Bordo Blog

In her analysis, English discusses how due to images portrayed in the media, young boys and adolescents are starting to feel more insecure about their appearances. A study was done by Moss Norman of Concordia University in Canada. “Norman concluded that boys possess a ‘double-bind masculinity,’ in which they care about their appearance but not in ways that make them look vain or uncool” (English). This is interesting cause it ties into Bordo’s essay, “Beauty (Re)discovers the Male Body,” by stating how recently, men have felt the desire to keep up with their physical appearances. English adds on to Bordo’s argument by stating that it is true that men are more self-conscious about their looks, but they feel that they should do so in a way that allows them to “transcend concerns over their physical appearance in favor of a more rational, functional outlook in life” (English). In order to fit to the contemporary social standard, they find themselves stuck in a dilemma between keeping physically fit and morally modest.

English, Marianne. "Boys Want To Look Good, but Not Too Good: Discovery News."Discovery News: Earth, Space, Tech, Animals, History, Adventure, Human, Autos. Discovery News, 30 Sept. 2011. Web. 27 Oct. 2011. <http://news.discovery.com/human/boys-media-110930l.html>.

"The 'Banking' Concept of Education"

     In Freire's essay, he discusses a great deal how modern education is a one way street. It is an "act of depositing." Teachers give their students some dosage of facts and the students are only required to regurgitate this information on some sort of examination. Friere sees this as a negative; however, I see it as a necessary evil. Yes school does only provide fact and does not stimulate thinking to some extent. However, in order to discuss or think about concepts, a student needs a certain foundation on which to begin discussing. A discussion between a proponent of socialized healthcare and someone who is indifferent and is not even aware that health care can be socialized is not a very interesting discussion. Free thinking and discussion is promoted within the classroom in several courses--such as this one--; however, in most courses, discussion occurs outside the classroom. Even after an individual is knowledgeable in a certain topic through lecture, the learning process has not stopped there. Now that person can share his perspective on socialized healthcare, for instance, with someone who disagrees with him or her. Through such a debate, it is almost certain that he or she will learn a new aspect of the topic from that other person. Therefore, one way learning in the classroom, although very static, is required.

Research Prospectus

1.                 My topic involves the benefits of online social networking. For some time now, the vast majority of arguments portrayed in the media are the negative aspects of facebook and other sites. The opposition suggests several arguments such as the youth will get addicted, too much private information is available, and users will forget how to interact in person. Although these are sound arguments, there are much more benefits than detriments. This issue is very relevant to contemporary society considering the countless hours most of us spend on facebook and other social networking sites. Facebook is in fact revolutionizing how people communicate with others.

            Although facebook has a negative connotation by most people, it has in fact facilitated group collaboration, promoting free speech, and reuniting with relatives.

            From personal experience, the vast majority of participants in a group project for a class end up creating a facebook group to easily share ideas. Using facebook, one could post links to online articles that contain content that is extremely beneficial for the project. A member of the group can also post other messages to his or her colleagues such as when they should meet next. Even scientists have expressed that facebook is a convenient tool in sharing ideas and discoveries.

            Facebook is actually a privilege in the United States. A great deal of other countries have outlawed the use of facebook and other online social networking sites. It is banned in Pakistan and Syria and was only recently allowed in China. We post statuses about what we are doing or our beliefs everyday. This is the perfect expression of our first amendment right of free speech. Unfortunately, some other countries are not so lucky.

            Facebook is also a great way to keep in touch with distant relatives. For instance, if someone in Florida wants to keep in contact with a cousin in California, they can do so easily with facebook. Rather than spend a large sum of money on many long distance phone calls or letters, one can just send a facebook message daily for free. Sending a message through facebook also reaches the recipient in California much more quickly. There was also a recent story discussing how a daughter found her biological parents through facebook after being separated from them for twenty years.

