Introduction to Myself

My name is Katherine, and I was born on September 17.  I live in a small town called Howards Grove where everyone feels like family. I am in pursuit of a triple major at Silver Lake College, studying Music Education – Kodaly, Choral, and Instrumental. I study piano, voice, and oboe privately. Yes, I took English classes straight through from elementary school until my last year of high school, and part of taking that class was reading books. Classics were read all the time, but they were books from Charlotte Bronte and Homer. We were never asked to read books or literature from cultures other than our own.  

One of my expectations for this class would be that I will learn many things about other cultures and the books that have come from all of the different cultures. For example, with the poems by Anna Akhmatova, you could tell that maybe there was more behind her poetry than what met the eye, and it could have been about numerous other things. Being able to not only understand the books, but to be able to connect the books with the social atmosphere and culture that was happening at the time is another of my expectations. Being from a smaller town in Wisconsin, we never had much diversity within our community. However, we had two very different cultures, farming and small-town people. Everyone knows everyone else and what they do and how they act, and, being from a small town and not having many different cultures and societies, I have not seen many of the different kinds of people that there are.

            I have read hundreds of books, but I have never found poetry very easy to understand what it may actually means and to be able to connect to the different materials. Where I grew up, poetry was not something that was taught above the 6^th grade English class. In this class, I look forward to being able to broaden my horizons and read more literature than just the books that are in my own personal library at home.

            Some of the goals that I would have for myself this semester would be that I want to keep up with the readings that we are supposed to do for the class, because it will be very hard to be able to catch up if I fall behind in the class. Also, another goal that I have for myself would be that I become more able to understand what I am reading. It is one thing to be able to keep up with the reading, but another whole thing entirely to be able to understand and apply what I will be reading in this class.