America: A Salad Bowl

America has always been known for its cultural diversity and I feel that's exactly what it means when you call it a salad bowl. America is like a salad because you've taken so much diversity and crammed it into one spot and everything in it is different. There are many different cultures, religions, races, genders, and other diversities to make up the ingredients of this salad. One large problem America has is illegal immigration. America has had the re-occuring problem of having refugees from southern countries, such as Mexico, Guatemala, etc. etc., and have tried to contain and stop it with little avail. Millions of immigrants are able to pass through the border each year and make it to "freedom". Although we have a border patrol, it cannot stop everything that tries to make it into the country. Another part is the immigrants of which whom cross over by water, which is much harder to regulate. Summing this up, we have a large mixture of new ingredients being poured into our bowl each day, and although each ingredient may be very different, they all come together to make a salad which can coexist and thrive.

Position in life and its effect on perception

The way you perceive identity, society, and culture is affected by your position in the world or "class". When you are born, you inherit the class of your family and your family basically decides who you are until you are old enough to change your class yourself. You are raised by your family so you think like your family. Poorer and middle class families tend to base life off of hard work and getting by through their own efforts. They also tend to put down upper classes and the rich. Being born into a richer family means that usually less work is involved and they look down on lower class family. In society, the middle class is always busy and the rich are viewed as being leisurely. No matter what your position in life is, you tend to build that up behind you as your identity. You become proud of what you are and if you move up a class, you become even more appreciative and it is more respectful in the eyes of others. Dropping a class is sometimes viewed as a lack of determination and hard work. In society, the poorer seem to feel that the government is out to get them because everything seems unfair. For upper classes, society is a much easier place to live in because you are looked up to. These views are all opinionated and change from person to person.

Bigger, Stronger, Faster

The poster Bigger, Stronger, Faster on page 433 is describing the abuse of steroids in our sports/fame/everyday world. One of the quotes on the poster is "Is it still cheating if everyone's doing it?" I feel that all of these role models are giving the wrong impression to people to look up to them and want to be like them. They are also giving their sports and peers a bad name. Some of the people depicted are Hulk Hogan, a pro baseball player from San Francisco, a ballerina, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone as rocky, and an olympic runner. These have been known to be some of Americas everyday heroes for some people and they are giving the idea that they can only be good with the use of steroids. It's also giving younger generations and upcoming professionals the idea that it is ok to use steroids because everyone else is, and their idols and heroes got away with it. It shows they 6 characters standing atop a mountain of anabolic steroids, with an epic style background and lighting, also they are flying a huge American flag in the background to show this is what has become of America's professionals. Like its saying you can't be great unless you cheat and its ok because "everyone else is doing it." It also puts people in check to see if they're going to follow the ways of others or stay within their own personal boundaries and preferences.

Taking Notes and Staying Out of Trouble

Plagiarism is using someone else's thought or idea and claiming it as your own. Plagiarism can be both intentional and unintentional. Being effective in note-taking means that you are skilled at taking in information and being able to write it down as your own, while at the same time respecting other people's ideas and writings. When I take notes, I always cite the information if it is a direct quote or if i pull the main idea out of someone else's work. Every time i find an idea of another researcher or author that i like, i write his information down after the information that i pulled from the document is taken. Also, i try to put it in my own style of writing or wording to where the ideas are similar, but its from my own creativity or thought, not from the original script. I feel that at sometimes, plagiarism for some people can be hard to avoid because most of the time it is unintentional and they didn't realize they were doing it. Another effective way to avoid it is to cite the article/author first, and then, if you find any direct quotes or ideas, mark them with a sign, such as quotations or stars. But also know that when you put into a work, you must cite each quote to respect the text.

Interviews

In interviews, every person has a different way of expressing their opinions, feelings, and stories when confronted with a question. In the book, it describes the coverage of war by reporters and what happened with them. I like this interview because it showed that the media even though they may or may not be on scene, they don't get the real picture. "And what we are seeing is not the war in Iraq; what we're seeing are slices of the war in Iraq" says Donald Rumsfeld. It talks about how we only see a particularized perspective  that the reporter can capture at that specific moment, but its just a piece, and "totality of that is what the war is about" not just the small frames we see. It also talks about how they are trying to embed reporters in the military, to get better coverage and show what is really happening. There were pitfalls though, such as during bombings and such, satellite phones used by reporters weren't allowed. Also, many were expelled by the countries authorities. What these interviews show is that unless you are in the military, and involved in the war, you won't know the real perspective.

Playing Against Stereotypes

This chapter talks about the media messages about sports and how athletes become victims of race and gender stereotyping in everyday life. I liked the opening article because it talked about a male tennis coach that judged a group of teenage girl that they wouldn't be very good. But, to his surprise, when they played, they turned into Serena Williams which was a metaphor that they were actually very skilled, but because they were young girls, they were not good. It also talks about handicapped athletes. Such as the one doing the high jump with a prosthetic leg. Surprisingly he does amazing which is ironic. Another judgement in the media is race. The stereotype is that black athletes have made the once all white sports- basketball and football theirs, and left the white athletes behind. There is also the stereotype of the black athletes that they are clowning, smack talkers. But this is definitely not the full case. I enjoyed this  article because it shows true views and stereotypes about people who do things they love. But the truth is anyone can be as equally skilled, it just takes practice.

Process Paper

http://www.deerhuntingwisconsin.com/controversial-deer-hunting-laws
-this website will be used because it shows many controversial laws in other states as well as sc.

http://www.dnr.sc.gov/regulations.html
-i will be using this site to find the exact laws and regulations from the primary source

http://www.scducks.com/forum/index.php
-i will use this site because i want field research and other actual hunters' views on what should and shouldn't be. along with their personal opinions.

http://www.fieldandstream.com/
- this is a great website for hunting information and other articles.