Portfolio: Reflective Letter

At the beginning of the quarter, I felt that I was a fairly strong writer, but tot long after I found out how dangerous that assumption could be. Once I received the first essay's grade, I was shown where I really stood. I was not prepared for the high standards college level writing required me to meet. College level writing is much more difficult than any grade school I've ever gone to has assigned. Although it was challenging to really buckle down and get working, I have shown much progress from the beginning of the year. This can be shown within my first and last essays, which are included in my portfolio. Essay number one was on Bacon's Rebellion and how social classes played the largest role within the rebellion itself. My last essay was a group project, me and three others, and was perhaps the most difficult to both get done and get done well. Both of these essays have specific strong and weak points, as well as tie into my writing philosophy and style.


My first essay, on social classes within Bacon's Rebellion, was not originally worded well. This issue spawned from my inability to sum up or explain the information I acquired. I tried hard to get quality information into the essay, but I went through a series of high school thought processes trying to get it done. My brain needed to mature fast to get really great work done in such a timely fashion. So I finished the essay and turned it in on time, but the end result was not up to college standards at all; the information was lax, and it lacked a real voice. That problem, lacking a voice in essays, really stems from my educational career prior to arriving at PSEC; before I arrived at Puget Sound Early College, I mainly wrote informative essays. My instructor stressed the fact that we would not write informative essays since the beginning of the Writing 101 course. Since I received feedback on my first essay I have really worked on gathering more useful information and applying time management skills to my writing.


Many of the problems I had faced were not present in my next essay, or at least not to the extent in which they were in the essay prior. The second paper was on Patriotism within the original thirteen colonies. It was unique in the fact that I ended up working on it with one other person, which really required me to utilize a lot of different time management skills than normal. One of the main issues I had to deal with was the merging of two very different voices. I was able to manage my time well and ended with a paper that I felt proud of. My ability to get quality information had progressed quite a way in a matter of a few weeks, though still not up to par with the college writing standards. Also, my voice really shone through with this essay because I created a character and spoke through him. I was really proud of my second essay, as well as the progress I’ve made throughout fall quarter.


As my overviews of those two essays show, time management has greatly improved. Really, getting an essay or writing assignment finished is not the problem very often at all. I can get the final product done as quickly as I need to. My weaknesses lie within the actual essays themselves. Though I have been working on it throughout the quarter, I still find it hard to get useful information that is specific; I find myself using generalized information to base my arguments off of, or strengthen my arguments. Overall, I have made progress with my writing abilities. I have not gotten worse at anything, either gotten better or stayed consistently under par.


Two aspects of my writing must be looked at to get a good view of just where I stand with writing: my writing philosophy and style. My writing philosophy at the beginning of the year was as follows: writing of any kind must always start with a main idea to build off of. What seems to me to be the best way to show where I am at now would be to slightly skew the aforesaid sentence. I do not believe that it must always start with a main idea, but some sort of idea in general. An idea of what purpose the writing at hand must serve is necessary to find useful information about the paper. I guess my newly stated writing philosophy would be: writing must always start with the purpose of the paper in mind, so that information can be found in regard to the main idea. My style of writing has changed slightly; I no longer 'just write' as I would do in high school. Now I write with much more structure and organization. I tend to get to the point quicker, now that I have taken Writing 101.


A great amount of progression is shown from my second essay to the Writing 101 final. Since there were only two hours allotted for the essay to be written in, time management skills were used efficiently. I am very proud of this essay as a whole, actually. The thesis was well written and explained thoroughly throughout the entirety of the essay. One thing that I tend to do when writing is stray from the overall argument; this was definitely not an issue for the final exam, however. I followed the thesis quite strictly, which I feel very proud of. My final is definitely an example of my improvement throughout the quarter because it was better in both content and voice. It is most assuredly the paper I am most proud of myself for having written.


