Rebecca Skloot's Speech

I was actually very interested to hear what Rebecca had to say during her speech. To hear her talk about her true meaning and inspiration behind writing this book was very interesting. I was curious to hear how she was going to answer some of the questions that she was asked. She seems like a very, very intelligent woman who is very passionate about her book. It's also interesting to me how she never wanted to be a writer until she learned about this story, and this is what has pretty much made her career. She has sold many, many copies of her book, and is now going to have it made into a movie. It just goes to show you how you never know which direction your life is going to lead. I didn't think I was going to enjoy her speech, but I was very moved and motivated after her speech was over.

Bamboozled Blog

I thought that Spike Lee did a good job writing and directing this movie. I have watched many of movies that he has directed, and this Bamboozled seems to be along the same lines as his others. I thought that Damon Wayans' character had the right indea in his mind since he was sick of "writing too white" all the time, but i think he went somewhat to the extreme in trying to get his point across. This movie shows you how bad racism was, and that it still exists today. There were many scenes in the movie that dramatically showed you the level of racism and its impact it had on people. I do however think that Spike Lee might have gone to the extreme with getting his point across. To me, it seems like he thinks that the viewing audience is too nieve to understand his point, so he had to be dramatic about it. I thought the ending was really dramatic and violent, but I think it was appropriate because it puts an ever-lasting thought into people's minds about the effects of their racism.

Blog-April 3rd

The part of class the stood out to me the most was the pictures and information that everyone found on the information about diversity in media. The amount of diversity in all media is seemingly endless. Most groups had a picture of what is known to be "the ideal man" and "the ideal woman". These types of images are what puts these pictures and ideas in people's minds and somewhat brainwashes us into thinking this is what we all should strive to be like. There is also much diversity in class levels that I noticed that people found. You just type in diversity into google's search bar and you could find infinite amounts of information and pictures of the different areas of it in media. I also tried to watch tv and pay attention to see if I could find diversity in it this week, and I noticed much of the same things.

Longest Yard

The part of class that stood out to me was when we watched the longest yard. There weren't many issues in the movie that had to deal with gender from a female's perspective. This was a male dominant movie. Looking at class, it was easy to see the power and motivation that the warden of the prison possessed. He wanted Adam Sandler to lead his prison football team to be better because he was really big on football. He is part of the upper class while Sandler is part of the lower class of inmates even though he use to be a big-time football player. He manipulated Sandler into joining his team even though he didn't want to but using his power he had over him. The gaurds also showed their power over the lower class inmates by doing pretty much whatever they wanted to do to them without worrying about the consequences. Adam Sandler played Michael Irvin in a game of basketball, and Michael beat up on Sandler the whole game. Guys aren't suppose to show pain and weakness and Sandler took the beating the whole game without calling a foul to show his pride as a man. Throughout the entire movie, the men are portrayed as rough and tough. There is one man, the 400 pound man of pretty much all muscle, who they make fun of by having him cry and whine when he gets hit hard. It's a funny play on a man and how they shouldn't show emotion.

Midterm Blog

Last Monday, we took our final. I studied the powerpoints and my class notes, and feel that I did fairly well. The midterm itself was not what I was expecting. I am used to teachers giving multiple choice and true/false questions. It was a midterm that required you to know and understand the material and how to apply your knowledge. The NCIS movie we watched had a lot of class/gender aspects that I noticed. I ended up with a page and a half of isses that I noticed. There was also a few racial things I noticed. It was a different midterm than I am used to having, but at least I know what to expect for our final.

Blog #5

      The part of last week's class that stood out to me was the first part of class when we talked about gender and the roles associated with it. The part of that discussion that interested me the most was our talk about the difference in gender identity and gender performance. I didn't really know there was a difference between these two. After talking about it, I took a closer look at some of my peers. One of my friends is a female, but she dresses somewhat like a boy. I have talked to her about it before, and she said that it's how she feels most comfortable. I never questioned her, and I'm glad I didn't since now I'm more educated about why she maybe feels that way.

Week 4 Blog

Last week in class, the part that stood out to me the most was when we watched the movie Veronica Mars. It was a good movie to show us how the different levels of classes affect others. She use to be part of the "popular" and rich kids until her dad's investigation turned her friends against her. She was depressed and down because of how her social status had changed since then. I also found it interesting how they portrayed the rich kids and the things they value. Also, how they show gender differentiation. They show Veronica as a smart girl who wins her battles by being clever, and they show guys solving their problems by being violent or destructive. We got into our groups, and I also found it interesting the points of the movie that stood out to my fellow classmates. Most of the groups had a different focus on parts of the movie. Since starting this class, I have been paying a lot closer attention to the people around me. I have been watching them to see what they value and who they surround themselves with. Until now, I never paid any attention to these kinds of things. I am starting to be able to learn a little bit about people just by watching them.

Week 3 Blog

I thought last week's class was a very interesting one. The part I thought was the most interesting was when we got into our groups and we had to list the characteristics of the different levels of class. When the people from each group wrote the characteristics on the board, I thought some of the one's that people put were interesting and funny. When I was out at different places this week, I tried to look at people and their characteristics to see what class seemed to be in. I wanted to see how close my classmates actually were. It was pretty amazing how right they were. I wrote down some of the key characteristics listed for each class, and you could tell someone's class level just by these few characteristics. Most of the people I paid attention to had characteristics of middle class. I could tell just by they way they talked, dressed, and acted which class they belonged to. It's pretty amazing what I am able to learn about a person now just by paying close attention to how they act.

Class Blog #2

The part of class That i found to be most interesting was when we watched the video, and it talked about the different social classes and the effect they have on others. I was paying attention to my co-workers on Tuesday night and I tried seeing if I could distinguish the diffrent social classes between my peers. I paid attention to who they interacted with more than the others around them. I did notice that the older women tended to hang around the others that were around the same age. They all are servers trying to raise a family on their wages, so they are in the same class, which gives them some common interests. The younger employees interacted with mostly everybody, but they also had certain people they seemed to talk to more. There are a few high school students working with me, and they seemed to hang out together more than they did with the older women. Also, there are a few guys that work back in the dish area, and not too many people would associate with them, for whatever reason. There is also one guy that works with me who is a little bit different from everyone else. He only seemed to talk to people when he initiated the conversation. Noone seemed interested in being seen with him or conversing with him. It was quite sad actually. I never really stopped and looked at my peers around me to see the different social classes. It really made me see how important it is to treat everyone as an equal, no matter the social class they're in.

Week 1's Class

The one thing that stood out to me the most was us talking about the "American Dream". I feel that people have differernt dreams for their futures, but are all ultimnately similar. Most people want to have a good family, with a big house, and make a lot of money, while others may value the smaller things in life instead. The thought of the American Dream is instilled into people's minds mostly by television. They see people on television that are living with all of these luxuries, and they see how happy those people are. That makes them want to have those things in their lives so they can be happy like that too.
Something else I found interesting was in the definition section of class. I found it interesting when we talked about mainstream culture and counter cultures. I always portrayed the people who are part of the counter culture as weirdos, and never really looked deeper into it. I guess if a culture doesn't have those people, then that culture would be pretty boring. Every mainstream culture has a counter culture, which isn't exactly people who are weird, but it's just people who view things differently than "normal" people do. Television is the media that shows this connection. You can turn on pretty much any channel and see the counter cultured people and how they act differently and how they are treated for doing so.