When Pigs acted like Human: review of Animal Farm by George Orwell

ALL ANIMAL ARE EQUAL (but some animals are more equal than others...)

When a leader corrupted and use the power for personal satisfaction, it will not only affect the people under his or her authority, but also change the world history. George Orwell was able to portray how spoiled could a leader be creatively in his works. In one of his essays entitled Why I Write, Orwell studied the human misery in an exploitative social order. He wanted to capture the truth of human nature, as exemplified in the story ‘Animal Farm’. He said “I write it because there is some lie that I want to expose, some fact to which I want to draw attention, and my initial concern is to get a hearing.” As he experienced of being the oppressors and living in the world war times, he could see how corrupted the leaders could become.

In the ‘Animal Farm’, the elements of corrupted leadership are raised based on the history of the communism. It was published in 1945 and is considered as one of the most popular and significant satirical of Soviet totalitarianism. Orwell uses a simple fairy tale where animals rebel from their irresponsible owner to illustrate the complexities of the Russian revolution in order to make the evils of communism painfully apparent.

The emergence of the two main leaders after the death of the Old Major was the starting point of the corruption in the animal farm. Both Napoleon and Snowball have opposing leadership styles. Napoleon is a strict, no-nonsense kind of pig, a true proponent of "might make right." Snowball, on the other hand, is more innovative in his thinking, willing to embrace new methods and philosophies. Brain power is embodied most completely in the figure of Snowball, whose clever military tactics result in the animals’ victory in the Battle of the Cowshed. Another feature of Snowball’s intelligence is reflected in his visionary conception of an outline for a windmill. But in the world of revolutionary politics, brain power is no match for brute force. It might be said that on Animal Farm emerge two classes of creatures: pigs and animals. The appearance of this “class” marks another stage in the movement from revolution to totalitarian state, the imposition of state terror to ensure the continued acquisition of power. Pigs have the control over the farm. Along with terror is the invention of a significant scapegoat. When Snowball devises a plan to power the farm with a windmill, Napoleon is quick to criticize. Snowball and Napoleon had a conflict, which divided the farm animals into two groups of supporters. Napoleon as his defense in a heated conflict demanded the nine dogs that he trained to attack Snowball to drive him off the farm. Now, the brain of the farm had gone and this opportunity was misuse by Napoleon. He started to break the commandments and applied double standard to his kinds. He became the tyrant to the animal farm. All the animals must work hard for the better of the swine. The resulting schism alters the course of Animal Farm, transforming it from utopian paradise to nightmarish hell.

George Orwell was able to show how corrupted politicians could be in the ‘Animal Farm’. The way the story is presented is very creative as he makes the story to be like a ‘Walt Disney’ cartoon. However the message that Orwell wanted to convey still delivered well although he uses a fairy tale as the medium of giving the justification.

Winston Churchill vs Adolf Hitler

what is leadership..??how can one person lead millions of people to follow his rule? why do he lead the people?did he want to do it for justice or just for personal satisfaction? these are the two leaders who were one of the most influential leaders in the world war times. in the video that we watched in the class, both of them were very persuasive in giving the speech and persuade their people in conveying their agenda...

if we see the way they present their speech, there are some similarities that they used to catch the attention of the audiences. the first and the most obvious element is the use of 'I' and 'We'..both Hitler and Churchill used I to show the authority of them in delivering the speech. they are the leader, so they use the pronoun I to show that that they are the solely person with power at the particular place...then they use the pronoun 'We' to catch the audience empathy towards what had happened to them..in other words, they sate their status very clearly (I) but they deliver the speech with friendly (we)..thus, the use of theses pronouns was very effective to win the people's attention.

other than that, there are a few elements of persuasion that were used in the speech. the first element is using rhetorical questions..the use of rhetorical question is to make the audience reflect and think of what was said or happened to them for example Hitler uses rhetorical question to reflect what other nations had done to them

"but who was they blackmailed?who was it they sweated?was it the national socialist state?"

the second element of persuasion is the use of repetition. repetition is use to emphasize some important matter or to tell a new information..in the speeches, both of them use repetition several times to emphasis the important matter and to change the people's mentality to follow the way the leaders think..in Churchill speech he uses repetition to emphasize his hope and spirit of fighting against the enemy...