This quarter I learned how wrong it is to assume that meeting the standards of writing for high school meant that I was prepared for college level writing. That statement is shown in the progress that I have made within my essays. In my first essay, I didn't manage my time very well, and I wrote to simply get the paper done. However, my second essay went along much more smoothly, and was written with purpose. Even better was my final, where I took all of the necessary steps towards creating an essay, and implemented them in less than two hours. This is not to say that I have become the perfect writer. In fact, my first and second essays both show a lack of specific detail. They are both plagued with general information that doesn't support the thesis very well. Both my writing philosophy and writing style have changed slightly. Overall, I believe I have shown strong improvement in several categories such as time management and organization, but I still need to work on finding and utilizing specific information to support my arguments.

Portfolio: Bacon's Rebellion Essay (1st Essay)

Social issues among the Virginian colonists during the seventeenth century played the main role in Bacon’s Rebellion. Some believe that economy, and even race played the largest part in Nathanial Bacon’s uprising; the truth is the colonists being split into subdivisions according to how much land they owned directly led to this dispute between smalltime farmers and wealthier plantation owners. Since land was not distributed evenly, most colonists were impoverished or very poor. A wave of envy swept over those who did not have the wealth to buy land nor the land to acquire such wealth. In turn, the high class citizens feared for their two most precious properties: their land and their lives. (1) lack of a middle class made life harder for lower class citizens because they had nothing to work towards; those born poor tended to stay poor for the entirety of their lives, unless they married into a high class family. Since such a scenario was highly unlikely, the unlucky majority of Virginia stewed in their hatred and envy until finally rebelling against the system. Some major aspects of this flawed class structure are alive today in the United States, though much less life threatening.


The source of Bacon’s Rebellion was rooted within the lower class citizens’ hatred towards wealthy land owners. For the most part, the lower class citizens of Virginia hated those that ranked above them. A major portion of that hatred was due to the fact that a citizen’s place on the hierarchical structure in Virginia was hereditary. In other words, colonists at the time were born into either power or poverty. Their class, in the seventeenth century, rarely shifted up or down on the social ladder, especially within the confines of the Virginia colony. The commoners envied the wealthy, both for their land and money, as well as their places of power among the rest of the colony. From this envy, resentment blossomed. The majority of the colonists in Virginia, the poorer farmers, wished that they had more land; due to their status as un-wealthy citizens, they could not achieve such a feat. This caused frustration and anger among the lower class population.


Nathanial Bacon seized this moment in time, when the colonists were so angry and confused, to fuel his own rebellion. He knew that the poor farmers needed more land, and was well aware of how much land was untouched by Englishmen to the west. The land Bacon spoke of was being ‘unproductively’ inhabited by the Natives. With these thoughts in mind, utilizing his own power in the government, Bacon rallied up many farmers and indentured servants and set off. Monica R. Gisolfi put it into words rather well when she wrote about how Nathanial Bacon went through farmlands with his gang of poor colonists and “gather[ed] slaves and indentured servants to join [him].”(1) This quote effectively displays how deeply the poor colonists’ hate dwelled within them. It shows that Bacon and his band of followers could simply walk onto someone’s land and swipe them away from their work. It also shows how tightly knit the poor farmers and indentured servants were, because they had no bonds with the wealthy strong enough to stop them. Not only does it display how together the lower class was, but also the schism between the rich and poor.


Prosperous land was sparse, so few planters were able to generate enough profit to be referred to as high class plantation owners. Due to this rough distribution of land there was no middle class to speak of. (2) This was a main factor causing the poor to stay poor. Those underprivileged farmers had neither the land, nor the money to rise up the hierarchical social ranking of the Virginia colony. The lack of valuable land meant that the low class had no land to significantly increase their profits. Land also cost a lot more money, seeing as it was so sparingly distributed. These facts economically crippled them so they were unable to buy more land, because the ratio of citizens to available land was so high. Another effect of the lack of available land was that wealthy land owners made up a small percentage of the population. Thus, the majority of the population was impoverished. Lack of a middle class made life harder for the poor citizens of Virginia, because in order to rise up the ranks of society, they had to increase their revenue almost tenfold. As stated earlier, the lower class was unable to reach ‘wealthy’ status among the Virginians. Indentured servants who lived out their servitude became free man, which posed another problem, because they had no money to buy land. Such men and women were freed into poverty. Their dreams of a glorious life in the New World were crushed by their lack of money and residency, which did nothing but expand the gap between the rich and the poor, and raise the potential farmer to land ratio.


