Sunday, January 17, 2016

Symbolism on National Treasure the movie ( Examples of Symbolism in movies)

http://www.cuttingedge.org/news/n1986.cfm

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread842359/pg1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4k4wF37B1gY

http://greatseal.com/sightings/treasure.html

http://vigilantcitizen.com/moviesandtv/how-hollywood-spreads-disinformation-about-secret-societies/

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/09/090915-lost-symbol-dan-brown-freemasons-book.html

Watch the following prezi presentation to better understand symbolism on songs

https://prezi.com/y4cgm2xfhmjv/symbolism-song-project/

Symbolism: Activity #1 January 2016 (Value: 100 points)(1 Grade)

  • Theme : Literary Devices
  • Sub-theme: Symbolism
  • Activity:#1- Second Semester (January-2016)
  • Instructions: 
  • 1-Look for the Song With Arms Wide Open by Creed or any other Creed song. You can choose any song for the activity that can be used on this work.
  • Example:Bob Marley and The Wailers  "I'm Hurting Inside"
  • Background information:
     
    According to the movie Marley, Bob instructed the band to play the same song over and over—"I'm Hurting Inside," a plaintive, little-known late 60s Wailers cut that spoke to the pain in the 35-year-old man's body and soul.
    He never performed the song during his final concert, which is captured on the live album Live Forever. Apparently Bob was just feeling this song that day for deeply personal reasons. "When I was just a little child, happiness was there a while," he sang. "But for me it slipped one day. Happiness come back I say..."
  • On September 23, 1980, Bob Marley performed the last concert of his life in Pittsburgh, PA. Suffering from terminal cancer, the Tuff Gong was not expected to live much longer. Still he rehearsed relentlessly before that last show as usual—but this rehearsal was a bit different.
  • Bob Marley – I'm Hurting Inside Lyrics

    When I was just a little child (little child)
    Happiness was there awhile (there awhile)
    And from me it... it slipped one day 
    Happiness come back I say

    Cause if you don't come
    I've got to go looking
    For happiness

    Well if you don't come
    I've got to go looking
    God, for happiness, happiness

    Say that
    Say I'm hurting
    And it's no sense
    I'm hurting, I'm hurting
    Deep inside
    Oh good god now

    Oh hear my cry, hear my cry
    Yeah my my my my my my my cry

    Been together like school children (school children)
    Then you hurt me just in vain (just in vain)
    Oh, Lord, I'm your weary child
    Oh, happiness come back awhile

    Cause if you don't come
    I'm gonna go looking
    For happiness (the road is dangerous)
    I've got to go looking
    For happiness, happiness

    Said I'm
    Don't you know I'm
    I'm hurting, hurting inside
    Oh I'm hurting 
    Who cares
    Who cares

    Does the one who love, oh
    Feel the pain
    Feel the pain

    Does the one who love
    Feel the pain
    Feel the pain
  • 2-Listen to the song or watch the video.
  • 3- Find the lyrics online, read the lyrics and...) 
  • 4- Print the lyrics.
  • 5-You will circle the symbols (looking for words with double meaning or that make you think of specific things) or words.
  • 6- Google search the word and copy its meaning or significance.
  • 7- Look for the author's or band background, or any reference in history or time to a specific person, place or event that its mentioned in the song.

Sunday, January 3, 2016

Journal Entry # 4 Why do people seek power?

Journal Entry # 4
Theme: Why do People seek power?


During William Shakespeare's lifetime, there were frequent struggles for control in and around the court of Elizabeth I  and her successor, James I. In turn, many of Shakespeare's plays dealt with themes of political conflict and struggle to achieve balance between power, justice, and legitimate authority in society.
What is so attractive about power?
 Is it worthwhile objective, or does power inevitably corrupts people?

Journal Entry # 3 (Unit 2) January_ Ideal Society

Journal Entry # 3

Theme: What is the Ideal Society?


In certain respects, the Renaissance was a golden age - a time of relative peace and prosperity, a time of amazing advances in the arts and sciences. Yet people of the day began to question their society, examining its failings and asking themselves how it could be improved. Sir Thomas More even created a fictional "perfect world" that he called Utopia - a world ruled by reason. What do you think a perfect society might be like?



