Week 9: Social Construction of Gender

I agree with the book in saying that gender is learned through socialization.  Once society determines whether you are male or female you are expected to act in a certain way.  If you break the norm, then society is shocked.  Growing up, boys are typically given trucks and action figures to play with while girls are given dolls and dresses.  Boys are just expected to be stronger and more into playing rough and getting dirty than girls.  If a girl would rather play in the mud than play dress-up, people call her a "tomboy" or other such terms.  Although men and women may have different body-builds, I think it is ridiculous to say that men are smarter than women or vice versa.  Different people, regardless of sex and gender, have different skill sets and they shouldn't just be pegged a certain way because they are male or female.

I'm studying to be a mechanical engineer; the College of Engineering at Virginia Tech is only around 20% female.  Only around 5% of working mechanical engineers are female.  When people find out that I'm an engineering student, they are usually surprised because society seems to think that only men can build and design big machines.  It's definitely taken a bit of getting used to being constantly outnumbered in classes.  I had a math class my first semester that was 45 students and I was the only female.  It didn't take long for my professor to learn my name in that class.  Being a female in this field, it seems that I have to prove myself a little more than the guys to show that I do belong which I think goes back to society "assigning" genders.

Week Eight: Global Inequality

Why should we care about global inequality?
One of the topics that stuck out to me after listening to the podcast was how interwined countries are.  As globalization increases, global inequality seems to become more important as it affects price of our products, the size and strength of the economy, the health of the environment, and whether they as a whole, contribute positively or negatively to the world.

Poorer countries have people who are more willing to do hard manual labor and produce products for less than they would be produced in a countries like the United States.  This an important to look at and realize that as global inequality lessens, the prices of different products are going to increase to meet the demands of the workers.  On the other hand, the fewer people living in poverty means that more and more people are able to buy goods and services which ultimately serves to strengthen the economy.  Also as countries become more wealthy, they can look towards improving environmental conditions.  We should care about global inequality because we are a more fortunate country than most and we should work to reduce poverty as ultimaltey it will benefit us.

Week Seven: Exploring Social Class

I think that social class is very important to people living in the United States.  It's not that people purposely judge others on their class, it's just so ingrained in society that it's hard to break away from it.  The book provides many great examples about how people from the working class, middle class, and upper class are all seperated.  It was definitely quite prominant in my high school who the "rich" kids were and who the "poor" kids were.  Because these two groups often live in different areas around town, they hardly ever interact and create their own social groups that are seperate from one another.  In high school, I was on the crew team.  Crew is often considered an rich person sport due to the astronomical costs of the equipment and the fact that it isn't paid for by the school.  Every year when we would compete at the Stotesbury Cup, the largest high school regatta, the trophies would be won by the elite, private schools were money wasn't an issue.
Exploring the PBS website about the documentary People Like Us was really interesting.  I liked reading the stories about the people from different classes and I could relate to a lot of them.  I think it definitely helped emphasis how social classes still play an important role in today's society.  After exploring the website, this documentary is on my list of movies to watch.

Week Six: Changing Social Connections

I've never really had the experience of living in a world without Facebook or email or instant messaging.  As a college sophomore, Facebook exploded in popularily during my freshman year of high school.  Before that, everyone had a myspace.  So for me, I've never really experienced a world without multiple electronic ways of communicating with my friends and family.  I do, however, think that Americans are more isolated today due to technology.  I have a large circle of friends due to various schools, jobs, and activities but my close friends who I having meaningful conversations with is much smaller.  Before all of this technology invaded our world, people had to make an effort to talk to their friends.  They had to go out and travel to see people who lived a long distance away instead of just calling them or Skyping with them.  I do think that this issue is something that society as a whole should be concerded about.  People seem to steadily be loosing the ability to interact face to face with strangers.  A lot of times when placed in awkward and uncomfortable situations, people pull out their phone to play games or text/email friends so they don't have to deal with strangers.  Technology has definitely helped people keep a wider circle of friends but it has made people more isolated due to the fact that their conversations are less meaningful

Week Five: The Criminal Justice System

Reading that only 38% of rapes are reported to the police is an alarming statistic.  I see why a majority of females do not wish to report sexual violence.  Having to have the whole traumatizing and embarrassing ordeal brought up over and over again isn't something most people want to have to deal with.  The thought of facing your attacker in court must also be unbearable.  During most rape proceedings, the women's own sexual history might be made public which would be embarassing and make the women feel as if the rape was her fault and as if she was the one on trial. Because of this, I think that the way rapes and other cases of sexual violence are handled should be reexamined.  Women should be able to report rapes to the police, knowing that everything will be done quickly and confidentially as to not tramautize the woman anymore.  It is ridiculous that some say that women should modify their behavior to reduce the risk of becoming a victim.  Women should have the right to dress however they want without being accused of "asking for trouble:".

While prisons keep dangerous criminals off the street, they have a downside in that they can make prisoners more hardened criminals.  There definitely isn't an easy way to fix this dilemia as possesing a criminal record can make it nearly impossible for reformed criminals to hold jobs and become full-functioning memebers of society again.  I'm not for getting rid of the prison system as I don't want to be living among criminals, I just think that it could be reformed in a way that it doesn't encourage prisoners to keep committing crimes and it allows former prisoners to have better opportunities once they reenter society.

Week Four: Nature vs. Nurture

I definitely think that gender roles and how they are percieved by society is on the nurture side.  Although we are shaped by biology with the fact that we are either male or female, we learn through play as children the roles that men and women typically take on in society.  The "Beth/Adam" experiment deals with gender socialization and seems to prove the point that gender roles are learned through social factors and influences of people around you.  Reading in the textbook about children's storybooks and the roles that males and females take in those books isn't surprising.  Most media portrays males as the protector of the family and women as the one who stays home to raise the children.  The quote by the mother of the 5 year old boy who read a story to her son and reversed the sexes was amusing but also eye-opening.  It really made me realize how much as a society we assign genders.

The section in the book on "unsocialized" children brought up a lot of interesting arguements.  After reading this section, I think that nurture is what influences humans the most.  If it was human nature to know how to speak and do a variety of other tasks then the "wild boy of Aveyron" and "Genie" both would have known how to speak and interact with others.  Instead when they did try to communicate, it was through strange noises.  Genie eventually did learn English but it was on such a basic level.  Althought it is possible that both children suffered from undiagnozed mental abnormalities, it is more likely that the fact they weren't nurtured as young children is the reason behind their strange and unhuman-like behaviors.

Week 3: American Culture

When the YouTube clip first showed the stage and Hugh Laurie playing the piano I didn't know what to expect.  It was an interesting spoof on country music and how America portrays itself through its music..  Hugh Laurie literally said two words during the 1:11 minute video; he only said "America" and "the States", repeating them both over and over again.  The audience keeps laughing because they think the skit accurately portrays American music and how little content songs actually have.

Hugh Laurie and the skit seem to also be mocking American clothing and style as he is wearing a bandana and a plaid shirt while the British character who punches him at the end of the video is wearing a formal suit.

In the eyes of the British, American culture seems to be informal (in regards to clothing), over the top patriotic, and the music seems to lack actual content and substance.