Status Update

1. The truck stop as community and culture
Claim : That truckers are similar to cowboys with their freedom and to
travel wherever . As for the stop it is a like a comfort zone when they are long away
from home.
Style of argument : Toulmin Model

2. Goth Subcultures in Cyberspace.
Claim: Gothics uses the cyberspace world for a community as a means to communicate ,
and to spread invitations about their events to get more participation outside the Internet.
Style of argument: Classical Model

3. Transmissions from Camp Trans
Claim: That Trans-women has ever right to attend the MWMF as lesbian women.
Style of argument: Classical Model

4. House for the Homeless: A place to hang your hat
Claim : Homeless people were once people with a good life , until a bad situation occurred.
Despite that they have no home, or wealth , they have a dream or goal to succeed in
life like ever one else.
Style of argument : Rogerian Model

STATUS: I'm still researching on my topic trying to know
more about my subculture.I've already visited the filed site,
made notes about my observations, interviewed a couple of
people, and checked out some books for more research. I have
a found couple of things for my subculture like the norms
and beliefs and how the officers interact with each other.
I am just worried about my findings making five full pages
for peer review! What I'm really struggling with is figuring
exactly what I want to know about them and writing it. I guess
I'll just write about my observations for a rough draft and
figure out the rest from there. I'm plan on making another
visit to the site on Friday or next week.
Question: Are my ideas/observations are fully expressed and is clear in my paper?

Visinting Atlanta Detention Center

On Friday night at 9:21p.m. , I went downtown to visit the Atlanta Detention Center (located on Peachtree street) to met with my cousin who was going to give me a tour and tell me about the duties of Correction Officers . Once I arrived there I had to sign in , turn in any electronic devices (my cell phone) , and be searched by the officers at the front desk. Once the process was over the officers showed me to the back where my cousin office was. I happy to see
my cousin but had second thoughts about going on the tour. Before the tour started my cousin quickly informed me that he was not a police officer, but a correction officer. He told me people that easily make the mistake of confusing the two because the uniform is very similar. He also
said that police officers do not handle inmates only when they have to lock them up on the streets ad take them to detention centers where he and other officers handle them. My cousin
is Major Jackson , and by his rank being a major his duties mostly consist of being in charge of the 87 officers, staff, 100+inmates , and make sure that everything is ran properly. The first stop of the tour was the central control area . This area was very dark inside where all the surveillance cameras are monitored by officers , the control to open the doors , and the holding area for weapons. We went on to the next stop which was the roll call room where all officers must report to check in, and is brief over the assignments for the day by whom ever is in charge. As we walked towards the elevator my cousin pointed to an exit door . He explained that this is the stop where the police officers drop off all inmates to be checked in . I noticed that my cousin mood was very relaxed and calm as he was giving me the tour. I asked if he was ever scared about being around the inmates at night. He gave me a gentle smiled and said" Yes! every minute, hour, I'm very scared! I make it through the day by praying that GOD send me back safe to my family . Although they are inmates I showed them respect the same way I with my staff. I have to realize that I'm around them so I might as well." Second stop was the Intake center(2ND floor) , the first process that the inmates go through: Identification/screen- have put their information into the system, booking- where they can bail out. Sometimes if the crime is minor inmates can sign out on a signature bond, and the medical center- where they receive help if they are hurt for minor injuries. In addition , there is small station where they get strip search, and receive uniforms. There were quite a few inmates there, I will guess that there was 45 inmates waiting to be checked in . I was greeted by smiles from the staff , but strange stares at the inmates. By their facial expressions I could tell they were curious about why I was there and what was I writing down in my book , but no one questioned me. I noticed the different colored uniforms that some of them wearing and asked if there was any important of it . He told me that it does and as well as the painting of the walls represent something, and will change as I go to a different floor.
I learned that brown and green uniforms stands for people that had DUIs or did minor crimes. They stay over the weekend , if violated any rules they stay longer, also they sometimes help clean the center by mopping floors. The orange uniforms are for people that have been caught with drugs. Lastly the red uniforms stands for people that have committed the white collar crimes like murder etc.. I went to the different holding cells seeing people sleeping on the tiny bunk beds, even or the floors. I happened to step inside one empty holding cell and the smell knocked me back out. The room's odor was incredible strong and foul! My cousin explained to me that the odor is a mixture of other inmates scent , and the open commode which I soon
noticed by a corner. He told that this is what he has to go through everyday and that he is used to the odor. As he led me to the back of the intake center to the next stop , Jack had to quickly stop to help one of the other officers with a female inmate that refused to go in the female restroom and wanted to go into the men restroom instead. After a few yells from the officers instructing her to go the proper restroom, she soon decided to follow their instructions.
Afterwards Jack led me towads the back of the center into another room that was painted blue.
"This room is when for those that have finished the check in process and now is waiting to be move upstairs to their cells, sent to another jail , or make a phone call. Very few of them were waiting to be released. I glance around the room , again there were several stares , very few looked up front toward the officer that was in charge.

