book

       Hello again! This is blog number three out of my four summer assignment blogs. This assignment is a little different than the others. I don't have to summarize the first half of the book, "Getting Away With Murder: The True Story of the Emmett Till Case", or analyze the use of the rhetorical triangle. This time, I'm supposed to find two articles about the topic of my book, summarize the ARTICLES and then compare the two articles with the book, looking for similarities and differences among all three writings.
       After searching on the internet for hours on end, the tedious task becoming an outright bother, I finally found two articles that I believe will suffice.All three of the writers have the same viewpoint. The event was a tragedy, the killers were at faukt, and it helped start the civil rights movement. While it is definitely true that there are some who believe it is Emmett Till's fault for whistling at the woman, or that the killers aren't really guilty, none of their work has been published, for hopefully obvious reasons.
       The first article I chose is "1955 Killing Sparked Civil Rights Revolution: Emmett Till: South's Legend and Legacy." A long title such as this is only fit for the long story that was written. It tells the story of Emmett Till's death, describes the effects of his death on America at the time, shows the local black people's reaction, tells the story of his death in desription, shows his mom's reaction, gives insight into the courtroom of the trial, and then tells us where the people in the article are now, or at least when the article was written. In my opinion, it was just like a condensed version of thebook with slightly less detail, the version I would rather have read.
       The second article is a biography of Emmet Till. How can a biography have a viewpoint? Well, the author chooses to put in certain sentences and chooses their wording carefully to give readers insight on their viewpoint, even in biographies. The biography starts off with a little bit about his parents, then his childhood, his trip to Mississippi, his death, the trial, and a little about the civil rights movement, in that order. It's a mini version of the book as well, with less emphasis on the civil rights movement.
       In my opinion, the authors all agree that Emmett Till's death was a national tragedy, but that it helped move along the civil rights movement. They all went over the same main points, that he supposedly wolf whistled at a white pageant girl, that her husband and friends killed Emmett Till, and that it helped start civil rights movements. They all have different focuses though.
       The book, it seems, focuses more on the civil rights aspect of the murder. While both articles featured more of the boy himself, the first article focuses more on the event's effects now and the biography focuses mainly on Emmett Till, his family, and his friends. I wasn't particularly interested in any of the three writings and they didn't hold my attention well, not because it's not important or anything like that, but simply because I'm not very interested in history or anything that hasn't happened in the last 20 or 30 years. This happened around 60 years ago, so, for now, I'm done blogging about it. Keep posted for my next (and last) update on this blog, part four of my summer assignment, which should be posted early next week, maybe Sunday or Monday.
-The Blog Monster

Citations:
Crowe, Chris. Getting Away with Murder: The True Story of the Emmett Till Case. New York: Phyllis Fogelman, 2003. Print
"Emmett Till Biography." Bio.com. A&E Networks Television, n.d. Web. 03 Aug. 2013. http://www.biography.com/people/emmett-till-507515.
Jalon, Allan. "1955 Killing Sparked Civil Rights Revolution : Emmett Till: South's Legend and Legacy." Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 07 Oct. 1985. Web. 03 Aug. 2013. http://articles.latimes.com/1985-10-07/news/mn-16511_1_emmett-till-s-name.
History News Network. Center for Histoy and New Media, n.d. Web. 3 Aug. 2013. http://hnn.us/sites/default/files/Emmett-Till-507515-1-402.jpg.

AP Summer Assignment Part 2- The Last Half of the First Book

       For this weeks assignment, I am supposed to summarize the ssecond half of the book, discuss the purpose, or what the book is trying to persuade me to believe, and either support or refute the purpose.
       The summary will begin where I left off last blog, at section three, "Freedom." Like the other sections, it begins with a story. The story in this part is about a slave becoming a free person after being brought from a sugar island to France, affecting the world's thinking and ideals with the idea that all men are created equally. Then the book goes on to discuss the sugar taxes which were imposed upon the North American colonists by their mother country, England. Then the scenery changes and we find ourselves in England, at Cambridge University. There, a student named Thomas Clarkson realizes that, for all of England's sugar, people are suffering and dying unwillingly to create it. He starts to spread this idea to others and it spread like wildfire to France, our next destination on this journey through history. In France, a revolution occurs, and by 1791, a law supposedly freeing all slaves on the sugar islands is passed. In that same year in Haiti, then called Saint Domingue, the slaves and commanders of the plantation rose against their oppressors and burnt down the sugar cane plantations. This revolt ended in 1973, when "the ideal of brotherhood announced by the revolutionaries of Paris finally included the sugar workers of Saint Domingue." Their leader, Toussaint, eventually gained control of the entire island. Back in England, antislavery forces began to act and, eventually, a law banning involvement in the slave trade was passed by England. Then a glimpse at sugar plantations in the United States and Hawaii is seen.