Another threat to Virginia’s class structure was that the elite farmland owners tended to hold government offices. This point directly affected the rebellion, because the number of wealthy land owners completely outweighed the amount of lower class colonists with such power. As studies have shown, in the eighteenth century, four out of five of Virginia’s House of Burgesses’ most prestigious men held more than 10,000 acres of land each.(3) Many lower class land owners viewed this distribution of power as a conflict of interest. In The American Dream, Bacon is said to have claimed that the “elite planters operated the government for private gain.”(4) Nathanial Bacon was speaking against such a dishonorable act in Chesapeake’s society. Obviously, the rich wished to be richer, thus taking advantage of their positions of power. This enraged many commoners, who strongly needed more land, which the officials would not allow them to have. The Governor at the time, Berkley, was singled out among those who unfairly used their power. Nathanial told his followers that the governor was denying them access to the Natives’ land solely because he held substantial trades with them. This would be yet another example of how unstable the Chesapeake society was during the seventeenth century, and how it directly contributed to Bacon’s Rebellion. Poor colonists could not control their own fates because the rich held governmental positions, and they sought to destroy that restraint.


Though the rebellion was eventually crushed and the worse off colonists were put back in their place on the communal hierarchy, tensions between the classes lessened throughout Virginia. The colonists, both rich and poor, banded together to defeat the Indians. This was necessary because the Native Americans were retaliating due to the English intruding on their territories, and taking their land. The planter elites’ positions of power in the colony were not limited, however, after the rebellion. As The American Promise states, “If anything [Bacon’s Rebellion] strengthened their power.”(4) Whether their stronghold over the Chesapeake society was positive or remained negative is irrelevant to the argument of class structure’s importance in the aftermath of Bacon’s Rebellion. The important part that cannot be overlooked is that the grandees still held their land and power after such a violent rebellion was raised geared towards them losing both.


Society began to stabilize after the rebellion took place. One huge help to the cause was that the ratio of people to land began to lower. Reasons for this ratio’s slip included both the introduction of slavery and the dwindling of English immigrants due to better economy in England. Also, the Virginian government stopped enforcing, harshly, the encroachment into Indian territories. This led to less animosity between classes as free men got more land from the Natives. Indentured servants were no longer coming into the colony after slavery was introduced. Also, a middle class began to shape as slavery increased profits substantially. All of these facts lessened the tension between the lower and high class citizens of the Virginia colonies.


Today, the separation between high, low and middle classes are still very distinct. Middle class is the most common in rural areas, but even this class is vastly separated from the high class citizens. Those on the top of the tier, such as computer programmers, royalty, and media icons have much more wealth than the average person in a first world country, such as America or England. Though lifestyles have changed drastically, the rich are still envied by the poor. This is simply because they have more wealth, power, and land, like in the seventeenth century. Like colonists in Virginia, Americans today plainly wish to have more land, money, freedom and power. Technology and times have changed, but the American dream has not. It is not likely to ever change, even as society becomes more progressive; the want for high social status is in human nature, it is not a necessity, nor is it necessarily life dependent, but the want for more will always be there.


It is clear to see that social classes have had major effects in the American lifestyles since before the seventeenth century. Bacon’s Rebellion is a concrete example on how an unstable class structure can lead to a discontented society. In both seventeenth century Chesapeake Bay and the Americas today, class is viewed as the amount of wealth acquired over one’s lifetime. Even in the contemporary United States, many government officials are viewed as corrupt. Like in the seventeenth century, some are said to have ‘bought’ their way into their positions, and are even accused as creating laws solely to benefit themselves. Technology, clothing and shelter styles have all changed, but class has played, and most likely always will play, a large part in social content. The fluid class structure in seventeenth century Virginia took the leading role in Bacon’s Rebellion. There were other adding components, but the social hierarchy of poor farmers and rich planters no doubt took center stage.

