Corn-Pone Opinions.docx - Vezaldenos 1 Julia Vezaldenos AP ~ High-End News

As a teenager, Mark Twain had a friend who taught him about conformity. The friend was a black slave who practiced preaching daily atop his . As a teenager, Mark Twain had a friend who taught him about conformity. The friend was a black slave who practiced preaching daily atop his master's woodpileMark Twain used corn-pone as a metaphor for conformity. But maybe both corn-pone and conformity deserve a second look.How does Twain expand Jerry's definition of corn-pone opinions? What is the effect of numbering the two items in which he begins o expand Jerry's definition?

In Praise Of The Corn-Pone Opinion - Electric Literature

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AP Lang - Mark Twain (Corn-Pone Opinions) Flashcards | Quizlet

In his essay titled "Corn-pone Opinions," the famous American author Mark Twain explores the idea of public opinion and its correlation with . This photo is the property of Google. This photo is an abstract example of the groupthink idea Twain seems to set a precursor to in hCorn-Pone Opinions Annotations: S - Mark Twain O - Satire/Commentary/Critique A - The general public who conform to social standards P - Express angered essay published after Twain's death titled "Corn-Pone Opinions." An article on the discovery, including Fulton's revised version of the essay, . A Baylor professor says he found the papers in a dusty drawer at a Mark Twain collection. Lost manuscript completes Twain's 'Corn-Pone Opinions'Unlimited digital access only $1/mo.! Facebook Twitter WhatsApp SMS Email Print Save A Baylor professor says he found the papers in a dusty drawer at a Mark Twain collection.WACO, Texas --View Homework Help - Corn-Pone Opinions.docx from ENGLISH 101 at East Union High. Vezaldenos 1 Julia Vezaldenos AP English Mr. Smith 8 Mar.

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Years of concept and debate have long past into this monumental question and yet it's nonetheless to be responded: Is there a distinction between corn-pone and corn bread? And is corn-pone cooked in a skillet or baked? Should it have sugar, milk, or eggs? Should it have baking soda? Is corn-pone one phrase or two? There are no such difficulties, on the other hand, when it comes to distinguishing corn-pone, whatever this is, from Trinidad's "pone."

Trinidad pone is a scrumptious delectable dessert, a confection crafted from cassava, coconut, sugar, and spice. It's bought in all places: to hoity-toity hipsters in uppity farmers' markets, and to ravenous bachelors at no-frill vegetable stalls, to momzillas in bakeries at the major street, and to previous tanties in parlors on the corner, to blue-collar workers buying groceries in supermarket chains, and to smiling-faced youngsters in tiny school cafes. I've had "gourmet" pone, from a cafe that specialises in "deconstructed local classics." I've had pone from a tired girl selling snacks to raise finances for her unwell son. I've had pone heat, evenly drizzled with a caramel sauce. I've eaten it cold, as though it were some roughly iced treat, at the heat sands of the northern coast.

Pone is made of cassava however for those who're now not a purist (and need to be fallacious) there's leeway as to what you'll installed it. Some people use pumpkin so as to add pleasure to their lifestyles by way of raising the color of the dish, which tends to fall someplace along a spectrum between pale brown to golden. The texture of pone, however, is consistently the same: gelatinous Turkish satisfaction cocooned in a crisp cassava coconut pores and skin. Connoisseurs of style upload lots of spice: cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, clove, ground spice. The raucous and more adventurous throw in raisins, however that is universally accredited to be a gratuitous touch.

Some dictionaries say a corn-pone is a simple-minded particular person.

Trinidad pone isn't to be puzzled with Jamaican pone, which is, unfortunately, constructed from sweet potato, milk, sugar, and rum. Incidentally, the overbearingly lumpy Jamaican pone is now and then comprised of cornmeal and is as ostentatious as a dancehall queen. The Jamaican use of cornmeal makes the speculation that the Caribbean pone is the sweeter, better-looking brother to the American pone appear believable.

Yet, for a majority of these nuances, Trinidadians feel no use for precision. A Trinidadian will call cassava pone merely "pone," disposing of the adjective in the assumption that what constitutes pone right here must even be pone all over the place. In fact, had I not encountered Mark Twain's well-known essay "Corn-pone Opinions," I might never have puzzled what a pone is and the way it differs from a bread. Nor would I've pondered the fact that some dictionaries say a corn-pone is a simple-minded person, a that means which would possibly have something to do with the argument in Twain's essay.

