Racial Stereotypes

The Harvard video of the doll experiment was very interesting. Especially since that experiment was first conducted many years ago, and then conducted again recently. This means that the racial stereotype of black people hasn't made much progress. It was also sad to see that there are such extreme racial stereotypes within a race (dark skin, light skin). It just shows that society feels that we have to keep seperating people into certain categories. The last thing said in the video I found very dissapointing. The girl said that people don't know what their culture is based from, but we allow society to decide what kind of person you are. Although she was talking about her race in specific, I think the statement applies to all races. There is so much we don't know about each and every persons past and present life, yet we allow society to judge how someone is supposed to act. But not even that, we also allow ourselves to givin to the stereotype. We allow ourselves to be whats expected of us from society. Although that's a very intense way of looking at the subject, the situation of racial stereotypes may become more serious the more people take apart and divide races into certain expectations.

monopoly

Playing monopoly in class really did show how hard it is to move out of your social class. By the end of the game, each player was about where they started. Since moving to a higher class is so difficult, you probably have to go through extremes to get there. Both of my parents had grown up in an upper middle class like I am now. I didn't realize till I asked them, but it does show how classes tend to stay the same throughout generations. I'm not sure what class I see myself in in the future because I plan on doing something very different then my parents. In fact, among my sisters and I, we all are going a different path although we'd like to be successful at whatever we're doing. My oldest sister is an artist and has been trying to work her way up the ladder of art production, set design, murals. This profession doesn't have a set salary. You get paid job by job, which is very different than what my parents do. My other sister, Melissa, is studying to be a nurse. She would very much like to be successful at it, and is actually thinking about being a surgical nurse. Depending what kind of nursing job she'd like to do, may determine what "class" she is in. I'm thinking about foreign affairs nursing, or international development. So if I plan on traveling for an open amount of time, I might not even own a house.

Tammy's Story

I find Tammy's story...going no where. and its frusterating. They have to continue moving in that cycle. They can't move away to a different location where she would have more oppurtunity, b/c they have no money to transport themselves. She just has to keep doing the same thing everyday. What's also very frusterating is that she doesn't want her son to break out of the cycle. It seems like she doesn't want the best for her son, but maybe she thinks "the best" is staying to your roots. Its unfortunate that we accept the stereotypes of different classes, especially when these classes have no other choice

education and wealth

Its true that the higher a family's income is, the average ACT is a lot higher, and the higher the education the student recieves. With a higher education, the student will get a high income job, and then they have children and the whole cycle starts over again. So really, the middle class system is dying and wealthy will just keep getting wealthy. There are very few who start from the bottom to work there way to the top. The reason poorer families can't recieve higher education is because of "rules" of America. How would poorer families get good education if good educators don't want to work at a school with a smaller income. The children are deprived of better education.

30 days

Seeing the video of the guy trying out jail for 30 days was very interesting. Even though it the people seemed a lot less scary then i stereotyped them to be, the pain the prisoners suffered was even more frightening. Morgan was only in the jail for 30 days and he was craving being outdoors so much that I can't even imagine people who had been there for years. It also surprised me how much different the people are in the rehab prison, why isn't this used more? I had a lot of hope in the people who were being released that their life was going to change for the better, but instead they ended up back in jail. This shows that people can't get used to life outside of prison after being in it for so long. Why do people have such a hard time changing for the better? Why can't these prisoners refrain themselves from doing bad again? Do they not remember how much pain they went through inside of jail?

stereotypical teens

Teenagers are stereotypically viewed as being routy kids who look for trouble. Although, I know no one who wants to be in danger. I think this is why parents don't allow us to certain things that arn't actually dangerous at all. For example, about 2 weekends ago I was planning on going to a concert in Milwaukee, WI to the Rave. My parents only would allow me to go if parents we're driving me there, and wouldn't allow my friend to drive me there. They thought the neighborhood was too "shady", which it was, but I found it unfair that I wasn't allowed to go b/c of who drove there. I thought my mom should understand that we would be fine driving there, even though we're teenagers, and teenagers are thought of as unorganized and bad drivers. I didn't really mind I wasn't going to the concert, but I found it to be a perfect example of regulations parents set on teens. If I was allowed to go, it would teach me how to react to certain situations on the road, and maybe about the neighborhood I was in, but except I wasn't allowed to mature in those ways. What the parents don't realize is that I'm probably going to be in multiple situations like that next year, when I'm in college, and they're not there to help me.