Before you answer the question from the paragraph,  read below. Take in consideration the background information provided by the instructor when answering the question at the end of the first paragraph.


Thomas More

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  (Redirected from Sir Thomas More)
For other uses, see Thomas More (disambiguation).
Sir Thomas More
Hans Holbein, the Younger - Sir Thomas More - Google Art Project.jpg
Sir Thomas More,
by Hans Holbein the Younger, 1527
Lord Chancellor
In office
October 1529 – May 1532
MonarchHenry VIII
Preceded byThomas Wolsey
Succeeded byThomas Audley
Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
In office
31 December 1525 – 3 November 1529
MonarchHenry VIII
Preceded byRichard Wingfield
Succeeded byWilliam FitzWilliam
Speaker of the House of Commons
In office
16 April 1523 – 13 August 1523
MonarchHenry VIII
Preceded byThomas Nevill
Succeeded byThomas Audley
Personal details
Born7 February 1478
LondonEngland
Died6 July 1535 (aged 57)
London, England
Resting placeChurch of St Peter ad Vincula,LondonEngland
51.508611°N 0.076944°W
Spouse(s)Jane Colt (m. 1505)
Alice Harpur (m. 1511)
ChildrenMargaret
Elizabeth
Cicely
John
Alma materUniversity of Oxford
Lincoln's Inn
ReligionRoman Catholic
Signature
Sir Thomas More (/ˈmÉ”r/; 7 February 1478 – 6 July 1535), venerated by Catholics as Saint Thomas More,[1][2] was an English lawyer, social philosopher, author, statesman and noted Renaissance humanist. He was also a councilor to Henry VIII, and Lord High Chancellor of England from October 1529 to 16 May 1532.[3]
More opposed the Protestant Reformation, in particular the theology of Martin Luther and William Tyndale. He also wrote Utopia, published in 1516, about the political system of an imaginary ideal island nation. More opposed the King's separation from the Catholic Church, refusing to acknowledge Henry as Supreme Head of the Church of England and the annulment of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon. After refusing to take the Oath of Supremacy, he was convicted of treason and beheaded.
Pope Pius XI canonized More in 1935 as a martyrPope John Paul II in 2000 declared him the "heavenly Patron of Statesmen and Politicians."[4] Since 1980, the Church of England has remembered More liturgically as a Reformation martyr.[5] The Soviet Union honored him for the Communistic attitude toward property rights he expressed in Utopia.

Campaign against the Reformation

More supported the Catholic Church and saw the Protestant Reformation as heresy, a threat to the unity of both church and society. Believing in the theology, polemics, and ecclesiastical laws of the church, More "heard Luther's call to destroy the Catholic Church as a call to war."[24]
His early actions against the Reformation included aiding Wolsey in preventing Lutheran books from being imported into England, spying on and investigating suspected Protestants, especially publishers, and arresting any one holding in his possession, transporting, or selling the books of the Protestant Reformation. More vigorously suppressed the travelling country ministers who used Tyndale's English translation of the New Testament.[citation needed] It contained controversial translations of certain words—for example Tyndale used "senior" and "elder" rather than "priest" for the Greek "presbyteros"—and some of the marginal glosses challenged Catholic doctrine.[25] It was during this time that most of his literary polemics appeared.