            Some of the arguments against facebook are that youth will get addicted, too much private information is easily accessible, and people will forget how to interact in person. If someone’s child gets addicted to facebook, the parent is to blame for not intervening when the addiction is in its early stages. There are many privacy settings on facebook that allow a user to block all photos from others who are not friends and they can choose to put their phone number, address, or e-mail address on their profile or not. Finally, it is a facebook user’s responsibility to interact with others in the real world outside of facebook. If people choose not too it is their issue. Even so, facebook can facilitate keeping in touch with people someone has already meant in the real world.

            I hope to research several statistics on the facebook bans, such as what countries it is banned in. I also would like to see if there are any studies that correlate to the belief that facebook causes users to become antisocial or how many people have used facebook for a group project in school at least once.

            There is an interesting article in the British Medical Journal that discusses the use of facebook in the scientific community titled “Facebook for Scientists?” (1). Another study showed the importance of facebook to teens and how it is allowing them to “grapple with social norms [and] explore interests.” (2) David Kirkpatrick’s book, The Facebook effect : the inside story of the company that is connecting the world, the author discusses how the networking website has become instrumental in political protests among other things. (3)

            Initially, I thought this topic would not have enough literature to research for. However, after hitting just the tip of the iceberg, I have found that many scholars have been writing and discussing the uses of facebook and what it means for our society. I am definitely looking forward to exploring more of the topic.

1.      http://www.jstor.org/stable/20695065?&Search=yes&searchText=facebook&list=hide&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dfacebook%26gw%3Djtx%26acc%3Don%26prq%3Dsocial%2Bnetworking%26Search%3DSearch%26hp%3D25%26wc%3Don&prevSearch=&item=4&ttl=260&returnArticleService=showFullText

2.      http://www.macfound.org/atf/cf/%7BB0386CE3-8B29-4162-8098-E466FB856794%7D/DML_ETHNOG_2PGR.PDF

3.      Kirkpatrick, David. The Facebook Effect: The Inside Story of the Company That Is Connecting the World. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010. Print.

           

"The Achievement of Desire" by Richard Rodriguez Blog

     "The Achievement of Desire" is an autobiographical work that discusses the inner conflict a "scholarship boy" has between his school life and his home life. As he progresses in his education, he becomes more disillusioned with his parents' education. He begins to feel embarrassed by his parents lack of education. Rodriguez begins to distance himself from his family to pursue his educational goals which he feels are more important. This is why he does not grasp the meaning behind the phrase "Your parents would be proud." His parents are proud, yes, but how can he relate all the valuable knowledge he has learned in school to his uneducated parents. Whenever his mother interrogates him about his courses, he only responds with short vague answers because he knows it is futile to explain his complex knowledge.
    As Rodriguez makes his way through college he takes in all his critics praises as undeserving. He feels he has not learned anything at all. In fact, he is not a good student, he is a good "mimicker." The author believes that he has no formed opinion of his own, and that all his opinions are just regurgitated from his previous educators or authors from all the books he has read. This may be stretch, but, I feel that he illustrates this lack of a voice by citing Hoggart so much. Even the final footnote states that all his quotes come from one source: The Uses of Literacy by Richard Hoggart. So are all his viewpoints in the essay coming from him, or is he just taking them from one of his many literary sources?
   Towards the end of the essay he finally feels a sort of nostalgia for the life he once held prior to his education. He refers to an intimate family life where he felt part of a distinct culture that he feels he abandoned so long ago. However, his education has now made him come to realize that he should always stay in touch with his cultural background because that is where he came from.

"The Pain Scale" Summary

     Although "The Pain Scale" is written in a very strange almost jumbled style, Biss manages to convey her points to the reader. Some of these are the similarity between God and the number 0, the inefficiency of a scale for pain, and the nonexistence of absolutes. Even though we can go on and on discussing the many themes in the work, I feel there is still one main theme that brings the whole piece together. That theme is that all knowledge and fact is relative and subjective. There is an exception to every rule. Even concrete dogmas and laws that have been established in academia can be bent or broken. Take gravity for example: what goes up must come down, but what do we say about gravity when a balloon full of helium floats out of a young child's grasp? 

