Entry 5: The Body

I actually found "Women and Their Clitoris" REAL interesting. 

The responses of all the different participants developed the consensus that

they were taught about sex in a strictly reproductive sense. For me and, 

I think, for all my friends, that's how anatomy was presented. Not

only at school, but with my parents and friends as well. Similar to 

one of the participants, I remember my mom buying me this specific

book and kind of just being like, "Oh, read this at your leisure." And 

I'd always act so grossed out, but then I'd read it anyway. If pleasure

was more prominent in my learning, I feel like I'd be very different...

A lot of my friends had this book too, and I'm pretty sure they did 

the same grossed-out-but-actually-interested act.

I was less interested by the tattoo article. The argument

is pretty unresolvable. I mean, some people definitely do get

tattoos for social assimilation purposes, but everyone is going to have

their own personal associations and meanings to things

simply because no two people, except maybe siamese twins, have the same

exact shared life experiences. For example, I think it's safe to say

the Harley Davidson tattoo has communal meanings of motorists, 

rugid-ness, and freedom; however, one person might love Harleys because

their dad had a motorcycle, while someone else might embrace the company

because it allowed them to get away and separate from families. 

I would never get a tattoo of a corporate logo. I don't know if I'd

get a tattoo at all...unless I become more consistent and stop

changing my mind and opinions. 

So I literally just spent 30 minutes trying to find this picture of

a kid the grade above me from high school who got a tattoo of his 

best friend's face on his butt...he deleted his facebook, though, so

I couldn't find it. Here's a good alternative:

Entry 4: Emotion Work and Managing Emotions

The Emotion Work and Feeling Rules article provoked

a lot of reflection of my emotional life and habits. I constantly find

myself questioning what I feel and shaping the emotions I convey

to societal appropriateness. 

One example I thought of was when my Great Aunt died when I

was a freshman in high school. She lived in Boston, so I did not

see her too often; we visited each other enough, though, to

the point where we had a pretty good relationship. 

On the day she died, I was obviously sad, but I kept feeling like I was 

sad only because I should have been sad. After a lot of self-analyzing, I 

decided I would probably just express my grief at her funeral, and

that it simply had not hit me yet. Well, her funeral came

and it was the same kind of feeling. I felt, and still feel, 

heartless for not being able to convey my sadness

the way everyone else did. Ever since then, whenever

something sad happens, I'm always somewhat scared I won't

seem as sad as everyone else and people will assume I don't care.

Like when I said bye to my friends before we all left for college,

I cried with three of my really good friends. But when a large

group of my friends were hanging out our last night, I was

the only girl who wasn't crying. I don't know what it is. 

As apparently unemotional as I am, "Graduation"

by Vitamin C gets me every time. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HDM3eYp4KQ

The other reading, about the animal shelter, was really upsetting.

It wasn't so bad because I have an extreme opinion one way or the other, though.

It was bad for me because I guess I can equally see both sides of the fence.

Killing an animal would be hard enough, and then to have to manage 

that emotion and change your opinions into more of an "economic"

sense...I would not do well with that. Having people constantly asking

you, and judging you, about your job would be tiring too. I found it interesting

they included that often times workers cope

with the situation through humor. I do it too, but it's so 

weird how laughing and making light of bad situations makes them

more acceptable. 

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/C-3PO

C3PO was the first thing I thought of when I thought of comic relief.

Entry 3: September 11

I know it's cliche when people say you'll never forge where you

were and what you were doing on September 11, 2001.

Well it's completely true.

The morning of September 11 I was running late to school, per usual,

and my mom was about to drive me to Oak Grove Elementary School.

Fourth grade was not my favorite year, so I leisurely got ready. 

While I was in the bathroom, I heard the phone ring, recognized it was my dad,

and was perplexed as my mom continually said, "Oh no". 

For some reason I thought my dad's building got robbed.

My mom briefly explained what she knew had happened, which was confirmed

by the radio as we drove to school.

Once I got to my class, I immediately told my teacher a plane crashed into one

of the Twin Towers (at the time, only one had). My teacher told me I was lying. Great lady.

Anyway, after we went to music class, my teacher sat my class 

down and told us what happened. A lot of my classmates took it 

really hard; a couple of them had parents whom were traveling, one from Washington.

One kid locked himself in a locker. I'm not really sure what we did the rest of the day...

I think we colored, and I know we weren't allowed outside for recess. 