Sir Thomas More is commemorated with a sculpture at the late-19th-century Sir Thomas More House, opposite theRoyal Courts of Justice, Carey Street, London.
Rumors circulated during and after More's lifetime regarding ill-treatment of heretics during his time as Lord Chancellor. The popular anti-Catholic polemicist John Foxe, who "placed Protestant sufferings against the background of... the Antichrist"[26] was instrumental in publicizing accusations of torture in his famous Book of Martyrs, claiming that More had often personally used violence or torture while interrogating heretics. Later authors, such as Brian Moynahan and Michael Farris, cite Foxe when repeating these allegations.[27] More himself denied these allegations:
Stories of a similar nature were current even in More's lifetime and he denied them forcefully. He admitted that he did imprison heretics in his house – 'theyr sure kepynge' – he called it – but he utterly rejected claims of torture and whipping... 'so help me God.'[12]:298
However, in More's "Apology," published in 1533, he writes that he only applied corporal punishment to two heretics: a child who was caned in front of his family for heresy regarding the Eucharist and a "feeble-minded" man who was whipped for disrupting prayers. During More's chancellorship six people were burned at the stake for heresy; they were Thomas HittonThomas BilneyRichard Bayfield, John Tewkesbery, Thomas Dusgate, and James Bainham.[12]:299–306 Moynahan has argued that More was influential in the burning of Tyndale as More's agents had long pursued him, even though this took place over a year after his own death.[29] Burning at the stake had long been a standard punishment for heresy—about thirty burning had taken place in the century before More's elevation to Chancellor, and burning continued to be used by both Catholics and Protestants during the religious upheaval of the following decades.[30] Ackroyd notes that More explicitly "approved of Burning".[12]:298 After the case of John Tewkesbury, a London leather-seller found guilty by the Bishop of LondonJohn Stokesley,[31] of harboring banned books and sentenced to burning for refusing to recant, More declared: he "burned as there was never wretched I when better worthy."[32]
Modern commentators are divided over More's religious actions as Chancellor. While biographers such as Peter Ackroyd, a Catholic English biographer, have taken a relatively tolerant view of More's campaign against Protestantism by placing his actions within the turbulent religious climate of the time, other eminent historians, such as Richard Marius, an American scholar of the Reformation, have been more critical, believing that persecutions—including More's zealous and well-documented advocacy of extermination for Protestants—were a betrayal of More's earlier humanist convictions.[28]:386–406 Some Protestants take a different view—in 1980, despite being a fierce opponent of the English Reformation that created the Church of England, More was added to the Church of England's calendar of Saints and Heroes of the Christian Church, jointly with John Fisher, to be commemorated every 6 July (the date of More's execution) as "Thomas More, Scholar, and John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, Reformation Martyrs, 1535".[5] When honoring him by making him patron saint of statesmen and politicians in October 2000 Pope John Paul II stated: "It can be said that he demonstrated in a singular way the value of a moral conscience... even if, in his actions against heretics, he reflected the limits of the culture of his time".


UTOPIA

Sir Thomas More


General Summary
Note: The characters of More, Giles, and Morton all correspond in biographical background to actual historical people, Sir Thomas More (author of Utopia), the Humanist thinker Peter Giles, and former Chancellor of England Cardinal John Morton. The fictional characters of the book, however, should not be considered to be direct translations of these historic personalities to the page. In particular, the character of More should not be taken to hold the same views as Sir Thomas More himself. For the purpose of the following Summaries and Commentaries, the name More will refer to the fictional character while Sir Thomas More refers to the author.

Summary

More travels to Antwerp as an ambassador for England and King Henry VIII. While not engaged in his official duties, More spends time conversing about intellectual matters with his friend, Peter Giles. One day, More sees Giles speaking to a bearded man whom More assumes to be a ship's captain. Giles soon introduces More to this new man, Raphael Hythloday, who turns out to be a philosopher and world traveler. The three men retire to Giles's house for supper and conversation, and Hythloday begins to speak about his travels.
Hythloday has been on many voyages with the noted explorer Amerigo Vespucci, traveling to the New World, south of the Equator, through Asia, and eventually landing on the island of Utopia. He describes the societies through which he travels with such insight that Giles and More become convinced that Hythloday would make a terrific counselor to a king. Hythloday refuses even to consider such a notion. A disagreement follows, in which the three discuss Hythloday's reasons for his position. To make his point, Hythloday describes a dinner he once shared in England with Cardinal Morton and a number of others. During this dinner, Hythloday proposed alternatives to the many evil civil practices of England, such as the policy of capital punishment for the crime of theft. His proposals meet with derision, until they are given legitimate thought by the Cardinal, at which point they meet with great general approval. Hythloday uses this story to show how pointless it is to counsel a king when the king can always expect his other counselors to agree with his own beliefs or policies. Hythloday then goes on to make his point through a number of other examples, finally noting that no matter how good a proposed policy is, it will always look insane to a person used to a different way of seeing the world. Hythloday points out that the policies of the Utopians are clearly superior to those of Europeans, yet adds that Europeans would see as ludicrous the all-important Utopian policy of common property. More and Giles do disagree with the notion that common property is superior to private property, and the three agree that Hythloday should describe the Utopian society in more detail. First, however, they break for lunch.
Back from lunch, Hythloday describes the geography and history of Utopia. He explains how the founder of Utopia, General Utopus, conquered the isthmus on which Utopia now stands and through a great public works effort cut away the land to make an island. Next, Hythloday moves to a discussion of Utopian society, portraying a nation based on rational thought, with communal property, great productivity, no rapacious love of gold, no real class distinctions, no poverty, little crime or immoral behavior, religious tolerance, and little inclination to war. It is a society that Hythloday believes is superior to any in Europe.
Hythloday finishes his description and More explains that after so much talking, Giles, Hythloday, and he were too tired to discuss the particular points of Utopian society. More concludes that many of the Utopian customs described by Hythloday, such as their methods of making war and their belief in communal property, seem absurd. He does admit, however, that he would like to see some aspects of Utopian society put into practice in England, though he does not believe any such thing will happen.