ACT V

1. What makes this a good field site? It gives an excellent
insight of how the prisoners feel about performing plays,
and how they use it as a tool to change themselves from
their criminal past.

2. What observations does the author makes about the
subculture to help us understand? The author observes the
different types of prisoners , for example the skinheads .
He also noticed and described the way prisoners have to
live in a cell that might be shared with another person that
does not have much space. In addition, there is a daily routine
of strip searches to make sure that are no weapons.

3. What are the norms and values of the subculture? The norm/value
is that IT IS A MUST to defend themselves, their gangs that
they might be apart of while in prison, and drug business.
If not they will have a hard time in prison until it is time for
them to be released.

4. What interview techniques does the author use to
work to help us understand this subculture? I liked how
the author interviewed the prisoners individually to
give me a sense of who they are as a person and actor.
It help when he asked questions about what were
their thoughts and feelings about the crimes they
committed, how has acting help them developed into
a new being, and how they use their past actions into
the play to come to life. Although they are behind bars ,
I could feel that the prisoners did have remorse ,and
wish that they could change the past.

Subculture: Police Officers

TOPIC: Police officers

INTERESTING SOURCES:

Voyeurism: I see you!

My word is voyeurism, and here are some really interesting facts I found about it on the library site.First, I first looked up the term voyeurism on the Oxford dictionary to find out what it means. Voyeurism-"1924 J. S. VAN TESLAAR tr. Stekel's Disorders of Instincts & Emotions II. 341 Voyeurism, erotic gratification experienced at looking at another's sexual organs; morbid desire to peep into secrets. "In Greek it means scopophilia. In addition, I found the following piece of information to be very interesting since I see a lot of actors and actresses in nude acts on television. The dictionary also states that, "1969 Daily Tel. 25 Apr. 19/5 there is a feeling that more and more actresses are being asked to take their clothes off at auditions. As a form of voyeurism. "(Wow!) Next, I checked out the date chart to find the time in which this word was first discovered. The data chart showed it started being used around 1924-1985. I decided to find a book that contains voyeurism. I found an electronic book that is titled, "Video Voyeurism Prevention Act of 2003", presented by representatives Ovley, Gonzalez, Goode, and Baird. The purpose of this act is to prevent individuals from taping others privacy with out their consent, or them knowing. The article goes into explaining why camera phones, video cameras, combined with the Internet has provided a great threat to adults, teenagers, and even children . That there have been numerous reports of violating privacy across the country!The punishment for this spiteful crime , " punishable by a fine of not more than One hundred thousand dollars or imprisonment for up to one year , or both."(Video Voyeruism Prevention p.1 ) In my opinion, this punishment does not seem to fit the crime. I think that a person’s privacy is worth much more than 100,000 dollars or even a year in jail. Moreover, the humiliation and the pain that a person might go through once he or she finds out that they have been taped and put on the Internet for the world to see! I also found a TV show that contains voyeurism in the media section, Alfred Hitchcock show. I'm already aquainted with Alfred Hitchcock shows because I’m always watching it on the Chiller channel. I found two other interesting novels: Privacy lost : How technology is endangering your privacy by David H. Holtzman, and Dirty Windows by Merry Alpern that contain voyeurism.

Who am I?

While doing this assignment was a good and bad thing for me. The good outcome of this assignment was that I finally found my source! (*smiles* ) On the other hand , the bad thing is that I had a hard time finding out exact information about the author that wrote the article. (frowns). So I found my source on this website , its perfect and everything. Of course, the next step for me would be look around on the website and try finding a biography of the author , and other achievements of the person just because of the simple fact that she posted on the website . Well this website was a disadvantage because I found nothing about the author , just other information that I thought was irrelevant to me , not useful. So I decided to go on a deeper mission to find out about this anonymous person . I went to Yahoo , and Google because these search engines were always helpful with past researches and that I am very familiar with them. I found myself with another disadvantage these search engines were not useful with providing information that I was looking for. So as time went by , I was getting frustrated by the minute. At first, I wanted to give up and forget about the newfound source , the author , and even this blog assignment! But I changed my mind and decided to stay with it. I went back to the website where I had found the source in the beginning because I thought maybe I missed something. Well I did miss something on the website, no I did not find out exactly about the author , but the website itself had sort of provided clues about what type of person the author could be. I even took a further step in emailing one of the other authors on the website to find out if she knew anything about the unknown author. In the end I gave up researching about the author ,and started researching about the website. I just clicked around and read about the mission of what the website was trying to achieve and other interesting facts. I guess my advantages were that I found my source , and information that I could use as ethos to put in my paper. So now I am very happy….