Twain isn't considering the complexities of pone aesthetics. He takes with no consideration that when he opens his essay with a slave pronouncing, "You tell me whar a man gits his corn pone, en I'll let you know what his 'pinions is," we'll know what corn pone is and, what's extra, that we'll understand its position in 1901 society. Admittedly, he didn't publish the essay in his lifetime—it was published posthumously in 1923. But Twain being useless hasn't stopped him from publishing acclaimed work. His essay opens the 2001 Best American Essays of the Century, edited by Joyce Carol Oates.

Instead of dessert, Twain has his sights on making a mundane point about the way other folks think, or fairly, don't. He believes his good friend, the slave, is announcing guy isn't impartial and cannot afford perspectives that might intervene with his bread and butter (to combine up the pone metaphor a bit). He additionally feels his buddy is saying that as a way to prosper we will have to all line up with the majority, must suppose and really feel what everybody else thinks and feels, or else endure the effects.

"He should prohibit himself to corn-pone opinions," Twain paraphrases. "He will have to get his opinions from folks; he will have to reason why out none for himself; he must have no first-hand perspectives."

Twain doesn't fully trust this. He thinks the situation is more dire. Whereas his buddy feels other folks cherry-pick their opinions strategically, Twain believes this exceeds their capabilities. Whereas his pal assumes it's conceivable to formulate authentic positions, Twain casts doubt at the lifestyles of loose concept. He says: "I'm persuaded that a coldly-thought-out and unbiased verdict upon a fashion in clothes, or manners, or literature, or politics, or religion, or another topic that is projected into the field of our realize and pastime, is a most uncommon factor—if it has ever existed." To wit, the only method people could like hideous hoop skirts was as a result of everybody else did.

When I was a wee little child, I was a well-behaved Trinidadian boy. I listened to my oldsters. I went to church. I tried to develop into an acolyte (though they threw me out after suspecting I used to be extra into the pretty, flowing robes than the Holy Ghost). I paid consideration in school. Back then, the Belmont Boys Roman Catholic School was yet to increase a name for unhealthy boys and ruffians. I studied hard.

By Standard Five, then again, this excellent conduct began to get me into trouble. As everyone knows, there is best so much just right behavior that little boys can take. The different boys grumbled, softly at first, then brazenly, that I had by no means made a mark on the planet, had by no means distinguished myself through any type of truancy, had omitted to uphold the long-held custom of boys being in fights. Such was my appalling decency and civic-mindness, that the elder boys had been incensed. I became a pariah, a determine of censure, character non grata.

To address this misconduct, it behooved me to do so. I organized, with any other similarly-circumstanced do-gooder, to orchestrate a skirmish. We mentioned our plan prior, and scheduled an acceptable day for the momentous duel. Naivety were given the easier people: we believed it important to come up with a background tale to justify our battle. A jumbled narrative, involving the theft of marbles and a lunch package through which a precious piece of pone have been stolen, was once formulated and tantalisingly teased out. There used to be enough withholding of key details to stir up hypothesis and conjecture. Then, the Friday of our selected appointment arrived. We sought after tales of our exploits to unfold over the weekend.

The college bell rang like a loss of life knell. I immediately driven Kwesi round for a while, he grabbed the neck of my shirt, I ripped off a button or two of his, as we groaned and grunted strenuously as a mark of our manly hard work. The fight had to have an epic scale so we extended it for as long as possible till, either one of us having run out of strikes, it got here to a natural end. It was determined—universally I feel—that the combat was a good one, that we both had "received" since there was once little to differentiate us, despite the fact that maybe Kwesi had a couple of extra scratches on his arm than I did.

So when Mark Twain alludes to the ridiculous lengths people will bear to be able to conform, I fully perceive.

Entire careers have been constructed on work this is unlikeable but has nevertheless discovered favor with other people, or a minimum of been mentioned to have found choose with people.

And I believe it's safe to say everyone has had that second when there's a new emperor and he's now not dressed in clothes but you must faux he's and not simplest do it's a must to pretend he's but you also have to go with him on just how fabulous the clothes are even if you're seeing nothing however you do it anyway as a result of everyone else is complimenting him and in case you don't people will suppose you are dumb or blind or just simple mean. The Emperor's New Clothes explains the luck of many motion pictures, books, performs, and artwork exhibitions. Entire careers have been built on paintings that is, even within the subjective realm of the humanities, unlikeable however which has nonetheless discovered favor with folks, or at least been said to have discovered choose with other folks, the snowball rising bigger and bigger, threatening to squash any person who won't yield. Twain used to be on to something.