     I really like how Biss discussed hell in "The Pain Scale." According to scientists, we cannot prove that hell is an actual place. However, speak to a devout Christian, and you will realize that convincing them that hell is imaginary is nearly impossible. Biss even mentions that Galileo Galilei, one of the most brilliant scientific minds of the Renaissance, attempted to map out the exact dimensions of hell (178). He was not the only brilliant scientist to do so. There were actually debates over what were the correct dimensions of hell, what sections were located where, and where the entrance is of hell is. As you can see, a good deal of people society deemed as respected and brilliant believed that hell is a concrete place. However, many credible, contemporary scientists will argue that hell is imaginary. This debate Biss discusses perfectly illustrates how knowledge is relative. 

     The piece seems to be more of internal debate of several topics rather than something trying to convey a point. It seems everytime she brings up a new topic, she just brings up more questions than answers. In doing this, I believe that she is trying to say that there are no answers. She even mentions at one point, when talking about how even at absolute zero atoms still move, that the absolute is not absolute (172). So this goes back, again, to that main theme of there is no absolute truth.

     So basically, what I got from Eula Biss is that truth is essentially what you want it to be. Every individual has their own sets of truths, morals, values, etc. Even if one person's "truth" is considered delusional by most, I am almost certain that there are several people who believe the same delusion. It's not about who is right. It's about who can argue their point the best. Defense attorneys, some of the highest paid people in society, generally argue for a person who they know is guilty. Many times the defense attorney convinces the judge and jury that he is "right" and that his client did not commit the crime even though he knows every word he has spoken is false.

"Why Bother?" Summary

     Michael Pollan's article on climate change discusses the pressing issues of global warming along with several solutions. He conveys an urgency in his article concerning the fate of our planet. He utilizes a great deal of statistics as well such as the one from James Hansen from NASA. Based on what Hansen says, we only have eight years to cut down on carbon emissions before we change our climate permanently. Pollan also discusses how we have become trapped in a world of specialists. We expect other people to do certain tasks for us such as butchers handling our meat, doctors curing our sickness, and politicians dealing with politics. He says that this has caused our society to grow complacent, and is the source of our "cheap-energy mind" that has placed the goal of going green so out of reach. The main reason most of us do not go green, he says, is because we do not think we can contribute. We believe we are useless because of the mindset of using specialist has plagued society of so long. He then attempts to persuade us by saying there are many courses of action that are feasible. He actually goes into great detail about how someone growing their own food would significantly assist in our society going green. The support he provides is, you buy less processed produce which consists of fertilizer from fossil fuels, you use less emissions by going to the grocery store, and because people would be exercising in their garden, they will not have to drive to the gym to keep in shape. He states that the garden idea will most likely cause a viral effect and people will eventually join the trend once they see all the benefits of it.

Research Topic Exploration

I have more or less a general idea of what I would to research for my paper this semester. For years I have been hearing all the negative aspects of online social networking. Kids are getting addicted. Too much private information about a person is easily accessible. People are more deficient in social skills on a real life interaction basis.  There are several great arguments against the use of social networking; however, the list of benefits are much more abundant than the list of drawbacks. For instance, we now have a resource that allows us to meet thousands of people more easily. We can now be friends with someone in China or even India. Another main benefit of easy, long distance communication is the ability to keep in touch with old friends and acquaintances. I can't even begin to guess the number of facebook groups I've been a part of for group projects for class. These groups were always very helpful with keeping us on the same page. We could post anything on the wall that we wanted the rest of the group to know such as ideas, links to research articles, etc. Other benefits are keeping digital photo albums and even invitations. With this resource we can save paper from printed pictures and mailed invitations. There are a plethora of benefits from social networking and I'm willing to explore them and narrow the down to a discernable thesis for my paper.