Thursday, January 23

Today is Thursday of Week 2, and here is a link to the Week 2 assignments. For many of you, this will be a day of storytelling: I hope you will have fun as you choose one of the stories from the Anthology to retell in your own way!

Class Procedures and Reminders

Story stream. A lot of people will be writing stories today, and there are also people who have written their stories already (plus there are some stories from future weeks, thanks to the people who are working ahead). It might give you a creative boost to browse and explore the stories so far, so take a look if you are curious: Myth-Folklore Stories and Indian Epic Stories.

Blog comments. The Week 2 blog comment assignment is ready to go where you will be commenting on other people's Introductions, and the Week 3 blog comment assignment is also ready now too, where you will be commenting on people's stories. Visiting other people's blogs is a great way to get ideas for your own stories and also to see different ways you might want to customize your blog design.

The following items are for fun and exploration:

Blog Stream. Here's another beautiful photo from a favorite place post; this time it's Crater Lake from Britten's Oregon post, which has some other lovely photos.


Twitter Stream. I thought this was something really cool in the Bizzell Library Twitter feed: a podcasting kit you can check out!

100-Word Stories. Today's story is an Aesop's fable: Belling the Cat (click title for more info).


Storybooks. Here's a Storybook that is based on Aesop's fables: Lions of Aesop.


Indian Epics Today. Today's character is AGNI, the god of fire. His name is related to the Latin word ignis, which gives us the English word "ignite," i.e. to set on fire! Agni will be an important character in both the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. More about Agni. Here is Agni in a scene from the Ramayana:


Indian Epics. Here's an Agni fact sheet from Amar Chitra Katha:


India Video. This is an Epified video about Swaha, Agni's wife:


Writing. That connection between "Agni" and "ignite" is because Sanskrit and Latin and English are related languages, part of the Indo-European language family tree. Here's a great illustration by Minna Sundberg:


Writing Video. Here's a video from John McWhorter, one of my favorite linguists, about languages not on that family tree: Are Elvish, Klingon, Dothraki and Na'vi real languages?


Mindset Cats. When you create your story this week, the mindset cat urges you think outside the box.


Event on Campus. The Young Choreographers' Showcase opens at 8PM tonight in the Elsie C. Brackett Theatre (details).


January 23: Charles Kingsley. Today marks the anniversary of the death of the scholar, writer, and social activist Charles Kingsley in 1875; you can find out more about his life and career at Wikipedia. This is an illustration by T. H. Robinson for Kingsley's book The Heroes: Or, Greek Fairy Tales:



Check out the Twitter stream for information and fun stuff during the day, or click here for past announcements.

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