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For this story, I wanted to show something that is EXTREMELY near and dear to my heart. I wrote this wanting to relay a heartfelt message that I hope my readers feel, as well.

I’m proud to call a third world country my second home. El Salvador, the smallest country in Central America, is where my mother was born, where she grew up, and where most of my family still resides today. However, my mother was one of the fortunate few to escape the dire poverty I cannot overlook each summer when I visit. My grandpa, Antonio Cabrales, bought an island in El Salvador, in 1971, naming it “Isla Teopan.” “Teo” means God in the Mayan language, and “Pan” is a place of resting: together they make the resting place of the Lord. One of the most eye-opening moments is driving down the bumpy dirt road to get to the island. The narrow road is lined with people selling their latest catch, tortillas, fresh coconuts, and other fruits. Trash piled on the sides of the road, dogs starved and deserted, families waiting for any car to stop by and pay a dollar to make their week, this is the road to get to my home. Adults and children, young and old, walk these roads covered in dust, while our cars roll toward the Teopan gate where the ferry awaits to take us to the island. As soon as I board the ferryboat, I happily greet the two workers who have been there since I was a little girl. Getting off, I roll my window down and stick my head out, breathing in the fresh air. From then on, every morning, the sound of the chachalaca wakes me with its raucous call. Whether it be swimming in the freshwater, jet skiing around the island, or going on our boat, I feel an overwhelming sense of belonging. These cherished moments, however, don’t allow me to forget about the poverty I witness when I’m there. Rather, they have driven me to take action whenever I visit.

As I walked into one of the schools surrounding the lake, I was immediately astounded by the underprivileged conditions. I saw children, from kindergarten to ninth grade, playing kickball on the cement. The paint on the buildings was badly discolored; tile on the ground was eroding; and chairs and tables were surrounded by mounds of dirt and overgrown vines. Arriving at one of the first-grade classrooms, I was introduced to the children sitting in their rickety wooden chairs. I stood in front of thirty eager first graders and read, in Spanish, “Tacky the Penguin,” a story about an odd penguin who does what he wants to do, despite sticking out from the other penguins and being different. By the end of the book, as I helped them in a follow-up activity, I wondered what would allow the children to be different, to move beyond their life of poverty. I’ll never forget a seven-year-old Stephen. He followed me out of the first-grade classroom, holding onto my leg, as I asked him more about himself. We sat on a hot tire next to what seemed to be the playground, and he began to tell me about the long walk he took to school by himself every morning, how he doesn’t have a father, how his home is filled with his six siblings, and he spends the night on a blanket on the floor. He loves school. He told me he is sad when it downpours, and the roads are filled with mud and rocks that have fallen down from the mountains, making it impossible for him to get there. As he talked more, I struggled with the conflicting feelings of sadness and contentment that my second home produces. Every time I visit, I realize how fortunate I am to be safe, healthy, and comfortable on the island; but I feel compelled to spend some of my time helping these young people who might never get the chance to live my fortunate life in El Salvador. 

 

When we were learning a little bit about Stuart Hall, I was able to dig into my Cultural Studies notes with Professor Towns. In that class, we focus A LOT on Stuart Hall and the importance of relating the encoding and decoding model to not only media, but also to ideologies. Aside from the model being used to provide and explain the meaning behind messages, there are three hypothetical positions for the model. The first being the Preferred reading of messages which is dominant reading  that the media wants you to have. The second is the Negotiated position where  messages will occur, and an individual deals with it in a way to fit their own life or worldview. With this position, one may accept some of the message but not all of it. This is the most common reading. The third position is Oppositional, which is your own interpretation of the dominant reading, which results in being completely against the dominant. 

I always have a different lens than everyone when viewing immigrants at the border on any news channel. I remember a specific time when my mom and I were on our couch in Florida and we turned the tv on. The first thing that came on was the horrifying images of families being ripped apart by ICE. There was crying, screaming, violent struggles, and innocent families just trying to seek a better life. For my mom and I, it is extremely hard to watch these channels because the immigrants tend to be from Guatemala, El Salvador, Mexico, Honduras, etc. These are places that my mom has either been to or lived in. Being from El Salvador, she and I have a different lens through which we view this media. My reaction to this is completely different from someone who doesn’t know someone who is illegally crossing or someone who made the journey successfully. This relates to the concept of polysemy from chapter 8 that talks about different people having multiple meanings from the media and how they coexist together. All in all, I think having these differing views on media and having the ability to critique media is the most important tool that ties back to Stuart Hall and Croteau and Hoynes.

