9/23/19
Jayden Huang
Period 5

Aim: How does close reading of “Lord of the Flies” demonstrate the power naming has in society?

  Today, we had discussed the importance and the power a name has. We began the lesson with a do now, asking us about the history of our first name, why our parents chose it, if it defines us, and if it adds to our character. After a short period to brainstorm, we discussed and shared our answers to the class. A variety of different stories and different opinions were shared. We overall came to a conclusion that while your name can show things about you like your culture or heritage, you would still be the same person even if you had a different name, like the Romeo and Juliet quote “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”

  Afterwards, we began to discuss the importance of naming in “The Lord of the Flies.” We first began by discussing with our teams about each chapter title, and what we thought they might mean. We inferred, that based on our knowledge of chapter 1, that each title might describe an important event in the chapter, like in chapter 1,“The Sound of a Shell,” the conch shell being the important event of the chapter. We also thought that some of the chapter titles seemed to have negative connotations and seemed grim, like “Beast from Water” and “A View to a Death.”

  After this, we began to focus on a specific section of the chapter, where Ralph and the fat boy, as the story calls him, have a discussion about getting to know all the boys’ names, and when Ralph finds out about the fat boy’s nickname, Piggy. In this situation, we are able to learn a lot about Piggy as a character. For example, through this quote we were able to infer that Piggy just wanted to be recognized, and even though he hated the name Piggy, he still enjoyed receiving recognition. This can be seen in the quote “Piggy grinned reluctantly, pleased despite himself at even this much recognition.” Another idea we had about Piggy was how he was a leader, but one behind the scenes. This was seen when Piggy was on the sidelines, helping Ralph to blow the conch shell, gathering all the boys, and relaying to Ralph the names of each boy.

  Overall, what I personally learned during this lesson was the power that the name of something can have. Initially, as a class we believed that a different name didn’t change someone, but after discussion about titles in “The Lord of the Flies,” we realized that names do have a lot of power, and that they can show a lot about what it is naming. We learned this because everything in our world has a name, so knowing the power of names helps us to better understand the world around us. Personally, I will use the information learned today to be able to better understand choices in names, specifically in literature, and the reasons the author might have had in choosing such a name.