Social media has magnified this. It's given us equipment in which we will be able to empirically gauge just how admired something is, what number of views it has gained, the quantum of votes it has drawn or comments it has received. Some of us, seeing simplest that folks have appreciated something, sheepishly click the like button without reading the entire publish, or taking note of the full podcast, or gazing the whole 20-minute video.

But when Twain's nameless slave, whom we can call Uncle Jake, says "You inform me whar a man gits his corn pone, en I'll tell you what his 'pinions is," what Uncle Jake truly manner isn't what Twain hears. What Uncle Jake was alluding to used to be the unabashed undeniable fact that people are in most cases self-serving. We all have vested interests, hidden agendas, values that fall to the wayside if there is a wish to ensure self-preservation. People don't imagine deontological values, as a thinker may say, nor do they care in regards to the larger utilitarian good; we would not have such luxuries when living from day to day, meal to meal, paycheck to paycheck. This does think the capability for unbiased considering. But the idea isn't the realization.

Nor is it worthwhile attacking that premise. For statement of self-preservation is egocentric, sovereign considering. What is extra impartial than that?

Is Twain truly skeptical of loose considering? If there is not any impartial idea on the planet, this would render his corn-pone opinions computerized. We would live in a global of determinism. There could be no alternatives on the menu. What would be the point of saying somebody has an opinion? We would all have a passion for hoop skirts come hell or high water.

Even if Twain's interpretation is substantially proper, I have reservations about his argument.

"We are creatures of outside influences," he argues, "more often than not we do not think, we handiest imitate." However, even when we reproduction others, we mentally formulate our positions. We decide, consciously and even subconsciously, whether or not we will apply the status quo. Twain underestimates how a lot we intuit.

All this cogitation on corn-pone opinions makes one have a hankering for corn-pone itself. But what precisely does it style like? As Tom Sawyer did before me, I steal into the kitchen. Call it analysis. Call it art. Call it starvation. Why shouldn't I indulge my taste buds? I devise a plan. I assess the shares in my pantry, pull out my smartphone, and scour the web for recipes. This throws up the primary challenge. The seek yields a million effects.

Corn-pone is so fashionable there should be a reason. It's clearly been round for a long time. The internet tells me it's a Native American dish, corn being primarily a Native American invention. (Interestingly, Trinidad's pone, created from cassava, has additionally been connected to our indigenous peoples.)

My chosen recipe calls for simply five issues: cornmeal, water, milk, salt, and baking powder. I'm no longer positive about the baking powder, regardless that. Wouldn't the more unique corn-pone be flat and unleavened? Did other people always have baking powder to hand when roving throughout the wooded area, pitching tents, lighting fixtures fires and whatnot?

I halve the recipe. Don't really need 4 corn-pones for this experiment when two will suffice. Listed are exact measurements to follow, however I've got a deft hand so I float, eyeing the amounts I put it. Cooking is a science however it's also an art. You use what's handy, you do what feels right, drawing from enjoy.

We do not all the time assume things thru, sure, however at the similar time we really feel. We intuit and, therefore, we explanation why.

Just as meals are shaped in this intuitive method, so too can we formulate viewpoints. We are not machines. We do not at all times think things thru, sure, but on the identical time we feel. We intuit and, due to this fact, we reason why.

The corn meal is a light dusty yellow, but if I upload my liquid components the color will get deeper: extra saffron than butternut, extra turmeric than lemon. It comes together in a dough that's similar to the dough we use in Trinidad to make Christmas pastelles, a kind of stuffed polenta; a steamed empanada. As I knead the dough, which feels just like the plasticine kids used to amuse themselves with, feels as actual as thoughts made subject matter, I consider how simple it's to overlook the past, forget the names the of all of the tribes and peoples that would possibly have completed the same thing. Yet we're nonetheless tied to them. A straight forward factor like a meal generally is a commemoration.

Our very nature is to really feel. Feeling allows us to sense whether we think something is ethical. Our feelings guide us. This is a kind of reason why. Without having a theory obviously formulated in our thoughts, we know something is bad by just the way we feel. Stealing. Killing. Lying. We talk of moral sense. Even if one thing is the bees' knees, we first must decide if it tickles our fancy. Hoop skirts only changed into the trend as a result of they happy us on a degree we won't have been able to articulate.