"we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields in the street, we shall fight in the hills:we shall never surrender"

when my group presented the speech analysis, we said that all this speech is 'crap'..we are not insulting the speeches because these are historical script which are kept in the world museum...actually the 'crap' that we mean is that the leaders main message is at the end of their speeches..all the other things that they said from the beginning is like a form of persuasion..every leader do that...they talk about the current issues and then relate to the main input at the end of their talk...so..we wanted to convey that both leaders do the same thing in their speech(that is what we think)..i hope the misunderstanding is now cleared...=D

Sing for the Humanity...We Believe by Good Charlotte

prepared by Fahmi Khan, Najat, Fadhli and Ikram Muzakkir

‘Creemos’, ‘אנו מאמינים’, ‘Wij zijn van mening’, ‘wir glauben’, ‘nous croyons’, ‘we believe’. These are the phrases that can be found in the video clip. ‘We Believe’. There are more than one language included with a purpose. Why? Different languages represent different continents. However, all of them are saying one same thing, ‘We Believe’. Everybody hates violation and sufferings. Because everyone believes in peace. We believe in life. We believe we could have a better way of life without suffer and pain. Not only for us. This includes the entire human all around the world. It is a phenomenon! A believe! A hope!

We may not notice that somewhere in this world, there are people who suffered. We continue our lives and try to survive in this world by believing in the love. When we are suffered, we always believe that the good people will come and save us. If the heroes won’t come up and save us, yet we still believe someday, someway, it will change. This ‘believes’ make us strong and give us the will to live and fight till the end of our lives.

There are lots of short clips on war as well as the disaster happened all over the world. We could see where people are helping each other. One of the most interesting scenes is when a brave man stopped a tank from attacking his place. His heroic deed will be praised by every person in the world who has the sense of love in his or her heart.

Other than war and oppression, the video also showed clips of tsunami victims who have lost everything in their life. The phrase ‘We Believe’ could give them a reason to continue living. They will stand up and pick up their pieces of life although they knew that the new beginning of their life is almost impossible as they have nothing and no one to rely on. This phrase will be a paradigm for them to move on.

We choose this song because the message they want to deliver is so deep. It is a nice song to be heard and a really beautiful in the lyrics. In the video itself, they use candles as a symbol of hope. Towards the end of the song, each and every audience held the candle at their faces and protects the lights from fading off. This could means that people are hoping for a better tomorrow, as fair and just as the light of the candles and preserving it from their awful past.

We are all the same but we lead a different way of live. We might be the victim. We might be the villain. We might be the people who fight for others. We also might be the people who do not even care to what is happening all around the world. We believe that somewhere in their heart they care about life. We believe the world can be change. No more suffered. No more war. We care about each other. We are helping each other to survive this temporary live in this world. We stand together as one. Because we are human. We are weak. We share the same thing although we live in a different part of the world.

After watching the video, you might feel the same feelings as the people who are in that kind of situation. We might not realize it but this song always reminds us about it. We tend to forget as a human. Sometimes we are not even know what we are doing until someone point it out for us. For us, Good Charlotte has delivered their messages clearly from the song.

Pre Marital Sex: A new disease

In ‘The Merry Maid’ by Jayakaran Mukundan, Shanmugam and Lakshmi had sex when they were still students. With no income, they could not afford to have the baby. Shanmugam took the wrong path and become thief. He was caught and jailed for a long time (family broken into two pieces) Lakshmi could not support her baby either. As a result, she had to give her baby to others to guarantee a better life than her. (family broken into three pieces)

In ‘A Great Injustice’ by Heah Chwee Sian, her family suffered shames and humiliations from the society because of being pregnant before her marriage. The pressure of the society has made her to think of one and the only solution; to abort the baby. Although she knew that killing the innocent baby is an unacceptable sin, but she had to undergo that for the sake of her family.

“I’m sorry for having brought you shame. Now, I’ll clear your name”

In ‘The Merry Maid’ by Jayakaran Mukundan,Lakshmi might not be able to reunite her family anymore. When she left her daughter at the big mansion, she did not know that Muslim family lives there. She cannot simply take back what she gave: Sakinah is happy with her family now. Although she finally met with her daughter, she still did not get her Savitri back.The institution of her family is still and will be incomplete even though both of them live under a same roof.

With abortions and babies born out of wedlock growing in numbers, teens should be taught the truth; the consequences of premarital sex. Heah Chwee Sian and Jayakaran Mukundan has clearly explicate that pre-marital sex leads to the destruction of a family institution.