Black Noise by Tricia Rose

"Black Noise : Rap music and Black culture in a contemporary America",is a very interesting novel to read. I’m not saying this just because it’s a part of the assignment, but it is a remarkable novel. From what I read in the first few chapters of the book and the overview, it goes on to further explain and explore the positive and negative roles that rap music plays in America . In the first chapter the author examines how this popular music brings focus on important issues like racism and economic injustice, and contrasts it with the controversial statements of violence that is often found. Besides these issues the author also traces hip hop history to discuss what really makes rap so contentious and focus on where female rappers really do stand in the hip-hop community. Tricia Rose is a great candidate for writing this book because of her credibility. From her biography she is a professor of African Studies at Brown University , and specializes in culture, politics, and gender issues. From her research and studies of the aspects of the music, in addition to writing numerous documents about this culture, she provides the audience with reliance in the author due to her knowledge of what she is debating about throughout her book. This gives a great affect on the readers.

Dizzee Rascal

I decided to research Dizzee Rascal . My reason for choosing him is because I felt that I can relate more to his style of music with the dancing and the girls in the video “Flex”. I felt that it was more similar to the rap videos that I’m used to seeing on BET and MTV all the time. So I searched around on Yahoo music and Google and here is what I found out about Mr. Rascal . Dizzee Rascal, who real name is Dylan Mills, grew up in the East End of London with his mother. Rascal music talent began when he was a teenager, started off making tracks on a classroom computer,in addition, getting some ideas from other known rappers from the U.S. that he admired. Later he released his first single “I Love you”, with his group, Roll Deep Crew, as underground artists under the white label.
The single helped lead the way of the beginning of the young artist ‘s way to success of his first album released in 2003 titled,” Boy In the Corner”, that was number twenty-three on the U.K. charts, also went platinum. Other albums that followed are, Showtime (2004), and Dream (2004) and several great other albums. I researched more about his music style and came across this description from Answer .com website in the entertainment section, “music is an electric mixture of garage and hip-hop beats with Palette of influences, ranging from metal guitars to found sounds, drill and bass synthlines, eclectic samples and even Japanese court music. His vocals, he uses fast style of rapping which blends elements from garage Mcing, conventional rap, grime, and reggae.” Some other interesting facts that I found from the same website. That in 2005, he had an endorsement deal with clothing ECKO and with Nike to design his own shoe!
Although he is from London , Dizzie is like any other U.S. rapper . From what I have read from his lyrics and listen to clips of other songs, he uses the hip-hop music to vent out anything that is on mind rather it is issues about his life growing up , present issues, money, girls, or even to up come with a new dance song , it is all the same like artists today. The only difference is the styles and his beats that sets him a part from other rap artists. Maybe his culture has somewhat of an impact of his hip-hop, but the messages are all the same.

Peer Review

Today, there was peer review session in class. Oh, how I dread peer review! I often wish my professor did not allow us to do it just because of how I believe I will do with helping others. Typically, I have trouble trying to proofread and reword my paper to give it that effectiveness. Therefore, I worry how I might do with someone else’s paper. However, today it was not disaster as I thought it would be. I actually enjoyed reading my peers paper. I guess it because their topics were interesting to read. The short session was good and I got great feedback from my group members. They mostly suggested that I add more details to certain parts, and my weakness I could approve. I did not get anything about grammar mistakes, and misspell words, which really please me. I wanted my paper to be close to perfect so I will have less editing to do. My main concern about my paper was whether the readers were able to identify my claim, and that my examples supported my claim. I want my paper to be concise that targets a particular audience.I believe my paper is more towards persuasion than truth seeking. I think I might have persuaded my group members to agree with my argument. As for giving good feedback to my group members, I know I did a good job. I mostly gave advice of switching paragraphs were I thought it would fit best, and the usage of other words instead of commonly used ones. My other group member I did not have time to review the work, but I’m taking time out at home to go over it and give the best advice I can. Overall, the session wasawesome! I hope that the next one is just the same.

PCU

The fallacy that I believe that identifies with the film PCU would have to be Ad Hominem, Ad Hominem, is a attack on one's characters rather than an attack on the actual ideas of the person. The way that each of the groups in the film were labeled and stereotyped clearly shows this. For example, the Fraternity in the film , The Pitts, were stereotyped as lazy bums that always party and stirred up trouble among the campus. In actuality most fraternities are not like this, some are very positive. The "Activist students", were portrayed as radical and forceful with there beliefs, when in normal circumstances they are not as forceful to promote there beliefs to others.The main character uses the stereotypical perception of the characters as a basis to determine whether he wants to attend PCU. Originally he thought that PCU was prestigious prep school until he learned otherwise.