Sometimes the result of this procedure are bad: the wrong feelings dominate. So it's fear that accounts for the rise of the Nazis, the racism of Twain's America, the xenophobia of Britain. The Brexit vote and the upward thrust of Donald Trump have emboldened positive other people to come back out and practice swimsuit. The motive: concern. People are scared of that the majority reliable of Boogeymen, The Other. The counter to such concern is to draw upon opposite and similarly tough emotions: compassion, love, kindness. Understanding that we are all human. For things to switch, those purer feelings will have to be admitted into the equation.

My pones are strangely fulfilling. I take a look at them with butter. I try them with maple syrup. I check out cheese. They are like arepas. They can fit no matter you placed on them, meet flavors halfway.

But let's say Twain is true and all we do is conform. Can't conforming still be a type of resistance? Can't it cause insurrection? Be its own sign of an independent assertion of values?

When Rosa Parks got onto the bus in Montgomery, Alabama, on December 1, 1955, she didn't disobey any regulations. She conformed to them. The prevailing laws divided the bus into white and black sections. Parks sat within the black phase. When the white phase filled up, the bus motive force attempted to enlarge the phase for whites simplest. The regulation called for "equivalent but separate accommodations"; it didn't permit this tradition of shifting the goalpost, a convention that had it seems that evolved over time. Parks stayed in the segment designated for her below the legislation. She stated: "When that white driver stepped back towards us, when he waved his hand and ordered us up and out of our seats, I felt a choice cover my frame like a cover on a wintry weather night time." It was once by means of conforming to a racist law that she asserted her individuality. It used to be through this conforming that she defied the whole thing. If individuals may to find freedom via compliance, so too may entire international locations.

Can't conforming nonetheless be a type of resistance? Can't it cause rebel?

In the past due twentieth century, a wave swept in the course of the Caribbean. Territories of the British Empire sought what Rosa Parks accomplished. They flirted with, lobbied for, then won independence. Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago in 1962, Barbados and Guyana in 1966, Bahamas in 1973, Grenada in 1974, Suriname in 1975, Dominica in 1978, St. Lucia in 1979, St. Vincent in 1979, Belize and Antigua and Barbuda in 1981, St. Kitts and Nevis in 1983. One via one, they attained get admission to to the comity of nations.

Was this wave merely a case of following type? Or used to be swimming with the tide some way of swimming towards it? By emulating each and every different's instance, those countries cultivated the sense of a shared future. This made the destiny of the islands irresistible. In this manner, independence was once completed not thru bloody rebellion, however through collective energy. There was power in numbers. As swimmers within the Caribbean will let you know sometimes, to survive a perilous current, you will have to let it take then you slowly make your strategy to the shore.

"Power is all over the place," wrote Michel Foucault, "now not as it embraces everything, but as it comes from in every single place." We see energy in action when individuals protest peacefully. We see it when countries come together to raise a fist. We also see it when artists, painters, musicians, writers, and poets undertake bureaucracy that at the surface look like imitations however, in reality, are indicators of resistance.

St. Lucian poet Derek Walcott and homosexual poet Thom Gunn did this. They now and again placed on a dressing up, paraded in it, then took it off with a view to move directly to the following poem, or collection or ebook. In their verse, these poets got down to show they too may just write in the traditional bureaucracy that experience ruled English letters for hundreds of years. Walcott took at the idea of the epic, its rhythms, tones and textures. He co-opted the theatre, emulating Shakespeare, and produced dramas in verse. He carried out those bureaucracy not to white, European subjects, but to the Caribbean. His mimicking used to be now not appeasement. It was once an statement of a black guy's inherent and equivalent claim to phrases. "The English language is no person's particular property," he said.

Like Walcott, Gunn used to be a poet with a penchant for the metres of a long tradition. His poems adopted a regimented pulse. Sonnets, elegies, syllabic verse, couplets. Yet, the usage of those paperwork Gunn addressed the queer, even if carefully wrapped and tied with a metaphorical bow. The poem 'The Allegory of the Wolf Boy' is ready existence as a homosexual adolescent. Like Walcott, he too used to be laying down the gauntlet on behalf of a disenfranchised magnificence. "Rebellion," Gunn wrote, "comes dressed in conformity".

These poets know what Twain forgets. Twain underestimates how following can also be main. It may also be the ultimate within process.

Corn-pone opinions reflecting the overall consensus might seem shallow, simplistic, half-baked. But that on my own will have to no longer prevent us from taking a second just right chunk.

Take a wreck from the inside track

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