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(1) http://caho-test.cc.columbia.edu/sim/15005.html, Bacon's Rebellion: Colonial Society and Politics, 1972
(2) http://www.wm.edu/niahd/journals/index.php?browse=entry&id=440, Jacqueline Woods, 2004
(3) The Invention of the White Race, by Theodore W. Allen, 1998
(4) The American Promise, by James L. Roark, Michael P. Johnson, Patricia Cline Cohen, Sarah Stage, Alan Lawson, Susan M. Hartmann, 2005

Portfolio: Patriotism Essay (2nd Essay)

Letter One-July 20, 1769

1. Dear Mother,

These soldiers have reached my last nerve. I am consumed by such an emotional confusion; on the first hand, I loathe my place under King George and the Parliament's thumb, but you continue attempting to persuade me that I owe them my rights and liberties.2. To you, I am to aim to be nothing more than a puppet for your 'glorious' majesty to string along in life. These soldiers, mother, are noisy echoes of a patriotic lost hope. This hope, seemingly lost in you as well, can be retrieved from the well you've so carelessly tossed it into.

Like you, many of the colonists voice their loyalty to the King. Widespread hope in the King and Parliament, though loyal to England, is truthfully disloyal to the colonial Americans' rights and liberties. Such Americans, whose rights are attacked and hindered by these same two components, turn a blind eye to the truth. It can only be right to protect your liberties, both with pen and sword. Mother, you must think before you set your loyalties; the King has not your best interests in mind, so is it wise to place your trust in him?

Signed,

Laurence

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1. The American Promise Volume A:To 1800Families Divide Over the Revolution, pg 230-32
2. Is Patriotism a Mistake? , George KatebRefer to http://historyetc.wetpaint.com/page/Research

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Letter Three-March 6, 1770

1. Dearest Mother,

I have delayed response for good reason; though I believe not your reasoning is correct on the issue of your loyalism to the King's Law, I still respect you. It would be an awful time in life to lash out at you, most honorable mother.

I have taken your words as close to my heart as possible, but I cannot logically allow them to prosper. Can you not see what has been happening? Of course recent news just outside my home will reach you before this letter does reach your hands, but I will continue as if you stand in ignorance; blood has been shed here in Boston. Just this January a boy was shot dead for literally no reason at all. Shot in cold blood by one of your 'trusted' King's officials. I stood at his funeral in silence, yet boiling with white hot Rage. Rage, mother!

This unfiltered anger took hold of my lungs, swelled within my heart; my blood ran blistering hot through my veins. An innocent boy! This behavior has gone unnoticed by Your Royal Majesty and his party of Good men. We followed along, my Brothers and Sons, grinding our teeth. We went along with this silent Fury, day to day; nothing more than fist fights had ensued upon the Reds until yesterday evening when a riot broke out. Five men shot down, just as many more wounded, but numbers matter not. We’ve been to far too many funerals for one man to take, yet the Cause stands stronger than ever. If these words are not enough to assuage you, words from your beloved Son, than truthfully nothing short of Divine persuasion will fall on your ears (and believe me, He shall have my side.)

Your Son,

Laurence

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1. The American Promise Volume A:To 1800Families Divide Over the Revolution, pg 230-32

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Letter Five-April 21st, 1775

1. To one Ms. Chatterton:

To prolong this information would do more damage than it would to tell you now; this morning, at 0200 hours, your son passed away. He was part of the Bostonian militia attack against the British. His death was brought on by splintered wood shot through his shoulder. Our medic, however inexperienced she was, did her best given the situation; there were many more wounded, most with a much less tragic.

He was a brave Soldier and a remarkable man.

The following are a few diary entries that were found on his person. They have been damaged in battle, but our son seemed to have meant these be sent to you upon his returning to Boston. I hope they hold some significance to you.

-General R. Jefferson

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April 18, 1775

... and as we walked onwards, towards our destination, the Reds yelled from over the hill. They spoke as if they had Power to speak, "Put down your weapons" and such. We continued in our march, until one of my Brothers opened fire. In all, eight of my Friends have passed and a handful wounded, still. We cannot be silenced, mother. I have not been wounded, and shall continue in full strength towards our colonial goal. Freedom!

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April 19, 1775

...for I have been impaled! My left arm shudders in pain, (thankfully my writing hand fails me not) and the medic has been attempting to remove the splinters of wood from my shoulder and arm. She says that I need rest; that I should sleep now...

