Persepolis Film

After watching the film and reading the novel Persepolis I really enjoyed the film. I think the film was a better way to make the reader understand Marjane because of the sound and emotion that was put into the film. Although the novel was a better source to get a better perspective of her life and the Iranian culture and how the regime put a lot of fears into others, the film was helpful  to connect to the novel. I had a lot of fun watching the film because their was a innocence to it as well as the novel.

Persepolis - Film vs. Graphic Novel

While both the novel and film focus on Marjane's story of her upbringing in Iran during the time of the Islamic Regime, the novel more deeply focuses on Marjane and her family. This allows for the reader to grow fond of Marjane. The film on the other hand seems to have less of her emotions and more of the Iranian challenges.

Each have particular scenes unshared with the other... to one example, in the film, there is a scene when Marjane leaves a party where she lies to a guy about her ethnicity...we see her shadow and a shadow of an older women, her grandmother, reminding her that she must be true to herself-- later insinuating the reason for her return back home. Although in the book, it was more than that, she was kicked out, homesick, and ashamed of her current self. Both the novel and the film depict Marjane's story well, but I on one hand prefer the novel. I found myself becoming attached to her character, as a reader, I watched her fight her battles and grow up to be a free women. While I watched the film, it seemed informative, less insightful to her as a person and when she left, I found myself grieving more for her grandmother's death than feeling happy for her freedom.

Powerful Scenes

Chris Macrae

Film Response

As a whole, the movie version of Persepolis was significantly more emotionally involving. In particular, one scene which was exceptionally powerful and moving for me was the scene where a man falls to his death.

 The Guardians of the Revolution storm into the building after spotting the party outside. Suddenly the music becomes dark and menancing, as the Guardians rush into the building. The crowd of people disperse, some fleeing upstairs, while others hide below. A few women remain in the apartment to explain things. But, while the owner of the apartment negotiates with the Guardians, a noise is heard coming from the stairwell. The music swells dramatically! 

At this point, I was on the edge of my seat, watching for what happens next. Even though I knew that Farzad was a dead man walking, the power of the scene really brought me in and made me feel anxious. The artistic style, combined with brutally graphic imagery, added signifcantly more emotional impact than the graphic novel. 

Persepolis Film Repsonse

Films and novels are always different no matter what, but I did feel the novel showed more of the issues of the revolution and the Islamic regime in detail then what the film showed. The film showed a bit more of how Marjane grew up, went to Europe, and returned home. It was more a film of Marjane's life without the issues of the revolution or the regime. The film picked the topics or the panels they wanted to show and summarizes other topics or issues by narrating them. The novel showed a better version of Marjane's persona and the dangers of living in Iran and the oppression of the Islamic regime.

Film Response

The scene, where Marji's walking down the street at night after a party, was most powerful to me. As Marji walks down the street, a shadow of her grandmother appears and asks "Now you're French? I didn't know you're French." Marji admits shamefully and explains that it's better to be French than Iranian in Austria. The conversation between Marji and her grandmother reveals Marji's identity crisis and her conformity to western culture. Because Marji feels lonely and unaccepted in Austria, she values the western culture more than her Iranian side. So, she hides her true identity to fit in. This scene can be seen as a turning point for Marji to realize her true identity is Iranian no matter where she goes. Another notable scene is when Marji is in the taxi in France. It's the first time where there's color. Prior to this scene, everything was in black and white. The colors symbolizes a new hope for Marji to live as an independent and liberated woman.

Persepolis Film Response

The Persepolis film was more livelier than the book, although the book provided a more solid foundation for describing Marjane's life. The film provides a much more darker and intense atmosphere, while adding bits of humor - such as when Marjane's grandmother covers up Marjane's eyes from watching a dinosaur eating people in the movie theater, (which the book doesn't include) to mellow out the tension. In addition to adding suspense with the music and voice, the film changes certain scenes in the book that emphasize the intensity. For example, in the Neda Baba-Levy scene, whereas the book only shows the bracelet sticking out amongst the house remains, the film shows the wrist with the bracelet. The film also places the audience right in the scene, such as when Uncle Taher dies; we are placed in the hospital scene, which helps us to "be right in the moment" and stirs up more emotions than when we read the book. In addition, the film seems to show Reza as a man with more power in his marriage with Marjane, than in the book, where they both seem to have equal power (in the film, Reza turns up the music volume when Marjane tries to ask him where the car keys are - highlighting the great difference in "women power" between the film and the book, where Marjane is victimized in the "car key" situation, as Reza watching a violent television show (with the man and the gun) that shows his inner emotions). The book emphasizes Western values more than in the film, and shows more cultural tension than in the film (for example, Marjane doesn't cut her hair in the film, which shows her still being "intact" with her Iranian identity). Both the film and the book emphasize how the war affects the lives of Iranian citizens (fear of authority, partying indoors during the war, etc.). Although the movie engages the audience better (with the music and voices, that make the story come more to life), the book is much more informational and flows smoother, which makes it better for telling the story (the book does a better job for highlighting Marjane's step-by-step growth in developing her identity, such as how it shows her resolving her western-eastern cultural tension, which the film lacks). 

