Comparing & Contrasting

        Bharati Mukherjee's essay "Two Ways to Belong in America," describes the differences and similarities of her and her sister's views on immigrants. Most of the essay consists of the differences, however. The main subjects of the differences are how she defines herself as being an "immigrant nobody," yet she defines her sister as a "expatriate." Both sisters moved from their homeland of India, to the United States in order to work and attend universities. They both stayed in America, continued working and studying, and eventually got married in the states. Bharati's sister, Mira, stayed within their culture and married an Indian man. Bharati, on the other hand, married a Canadian-American. Mira still has her heart and mind in India, as shown by how she has not conformed herself to the ways of America. "My sister is an expatriate, professionally generous and creative, socially courteous and gracious, and that's as far as her Americanization can go. She is here to maintain an identity, not to transform it" (Mukherjee 274) Mira is staying in America to simply keep up her immigrant status. To be able to keep her job. She does not want to become an "American" in the sense that she transforms herself to the cultural norms. Bharati, did the complete of Mira, "In one family, from two sisters alike as peas in a pod, there could not be a wider divergence of immigrant experience. America spoke to me - I married it..." (Mukgerjee 274) Bharati adopted every single one of America's cultural norms, from it's fashions, to it's language, so it's lifestyle. 

In this essay, the purpose of comparing and contrasting the two sisters is to show what Bharati thinks are the only two ways to define being an immigrant.  I disagree with the idea of their being only two ways. These two ways, are the complete extreme opposites of each other. Yes, some immigrants adopt these ways, especially those who are new to the country. However, most immigrants take the middle ground, they adopt and accept American norms, yet inject their own home culture into it. That's what makes American so diverse, the fact that so many immigrants infuse their outside cultures into America. 

Response to "The Ways We Lie"

By far, this is my favorite essay that we have been assigned to read. It was entertaining, sarcastic, easy to follow, and very informative. I one hundred percent agree with how categorizes the lies that humans tell. She categorizes them in quick, efficient ways that anyone could understand. Especially with the anecdotal examples, any reader could understand and relate to the classified, described lie. I think she covered every lie there could possibly be. I even learned new types of lies while reading this. For example, I had no idea that stereotypes were considered lies. I think this essay got published because it was detailed in such a way that it was relatable. That people could pull up the essay, and classify the lies they tell themselves everyday. 

Okay kind of random, but I just need to say how much the little anecdote about the myths of Lilith shocked me. I literally dropped my book and sat with my mouth open for I don’t even know how long. This myth literally made me question every form of the story of Adam & Eve that I have ever heard, every my own faith itself. But it completely makes sense of why women have believed that they are the lesser sex because of the omission of Lilith’s story. Even though every myth about her has posed her as a Mother of Demons, she was the only strong woman in any ancient religion that stood up to a man. If that story had been detailed in the Bible, or the Quran, in any religious book, women would have thought of themselves much, much differently throughout history. 

Why did Robert Connor write "How in the World Do You Get a Skunk Out of a Bottle?"

Robert Connors' essay is titled with the question, "How in the World Do You Get a Skunk Out of a Bottle?" because that was the question that he pondered the whole time during this particular situation. Connor was running on the side of a road when he saw a skunk struggling to get his head out of a glass jar. 

I think Connor wrote such a detailed, analytic essay because he himself could not explain why he turned back and tried so hard to help the skunk. He went against his own strong urge to just run home and not do anything, his own instinct. "I have a sudden desire to turn go, keep running, get home. . . . But now I realize that this skunk is my responsibility." (Connors 8 & 11) He had an overwhelming sense of responsibility over this skunk, because he knew that if someone else like the police found it, they would kill it trying to save it. He was the only one there, so he assumed the responsibility himself. I think the purpose of this essay was to say to readers that it's okay to do things on impulse, things that you know will benefit someone in the moment. Connor literally saved a life here, even thought he could have gotten sprayed or attacked. He could have just kept on running, and forgotten about the slowly dying skunk. It couldn't have earned him anything if he did it. But after the act, he felt a sense of happiness and relief, which he never really connected to the skunk, probably because it was indescribable. It was something that he just felt and couldn't place the source. Which is probably why he wrote this essay now, because he finally placed all of the feelings and actions from that day. 