When I got home that night, my parents were transfixed by the television. I honestly 

think I was too young to grasp the gravity of the day, but I'll never forget seeing 

the huge dust cloud after the second tower fell and images of people

jumping out of windows. This summer I went to the Newseum in Washington, which 

has an exhibit dedicated to 9/11. Although I hadn't really looked at footage

or papers in a while, I remembered seeing specific covers of papers

I had seen almost ten years earlier on my kitchen table the morning after.

Maya Lin's point that other memorials were "propagandized statements about

the victory" is applicable to September 11, and likens it to Vietnam 

because the central purpose of the monuments are to commemorate 

the life lost. With 9/11, there was no disagreement of the role of the monument,

but because Vietnam appeared different than any other U.S. war. Today the media

is very open with the 9/11 memorial, and there is a national agreement. The controversy 

of the Vietnam Memorial reminds me of the dispute about the placement of 

a mosque near ground zero. While America maintains the common

epithet of the "melting pot", the debate of appropriateness of the location contradicts it. 

I feel like the media and politicians blew this out of the water, although I get the 

gravity of it. Regardless if its right, I thought the whole issue took

attention away from where attention should have been: those who

lost their lives. 

Entry 2: Socialization

What do hedgehogs have to do with sociology?

Relatively little. 

But I really want a hedgehog and my friends were warning me they were mean...

if you socialize them, though, they're actually really nice...

So back to Social Psych...

I ate up the two readings ("Becoming a Marihuana User" and pages 126-136).

To start, I think the smoking story was interesting because of the different quotes they had

from people. Just the whole perspective of the reason behind smoking was something I'd never

considered...how "the motivation or disposition to engage in the activity is built

up in the course of learning to engage in it and does not antedate this learning process."

I've just never considered doing drugs as a learning process, probably 

because there's this "cool" (for lack of a better word) stereotype that goes along

with smoking; someone's first time smoking is not what I think about when I think of drugs. 

The whole process of becoming a marijuana user is so socially based, and the processes are so

 simple, but accurate. I started thinking about how many other things people can only find

 pleasure in when one has to go through a process of learning to see something as an object

of fun...running, complete opposite end of the spectrum, is kind of like that for me:

the object of running really isn't that fun, but my friends started running so I ran with them.

After a while, it just became something I did on my own and considered fun.

I wonder what Hyde's first time smoking was like...

For the other reading, I was intrigued by the study of Jill Carter's sexual education.

I really wish I had been taught like that. "The Talk" is unavoidably awkward, 

but I think Fox Academy handled it as gracefully and fairly as possible.

The private school aspect had a ton to do with it...still, if public schools could do that,

I think it'd be beneficial. I don't even remember what I was taught during sex. ed....

but I can guarantee I would of retained a lot more if I got to do a sweet art project on it.

Entry 1: Nature and the Social

First blog entry....WAHOOOO! 

I'm not a huge blogger, so bear with me. I'm really pleased with this class so far and impressed with the book. With that said, onto Nature and the Social. 

As I was reading the book and other material, it reminded me of a ton of the Anthropology class I took last year. My class spent a lot of time discussing behavior, and whether it was biological or cultural. One example that stuck with me was the question Professor Palmer raised while talking about natural behavior v. learned behavior: if smiling is a learned behavior, why do blind babies smile? Well, after substantial arguing, we determined although smiling may seem like a natural behavior, something must make one smile, and without that stimulant, one would not smile. So smiling is technically learned, but not necessarily uniform in how it is learned. Kind of a tangent, but every time I hear nature v. nurture (or what have you), I think of that class. 

Talking about social foundations was interesting...the predisposition to engage with other humans is particularly fascinating. When I babysit young children, I've observed how attentive and alert they are to everything I do: they make constant eye contact and learn incredibly fast. That sponge-like learning is so cool...it makes me wish my parents taught me a different language when I was younger. Two of my best friends, Haye (pronounced "Hi-ya") and Siyi ("C"), are bilingual, and it makes me very jealous.

(Haye is on the far right and Siyi is directly to his left.)

Haye moved from Holland when he was ten and is fluent in Dutch. Siyi was born in China, but moved before she was one; however, she still speaks Chinese at home, though she seldom will in front of me. 

Another thing I though about was social construction of reality, and how literally EVERYTHING around us is constructed from human projections of reality...it really trips me up. 

Side-note: the device the director holds in his hand in this clip of the The Truman Show reminds me of an Ipad.

That's all for now!