Why Is There Racism?

Wouldn't it be nice to not have a thing called race? And just to be called "people"? Our society tends to classify people of different races before knowing what their true race is. For example, I may walk into the grocery store with my mom, and I'll see someone with dark colored skin. I would probably think in my mind that the person I saw would be black, but what if they were really Latino? We don't know anything. We generally tend to judge someone by their outside appearance.

Living off of minimum wage??

 In class we watched an episode of 30 Days where Morgan & his fiance live off of minimum wage. While watching this episode, I thought to myself, "Wow...How can anybody live like this everyday for the rest of their lives?" I tell myself that I am lucky to be where I am right now, and to understand that there are people that live like this everyday just to keep themselves to survive. Low-middle class, middle class, middle-upper class, & upper class even struggle through life, but thinking about how others are living off of minimum wage...I am thankful for where I stand today.

Tammy's Story- Poverty

We watched a documentary on a woman named Tammy that lives in the middle of nowhere & lives in poverty. She supports her and her family by walking to work everyday 10 miles to Burger King and back home, only earning minimum wage. Tammy does this to keep her & her family to survive. In each class, (High Class, Middle Class, & Low Class), struggle with problems all the time. But if you look back at Tammy's way of life, you want to be thankful everyday that you don't live that way. That you are lucky to be where you are today. And to keep fighting those struggles throughout life, because someone else has it way worse than you do.

JAIL isn't helping

In class, we watched an episode of 30 Days with Morgan Spurlock and how he experienced these days in jail.  From watching his experience, the prisoners that he would talk with more than half were in jail because of a drug related crime. A guy named Travis was in jail because he was addiceted to cocaine, heroin, and marajuana. He had goals for himself, like getting a job when he would get released. And once he was released, he ended up committing two other crimes about 2 months later from his release date. From him being in jail for a long period of time, then already 2 months later he's committing crimes again shows that jail isn't helping these prisoners. What they really need is counseling and other programs that would       support them by becoming drug free. To come clean, and not go back to prison because apparently jail isn't helping.

Deviance

What is deviance? It's an act out of the norm. What you may think is not normal to you, may be normal to others. An example would be carrying a basket of food on your head. To me, this is deviant, but that's because in America you don't see people walking out of the grocery store carrying their food by placing it on their head. We carry our groceries with bags using our hands. Another example of deviance would be walking barefoot into stores. Someone in the store would look at you thinking, "Why the heck aren't they wearing any shoes...?" Whenever we go to stores you see everyone wearing something on their feet. So we define this as deviant.  There are many other examples of deviance. It all depends on who thinks what is normal and what is not normal to them.

Are we ready to be adults so soon?...

Legally, the age to be an adult is 18 years, but when we all hit 18 are we really adults yet? Legally we are, but our readiness is not. People expect us teenagers to become adults right away, but we aren't ready. We still take responsibility, but we aren't as successful as other adults right now. What I mean is that we don't have our own house. We don't have our own bills to pay. Most of us aren't even married or have any kids to support a family. What we're about to do is graduate high school, go to college, and get a reasonable job to pay for student loans and etc. We still depend on our parents to help us out with things financially. Once we graduate college, go for a real job out there, live in our own place, and pay our own bills is when we're ready to be independent and not to be dependent on our parents anymore. We then take care of ourselves. We become adults.

Are guys really all that "tough"?

In class we talked about masculinity, and how that impacts guys today. Guys have a tendency to be "tough". They have to be dominant, independent, strong, and fearless. But do they really have to be what they call "tough"? To me, guys' status can be annoying for them. The media has an impact on guys, because they get this message that they have to be these things or do specific things (play football, join wrestling, play hockey)  in order to be a man. In order to not be "wuss", "sissy", and etc. The status of not having any emotions, to suck it up, and let it go. And not to worry about it. I know guys cry, and they shouldn't be placed as a wuss just because they aren't doing what they media is showing them what they are "supposed to be."

MEDIA: Appearance

In class we all talked about how the media can shape up the appearance of other "beautiful models" and "beautiful stars". Looking at magazines pictures, billboards, posters, pictures from the Internet & etc., these stars and models aren't shown for who they really are. Things get edited all the time. Our society strives for perfection, and the appearances of these oh so called perfect & beautiful people, aren't really them. We have a lower self esteem based off of these appearances when these appearances aren't real. So why does society have to make others feel insecure like, "Omg, she has perfect skin. I have to buy that product." Or "Ughh...why can't I be like that? That's not fair." Or "I wish I had a body like that...". Everything you see may not be as it seems.

Surroundings

In class we talked about how much of people's characteristics come from nature and nurture. The way we are is because of these things. "Nature"....our genes. Then there's "Nurture"....our social environment. The action and talk that influences us. The people we live with, the people we go to school with, and our friends who we hang with. Our surroundings make up who we are.Whether we like it or not. Nature and nurture combined is just the way it is.

"Doing Nothing"

We had an assignment where we had to pick a place that was busy to be at, and stand there for 10 minutes straight doing absolutely nothing. We couldn't pretend we were waiting for someone to meet up with. We couldn't examine other people. We just had to do literally NOTHING. To me this assignment was pretty hard. I was with my mom and little sister at Hawthorn mall, and then I told them about what we all had to do, and they were like, "What kind of homework is that?" I was like, "I don't know... lol. I just have to do it." So that was when I told them to go elsewhere in the mall. And I was standing by the food court and the store Hot Topic just standing by the ledge doing nothing... I had alot of stares from people. This made me feel uncomfortable, because you'd get looks from people like "What is she doing?" or "That girl seems weird." At first, I thought that this assignment would be pretty easy just to do nothing, but as you experience it, it's actually harder than it seems. That is because us Americans are so used to doing something 24:7. Whether its listening to your teacher from english class, or texting one of your good friends, or walking from one class to another, or sleeping....we are all always doing something no matter what. This is what made the assignment very interesting.