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As a girl, I generally like to shop, especially shop online. I primarily go on sites like Forever 21, Topshop, Etsy etc. And while I browse the internet for my next online purchase, I like to listen to music, especially to my stations on Pandora Internet Radio. Every time I simultaneously am online shopping while listening to Pandora, specific advertisements pop up on the sides of Pandora,  advertisements that just so happen to be from the exact company I was just browsing online, with the exact products I was interested in but didn't purchase. The internet is a funny, sadistic thing. In order to sway me to buy their products, to spend my own precious money, companies advertise their products all over Pandora, specific to the person. How in the world, the internet manages to know what we were contemplating buying, and put in directly in a place where it knows we would see it, I will never know. Clothing and accessory companies are quite clever in manipulating the internet like this, because it causes customers to buy more and more, giving the companies exactly what they want, more money.

No Jewelmint, I will not go back on your site just because of Free Shipping & Easy Returns. 

Response to Alissa Steiner's "Depression in College Students"

I believe Alissa Steiner's thesis to be, "Understanding depression, its symptoms and its consequences, can help us identify and help friends and family members who may be suffering. Also, if counseling services on college campuses were better able to publicize and reach out to students, perhaps more students could get help they need before it is too late." To me, she doesn't support this at all. She doesn't give any examples of how understanding depression, and/or, college counseling helps people who are truly depressed. She only tells the short stories of two students who were perfect on the outside, then turned out to be so depressed that they committed suicide. To make a claim, any claim, you need to give two or more examples supporting that claim. She doesn't do that at all, she only restates the same thing over and over again. I don't like how she basically used the essay as an advertisement for counseling on college campuses. She didn't analyze in depth why exactly college students are depressed, she only said that if they perhaps had gone to a counselor on their campus, they wouldn't have committed suicide. This essay really frustrates me because she never went into depth about the real issue; how colleges are depressing to students. If she had actually, fully analyzed that, with actual true facts, this would have been a much better essay. 

Response to Gerald Graff's "Hidden Intellectualism"

When first reading Gerald Graff's essay, "Hidden Intellectualism", I thought his thesis was this, "What doesn't occur to us, though, is that schools and colleges might be at fault for missing the opportunity to tap into such street smarts and channel them into good academic work." I assumed that this was his rightfully placed thesis because it explains the main topic of the essay - but I assumed it's purpose because of it's placement. I'm so used to reading essay in high school where the thesis is located right in the first paragraph. So naturally, that is where I search for it. However, with further reading, I realized that the following is thesis, not only because it discusses the main topic, but because it clearly shows what they author is trying to argue. "But they would be more prone to take on intellectual identities if we encouraged them to do so at first on subjects that interest them rather than ones that interest us" 

To back his thesis, Graff gives two major ways in which intellectualism is more important than academic intelligence. His first is shown in his account of the Chicago neighborhood in which he grew up. "I grew up torn, then, between the need to prove I was smart and the fear of a beating if I proved it too well; between the need not to jeopardize my respectable future and the need to impress the hoods." Aside from wanting to prove himself book-smart, Graff grew up with the threat of getting beaten up by the neighborhood kids. So, he had to develop a sense of protection physically and mentally. He began to play sports, and learned how to get around the "hoods". His other major back-up is how talking and writing about sports eventually helps one to be able to form and write perfect English. "It was in reading and arguing about sports and toughness that I experienced what it felt like to propose a generalization, restate and respond to a counterargument, and perform other intellectualizing operations, including composing the kind of sentences I am writing now. 

I agree with Graff in the sense that schools need to implement current issues and topics of interest to peak the interest of their students - thus encouraging them even further to create the best work that they can create. However, with all of the talk of sports and entertainment, I don't agree that such topics within those generalizations should be taught in schools. If schools were to implement these such topics into their curriculums, then they should pick apart details from them that they know would benefit their students. 