Response to Persepolis

Comparing the movie to the novel, I feel that the movie left out a lot of details than the book had. The book provided a lot more details of the experiences that Marjane had gone through, which the movie had left out, mainly because movies have a certain length. The book in my opinion did a better job at explaining Marjanes story because it told her story better. Some of the important themes of the book were also missing from the movie . For example, when Marjane had moved to Vienna some of the themes from this scene and a lot of the detail was missing in the movie. The movie rushed through telling her experiences and if someone were to have saw the movie before reading the book, it would leave them a bit confused. The movie did help with understanding how they felt going through such situations and the music also helped with the feel of things.

Persepolis film response

In comparison to the book, The Complete Persepolis film cuts out a huge chunk of Marjane's life. The graphic novel provides the reader with a lot of background information and detail about what lead up to each event. In the film, Marjane briefly touches upon an event and then moves onto the next. An example might be when Marjane moves to Vienna. In the novel, Satrapi describes her hardships in her mother's friend's house and how she moved from house to house until her mother visits her in Vienna and helps her find Frau Doctor Heller's house. In the film, Marjane's mother's visit isn't even mentioned. For the sake of telling Marjane's story, the graphic novel version is far more effective due to the amount of background information given for each scene of her life.

Persepolis Film Response

Persepolis as a book offers more detail and insight to Marjane’s life in Iran and Austria, while the film seemed to pick and choose what would be the most important aspects of the story to create a storyline audiences could understand. While both are great depictions of Marjane’s life, what the film did leave out changed certain main themes of the story, such as Marjane’s understand of the social hierarchy in her country, and how it affected her want to be a prophet and her feelings toward her parents beliefs. The film also seemed to take away from moments that were much more impactful in the book, such as when she finds out about her grandfather and sits in the tub to feel what he felt, in the film it was more made out to be that she was proud she had a grandfather that was once a prince, it seemed more glamorized than in the book. The film did well in telling Marjane’s story, but you don’t get the full impact of what she went through and how her identity changed with time like you do in the book, where it’s much more detailed and specific to the all the trials of Marjane’s life.

Persepolis Film Response

The film of Persepolis was much more hands on with presenting messages/themes of the story when compared to the book. This naturally happens with films because films more directly present a story, as opposed to a book that is more than likely going to have a lot that must be interpreted. As far as learning about the story, I preferred the book more because it had a lot of information and detail, while the movie felt rushed and unexplained. I know that the movie did have a lot of detail, but it did not have nearly as much as the book. I did, however, really enjoy the visual depictions, such as when she gets older and her body literally morphs into an adult body. I found the movie to very entertaining on the visual end but overall feel that the book was a better depiction of her story and message.

Response to Persepolis Film

While the film Persepolis was an enjoyable watch, I would argue that the graphic novel did a much better job of telling Marjane's story. The graphic novel, having more time/pages to convey the depths of Marjane's character, allowed the reader to grow with Marjane through out the novel- to really see her at her worst and watch her build her life back up as she returned to Iran. We saw her at school in Austria, frustrated that no one wanted to listen to her talk about her life back home unless she was talking about war or death. In the film, we saw a little of this, and I think we would have seen a bit more of her rock bottom had we not skipped a section of the film, but these parts of the film didn't convey her feelings of difference and being outside of the norm as well as did these sections in the graphic novel. While I felt that the most important scene of the film was where Marjane's grandmother yelled at her for getting a mostly innocent man arrested by the Guardians in order to save herself, the fall out from this scene was much different in the film than it was in the graphic novel. In the graphic novel, we saw how Marjane really felt she needed to redeem her self in her grandmother's eyes, and it was a big deal when her grandmother was talking to her again. In the film, the issue was blown over almost immediately, and we missed the depths of Marjane's shame and subsequent growth. The film was well done, but the graphic novel did an infinitely better job of conveying Marjane's life as it progressed, and her growth through the years.

