Tag Archives: Humanities

Related to the ISB Middle School subject called “Humanities”

The Journal of Jonas Browne, a Colonial Teenager

Just like the journals we wrote prior to this, we are imagining the life of a person living in the past. However, in this journal, the enviroment is vastly different from the Russian Revolution, and it is in a very different time. This is the journal of Jonas Browne, a colonist born in 1769. A fictional charachter created by me.

His father is a British tax collector many years prior the revolution. Yet the rising American spirit aginst taxes from Britain destroyed his father’s career and put their family to many challenges. The mother of Jonas had died at a young age, and the aging father was often involved in fights. Eventually his father retired, and his tax office was closed down.

The education Jonas recieved is mainly from his father. This is why he was pro-British for a very long time. His father taught him to become a “Loyalist”. Yet as Jonas grew into his teenage years and became more rebellious, he thought differently towards British people and began to question the other brutalities they committed, like the Boston Massacre.

Towards the end, Jonas joined the Army for his belief of self-government. Serving the British had brought him too much hatred, and he began to think towards the Colonists. After his battle ended, the British forces were crammed to Yorktown and surrendered a few weeks later. In his life after the war, he was able to live in a society where he is no longer hated,  where he is a war hero, and where his own political belief is considered. Yet he is one of the small portion of people that had anything changed for them. Most women’s lives and most slaves’ lives were still their old styles, and the freedom promised by the Declaration was not given.

An Analysis of M.H. Cottman’s Shackles from the Deep

Michael H. Cottman’s Shackles from the Deep is a literary non-fiction about the history of trans-atlantic slave trade and slave ships. This book is about the author re-tracing the path of a sunken slave-ship named the Henrietta Marie, and visiting the various places of history where the slave ship docked and traded Africans, just for the author to raise awareness of the slave trade. Through his expeditions, the author learned of the immense cruelty the enslaved faced, and how they recieved discrimination even after their liberation.

 

Mrs. Luella’s Pocketbook

This story came from page 3 of “Thank You, M’am” by Langston Huges. The concept of the poem is Internal Conflict. In line 3 of the poem, a woman called Mrs. Luella is scolding a boy for trying to snatch her pocketbook. The boy thinks of escaping with the words: He turned around, he could run!” And tries to convince himself to run with “Run!”. But in the end, he didn’t, and he stayed with Mrs. Luella and even managed to say “thank you” in the end.

The Photo supports this poem because it is monochrome, and this story is 70 years old, it really enphasizes it’s age. Also because it’s a vintage bedroom, which is where this poem took place, as where the boy washed his face.