       Now we are at part four of the book, the short 20-page end of our journey. We find ourselves in India, an impoverished country prone to natural disaster, like famine and floods. We learn that Indians, mostly Hindus, would be "recruited" by other Indians, told they would make money to send back home in a distant land. If they followed, they would lose their position in the caste, the role you were born into. They worked on a plantation for 5-years, bound by contract, before they were released to go back home. Around 75% of those who came to foreign lands decided to stay. With ten pages left we are brought to France, this time for, not sugar, but beets. Beets were easier to grow, could be grown in most of Europe, and tasted just like sugar! Then we go to Russia. There are no sugar plantations, only old-fashioned farms. It was as if they were still living in the Age of Honey. Then we go back to India to meet, perhaps, the most famous Indian of all time, Mohandas K. Ghandi. Recognize the name? Yes, the same Ghandi we see in all of our history textbooks. He went to England to study law, then returned to India, performing a special ceremony to retain his caste position. The Indians overseas, even the ones who chose to stay after their contract ended, were treated harshly and were unwelcoming in those lands. Ghandi stood up for them and helped them stand up for themselves. However, as he is known for, he did not use violence, instead using passive resistance. In the end, we close this journey with knowledge and on the final words, "Sugar changed the world."
       If you haven't figured it out yet, the purpose of this book is to persuade you to believe that sugar really has changed the world. If you hadn't figured it out? Well, let me help you out a little. I think the bright neon sign showing the purpose is the title and last words, "Sugar Changed the World." If you say it out loud, or even in your head, it's a statement, spoken with conviction. That means the author thinks it's true. Since the title describes the book, the book is about how sugar changed the world. Now, if a persuasive non-fiction book is about a topic and the author has an opinion that could go two ways, the purpose is to convince the reader of his opinion. In this case, that menas that the purpose is that sugar really changed the world. If thhat was a little too hard to follow, just think of it this way. At the end of the book, did you find yourself thing Wow! Sugar really did change the world! like I did? That is exactly what the author was trying to persuade you to think.
       For the last part of this blog, I'm going to share my reaction to the book. I ended up agreeing with it. I already like sugar, because I use it all the time, but this book made me look at it in a different light. I found myself looking for videos of modern sugar-making and searching the web for interesting facts about sugar. On the Domino Sugar website there is a list of interesting facts I'd like to share.

In 327 BC, Alexander the Great discovered the sugar cane; it then spread through Persia and introduced it in the Mediterranean.

Sugar’s name originated from the Sanskrit word “Sharkara,” which means “material in a granule form.”

Christopher Columbus introduced sugar to the New World in 1493 on his second voyage.

Sugar was called “White Gold”: Until the late 1700's, sugar was a luxury that European nobility used to validate their rank and social power.

Sugar does help the medicine go down! It’s an important component of many modern medicines.

Some people say that one teaspoon of sugar swallowed “dry” can cure the hiccups!

Sugar has no fat and is 100% natural.

Sweet is the only taste humans are born desiring.

Some plants can make their own sugar— when a banana ripens, it changes starch into sugar, making it sweeter.

In 2001, scientists found sugar in outer space!

Sugar helps bread or doughnuts rise when they’re baked.

Sugar cane stalks can reach 30 feet high!

Sugar prolongs the life of fresh cut flowers.

Sugar is an important source of carbohydrate—the body’s main energy supply.

-The Blog Monster

Citations:
 "Sugar Facts." Sugar Products, Baking Tips, Sweet Recipes, & More. Domino Sugar, n.d. Web. 01 Aug. 2013
Aronson, Marc, and Marina Tamar. Budhos. Sugar Changed the World: A Story of Magic, Spice, Slavery, Freedom, and Science. Boston [Mass.: Clarion, 2010. Print
"How Its Made 01 Sugar." YouTube. YouTube, 20 Feb. 2010. Web. 01 Aug. 2013. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIgavNuBRRA.
"Kauai Sugar Plantations." KauaiPlantationRailway.com. Kauai Plantation Railway, n.d. Web. 1 Aug. 2013. http://www.kauaiplantationrailway.com/agplantations.htm.