Persepolis Film Response

Although the novel contained a lot more information and gave us a better understanding of who Marjane truly is, i enjoyed the film more. The film made some of the scenes more powerful due to the animation and movement that isn't possible in a novel. For example, i thought the scene where Marjanes grandmother told her to stay true to her roots and not hide her identity because what others think was a very powerful scene. Another scene in the film that i think worked better than in the novel was when Marjane visits the grave of Anoosh. The filming techniques used in this scene along with the music and voice narrations made me feel sympathy for Marjane and her situation. This is something that i didn't feel when i was reading the novel. The film also brought out some humor that wasn't present in the novel. While reading the book, i don't think i laughed once. However, some of the scenes from Marjanes childhood in the film were hilarious. Overall, i think that the novel and film are both successful, but in their own ways.

Response to the film

The film didn't surprise me of how it cut some of the important scenes in the book to fit in a length of a movie. This lack of details made it hard for audience to realize the development/change of her identity and the clash between Western and Eastern culture. However, it did bring the words and pictures into live, enhanced our emotion and awareness of what's really happening. The most powerful scene I found was the story of uncle Anoosh and his death because I could really feel the pain: when he ran away from the Shah's soldiers or when he suffered in Russia alone. His face expression, the narrative voice, the sound of the wind and the music altogether gave me a strong sympathy. Although the sad scene when he last met his wife in prison was cut, the film didn't lose its emotional connection with its audience. It even pushed our feeling to the peak through the last farewell of Anoosh and Marjane when he was holding her and said: "Star of my life." Knowing that he was going to be executed tomorrow, he tried to tell Marjane not to be sad as when he's dead, he's coming to the star and they'd meet again. The book itself is adorable and good for reflection, but in an entertaining perspective, I'd prefer to watch and hear. 

Film Response

     In my opinion, think that both the film and book of Persepolis were very good. I thought it was cool how she didn't use real people in the movie and continued with the cartoons because it definitely brought the book to life. I think that the film was better when it comes to understanding her story and feeling sympathetic towards her. The film gave us the opportunity to learn more about her personality and it also gives people the opportunity to make a more emotional/personal connection with Marjane. 

Who is Marjane now?

Marjane, after her experience in Austria, has finally returned home to Iran. She has gotten into a good university, has friends and a boyfriend, and continues to be a rebel.  She designs a new veil, parties every night, and remains politically conscious, not buying into the propaganda and the lies everywhere.  She has changed from a young girl with unshakeable faith in God to a young woman with her own moral values and ideas.

Who is Marjane Now?

At the beginning of the novel, Marjane is seen as an innocent young girl who doesn't really understand the political and cultural clashes occurring in Iran. Marjane doesn't know why Mehri can't be with the man across the street until her dad explains it's because of their different social classes. Marjane follows the status-quo and believes everything she hears and sees on TV rather than truly comprehending whats actually going on. When her father and Anoosh are talking about the elections, Marjane says, "On TV they say that 99.99% of the population voted for the Islamic Republic" (Satrapi 62). In reality the fundamentalist rulers were manipulating the public into believing this fake statistic, but Marjane doesn't realize that. Throughout the novel, however, Marjane matures and begins to understand more about the world. She makes sure her voice and opinions are heard, even if they don't follow the status-quo. For example, when the professor at the art university she's attending talks to the students about dress code and tells the girls they need to wear longer head scarfs and less-wide trousers, she voices her opinion. She says that its unfair to have all of these restrictions on what women wear while for men get to wear practically whatever they want. Marjane develops into a mature, intelligent, and well-spoken woman by the end of Persepolis.

Who is Marjane Now?

Who is Marjane Now?

In Persepolis, Marjane has undoubtedly matured from the 10 year-old girl she used to be. Whereas in the past she would without-inquiry accept what she heard on television as the truth, she now is the bold woman who doesn't hesitate to stand up for what she believes is right. As a 12 year-old, she felt pressured to skip classes and follow two older girls to get hamburgers (111), but Marjane has transformed into someone that actually goes against the status quo. She is an excellent student, and unique in the sense that she was not one to hide that she was using her birth control pills not for any other purpose but to prevent pregnancy when she sleeps with her boyfriend (303). Marjane has simply gone through experiences in both Vienna and Iran that have equipped her with the bravery to live her life while remembering her grandmother's words to "be true to [herself]" (150). Transcending from her depression after returning to Iran, she now feels like everything is falling into place, saying so herself that she was now a "sophisticated woman, strong and invincible  (274-275). Having grown up in a place where there was a thin line between life and facing prosecution/death, she has perhaps realized that life is too short and unpredictable to not do anything else but take her grandmother's advice. 

who is Marjane now?

