Theory of Knowledge

The Venus Figurine

Hey y'all!

     In our TOK class, we have just completed the Human Sciences unit in which we spent most of our time learning about Margaret Mead and the research that she conducted about youths in Samoa. In summary, her research was geared towards learning and trying to understand why the behavior of youths in Samoa are completely different form those in America. Margaret Mead was an anthropologist. She specialized in this field in her mid-twenties by studying humans and their culture. In the unit of human sciences our main aim was to understand and explore the human behavior, have the ability to formulate theories, and develop solutions to solve problems. Now we have moved on to our next unit. As our teacher always says, "We never really finish and area of knowledge or a way of knowing in this class; we simply press the pause button for a while." What he means is that we really haven't completed the Human Sciences unit, we just put it to the side for a while. On Monday we start a new unit: the Arts. I'm super excited for this because I love art. On Friday our teacher gave us a teaser as to what we will be studying. We watched a video about how different cultures sculpt and paint bodies. The aim of the video was understand and learn why the different cultures around the world like to disfigure the human body when it comes to art. As it turns out, it depends on the culture and mindset that the people of the culture had at the time. The video began with talking about the Venus Figurines in which they have been found in many different parts of the world. Then, it went on to discuss how each culture had a special way of portraying the human body in art. We have not complete the video yet, but by far it is verging intriguing.

Here are some pictures of various Venus Figurines:

Happy reading!

- Felicinda J.