Postmodernism is an interesting book filled with many fascinating ideas about the world. In the book contain ideas about power and knowledge. This book can assist people in finding their way through this complex world. For this blog however, I will talk about how different stories can manipulate or control how a person lives his/ her life. For example, narratives are stories that “legitimize the society in which they are told”. It can “define what has the right to be said and done by the culture” (24-25). If a person hears a legend, he/ she has the right to go and spread the legend to other people. Myths are types of narratives that are told so that a group of people can understand their lifestyles, their heritage, or just why they do what they do. These stories are powerful because they have been chosen by important people and they are shared to others that way their cultures can live how they want to live. Other myths are called “grand narratives” and they are “big stories that claim to be able to account for, explain, and subordinate all lesser, little, local narratives” (29). This type of myth could seem a bit unbelievable. People, who believe certain myths and then they hear grand narratives that contradict or have changed the myths, become confused in what they thought was true and accurate. Because of grand narratives, minority discourse can be marginalized. This is because all the little stories are being combined into one big narrative, making the smaller or “minority” stories disappear. If people begin to believe the larger myths, they might forget about the little myths that may be more important to their culture or personality. By loosing sight of how people first viewed the world through myths, these stories will soon become meaningless and completely forgotten.

Brave New World is a different book. It is similar to 1984 in the way that the people are being controlled. For example, the people “were forced to feel strongly. And feeling strongly, how could they be stable (41)?” Apparently, if a person feels too strongly about a subject or an idea, that person will either end up insane or committing suicide. This lifestyle that the people live by HAS to be normal. They can not have a personality that has individuality. People have to be smart, but not to smart, or they have to be average. There is no acceptance for anything in between or below.
I think this society would be horrible to live in. Even though everyone person is their own person, he/ she can not have their own opinions, or have distinct qualities that define them. They can not do what they really want to do with their lives. It is however, somewhat of an improvement. More people are being born and they can live for longer, but for the most part it is a disgrace. At young ages the people are brain-washed into thinking ridiculous things, like that books are bad. This world is corrupted in the way that new technology is making them seem more superior but is really just making their society more complex and ridiculous. Not only are the people similar, but they will be punished if they want to be different.
Even though this world is technologically advanced, it still suffers. It suffers in the way our world thrives. Our world is good because everyone has a mind of his/ her own and everyone can have his/ her own opinions. In Brave New World the society can only function if every person obeys all of the rules. No one can rebel. Moreover, our world has freedom of speech, which gives us the right to say anything. Our two worlds are different and they both have some advantages and disadvantages over the other.

In class we discussed the dispute in Texas about what goes into U.S. History textbooks. Can history really be objective? Who gets to decide what curriculum goes into the history textbooks and why do people want to delete the past?
History can never be truly objective. No matter how neutral a person feels about a subject in history they will, most likely, have opinions. This would make a person bias. If I were to say that no political party is right or true, but then I say that I only vote for republicans, then I am not objective. I would be taking a side. Therefore, no one person can be neutral about every aspect in history or everyday life. When the government chooses whether to delete or keep a piece of history that is being biased. Some reviewers want to “replace Thurgood Marshall with Harriet Tubman or Sam Houston”. How is this being objective? It is not, thus, explaining how history can never be fully neutral.
Curriculum is made by the state government. Should the state government, however, tell a school what to or not to discuss. I believe that U.S. history should be about our history and if an event happened in our country, then it should be included in the curriculum. The facts that the government decides to leave out are facts from our background and our past. Why is it being questioned or trying to be erased? For example, a reviewer wrote that Cesar Chavez should be deleted from the history books. This man played a big role in our history. He “led a strike and boycott to improve working conditions for immigrant farmhands”. This is taught in fifth grade to be an example of citizenship. This reviewer believes that this is not an illustration of citizenship, when in fact it is. A man standing up people because he believes in something better is an excellent way to show citizenship. Why should this man, a leader of so many people, be deleted from the entire textbook?
I believe that any type or form of our country’s history should be kept in our books and nothing should be changed or deleted.