For Some, Uncertainty Starts at Racial Identity/In Generation Seen as Colorblind, Black Is Yet a Factor

I continue to be impressed with this class and the critical thinking skills you've been building since we first met in September. Tonight we're going to change this up a little bit. You will be discussing sentiments expressed by citizens about race and the upcoming presidential election. You will be making inferences about the ideology of the people interviewed in these articles based both on the text and on your own logic.


Answer each bulleted prompt and then respond to two of your peers' comments. This is a total of 10 posts of 5-7 sentences each. There should be enough time to finish the assignment in class, but the remainder may be completed as homework if you run short on time.


In Generation Seen as Colorblind, Black Is Yet a Factor

• What is significance of the sentiments about Senator Obama being expressed on a college campus?
• What does the following excerpt from the article indicate to you about the culture on the campus of the University of Kentucky:

“I might have heard something like that,” he said.

Asked if what he had heard was hard to talk about, Mr. Osborne stopped talking altogether and simply nodded, looking miserable.

• Pick out one significant quote or point of interest from the article and discuss it in a post.
  

For Some, Uncertainty Starts at Racial Identity

• How might the interviewees referencing the Bible in his statement relate to their ideology
• How does this impact your evaluation of their statements?
• Looking at Mr. Reynold's statements on race, provide an analysis:

“I would think of him as I would of another of mixed race,” said Glenn Reynolds, 74, a retired textile worker in Martinsville, Va., and a former supervisor at a Goodyear plant. “God taught the children of Israel not to intermarry. You should be proud of what you are, and not intermarry.”

Mr. Reynolds, standing outside a Kroger grocery store, described Mr. Obama as a “real charismatic person, in that he’s the type of person you can’t really hate, but you don’t really trust.”

• Based on the first part of the statement, how believable is the second part? Explain.
  
• Pick out one significant quote or point of interest from the article and discuss it in a post.

What Shamu Taught Me About a Happy Marriage

Please address all of the questions below in separate posts of 5-7 sentences each. In addition you will be responding to two of your peers' comments as well for a total of 6 posts.




NY Times Article: What Shamu Taught Me About a Happy Marriage

We are often required to use our experience as a guide for how we must act in any given situation. Sometimes when we are not sure how to act, we interpret cues about what is acceptable or unacceptable based on the reactions we get from others.

1. How do people telegraph the treatment they expect from others?


2. Is there a difference between telling someone what you expect of their behavior and showing them by training them. Explain.


3. Is training a spouse acceptable behavior in a relationship? Explain.


4. The author makes a comparison of training husbands to the animal world. Does this implication reflect her feelings toward him in any way? Use parts of the text to support your rationale.
   

Let's Not Get to Know Each Other Better

The essay we read is one of the five essays selected from a contest run by the NY Times:

"Just before Valentine’s Day this year, Sunday Styles did something very unromantic: we asked college students nationwide to tell the plain truth about what love is like for them. We weren’t sure what to expect, but we thought we wouldn’t receive many essays about red roses and white tablecloths.

When the contest deadline passed seven weeks later, more than 1,200 essays had arrived, from 365 schools in 46 states and Puerto Rico. In perhaps typical collegiate fashion, nearly 700 poured in on the last day, 400 over the final hour. We counted only three red roses among them, and one was bestowed in a laundry room.

As for the more complicated stuff, and the uniquely 21st century struggles — those we got by the hundreds, covering everything from how students view communications technology (as a lifeline, a crutch or a scourge) to their ambivalence about the no-strings-attached sexual opportunism of the hookup culture."

In our class discussion of the essay and of love and relationships in modern times, we came to the conclusion that like the author, we all want a committed and loving relationship.  And yet, all of us were very familiar with the type of relationships the author describes in the essay.

Assuming the article is true for many besides our class and we all being forthcoming about the desire for commitment and security in love...

• How do you account for the difference in how people act and what they want?   
• How do people negotiate what they truly want (commitment) in finding love to get what they need.  
• Is there any benefit to "no-strings" relationships-- do they empower or weaken us?  
  

Please respond to the 3 questions posed above and to 2 of your peers' responses for a total of 5 separate postings.  As always, keep your language and expression of ideas academic and respectful.