Marjane becomes a social activist even when she got back to Iran. She designed a new uniform with a shorter veil, she throws secret house parties like her parents used to throw when she was a young girl. She even gets married to Reza, who later she divorces. 

Who is Marjane now?

Compared to the beginning of Persepolis, Marjane is not only more mature, but also more aware of her identity. Marjane also learns how to express her feelings about injustice more effectively instead of in a rash way. In the beginning of "The Dowry", Marjane hits the principal for attempting to take away Marjane's bracelet, but ends up hitting the principal. Marjane allowed her emotions to come over her and ended up physically hurting another person in which lead to her getting expelled. Now, Marjane expresses her feelings about injustices in a less physical, yet more powerful way. As Marjane runs to catch her bus, she is stopped by two policemen who tell her that her butt moves in an obscene way when she runs. Marjane then yells " Well then don't look at my ass!" (301). In this scene, she does not react in a rash, physical way; rather, in way in which her words spoke louder than actions.

Marjane- fail in Western culture and sucess in experience 2 different culture.

 " I didn't know whether or not they knew about my European failure. I was scared that they would be disappointed." (258)

To Marjane, after a few years lived in Austria and suffered from the divergent between two totally different cultures, she felt that she had failed with life in an Europe country. We can see that the way she tried to cope with the new culture is not good for her as she got lost and didn't know who she was and what was she doing. Marjane learned how to smoke, did make up and dressed up like punks, went to party and lied about her identities to avoid trouble from her nationalities because she thought they are ways to help her to get involve in the society and make people admit who she was. In fact, she just tried to escaped from the reality and fell in the obsession about deviance toward Iranian and the new life in new country. It leads to her depression and suffering with the big question "Who am I?"

On the other hand, in my own opinion, I felt like she was not fail at all. To be honest, isn't it all of us have time when we face any troubles and suffer because we don't know what to do? Failure is normal, actually if we never experience we will never know how is it like, what may happened if we do this thing or how the trouble can affect us. Marjane is a normal human being. We can't discriminate her for her bad behaviors that lead to the  failure. Actually, she had succeed in experience the difficulties of both culture and became mature after all. From when she talked to her father and friends back in Iran, she recognized the things were happening her own country and the society- the people live in that country. She could understand and sympathize with the situation that people met could shape the personality they are. Therefore she is no longer a little girl with weird ideas about life, always listen and follow her parents idea, but she had many point of views herself due to her experience and she can judge the world in the more wide aspects.

 At this point, she was just a normal person who failed and got lost at the middle of life try to balance and figure out herself - she was a girl who growing up and learning things from her experience.

Who is Marjane (Now)? --up to page 311

Marjane has come a long way, she is no longer the 10 year old girl at the start of the regime who relied on her faith to get her through life. She has become her own person, with justification of her own moral value. She stands up for what she believes in and has no problem walking on the toes of those whom do not share her same compassion. Marjane has experienced freedom while in Vienna and being back home, in the place she loves, she should not have to change so drastically those freedoms. Although, Marjane understands what she could potentially be getting herself into by rebelling against authority, she finds it necessary to be the voice everyone can hear. And because of this, I believe she feels at peace with herself for doing what she can to change people's perspective in the place she calls home. It has been a long time since she has felt at home in Iran, she's lived in fear, been told what to do, and seized the opportunity to have her own identity. By voicing her opinion, she has found those who share her values and who knows, maybe she will find peace.

