The Blog

We have been posting and commenting on this class blog for the majority of the semester. Did your experience writing on the blog change the way you write in class? Did it do anything at all? Did it help you reflect on the readings for the class? Would you like blogs to be included in other classes as well? What are your overall feelings about the blog? Does your experience with the blog make you want to take some online classes or experience do more school related work online?

How has your life changed during this semester of college?

After our first semester of college I'm sure a lot has changed in everyone's lives. It was the first semester living away from home. This puts a lot of responsibilities on ourselves like managing our money, time management doing laundry, buying food, doing school work. How have you handled these responsibilities? What us the hardest part of bring in college? What is the easiest part of being in college? Also how has your relationship with your family changed? Have your parents been treating you more like an adult? How so? Finally, there are a lot of benefits of living at home but what is the one thing that you miss the most about living at home?

On Turkey and Consumer Culture Protest Movements

Every year, around this time, my thoughts turn toward home, family, and...the destructive potential of the American market economy. As Americans, we are expected to gather around our tables, give thanks to whatever higher power we may believe in, and enjoy the fruits of another year's harvest together with our families. Then, the day after, we are expected to make a pilgrimage together to a mall, or Wal-Mart, or some other Temple to Cheap Consumer Goods, and pay homage to another god. And every year there is at least one news report of devotees to the dollar trampling one another in the early morning rush to buy.

So, every year, I feel the need to take a step back for a moment and consider what effect my own purchasing habits have on the rest of the world. Certainly, I'm not trampling anyone to grab a coffee at Starbuck's. Nor am I kneeling at the CD racks within the hallowed halls of any capitalist temple by downloading an album on iTunes. In fact, most "Black Fridays" I don't even leave the house. Sometimes, I count myself among the few participants in the annual social protest event known as "Buy Nothing Day." The Buy Nothing Day website calls for a "24-hour moratorium on consumer spending." I can do that. I'd rather not be at the mall on Black Friday anyway. I'm more than happy to sit at home, watch some football, and feast on leftovers.

But, every year I wonder...is this really an effective form of protest? Would it, in reality, be better for me to go out and spend a few bucks for the people who have to work on the day after Thanksgiving in order to afford a decent holiday season? Is my ability to stay at home and comfortably enjoy a hot turkey sandwich and a football game really just symptomatic of the degree to which I am immersed in our consumer culture? Another blog post I found on a fashion blog site through Google makes a similar point. These bloggers suggest that "there needs to be a more sound concept where everyone could bind together and help causes instead of hinder businesses."

Is Buy Nothing Day an effective form of protest? Is Black Friday even a day worth protesting about? Are there other, "more sound concepts" out there for one who is critical of consumer culture, but also skeptical of forms of protest that seem a bit too "easy"?

Cavemen

In the "Caveman" episode we watched in class on monday, we saw many different cultural myths. One of the cultural myths that was prevalent throughout the episode was that of the conception of cavemen as being primitive beasts. Through your own experiences or the experiences of others, have you encountered any type of misconceptions because of your race or gender? How did that make you feel?

American Eagle Ad 2

http://www.ae.com/web/index.jsp. Go to this link and look at the American Eagle ad. What American myths does it portray and why? Do you think these myths still exist? Why do you think that American Eagle has ads like these? Do you think it helps thier sales?

From Rags to Riches

Horatio Alger wrote a lot of rags to riches books. Unlike Herbert Spencer, Horatio tells us that anyone can achieve the American Dream if only they work hard, have concern for more than just themselves, and stay persistent. His character in Ragged Dick shows us his concern for others as he dives in to save the boy. We have heard stories about those who had nothing and became successful (Abraham Lincoln) and those who are just born into a rich and successful family and earned their way with their father's name (possibly George Bush). I guess what i am asking is do you think that out of all of today's "successful and rich" people how many of them earned their success the hard way or did most of them just inherit the fortune and fame?

Money vs. Morals

In the story From Ragged Dick , the reader could tell the character main motive was not money, but his own morals that lead him to save the boy. If he was present the money before hand, would his main motive still be to save the boy because of his morals or would it he have save the boy because of the money?

Equality and womens rights

Some women in our country believe that they are still not treated like they should be in the workplace. According to this poster a women does not make near as much as a man does for the same job. I want to know what you think. Do you believe that womens rights activists are correct when they create posters such as this? Is our economy still horribly degrading women in the workplace and society in general? Or do you believe those women activists have gone to far and have blown their ideas way out of proportion? I saw this poster about a couple of months back and actually wrote my persuasive paper about it. I want to know how everyone else feels about it and if it compares or contrasts to what i believe.

Advertisement and Gender Roles

This semester in English 103 we have discussed a lot about Gender Roles. So I went searching for an image that was an advertisement, and showed this quality. How do u feel about the ad to your left? What is this ad trying to tell us? Do you think it is unfair to men, women, or both?

Advertisments

In Kilbourne's article "Two Ways a Woman Can Get Hurt" she talks about advertising and the ways it hints at power and violence. She says how some of them "dehumanizes and objectifies people, often women", often comparing it to pornography. What is your opinion on this, do you agree or disagree with her? How do you think advertising has changed over the years? Do you think sometimes it is taken too far? She also mentions kids in advertisments, and how they may be portrayed in a sexual manner. Do you agree or disagree with this and do you think there is any truth to her claims? What did you find most disturbing?

Torture

According to Press torture is wrong in all cases and scenarios, do you agree with him?
Or do agree with others who think that in some cases where information is vital to save lives, such as the Al Queda captive Mohammed. Is torture okay in those cases? Which one of those two ideas to you agree with and why?

Arabic School Controversy

Here is a link to a story found in the New York Times about the Khalil Gibran International Academy, the first Arabic-language school in New York City. The former principal and founder of the school, Debbie Almontaser, was pressured to step down recently due to a controversy surrounding t-shirts worn by some of the that students attending the school. She claims she is the victim of "an anti-Arab 'smear campaign,'" and that the school has become a target of anti-Arab, anti-Muslim sentiments in New York. Here is a link to the school's website, which has some general info about the school, and this is a link to a blog run by a conservative historian and foreign policy adviser to Rudy Giuliani who is opposed to the school. Do you think the school poses a threat? What about Almontaser's claim that the school was her "American dream"?

Jefferson essay

In the Jefferson essay he talks about differences between white and black people. He mentions how black people require less sleep and are better at music and how white people are more capable of love. What are your thoughts on this? Would you consider these to be myths or true?

Difference of Condition

In the Jefferson reading he talks about something called a difference of condition. This condition of color is what separates us according to him. Do you feel as if Jefferson’s view that hate will still exist unless one of the races was wiped out has lead to a battle of racial superiority? Jefferson states that African Americans are better at music and white people are more capable of love. Do you feel as if these differences of condition are stereotypes and if so where do they come from? Do you believe these differences lead to a negative view of a particular race?

Resentment Towards America

After reading THE OBLIVIOUS EMPIRE, by Mark Hertsgaard, we see that different parts of the world have different views on Americans in general. They don’t really seem to see that not all American citizens agree with the United States’ government. We see that other countries have resentment towards American Citizens, and like them, we also don’t pay much attention to what is going on in their home land.
Why do you think the rest of the world sees us the way they do? Do you believe that it is fair for American citizens to receive the same resentment as the US government? Is there something that can be done to reduce other countries’ resentment towards America?

Us and Them

In the essay by Maria Poggi Johnson, the main character is christian and moves to a mostly Jewish neighborhood. She explores the Jewish religion and teaches it in her school. The experience of learning more about the Jewish faith strengthens her beliefs about her own religion. Have you ever questioned your faith when learning of another religion or has others differences made you feel more confident in your beliefs? Have you ever felt left out in a situation where you were surrounded by another religion that was not of your own? Describe a moment in your life that you have either questioned or had been assured of your religion.

Aunt Ida Pieces a Quilt

Melvin Dixon gives a little insight of Ida's thoughts (a woman speaking of her niece’s son Junie who recently passed away from AIDs). She has been quilting since a very young age. She plans on making a quilt in memory of Junie. He was a great singer and loved by the church. Ida stitches pieces of Junie's things in his name to remember him by. They plan on sending the quilt to Washington D.C. where a lot of different quilts made by others can be pieced together in memory of those who have also lost babies, mothers, and fathers from AIDs.

What are your thoughts on this poem? What about Ida? What was your first image of her when you started reading? Did it change by the end of the poem?

Still Separate, Still Unequal

Kozol tells us of the fact that even though legal segregation is over segregation in public schools across the county is still rampant. He describes how he visited public schools and the population various schools across the country were mainly Black or Hispanic. For example, Kozol spoke to that one teacher who claims that in her eight years of teaching she had never taught a white child.

