This is a start, but I need one more body paragraph where I want to touch on the nuclear-level effects of Affluenza like bankruptcy at rates above that over college graduation as well as increasing levels of family fracturing and divorce due to extensive financial reasons. There should be a brief conclusion at the end with long-term effects on us as a population and why non-asset-holding college kids should care. Suggestions about prevention and cure of affluenza will get thrown into the end as well including social and financial changes that need to be made. Works cited will be completed at the end, but I listed my main information sources for reference, they will get worked in for internal citations in-text. I would like to get feedback on what conclusions I might be jumping to without proper backing as well as where I can expand and add more detail!
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Thursday, November 10, 2011
to tame a wild tongue
What definitions does Anzaldúa dispute in her piece? What definitions does she introduce that are new to you? Respond to her arguments – what resonated for you, and what didn’t work?
Anzaldúa is arguing the disastrous nature of the linguistic terrorism her culture experiences by English speakers and Spanish speakers alike. I hadn't really considered any one dialect of Spanish (I have lived in Texas my whole life, so perhaps it's the only one I have been exposed to) to be inferior to the others. The only thing I can even think of comparing it to is the funny looks Texas give to the occasional aboot that sneak out a Canadian/Northerner's mouth, but I had never thought of one being superior to the other. I can see where she's coming from with this argument, but I'm not sure that war and the loss of a dialect in formal speech can necessarily be equated like she tries to. A dialect is certainly a form of expression, and it's sad that schools try to take it away, but I didn't really get that out of her argument. The way she presented the oppression in English classes almost made me take the side of the school. I don't speak Spanish in any capacity, and in the first half of the essay there's a lot of Spanish colloquialisms and phrases that I couldn't understand without Google. I was pretty frustrated with trying to get her gist when I couldn't understand everything she said, and if I was trying to teach an English class I was hired to instruct, I would be equally perturbed.
Anzaldúa is arguing the disastrous nature of the linguistic terrorism her culture experiences by English speakers and Spanish speakers alike. I hadn't really considered any one dialect of Spanish (I have lived in Texas my whole life, so perhaps it's the only one I have been exposed to) to be inferior to the others. The only thing I can even think of comparing it to is the funny looks Texas give to the occasional aboot that sneak out a Canadian/Northerner's mouth, but I had never thought of one being superior to the other. I can see where she's coming from with this argument, but I'm not sure that war and the loss of a dialect in formal speech can necessarily be equated like she tries to. A dialect is certainly a form of expression, and it's sad that schools try to take it away, but I didn't really get that out of her argument. The way she presented the oppression in English classes almost made me take the side of the school. I don't speak Spanish in any capacity, and in the first half of the essay there's a lot of Spanish colloquialisms and phrases that I couldn't understand without Google. I was pretty frustrated with trying to get her gist when I couldn't understand everything she said, and if I was trying to teach an English class I was hired to instruct, I would be equally perturbed.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
pearls before breakfast
I think one of the main things the author argues in Pearls is that of Music. Not just music, but good music. Bell is an incredible artist, even a work of art, but a work of art in the wring place without a frame is just art - not a masterpiece. This essay takes on a Kant-like epistemological point of view: is good music inherently good, or does it need to be perceived as good by the listener to be good? Bell talked about the validation he got for performing for thousands of dollars per minute in front of hundreds of paying ticket-holders. When he was taken out of that glorious setting and transplanted into a cold and dark subway station with sad clothes and an empty case, all the controlled variables for the concert hall are gone (no captive audience, no attention, no name recognition, no acoustics, nothing.) He's playing the same pieces with the same grandeur as he would play in Carnegie Hall, but without a frame, the artwork hangs alone. People rush by without any idea what kind of talent they're passing up. Bell was hoping that even against the odds of people rushing by to get to government jobs or get home, beauty would transcend needs.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
in-class writing 11/3
This class discussion helped me re-frame the argument I was trying to make. I don't think my topic is as huge of a cultural phenomenon as we were talking about today, but the papers and the way they re-framed the conversation about wither topic were helpful in structuring mine better. The reading we did for today wasn't totally helopful intil we put it into flowchart form - could make for some very well-put-together paragraphs here pretty soon. This also gives me some more ideas on topics in general since some of the samples in the file reminded me of the film paper where I tackled stereotypes and pre-conceived notions about groups. Definitely should be better. I got a political cartoon related to running/redefining the running shoe like my argument, so maybe that can tie in as well.
an introduction to the toulmin model
a more college-kid friendly interpretation:
Argument is kinda tough to teach cause all the books on it suck and if all you do is tell kids what NOT to to - that's what going to happen. They're not going to do it. We gotta be positive here. There's not a lot of really well-structured arguments in day-to-day talk, so we gotta go old-school here to this model that looks like a teeter-totter. Here's where Toulmin hits the streets. He says making arguments with real life examples is tough, but here's the basics:
The Data: The starting point and the reason you got on the teeter-totter.
The Warrant: The down low, what we should already know, and what the argument hinges on. Get it?!
The Claim: the point you're trying to make by the time you've gone through the whole teeter-totter.
Ok but here's the catch - arguments aren't always rainbows and butterflies here. There's going to be times when you need a little street cred to get the argument to stand on its own. Here's your backup singers:
The Qualifier: likes to hang out with the claim, keeps the argument realistic, "Keeps it real."