Who is Marjane Now? – Esther Leung

On page 311, the way Marjane acts - how she drinks and parties at Ali's house after Farzad died, is similar to the incident on page 143, when Marjane resorts to rebellious behavior after the death of Neda Baba-Levy. The way Marjane describes her state of mind after knowing the missile destroyed her neighbor's house is similar to how she feels on page 311: "After the death of Neda Baba-Levy, my life took a new turn. In 1984, I was fourteen and a rebel. Nothing scared me anymore"(143). The death of Farzad is a confirmation of the extreme views of the Iranian regime and how they haven't changed since the past. This tragic event serves as a reminder of the missile explosion incident, and reinforces the fear of the consequences of partying indoors. The way the Iranian regime still held their extreme views after Marjane had changed her identity proves that no matter how she tries to better herself, it won’t necessarily change the way society perceives her; even though she’s “[taken herself] in hand”(273); as long as she is still repressed by the regime, she ultimately feels that she has no real control over herself and her views (they aren't being taken into account). Although Marjane voices out her feminist views in public (such as on page 297), she ultimately feels "controlled" by the government when it acts according to its extreme views (this is emphasized when many high school and college students were imprisoned and executed as a result of their demonstrations (page 302), and when Farzad died). This is seen on page 311 when Marjane and her friends are reacting to the disastrous previous night, and in the last panel when Marjane drinks - an act of temporary relief that isn't true to her identity, and shows her rebellious attitude: "I never drank so much in my life"(311).  (Although she changed her outlook and voiced out her feminist views in public, the regime still responds in the same controlling manner.)

Who is Marjane now?

Marjane has come a very long way, from being a girl in Iran living with your parents, sheltering her, until she has to live in Europe and becoming an adult in a young age. When Marjane moved to Vienna, she had bad experiences living with people. The people, who would take her in for a while, would end up mistreating her by insulting her and making her feel less because she was from Iran. However Marjane is still the same old Marji because she is not the type of person who would say quite, she would talk back to them. Marjane even learned the awful feeling of not sleeping under a shelter. She got to experience sleeping on the street during winter, she even starting looking for food in the garbage; leading her to the hospital with severe bronchitis. Once Marji returned home, she started to change her look. She started to worry about her appearance but not to a extreme where she was obsessed on how she looked, but she did update her look. She slowing started to go back to her “old self”, she started seeing her old friends, and started to get involve with the news about the war, etc. 

Who is Marjane now?

At the point in the book that we are at now, Marjane is a totally different person than she was earlier on in the book. She has gone from a girl who lived an upper class lifestyle to someone who has lived a life on the streets. In the beginning of the book, her father drove a Cadillac and she felt bad that she had such a nice life compared to some of those around her. When she moved to Vienna to escape the war, she eventually became homeless due to an argument with the woman she was staying with. She slept on the streets and eventually called her parents to tell them she was coming back to Iran. When Marjane arrived at the airport in Iran, her parents picked her up in a car that was not as nice as her Cadillac, because they no longer owned one. Since she had suffered in the streets of Vienna, she now would have rather been picked up in the Cadillac as a symbol of leaving her hardships behind. This shows that Marjane is no longer a sheltered girl, and that she has lived on the other side of the spectrum. She has also grown up quite a bit, caring about her appearance and having a boyfriend, she is quite different than she was in the beginning of the book.

One Post and Two Comments on "Who is Marjane Now?" (at page 311 of the novel)

1. Submit one "new post" in which you respond to the question: Who Is Marjane Now? (at page 311 of the novel). Discuss a specific scene in the novel to support your points. Write a few sentences to one paragraph.

2. Then, "comment" on the posts of 2 other students, offering useful feedback to deepen the discussion. You should submit two thoughtful comments total.

List of Criteria for Appealing and Poor Model Portfolios - Esther Leung

Specific qualities that work well for model portfolios, include visually appealing images that capture the essence of the blog (in one or two pictures) like Celina's poem, Yusra's "word focus"
 picture. Others include neat organization skills, include Celina's blog, which is easy to see and navigate, and didn't require much scrolling for the viewer. Poor qualities include long, non-visually appealing large blocks of text that require endless scrolling, which becomes too wordy, long, and boring, and take away the teacher's attention from the blog. These include blogs such as Jonathan's blog and Kiet's blog, which are agonizing to read for the reader.

portfolios

I thought Celina's blog was very easy to navigate. She had a little bit of everything on her portfolio. However, Mathew was something i didn't like very much because the essays were very long and all one long paged, making viewer not want to read the whole thing. But, if he made it into little sections where people can skim through and read whatever they are interested in, it would be better.

i liked Celina j.'s blog. i liked it because it was really good to navigate . I liked how she made it artistic. The images she used brings graphical views .  She also was being creative and saving space in her blog.

in my review of the of the portfolios I believe that the bloggers were very creative in the posts that they made. i thought that celinas was the best blog because of how straight forward it was.

