I understand what she is saying and agree with her husband. Her husband is one Muslim and he may or may not agree with some things of his religion. Just like I don't agree with some things in my religion. I think its unfortunate if people are targeting him just because he is Muslim and people think he is evil as Bin Ladin is. Her husband didn't decided to be Muslim and her husband isn't friends with Bin Ladin, so why should it matter what religion he is. I feel this situation is blown out of proportion, who cares what religion we are and what color skin we have, or what color hair and eyes we have. We all have hearts that are beating and mind that have opinions but when all said and done, we are all the same. We're living here on Earth for a short time so why have all the extra unnecessary crap added to it.

This lecture really opened my eyes to many things. Not only did I learn a lot about this topic during the hour an a half but i also was provoked to learn more about what is truly going on. I thought Sam did a great job leading up to this lecture talking about ethnocentrism the previous class and and interpreting in into the lecture last Thursday. I think it was a great idea to have us be in the mind set that we are Muslims and see what they are seeing from their point of view. That hit hard. What if that was us living like that? I never had even thought of it like that. After attending this lecture the war in the Middle East has a new perspective for me. I am not only seeing it from an American point of view. Seeing all the clips also blew my mind. Especially the clip from the guy that has Sam listed as one of the 100 hundred most dangerous professors. His video was intense, and by the end of it I had tears in my eyes and the chills. It made everything clearer and made me nervous and scared for the future. This class made me a little uncomfortable but that's the point, right? I was touched when learning and seeing our soldiers. I think this hit close to me because one of my best childhood friends who also happens to be my neighbor graduates boot camp for the marines this week. Thinking about the fact that he will most likely go over sees and fight in our war and see the way the soldiers acted good and bad made me also get the chills. What really blew my mind is that their media is interpreting this as us trying to convince them to be Christian. I had never even thought of that. I mean some of the things that are said by our political figures, such as Sarah Palin shouldn't have been said. I feel the use of 'god' should not be brought into this subject, especially now since they think we are trying to invade them as Christians. Another fact that blew my mind when was the family asked the American to take their picture and bring it home and show their friends and family. That absolutely shocked me. I could never even imagine going to their country and asking them to take my family and I's picture than showing it to their friends and family. Their customs are so different than ours and its so interesting to learn about this and see things from a different perspective not just a college student in America. Sam was definitely not lying when he said this lecture is going to blow your mind because it did just that. I am so glad that I am taking this class because it is opening my eyes to a whole other world.

Growing up in a small down in Pennsylvania when going into high school I had to choose between taking German and Spanish. Even though I am 100 percent German, I decided to take Spanish because I felt that it would be more beneficial. I struggled so bad ninth and tenth grade while learning Spanish. I had absolutely no interest in learning a forgien language which made it that much harder as well. If you asked me today, five years later I can tell you about three Spanish words so obviously it didn't help me at all in life. I feel taking a second language will really only help you if you use it frequently and stay on top of it.
If I wasn't a full time student taking 18 credits as well as working a part time job and had absolutely nothing else to worry about, I might consider learning a second language. But learning Chinese would most like never cross my mind. I feel learning Chinese would beA an extremely difficult language to learn. Due to the fact that they have different vowels, and don't have the same sounds as English. So it would just make it extremely difficult to learn. But then again if i had nothing on my plate and had all the free time in the world, I could focus on the language differences and put the effort into learning this unique language.
I would also not learn this language because of the Chinese population. I do not really plan on traveling after graduation, and residing in Pennsylvania somewhere. And after seeing the guest speaker last week and the demographic maps he presented to our class I would most definitely not learn Chinese. This gentleman showed a map of all the counties in Pennsylvania and most populated areas of Asians are Centre county and Pittsburgh. Centre county due to Penn State! And Pitt being because of the medical resources there. The way I feel now, I do not want to live in the State College area or Pittsburgh when I am older and raising a family so therefore learning this language seems a little out of the picture for me.
I am going to school for Speech Pathology and I am sure it would look absolutely incredible on my resume that I know Chinese. But really? Is all the practice and education and time put into learning this language really worth it just for a job that will always be in demand. Maybe if I was going to school for International business or something that I would actually be interacting with Chinese people it may be a little more useful.
I hope i am not sound like a debbie downer, I mean learning Chinese would be an awesome characteristic of an individual and would definitely part yourself from a numerous amount of individuals.

I definitely think males also have to conform to society, just not near as much as females. I feel like there is a lot more pressure for females to look like this, do this with your hair, wear this, do your make up like this. Whereas for males I feel like they're not under as much pressure from society to dress certain, and they obviously don't have to worry about hair or makeup. I feel like males are under the pressure to have a muscular body but if they don't I feel like they don't care as much as females. I mean every magazine cover is a female that is a size 2 so I definitely feel that adds more pressure for girls. Maybe myself, being a female i don't exactly understand the pressure a male in todays society feels. It would be nice to hear from a male how they feel about the pressure from society because I know as a girl it's super annoying and stressful.

If our government eliminated welfare all together it probably would cause a lot more problems in the system. And I'm sure the government has other issues to be working out right now. I personally feel that welfare should be related. I understand many individuals are born into the welfare system and can not help it but I feel that the government should set up a program to help get these people back on their feet. I think I am so against welfare because I have grown up to see my parents and family members work forty hours a week. My dad owns his own business and as the economy as gotten bad I see my dad working more hours a day and working weekends. I respect hard work and my parents made me get a job right when i turned 16. I feel that parents should instill this characteristic into their children at an early age. At the age of 16 I got a job at a local grocery store back at home. I have seen a numerous amounts of different people during those years. But, the one thing that gets on my nerves so bad is when people who are on food stamps buy the most expensive steak on the shelf. Then after they purchase all this luxurious food they then proceed to order cigerattes. I don't know for some reason this gets on my nerves so bad.

I think before coming into soc 119, I had a sense of the things Sam has mentioned but I feel I have learned a tremendous amount taking this class. It's a nice break from all of my core classes. On the first day of class we took that quiz to test our knowledge about our society. The next class when we reviewed the answers I was surprised by the majority of them! I feel that this class has changed my opinion on race, somewhat. I was taken back by the fact that the little girls and boys wanted to play with white dolls instead of black dolls. That right there changed my opinion on black and white people. My opinion also changed when learning about Native Americans. I thought Native Americans were hard working respectable, but after what we learned I now don't respect Native Americans as much as I use too. That's kind of harsh to say but that's how i feel. I also feel that this class has made a huge difference in my way of thinking. I never knew there were different steps if identifying race and now that I know their are and they are different for black and white people, I take a new approach to when people say something racist, or something about race. I think this class is super interesting, for example seeing the lady living in the trailer, walking ten miles to her job at Burger King. Also, the books we have to read. They may not be the most interesting things ever but they are full of such great facts that I probably would have never known without taking this class.

When we watched this video in class I couldn't believe what I was seeing. If it were young white children and they picked the white doll over the black one, I could understand a little more. But i was astonished with I saw the young black boys and girls pick the white baby doll. That was an eye opener for me but what really made me think 'oh my god, is this really happening' was the kids reactions to why they wanted to play with the white doll over the black doll. I would have thought that the black children would have wanted to play with the black baby dolls. I never really thought about this issue and when I do its crazy. I wish my parents would have exposed me to issues like this growing up, and because I don't want my children in this box, I am going to educate them on issues like this as they are growing up. I want my children to realize at an early age that every race and individual is equal. I'm going to buy my little girl all kinds of dolls and i'll buy my little boy different kinds of GI Joe's. So they know there is a difference and they become aware at an early age that we're all equal and shouldn't be separated in any ways.
I feel like I was brought up in this box that I'm white so i should play with white dolls. I feel like our society has a odd way of going about things. Like, shouldn't our parents want us to grow up playing with other race dolls. So we are aware at an early age of things that we become aware of later on.
I feel as if this video affected a lot of our class, and hopefully this video will keep spreading and all different people will see the outcome of this video! And we will feel empowered to not keep our children in this box. We'll want to expand their horizons and not have them question are we all equal when they are old enough to understand race and complex issues like this. I feel that we need to start educating everyone about things like this because its not fair that young black children want to be like white people. They want to be like this because according to them black people are 'bad' and 'ugly'. I just find this topic so distrubing and crazy! I know i will share this video with as many people as possible so they are also aware of this ridiculous issue our children are facing. I think it is important for young children to know that we are all equal no matter what color our skin is, what our hair looks like, what our eyes look like, where our family came from, where we came from. Where all equal dispite having different skin color.

I think ethnocentrism, is a great topic to talk about especially in a soc class. I mean obvious 'bleeding' isn't something we all want to talk about or hear about daily. But, Sam was right. This is a natural occurance, just like your stomach growling, hair growing, and nails growing! It is disgusting to think about this bodily function but theres nothing wrong with it. The post above mine made a great point, making people uncomfortable in class starts a great conversation topic. Example, this topic. I think its a great thing to make people uncomfortable and talk about issues that not everyone thinks about, or feels comfortable with. But because of the uncomfortable feeling it makes the topic a lot more interesting and makes people learn and realize new things that they would have never even ran across before. Im eager to see what else sam brings up that makes the class feel awkward and the great conversations that will stir from it.

I feel in a way that this is going a little too far. I mean yes, older color of people are used to the being referred as 'negro' but times are changing. Which they should understand. There is always going to be change. Now the new work is 'black'. This is the census, all they are trying to do is take a total in America, they are not trying to hurt anyone by referring to them as 'black' or 'negro'. I could maybe understand some people getting offended if this was something sacred to their family, or something of value. But it's the census! Whoever created the census was not trying to stir up an ongoing debate between 'negro' and 'black'. Maybe i feel this way because I am white and I have no been faced with his dilemma, but to me I feel that it is going a little too far, and shouldn't effect people as much as it is.

I just asked the same question in a previous blog entry I just posted. How do 'brown' people feel about these issues? What's their stand on this issue between black and white people. I think we should start polling the brown people and see what their responses are. I would find it interesting to see what they would have to say. Would they side more with the black race or the white race? I don't even know what 'brown' people consider themselves in these polls, do they answer under white or black or do they not even answer? I never really thought of this topic before, but I find it strange how we leave them out on posing their opinion on these intense topics. They obviously must have an opinion about these topics because they're in on this too. Somehow we should figure out a way to incorporate their feelings into the class as well as everyone else.