In the beginning of the book, Jane Eyre, a little girl of ten years old girl lives with her aunt and her cousins. Where she is constantly is abused and oppressed. She is seen as someone who has done something wrong when she fights back with her cousin John who struck her and injured her at that moment. Rather than her aunt caring for Jane, she order her servants to lock Jane in a red room. Not holding anything back, Jane confronts her aunt for all the wrong her aunt has done to her and she will never forgive her. After that, the aunt sends Jane to a charity school where Jane sees all the harsh environment her fellow classmates are living through. The head of Jane’s school accuses alerts and orders that no one should even interact with her because she is a liar. Soon the school finds out Jane is innocent and the head is not capable of running the school properly which leads into bringing a new crew to take over. Through all the nagtivity, oppression, and poor environment Jane manages to get through many years of school. In chapter 12, Jane goes to Thornfield for a new beginning where she is a tutor of a young girl Adele and helps Mr. Rochester who owns the house Jane is staying in.

-Simarjit Singh

Chapter 12 reflection:

Jane Eyre is comfortable at Thornfield, and her thoughts allow her to feel many emotions within her new residence. Jane strolls through Thornfield for clarity and relief of her reality. Imagination gives her the emotion she has yet to experience. And also reasoning with herself on her past and present.  Jane’s suffering stems from society’s take on her appearance , her gender and class of person. However her past experiences have oppressed her in a way of becoming nonexistent. She admiring when finding a way out of her demise by self education and imagination. Jane floats away from reality with the help of books and the views of nature that she’s surrounded by.  She is teaching a young girl named Adele to be intelligent and understanding. Jane also feels responsible for Adele’s welfare while Mrs. Fairfax is turning out to be just what she perceived.  Her state of confusion came from seeing Mr. Rochester for the first time and telling him, her position at Thornfield as a governess without knowing who he was.

Melissa Derrick

 After reading the first 12 chapters of Jane Eyre, I will infer that Jane Eyre lives unhappily with her wealthy relatives, at Gateshead. Jane relatives used every opportunity to abuse and neglects her just because of her subordinate and poor background. The evil treatment she received from Mrs. Reed family as a child was cruel and ungodly. Mrs. Reed used every power she and her family has to punish her by imprisoning her in the “red room” the room in which her uncle died. She believes that she sees her uncle’s ghost and begs to be set free. Her Aunt refuses, insisting that she will remain in the room which she called a prison until she learn a lesson.

However, at the age of 10 years old, Jane was treated as an outsider, her female cousins, Eliza and Georgiana tolerate her but don’t love her, their brother John who is rude and harsh to Jane, reminding her that she is from a poor family, that she shouldn’t even be associate with the children of a gentlemen.  According to the novel, before Mrs. Reed husband dead, got her to promised before he died, that she would always keep and protect her, which she didn’t. rather than abuse and humiliate her. Thus, from the beginning Mrs. Reed is very happy to get rid of her by sending her to the Lowood school. During her time in school, Jane faces a lot of challenges and also humiliated by her teachers. Despite the circumstances she encountered, she was strong, hardworking, self-motivated and brilliant. While at Lowood, Jane became a star student and became an effective teacher. Moreover, with all this affliction going on around and her time in Lowood school, her relatives, including Mrs. Reed never care to visit Jane for one day in school.

After reading the first 12 chapters of Jane Eyre and Lorde’s two pieces, it makes sense to assume that Jane Eyre can be seen as the woman of oppression, resistance and eventually change. From the get-go it was very clear that Jane was very oppressed. As a young child, she herself pretty much had to put up with her abusive aunts. In one specific part her aunt essentially locked her in a room in which her uncle had died in. Her uncle liked Jane, but it was very clear that her aunts did not, except for one. Anyways, being locked in that room must have been difficult for her being a child and vulnerable to any kind of fear. However, before she left for her new school she stood up for herself and spoke her mind. She pretty much told her aunt that she despised her and that she was going to let everyone know what kind of person she really was. The most notable part is that she stood her ground. When she finally started school, at one point, she was accused of being a liar. In the end, Jane managed to make her case and eventually gained her innocence, so to speak. Like in Lorde’s readings, staying silent does nothing but ultimately build up and hurt you from the inside out. I’ve yet to read the remainder of the book but I’m sure that the prospect of change and self-realization will come into play regarding Jane’s own development and personal experiences.