Death of an Innocnet

I believe that there are some people in society that are similar to McCandless character. Society has not changed significantly since McCandless journey into the wilderness. There are people in society; whether they are college students are not, that have the same free spirits that are unafraid, and adventurous like Chris. They seem to be trying to search for a type of truth to satisfy their many questions about society, or about themselves. I’m not saying that these people that are similar to Chris will go off into the wildness like he did, but many may find different paths and ways of finding their truth. Chris has always been the optimistic and adventurous type, as a child he “marched to the beat of a different drum”. He has always had the spirit of a humanitarian, he dreamed of going to South Africa to aid the homeless and join the fight against the apartheid.
Sometimes people may want to escape the consistent norms of society, just to get away from everything that they know or were raised to do. This is what I believe Chris McCandless wanted to do, besides taking a journey to seek truth he also wanted to escape the bounds of a “normal society”, as well as everything it had to offer. For example, Chris grew up in a wealthy home where he probably had everything he could have wanted in life, without having to work hard for it. He had two loving parents that had well paying careers as aerospace engineers with a firm. His college fund was paid at his parents’ expense to the very expensive and prestigious Emory University and law school. In addition, his parents also made sure that Chris received twenty thousand dollars in his account to be used at his disposable. Yet he goes away from his home where it is safe, and out into his own dangerous journeys, ignoring the simple fact that he could easily have had a really great life if he wanted that opportunity. Instead he enjoys being out in the wilderness, moneyless, without clean clothes, adequate food, and suitable shelter. As he tells a man named Westerberg in a postcard that he thinks life is more exciting when he had to find his own meal in the woods and had no money. He prefers the idea of ruffing it. In my opinion, as I read Chris’s statement, I agree somewhat with his beliefs. If world did not revolve around money, just maybe it would be more exciting to actually work really hard to make a living. Also to appreciate life more than just the materialistic things that it has to offer. Chris’s idea may seem crazy to most people because of the norm of having money to buy food, clothes, shelter, and having jobs. It is unaccepted to go into a foreign territory, having to haunt for fish, squirrels, and other wild animals for a means of survival. Only when one can release them selves from their natural roles in society can they honestly and truly find peace.

" The Picture with an empty message"

Looking at this advertisement, I do not see the grief, the death, not even the awareness that
it is trying to promote to the public, but just as a pure gimmick to make more money.
Today, I feel that society is all for “ever man for themselves” and is money hungry! This ad really prove the point that companies will do anything to make a huge profit or to at least to get attention, and they do not care how they make it! In my opinion, the only true reason why United Colors of Benetton Company decided to use this image is that they know that a good sad story will always win in the end. People will always feel sympathy towards someone that is ill or with a disability, and will support whatever research on the other hand, dig into their wallets to contribute to a foundation to know that they have done a good deed. This is purposely their main strategy to seek and win over the hearts and compassion of the public. Therefore, to no surprise their plan succeeded. As for the notion of company trying to promote the awareness of AIDS, failed. The strategy that the company used, or at least attempt to used, is disastrous simply because of the image. The manner in which the photo was used is powerless, unconvincing and the fact the photo have a stamped clothing logo at the bottom DOES NOT send an AIDS awareness message to its consumers, or anyone in general. For instance if a person is walking down the street ,or driving in the car and happens to look up and see this advertisement posted on a billboard , the viewer would see is a sickly person with an unknown illness laying in a hospital bed with their relatives gather around embracing each other and crying because it is a very gloomy moment . As well as there are clothes(logo) involved in the scene. The sickly person , the tears, and the depression, and sadness are all obvious to the public ,but the AIDS message is not. Where is the awareness of this epidemic? How is the public is suppose to know that the sickly man has AIDS in this photo? With a quick look at this man , a person can easily make hundreds of assumption that could be wrong without even thinking about the possibility of AIDS. Maybe he needs a organ transplant or that he needs a blood transfusion? How do the public suppose to know what is wrong? There is not a single connection towards this silent and unnoticeable disease to let the public know that it is out there and millions of people are dying from it . I thought the company could have put an message of how they felt about AIDS/HIV infection . Or at least a added the numbers of people that are infected (statistics ) and the chances of becoming part of this epidemic if ignorant about it. This advertisement did not grab people attention about the awareness and say," HEY! THERE IS REALLY A SUCH THING AS AIDS, AND MAYBE I Should BE CAREFUL!” But yet, there is the name of the clothing company in green and white bold letters included on the photo publicize for everyone to know.

Wow! This picture really speaks for itself….