Feature Photograph
America at Home Assignment
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Time Exposure
Fashion
Today was once in a blue moon. Whew.
Two very distinct videos. Allen Iverson ranting is funny in its own right, but it adds to the subtle humor of the Reebok ad knowing the allusion. Iverson did have a great press conference, right up there with Dennis Green's conference after the Cardinals lost to the Bears. I'll find that video and post it later. I just made the connection between these two videos tonight, and found it most amusing. Probably the most amusing thing I saw all evening, although I did find it humorous that a woman won a contest and now she gets to play a dead body on a future episode of CSI. Goooo Her!!! She probably won't need a lot of practice for the roll. Had to at least bring that up, for tonight We talking about practice.
I was hoping to start a trend where I would compose at least 500 words a day in the attempt to stay sharp as well as maybe stumble upon something that I could use to expand into something more in depth. Tonight, I am probably not going to hit that number, as I am tired, and I start my internship at Entertainment Tonight tomorrow.
However, I will attempt to start to broach a subject that has been on my mind for the past day or so. The following story ran in the Los Angeles Daily News. Apparently, two Indian reporters (reporters from India) have been hired to cover the Pasadena city council for the website www.pasadenanow.com. In order to clarify so that I don't sound
It sounds like the goal is for the website to have a summary of the Monday city council meeting posted online so that when Tuesday morning rolls around Pasadena residents can go online and read all about the exciting events that have transpired.
The logic is there. India is in a different time zone so that when city council meetings go long, a reporter does not have to burn the midnight oil in order to get the story filed before the AM deadline.
The problem is that journalism is suffering. We have a generation of journalists who can file a story without leaving home. The internet has made this possible. I just think that something is lacking. Having a story filed as soon as an event happens is amazing. I can log onto my homepage and get up to the second news at all hours of the day or night. My beef is that it is hard to capture the emotion of an event with out ever going.
It will be interesting to see if the reporters from half a world away can adequately capture and summarize a city council meeting in Pasadena. If the experiment is successful who knows the extent to which foreign reporters will cover my local news. I just think it seems sketchy.
Post script: The above was 389 words. Didn't quite make my 500 word goal, but it's a step in the right direction.
As a result of a discussion in class two notes that I made on the back of one of the readings stuck out in my mind. What is education? Who then is educated? This raises a bevy of other questions, which I will attempt to sort through on my way toward the end of this paper. I doubt I will reach any conclusions; rather, this will be as in depth of a foray into philosophy, education, mass media, culture, and Jeff Peak’s mind as I can get without dying.
A body of knowledge acquired while being educated. (Widget dictionary on my computer)
Any set of experiences and/or memories that can be used to synthesize with current situations/problems/questions in order to attempt to solve/come to a conclusion about said situations/problems/questions at hand. (My definition)
A homeless woman has been living in a city for all her life. Recently she
Who is more educated?: Both the doctor and the homeless woman have a variety of knowledge that overlaps, but as a result of the positions that they are in, one is judged to be more educated than the other. However, both are just as educated.
Who does society view as more educated?: The doctor. Perception is everything. Doctors have to spend a certain amount of time in school in order to get licensed. As a result of their time in school, (elementary, high school, college and medical school) they achieve the status of a trusted and learned individual who can help to improve the quality of life of those around them. The knowledge gained during this time in school not only takes years to attain, but it can help to save lives. Anybody can be homeless. It takes an education to know how to survive, but no skill to get there.
Are some people more predisposed toward learning?
Similar questions along the same vein would include:
Why do some people have photographic memories and other people do not?
Why do some people have hand eye coordination and other people do not?
Why can some people create art very well, and other people cannot?
Whether these are questions for a biologist, geneticist, psychologist, or any other type of ist, the outcome plays a role on education. If these differences in individuals exist from birth, it would mean that certain people have a predisposition toward learning, or retaining information. As a result, Thomas Jefferson was wrong because in at least one respect all men were not created equal. If the differences do not exist from birth, certain people must have better teachers than others. Better teachers, or there is something in the water that causes people to be smarter. Bottle that water up, market the hell out of it, and sell it for millions.
What is learning? To use the terminology of my definition of education, learning would then be the acquiring of experiences and memories necessary to make future synthesis possible. Education begins right after birth. The first learning for a young child is done strictly by accident. Instinct. A baby feels discomfort and cries. After a while, the baby begins to get trained. When he/she cries he/she gets fed, a diaper changed, or entertained. The baby begins to recognize people: mom, dad and siblings. Imitation of sound begets spoken language, and eventually understanding of what those spoken sounds mean.