Carlos Montoya

After reading the first 13 chapters of Jane Eyre, I immediately felt like what she was going through. In chapter 1 it introduces us to the oppression she faces. The unnecessary cruel treatment she receives within the Reed’s household shows how much she is welcomed there. She was treated worse than servants the reason being she did nothing for the Reeds. She was looked at as basically a leech using them for a home. Although it was not her choice or responsibility for what happened that led her here. She was treated as if she was a monster. Yet she was merely a young girl, frightened yet put on a brave mask whenever needed.

Resistance is important when someone believes they have no power. Resistance is key, and that is something Jane kept with her. For example she resisted when the servants tried to hold her down, and when they tried to carry her away. She didn’t allow any of this to happen without a fight. Resistance is needed to keep things in order, its the only way to withstand unfair thoughts, treatment or actions. Jane has gone through what most people who resist the “power”, the beating, the punishments all the cons of resisting, this young child went through. Accompanying this behavior is guilt when things go wrong, The only time Jane has been treated with sympathy was when she fell sick. This occurred after being hit with a book in the head and punished for hours in a room alone.

I had looked up the definition of sublime, and the definition that was given was, “of such excellence, grandeur, or beauty as to inspire great admiration or awe.” But, according to Edmund Burke, the affects of such defined by the Google, are only the inferior effects of the sublime; the most prominent effect of the sublime is really astonishment. I think the sublime according the Edmund Burke, is something that consumes you so entirely, that anything else that would normally and naturally occupy apart of your mind, body, and soul, does not.

If my understanding of the sublime is correct, I would have to say that I discovered the sublime while traveling. I had attended college for two years right after I had finished high school, and realized that in that moment, it was not the time for me to be in school. My head wasn’t there so I set out traveling for about a year and half. When I was traveling, it was as nothing else existed except the place in which I was visiting; there was always so much to take in.. a new culture, new language, traditions, norms. It felt like a sensory overload every time I entered a new place, the object of the cultures filled me so entirely it was blissful. There was no room in my mind for anything other than the “now” at the time. And as Burke described, with the sublime comes astonishment, and with astonishment, a degree of fear, yet arrises great power.. and when I was traveling, that was exactly it.

There is a reason traveling is my passion. There is a risk that comes along with it, which is the risk of your life. Traveling alone you constantly have to be aware of everything around you and to do so there has to be a degree of fear in you to really be alert. But when I mention fear, I don’t mean it negatively, I mean it in a way that strikes adrenaline; it’s the kind of fear that gives you a sense of power when I have experienced a country and its culture on my own successfully and unharmed, receiving only enlightening experiences. It brings up a power within you that has always been there but you never knew you had.

Irene

Sublime is “of such excellence, grandeur, or beauty as to inspire great admiration or awe” defined by google. My sublime is The Golden Temple back in India, Punjab. I use to go there when I was a little boy very often. We, Sikhs, call this our holy place also call it Shri Harmander Sahib. This place is amazingly built from its architecture to its rich history. Golden Temple was attacked in 1984, killing many innocent men, women, and children. This attacked destroyed many parts of this holy place. But through all the struggles, Sikhs managed to fix it back to into this incredible place made half out of real gold. I have not been back to the Golden Temple ever since I was about eight years old. But I still remember this peaceful feeling I would get when I used to visit there. I do not know what it is about that place but this place brings peace to my mind and also my soul. People go to this holy place to start something such as a business, had children, or just starting a new life, Sikhs and many other people come here to get the blessing and spiritually be cleansed. Another thing that amazes me about the Golden Temple, is that it has four doors indicating that anyone from any religion, culture, or any person can come without being judged or being stopped for practicing another religion. Sikhism believes all beings are created equal.