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April 20, 1775

I awoke this morning in an unworldly pain. Shot through my arm, the sun's fire. I can't think about anything but my Brothers, my Friends, and my Mother. She must know that though I went against her words of advice I was fighting for her. For her Freedom, her Rights, her Liberties. Though she was too blind to see them taken for granted, I played her eyes. Though too distracted to hear the hiss behind her king's words, I played her ears. I hope she sees that I did this for her. The doctor says that I don't have much energy, and in order to get better, I must rest. Mother, take these words not for granted: our beliefs have differed, but my love for you has not left me. Thank you for all you have done for me.

2.-Laurence

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1. George Washington and Benedict Arnold: A Tale of Two Patriots, Alan CateRefer to http://historyetc.wetpaint.com/page/Research2. The American Promise Volume A:To 1800Families Divide Over the Revolution, pg 230-32

Portfolio: Final Exam

History 121 and Writing 101 have taught many students, myself included, that the two subjects are connected quite firmly. It’s not hard to see that writing and history will always hold a place in peoples’ lives, simply because they are writing and history. A question of whether it is really necessary to deeply analyze historic events comes up. Michel Foucault answers this question with his theory “Why [consider history]? Simply because I am interested in the past? No, if one means by that a history of the past in terms of the present. Yes, if one means the history of the present.” Michel Foucault’s theory of studying history is that past events are not separate from the present. His belief is that the past and present are connected, that today is a continuation of yesterday, so to speak. Out of this, I gather that history is not just a strand of events with varying importance; the study of history takes place to understand the connection between any and every event that has taken place, including contemporary happenings. It is now clear that historical events are important not because of how many lives were lost, or what controversial events took place, but due to their impact on us today. Questions pile up after this concept has been grasped, such as “what would life be like if we had never split from Britain?” and "what would have happened if the not all states ratified the Constitution?" In order to back up any opinion of such matters, a thorough understanding of happenings throughout time must be present.

Similarities between the past and the present begin to unfold once historical texts are analyzed as more than simple events. For example, during George Washington’s term as president, he stated that the United States should veer away from a dual party system. This may seem like a mere statement from a former president, but that'd be a completely above the surface observation. What’s really interesting about that is we are currently split into two main categories throughout the country: democratic and republican. Washington feared that such a system would divide the country in half, and in a way, it has. The way George Washington foresaw this becoming a problem really speaks integrated the past and present are. Yes, time has progressed and today is a much different society than it was in the 1800s. However, we are still facing the same problems that eighteenth century American citizens faced.

Not only do historical events relate to things that have happened today, or recently, they also connect to happenings from any moment in time, or at least during human existence. One great example of this is a connection made between World War II and the Holocaust. During Hitler’s reign over Nazi Germany, his followers took people from their homes simply because he persuaded them to. Adolf Hitler told those who stood behind him to send people, specifically Jews, to concentration camps, where they were to live out the rest of their lives. Those captives underwent numerous different torture techniques, and millions died simply because they were ordered to. Now, is that any different from World War II, when the US took Japanese people, even ones that have lived in America their entire lives, and brought them to concentration camps? The same basic principles are there: Jewish and Japanese people were both tortured simply because of the way they were born, and they were taken by people who only did so because they were persuaded that it was the right thing. This connection, along with the numerous others that are out there ready to be discovered, shows that the past is still relevant.

Once the connections are made, it will become clear that all events, whether from the past, present, or even future, are relevant to one another. Simply because something happened a long time ago does not mean it will not happen again, nor does it confirm that a single event will not be impacted by a prior occurrence. History isn’t taught simply to study past events, but to allow one to make links between different events throughout time. Once the ability to connect episodes from the past and present is attained, one will be better prepared for the future. Michel Foucault’s statement speaks to this thought that you should look at the past as “the history of the present.” Questions do begin to accumulate after this idea is grasped, but only when implementing these ideas can we begin to formulate answers or educated speculation. Writing and studying history cannot be escaped, because they are so firmly ingrained within life itself; the need for understanding the past, present, and one another, separates man from any other animal.