Status Update

So far along in the process of the “Ten Page Paper” I have been able to go to the field site and have an interview and watch the way reporters interact with each other and how they do their work. I have done research but the result tends to be the same information over and over again. It is always about numbers and statistics and how times have changed. Unfortunately I still have to find a claim, because I cannot find anything to exactly argue for or against in regards to my subculture. In peer review, I wish that someone would tell me what my claim should be, but I know that should not be my question. I think my question would be if my ideas and my thoughts are coherent, because that is a problem I really have when it comes to writing and I feel extremely confused about what I am doing.

A House for the Homeless

1. A House for the Homeless is basically arguing that the generalizations made about the homeless cannot be applied to all of them. As the author Ivana Nikolic points out in her story that the term “homeless” can be applied to many people of different races, cultures, backgrounds, with a wide variety of education.
2. I think that the style of argument for the story was classical because in her introduction she opens up by hooking in the audience and she uses ethos as well by discussing her life as a refuge. Then she goes on to state her case and so forth. Also, at the end in her conclusion she appeals to the emotions of the audience.

First Field Site Observation

On Friday I made a trip to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the field site I had chosen to observe for my subculture. When my original escort of the newspaper was not able to take me on a tour of the newsroom, I was directed by her assistant, Ms. Hoffman to the desk of Mr. Ernie Suggs, rover reporter for the Atlanta area. As I first looked around, I instantly took in all the clutter and linked newspaper journalists to being hoarders. There were desks, papers, copiers, pens, headphones, headsets, and phones everywhere. Each desk was decorated with some personal artifact of the person who at the time inhabited it whether it was snow globes, stuffed animals, masses of books, small flags decorated with someone’s college letters on it, and name tags on the top of their desks. Staffers sat typing away, talking on phones or chatting quietly with those near them. Supposedly today (Friday) was a “slow” day.
As we sat down he asked me why I was there. When I told him subcultures, he laughed. He questioned me first, on a couple of things like where I was from, where I grew up, and where I went to school, which I thought was interesting. He was a reporter after all.
It was easy to open up to Ernie which I guess makes him a good reporter, and he gave me ideas on questions to ask him. He told me a lot about his life as a journalist, and gave me a general idea of the process that journalists usually go through (well those that work at the AJC). I was able to get his definition of the word “beat” which I later on learned as I did research on the word, had a couple of definitions in the world of journalism. Mr. Suggs had opened up to me a lot more easily than I thought he would, but I still got the idea as we made our way through the three departments of the newsroom, that journalists liked to keep things on the hush hush. Ernie seemed to know everyone and was fully aware of what all the other divisions of the newspaper did. He’d say things like, “They do arts, and they do investigative reporting.” As we headed to the staircase he pointed out Sonia Murray, music writer for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. As he said, “she was one of the first, and the best.”
Mr. Suggs then showed me the first five minute video clip in a series of three that noted the fortieth anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination in April of 1968. It was a collaborated work done with him and three other reporters.
My tour went on like this for the next half hour. I was able to grasp the fact that the Atlanta Journal-Constitution was used to attaining some of the best reporters in their fields as journalists as Ernie pointed out other people and their jobs. Everyone was very courteous, but I knew I was being mocked. They laughed as Ernie repeatedly told fellow staff members that I had chosen to study journalists as a subculture.
Another thing that the journalists liked to laugh at was my age. When I first sat down with Suggs, he told me that he started writing soon after he graduated, and had done work on the newspaper at his college (he was the editor). I asked him when he graduated from school. He told me in 1990. I told him 1989. He laughed and told me that that was the year he pledged. As we met with others the years that had past them by became a joke. He shouted out to one man that I was born in ’89. The man responded by saying that he graduated then.
During the tour and as it came to the end, any question that even popped to my mind was answered promptly by Ernie. After that I got to meet Ms. Angela Tuck (the lady who was supposed my original escort). It was her job to deal with the readers and any complaints that they about things that were written in the newspaper.
I really liked my trip to the AJC. It brought back for about the first five minutes of my walk back home, the dream I had as a pre-teenager to become a newspaper reporter.