NY Times Article:  Let's Not Get to Know Each Other Better

Reading Schedule & Resources for Elie Weisel's Night

All readings need to be completed on schedule to ensure that you are prepared for the discussion that the class and assignments are based on. There will be sporadic, content- related quizzes on the reading. These will not be particularly in-depth but will be simple and easy to answer provided you have done the reading, therefore, it is not advisable to fall behind.

• Pages 1-40 October 16th
• Pages 41-65 October 23st
• Pages 66-97 October 30th
• Pages 97-112 November 6th

In addition to reading the novel, you will be forming 2 substantive questions about each week's readings to be asked in class during discussion of that reading. These should be legitimate questions about something you did not understand while reading or be a question you think would produce some insight for our class discussion. Questions should be prepared ahead of time and be typed and suitable for submission as a for-credit assignment.

Here is an example of a substantive/insightful question about the novel Night:

• "Why didn't people do something about the Nazi Army if they knew they were coming anyway?"

Here is a legitimate question that one might ask:

• "What is a Kabbalist and why did Elie's father not want him to learn about it?"

Questions that are not appropriate are ones that are posed merely for the sake of completing the assignment. These are examples of questions that are not appropriate for the assignment.

• "What is the main character's name?
• "What county did the Nazis come from?"

If you have legitimately simple questions such as these, I encourage you to ask them. Please make a note of them and ask them during our discussion, but form more substantive ones as your assignment.

For further information on the Holocaust you can research it using the following online resources:

Wikipedia

US Holocaust Museum

The Man Date- Study Questions

Respond to the following questions based on the NY Times Article "The Man Date."  Please respond online.  You will have approximately 20 minutes to answer.  

As always, your response should reflect appropriate language befitting a college student and respect for diversity.

1. Summarize the article in 4-6 sentences.
   
2. According to the article, what is a "man date?" (please paraphrase)
   
3. Why does a "man date" make some people uncomfortable?
   
4. Give your own example of a man date as the article defines it. 
   

NY Times Article: The Man Date

The Man Date; What Do You Call Two Straight Men Having Dinner?

You may discuss any—or a combination—of the following as long as it results in 4 separate 5-7 sentence paragraphs: 2 to your peers. Please respond to the ideas below-- in particular the italizied portions.

During our in-class discussion, it seems that many of you associate being “intimate” with being “homosexual” or in some cases, with being “feminine.” The obvious question is, then, why is this so? These are two separate concepts, so why have people—in this case, some of you—decided that one is just as good as the other?

Second, in the article it states that men were not always so hesitant to “go out” with each other, and that there have been two factors involved in how men presently feel about “man dates.” Both of these boil down to insecurity with society’s opinions of “manliness.”

So, here, I will ask a less obvious question: Why are men so concerned with what society thinks?

Reading Schedule & Resources for Elis Weisel's Night

All readings need to be completed on schedule to ensure that you are prepared for the discussion that the class and assignments are based on. There will be sporadic, content- related quizzes on the reading. These will not be particularly in-depth but will be simple and easy to answer provided you have done the reading, therefore, it is not advisable to fall behind.

• Pages 1-40 October 14th
  
• Pages 41-65 October 21st
  
• Pages 66-97 October 28th
  
• Pages 97-112 November 4th

In addition to reading the novel, you will be forming 2 substantive questions about each week's readings to be asked in class during discussion of that reading. These should be legitimate questions about something you did not understand while reading or be a question you think would produce some insight for our class discussion. Questions should be prepared ahead of time and be typed and suitable for submission as a for-credit assignment.

Here is an example of a substantive/insightful question about the novel Night:

• "Why didn't people do something about the Nazi Army if they knew they were coming anyway?"
  

Here is a legitimate question that one might ask:

• "What is a Kabbalist and why did Elie's father not want him to learn about it?"
  

Questions that are not appropriate are ones that are posed merely for the sake of completing the assignment. These are examples of questions that are not appropriate for the assignment.

• "What is the main character's name?
• "What county did the Nazis come from?"
  

If you have legitimately simple questions such as these, I encourage you to ask them. Please make a note of them and ask them during our discussion, but form more substantive ones as your assignment.

For further information on the Holocaust you can research it using the following online resources:

Wikipedia

U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum