Rosling: Let My Dataset Change Your Mindset

In this video, Hans Rosling, a Swedish doctor and professor, gives a presentation at the US State Department for a video series called TEDtalks about the mindset of people versus what is actually true when it comes to the differences between first world and third world countries. The reason he gives this presentation is because of the preconceptions of his students that the Western world contained long life in small families and shorter lives with large families. According to Rosling, the preconceptions have not been true since the years that these students' professors were born. He goes on to disprove this misconception with a bubble chart that shows the relationship between life expectancy at birth and children per woman and income per person, child mortality and yearly income, as well as how HIV relates (or does not) to income over the span of different years. Approximately ten minutes into this presentation, Rosling presents a chart showing the relationship between child survival and GDP per capita in different regions of the world in 2003. When showed by region, it only makes sense that the African region is at the bottom, but when Rosling breaks the regions down by country the results change, showing countries from the regions at the bottom move to the top. By doing this, Rosling shows that these developing regions are slowly moving upward an improving their health and development. Breaking away from these assumptions is necessary in order to change the mindset of the world. Based on what Rosling has presented, once we have collected thorough and specific data that there should be a new mindset around convergence.

Alexie: Class

Edgar

Alexie's character Edgar Eagle Runner is a Native American from Spokane, Washington, and despite his ethnic background and upbringing, was able to overcome and become a corporate lawyer. Not only is Edgar the protagonist in Alexie's story, but he also represents what many people in America could experience: a cheating wife, revenge, the loss of a child, a loveless marriage, and even a life-changing epiphany. Told in Edgar's point of view, Alexie tells the story of Edgar and Susan, the white woman that he marries, from how they met to the morning after Edgar's bloody bar fight. This shows how Edgar evolves over the relationship. Towards the end of the story, Edgar experiences an epiphany while being intimate with his wife "that she'd been faking her orgasms all along since [their] child had died, and probably since the first time [they] made love," (Alexie, 46). This epiphany causes him to leave his wife in bed and leave the house to a bar and allow himself to get into a fight that he is certainly outmatched in. After this fight, he returns home to his wife in more ways than one. When Edgar answers his wife's question of where he had gone he says "I was gone...But now I am back," (Alexie, 56). This shows that his physical return is also a metaphorical return, that he had not truly been there in the relationship since he discovered her secret affair.

Work Cited:

Alexie, Sherman. "Class." The Toughest Indian in the World. New York: Grove, 2000. 35-56. Print.

Sommers: Responding to Student Writing

In this article the writer, Nancy Sommers, is trying to show her audience of fellow writing teachers that students are not getting the help they need with their writing. Sommers explains that comments are very important to writers because writers "need and want thoughtful commentary to show that we have communicated our ideas and when not." (Sommers, pg. 148). According to Sommers, teachers comment on their students writing to only show them whether or not they are communicating effectively but also to teach them to question themselves. Sommers also makes note of how teachers are "appropriating" their students' writing. What she means by this is that the way teachers comment or correct the students' papers is not very helpful and often vague. In this article, Sommers makes it clear that the use of generic comments on grammar and spelling is not useful to a writer. Instead, a teacher should ask the questions and showing the confusion another reader would ask on befuddling passages. As a writer, I must agree with Sommers on this issue. I can recall having teachers whose corrections were less than helpful.

Ramsdell: Language and Identity Politics: The Linguistic Autobiographies of Latinos in the United States

In this work, Lea Ramsdell compares three authors who wrote autobiographies that focused on their "home" language in order to prove that "language is identity and that identity is political" (Ramsdell 166). What Ramsdell means by this statement is that language is a part of our identities as humans. It is the way that we communicate with one another and it shapes up us as human beings. However, it becomes political when that language is under public scrutiny. As stated earlier, Ramsdell wrote this comparison after reading three different works with language as the common factor. Those works are Hunger of Memory by Richard Rodríguez, Heading South, Looking North: A Bilingual Journey by Ariel Dorfman, and "How to Tame a Wild Tongue," by Gloria Anzaldúa. In these stories language is at the premise of each. Language has shaped each one of these authors in one form or another and it is why these authors put it as the focus of their works. According to Ramsdell, Anzaldúa's relationship with her language differs from the other works studies is through the way she "takes pride in her ability to express herself with such a range of linguistic codes." (Ramsdell 174). In the stories of the other two authors they encountered a struggle with their language, even grew to hate it at some point, for Anzaldúa it was the exact opposite. I agree with the author's stance of "language is identity and that identity is political." Like the authors of the autobiographies I have had my own relationship with the language I speak and the language of my culture, and I see the the struggle of both sides, much like Anzaldúa has.

Anzaldúa: Borderlands / La Frontera: The New Mestiza

In this article, Anzaldúa wishes to show her audience the new "mestiza," as stated in her title. She tackles issues such as the self-identity in the Latina culture for both men and women as well as the controversial border issues. In the issue of the border, Anzaldúa uses the physical border as a metaphor for that of cultural borders and differences. Differences such as the difference of "machismo" and "macho" of then and now and how is challenges a man's ability to take care of his family. According to Anzaldúa, one of the important effects of having a mestiza consciousness is "developing a tolerance for contradictions, a tolerance for ambiguity."It is this tolerance that aids one in dealing with the social and economic problems that affect oppressed groups in the United States today. By adopting the this consciousness, the mestiza will endure a great struggle but according to Anzaldúa, it is a mindset that can "bring about the end of rape, of violence, and of war." Personally, I agree with Anzaldúa on this subject. Although tolerance is not the easiest trait to develop, it is something that could have a great effect on any culture. If we, as humans, were to become tolerant of each others beliefs, skin colors, social statuses, and religions, maybe there would be less hate in the world. Perhaps it is hate itself that should be the one thing that should not be tolerated.