Act V

In listening to the Act V from Chicago Public Radio, I got a look into the subculture of inmates who take part in the performing arts. The episode followed a reporter who watched and analyzed criminals in a high security jail as they prepared for their performance of Act V of Shakespeare’s legendary play Hamlet.
The Missouri Eastern Correctional Center is the field site of this subculture, and a perfect one at that. In watching the inmates at this correctional facility, the reporter is able to view the "actors" prepare for their play, in which they come from one hard core setting and move into the rehearsal space, a place where they have to change characters completely.
The reporter conveys to listeners how difficult it must be to be a good actor especially in trying to be one while being an inmate at a jail. As the reporter points out, "being a good actor is the exact opposite of being a successful inmate." According to him, an actor must be vulnerable, but an inmate is someone who lacks emotion and looks tough.
There is a hierarchy system in jail, one inmate illustrates, and all of those who act are the ones at the bottom of the chain. At first, those inmates that wanted to take part in drama were abused by the bigger inmates. That was until “Big Hutch”, one of the guys who stood at the top of the hierarchy, was cast as the role of Horatio. Before then, someone like “Big Hutch” would have never associated themselves with the “actors.”
Through his interviews the author allows listeners to understand what makes these hardened criminals such good actors and how they bring the characters to life. Unfortunately, most of them take from their past experiences, which are not good ones. One criminal says that what helps him was the fact that he understands how it feels to really want to hurt someone. Too bad he has experienced really hurting someone. He also conveys to the listeners how much the convicted actors have a grasp for the story. They practically understand the story better than any one else outside the jail. As the author points out, as many times as he had seen Hamlet, he did not really know it all.
What is important for those in the subculture is to do their roles correctly, and they do. What is also pointed out is how each man, all of them in prison for some horrific crime, tries to illustrate how they have changed. They all have the “that was me then, this is me now” attitude on the outlook of their present situation. It appears to be important for all of them to separate themselves from what they used to be.

My SubCulture

Topic: Newspaper Journalists

Sources:

Burgh, Hugo De, ed. Making Journalists. New York: Routledge, 2005.
Copperud, Roy H. Handbook for Journalists. 1965.
Garlock, David, ed. Pulitzer Prize Feature Stories. 3rd ed. Ames: Iowa State Press, 2003. Mills, Eleanor, Kira Cochrane, eds. Journalistas. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers,
2005.
Randall, David. The Universal Journalist. 3rd ed. Ann Harbor: Pluto Press, 2007.


My favorite source (so far) is the book titled Making Journalists. It is my favorite because, I think that so far it is the best source for the subculture that I want to do my paper on. I have not read much of the book yet, but from looking through it briefly, I have gotten a basic idea of what it is about. The book touches upon some of the things that I believe I really need for my paper, such as what journalism is (in different societies from China to here in the United States), and what a journalist is (and what makes a journalist).
On the other hand, I am not sure that the book will give me all the information I want. For example, I wanted to know what makes people want to become newspaper journalists. I also want to know what the goals of newspaper journalists are. Are there any things that journalists (at least the majority) aim for when they begin writing? Like special awards, or writing the “big” news story.

Intro to Research (uggh)

So we had this blogging assignment to do in which we had to look up a word. My word was Menudo. I went on to the whole use Georgia State's online library resouces thing, and it just did not work out for me. First of all I could only find three resources. No wait, that is a lie, I could only ACCESS three resources. I found enough articles on the group Menudo, and I even found a definition for what the word actually meant, but I could not get any of the information. The articles that I found concerning Menudo were not in text file and I could only get them by doing a whole bunch of confusing stuff. As a result, I simply gave up.
What I was able to find and actually read were just two articles. One which was actually about the group looking for new members, and the other one was more about Ricki Martin who used to be a member of Menudo when he was younger, but the article had nothing to do with Menudo at all.
Basically, I'm just writing this to say that this whole process had been very frustrating for me.

"Who Am I?" ?

