Blogs

    There is no doubt that “mother” is one of the most valuable and influential figures in our society. She plays a vital role within the traditional family structure, which is part of our social fabric and is at the core of our culture. However, many of us do not expect that being a mother would make me more of a feminist. In fact, we fear quite the opposite, worrying that feminist convictions would wane under the weight of overfilled diaper bags and the expansive responsibilities of caring for children. I therefore wondered the correlation between motherhood and feminism: Are they compatible? What is the effect of a feminist parenting? Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua, though may not give me answer to the questions, at least provides me with some interesting hints.

 [edited 3/3/12 for formatting]

This semester I am taking Intro to Film with Michael Tratner.  We recently watched a 1960’s French New Wave film directed by Jean-Luc Godard, Breathless.   This movie featured two main characters: Michel and Patricia.  Michel steals a car, impulsively shoots a policeman, and spends the rest of the film on the run from the police.  He imposes himself on his “girlfriend” Patricia, a young New Yorker who sells newspapers in the streets of Paris.  Michel spends most of his time trying to convince Patricia to sleep with him and have her run away with him to Italy, and Patricia spends most of her time blowing him off and pursuing her career as a journalist. 

           All genres have gaps of indeterminacy as each reader creates an account of their own. As a particular choice of words, a Google-search click away, an abrupt ending to a short story, or the space between comics panels, gaps appear in all genres and are to be filled by the reader. A text is subject to a reader’s interpretation as the reader fills in these gaps through uniquely drawn connections and meanings that are relevant to him or her. Whether the text appears as an online blog, an academic journal, a short story, or a graphic novel, a unique reading experience will be created as one completes the missing story in a text.  As we continue engaging our class discussion on literary genre, it may be agreed upon that we all have had different readings of a text and that gaps of indeterminacy will prevail.

“Disability is a mode of human difference (Price, p.4).”  In the past decades there has been a growing emphasis on the differences among people within the school setting.  This emphasis on differences has led us to create more genres of students existing within the classroom.  Advances in psychology have increased awareness of various mental differences and how they affect the success in the school setting.  The expectations for success have now changed because with this new awareness every individual is provided with the opportunity to learn, leading to an increase in the categories society places students into.      

One awkward person trying to think it through and not even brushing the tip of the iceberg. 

Part 1

Part 2

(Attempts at embedding lead to two copies of one video, so I'm afraid I only have links.)

Videos of myself attempting to explain why sometimes we have to look past ignorance as an explanation for behavior, and explore and dissect how behaviors are considered acceptable in the first place. What is power? How do we use it? How is it used against us, and how does its use against others affect us? What layers of power do we as individuals move against? 

            In my last web paper, I gave a brief history of Korea and the dynamic religious background that has followed Korea’s development in its fundamental ideas of woman’s relationship to man and vice-versa. Essentially, the stemming of modern discrimination against women, or the dichotomy of the two sexes, could be said to come from Korea’s groundings in Confucianism during the 14th century.

One System Does Not Work for Everyone

When I was in middle school, I had to take a physical education class every other day.  Every week, on the last day of class, our teachers would let us choose a sport that we wanted to play: kick ball, soccer, basketball or walking.  Of course, I chose soccer every time - it is my favorite sport to play.  After about three weeks, the teachers realized that the same people were picking the same sports to play every time.  They announced that since some students were dominating one sport, they were going to create a structured space for all students to play each sport.  So they put us in groups and rotated us throughout the sports.  What happened to free play?  The teachers thought that students who were always walking every week secretly wanted to play soccer.  They thought they were doing them a favor, but those students just stood on the field.  They didn’t want to play a contact sport with lots of competition and running.  They wanted to relax and think and walk.

“Who are the 99?

An ever-growing team of specially powered young people. The 99 prevent disasters, help people in need, and perform good deeds under the banner of the 99 Steps Foundation.

What are the Noor Stones?

Each member of the 99 bears a Noor Stone- an ancient gem of power. Forged out of the destruction of ancient Baghdad, the Noor Stones were created to preserve the wisdom of the ages. When bonded with a specific young person, each gem grants him or her a different gift of power”

When someone mentioned in class that language was a feminist issue, I was so curious as to how.  Beyond perhaps certain words ending in "man," I couldn't think of a way that language could be sexist.  "'The english language is sexist in so far as it relegates women to a secondary and inferior lace in society'" (Spender 15).  Language is the way that you communicate with others and express yourself, if that is inherently male, then how are women expected to express themselves?   As we saw in The Book of Salt, it was difficult for Bìhn to progress further in his community because of the language barrier.   He doesn't have the tools to gain social capital. He lacks the ability to speak in a certain way that will gain him a higher position in life.  

WHAT IS A FEMINIST LANGUAGE