Journal Entry # 2_January_ Why is love complicated?

Why is love so complicated?


The Renaissance was a time of rapid change in the arts, literature, and learning. New ideas were embraced, and old ones-including the concept of love- were examined from fresh perspectives. Poets of the day put their pens to many different aspects of love: unrequited love, constant love, timeless love, fickle love. What is so fascinating about love? Why does it seem so complicated?

Remember: Answer the questions on your Journal or notebook, discuss in class then present the answers for grading to your teacher.

Before you answer the question from the paragraph,  read below. Take in consideration the background information provided by the instructor when answering the question at the end of the first paragraph.


Love and Marriage

During the Renaissance, Europeans saw love and marriage as two important, but very different, parts of life. Poets described love as an overpowering force, both spiritual and sexual. For most people, however, marriage was a more practical matter. As the basic building block of society, it involved the expectations of families and communities, not just the wishes of two individuals. Although marriage was the normal state of life for most people, many remained unmarried for either practical or religious reasons.
Renaissance Ideas About Love. The idea of romantic love took shape in the centuries leading up to the Renaissance. The literature of the Middle Ages developed the concept of courtly love, which treated the beloved as a pure ideal. Two Italian writers of the 1300's, Dante Alighieri and Petrarch, drew on this tradition in their poetry. Each of them presented a beloved woman as a source of inspiration and a symbol of female perfection. European poetry in the following centuries followed their lead, treating love as an experience above and beyond ordinary life. Some poets saw sexual desire as a vital part of love, while others presented love as a pure and selfless emotion.
Renaissance thinkers viewed "platonic" love as the highest and noblest form of love. This concept of love was based on the ideas of the Neoplatonists, a group of philosophers who had given new interpretations to the works of the ancient Greek thinker Plato. They saw love as a path to the divine, which was the source of the beloved's beauty. Italian writer Baldassare Castiglione discussed Platonic love in the fourth part of The Book of the Courtier (1528). 


Journal Entry #1_ January_Religion and politics

Should religion be tied to politics?


Instructions: Read carefully the following paragraph, analyze and answer the questions  in your notebook (for grading) at the end of it, then, discuss with your peers and teacher. (VALUE 10 pts. on your homework grade). 


 The Renaissance period in England was marked by religious conflict. Henry VIII and each successive monarch held a different view on the country's official religion. Leaders were assassinated, writers were imprisoned, and the country even endured a civil war over questions of religion. 

1-What is the proper role of religion in public life?

 2-How can societies reconcile religion and politics?



Before you answer the question from the paragraph,  read below. Take in consideration the background information provided by the instructor when answering the question at the end of the first paragraph.