Portfolio Personal Impressions

I liked the refreshing simplicity that Celina's homepage provided. I also liked the colors and layout of Kiet's page. Both blogs had calming colors. Jonathan's blog appeared overwhelming at first, and therefore gave a worse impression. All blogs were navigable for me, however.

Past Blog Critiques

Celina J's blog:
-Good organization of written pieces and videos
-Enjoyable color scheme
-seems like weebly is a good choice to make your blog with

Yusra Beig's blog:
-Very simple layout but it is a bit too simple; it is a bit unorganized
-Unclear from layout which posts are videos and which ones are written

Jonathan Kuo's blog:
-It had its posts organized by months. I do not think this is the best way to organize your blog because even though it makes sense to the author, it would be really hard to navigate for someone who doesn't follow the class agenda month to month.

Blog Posts

The blog I found to be most appealing is Celina's. It was well organized, easy to find what the reader is looking for, visually appealing and easy to navigate.

I disliked some of the blogs that seemed too bland or hard to navigate--too much scrolling to get to what you need to find.

I found Celina's post to be well organized. She clearly labeled using well informed titles for her blogs.

The blog portfolios I liked reading were Celina's, Antoine's, Jaym's and Olivia's portfolios because their pages were organized i was able to navigate throughout their page. Their portfolios also had an 'About Me' page or paragraph introducing who they were and what was to be expected on their page. What makes a good portfolio is to have an introduction and having organized blogs throughout the portfolios. The rest of the portfolios i did not really like because it was all over the place and it did not captivate my attention. Their blogs were just paragraphs or they were unorganized to me.

Celine's and Olivia's were the ones that I enjoyed looking at. Both had everything organized and everything had a link, instead of scrolling down until you find the specific information you are looking for. Both of them had a little bit of thing, which made it fun in reading and looking around. 

Jonathan was the more that I did not like at all. He's stuff was everywhere and it was confusing to navigate. I didn't know where to click to see his stuff that he posted. 

It seemed that Celina, Matthew Shull, and Olivia Tenzing had good organization on their portfolios- the use of the side-bar makes it easy to navigate and know what you're looking at/for. I thought that Yursa's portfolio was unorganized, as was Kiet Vu's and Antoine's. Kiet Vu also could have incorporated images to make the portfolio more interesting. Celina's use of images, poems, and her good organization made her portfolio stand out as the best to me.

Blog Criteria

Celina's blog, "Blood, Sweat, and Ink", was extremely original with her layout and the content she provided. Her personal dictionary stood out to me the most because she not only provided her dictionary, but she also created a poem to show readers what the message is behind the words she used. Yusra's blog was very creative with the artwork she presented, the content wasn't as structured but the design was very creative and artistic. Jing's blog was all over the place and wasn't very eye catching and had me very confused as to what were post and what they had to do with. Mathew Shull was organized with the different tabs, but on the pages it became a little to chaotic with all the posts on one page.

Portfolio Review

The Best Portfolios

Elements in common

• Pleasant design, e.g. Celina's, Yusra's, and Jaym's.
• Easy to navigate.
• Legible text - Yusra's is alright, but the others are all poorly formatted.

Examples

• Jajm's is pretty good - pleasant design and easy to navigate, although lumping all the text together on one page isn't the best idea.  The design compensates for it, though.
• Yusra's is the best - the only issue is the poor legibility.  She should really have made text a bit larger.  Other than that, the design is simple, straightforward, and easy to navigate with an unambiguous navigation menu to the left.
• Kiet's design is nice, and is also quite easy to navigate.

The Weaker Portfolios

• Unpleasant design, e.g. Johnathan's.
• Difficult to navigate/confusing.
• Text is hard to read, e.g. Matthew's and Olivia's.
• In general, legibility is an issue.  Most of the blogs had very hard-to-read text that could be improved by making the text larger, darker, and with a larger line-spacing.

Examples

• Johnathan Kuo's is unfortunate.  The design and colors are painful, and elements are just poorly arranged on the page.  I can't even see the guy's name on the front page, it's extremely confusing as to what this site even is.  There should at least be an intro of some sort where it's visible.

Blog Criteria

Majority of the blogs are straightforward and organized. It wasn't difficult to find their written essays. The blogs were also visually appealing. I liked Randal Moore's because it looked simple and modern, especially the earth background. The blog reminded me of an Apple product. In terms of structure, the essays weren't organized into categories but instead, they were all posted on the same page. Kiet's blog was similar but much more easy to navigate. I disliked Jonathan Kuo's blog because the dark colors of the background wasn't visually appealing.