AP Summer Assignment Part 1- The Mouth of the Beast

        To start off, I would like to mention a little about this week's blogging assignment. According to the e-mail I recieved from my teacher, the first assignment has two parts. The first is to summarize what I have read and the second is to identify and describe the use of the rhetorical triangle within the book. The book I selected to read is, "Sugar Changed the World- A Story of Magic, Spice, Slavery, Freedom, and Science." It is written by Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos, who have a website that I will link to in the bottom. The title itself is a fairly accurate summary, in chronological order even, however, for this assignment, further detail is necessary.

       The start of the book is, of course, the prologue, so my summary will start there. The prologue, composed of three sections, informs the readers of the driving force behind the book, or why the authors wrote it. It also gives readers a glimpse into the "Age of Honey", the era before sugar had truly been discovered. It is used to set up a base time to start the book from. Then you, the reader, are plunged into part one, "From Magic to Spice." This section starts off with the story of Nearchus, a Greek ship captain who, along with Alexander the Great, discover sugar cane. In all actuality, sugar cane was, according to the book, cultivated first on the islands of New Guinea, then spread to surrounding areas by indigenous tribes. After this we reach the "magic" part, which describes sugar cane being used in Hindu rituals as a way to contact the gods. Eventually, the people who performed the rituals realized that boiling the juice of the cane causes it to crystalize into brown sugar. This method of creating sugar was passed along through the generations and, eventually, scholars at Jundi Shapur, an ancient school, refined the practice, making better tasting, sweeter sugar. Sugar was then used as a spice, like nutmeg or saffron. From Jundi Shapur, Muslim scholars and traders learnt these methods and spread it to nearby conquered lands. From those lands it spread even further, into Europe, specifically France! Then we learn that during the crusades, the holy knights learnt of sugar cane and the planting methods, spreading the knowledge of sugar to the tips of Europe and to a country of historical importance, Great Britain. However, to boil sugar cane, wood is required, and a lot of it. So when new land was found by what I like to call "the colonizing countries" (mainly Britain, Spain, and France), sugar flourished due to the abundance of trees and capturing locals to use as slaves to plow land, sew seeds, weed, and chop down sugar cane. Soon, more slaves were being shiped in from abroad, from Africa, where tribe leader sold their own tribe members for money, weapons, and modern products.

       This is our entry into the second part of the book, "Hell." It is named this because being a sugar slave was like being in Hell. After a nice insert of relevant pictures, we are transported back to Europe, where sugar is being used to make sculptures. Then, the East India Company took a risk and brought over one of Englands now most famous icons, tea. Obviously that risk paid off! Of course, one cannot simply have tea by itself, it must have cubes or spoons of sugar to sweeten the slightly bitter taste. Sugar became a necessity to both the rich and poor, thus naming the era, "The Age of Sugar."

       For the second part of this assignment, I would like to bring you back to the beginning of the book, the prologue. Now I will introduce the rhetorical triangle. There are three parts to it, which we will call logos, ethos, and pathos. Ethos is the author's credibility. For example, you're more likely to believe someone who is well-researched on a topic and has a background in the topic than a random pedestrian, right? Back in the prologue, we learned that the authors mention how their families have a history with sugar and they, the authors, were curious, so they researched a bit, uncovered many interesting facts, and created a book out of them. Plug them into the equation I stated earlier, and you, most likely, will feel more obligated to believe them. Also, they portray themselves as "the average Joe"who simply did a lot of research, which makes them more relatable and also makes their writing more understandable to mostly any person who knows how to read.

       Pathos is using the audiences emotions to persuade them into believing you or siding with you. To do this, you need to know you intended audience. The intended audience of the book is a simpler matter, since the genre has a small audience to begin with. Non-fiction books, in general, are usually for educated adults or older teenagers who are interested in a specific topic. The book, "Sugar Changed the World", is for educated people, mostly adults, who are interested in world history, have a family history in sugar, or are simply curious by nature. It could also be for a teacher of any subject, for a teenager who wants to learn something new, or a student who was assigned a summer reading project! And lastly, logos, logic, the research and, arguably, the backbone of a work. I can personally attest to the fact that this book is well researched. I don't think any average person would know this much information otherwise! Before I check out, I would like to ask whoever is reading this to leave a comment if you liked it or have any questions and to check out the book's website, http://sugarchangedtheworld.com/. Please look forward to the next blog!

-The Blog Monster

Citations:
Aronson, Marc, and Marina Tamar. Budhos. Sugar Changed the World: A Story of Magic, Spice, Slavery, Freedom, and Science. Boston [Mass.: Clarion, 2010. Print.