![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ricardienneWhat I have accomplished today:
1. Registration.
I am in for English Lit I, Counterpoint, Latin, and Historical Sociology of Punishment, plus orchestra, lessons, and chamber music, of course. J. said she would try to put me in a good string quartet next semester. Also, my advisor was not there, so I didn't have to explain what I'm not in contemporary ensemble again… yay! Now I just have to avoid her for the next 1.5 weeks so she can't make me sign up. I need to e-mail Professor E. about coming by tomorrow or Thursday to add History of Politics as a audit, and then I've made myself a self-proclaimed honorary member of the Chaucer class. Because I would totally take it if I didn't have another class at exactly the same time. So I'm going to get the syllabus and do the reading anyway. I AM!
A. is also taking Sociology. This will be good: someone else I know and don't hate. She's also taking Greek. I'd really like to take Greek. Maybe I'll take it junior year, when I was also planning to take Italian immersion and medieval history at the 300 level and be Moderating into Medieval Studies… or something… damn it! Too many things to learn and too little time! Or, I could talke to A. this semester and find out how utterly awesome Greek is, then study really ridiculously hard over intersession and go into 2nd semester in the spring…
2. Baking. I made chocolate chip scones and walnut scones for the FYSEM party tomorrow. I am going to bring 6 of each: the remainder were donated to the people in my dorm: namely, my roommate and her friends.Aren't I sooo saintly?
3. Homework. I have now written about half of a truly awful piece for theory. But it does modulate and even used a Neapolitan. Maybe I'll modulate again, and then stick in some augmented 6th chords, and then find a way to end it. It's not nearly as good as my piece for last semester. But the voice leading probably wouldn't make Schubert shudder and roll over in his grave.
This is the sum total of today. There's an orchestra concert tonight, and tomorrow I'm meeting with my lit professor to discuss my paper. This means I need to come up with something to discuss.
So what is the point of my essay? How Christine de Pizan uses Pagan Women and why she uses them. Yes, her use is different from Bocaccio's: not moral. Women are naturally virtuous; they are inclined to virtue; they are inclined to godliness. Hierarchical society makes gender roles completely acceptable. Contemplation/virtue/holiness better than accomplishment anyway.
What if she hadn't included women of accomplishment? Then women are different from men, I suppose. Then there is no virtue in women being virtuous because it the way they are? Women have more than one virtue, certainly. But does that contradict assertion that women are naturally virtuous? No. Men are naturally tending towards accomplishment; women towards virtue, maybe. But obviously men are not incapable of virtue. ERGO women not incapable of accomplishment. That's good. If women aren't shown doing things, because they "can't" -- actually are made NOT ABLE TO BE -- doing things, then there is no virtue in their being on the higher path of contemplation because they are not acting out of free will but out of necessity. Universality: it's a division of labor, but not of soul. Women and men aren't different species any more than knights and peasants are different species. Called to different things; better suited for different things, but ultimtely capable of same things. This obivously goes up before the last bit.
It's quite weird. I started this semester out with an essay on Wollstonecraft, and I end with Christine de Pizan, and both times, my thesis involves a analogy between gender and social class.
1. Registration.
I am in for English Lit I, Counterpoint, Latin, and Historical Sociology of Punishment, plus orchestra, lessons, and chamber music, of course. J. said she would try to put me in a good string quartet next semester. Also, my advisor was not there, so I didn't have to explain what I'm not in contemporary ensemble again… yay! Now I just have to avoid her for the next 1.5 weeks so she can't make me sign up. I need to e-mail Professor E. about coming by tomorrow or Thursday to add History of Politics as a audit, and then I've made myself a self-proclaimed honorary member of the Chaucer class. Because I would totally take it if I didn't have another class at exactly the same time. So I'm going to get the syllabus and do the reading anyway. I AM!
A. is also taking Sociology. This will be good: someone else I know and don't hate. She's also taking Greek. I'd really like to take Greek. Maybe I'll take it junior year, when I was also planning to take Italian immersion and medieval history at the 300 level and be Moderating into Medieval Studies… or something… damn it! Too many things to learn and too little time! Or, I could talke to A. this semester and find out how utterly awesome Greek is, then study really ridiculously hard over intersession and go into 2nd semester in the spring…
2. Baking. I made chocolate chip scones and walnut scones for the FYSEM party tomorrow. I am going to bring 6 of each: the remainder were donated to the people in my dorm: namely, my roommate and her friends.
3. Homework. I have now written about half of a truly awful piece for theory. But it does modulate and even used a Neapolitan. Maybe I'll modulate again, and then stick in some augmented 6th chords, and then find a way to end it. It's not nearly as good as my piece for last semester. But the voice leading probably wouldn't make Schubert shudder and roll over in his grave.
This is the sum total of today. There's an orchestra concert tonight, and tomorrow I'm meeting with my lit professor to discuss my paper. This means I need to come up with something to discuss.
So what is the point of my essay? How Christine de Pizan uses Pagan Women and why she uses them. Yes, her use is different from Bocaccio's: not moral. Women are naturally virtuous; they are inclined to virtue; they are inclined to godliness. Hierarchical society makes gender roles completely acceptable. Contemplation/virtue/holiness better than accomplishment anyway.
What if she hadn't included women of accomplishment? Then women are different from men, I suppose. Then there is no virtue in women being virtuous because it the way they are? Women have more than one virtue, certainly. But does that contradict assertion that women are naturally virtuous? No. Men are naturally tending towards accomplishment; women towards virtue, maybe. But obviously men are not incapable of virtue. ERGO women not incapable of accomplishment. That's good. If women aren't shown doing things, because they "can't" -- actually are made NOT ABLE TO BE -- doing things, then there is no virtue in their being on the higher path of contemplation because they are not acting out of free will but out of necessity. Universality: it's a division of labor, but not of soul. Women and men aren't different species any more than knights and peasants are different species. Called to different things; better suited for different things, but ultimtely capable of same things. This obivously goes up before the last bit.
It's quite weird. I started this semester out with an essay on Wollstonecraft, and I end with Christine de Pizan, and both times, my thesis involves a analogy between gender and social class.
