ratbastid

I know how a sound wave works: my vocal cords cause rapid pulses of pressure (or density) in the surrounding air molecules, those are amplified (increased in amplitude) inside the cavity of my throat and mouth, and those "waves" of pressure emanate from me until they are perceived by your ear and turned into sound.

In your High School physics book, sound waves were depicted as a sine wave, which is a simplification of what's actually going on. That sine wave is actually a graph of the pressures involved in the propagation of a sound wave.

Here's my question: Light waves were depicted the same way in my High School physics book, as a sine wave. But I'm not clear what the actual physical mechanism of light wave propagation is. I know that "light behaves as both a wave and a particle", but that doesn't give me much of an understanding.

Somebody who's up with physics answer this: HOW does light behave as both a particle and a wave? I understand there's such a thing as a photon, but I don't know quite what it is or how it works. And that's the particle side of the equation; tell me also about the wave part.

And then... tell me about light wave polarity. How do light waves work (again, in the real world, not in physics textbook simplifications) such that my polarized sunglasses filter out light that has been reflected?

Thanks!