Project Description
For this project in Stephen Seller’s class we were commissioned to be a poet laureates of various, mostly unheard, countries that were involved in World War 1. The laureates were responsible for researching and choosing an event that was somehow relevant to the World War 1 timeline, then choosing a specific poetic form and a perspective of the event to write a poem. To accompany that they had to write an essay providing historical context for their poem as well as giving a presentation to their peers about their historical event and its significance. Finally, we organized, designed, and created an anthology of their work. We also created a website to achieve the project’s process and to show our product digitally. We then conducted an exhibition at the Open Shutter Gallery in downtown Durango. This project was very eye opening and I enjoyed it. Below you can read my poem, to the right, and my explanatory essay, to the left, as well as look at my presentation below those, you can also go to the website below to see what we created for this project and look at all the poems online here: ahspoetlaureate2016.weebly.com
|
|
Project Reflection
During this project I was on the Global Promotion Team as well as The poet laureate for Senegal. For the Global Promotion Team we created a Facebook page to show our book and get the news of the exhibition out there. We were in contact with local professors, schools, DGO, The Herald, other websites, and clubs to promote. We created a trailer for the exhibition and book.
As the poet laureate of Senegal I researched a lot about their colonies and their involvement in the war. The event I choose was The Siege Of Maubeuge, which was a fight between the Germans and the French. The Senegalese were slaves in this war for the French, British, and many European countries. So I ended up having to research a lot about the French as well and their involvement in different battles. For the poet laureate portion I produced a powerpoint on my event as well as a poem and an explanatory essay.
In this project I am most proud of my poem. Normally I don’t write poetry and was having a hard time with it at the start. I was thinking too much you could say and was getting in the way of myself going forward. I researched more about my poetry from, Elegy, and then got a pen and paper and wrote what first came to my mind. I think one thing I think is neat about my poem is the perspective I choose to write in. I thought the perspective of the Senegalese for this project was going to be creative and interesting from the start seeing as they were a little colony that were slaves in the war. The perspective of the Senegalese were not only unique but overlooked.The thought that I was or am able to advocate for people whose voices never got heard was just amazing to me. It was a different experience to put myself in their shoes. I am proud of the end result of my poem because I put a lot of emotion and labor into making it.
The thing I remember best from this project will probably be our exhibition, how we all put so much purpose into it and that night it turned out to be amazing. We all shined that night and it was very enjoyable. I thought it was a great experience for all of us to be able to reach out to our local and global community and share our hard work with them. It was also great just to see each other’s work and get to see how our peers viewed the subject and their perspective at the end of the project. I look forward to our next project to see if we can push the boundaries like we did with this one.
Some lessons I have learned through this project were that I procrastinate or don’t do enough work at the beginning. I had a hard time starting off the project and finding the topic interesting. So I did as little research as possible to pass the class period. Then when the time came and we needed the detailed research I was in a rough spot. So in a way I got a late start from my ignorance towards this project. I ended up having to buckle down and get to work. So through this project I learned that I need to find something in every project that I find interesting or something motivating to complete the project and then move forward with that instead of being somewhat closed minded. I learned a little bit about myself and how I work and how I need to improve.
One transferable I learned through this project would be communication. Since I was on the Global Promotion Team I had to talk to a lot of people, so through this I learned some great communication skills on how to be precise, clear, and adult when engaging in conversations. I will definitely be using this in the future and am glad that I had the opportunity to learn this skill.
As the poet laureate of Senegal I researched a lot about their colonies and their involvement in the war. The event I choose was The Siege Of Maubeuge, which was a fight between the Germans and the French. The Senegalese were slaves in this war for the French, British, and many European countries. So I ended up having to research a lot about the French as well and their involvement in different battles. For the poet laureate portion I produced a powerpoint on my event as well as a poem and an explanatory essay.
In this project I am most proud of my poem. Normally I don’t write poetry and was having a hard time with it at the start. I was thinking too much you could say and was getting in the way of myself going forward. I researched more about my poetry from, Elegy, and then got a pen and paper and wrote what first came to my mind. I think one thing I think is neat about my poem is the perspective I choose to write in. I thought the perspective of the Senegalese for this project was going to be creative and interesting from the start seeing as they were a little colony that were slaves in the war. The perspective of the Senegalese were not only unique but overlooked.The thought that I was or am able to advocate for people whose voices never got heard was just amazing to me. It was a different experience to put myself in their shoes. I am proud of the end result of my poem because I put a lot of emotion and labor into making it.
The thing I remember best from this project will probably be our exhibition, how we all put so much purpose into it and that night it turned out to be amazing. We all shined that night and it was very enjoyable. I thought it was a great experience for all of us to be able to reach out to our local and global community and share our hard work with them. It was also great just to see each other’s work and get to see how our peers viewed the subject and their perspective at the end of the project. I look forward to our next project to see if we can push the boundaries like we did with this one.
Some lessons I have learned through this project were that I procrastinate or don’t do enough work at the beginning. I had a hard time starting off the project and finding the topic interesting. So I did as little research as possible to pass the class period. Then when the time came and we needed the detailed research I was in a rough spot. So in a way I got a late start from my ignorance towards this project. I ended up having to buckle down and get to work. So through this project I learned that I need to find something in every project that I find interesting or something motivating to complete the project and then move forward with that instead of being somewhat closed minded. I learned a little bit about myself and how I work and how I need to improve.
One transferable I learned through this project would be communication. Since I was on the Global Promotion Team I had to talk to a lot of people, so through this I learned some great communication skills on how to be precise, clear, and adult when engaging in conversations. I will definitely be using this in the future and am glad that I had the opportunity to learn this skill.