I used the internet to research and find information about the writer of my song, Tupac Shakur. I think I preferred the internet over going to the library for so many reasons. One being, I am lazy and I did not want to walk all the way (fifteen minutes) to campus to have some librarian look him up and only find me two books. Another is that the Georgia State University library has disappointed me so much in the short time I have been here at the university. Unlike the Georgia State University library, I can sit back in my own chair at home and look up (rather comfortably) things about Tupac. I was able to find an array of things from just typing his name. My search on him brought up things such as online biographies, and online sites to buy books about Mr. Shakur. Also, there were many sites that offered the lyrics to all of his songs. In addition, there are still fan based sites for him.
What I also did was look at music videos of Tupac’s most popular songs. One of the videos that I looked at was one for the song that my essay is about. I decided to go onto YouTube, because I think that it was good for me to get a visual, to better understand the message of his song, even if I felt the video was not a good enough visual for the song.
That is what I truly like about the internet, because you are able to gather a large amount of information about anything, by just using your fingertips. On the other hand, there are some problems with going on to online biographies (such as Wikipedia), and fan based sites, because not everything you will find on these kinds of sources, wikipedia especially, will always be hard core fact.

Rhythm, Rhyme, and Rhetoric (an article about Hip Hop)

I believe that the article might be interesting to me because it does not talk about all rappers but it gets specific and discusses one gangster rap group known as Public Enemy. Unlike other articles that are always written about Hip Hop artists, “Rhythm, Rhyme, and Rhetoric in the Music of Public Enemy,” goes into discussing their music. Even before I read the first couple of pages of the article (from just looking at the title), I felt that I would enjoy it, because it would not be an article that I was used to seeing, engaging in an argument about Hip Hop. The article appears to address something that a lot of critics of Rap and Hip Hop take for granted. It feels like to me, that critics seem to only like to discuss the lifestyles and images that are attached to, and surround the Hip Hop genre. They do not appreciate the actual work that comes from Rap and Hip Hop.
Robert Walser, a professor at the University of California at Los Angeles wrote this article in 1995. His specialty is in jazz and other popular music of America. He was the chair of the musicology department and has won the Irving Lowens Award for Distinguished Scholarship in American Music two times. Not only has he written this article which discusses Hip Hop, he has also made publications on music types such as Heavy Metal and Jazz.

Dizzee Rascal (British Hip Hop Artist)

I decided to do some research on artist Dizzee Rascal because not only does he look like the average rapper ( a stereotype, yes I know), but when I looked up his story it was so similar to that of Rap and Hip Hop artists here in the United States. The image that is portrayed by most Hip Hop artists especially the men is one that reflects lives of poverty, stints in crime and at times involvement in violence. These same characteristics can be applied to the life of Dizzee Rascal, and I for one believe that it is the life someone has once lived contributes greatly to their own involvement in Hip Hop culture.
Despite his younger days, his music has gained him success in the United Kingdom. His music like many rappers seems to be a product of where he grew up and his background.
What does contribute to Dizzee’s own personal style of Hip Hop is the other music styles that he uses in his music. These styles are ragga (which comes from reggae and or dancehall), and grime (which comes from urban music from London). According to Dizzee though, he does take some from the American Hip Hop scene, but tries to maintain the British identity of his work.
Rascal is known in the United Kingdom to have music that is humorously entertaining. At the same time, he has done a lot of work that has included social commentary.

The Benefits of Peer Review

Today in English class we had peer review I normally hate peer review and feel like it is a waste of time but I actually liked it today. What I liked about the peer review that we had in class today was that before we discussed each other’s papers we had to write down things about other papers. For example, three things that worked for the paper and three things that did not (even though I could not find three things). The peer review helped me, because both people that I worked in a group with presented ideas that I should think about for my final draft that I would definitely take into account for my final draft. For example, they said I should think about what the opposing side would have to say about my argument and try to argue against that. I did not think about that when I was writing my two page rough draft, so now that I will hopefully make that apart of my final draft; I would reach three to four pages. :)

Logical Fallacies in PCU

In the approximate fifty minutes that we were able to watch PCU, the movie about politically correct things that should be said and done on college campuses, there were many logical fallacies that I thought I identified (even though I found it hard to because I was enjoying the movie). The one that I did notice for sure (I think) was the either/or fallacy. The either/or fallacy is the conclusion that oversimplifies the argument by reducing it to only two sides or choices. It came in the scene right after “Ms. President” of the college left the “PIT.” One of the main characters suggested throwing a party to raise money so that they would be able to keep the PIT as housing. When a member protested he then went on to say, "you either throw the party or have to get jobs."

