Final Blog!

This semester has been a wonderful experience and I enjoyed the class so much. I can't believe that it's the end of the semester, but I've learned so much. Before I didn't really think much about how I was influenced by todays society. I knew that I was influenced somewhat, but this class has taught me that I've been influenced the day I was conceived in my mom. My name is really long and it's because of my parents culture that they chose this name for me. I've also realized how our American cultures have influenced other racial groups. The way our American society works is so different than in most other foreign places. My mom was brought up more differently than me. My grandmother had 6 children so the care and attention my mom received is different than how she raised my sister and me. Sociological Imagination has taught me that my family, friends, neighbors, school, and teachers all influenced me in more than one way. Sociological Mindfulness taught me that I should open to new perspectives of others. I've always thought that just because my friends and I grew up in the same society, doesn't make us the same. Because my family was from Asia, I was able to be raised by two parents. My Asian parents and my American parents.

Now that I've learned new things about our society and how it affects, it's gotten me interested in living in a totally different society. I really want to go see how people communicate and treat each other in a less known world than the one I live in. Our society looks at race and class a lot. Do other minority societies do as well? This class may have ended, but I'm going to keep in mind what I've learned and apply it to my everyday life. I want to volunteer and make a difference in someone's life. Maybe not everyone's, but if one person is able to be happy because of what I did, then I'm fine with just one.

Race (Crash)

This week we watched Crash. In my opinion, this movie did a great job depicting racism. Even though we have civil rights so that everyone is equal, there is still racism today. In one of the scenes where one character is buying a gun with her dad, the owner of the store accuses them of being a terrorist race.

 We have made it so that those who look Middle-Eastern are terrorists and bad people. There were references to the twin towers and planes. These people were not Arabs, but Persians but that didn't matter to the clerk because he thinks they're are all the same. There are people who were born in America and maybe their parents were born in America as well, but if they have the physical features of a certain type of group, then they are that group. Everything is down to physical features. I liked how this movie did a great job showing the kinds of racism there is today. It's surprising how people are so quick to judge people and foreigners, but don't like to be judged themselves. I have made judgements before about people, but I also hate being judged when they don't even know me. It's like a taste of your own medicine. If you know how it feels to be judged by others, then judging other people isn't exactly going to make you feel so great. You have to stop yourself from judging although it's really hard. Racism isn't going to really end because there'll always be that one person who hates another race. This is part of us, but we should keep it ourself because once you insult someone, they'll feel they have protect themselves from you. And that could lead to chaos. We talk all nasty stereotypes, but that'll offend someone in the end. 

Race

This week we talked about race!!!!!!!! Now Sal told us that if you go to Brazil, then you're a different race than you may be in America. This is really interesting because you would think that races would be the same in all countries around the world. Black, White, Asian, Hispanic, etc. But if you really think about it, race is just a word that our society created to categorize people. We gave race a meaning when it's just really a label. If we are considered a different race in another country, this just shows that race is just according to what people think.

Now this made me think of people who are colorblind. If there were two different worlds where on one side lived people who were colorblind and another where they had normal vision. If they grew up not influenced by each other and then were put together, would they categorize people and just things in general differently than we do?

We learned that after we're born our environment influences us. What if we grew up in a completely different social environment?

30 Days

This week we continued talking about social class but we also talked about how people live in that class live. The poor were not even making enough to support their family let alone themselves. We watched a show and it was about how this couple who was living the high end of life but decided to live on minimum wage. Even on minimum wage, they were barely getting by. They were only trying to support each other but even that was hard. Those that have kids and more to take care of on minimum wage is just really brave. We know there's the lower poor class but we don't really do much. Sure there's a few here and there things that are done, but it's really not doing much if you step back and look at the whole poor class. The couple in the show only had to live on minimum wage for a month, but there's people who try to make it on minimum wage their whole lives.

We also played Monopoly but with different rules. Whoever rolled the highest dice would be the old money and then second highest was new money, but everyone later than that would be either middle-class or working class.We don't really get to pick our social status, especially if you're born into it. You can move up a bit, but that's really hard to do when everything almost requires money to attain. I only work at local cafes to make money so I can spend it on the movies are shopping, but there's people who  work in cafes to support their family at home.

Social Class

This week we learned about social class. Nobody really likes to talk about their social status, but we sure have a way of showing it. Those who are wealthier may not exactly straight out say they're rich so they can afford everything, but they show it by the things they own and wear. Those that are not as wealthy, the poor, definitely don't want to go off telling the world that they can't afford anything, but just by what they wear and what they own shows how much they have. From the following picture below, you can see  these young boys being put into different class just by what they're wearing. The left looks more sophisticated so it's safe to assume that they're wealthier and more prestigious and are able to buy the things they want. The right looks more mischievous and not well off. Even by their postures you can see the difference. The suited boys stand more manlier while the casual boys have their hands in their pockets and are slouching. 

Where you move also states your social status. Whom you associate yourselves with. We know that even if we don't speak about it, we're categorized into a certain social class. It seems to be better that even if you know you're part of a certain social class, as long as no one states it verbally then it's a little ok.