Undergraduate / Common App short answer about theatre [5]

Anyone mind telling me if this is a good topic/well-written? I'll be the happiest person in the world if you completely tear it apart. Thanks!

In the space provided below, please elaborate on one of your activities (extracurricular, personal activities, or work experience)(150 words or fewer).

For both the winter and spring season of 11th grade, I participated in my school's theatre program. I'd never tried theatre before, and I went in thinking it'd be easy. After all, what's so hard about reading lines? I was pleasantly surprised that this was not so; theatre is much more than just reciting lines. Actors have to be cognizant of how they present themselves in a multitude of ways: body position, volume, position... I had to throw away my characteristic demeanor--which I'd never given much thought to before--and mold it to a fictional situation. Due to my newfound awareness of my self-presentation, I was now able to better moderate how I came across in general, such as my tendency to mumble or lean on one leg as opposed to both. Through imitating someone that wasn't real, I grasped a better hold on myself and how I came across to other people.

Undergraduate / Johns Hopkins: Why an undecided major? essay [3]

The essay prompt is as such: (freshman applicants only): Johns Hopkins offers 50 majors across the schools of Arts and Sciences and Engineering. On this supplement, we ask you to identify one or two that you might like to pursue here. Why did you choose the way you did? If you are undecided, why didn't you choose? (If any past courses or academic experiences influenced your decision, you may include them in your essay.)

Savagely rip apart my essay. I'm open to as harsh criticism as you can give me. Thanks!

By writing this, I am stealing-stealing from countless languages, that is. After all, English is hardly what anyone could call an original language, having pilfered the majority of its words from other cultures and languages to create a mangled conglomeration of sounds and meanings. Souvenir? French. House? German. Algebra? Arabic. Misanthropy? Greek. None of these words we can call our own, and I love it that way.

Language has always been fascinating to me. Even as a child, I pondered English's structure and vocabulary, biding my time weighing questions like why we say "slept" instead of "sleep" when normally the past tense calls for "-ed." Learning vocabulary, usually a dreary task for most schoolchildren, was fun for me-I took joy out of breaking down newly acquired words into smaller words to ascertain the original meaning. A word like "awful," for instance, took on a whole new meaning when I considered it as full of awe rather than horrible. My pursuit of Latin only intensified this frenzied study of language as I discovered even more words could be broken down. The drastically different subject-object-verb structure of Latin prompted me to question English even more; why do we not formulate our sentences in the same way? What makes English English? Why is the capability for language so universal, but our languages so diverse?

Some might wonder, then, why I would express interest in a university known for science, rather than linguistic, pursuits like Johns Hopkins. Or, better yet, why I declare my major undecided rather than Romance Languages or Classics. For me, the study of language doesn't just stop at understanding the etymology of a word or the structure of a sentence. Language is science. In order to understand language, it is necessary to understand why language even exists. After all, every other organism gets along just fine without it. Why us? When did we acquire it? How? Why can't some people learn to speak? Why don't we all speak the same language? I cannot answer this with a mere knowledge of different languages. An understanding of biology, genetics, psychology and others are all tantamount to exploring these questions. I want the opportunity to feel out what sort of curriculum will best help me obtain this knowledge and prepare me for graduate school, and I know that Johns Hopkins can help me obtain this goal with its wide science curricula. Choosing a major now would be like assuming I was preparing to close my doors.