Barbara Ehrenreich T.V essay Q.3

The Worst Years of Our Lives

            People who are currently living in the 21^st century watch television day in and day out for numerous amounts of reasons. Most commonly, entertainment is the main one because they get to sit around like couch potatoes and do completely nothing. No one ever asserts that television represent real life, unless that person decides to do what they see on T.V. Nowadays, it’s a vital part of most people’s lives, even though it is a fantasy and doesn’t affect the person or has a meaningful act towards them. Ehrenreich uses the term “root vegetables” to describe the American society who are planted on their behinds for hours upon hours watching television the way real people do. Most people would disagree with the terms “eerie and “unnatural” that she uses because there is nothing weird with watching T.V that involves the chasing of fast cars or violent actions. This makes it be more entertaining and amusing to watch. Watching T.V enables us human beings to escape our realities and block out what’s going on around us so we can feel less stressed.

            Like Ehrenreich states, being a couch potato is true to some extent because it’s a common thing to stare at our T.V’s for a long period of time. We will eventually un-plant ourselves from our root and move on with our lives and daily routines. As people, we have a life and most of us would rather go out with friends and have fun, some of us need to do our homework, and adults have jobs. This sums up that at we all have responsibilities to take care of, but at some point we need to relax and take a break from the world, so we watch T.V to entertain ourselves. There are times where friends and family get together, have movie nights, and enjoy a wonderful movie together.

            Despite the fact that television can turn an intelligent human being into a follower of some kind, it can do a person more good than bad, but has a possibility to do both. The effect it takes on our society can only be decided by the spectator. Everybody has their own point of view on whether watching television can be “eerie” and “unnatural” because it’s your choice on whether or not you are influenced by what you see on T.V. Many young individuals take it as a positive influence to watch their idol play a certain sport because one day they want to grow up and be like them, they see them as a positive figure in their lives as they are growing up. As a young person, sports are what people love and enjoy time watching it for a long time.

            Television was never intended to cause harm in society, rather to be informative and important in the real world. It has transformed society in a way that it allows the entire population to receive important information quicker. It is one of those innovations that shouldn't be considered or seen as a real world complication unless you make it influence you the wrong way and take out stuff you see on T.V that will cause severe consequences. Most people, such as adults, turn to the news channel because there might be a current event to know and want us to be informed on the situation. There can be a shooter on the loose and news reporters intend to warn the people to be precautious and stay alert to what’s going on around them

             

             

             

           

            

How to Tame a Wild Tongue

“How to Tame a Wild Tongue”

          In this piece of writing, Gloria Anzaldua argues and expresses her point of view on the different nations, cultures, classes, genders, and languages. As a Chicana, the identity of a Mexican-American living in the United States, Gloria encounters hard moments in her life while living in Texas when she would express her Chicano culture. Throughout this text, Anzaldua subtly conveys, in her own manner, the destruction of her Chicano culture and having to defend and take pride through the use of rhetorical strategies such as syntax, narrative flashbacks, and the incorporation of her native tongue using diction.

            The use of syntax by Anzaldua helps evaluate and convey her argument to the reader. Through this device, she applies it to herself, strongly defends her language, and has to be willing to take a deep pride in it. She conveys it through deep emotions about her lingual identity using balanced and declarative sentences. “Ethnic identity is twin skin to linguistic identity- I am my language. Until I can take pride in my language, I cannot take pride in myself. Until I can accept as legitimate Chicano Texas Spanish, Tex-Mex, and all other languages I speak I cannot accept the legitimacy of myself” (Paragraph 27). Throughout these complex sentences, she further describes the acceptance of her languages and remove the feeling of shame by stating, “I will have my voice: Indian, Spanish, white” (Paragraph 29). By using these types of sentences, she tells the reader that only if her languages are accepted she will find acceptance for herself.

            Anzaldua also incorporates the use of flashbacks and past experiences to show a kindhearted emotion to the reader. When reading her first Chicano novel, “City of Night,” by John Rechy who was also a Texan, she was stunned with astonishment that a Chicano was able to write and get their book published. She also read “I Am Joaquin,” and was surprised to see that it was bilingual, also written by a Chicano and a feeling of pure joy illuminated her when she saw a piece of poetry written in Tex-Mex, a language in which she spoke. Anzaldua then stated, “I felt like we really existed as people.” She felt an act of delight shine through her because she felt proud of her chicano people and culture that some were able to get their names out and represent the chicano culture, as she wanted to do the same. Anzaldua also incorporates her experiences as child going to school and being punished for speaking Spanish instead of English. “I remember being caught speaking Spanish at recess- that was good for three licks on the knuckles with a sharp ruler. If you want to be American speak American. If you don’t like it, go back to Mexico where you belong” (Paragraph 4).  This represents how unjust and cruel schools were in the United States regarding  people's culture and race other than American. 

