Shrinking world

Have you ever looked at the statistics for your blog? They're pretty cool. You can see how many times your blog has been viewed and from where. I was shocked and amazed when I looked at it and saw that my blog has been looked at by people in the United Kingdom, South Africa, Germany and Brazil.

My first thought was "whoa! look at that!", my second "how on Earth did they come across my blog and why", and lastly, "this is strange, I actually have people reading my blog. I guess I better do a good job."

It makes our world feel so much more connected and so much smaller. It also made me really self-conscious about what I put in my blogs. It kind of motivates me to take them a step further and put a little more effort into them.

Previous Experience with Thomas Cole

I'm not an art person in the sense of being able to create art or even knowing much about it, but I do love going to the Art Institute of Chicago. I think I've been about a dozen times in the last three years. I love wandering through the seemingly endless hallways and stumbling into galleries I haven't been in before.

Last February my boyfriend and I made a trip there specifically to see a Thomas Cole painting. He was taking an art appreciation class, had a paper to write, was required to make a trip to the museum during the course of the class and the month of February had free admission. Plus I got out of a day out of school to go :)

I had never heard of Thomas Cole or seen any of his paintings but there I was standing in front of Distant View of Niagara Falls. I remember being struck by the colors in his paintings. I loved the way he used them and how the seemed to move seamlessly into one another was breath taking. I also loved the way the falls seemed so big and the people so small. Getting as close as I could without the security guy yelling at me again (a problem I often run into when ever I go to the Art Institute), I was in awe at the simplicity and the accuracy of the tiny Native Americans on the cliff, looking over at the falls.

Distant View of Niagara Falls

Close up of the Native Americans

Scene from the Last of the Mohicans, another painting by Thomas Cole

Our America

It didn't surprise me in the least when politics made their way into our conversations on the long drive home for spring break. My grandparents (who are awesome and came all the way out here to pick me up for spring break) fit what we talked about in class; they have more interest in politics because they have more at stake in our government.

I can't remember what we were talking about or why (but I do remember how surprising I found it that my grandpa was so up on Minnesota politics) but I do remember a comment my grandma made.

"This isn't our America anymore, it's your father's, and your mother's, but even more so it's yours. You are the one's who are taking charge of the nation now."

Immediately her comment sent me back through years of elementary and middle school. I kept thinking about all the comments that were made about investing in the future (by providing kids with the best education) and making future leaders out of us. It made me realize that future is coming a lot faster than I realized. Before we know it it's going to be up to us to take charge of our nation, world and society.

It still seems so far away, like we're still 8 years old or something. My grandma's comment really gave me some food for thought.

After a few moments I did have to giggle to myself. My grandma isn't a legal citizen. Hearing her talk about politics makes me both giggle and admire her. It makes me giggle because she gets so intense about it. I admire her because she is so intense about politics and has very strong opinions even though she can't vote and participate in our government in the way someone as passionate as she is would like to.

Democracy in training

Today, I am very proud of my little brother. He's a freshman in a school district that is facing some very, very painful budget cuts for the 2011-2012 school year. Hundreds of teachers set to lose their jobs (after hundreds lost their jobs last year)and he full understands what the repercussions mean for him; no music, art, soccer, or electives, limited opportunities for foreign language and even larger class sizes than what he has to deal with already. He also is one of the few students to understand that the district is not to blame for the budget woes. All this would be avoided if the state of Illinois would pay the schools the millions and millions of dollars they owe.

As a sign of support for the hundreds of teachers losing their jobs and as a statement that they care about the future of the quality of their education, the 3 high school in district 300 staged a walk-out during their advisory period (it's a 25 minute block similar to homeroom). He, along with 2500 other students at his school (plus thousands of other at the other 2 high schools) left their advisory rooms and gathered in front of the school to make a statement. What made me really proud was the conversation I had with him later in the day.

He was telling me how he understood the walk out wouldn't change anything, the cuts have to happen no matter what, but he was glad to see so many students come together for a cause.

"This is something Jacobs really needs", he told me. "We need a reason to come together and show some school spirit." He was absolutely right. Jacobs High School has absolutely no school spirit what so ever. Most students don't care about much of anything. They needed a reason to come together and relate to one another and to voice their opinion about something they truly care about.

Whats happening in our district is really effecting him. He knows what it means for his future and it's unfortunate to see him have to worry about this so much. He's too young to make a difference by voting but I'm proud of him for making his voice heard in a different way. You really know how important this was to him because this conversation took place at 10:00 in the morning as I was picking him up from school, sick. He went to school just so he could show how much he cares about the future of the district and the future of his education.

I was really proud of my little brother today. I hope this experience stays with him as he gets older and gives him a little taste of actively participating in democracy that will stay with him as he becomes of voting age.

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2011-03-24/news/ct-met-jacobs-school-walkout-20110324_1_teachers-union-school-board-kolleen-hanetho

Citizen lessons

Today, as we talked about what characteristics make up a citizen I had flash backs to elementary school. In my elementary school we had monthly citizenship assemblies. Everyone hated it. Each month the entire school would be herded into the gym with music blaring and our principle dancing to be packed in and smooshed together (we had an overcrowding problem in my district) for an hour long assembly. There were the "8 Keys of Excellence" and each month we would focus on one "key" to being a good citizen. At the assembly they would talk about what the featured key meant, how to live out that key and then we had the awards. Two kids from each class would be chosen every month as "Citizen of the Month" and be given a certificate and a sucker for being exemplary cases of what ever key had been the focus of the month. After the awards were handed out we had to dance. Yes, dance. Not just any dance, THE dance. The Keys of Excellence came with a dance and we had to do it. Over, and over and over again. I was really happy when I left Neubert elementary because I knew I would be leaving those assemblies behind too. And what do you know, here it is again, 7 years later.

Talking about being a citizen in class today made me wonder how my dancing principle and the assemblies fit in with what we talked about. According to my elementary school, the keys to being a good citizen were:

Integrity
Speak with Good Purpose
Commitment
Flexibility
Failure Leads to Success
This is it
Ownership
Balance

What we talked about in class does match up with the "Citizen of the Month" qualities. We talked about commitment and fulfilling your duty as a citizen. In a way, this fits in with ownership. Taking charge of your duties by fulfilling your responsibilities. Things, such as speak with good purpose and flexibility would make our citizens and our society more ideal but I guess we shouldn't expect too much at once.

Discouraged from attention

"Everywhere I went people told me that they were deeply worried about the future of democracy. The felt alianted from both the electoral process, and the culture wars and that were grouping about for plain language in which to express their discontent"

Is this why we don't "pay attention"? Have we become so disconnected that we no longer understand what is going on around us? Is it possible to understand the modern world of politics. I think this is why a lot of people don't participate or care about the government as much any more; it's simply because they don't understand. I have to say, I feel their pain. It's like when I sometimes pick up an abandon paper at breakfast and start reading the front page articles. They would make so much more sense if I had a better grasp on what was going on. It's really hard to do something like pick up a newspaper or vote in an election and really understand what is going on and what is being said when you have been neglectful for so long.

In the case of politics I think a lot of people would like to blame all the red tape, the bureaucracy, and the politics of the status quo instead of themselves. However, I don't think it's fair to blame it on the system. Politics have always been complicated and controversial and people still managed to get a grasp on what was going on and participate in government and community affairs.

Maybe we're just not as ambitious. Or maybe we've just gotten lazy.

The Winky Smiley Face vs Japan

After reading Bellah's article I can't help to wonder how distracted we truly are. I couldn't help to wonder about that this weekend.


There is distraction in the sense I had a really hard time getting anything done this weekend. Everything else just seemed to much more interesting than my French homework. That might just be procrastination.

Then there's distraction in the sense of just not really paying attention. Like millions of others around the world, I've been keeping my eyes on the headlines on Japan. I'm watching but I'm not doing anything. Not even talking about it with my friends. Instead we spent a long lunch on Sunday talking about the implications and the usage of the winky smiley face on Facebook chat. Don't get me wrong, it was a fun conversation but can it be used to exemplify how distracted we really are?

Families

I loved the points Bellah makes about families, about the importance of them and the ambiguity as well.

Being the daughter of a social worker who works in family social services (as well has being a social work major myself), I've been raised on the importance of relying on your family, being there for your family, and, just like Bellah talks about, eating with them. I think he was spot on when he said attentive families breed attentive children. It goes right back to de Tocqueville and the development of habits. If we form good habits of attention in our families we can not only improve our private lives (such as in marriages) but also our public lives (i.e. volunteering and joining organizations).

This class may be called "democratic vistas" but I think the underlying theme of the class may truly be "get involved and stay involved". De Tocqueville presented this in a very formal manner based in our government and Bellah and Putman have kind of joined forces to advocate for personalized involvement. By personalized involvement I mean finding an association you can be passionate about and that inserts you if governmental affairs isn't your cup of tea.

