talking points 4 chriansen

Linda Christensen                                                                                                 Jared Cormier

Unlearning the myths that bind us

1.       “Our society’s culture industry colonizes their minds and teaches them how to act, live and dream.” (126)

-Since I was a teenager, I’ve always been somewhat of a conspiracy theorist. I’ve grown to believe that no kind or entertaining gesture comes without an ulterior motive (usually involving money or power).  This statement serves as the thesis for the article which goes on to include the entertainment and fashion industries.

2.       “I want to develop their critical consciousness, but I also hope to move them into action.” (134)

-I consider this a very important notion that is often overlooked. My high school community (mostly middle class whites) was very conscious of cultural diversity and equality, offering many assemblies, announcements, and activities to support tolerance. While we were all required to attend the assemblies, most of us understood the importance, however there wasn’t much involvement in the optional activities. I wonder how many students gradually forgot about many of these notions after high school.

3.       “Don’t you ever get tired of analyzing everything?” (134)

I couldn’t help but consider a similar question while reading the article. Though I fully agree with the article in terms of our stereotypes being encouraged through media, I also believe it’s possible to find examples of inequality anywhere and in some cases people are looking too hard.

                I grew up watching most of the cartoons mentioned. It wasn’t until I was a teenager when I realized how racially biased many of these cartoons are. Loony Tunes in particular were full of sexual, financial, and racial stereotypes. The fact that I didn’t notice these as a child brings up an important question. Was I subconsciously affected by them? I can say I don’t believe so. I consider myself to have an equal world view of people but I’m not sure how this affected me developmentally.

talking points 3 carlson

Carlson, Dennis                                                                                      Jared Cormier

 Gayness, Multicultural Education and Community 

1.     “…english textbook publishers avoid gayness like the plague. English literature anthologies go out of their way to avoid acknowledging that certain famous writers are gay…” (236)

-This I found appalling. It goes on to mention Gertrude Stein, James Baldwin, and one of my favorite writers, Walt Whitman. I’ve always liked Whitman because he has a way of capturing the human and American spirit in print and I’ve never even paid any mind to any references to gay culture. To deny students the exposure of Whitman’s works, would be to deny them of an important part of our literary history and cultural observance.

2.     “To the extent that gayness is recognized in the curriculum, it is likely to be in the health curriculum, where it is associated with disease.” (237)

-Though I’ve always been aware of gayness being taught in health class, I’ve never made the connection with disease. Teaching about gayness in that environment almost encourages students to make false assumptions that it’s mostly gay people who spread STD’s. There was a time when AIDS was first discovered and that assumption was recognized but culturally I believe we’ve come a long way although our educational practices do not reflect that.

3. “…gay bar culture is grounded in the commercialization of gayness, which means that its primary motivation is to make money through the selling of a particular way of being gay that is relatively apolitical in its implications.”

-I worked at a bar for a man who owned mostly gay bars up and down the east coast. He was not very tolerant of the gay community but saw the value of owning gay bars and has taken advantage of the gay culture.

            One thing I would like to mention about this article is that it was very wordy. I don’t exactly use a variety of vocabulary in my everyday life but I found it hard to follow many of Mr. Carlson’s thought patterns. I feel the whole article could have been presented as effectively using half of the words he used. While the material in the article was very eye-opening and informative, I found the arrangement and presentation to be rather pretentious.