-Simarjit Singh

As I was looked for “awe” images I came across the photo above. The image is of New York City, the city that never sleep, the tall buildings and bright lights. I noticed that I experience sublime moments practically everyday. Being from the “Big Apple” brings ecstasy. When ever I visit the city these weird thoughts wonder through my mind. I wonder if I would’ve be able to make it in this big city. New York City is the city that never sleeps and represents aspiration, fame, fortune and dreams. This image has a combination of both fear and inspiration.

There is so much that I want to accomplish sometimes it’s scares me. At times I wish I had more than 24 hours a day. When your a career minded person as myself, growing up in New York; you sometimes feel as if your not doing enough. Whenever I find myself at home relaxing, or in the city shopping I feel like I should be working; because I there is someone, somewhere working twice as hard. And in this big busy city I’m always feeling as if I’m not doing enough, my success will be taken from me. I’m very fearful of failing and not
being successful as I plan to be. I glaze into these big buildings and I know if I work hard I can one day be there. There’s no better place to live in than New York City. Here you have tons of multination companies as well as headquarters. New York is a great place to network and meet other professions who were once in your shoes. My thoughts, my emotions, the good, and the bad surrounds around New York City every single day.

Google’s dictionary definition of the word sublime states, “of such excellence, grander, or beauty as to inspire great admiration or awe.” This definition is not far from Edmund Burke’s take on, “the passion caused by the sublime.” Burke describes passion caused by the sublime is in nature when, “those causes operate most powerfully, is Astonishment…with some degree of horror.” Although Burke’s description of passion, in respect to the sublime in nature, is defining nature as “mother nature”, this interpretation of nature can also be tied to our current political nature.

This is a photo of the United States Capitol building, during the 58^th presidential inauguration. According to Burke’s take on passion, in respect to the sublime, this photo triggers the emotional effects of astonishment and awe. Despite experiencing the most divisive and destructive presidential race, probably (hopefully) in my lifetime, there was still a peaceful exchange of power from the two polarizing political parties. Despite of also having the “largest crowd size” in inauguration history, this picture also invokes “some degree of horror”—as was defined on Burke’s second clause of his take on the sublime. There is no question that the United States is divided, and the terror that is associated with that, is if the 58^th presidential inauguration is the last picture we would have of a US inauguration.

-Danny Lee

Chopin Frédéric. Nocturne in E Flat, Op. 9, No. 2. Vadim Chaimovich, 2011. Www.Youtube.com. Web.

The sense of sublime. An unusual feeling of greatness and euphoria. According to Edmund Burke, sublime can be achieved in different manners. One of which is astonishment. I believe that above all senses, music might reach the greatest sublime that our human mind, as well as body, can experience. Burke elaborated on the astonishment saying, “In this case the mind is so entirely filled with its object that it cannot entertain any other, nor by consequence reason on that object which employs it.” subliming to a point of insensibility, and finding myself to be in a stage of euphoria is what I go through when listening to music.
One example to such music is a composer named Frederic Chopin, who was a Polish composer during the Romantic Era. Chopin is well known for his piano compositions and mostly famous for a composition called Nocturne. In Nocturne the softness and melodic sweetness, are features that make one feel incredibly light-headed, as well as emotional. This happens because such music is able to tremble your emotions and make you feel calm and sensitive at the same time. The genius of Chopin, unlike other composers and musicians, is that he has these sublime melodies which make one to be magically hypnotized to the tunes and sounds of another piece of art. Therefore, being under the sublime stage happens when I listen to maestro like Frederic Chopin and his masterpiece Nocturne.