Blog Critique

After viewing the example blogs, i noticed many aspects that i though worked nicely as well as some that didn't work as well. I thought Kiet Vu's blog was very organized and easy to navigate, which made the experience as a viewer more enjoyable. Celina Javate used a similar layout style that i think worked equally as well. Some of the other blogs, such as Jaym Arreola, were a lot more bland and difficult to navigate. Rather than many different categories to click on it was one excessively long post. The blogs that were artistic and colorful with many different assignments (personal dictionaries, essays, etc) were more visually appealing.

Criteria

I liked the Blogs from Celina, Yursa because they were visually appealing and easy to navigate. Both have a link box on the side of the screen that is organized and so I don't have to scroll all the way down to find a certain blog. Also Celina's blog has video responses that I personally enjoy because sometimes it gets tiring to read everything and my eyes feel like they are gonna fall out. With Yursa i don't mind reading her blogs because each one has a picture at the top of the blog which relates to the topic that she is talking about. First giving imagery helps me understand the topic more. I enjoyed both and now it gives me ideas to make something similar.

Personally, I like the simplicity of Kiet Vu's blog. The side bar that has the list of each assignment made finding the assignments easy. However, it lacks color like Celina's blog.
What did not work for me was the "blog archive" and the lack of navigation on the side. I did not find those aspects visually appealing.

I like how Olivia and Celina have their blogs organized. Things are easy to navigate and read. Each of their topics isn't too overwhelming to the point of endless scrolling compared to some of the others where they don't have separate pages for each topic.

Criteria

     I really enjoyed the portfolio of Kiet Vu because of the way it was organized. It was less overwhelming and it was nice to be able to click on a subject to read it instead of it being all over the place. Same thing goes with Yursa Beig's blog, it was nice and organized. It also had an appealing design instead of it being just black and white. I also enjoyed all the visuals on the blogs instead of it just being writing. Jaym Arreola's blog was nice too but it was a little harder to navigate with everything being on one page. 

Criteria

I really enjoyed going through Celine's portfolio because it was well organized and neat. All the other portfolios were well done and I saw the effort put into all of them but Celine's stood out the most because of the dedication she out into it. Criteria that I have for myself and other classmates is to put effort into the portfolio so that it makes the readers want to read your writings.

Blahggers

CELINA JAVATE

http://cjavate.weebly.com/

MATHEW SHULL

www-shadowhowl.blogspot.com

JAYM ARREOLA

http://jm1986er.wordpress.com/

RANDAL MOORE

http://randalmoore13.blogspot.com

All have well designed and visually interesting blogs. The content of the blogs is not necessarily as important as the delivery of the message. When blogs have a more cohesive style, it makes things easier to read and less clashing. 

Criteria for success

• Stay organized like in a majority of the blogs
• Use colors, pictures and any other visuals to help you personify your page much like in Celina's blog
• Simplify your page like Kiet Vu
• Get creative and incorporate videos on your blog like in Jaym Orejola's blog
• 
  

Review portfolios and establish criteria for success

Establish Criteria for a Successful Portfolio

Review the model portfolios below (from a different class: English 242B) by clicking on each one; view a couple of the video responses as well, and the Personal Dictionary entries. As you read them, make a list of the criteria that the best portfolios seem to share: what specific qualities does a model portfolio have? Also, make a list of specific qualities that don’t seem to work well (this could be about the form/design or the content).

Identify which specific portfolios work well and why, and which specific portfolios are weaker (take notes). Then post a response on this blog by adding a “new post”, in which you list one or two portfolios you liked the best, and one or two that didn’t work well. Explain the criteria the model portfolios share and explain what makes the weaker portfolios less strong.

Portfolios to review:

CELINA JAVATE

http://cjavate.weebly.com/

YUSRA BEIG

http://yusrabeigs.wordpress.com/

JONATHAN KUO

http://jkuoenglish.blogspot.com/

MATHEW SHULL

www-shadowhowl.blogspot.com

OLIVIA TENZING

https://sites.google.com/site/oliviatweblog/

KIET VU

http://myblog1s.weebly.com/look--movie.html

ANTOINE TRAN

http://antoinetran99.blogspot.com/

JAYM ARREOLA

http://jm1986er.wordpress.com/

RANDAL MOORE

http://randalmoore13.blogspot.com