Education from environment: Nobody is immune from the effects that an environment imposes upon life. Parents, neighborhood, friends, weather all affect life. Parents, or even lack of parents affect the way that a child is raised at a most basic level. Parents have a set of morals which they impose on their child's life in the form of care rendered, rules, and upbringing. Some parents -- not all, but some -- believe in showing their kids affection and love. Having parental support in a loving environment creates a supportive atmosphere for a kid to be raised in. The opposite would be an environment, for example, where a kid learns early on that dad drinks and that dad should be avoided after having alcohol.
- Women get attention from men if they look beautiful.
- A beautiful woman is a skinnier, scantily clad woman.
- Men see women as accessories.
The scary part is what the implications are. There are some great teachers, and some terrible ones, and this is not just comparing Ms. Soussi to Mr. Weiss. Nowadays kids sit for hours on end watching TV, and absorbing what they see. They are learning. What they are learning depends on what they watch. It is hard to see kids or even adults being content to watch public access on television every day. Even if public television is the only thing watched, John Donne put it best in Meditation XVII when he said, "No man is an island entire of itself." There are still billboards along the sides of the freeways soliciting information to those who drive past. There are advertisements in magazines. And these are just first hand interactions with the
Implications for Education: 1.) KFed has had more of an influence on my life than I would have hoped.
2.) There has to be a hierarchy of importance placed upon knowledge. And I think, to a large extent, there has been. There are certain skills that are taught in schools while other skills are neglected. Two main questions: Who determines what is worth teaching? What is being ignored as a result of the hierarchy determined by those teaching? There's no good answer. People are like bacterium infecting a human body. A broad spectrum antibiotic is prescribed in the hopes that one part of it will hit the infected area. I see education the same way. Schools teach a variety of subjects in hopes that a kid can eventually use that foundation to turn into a productive member of society.
This goes back to "Thought Question 1" where it was asked, who is more educated, the doctor or the homeless woman? The homeless woman received a larger portion of her education, as it related to her situation, from experience. To a large extent, the doctor gets better at what he does from experience too. Both are equally as smart. Take the doctor and swap him with the homeless woman, or vice versa and both would be fish out of water. Is the fact that the doctor is the more productive member of society the basis for our judgment of his education?
Where do I go from here? To a large extent this paper/blog is largely inadequate in trying to decipher education. I spent the better portion of four weeks trying to figure out how to put this into words, and I don't feel like I did a good enough job. Perhaps because billboards educate, television educates, my interactions with other people educate me. Learning is not something that I can turn off, not something that other people can turn off, rather it's something that is ignored by those not in the know, and exploited by those who do know.
Advertisers spend millions of dollars promoting a product so that when I get thirsty, I pick up a certain brand of beverage. Millions of dollars spent creating a culture, defining values, telling me how to live. Ignoring them doesn't make it go away, rather it subscribes the counter-culturals to a whole different culture. Ignoring the ads shuts them down on the direct front, but millions of people are still influenced by them, and they influence me. I am a product of my society's education.
I am as educated as the doctor, I am as educated as the homeless woman. I have watched MTV, played Halo, and tried as hard as I could to avoid KFed. They have all been part of my education, though. Are these the people and things that I want educating the future, though? I don't think I have a choice. I'm not the only one that they have influenced, so the future will be tainted as well.
I can.
Subtitled: A tribute to the poetry written by Mrs. Denise Wade.
It could have been a lesson right out of a class on satire.
Gross exaggerations of characteristics in order to illustrate a point.
A new lens with which to view societal problems.
The only problem was that over Spring Break
the story was real.
Once upon a time there was a city called New Orleans…
a true story of unfortunate events.
Our paths crossed, and now neither of us will be the same.
Satire. Life. Lessons.
This time the situation was real.
The characters were real.
Mrs. Wade. Mr. Jones, Vera, Donald.
If the story had been written by Pope,
it would have masterfully satirized the country’s
racial tensions and denial of poverty by using a fairy tale
set in the little town of New Orleans.
If only the story had been written by Pope.
Katrina wove a different tale.
New Orleans nearly died a year and a half ago
after suffering from an abusive hurricane and then
nearly overdosing on water.
The rehabilitation process has been a slow one.
White people have the money to rehab.
To rebuild their broken homes,
and pick up the pieces of their broken lives.
That’s nice for them.
No really, it’s nice. Someone has to start rebuilding
and it sure as hell isn’t going to be people from the lower classes.
They don’t even have enough money to get back to the city
let alone gut their house and start over.
Think that New Orleans is just a bunch of bayou
stuck beneath sea level next to a river.