The Reservation: sometimes the warrant isn't always right (even Dog the Bounty Hunter could tel you that), so the reservation sets some ground rules (the first rule of fight club...)
The Backing: justifies what we're assuming with the warrant is legit, gives it a reason to be.
Pretty hardcore.
Argument is kinda tough to teach cause all the books on it suck and if all you do is tell kids what NOT to to - that's what going to happen. They're not going to do it. We gotta be positive here. There's not a lot of really well-structured arguments in day-to-day talk, so we gotta go old-school here to this model that looks like a teeter-totter. Here's where Toulmin hits the streets. He says making arguments with real life examples is tough, but here's the basics:
The Data: The starting point and the reason you got on the teeter-totter.
The Warrant: The down low, what we should already know, and what the argument hinges on. Get it?!
The Claim: the point you're trying to make by the time you've gone through the whole teeter-totter.
Ok but here's the catch - arguments aren't always rainbows and butterflies here. There's going to be times when you need a little street cred to get the argument to stand on its own. Here's your backup singers:
The Qualifier: likes to hang out with the claim, keeps the argument realistic, "Keeps it real."
The Reservation: sometimes the warrant isn't always right (even Dog the Bounty Hunter could tel you that), so the reservation sets some ground rules (the first rule of fight club...)
The Backing: justifies what we're assuming with the warrant is legit, gives it a reason to be.
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
getting started
I'm lucky I work in the industry I'm looking to evaluate. I have hands-on experience and connections to the representatives of the brands that shape the footwear industry. Aside from hundreds of footwear catalogues and technical speification sheets for several shoes, there's a lot of promotional material that goes out to customers - a direct insight into a companies' motivation to push a shoe or lack thereof. There's a lot of exercise physiology and biomechanical research going on right now concerningthe shod vs. unshod foot and how it behaves in the running as well as walking process, and databases in EBSCO like SportDiscus and the ACSM database have great representation of this ongoing trend. There's a lot of information riht now since this movement is so huge, so I think this paper is all abot filtering the outspu and making sure sources are reliable and unbiased about the industry.
back to barefoot.
I think there's a wide variety of definitions I would want to write a whole paper about, but I'll explore one really familiar to me that I struggle with everyday to get the brain going on this one. I work at a running shoe store, and my job is pretty much analyzing the gait of the customer, and custom-fit runners, walkers, and exercisers in shoe that fits their unique needs. The concept that has been most challenged in the industry I work with is that of the ideal running shoe. Companies like Asics, Nike, Adidas, etc. have owned the footwear market for years making really cushioned and supportive shoes for people who want something "comfortable" and doctors make orthopedic inserts for virtually any foot ailment. Sounds right? Here's the problem:
Feet.
Your foot is perfect the way it is. People complain about flat feet, high arches, and cramped up toes. It's hard to believe that people even survived without huge, fluffy, supportive, corrective shoes, right? Wrong. It sounds kind of silly to think our feet can't even support themselves. Your feet were made with the intention of supporting your body exclusively. They can walk and run and jump all day long. That being said, most of us have been wearing shoes on our feet since we were crawling. There are hundreds of muscles and tendons in our feet that function just like those in our hands - where they should be able to function independently. A foot raised without a shoe does an awesome job of supporting itself, gripping the ground, proprioceptive ability (think: stepping on a lego with bare feet), and efficient running and walking. Obviously, we can't just develop the strength of 20 years in shoes overnight, but there's first steps for everybody. Not everyone needs to buy barefoot shoes and run marathons. Bodies are made to run barefoot. Bodies are not made to run on concrete or without a gradual training plan. I think this redefining of footwear for fitness over time will change the face of running and walking shoes as we know it. Ever since Nike came out with the Free running shoe in 2005, almost every company has come out with a response, even as small as lowering the ratio of heel stack height to forefoot stack height. Over time, less running injuries and less injured runners will needs treatment if we go back to barefoot.
Feet.
Your foot is perfect the way it is. People complain about flat feet, high arches, and cramped up toes. It's hard to believe that people even survived without huge, fluffy, supportive, corrective shoes, right? Wrong. It sounds kind of silly to think our feet can't even support themselves. Your feet were made with the intention of supporting your body exclusively. They can walk and run and jump all day long. That being said, most of us have been wearing shoes on our feet since we were crawling. There are hundreds of muscles and tendons in our feet that function just like those in our hands - where they should be able to function independently. A foot raised without a shoe does an awesome job of supporting itself, gripping the ground, proprioceptive ability (think: stepping on a lego with bare feet), and efficient running and walking. Obviously, we can't just develop the strength of 20 years in shoes overnight, but there's first steps for everybody. Not everyone needs to buy barefoot shoes and run marathons. Bodies are made to run barefoot. Bodies are not made to run on concrete or without a gradual training plan. I think this redefining of footwear for fitness over time will change the face of running and walking shoes as we know it. Ever since Nike came out with the Free running shoe in 2005, almost every company has come out with a response, even as small as lowering the ratio of heel stack height to forefoot stack height. Over time, less running injuries and less injured runners will needs treatment if we go back to barefoot.
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