English 2000 (Special Emphasis: Video-Games and Technology)
Featured Work
The crown jewel of my coursework in English 2000, this essay on independent video-game development harangues the mainstream video-gaming industry for banality and shallowness, while proffering independent outlets as a ray of light and alternative for reintroducing creativity back into this pervasive entertainment medium.
The crown jewel of my coursework in English 2000, this essay on independent video-game development harangues the mainstream video-gaming industry for banality and shallowness, while proffering independent outlets as a ray of light and alternative for reintroducing creativity back into this pervasive entertainment medium.
Other Selected Works
| - My paper on the 2001 video-game "Final Fantasy X" described the game's premise and structure.
- This paper sketched the biography of influential video-game icon Hironobu Sakaguchi, one of the founders of the popular "Final Fantasy" series.
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English 2027: Introduction to Poetry: Social Issues and Poetic Witness
During the Fall 2011 semester, I completed this Communication Intensive course (as certified by CxC), which also entailed a Service Learning component. Throughout the semester, I became acquainted with the women of a rehabilitation program, Connections For Life (CFL). CFL is designed to facilitate the successful transition of Louisiana's female ex-convicts back into society. I volunteered for over 15 hours at a thrift store owned and operated by the program, located on Highland Road.
This volunteer work was germane to our assigned readings as a course in "Poetry of Witness." The class provided a survey in poetry that attested to horrific events and societal problems such as racial profiling, drug addiction, child molestation, impoverishment, famine, and atrocious war crimes. As such, it was illuminating to work with women who were trying to break from past illicit lifestyles.
My experiences in this volunteer work invoked empathy and a more profound awareness of my magnificent fortune to have chanced this privileged lifestyle as a relatively affluent or middle class white male. I acknowledged that tendentious favor was accorded to me merely owing to my intrinsic properties and the circumstances of my upbringing, and not necessarily on account of any effort on my own part. This awareness, in turn, fostered a greater respect for individuals who endure or surmount inimical factors in their lives (e.g., an African-American born in a blighted neighborhood who becomes the first in her family to graduate college).
I enjoyed this course, and earned an A in a class preponderantly composed of competitive pre-medical students. Below is a sample of some of my coursework.
This volunteer work was germane to our assigned readings as a course in "Poetry of Witness." The class provided a survey in poetry that attested to horrific events and societal problems such as racial profiling, drug addiction, child molestation, impoverishment, famine, and atrocious war crimes. As such, it was illuminating to work with women who were trying to break from past illicit lifestyles.
My experiences in this volunteer work invoked empathy and a more profound awareness of my magnificent fortune to have chanced this privileged lifestyle as a relatively affluent or middle class white male. I acknowledged that tendentious favor was accorded to me merely owing to my intrinsic properties and the circumstances of my upbringing, and not necessarily on account of any effort on my own part. This awareness, in turn, fostered a greater respect for individuals who endure or surmount inimical factors in their lives (e.g., an African-American born in a blighted neighborhood who becomes the first in her family to graduate college).
I enjoyed this course, and earned an A in a class preponderantly composed of competitive pre-medical students. Below is a sample of some of my coursework.
Featured Work
"The Somalian Child" is a poem I wrote for a class bonus, and fixates nauseatingly on the miserable disparity between the affluent classes in the industrialized world and the impoverished peoples of sub-Saharan Africa. I penned this poem with a savage Marxist's gusto.
"The Somalian Child" is a poem I wrote for a class bonus, and fixates nauseatingly on the miserable disparity between the affluent classes in the industrialized world and the impoverished peoples of sub-Saharan Africa. I penned this poem with a savage Marxist's gusto.
Other Selected Works
| - Early in the semester, I posed three questions to CFL director Karen Stagg regarding the nature of CFL and the service-learning component of our course.
- My journals were a series of pensive responses to our class's assigned poetry readings.
- Our group presented a poetry anthology before the women from CFL. The full list of poems selected by our group members is contained here, along with descriptions and analyses accompanying each poem to explain its pertinence to CFL. All group members selected their own poems and analyses, but I severely edited the content and am the primary author of the analyses.
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English 3072: American Literature
Featured Work
My final paper on Arthur Miller's "Death of a Salesman" (featured above) described the uncanny psychosis and mental disintegration of protagonist Willy Loman. I argue that Willy Loman embodies a pernicious and deluded philosophy that superimposes grandeur onto mediocre accomplishments, and tries to efface unsightly shortcomings with glib charm. Loman's gilded fantasies intensify as his failures compound, finally yielding his self-destruction.
My final paper on Arthur Miller's "Death of a Salesman" (featured above) described the uncanny psychosis and mental disintegration of protagonist Willy Loman. I argue that Willy Loman embodies a pernicious and deluded philosophy that superimposes grandeur onto mediocre accomplishments, and tries to efface unsightly shortcomings with glib charm. Loman's gilded fantasies intensify as his failures compound, finally yielding his self-destruction.