Bemused in America

In class today we talked about this article that we had to read called, "Bemused in America". This journalist from Munich, Germany, "Stefan Schirmer" came to America his first time and experienced some things that were strange and not ordinary to him. Where he comes from, supermarkets aren't open 24 hours like how some are in America. In Germany, supermarkets are closed at 8p.m. Saturdays 4p.m. and Sundays NO SHOPPING. In Stefan's point of view, he thought this was strange to him, because where he comes from its not usual to go shopping at whatever time you want to. Some countries, like Germany have their values and we have ours. Another example was when he had to reach an old woman on the phone, and he was talking to the old woman's daughter asking if she were there on the phone to talk to and the daughter's response was, "I'm afraid she has passed away." Stefan's response was, "When is she due back?" From this response, Stefan and a lot of other people from Germany probably don't know most idioms that we have in America even though they may speak English rather well. From looking at German culture and American culture, we all have differences views on things. We are all brought up with different values, and we may look at other things as responses like, "What?!", "What thaa?!", "Wow", "Whoa", "That's weird", and etc. We are the way we are. Everyone's lifestyle may be strange or not ordinary to others, but that's just the way it is.

CULTURE

What is the definition of normal? Can anyone explain it? The word "normal" doesn't necessarily have a clear explanation. A lot of different people have a different view of what is normal and what is not. Different cultures, such as the Danish mother leaving her baby outside a New York restaurant eating some food with her husband to us Americans was NOT normal to us at all. To us, we think "Who would leave their baby outside a restaurant in New York and think it's normal that their baby is not supervised?" Clearly to the Danish mother it was totally normal to her. Where she comes from; Denmark, leaving her baby outside at a restaurant would be okay to do. Who knew that things like this would be "normal". There are many things we may not consider that are normal, but to other cultures in this world of ours there are things that are normal to them.

A Bronx Tale

Watching this movie so far, you know that there are certain groups. Like the Italian nieghborhood is filled with Italians. Collegro or "C" is an Italian, but he's apart of different kinds of groups. He's in a group with his high school friends that are called "jerkoffs" according to Sonny. (: .This group is up to no good. And Collegro's status for that group is basically being a "bada**". Then there's the other group...Sonny's crew. Sonny loves Collegro like a son, and ever since Collegro became close with Sonny, everybody treats him so well. So Collegro's status is that he's special because he's apart of Sonny. And Sonny is the "boss". Then there's the other part of Collegro that falls in love with this girl, but for that time era there was alot of blacks vs. whites. And so Collegro likes a colored girl, but it's hard for the both of them because they are both not the same race. Looking back at these groups and such, I believe "C" in Sonny's crew is his master status because Sonny wants to make sure Collegro is doing the right thing. Sonny doesn't want "C" to end up doing what he does now. Collegro is always with Sonny and talks to him about no matter what topic it is. I feel that throughout the movie, that Collegro's master status will end up remaining the same.

What is my status?.

On Friday in class,  I believe we did that activity where we all had to put groups that influence us into circles around our names in the center of the piece of paper in our packets. My circles were "Friends from Stevenson High School", "Friends from Mundelein High School", "Family", and "Hobbies". In each of the these circles, I have a purpose for each one. The most influential one to me would be the "Family" circle. I am a daughter, older sister, younger sister, and an aunt of two at my one house that I'm living in for attending Stevenson. I have two nieces and I feel that I am a big part of their lives. They know I am always there for them, and that's what I have to do. That is my status... Not only for them, but for the rest of my family.  We are always there for each other, and that's what we all have to do as a family. Be supportive, be helpful, be useful, just to always be there no matter what happens. That's my status for everyday life.

Community Service

I am sooo happy that for our final we don't have to take a multiple choice exam, and a project. When we can go on our own time and help out others in need! I'm pretty excited about doing this, because I haven't done community service before, so this would be my first time doing it. Being social by doing something for someone else's community or even ours. I'm glad we're going to go through this experience, because we'll all feel like we've done something good for others. I am planning on joining the service Habitat for Humanity in Elgin with my friend Allie Junker and others. So if anyone is interested in this service and needs a group, we are more than happy to have a big ole' group. We can all contribute together to this experience this year.

First day of Sociology class

Silence?...Yes it is akward, because you don't know who's going to be in your class, and you're in a room full of people just sitting around not knowing what to do but to just sit there quietly. :/ thanks Mr. Salituro. I have experienced an akward silence before. When I  was in middle school, my math teacher from 8th grade was yelling at a kid in our classroom, and afterwards the whole class was nothing but quiet for a good straight 5 mins. Pretty akward i must say...but it ended eventually. What makes us get this way is our surroundings. They are what affect us all. Sociological Imagination is the explaination for this. We are affected by our friends, family, etc.  So by sitting in a room full of silence, no one knows what to do, so we all just sit in silence. Doing what everyone is doing. All of us felt some sort of akward presence, because we didn't know what to do. So our sociological imagination is based on who is around us and following whats going on.

About Me

This year I am a 17 year old senior in high school. My hobbies are singing, running, and fishing. I love hanging with my friends. No matter what we do we always have a good time. I love to laugh. I tend to laugh really loud. I'm shy at first, but once you get to know me I'm very outgoing. Some goals in my life are to graduate college, and get a career that I love.