            Gloria Anzaldua also incorporates words used in her native tongue to provide the reader with examples of her Chicano culture. “Chicanos, after 250 years of Spanish/Anglo colonization, have developed significant differences in the Spanish we speak. We collapse two adjacent vowels into a single syllable in certain words such as maíz/maiz, cohete/cuete. We leave out consonants appearing between vowels such as lado/lao and mojado/mojao (Paragraph 18). In their native tongue, they also borrowed words from the English language that almost sound the same so Spanish speakers adapt to English words. They are words like bola from ball, carpeta for carpet and maquina de lavar (instead of using lavadora­) for washing machine. Anzaldua uses this to show how chicanos use their form of language and their typical culture of a Mexican-American to emphasize her native tongue and way of speaking as well as communicating with their own racial group. 

            

Locavore essay

Locavore Essay

            Over the past decade, the Locavore Movement has become a developing trend throughout the nation. Defined by people who eat locally grown and produced products, locavores focus on the benefits of eating these products. They include such things like its nutritional value and its sustainability. While starting a locavore movement, people should take into consideration the difference in nutrition from products being shipped and those locally grown, the effect on local and large businesses, also involving the economy, and how pollution to the environment can be avoided.

            A justifiable argument to begin a locavore movement is that locally grown products are fresh rather than those who are packed in boxes and shipped to markets. By the time of purchase, those fruits and vegetables have been on board for weeks. People may argue that those products have decreased in nutrition. Produce purchased in the supermarket have been cold-stored for weeks, while those in local farmers markets were harvested within 24 hours of a customer’s purchase (Source A). Even though the person isn’t malnourished, healthy choices are always better and they might purchase fresh products. These choices of consuming products with more nutrients are left on the hands of that person. Purchasing produce from supermarkets isn’t wrong and doesn’t mean it’s unhealthy. “There will be nutritional differences, but they’ll be marginal, and people are not nutrient deprived.” Consuming more nutrients from a locally grown product is beneficial, but it is not a necessity.

            People may argue that that the locavore movement can save the world and the environment. When you buy locally, it preserves fossil fuels used to transport produce from long distances. As more and more produce is being shipped, gasoline emissions are sent to the earth’s surface, where it creates pollution. Those bad chemicals swaying in thin air, affects the people living around that environment. Transportation emissions pale in comparison to those of production (Source D). Farm industries that send out that hazardous black smoke aren’t the farmers found in markets, instead the ones sending their products to the markets. The more people who take part in the locavore movement, those production industries will be forced to cut back.

            Locavores who take part in this movement improve the economy of local markets. Farmers benefit from people who choose to purchase from Farmers Markets instead of Supermarkets or big brand stores. Some people argue that buying locally affects people elsewhere such as Kenya (Source C). But others ignore that issue because they believe buying local products improves their economy.

           

            

Autobiography

Autobiography

           I began my first day of kindergarten attending Vine St. Elementary located in Los Angeles, CA. Throughout the beginning of the year I didn’t want to go to school because I was always a scared and nervous child when I was young. So knowing me, I cried a lot throughout the day. But I eventually got used to it and started to like school more. During those five years of attendance in elementary, I was always one of the top students in all my classes, especially in math. Math has always been my strong subject in every grade level. When I was in about 3^rd grade, I also received a student of the month award by the school’s principal. I graduated from elementary with high honors and my parents were very proud of me. I really enjoyed elementary school because I knew that with that experience and knowledge I was going to exceed greatly in the future.

            From there I attended Bancroft Middle School where I was enrolled in the SAS program. I thought I wasn’t going to be able to handle it because all my classes were honors. Even though they gave out a lot of homework, I was able to manage myself to complete all of it no matter what it took. I was really dedicated to completing all my work because I wanted a good G.P.A on my way to high school. I wasn’t one of those students who took into consideration the act of not doing the work. I enrolled into SAS for the purpose of taking a step further in my education.

            Now moving on to high school, I was also assigned all honors classes starting from 9^th grade to now. I need to make sure that I really dedicate myself to my studies because I want to attend a good college. To do that, I need to push myself and get the best grades that I can. It is sometimes hard to get all my work done because I am part of the Fairfax baseball team and practice usually ends late. But in the most part, getting good grades and participating in a sport at the same time is good for your college record.