Un-TV

The Un-TV assignment was very interesting on how it played out. When we were first assigned to it, I thought it would be a waste of time. I thought that I already knew the message Sal was trying to send us, and that watching the black tv screen for thirty minutes wouldn't change it. Although, when I did the assignment, I realized how wrong I was. The TV is really just a box, and the fact that we show emotion toward it seems so strange. We are reacting to moving images that arn't realistic at all b/c of editing, the story line. When we are watching TV, we are escaping reality by watching a fake story on a box. That is basically what we waste are time with. I'm not saying TV is bad, b/c sometimes I think something is worth watching. But I do belive that we (or at least I) should limit the amount of television I watch. To be entertained by pictures, and a story isn't the way I intended. I hope to stay more active in my actual hobbies.

Wow. It is true that disney films are stereotyping masculinity. I love those disney movies, so its weird to see that i was exposed to it so early. It causes girls to think that they want a guy to come sweep them off their feet, like every guy in a disney movie. Our culture should promote nonviolence in men, so guys wouldn't feel like they have to live up to the expectations of being violent. Some television programs do not promote violence. Like in the Office, Jim, the perfect guy, isn't violent and is thought of as being funny and cute. It works!

Fear in U.S.

I found Bowling for Columbine very interesting to watch. It was really surprising when Moore went to the leader of the NRA to ask questions about rallys he held in cities that just had killings caused by a gun and he couldn't answer. I also learned that even though Canada has so many guns, and is a prime hunting country, they have so very few deaths caused by guns there. In the US, we have over 11,000 deaths caused by guns. I think the reason for that is fear. US media and news has filled their citizens with so much fear in every news story. The news channels purposely try to find the story that sounds most dangerous to people. This may be a major cause of fear in the US and could be the reason there are many deaths caused by guns. It was funny how so many people, mostly adults, would say that child shootings were caused by Marylin Manson music. When people can't find the cause of a problem, they make quick reactions to make them feel safer.

Dependence

Americans are afraid of dependence because we learned to grow up depending on only yourself. It's a trust issue that keeps us from allowing ourselves to rely on anyone. The capatalism cycle is to grow up, become successful and independent. When we think about our future, we think about only ourselves; how will I become successful?; what do I want to do? We believe that our friends and family will have a way of connecting themselves into it, but sometimes they don't. I depend on my parents, which does bother me. I really want to become independent from my parents, but I want them in my lives. I just don't want to depend on what I'm used to them giving me. I really want to become strong and independent. I'm hoping those calls for life advice to my mom will slowly come to an end when I'm in and out of college, but I have a feeling they won't.

absolutely nothing

The "nothing" assignment was something i really enjoyed. To be in a public place, and truly doing nothing really makes you stop and see everything around you. A lot of people had said that when doing it people were checking up on them. Some people wouldn't allow them to do "nothing". Although, in my case, I was outside the Union Station so not many people stopped to check if i was O.K. Everyone down town seems to always be in a rush: the way people drive, the hurried walk across the street. When I took a moment to stop and take things in, I was really able to enjoy the city. I was able to set apart all the different sounds of the city. I was also able to do a lot of people watching, which is something I already enjoy to do. You notice a lot more of what's around you once you sit back and actually let yourself notice.

Wow. I think the videos of the different countries and how they drive are very interesting. When crossing the street at the same pace, I would be way to scared that someone wasn't paying attention or didn't time their speed right. And India was a mess! Cars were just trying to overpower their right a way w/ them all turning right at one time. It's all in hope that the cars will let them pass, and not hit them. All cultures have these unspoken rules, and I think that's the hardest part of understanding them. I want to be able to visit a lot of cultures in the future, and i wouldn't want to defend anyone by something that's accepted in our culture. If only there was a way to decode this secret language of every culture. In those traveling language decoders, they should add in what gestures mean.

Bronx Tale

Bronx tale really showed how your views on certain things can't change because of how you've grown. In the movie "C" didn't want to be racist, but there's some part of him that always will be because of his surroundings. This movie also shows how everyones life contains groups of people that affect them differently. In this movie I believe that C and Sonny would be in their own group, other than C being in Sonny's crew. C and Sonny share a different relationship, and grow very close. Sonny is someone C always would listen to, and admire. Sonny didn't want C's life to turn out like his; he wanted him to be safe always. I think C's master status throughout the movie is "Sonny's boy" because everything he does relates to Sonny's influence on him. In the beginning C always wanted to know Sonny, and in the end he is running to Sonny trying to thank him for saving his life. The Social Construction of the italian neighborhood seems to be Sonny's crew, and then everyone else. The entire neighborhood understands not to get in Sonny's way or to get involved with Sonny. The neighborhood doesn't approve of the blacks passing through their neighborhood.

Roles

The idea that we play a certain role in everyones life means that we affect different people in different ways. As in, you'll act differntly around your work friends than you do your actual friends, or you may act differently around your actual friends and your family. I'm not sure if that's the case for me, though. A few of my close friends I've known since 1st or 2nd grade, and my others I've known since 5th or 6th grade. We were never those kind of people that drifted apart, which I find pretty sweet! These friends would almost fit into my family circle because I basically play the same role with both of them. In my family circle I play the role of being a sister. I have two older sisters who I am very close with. They come to me when they need help, and visa versa. We hang out every chance we get, and are comfortable sharing new ideas with eachother, even though our ideas are usually the same since we think pretty much alike. Just like my friends, My sisters and I share the same sense of humor because we've grown together. It's interesting how when we are around some people, we are only comfortable acting a certain way, and with the people close to you, you have no limits.

Enough said

I believe that learning something in school is completely different than learning something by experience. Of course in school we take in everything that we're told, but that's just the thing; we're being TOLD those things, and we're not learning it on our own. In class, a friend of Salituro's came in to tell us about her experience helping out with children's schools in Africa. Her journey was extremely interesting. She told us about learning Swahili, monkeys in the middle of the road, and teaching kids. When I hear about others adventures, it inspires me to not be afraid to try new things.
In class, I'm noticing that Salituro is really encouraging us to step out of our comfort zone. I'm very excited to do the 10 hours of experience. I'm looking forward to learning new things by actually witnessing them instead of hearing about them.
Adding to the pattern, we have read Gang Leader for a Day. This story also tells about how the student was interested in stepping outside of his classroom to learn about people in the projects of Chicago. The gang leader, J.T., told Sudhir that he wasn't going to learn about their part in society without experiencing how they live. Instead of doing a general multiple choice survey, he took the time to hang out with new, completely diffent people than he was used to. With that he was able to understand their lives, instead basing their lives on stereotypes.

internet

Has the internet changed our way to socialize? I would think so, seeing that we have switched off between multiple ways to stay in touch with our friends online. I remember the first web trend was "xanga". Then myspace came, it got a little weird, so then everyone got facebook. I think the internet is a way to stay close to friends that you don't know that well. I hardly ever talk online to the people that I see all the time. We spend so much time on the internet that it isn't just hurting our way to socialize, it's hurting our hobby-time. People are spending less time on what they love to do because they are on the web. I think we should work on limiting our time on the computer. Maybe have a little alarm on the corner of the desktop reminding us to go outside and play.

in a nutshell

Often I am asked what ethnicity I am. The answer is I'm a lot mixed together, and there's some things that I still question. So "Who are you?" can be answered the same way. There is so much mixed into my life that makes up who I am. But here's a start- Hi, I'm Allison. I have a Mom, a Dad, 2 older sisters named Melissa and Stephanie, and 2 dogs named Jack and Bruna. It's my senior year of high school, and I can't wait to go to college, but at the same time I want this year to last as long as it can. I can't imagine not seeing my friends at college, although there's not a doubt in my mind that I'll keep seeing them my whole life. My sisters are the closest people to me in my life. They're great! It's like gaurenteed love. My oldest sister, Stephanie, is an artist. She is my constant reminder that life is beautiful. She lives downtown so as often as I can, especially over summer, I take the train down town to devour pasta and watch Arrested Development. My middle sister, Melissa, is a nurse. She is in the nursing program at CLC. Although Melissa is deciding to be a nurse right now, she has been a healer all her life. She always knows what prescription to give me, whether it's laying around watching Newsies, cooking, or going out to a concert festival and dancing to the choreography of a 4 year old. Melissa is my strongest supporter of me going to college far, far away. The schools that I'm most interested in at the time being, are schools that are either in California, East coast, Colorado, basically anything that is not in the midwest. I have visited midwest schools and I do like a few, but I think I want to look for a bigger change of environment. The one thing I know for sure is that I want to travel all over the world for my job. Lately, I have been looking into Amnesty International as a possibility career, but we'll see! I wouldn't want my future completely planned out.
Silence. I don't think silence has to be akward. I know around my friends or family, we arn't continuously making noise, we tend to just enjoy one anothers company. Although when I'm around people who I don't know, I'm not as comfortable being in a mute conversation. I think people want to fill space with pointless discussions to make others believe that they're not antisocial. When someone isn't talking, it isn't always because they're too afraid to talk; it might be that they simply don't want to talk.
Something that is a part of me that can be looked at from a bigger picture is my love for traveling. I have traveled hardly anywhere out of the country, only canada and I think some island that I don't remember, but I am extremely curious of the outside of my world. I think this desire to adventure the world came from my grandma, my mom's mom, who I call Nina. She had passed away a few years ago, and I regret my distant relationship with her. It's weird that I feel closer to her now than ever, and she isn't even here to talk with me. She used to be a stuartist, and I used to think that she took the job because it was a "cool" job to have in her early 20's. Now I realize that I don't think it was because of the trend at all, I think it's because she was just as curious as I am about the world.