Do you think that segregation is common even in College? Even here in NIU most Black students are put into Grant Hall, while a majority of white students are in the rest of the residence buildings. What are your thoughts on this?

Different uses for blogs

Blogs can be used for a variety of purposes, and can engage a variety of readers and participants. Some blogs are kinds of personal journals, where the author posts his or her thoughts on current issues or events - be they personal, social, political, or otherwise - and blog readers add their own thoughts or sympathies. Blogs may also be used to reflect on or discuss current business trends, or developments within a particular field. Still other blogs allow people with similar social or political concerns to connect and exchange ideas. Some blogs might fit within more than one of these basic categories, such as this principal's blog site reflecting on issues relating to education. If you're looking for a blog on a particular topic, you can use Google's blog search, or another blog search tool called Technorati.
The blog is a very flexible tool for people with similar concerns to connect and exchange information and ideas. As with all tools, though, knowledge of how to use it effectively is essential to its usefulness as a tool. And, as with all writing, observation of certain rules is necessary for communication to happen.

The Idea of Greater Entity

Lamott tells us about the effects of religion on the lives of a variety of people of different layers of society. She also describes how she went through various stages of life and developed a fervent belief in God, even though she was very much opposed to religion and Christianity before.
Religion plays a major role in the American society. For example, some people base their view of the world entirely from the religious perspective.

Do you think that a greater entity or entities, such as God or Allah, exist? How do you think religion affects your life, if at all? If it does, do you think it is a positive influence or a negative one? Finally, do you think religion has a place in the modern world or do you think it is a thing of the past?

Immigration

In the story by Martinez, he turned in the immigrants who told him their stories at the border. The immigrants openly gave him their story, but Martinez turned them in, for what he thought was their own good, after listening. Do you think that his actions helped the illegal immigrants or hurt them? If you were in Martinez's shoes, what would you do? Would you physically help the illegal aliens or would you turn them into border patrol. If you did help the immigrants, how would you help them and what would you do to make their lives better? If you turned them in, would you explain your action? Would you feel guilty for breaking the law or turning the immigrants in?

Vocational feelings

After reading the Rose selection how do you feel about vocational students being treated as having special needs? Do you feel that students that have been written off have huge unrealized potential? Rose comments about students "floating on a shallow pond." This seems to indicate that teachers do not know how to engage vocational students minds. School is organized as a hierarchy with a lot of emphasis and effort placed on the upper level classes. Do you think that teachers lack of motivation is partially to blame for vocational students being far behind other students? Will this way of teaching set a person up for a failure in the real world?

Rose

Rose is a young man who was sent to a vocational high school because, his test scores were mixed up with someone Else's. The story shows how he was put into classes with teachers that couldn't control the class to teachers that didn't care. Surrounded by peers with little ambitions to succeed. Finally a teacher realized that his test scores were consistently above average for the students attending the vocational high school. So he was placed into a college prep high school where he met an English teacher who recaptured his interest in reading and writing, After meeting this teacher Rose is able to attend college and become a successful writer.

1. From what we learned from our own experiences and from what we learned from reading about Rose, does the public education system really provide an equal opportunity for everyone to succeed?
2. Do you feel Rose's experience with education can be used to model ,or depict, what goes on in our modern public education system?

Writing for self-expression

Does anyone else here write for self-expression? Sometimes I find writing to be an important and helpful way for me to externalize my thoughts, and make sense of problems or situations that I'm struggling with or that are confusing in some way. Somehow the act of writing and seeing my thoughts on a page (or a screen, as the case may be) helps me organize my thoughts and digest things a little bit. Both of the readings we discussed in class are just that: people writing to make sense of a significant and perhaps confusing situation in their lives. I'm interested to find out if anyone else has tried something similar - be it in a journal or in the margins of school notebooks. It could be as short as a poem (like the one by Morales) or as long as a short story (like the one by Jack). It could even be just rambling on about whatever comes to mind. What works for you?

The Family Myth

Where do you think the "family myth" in American culture comes from? What are some possible sources for the idealized picture we painted together in class (mom and dad, two kids, dog, two-car garage, picket fence, baseball and a home-cooked meal)? In what current situations, contexts, or debates is this ideal picture evoked - for good or for ill?

Welcome to English 103!

Welcome to the English 103.m12 class blog! We will be using this site with some regularity both in and out of the classroom, so try to become familiar with the controls and tools available around the site.