Edwina the Emu...YEEK...!!!

this is the other children story that Dr Jaya tell us..this is also a very great story...written by Sheena Knowles, Edwina The Emu is considered as one of the most enjoyable bedtime stories for children..

Edwina and Edward were two emus (bird i think). Edwina laid 10 eggs and wanted to work to survive in the world along with the baby-to-be..while Edward While Edward sits on the eggs, Edwina searches for work. She tries three different career ideas:Ballet dancer, Chimney sweep, waitress. however, when she ran away to her nest when a man told that he ate 10 eggs straight from the nest..she took a cab and ran straight away to her precious eggs..eventually, they have ten little emus running around. they name them some cute and unusual names, and the last little emu gets an extra special name. YEEK...

the story was purposely written for children..the language use was easy and is full of illustration to catch children's attention...

other than the language, i would like to comment how the story is presented by Dr Jaya..he presented with full of emotion and intonation which make the story goes deep to the heart...he also uses nonverbal communication such as eye contact and body gesture to catch the students interest...the most important and exciting part is when Dr Jaya asked the last name of the baby...it attracts me so much whereby the listener need to think the name of the last baby..

Akeela and the BEE...

zzzzzzzz....(sounds of a bee) i thought this is an animated movie...where a girl named akeela become the savior of the bee nation...but no! it is actually a spelling competition...spelling bee...

Entertainment value

i would say that this movie is not a blockbuster as Transformers and Shrek..however it is worth watching for the purpose of entertainment and moral value. the movie is about a girl who is very intelligent in spelling words..in fact she is a walking dictionary..there are lots of interesting and crucial scenes in the movie..the one that i remember is when Akeela purposely spelled wrongly during the final stage of the competition...it creates a very critical condition to the audience(for me)...one more thing is there is no antagonist in the movie..so..the director creatively end this film by making both of the finalist become the winner...i like that...

For me as a B Ed Tesl student

this movie showed me a way of improving my own English...although i joined TESL course, i still did not acquire the vocabulary much...it is because i dont use English frequently (including reading english books) by watching this movie, i feel like i still need to improve my proficiency...the girl is just a student and she acquire that much of vocab..if i want to be a good teacher..i need to work on my proficiency and accuracy more and more with the 'invention' of new vocabulary in my brain...

My Teacher...Teacher Maznah Ayob..

she was the one who forced me to join the spelling bee competition in my school...she said that i could easily win..."you have many things in your mind..just throw it and dont panic..you will win..i believed you"she said to me (its not totally what she said, its just the gist that i remembered) and i won the competition..she brought me to join in district level...however i lost in that level because i was rushing for my choir competition...i love her so much...

lesson for future teacher

Akeela is not a 'favorite girl' to contribute to the school...she was picked up as an underdog to become a winner..this is what i learned after watching this movie..not every students have interest in learning...they have interest in other things..just like Akeela...therefore, by forcing them to learn would not make any difference in them...teachers (me) should know what is their interest and teach them using their interest..or at least brush the interest to ensure their bright future...

Dowry..Erm...

after a brief discussion we come up with a stand for the short story 'Everything is Arranged' and 'A Question of Dowry (although we dont really understand what is actually a 'stand'..is it an order to stand or anything that ask us to stand)

"the use of dowry has been abused in both stories"

in 'A Question of Dowry' the father of the girl couldnt afford fulfill the dowry because they dont have enough money to pay..they tried to sell the land..however the land was not that valuable to pay the dowry...i think that, if the boy really want to marry the girl, he could have thought about the problems of the other side..he could help them by giving them money to support the dowry (the boy is a doctor, he is rich for sure)

in 'Everything is Arranged' i think the issues raised here is a very sensitive issue:1. the question of dowry. 2. the acceptance of mixed marriage...but i will be focusing on the issue of dowry..the father of the girl increased the dowry value just for the purpose of not wanting his children to marry with non-indian...this is the abuse of the dowry main purpose

we can see that the dowry purpose is like have changed with time...before: dowry is given by the girl's father to ensure his daughter could live and survive with the money...(the purpose just went for the girl) now: the dowry is requested by the male's side to know the girl's financial status..see..it is change now...(just like night and day) i say, if the purpose of dowry is not being corrected by people now, it will one day vanish just like a mitos (and it is actually happening now)