10.6.15

Discuss: "Superman and Me" by Sherman Alexie response questions

Add to Academic Vocabulary section:

Irony


 * Definition: Contrast between expectation and reality—between what’s said and what is really meant, between what is expected to happen and what really happens, or between what appears to be true and what is really true. **

Additional information on irony: (you do not need to add this to your journal)
 * Three common types : **
 * __Verbal irony__: saying something when one means something completely different. Character toasting the health of an unsuspecting victim. (Sarcasm can be ironic, but it’s all about understanding/intent—song “Ironic” is not ironic…) **


 * __Situational irony:__ contrast between what would seem appropriate and what really happens or when there is a contradiction between what we expect to happen and what really takes place. Mercutio’s death in R and J. **


 * __Dramatic irony:__ When the audience or reader knows something important that a character in a play or story does not know. We know that Daisy and Gatsby are having an affair and Tom doesn’t. **


 * Some more examples: **
 * Irony deals with opposites; it has nothing to do with coincidence. If two baseball players from the same hometown, on different teams, receive the same uniform number, it is not ironic. It is a coincidence. If Barry Bonds attains lifetime statistics identical to his father’s it will not be ironic. It will be a coincidence. Irony is "a state of affairs that is the reverse of what was to be expected; a result opposite to and in mockery of the appropriate result." For instance: **
 * ** If a diabetic, on his way to buy insulin, is killed by a runaway truck, he is the victim of an accident. If the truck was delivering sugar, he is the victim of an oddly poetic coincidence. But if the truck was delivering insulin, ah! Then he is the victim of an irony. **
 * ** If a Kurd, after surviving bloody battle with Saddam Hussein’s army and a long, difficult escape through the mountains, is crushed and killed by a parachute drop of humanitarian aid, that, my friend, is irony writ large. **
 * George Carlin **
 * [|__http://www.sense.net/~blaine/funstuff/carlin.html__] **
 * Some visual examples: **
 * [[image:https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/RXYKY8ny7wzo7XJxiDsBV3cbhLk5O8zo5iG8NegCvSIO0R4F_LDspi297LN4JJSP4hWvpofRbDwFkkfrLYPcR8-bzgK-n6ZqsDBiLh85aT5lm6cYTMSa7XZgAWa3uNS7jQ caption="awhn193l.jpg" link="http://www.sense.net/~blaine/funstuff/carlin.html"]] ||
 * awhn193l.jpg ||


 * || [[image:https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/25nVK-XQMkjpc7Q2OFkglis_cAJMg9J7gAFpkHB42uOYcO9nkeLn_6cjxKeDHfqMYJ9Z884uZ24YwQKXQvI41I00DjXn8aKLdBcQjhoS_GzBWMRfYnaOCr95hi7AkMAuYg align="center" caption="Nothing-Is-Written-In-Stone.jpg"]] ||
 * Nothing-Is-Written-In-Stone.jpg ||
 * Nothing-Is-Written-In-Stone.jpg ||
 * Nothing-Is-Written-In-Stone.jpg ||


 * || [[image:https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/okuXYFgX-xjXAvn4vJETeF5mKLoFCCzNXbGRAXo3FziE9VRSd4WMgxR7o0_LEXJErEerBZAs-dWY8Vbb7XaTDx2MovBfNx4wGDc5pWRhrdkXTWhaRDRmVvoZSRFYrE6BPA align="center" caption="irony.jpg"]] ||
 * irony.jpg ||
 * irony.jpg ||
 * irony.jpg ||


 * || [[image:https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/pVaQHs-ZifMZFKp6Wwe0xYGaWYAUs65yAnIgqF1R8hh_ct12y5hB5F2Na5567S8ukZeiB7HiVBx5MA41N9jbCq6GGiBpva7o-zGaYQumJAnhNEEO7IbgCDjhe4JKDeED5Q align="center" caption="situational_irony.gif"]] ||
 * situational_irony.gif ||
 * situational_irony.gif ||
 * <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #222222; display: block; font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">situational_irony.gif ||

Read: "Evolution" by Sherman Alexie https://docs.google.com/document/d/1S4ppTXBqgIfce7HqFlvwCzwjM24u5GS5If9b9PlCJgg/edit?usp=sharing
 * <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; vertical-align: baseline;">And then some humor… **
 * || [[image:https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/qpDi9G8mYar-EMtTOSST7IfnlP1TrJ4r2LkXak-1BvbkmAOAyMcImt6gpwyVYCUHxL2GriEbI3o1EvemmV7gwSdxh7IrZtQfrNmwibOTdUOSmacM9t8i6TtYEqxGdWW13A align="center" caption="irony6.jpg"]] ||
 * irony6.jpg ||
 * <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #222222; display: block; font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">irony6.jpg ||
 * <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #222222; display: block; font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">irony6.jpg ||

Annotate: as a class, we looked at examples of irony, metaphor, symbol, single stories, allusion, and theme --metaphors/symbols: pawn shop, items pawned, buckskin outfit, pawning of hands, heart, thumbs, Museum/name --title --allusion to Buffalo Bill (take a look at the poster from Buffalo Bill's Wild West show to help establish context about the allusion to him in the poem) []

HW: Complete three themes for "Evolution" on the same page where you should also have themes for "Halfbreed Girl in a City School" and "Superman and Me".