Think again.
New Orleans is filled with mountains.
Mountains that people face when trying to rebuild their lives.
Government, society, poverty, race.
Just like Everest.
And these people won’t ever rest.
Not until their lives are restored.
They say that Katrina added 10 years to everyone’s life.
Some people don’t have 10 years.
Didn’t have 10 years.
The hurricane didn’t kill them when it hit,
but the hurricane killed them.
How does it feel to rely on the generosity of volunteers to rebuild a city?
To humble oneself to ask for help in one moment, many moments of need.
I wouldn’t be able to do it.
Many people can’t.
It’s far easier just close that chapter of life and start a fresh page elsewhere.
Life. Lessons. Stories.
For me it was like Vesuvius had erupted again.
Causing devastation, and preserving it beneath
layers of ash. Only there was no ash.
The city was preserved beneath a layer of poverty.
The archeologists: the volunteers piling out
of the long white vans only to discover that
A house that looks normal from the outside is dying on the inside.
The inside of these houses are perfectly preserved.
and why?
Because there is no money.
Because rebuilding is slow.
A watered down version of a once vibrant culture.
An election is coming up.
In just a short period of time television will be filled with political ads.
Millions upon millions of dollars spent, and for what?
To ruin the reputation, the life of another human being.
Katrina ruined lives for free.
Wouldn’t it be great if those millions of dollars
were spent in a more constructive way.
Not constructing a reputation, or a political machine.
But to rebuild a home. Mr. Jones’ home. Mrs. Wade’s home.
Lessons. Life. New Orleans.
Exhibit one:
Language does not describe
Language defines
Language creates
Exhibit two:
Myers Briggs test
Now that the two exhibits are out of the way, I'm going to try and formulate my thoughts into a cohesive blog, the content of which will explain the argument that I was not able to articulate during my Mass Media class today.
The year that Dornsife got to Creighton, he was requested to take his freshmen seminar to take the Myers Briggs personality test. He refused. I hope I am doing Dornsife's argument justice when I am saying that the reason for this dissension was, and still is, that the test ascribes meaningless letters to individuals telling those individuals what career path to choose based upon those letters. The test is prescriptive. "You're not obliged to have yourself renamed."
The example given was that after taking the class to take the test, an individual who had been very actualized, comfortable with himself, was told that he needed to be something based upon the letters that came out from his test. As a result, the individual changed. The language ascribed values to his life and told him he needed to change based upon what those values said about his life. A new reality was created based upon language used. We need to be careful with our language.
That is the point I agree on. Language is dangerous. Language defines. Language creates. The Myers Briggs test does this to an extent. An extent. The extent to which it creates is the point that I argued unsuccessfully in class. This is my attempt to clarify my thoughts because I have had time to sift through them.
Personality tests have a purpose. They are not creating a new reality, they are just attributing new terms to the reality already known by an individual. For instance, in observations of myself, I have realized that in order to rejuvenate myself I would rather be alone. I'll read a book, I'll go swimming. In larger groups, while I don't mind them, I tend to be the person that lets other people speak because they get more pleasure out of thrilling a crowd. To sum up all the individual situations, I may use the term introvert/introversion. Myers Briggs has a set of questions that may help determine if someone is an introvert/extrovert based upon how they would respond to the situations given in the test. The way that I answered the question was consistent with how I observed my personality. Myers Briggs would give the letter "I" to those with introvert characteristics.
There is a drawback. Someone may have both introvert and extrovert characteristics/tendencies. The test is not perfect in this respect. One cannot be both an "E" and an "I." However, the knowledge gained from the test is that someone has a personality that at times is introverted, and at times extroverted. If a person has done any amount of self reflection, he/she should have been able to realize this. A personality test should not be needed to discover one's personality, but for those who do not regularly take time to introspect, the test helps facilitate this.
My question would be that if a person comes to the realization by himself/herself that he has introverted tendencies, and defines those introverted tendencies, would that then be just as bad as a Myers Briggs test?
If a person is filling out a graduation questionnaire that asks "What would you like to be when you grow up?" by the same logic, this would be just as bad. If I said I wanted to be a dentist, my reality would then be that I wanted to be a dentist. I have defined reality. Most people are able to realize, though, that reality can change.
"Be deliberate in the signs applied to you, and the signs applied to others. Their lives are at stake."
Yes.
To an extent. Well, lives are always at stake as a result of language. However, by defining characteristics that are already present, ascribing a letter to them instead of the whole word, that is not much of a reality creation.
