“All the Stars” by Kendrick Lamar and SZA is a song that explores themes of success, power, and self-awareness. Kendrick’s rap verses focus on the skepticism towards fame, fake people, and superficial relationships. He reflects on the importance of recognizing and letting go of the toxic aspects of life, ultimately embracing the rewards that come with this understanding. On the other hand, SZA’s verses focus on pursuing dreams and the realization and rewards of achieving one’s potential. The chorus, “This may be the night that my dreams might let me know, all the stars are closer,” speaks to the idea of acknowledging one’s aspirations and recognizing the long process of achieving a goal. The song also explores the unique challenges and obstacles them as black artists face. They address the struggle to manage the pressures of the entertainment industry while staying true to their culture.
Author: Lia
IRJE #6 Killer Instinct
The Naturals (Killer Instinct) by Jennifer Lynn Barnes, follows five teenagers with special abilities that are obtained from traumatic experiences. One of these teenagers is Dean, a 17 year old boy whose father is a serial killer. During his childhood, Dean had to stay silent and endure the killings, as well as the suffering of the victims, all while keeping his father’s actions secret. When a new string of murders seems connected to his father, Dean is forced to confront him for the first time in years.
“These hands, these eyes –
they’re nothing?”
“They’re everything.” Pg. 73
This moment is significant because, throughout their conversation, Dean often belittles himself, making it seem like he’s worthless or irrelevant. However, despite his father being a terrible person, he still makes sure Dean understands his worth. This citation shows how a family bond is strong and even though there might be some obstacles family has unconditional love.
PW#6 – Grey’s Anatomy
Grey’s Anatomy is a tv show that follows around the life of 5 interns: Meredith, Cristina, Izzie, George, and Alex. Along with their attendings and the chief: Dr. Shepard, Dr.Burke, Dr. Bailey, Dr.Webber, Dr. Hunt, Dr.Hann, etc. The show takes place in the Seattle Grace Hospital, where the interns, nurses, and attendings have to work together in order to keep people healthy and help out on their problems. Through out the seasons of the show we can not only see the problems and personal life of the characters, we can also see the struggles they have as interns on the medical field. The main character is Meredith Grey, she is the daughter of a high ranked doctor, so we can see her struggle to achieve the expectations people have of her. We see the show through her perspective and are able to hear her thoughts of all the struggles her coworkers and herself have to study. The series mixes the intense emotions of the characters with the reality of being a medical consultant, it goes deeper into exploring the complex feelings such as love, loss, ambition, etc. I like the show because as it progresses, we can see different characters who undergo significant personal growth, making the characters evolve in relationships just as important as the medical challenges they encounter.
IRJE#5 – Brave New World
In Aldous Huxley Brave New World, we explore the story of a controlled society where people are made to choose confort and prioritize social order above all else. In this quote Mustapha Mond is having a conversation with John the savage, where John shows his state of mind with superficial happiness and Mustapha explains how people choose to loose their humanity over being able to feel.
“And being contented has none of the glamour
of a good fight against misfortune, none of the picturesqueness of a struggle
with temptation, or a fatal overthrow by passion or doubt. Happiness is never
grand.”(pg. 152)
This quote captures one of the central themes of the book: the superficial happiness and the nature of human life. Mustapha talks about how without emotions like pain and the need to resist temptation, people loose their ability to grow and develop a self image. The author wants to contrast what it means to be human and the need to feel unconfortable, pain, and other disconforting feelings to remain human.
PW – #05 Crazy Rich Asians
Crazy Rich Asians is a story that follows the main character, Rachel Chu. Rachel is a professor at NYU, who lives a normal middle-class life. Rachel’s boyfriend, Nick, is from Singapore and is invited to go back to Singapore to attend his best friend’s wedding along with Rachel. What Rachel doesn’t know is that Nick belongs to one of the wealthiest families in Singapore. When they arrive, Rachel is submerged in a life of luxury and elegance. Rachel has to fight the expectations of high society and the judgments of Nick’s family, especially his mother, Eleanor, who does not approve of Rachel and Nick’s relationship. As the movie goes on, we can explore the expectations of high society and the pressure that is put on different people. We can even see Rachel creating her own insecurities based on society’s standards and questioning her position in her boyfriend’s life. Rachel, as an outsider, faces judgment because of her background as a Chinese-American who is not as connected with her culture. As a woman, we can see Rachel is considered an unfit woman for the luxury life and unable to meet expectations, while Nick, as a man, gets to live life as a wealthy, successful man free of judgment. This movie can help us understand the pressure society puts on us. We can analyze more deeply the double standards we are expected to meet as a part of society. We can understand the importance of being ourselves and finding out who we are, so when we are faced with the occasion of someone having high standards, we won’t be affected by it or have thoughts that may create insecurities.