Monday, February 23, 2009

Talking Points # 3 

Gayness, Multicultural Education, and Community
Dennis Carlson

Authors Argument:
Carlson is arguing that communities, and schools should teach the people how to realize everyone is normal, and there isn't normal or abnormal people, just people.  He also states that it is the job of teachers and leaders to use the words "gay", "lesbian", "homosexual", etc. in their language, because it isn't something to be ashamed of just another aspect of life different from the "normals".

Quotes:
1)  "gay people have for the most part been made absent, invisible, and silent within this community and at the same time represented as the deviant and pathological 'other'."
When I first read this quote, I thought to myself, I never thought of gay people as invisible or silent.  It makes me wonder who really starts pointing out someone that is different.  I'd like to know what the normal persons looks like, or what the normal should be.  There are infinite number of different people, how can there be a normal.  That's pretty sad that some people stay "silent" because of their sexuality, and not because of the person they are.

2)  "(ie. black, working class, female, homosexual, etc.) are disempowered and represented as deviant, sick, neurotic, criminal, lazy, lacking in intelligence, and in other ways 'abnormal'."
Wow.  This quote is insane.  Because of someone's gender, sexuality, or race, they are dumb or lazy.  I am almost speechless about this.  I wonder is this the parents who help the kids to grow up like this, is it the views they are taught in school, I don't know what it is but it needs to be figured out and stopped.

3)  "The objective of classroom discourse is thus not so much to achieve consensus on "truth" or "objective" depiction of reality, but rather to clarify differences and agreements, work toward coalition-building across difference when possible, and build relationships based on caring and equity."
This is our future job, this is what as future teachers we need to strive to do.  I read this quote over a couple times and I thought to myself, I hope that I can really do this.  I hope I'm up to the responsibility as a teacher to shape and mold young people to become better than what I am and how everyone else is.  I am really excited to inspire and change you children's lives.

Questions/Comments:
This piece was actually pretty hard for me to read.  I don't know if it was the language or if it was his writing style, because it wasn't relazed, but I had to read a couple things over a couple times to understand it.  I think this is good that we are learning about gender, because I know in a high school classroom, which I'm looking to teach in, I will definitely have to deal with such things a gender, sexuality, race, etc.

Monday, February 16, 2009

Talking Point # 2 Rodriguez

Aria
Richard Rodriguez

Authors Argument:
Rodriguez argues that ones' self identity can often be altered in the face of adversity. He also agrues that ones' personal family and traditional lifestyle can be completely changed when one is trying to become a member of the society/culture of power.  Rodriguez stresses that a person should keep their individuality no matter how they have to change their lives.

Quotes:

1)  "In an instant, they agreed to give up the language (the sounds) that had revealed and accentuated our family's closeness."
I picked this quote because it made me feel sorry in a way.  Not only for Rodriguez, but for all the people who speak different languages and have to change their traditions to be accepted into the society/culture of power.  It's not fair for people to have to change, but it is the reality of it.  It's very different being in the white majority of people, I will never have to change anything in my life to fit in, nor will I ever know what it is like to give up a tradition just to fit in.

2)  "That day i moved very far from the disadvantaged child i had been only days earlier.  The belief, the calming assurance that I belonged in public, had at last taken hold."
I know Rodriguez is expressing joy in this quote, but I looked at the implicit meaning of it and thought of how horrible he must have felt prior to that day.  Not being able to speak, or hold a conversation, or express his own thoughts just because he wasn't speaking English.  That makes me angry at this "power" white people seem to have.

3)  "But the special feelings of closeness at home was diminished by then.  Gone was the desperate, urgent, intense feeling of being home; rare was the experience feeling myself individualized by family intimates.  We remained a loving family, but one greatly changed.  No longer so close; no longer bound tight by the pleasing and troubling knowledge of our public separateness."
It seems to me that there is a sense of new hope here, but no great happiness.  Rodriguez expresses how much tradition and family mean to him, and by loosing all of it, he feels as if he lost his family in a way.  Now they are accepted into the "public", because they all can speak English, but they have lost the bonds their family shared because they were not accepted.

Questions/Comments:
I really enjoyed reading this, I got a firm sense of what it is like to give up what you think is right to become something you never knew you had to be.  Rodriguez shows what it is like not to be able to talk in public because it is not a public language.  he shows what it is like to be excited to be able to speak in public finally.  He also expresses what it is like to loose personal identity and feel like an out cast.

Monday, February 9, 2009

Talking Points #1

110 People Who Are Screwing Up America
Bernard Goldberg

Author's Argument:
Goldberg states that Kozol has a very liberal attitude towards the education system.  Goldberg argues that Kozol's attitude in the education system is highly used and that people don't only use the liberal system but the children leaving these education systems are being turned out with blinders on, and that liberal is the way to be.

Quotes:
"They got there for lowering the level of civil discourse in this country- or for their shameless willingness to destroy decent people"
I really enjoy this quote, because it shows how angry Goldberg is about the situation in which peoples morals are being subjected to change, whether they like it or not.

"Once, it was understood by almost everyone that there is no free lunch and that you got yours, as the old commercial had it, "the old fashion way", you earned it!"
I can not say I fully agree with this quote, however I understand where Goldberg is coming from.  I know what its like to have to work hard so I can pay car insurance and small bills like that, so I think that shows that people have to take the initiative to work so they can pay for some of their own stuff.

Questions/Comments:
I found this article pretty interesting because it brought some basic things that you don't normally think about into perspective.


Amazing Grace
Jonathan Kozol

Author's Arguments:
Kozol argues that peoples lives get ripped away from them when tragedy strikes, and illness or misfortunate events happen.  He believes that no matter why a person is in the situation they are in, they deserve a better life, that the poor, sick, or others deserve to have the same life as those who earned it, whether they did or not.  He also argues that even though people live in poor quality homes and towns, they deserve to have a good life, without the threat of robbery, shootings, etc.

Quotes:
"The $150 million spent to build the dazzling new structure..., is almost exactly the same as what the city spent in the same year to purchase the massive prison barge that it has moored at Hunts Point in the South Bronx, where it accommodates the graduates and dropouts of much less attracting high schools on six floating floors of prison cells."
This quote really makes you think about how much money the cities and states waste on people who have messed up and are in prison, rather than spending it on the people who can barely make it day to day.

"I am in hell and you are not and so I hate you and I have to try to bring you down to where I am.  I feel pity for them and fear because they are lost."
It seems as though Kozol feels the pain of these people and is trying to see where they are coming from.  I agree with him, I feel everyone can change how they act but sometimes people get sucked into their lives of poverty because of they chances they have missed.  

Questions/Comments:
I enjoyed this article, because it made me think about how it is to live in such an unfair environment.  Kozol points out problems that really effect people and why they may be in the situations they are in.  He points out how some people have to change their whole lifestyle because of their living conditions.