But, people cannot be completely summed up by one of two choices in four different categories; therefore, validating the point that the prescriptive part of the Myers Briggs, where jobs are suggested based on the results of the test, is not beneficial, and could be detrimental. However, if the college experience is all about finding one's self, as was one definition given in class, the identification of already present personality traits should not be as detrimental as made out to be.
That is the point I wanted to make in class. This is a semi successful summation of what I wanted to write. I need more introspection to firm up some of the details.
Prior to my coming to a Jesuit university, I wouldn't have thought too much about it, but there is something about the way of education here that is conducive to delving deeper not only in classes, but also in life. Only problem is that English class and Saussure is already stretching my mind far more than it has been before. I guess in the spirit of the religious focus of Creighton, and because it has been an issue that I have been struggling with for a while, I will try and write my way through a current conundrum that is puzzling me.
"What if God was one of us?" she asks. Fair question.
God is currently dwelling in heaven, a reality that I have only been able to imagine. Because of our lack of interaction, God has never shared part of his reality with me. Some may argue that the Bible is God's word -- thus a sharing of reality -- in which case, I may be able to say that our linguistic realities are a tad closer than I originally thought. However, Christian doctrine teaches that God is both all knowing and infinite. These two characteristics definitely present a pickle to the Saussurian model of language.
There aren't many other applicable illustrations of infinite beings in relation to my reality. That isn't to say that they don't exist, I just can't think of them. There is always the possibility, though, of a non mutual sharing of reality. The realities would not overlap to the extent that God's does, but it still exists. In this instance, I cite another song. Bleu's hit song "Watching You Sleep," is a song about a stalker, a sharing in someone's reality, without the linguistic interaction. In this case, the stalker isn't sharing reality like the omniscient God is, but it's creepy enough when it happens, without reciprocation.
While my final example hasn't happened in the real world, to the best of my knowledge, there was a movie made about "The Truman Show," where someone stages the life of an individual for the purpose of T.V. In this instance, there is an all-knowing creator, but he doesn't know every thought of Truman Burbank, as is witnessed when Truman decides that he wants to run away.
The perplexing part is that this is all speculation. Not stalking, that definitely exists, but for as many good arguments about God's existence, there are arguments to the contrary. Even after winning an argument about God's existence, one still has to come up with a definition of the Almighty's traits, no easy task in itself. Is the Dude omnipotent, omnibenelovent, omniscient, or just sort of omniscient, and not all good? No one knows. At least no one who has shared reality with him.
It may not be a small beef as much as it's a pretty large beef. Big cow. 21 oz. steak. The qualms are with Ash Wednesday. I don't like it.
Allow me to qualify, Ash Wednesday is a fine day, a stellar kick off to the Lenten season. The attitudes that Catholics have towards the day make me irritated though. This all started about 6 years ago...
(Cue the time warp music now)
I was sitting in church back home for the Ash Wednesday afternoon service, and the church was packed. Standing room only. Sunday services never got this full. Unless it was Christmas or Easter, but that's for a whole different blog post. The crazy thing was that all the services were like this. It made me question why Ash Wednesday is probably the third most attended church service of the year.
As the ashes were distributed, the answer came to me.
During this ash distribution, even more people came into the church. They were late of course, running on the typical Catholic time, but as soon as they got the ashes, they left. Total time in church, less than five minutes. This made me realize that I had misplaced the entire focus of my Catholic faith. I was pissed.
For so long, I thought that receiving the body and blood of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist (not everyone is going to agree on this; however, since this is my blog, I post my views) was going to help me on my path toward salvation. All this time I was wrong. All I needed to do was burn some blessed palm fronds and smear them in the shape of a cross on my forehead. That's all.
What made me even more infuriated was that the Bible was wrong this whole time. In the Gospel it is the quiet man praying in the church that is praised by Jesus while the Pharisee who is praying loudly for everyone to hear is ostracized. That's not how the real world works. We need to go to church and get our ashes to prove how good of Catholics we are. Show the whole world that we are great because of the burnt palm fronds. What's more, it's not even necessary to stay for the whole service, five minutes is enough to be reminded of my own mortality and to get the ole smear-a-roo of ashes on my forehead. How could I have been so blind?
For so long I was deceived. Just another giant flaw of the Catholic church. So I stay irritated at Ash Wednesday, holding my grudge, letting the beef get bigger and bigger. I do feel the need to spread the word though. While so many people have figured Ash Wednesday out, I'm positive that there are still some people out there. People who are like how I was six years ago. I don't want them to have to come to this terrible realization on their own, so I share. I only hope that this eases the lesson that needs to be learned.