The Effects of Electronic Media According to Pinker and Orenstein

As an avid user of electronic media myself, I totally agree with Steven Pinker in his essay, “Mind Over Mass Media.” This Harvard professor of psychology goes against the general consensus that computer based media makes one stupider by saying that in fact it makes you smarter. With access to such a wide array of learning and teaching resources, you learn and retain much more than thought of from this kind of electronic media. To back up his thesis, Pinker uses the input of actual expert scientists who study the effects of media on the brain, and actual psychologists. He shows that they have tangible proof of how experience of this media can help the brain more than harm it. This kind of expert opinion and the sole fact the Pinker himself is a psychologist builds up his credibility, causing the reader to believe his opinions to be true. 

In her essay, “I Tweet, Therefore I Am,” Peggy Orenstein examines the effects of Twitter and other social media outlets. She open sup the topic by recounting an epiphany she had while listening to a book reading with her daughter. She explains her urge to tweet about that moment, and then she stopped and analyzed why she had such the urge, and what exactly twitter does to it’s users. Her essay mostly utilizes pathos, in the sense that it taps into one’s emotions and makes them question who exactly they are according to what they post on twitter and social media. She emphasizes that once you have established a strong presence on twitter, you lose yourself, you lose the sense of who you really are. You are only how others perceive you and nothing more. I personally don’t agree with her claims because I felt that she over-exaggerated everything and used only how she was feeling to describe the feelings of those who she doesn’t even know. 

Dialogue between Balko and Zincenko

*Two health activists, Radley Balko and David Zincenko, happen to bump into each other in the crowd of Michael Bloomberg's speech about the Soda tax. The following is the conversation they have on the topic of what Bloomberg is trying to do.*

Radley Balko: *chanting along with crowd* We want our soda! We want our soda! We want our soda!

David Zincenko: *starts chanting on his own* Put the tax! Put the tax! Put the tax!

Radley Balko: (To David) Excuse me, what are you doing?

David Zincenko: Chanting, the same as you are. *continues lone chant*

Radley Balko: Well you're the only one chanting "Put the ban" when the rest of us are chanting against it.

David Zincenko: Yes I am, what of it?

Radley Balko: Well, could you please stop doing that? You're disturbing what the majority of us are trying to do.

David Zincenko: And what exactly are you trying to do.

Radley Balko: Trying to put an end to this ridiculous tax before it even starts.

David Zincenko: Why in the world would you do that? This is going to help the obesity issue in New York!

Radley Balko: Putting a tax on soda isn’t going to solve such a large issue! Any government should never intervene in the food desires of Americans.

David Zincenko: Well if the government doesn’t make such a big fuss or try to intervene, then the obesity problems will only get worse! Such a push for the tax is making Americans see how bad the issue really is. It’s making them realize what they’re doing to themselves and to their families.

Radley Balko: What Americans do with their own bodies is their choice. Any opinion concerning their health should not in any way be pushed upon them like this. Aren’t we a free country? Isn’t that the brand we have made for ourselves? Well, if we’re so free, then why should we have politicians forcing such health regulations on us?

David Zincenko: America is known to be the most obese country in the world. And the government is partially at fault for it because they don’t push enough regulations as this. Americans need to be restrained in order to live a healthier life style, it would lower the number of people with health related illnesses all over the country, it would give the country means to cultivate natural foods more, everyone would just be happier. Everyone should be pushing this tax. It seems small now being in only one city, but New York City is one of if not the most famous cities in the country. This will get the health regulation ball rolling and in the future the country itself will be so much better because of it.

Radley Balko: Right now you’re defending the minimal opinion, as you can see here, most New Yorkers are against it. And they are against it because they share in my view that they should be able to live their own lives and do as they please. The only thing the government should do to regulate the health issues is promote healthy eating and living. Simply promote the advantages of it, and not force it like this.

David Zincenko: You know what, you have your opinion, and I have mine. It’s not like our arguing is going to save American, so let’s just be done with this and do what we came here for.

Radley Balko: For once, I agree.

*Both continue on yelling out their opposing chants.* 

Thesis: Even with the ever-present obesity problem in America, Michael Bloomberg's Soda Tax will do nothing but encourage consumers to rebel and ignore the government's tries o enforce health regulations.