Theme statement: Individual Self-Expression Is Important

Theme statement: Individual Self-Expression Is Important

Group Members: Marina Walters, Rebecca Shu, MacKenzie Miller, Grannt Epstein, and Anthony Lev

Bell 4

Three specific textual examples from the book that show how this theme is developing:      

1. “‘ It doesn’t think anything we don’t want it to think.’”

Bradbury, Ray. "The Hearth and the Salamander." Fahrenheit 451. New York: Del Rey Book, 1991. 27. Print.

2. ‘ Nobody listens anymore. I can’t talk to the walls because they’re yelling at me. I can’t talk to my wife; she listens to the walls. I just want someone to hear what I have to say. And maybe if I talk long enough, it’ll make sense. ‘“ (pg. 82)

Bradbury, Ray. "The Sieve and the Sand." Fahrenheit 451. New York: Del Rey Book, 1991.

82. Print.“

3. “...and if the men were silent it was because there was everything to think about and much to remember. Perhaps later… when the sun was up and had warmed them, they would begin to talk, or just say the things they remember...’” (pg.164-165)

Bradbury, Ray. "Burning Bright." Fahrenheit 451. New York: Del Rey Book, 1991. 164-65. Print.

Timeline of Theme

Part 1:

• Montag, in the beginning showed his patch to others to show that he was a fireman. (Firemen were those at the time lit fires instead of extinguish fires) The salamander was had thought to have lived in fire and wasn't affected by it. This was also given to the name of the firetrucks to “show the flame.”

• A woman in the book burnt herself with her books to symbolize that she would rather die than let firemen burn them. It states, “The woman's hand twitched on the single matchstick. The fumes of kerosene bloomed up about her.” (Page 49) Guy also shows his curiosity (his true self) by stealing a book and hiding it in his coat to read later.

 Part 2:

• Towards the middle of the book Montag had started to be more open with his thoughts about the burning of books. He was standing up for them and putting himself out there to try to save the books to show the society how important they really are. He believes that if he starts to show his feelings for the books then he could possibly make a change in making a more perfect society.

Part 3:

• In the middle of the book, Montag and the people in his society are censored from the government if they have books, this is a part of self-reflection. Though throughout the end of the book, things begin to change when the war starts. When the old government is destroyed, the men who will bring their own self-expression start to head towards the city. In the end of the book, when the “men were silent it was because there was everything to think about and much to remember”(pg164-5) shows how the theme had evolved throughout the book. At this point the people are now free from the government's control. Now that they are free from the censorship, they can be more open to self-expression.   

Individual self expression allows Montag to make changes to the world and create a different way of thinking for the people in the city, by the end of the book people are memorizing whole books about self expression without the self expression nothing would have changed.

Individual self-expression can be seen in our modern-day society when we look at the tv show “Modern Family” when individual characters such as how Cam chooses to express himself by trying to go back into teaching again, this is important to the theme by showing it in a modern contexts.

e-mail

Prompt: Discuss why you were interested in picking up this article.

           Here is a link to the article about Clinton's email  . I had heard about what had happen, and let me sum it up. What happened was is that when Hillary Clinton was Secretary of State, which was from 2009-2012. During this time she had been using a non government email. This means that anyone who wanted to see her emails couldn't as easily. She had said that it would have been too much work to have two phones. What is stating in the article is how this may ruin her chase for 2016, and how she it is going to effect her negatively.

           This first of all, isn't illegal like most people say it is. Under the guidelines, there is not specific penalty for using the private email. Also, Secretary of State's before Hillary also held a private email. Which shows the hypocrisy in the opposition who say this is a terrible thing. Even though they did not criticize previous Secretary of State's who did this before Hillary ever stepped foot in office.

         I think that this is a very minor thing that Hillary Clinton had done. This is just early Presidential politics talking. People who want to find, or create dirt on Hillary Clinton before she starts her campaign in 2016. This shows how weak the opposition is to Hillary. The best thing they could find was the fact she didn't use the government email she was given. It shouldn't be that big of a deal to people. If this is the strongest case against Hillary, then she is very likely will go on to do great in the Primaries. If she is lucky, she may do well too, in the General Election.

Fahrenheit 451

      In the book Fahrenheit 451, the use of fear is a large part of what happens in the book. The use of this fear can contribute to many of the things wrong in the book. Such as a society which rejects the knowledge of the past. So much so that a person who dares challenges this society will loose there house. I feel that the book was used not to spread the idea that Communism was bad, rather that a totalitarian society is wrong. Also that people need to change society, they don't need to be special. This can be seen when Faber takes it to himself that he should be the one who fixes the world by starting to print books again.
      This shows the multiple perspectives in the book, such as the fact that in the book Faber lives a life of fear, while Montag just wants to change things and doesn't care how. It seems that throughout the book, others who may appear as a 2D person, may actually be more than just that. Such as the head of the fire department, he seemed just to be a man who was doing his job, but in the end, he seemed different. He seemed to know that what he was doing was wrong, and didn't know what to do.