Circling back to the idea Bellah presents on families (I know, this is very disorganized and I feel like most of my blog posts are. I should work on that but I'm just so focused on getting my thoughts down before they vanish), I was able to connect his claim that creating "normal standard" for families is a historical mistake to one of my other classes.

Currently, I'm enrolled in Courtly Love in the Middle Ages and last week one of our readings had to do with day to day life in medieval times. One section the book talked about focused specifically on the ambiguity of "families" at the time. Medieval France didn't even have a real name for what we think of as family (which, in the case of my history textbook was blood relatives who live with you). They didn't have name because the word they used, familia, refereed to everybody who lived in that household; blood relations and hired help alike. To make things even more complicated, children, especially boys, rarely lived with their real parents. They often went to live with the maternal uncles or religious institutions (usually by the time they were 8) to receive their education. I think this goes to show us that it's awfully hard to have a standard now when at any point of time in history there wasn't one to be had.

Response to Putnam

Mark Chaves from the sociology department at the University of Arizona spends most of his article "Are We 'Bowling Alone'--and Does it Matter" agreeing with Putman but he does so in a rather roundabout way.

He acknowledges the fact that the numbers do show a decline in civic engagement over the years. However, he says it's more of a shift than a decline. He says to look at examples like churches. They're official membership is in decline but the number of people who par take in activities such as small groups have increased.

He primarily blames the shift in civic engagement primarily on a shift in generations. Today's youth simply aren't involved enough. Without this development of habit at an early age (yay de Tocquevielle!, they are less likely to become engaged in civic activities as adults.

Chaves other reasons civic engagement has declined or shifted: television watching, suburbanization and pressures of time and money. He never fully explains TV as the culprit but we can only guess: TV stops people from getting out and doing stuff. Suburbanization creates commuting time which prevents people from being involved in activities they may be interested in. Pressures of time and money doesn't really need to be explained. We simply are overcome by the need to work and earn a living that things such as volunteering (and sleeping and eating if you're talking to a college student)are the first "extras" to go.

All together, between Putman and Chaves, these articles made me want to get up and do something. I was really active and involved in several volunteer organizations in high school but since coming to college I haven't find my "niche" and these articles made me want to get out and find it quick. I miss being involved.

One more interesting comment Putman made that Chaves points out, is that evidence alone is not enough. Just like we discussed in class on Monday, alone, individuals are weak but associations together are strong. One piece of evidence is find and dandy and a fun trivia fact, but in order to prove a point you need a whole array of interconnected pieces of evidence.

Paper idea

I've been trying to work through some ideas for the paper and this is what I have so far.
De Tocqueville- An outsider looking in. Was looking for the reasons for success so he could pass his findings onto the French.

De Tocqueville was interested in analyzing the ways and reasons for democracy's success in America. His umbrella reasons boil down to laws, mores and habits. Americans have the habit and the belief of working for their own good. Therefore democracy relies on self-interest in the government.

Relating self-interest to the volunteer associations
People join associations because of something that they are motivated by or feel strongly about. Associations work to spread awareness. The most serious associations work to spread awareness in order to make a change. The changes they propose are presented to the government. By lobbying they take an active role in influencing their government to make changes for their personal interest. Ex: The American Colonization Society worked to "relocate" freed slaves to what is now Liberia. The association secured government funding to run the program. Members of the society were mostly citizens who were worried about the repercussions of having free slaves living in America.

I also really want to talk about America's ability to make "retrievable mistakes" but I need to think a little more about integrating that with self interest. Perhaps "mistakes" want to be fixed when the interests of the people change.

America's awkward place

Tonight I went to the PAC's panel discussion on the revolts in the Arab world. For a while there it was more like I was sitting in AmCon again. One of the professors (I wish I knew what her name was) talked a lot about how democracy is playing a role in the protests and how its going to pan out in the next several years as the revolted countries try to implement a democratic system. One of her last points, and the one I think stands out the most, was her comment on how America has put it's self in a very awkward place. On one hand they want to encourage democracy in other countries, but at the same time they need to stay out in order to let the country develop democracy by it's own standards. De Tocqueville would describe it as allowing the people of the country to develop self interest in their government. America can't come in and set up the government because they would never be able to cater to the needs of the country as they see it. On the other hand, if America doesn't step in and help move the Arab world towards democracy, its almost like we're turning our back on democracy.

I wonder how de Tocqueville would comment on America's position. One of the goals for writing his book was to demonstrate to the French people why and how democracy worked in America but he also pleads the case for self interest in the government. Perhaps he intended his book to be more of a personal commentary than a guide.