"Death of an Innocent"

The story of Christopher McCandless told through the article “Death of an Innocent’ by Jon Krakauer, is an exceptional story about a young man who not only defied the image of an average college student, but also defied the image of the average American.
It is pointed out in “Death of an Innocent” that Christopher McCandless (also known as Alex Supertramp), was very different from others his age. During his college career at Emory here in Georgia, he strayed away from the things that his friends and others his age were taking interest in. “Social life at Emory revolved around fraternities and sororities, something Chris wanted no part of. And when everybody started going Greek, he kind of pulled back from his old friends and got more heavily into himself” (8). However, his story is not sensational just because he did more that sit about and binge drink his college days away at the frat house. It is because he attempted to do feats that many past their college years would do. From an early age, it was pointed out that Christopher McCandless “marched to a different drummer” ( Death of an Innocent 7). He was willing to do things others were not willing to do from an early age. According to Krakauer, at ten years old McCandless ran in his first race that included approximately one thousand adults and finished sixty ninth.
McCandless reminds me of what I used to see growing up in New York. During my pre teenager and teenage years, I would have to travel into the city (Manhattan) for school. Both my middle school and my high school were on the west side, which was home to some of the oddest homeless people I had ever seen. These homeless people were not shriveled up, and they did not appear to be mentally unstable. They were scrawny white kids that sported hand written, “I will… for food” signs, whom I had always presumed to be acid or some crazy “white kid drug” users, because how many white kids did I know living homeless on the streets in New York City. To be quite honest, none. It was not until my freshman year of high school, when a teacher told us that these teenagers left their comfortable suburban (sometimes lavish) lifestyles to travel across the country. They were letting go of the stability of their money, and delving in to see what it was like without that security.
When I thought about what they did, I did not even stop to think that I should at least admire what they were doing. The first thing that came to my mind was that they were obviously crazy. No one in their right mind should leave home to live on a New York City street. After all, why would anyone want to leave economic security to travel with hardly anything to survive on? Unfortunately, the same belief is shared by many others. According to Jon Krakauer, “when news of McCandless’s fate came to light, most Alaskans were quick to dismiss him as a nut case” (9).

AIDS and Advertising

At first, I felt that if anything, the photograph would turn the public away from what it was that the company was selling. But then when I started to think about it, I realized that the photograph came from a completely different time in history than the one that I am apart of now. Now in these times, a picture of a young man crippled with a disease would have probably been black and white to present a softer touch to the point that they were trying to get across, so that it would not be so “hard hitting”. It feels as if because the photograph is in color, there is that certain intensity to it that would have been played down in a black and white photograph. The fact that the image is heightened would make any person stop and look and think about what is trying to be said with the advertisement. Once they get the point (if they are anything like me), they would purchase the shirt believing that they are helping with the cause.
One can look at the advertisements or commercials of today for various forms of cancer, and advertisements for HIV/ AIDS awareness for examples. In trying to get the point across the people making the commercials and advertisements are appealing to a side of the general public that would make them go out and want to purchase whatever items are being sold to help benefit HIV/ AIDS awareness, or that would benefit the research to help cure breast cancer. Then again, even if the way the photograph is presented in a different style, I believe that the advertisers all still have the same idea. They are attempting to appeal to a certain side of a consumer. It’s like that feeling a person gets when they go out and purchase the yellow bracelet for cancer, a red shirt from Gap to help with research for HIV/AIDS, or a yogurt from Yoplait with the pink cap that turns over some of its profit for breast cancer. The advertisers know that consumers like to buy items for themselves, so why not let them buy an item in which the consumers themselves feel that their money is indirectly helping someone else.
Also there is the side of the consumer that makes them feel as if they are making a personal statement about themselves. In wearing the photograph on a shirt, a person is saying, “I believe in AIDS awareness,” or for that time specifically, “I know that AIDS is not a taboo.” Look at the way people dress, especially now in the times of the Che Guevera and Bob Marley shirts. Or the shirts that blatantly have the messages written across them such as “You Know You Want Me.” Us human beings are always trying to get a message across for what we stand for, believe in, and or support.
I think that overall the company who used the photograph was trying to evoke that type of feeling from the general public. They wanted people to go out and feel as if not only were they making a statement about themselves and their own decisions, but they were also helping other human beings.