Henry VIII of England

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"Henry VIII" redirects here. For other uses, see Henry VIII (disambiguation).
Henry VIII
Workshop of Hans Holbein the Younger - Portrait of Henry VIII - Google Art Project.jpg
King Henry VIII by Hans Holbein the Younger,Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool.
King of EnglandLord/King of Ireland(more...)
Reign21 April 1509 – 28 January 1547
Coronation24 June 1509
PredecessorHenry VII
SuccessorEdward VI
Born28 June 1491
Greenwich PalaceGreenwich
Died28 January 1547 (aged 55)
Palace of WhitehallLondon
Burial4 February 1547
St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle
Spouse
Issue
Among others
HouseTudor
FatherHenry VII of England
MotherElizabeth of York
ReligionAnglican
prev. Roman Catholic
Signature
Henry VIII (28 June 1491 – 28 January 1547) was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later assumed the Kingship, of Ireland, and continued the nominal claim by English monarchs to the Kingdom of France. Henry was the second monarch of the Tudor dynasty, succeeding his father, Henry VII.
Besides his six marriages, Henry VIII is known for his role in the separation of the Church of England from the Roman Catholic Church. His disagreements with the Pope led to his separation of the Church of England from papal authority, with himself, as king, as the Supreme Head of the Church of England and to the Dissolution of the Monasteries. Because his principal dispute was with papal authority, rather than with doctrinal matters, he remained a believer in core Catholic theological teachings despite his excommunication from the Roman Catholic Church.[1] Henry oversaw the legal union of England and Wales with the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542. He is also well known for a long personal rivalry with both Francis I of France and the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, with whom he frequently warred.
Domestically, Henry is known for his radical changes to the English Constitution, ushering in the theory of the divine right of kings to England. Besides asserting the sovereign's supremacy over the Church of England, thus initiating the English Reformation, he greatly expanded royal power. Charges of treason and heresy were commonly used to quash dissent, and those accused were often executed without a formal trial, by means of bills of attainder. He achieved many of his political aims through the work of his chief ministers, some of whom were banished or executed when they fell out of his favour. Figures such as Thomas Wolsey,Thomas MoreThomas CromwellRichard Rich, and Thomas Cranmer figured prominently in Henry's administration. An extravagant spender, he used the proceeds from the Dissolution of the Monasteries and acts of the Reformation Parliament to convert money formerly paid to Rome into royal revenue. Despite the influx of money from these sources, Henry was continually on the verge of financial ruin due to his personal extravagance as well as his numerous costly continental wars.
His contemporaries considered Henry in his prime to be an attractive, educated and accomplished king, and he has been described as "one of the most charismatic rulers to sit on the English throne".[2] Besides ruling with considerable power, he was also an author and composer. His desire to provide England with a male heir – which stemmed partly from personal vanity and partly from his belief that a daughter would be unable to consolidate Tudor power and maintain the fragile peace that existed following the Wars of the Roses[3] – led to the two things for which Henry is most remembered: his six marriages and his break with the Pope (who would not allow an annulment of Henry's first marriage). As he aged, Henry became severely obese and his health suffered, contributing to his death in 1547. He is frequently characterised in his later life as a lustful, egotistical, harsh, and insecure king.[4] He was succeeded by his son Edward VI.

Government


Cardinal Thomas Wolsey in 1526
The power of Tudor monarchs, including Henry, was 'whole' and 'entire', ruling, as they claimed, by the grace of God alone.[157] The crown could also rely on the exclusive use of those functions that constituted the royal prerogative. These included acts of diplomacy (including royal marriages), declarations of war, management of the coinage, the issue of royal pardons and the power to summon and dissolve parliament as and when required.[158] Nevertheless, as evident during Henry's break with Rome, the monarch worked within established limits, whether legal or financial, that forced him to work closely with both the nobility and parliament (representing the gentry).[158] In practice, Tudor monarchs used patronage to maintain a royal court that included formal institutions such as the Privy Council as well as more informal advisers and confidants.[159] Both the rise and fall of court nobles could be swift: although the often-quoted figure of 72,000 executions during his reign is inflated,[160] Henry did undoubtedly execute at will, burning or beheading two of his wives, twenty peers, four leading public servants, six close attendants and friends, one cardinal (John Fisher) and numerous abbots.[152]Among those who were in favour at any given point in Henry's reign, one could usually be identified as a chief minister,[159] though one of the enduring debates in the historiography of the period has been the extent to which those chief ministers controlled Henry rather than vice versa.[161] In particular, historian G. R. Elton has argued that one such minister, Thomas Cromwell, led a "Tudor revolution in government" quite independent of the king, whom Elton presented as an opportunistic, essentially lazy participant in the nitty-gritty of politics. Where Henry did intervene personally in the running of the country, Elton argued, he mostly did so to its detriment.[162] The prominence and influence of faction in Henry's court is similarly discussed in the context of at least five episodes of Henry's reign, including the downfall of Anne Boleyn


After reading the background information,  Now, you can answer:

What is the proper role of religion in public life? 
How can societies reconcile religion and politics?