Sep 17, 2020
Journal 4
September 10th, 2020
In class reflection
When you look at the for the school that the class has created
- Have you already had an education like this?
- Are you getting an education like this?
- What decisions can you make right now to better position yourself for this kind of education
September 15th, 2020
“Prejudicially”
-The denying a persons humanity before allowing them to be understood or even met.
Denial of Agency: The practice of treating someone as though they cannot plan or carry out a plan. For example, someone might deny the agency of a homeless person by saying that there’s no reason to help a homeless person find a job because they probably wouldn’t prepare for it or even show up.
Denial of Experience: the practice of treating someone as though their emotional or psychological experience of the world is closer to that of an animal or a robot. For example, someone might assume that another person is incapable of feeling the higher order emotions that we assume are special to humans, e.g., compassion, romantic love, indignation, or pride, and that they are accustomed to feel instead only emotions like anger, lust, and fear.
“Pretty Women” Trailer
The pretty women is a perfect example of both denial of agency and denial of experience, in the place of denial of agency Julia Roberts’ character is a sex worker who people assume only does it because she is poor at planning her life and that she makes bad decisions. In place of denial of experience, the character that Richard Gere portrays is assumed that he in not capable of having a close intimate relationship with someone else due to his financial prosperity. Within the movie as a viewer you learn throughout the story that these two presumed ideologies of each character is far from the truth all together.
Key Terms
The name “Lysistrata” — she who loosens, or disbands, the army
Dehumanization — the process of depriving a person or group of positive human qualities.
Agency — action or intervention, especially such as to produce a particular effect.
Experience — encounter or undergo (an event or occurrence).
Athens — Athens is the capital of Greece. It was also at the heart of Ancient Greece, a powerful civilization and empire.
Sparta — Sparta was a prominent city-state in ancient Greece.
Peloponnesian War — The Peloponnesian War was a war fought in ancient Greece between Athens and Sparta — the two most powerful city-states in ancient Greece at the time (431 to 405 B.C.E.). This war shifted power from Athens to Sparta, making Sparta the most powerful city-state in the region.
Assignment
- My very first day in boarding school in London at around the age of twelve I experienced my first true taste of racism. I entered my dormitory ready to tackle this new experience as a kid from overseas with a heavy accent, little did I know the majority of my peers came from high ranking family either in the government or in society and they were far from used to people of color. As I was unpacking my things my roommate entered the room, the excited twelve year old who was new to the city with a heavy southern Nigerian accent said “Hello my name is Tosin”, immediately he assumed I was not meant to be there. He yelled for a head mistress yelling and shouting that someone was in his room that didn’t belong. After the whole situation was diffused with a headmistress she sat me down and explained to me that the boys were not used to “people like me” so close to them and on the same financial sphere as them. That was my first experience encountering someone basing my ability to be somewhere on only the color of my skin.
- Entering my last year of boarding school our old math instructor fell ill and had to be replace , with the urgency of finding a new teacher they failed to perform a lot of the necessary screenings a usual teacher at our boarding school would under go, or at least that is what they told my parents. First day of class I walk in and I see a white elderly man roughly 5'10 with thick glasses that gave him a cynical look, standing at the front of the lecture hall. He commands everyone to take their seat and begins to call roll. He stops at my name and looks up as I say “present”, he pauses roll call and calls me down to the front of the class. He proceeds to ask me questions as to where I’m from and how it was that my parents were able to afford sending me to such an expensive school. After answering all of questions he moves the seating around to place me at the front of the class. Then the next day he pulls me aside and to this day I can never forget the unkind words he said to me, “I’m not sure what illegal practices your parents performed to come to MY country and give you an education that thousands of other kids wish they could get. In my class you will not pass because people like you come to MY country, use the education system and leave giving nothing back to My country. You people have no sense of honor and will never understand “For country and queen”. I reported it to my headmaster and I never saw that man again.
- Playing soccer I had a very interesting coach who believed that internationals were taking over the game of soccer in the United States. Picture a 5'10 sophomore, 155 pounds, with a heavy British accent, that out paces every other player on the team. Due to the fact that I was an international student he refused to play me but there was no way for me as a player to leave because everyone signs a contract for the season. With that after many complaints and long team meetings he finally played me and we won Nationals. From that day on I never stepped off the field but also never became captain because of his bias on nationalities.
The Translation of Aristophanes’ Lysistrata (411 BCE)
The ability of women to change such a drastic event in history is inspiring. This very well relates to issues that we as planet have faced for the last century in the view of women and their place in society. Its hard to believe that women at one point were not able to vote, go to school, get a job, and so many other things, all because of the mentality that they were not capable or worthy to do such. Even now many people still have the mentality that women are second class citizens. I can’t disregard all the change that has occurred though, from women being on the list of richest people in the world, to holding the highest governing position in many countries. There is just so much that has changed but so much more that has yet to change.
Plotting Leadership Development
The alliance among women in Greece to combat the war had the following….
- the thoughtful selection of those who will join the alliance
- a shared sense of mission
- an open exchange of opinions and ideas as to the best strategy
- support for one another to stay focused on the mission
- a division of labor according to age
- constructively criticizing one another for falling short of their best behavior
- the taking of an oath to mark the seriousness of their undertaking and to enforce commitment
Looking into the realm of my family I genuinely believe we have the majority of these traits. Some traits that I personally see in my family in addition to the ones above are…..
- Built trust and emotional connection
- Financial distribution in time of need
If I could improve two people in my group in order to make things work a lot better it would be my parents, solely due to their inability to relate to situations that their nine kids face in the world that we live in right now. The mentality of how things worked in the days that my parents were our age was very different, relating to them not understanding why the issues we face are “such a big deal”, but that is just how communication among generations tend to unravel. I could personally make myself better by having less of a temperament when things are looking down or things are not going as planned. That would generally make a lot of process a lot better in the sense of transitioning into the change or out of a tight place.
Spike Lee’s Chi-Raq
Chi-Raq the combination of Chicago the city in Illinois and Iraq a worn torn country in the middle east. The term referring to Chicago was coined to represent the city’s thousands of annual shootings and hundreds of murders that happen every year. In the movie a girlfriend of a Chicago gang leader convinces other frustrated women in the area to abstain from sex in order to solve the issue of gang violence. This Spike Lee movie was written as a modern day version of Aristophanes’ Lysistrata in where women band together in order to stop a meaningless war by refusing men sexual intercourse or any sexual intimacy resulting in the frustration of men on both sides which lead to a peaceful end of the war between Sparta and Athens.