 

This 1997 film spotlights black culture and acts as a homage to black joy. There is an exaggerated sense of blackness in this film. For example, Nisi and Mickey’s hair is extremely over the top as well as what they wear to go to Beverly Hills. In the Teen Vogue article, “A Deep Dive Into Black Culture and Camp,” the author talks  the use of Nisi’s and Mickey’s extravagant hair, “At the time, black hair looked more like art, as opposed to functioning as a practical style.” This can be seen as Nice and Mickey’s way of “queering” the space they are in by being extra and rearticulating their place in an upper class society. 

As I was watching the film, I was thinking about the mythical norm of portraying a rich white male being the owner of a Beverly Hills mansion. This is not only a very stereotypical display of whiteness, but it also shows the clash of two worlds coming together: Nisi’s and Mr. B’s.

I was also thinking about who is behind the camera, which is something I wouldn’t have thought about before. Troy Beyer, the screen writer of this film, was behind the camera, destabilizing gender stereotypes in the high held position in the media industry. Robert Townsend, American director and actor, decentered the idea of whiteness at the end of the movie when Nisi and Mickey don’t accept the money from Mr. B. This humble act teaches the audience about the marginalized space that the girls were coming from, but ultimately, this idea was disrupted to create an ending that is representative of black joy. 

This movie also focused a lot on language subordination and what is proper versus what is not. When Nisi was getting ready to go into the mansion for the first time, she pulled out a book of etiquette, how to speak, how to act, etc. This demonstrates the concept of the personal as political because Nisi and Mickey are decentering the space just by being there and using their personal lives to unintentionally make a statement. Mickey completely queers the space of the mansion by remaining true to herself and not conforming to the Beverly Hills status quo. Overall, I enjoyed the movie, I thought it was super funny, and I realized how as I watch movies now I am thinking about more than just the plot. I am constantly questioning and analyzing, which opens my worldview to more things I didn’t know before.

 

 

 

 

My idea for our class name is Minds Across America. This relates to the concept of “hands across America.” I think it is important to realize that we all come from different backgrounds, upbringings, cultures, and identities, but we are all human beings that are just trying to live in this world.

I put Minds instead of Hands because this class really makes us think critically about not only the readings, but life and how the concepts tie into who we are and what we care about.

Julian Gloover is my favorite guest speaker we have had so far. I left our class yesterday feeling extremely happy and productive. His energy and passion for what he is writing about really transforms the discussion. It was super cool to have the author present in the room after reading his article prior to his arrival. The ability to ask him questions, offer criticism, and highlight areas of the article was gratifying and it helped dive into the material in a deeper sense. As we started to talk about his article, I asked about transnormativity, something I had never heard of or thought about.  I learned that the media has the ability to influence audiences by showing what constitutes as trans and what doesn’t. This related to gatekeeping, in having the ability to keep certain parts of the trans community out of the picture. He also talked about the impact of media and how they define what is human and nonhuman in terms of gender. This is all tied to the systemic structures of society that was SET UP to be this way. He explained the term “sexual panic,” which was also something I was unaware of, to describe a situation where an individual feels as if they are experiencing intentional misrepresentation. At the end of class, we did the most masculine to most feminine activity. This was eye opening because I found myself to be right next to the boys (the last girl that was towards the masculine side). I am definitely not very feminine, but I do have feminine qualities. But this raises the question of what are feminine qualities and masculine qualities? Who told us that in order to be masculine, you had to be strong or an athlete or a provider? Why do females have to be caring and girly? All these questions were popping into my head as we were doing the activity and Julian was simply spitting facts. He talked about masculinity being directly tied to power structures and I agree 100%. At the end of his article, he writes, “I hope that this article makes clear that everyone else can be free only when transgender women of color—especially black transgender women—are free.” This is absolutely beautifully written, and I loved reading it because it highlights the importance of humanity and that society has been set up to discriminate, instead of encourage people to be who they are.

Do you consider yourself as active when you watch tv, read a book, listen to music, or browse the web? Are the forms of activity different for different types of media?

Whenever I watch Netflix or TV, I tend to pay attention, unless there are outside distractions. I do consider myself as a active when I listen to music and browse the Internet because I am taking in all the things I see and hear. I am also thinking about the lyrics, songwriter, or genre. When I read a book, I have to focus on being an active audience member because it is harder to stay on task. There are multiple meanings that coexist in texts, so, this makes me have to really think about the many implications the book is conveying. My forms of activity are different for varying sources of media depending on whether I am interested in the content or if the media is open for interpretation. If it is ambiguous, this requires me to be more active than a passive audience member.

I think someone can be an effective storyteller without embodying that person’s identity, but only on a broad scale. When it comes to personal experiences and stories, I don’t think a storyteller can exemplify the exact emotions an individual was or is feeling. Furthermore, when it is about a social group, I don’t think someone can embody that group if you are not a member of it. Yes, you can support it and be an ally, but being in that group and going through the same experiences and emotions, is not the same. 

I think it is fair to judge a show based on its intersectionality. It is important to have different aspects of race, gender, sexuality, and class in a show to make it interdisciplinary. Another important aspect of intersectionality is exposing the system of privilege and oppression. In Aymar Jean Christian’s text, “Open TV,” he says: “Causes are personal before they are political” (151). This can be seen in television production when a topic or character is relatable to the audience. The audience relates on a personal level, before thinking about the political implications. 

 

*WARNING* personal content

I went to the VA pride fest with my friend, McKenna. It was a HOT Saturday, but it was definitely worth going. As I talked about in my second presentation, I don’t really know what I constitute myself as and I honestly have come to terms with that. I don’t think I necessarily have to choose, but obviously, I’m leaning towards the “BI” word. The thing is, most of my close friends and my sister knows and they all support me, but my mom would not be as supportive. It’s not that she wouldn’t love me, it’s just that she is religious and that whole side of my family is VERY Catholic and probably could never find out. I just feel that there would be LOTS of judgement and I do not need that, especially from the people I love the most. Whenever I attend these festivals or ally meetings to support LGBTQ+ community, I always think about those families who don’t support their children and honestly, it’s mind boggling. As I think about these topics, I realize that I should be more proud to be an ally, but also a possible member of the LGBTQ community??? As I said, I don’t really know, and I think it’s okay to not know. Thanks for coming to my TED talk 

 

On September 27th, I went to see the performance by Camille A. Brown and dancers. Going into the performance, I had looked Camille’s website up, but I didn’t know what I was about to see. There were seven black dancers and the pianist was also black. Camille’s choreography was absolutely incredible. It was a combination of hip hop, ballet, and modern dance that connected history to a contemporary setting. It was full of energy and celebrated black joy through storytelling. As the dancers were performing, there were phrases on the screen such as “it’s you and me,” and it made the audience feel like we were a part of the performance. One of the performance stood out especially to me. It was only two female dancers, Catherine Foster and Camille A. Brown herself. It was called BLACK GIRL: Linguistic Play. It was meant to reveal the complexity of being a Black female in urban American culture. There was a connection between the two dancers as best friends, sisters, and two independent strong women. It was beautiful to watch them feed off of each others energy and carry through the performance in unison. 

I found a link to the performance by Catherine Foster and Camille A. Brown on a Tedx Talk. PLEADE WATCH if you haven’t seen it already!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBwBscuc08g

In Lippi-Green’s English with an Accent, she writes about language focused discrimination and the need to understand individuals beliefs about language in order to relate on a personal level. In the film, Sorry to Bother you, Cassius is advised to “use his white voice.” This standard of language is not only racist, but also reflects on the idea of what black people have to do to hide who they are. Cash becomes successful when he uses his “white voice” and this is because he becomes very personable and talks to his client as if they can relate to him. This relates to the concept of passing and not passing because he passes as a rich white male whenever he is on the phone, but in reality, he is a black male who lives in a garage. 

The ending was unexpected, crazy, and just made me think of the power of resistance. He takes the first step towards change, whether it ends up being big or small, it is a step in the right direction to fight against capitalistic power. Boots RIley chooses to comment and examine the capitalistic view and pressure put on labor forces. Cash lost his morality because he was pushed by the authority to crave more and more. This greed is a reflection of the capitalist society as a whole and the hierarchical power that is manifested into the system. It was up to Cash whether he wanted to be a participant in the system or not, and he ended up making the wrong choice. 

For me, I think I change the way I speak depending on where I am. When I’m with my friends, I definitely am more comfortable with my language. Around my professors and family, I have to be more aware of what I say. In a classroom setting, I tend to think a lot before I talk, but I am trying to grow out of that habit. In Lippi-Green’s chapter 8, she says  that our language, “shouldn’t be corrected, it should be enriched” and I value this statement a lot because it spoke to me as I read her article as something everyone should be aware of. Sometimes it is hard for people to speak up because they are afraid of judgement, but instead of this being the norm, it should be that we can all learn from what each one of us has to say.