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English E

“My Other Half”

Personally, I have different languages for the various aspects of my life. In my life I tend to keep the way I act in school separate and opposite to the way I act at home. In school, when we’re working on a High School Office episode, I’m as active as I can be even to the point where it’s annoying. When we’re preparing for a confessional, Stephen (Mr. I’m the Director because I have camera) gets Sam ready for his line.

“Ok ready Sam?”

“Ugh Yeah” sighed Sam.

I interrupt with a giant “C’MON PEOPLE I’VE GOT PLACES TO BE!” In an attempt to get shooting done quicker. Stephen retaliates with his own remark.

“Well we would be able to get some shooting done if CERTAIN people weren’t yelling!” yells Stephen.

“WELL I’m only yelling because we waste so much time messing around!”

“Me and you yelling isn’t helping anything either so SHUT UP!”

“Ok you don’t have to a douchebag about it.”

“RYAN! I will KILL YOU!”

“O?”

Around my friends I become a much more open and upbeat individual. Expressing my opinion in the way of choosing without having to worry looking dumb. At home, I change completely. That open and upbeat person becomes so reserved and quiet. I don’t even “Hi” to anyone. I walk and usually see my mom just chilling watching TV.

“If you hungry I made something for you.”

“Ok.”

“OK.” Those are probably the most words I say to them for a while. At home, I usually don’t speak to my family unless I’m spoken to. For some reason, I just can’t be that open and expressive at home. The way I interact with friends is way too (for lack of a better word) weird for my family. When they speak, I can’t even be asked to say something back. In a sense I leave that version of me back at school.

In the words of James Baldwin, “Language, incontestably, reveals the speaker.” To James Baldwin, he saw that when black people spoke in “Black English” it showed that they different from the other white people. It showed that they’ve lived differently from being slaves, in which they knew a few Standard English words but had to piece the rest together for themselves. When I think about my personas, both in and out of school, I understand what he’s talking about. When I’m at school I’m surrounded by a vast majority of people that I can outright trust. Sometimes I can see my friends as more of my family than my real family. To me, we speak the same language, Trust. If I have a problem, I always go to a friend first before anything or anyone else. To my family, they might as well be speaking gibberish since I can’t be my true self around them. When I think about it again it’s like being in Spanish class, I usually don’t say much because I have a fear of being wrong or looking stupid. I don’t want to say the wrong thing to family and just look stupid in the end.

So in conclusion, I would guess as of now my main language among my friends and I is Trust. Like James Baldwin said, my language does reveals a lot about me. It reveals that I do indeed code-switch from school and home. Yet, my code-switch is pretty dynamic. I feel as though I’m two different people living in the same body, and to be honest I like it this way. When I’m around my family we can’t relate with anything at all, but on the other hand when I’m around friends I can be at peace with how I really am.

Both of my parents speak a very high-class sophisticated English dialect and that’s because that’s how they were raised. When I was younger, I would say that’s the only English I could speak as well. As I got older and started making my own friends, I learned new slangs, words, accents, and definitions. For example the word bad has changed a lot for me. The way I first learned it “bad” was a way of expressing something not good or wrong. Such as, “Every time you go get into trouble, it’s bad.”

Then as I started hanging out with more friends from my private school school, and they would use bad this way “Sneaking into the movies is so bad! Way to go!”

After a couple of years I graduated from that private school, this is when I started making a lot of new groups of friends. Some of my good friends came from playing basketball in west Philly. Their definition of bad would go like this, “That girl is so hot she’s just so bad”

Another of group of close friends are involved in a rap group called “OCD” Since there rappers they find creative ways to use words. When their talking about “bad” it means real or true reality for example “I’m living it big so completely bad, don’t even hate because I know you mad”

Now-a-days one language isn’t enough. You’ll need to have two different languages and at least three dialects for each. For me I speak Spanish and English. My dialects in Spanish are whatever I learn in class but in English I create or choose my own dialects. There’s prep, ghetto, church, sincere, political, respectful, and many more. I’m a pretty diverse person when it comes to groups of friends and I’d say I could fluently speak all those dialects of English.

Maybe if I had traveled more I would have picked up even more dialects but Philly is a pretty diverse city. Different areas require different words so sometimes I do have to consciously switch my dialects to sound respectable. The thing is, if your speaking in the wrong dialect your in for some serious ridicule. If I spoke slang to my parents they’d ask me if id forgotten how to speak English, but if spoke prep to my neighborhood friends they’d tell me I sounded like a bitch. If you don’t know the people the key is to listen to how they speak and then imitate their dialect. You have to be careful with this because you don’t want to sound like a poser. Another rule to imitating speech is to stay consistent with that dialect, you don’t want to be talking like a hipster for an hour and then tell a story speaking like your mom. I’ve had times where I didn’t recognize a dialect. This just makes you feel awkward because even if you have something interesting to say you don’t know how to say it without sounding stupid. I was in North Carolina visiting my cousins he was with his friends using words I didn’t understand with inside jokes that could only be recognizable if you lived in the area. The worst was when they asked me how Philly cheese steaks were and I responded, “what’s a Philly cheese steak” because to me it was just a Cheese Steak. Next time my cousin comes to Philly ill be sure to tell him to get some “wuder ice” and that “use guys” should get some “baagel’s”

Mike Rose wrote that “Growing up where I did I understood and admired physical powers and there was an abundance of muscle here.” Here Mike rose it talking about how when your young the strong or most mature kids have an easier time then anyone else. I find this to be true and that for the most part stronger people do well throughout life. But this is not to say that being strong is all that is required to have a successful life. Now relating physical strength to language switching is connected to the amount of social interaction that a “popular” kid will have. The more popular you are the more people will try to talk to you and that translates to an improvement in social skills. People with more social skills will be better speakers because they will know how to use words to their advantage. One problem with this though is that some people will dedicate their adolescent life to social skills and not develop academic skills, which are also extremely important. This creates an unbalanced society.

Society is an idea of civilization coming together to create a social and community-based world. As the human race advances so does our society. Human’s advance through industry, economics, government and humans advance through culture. A culture grows through constant reconstruction. The amount that the today’s world is different just from two thousand and one is marvelous. When talking about culture speech is one of the most important pieces. Languages changes from culture to culture and since there are millions of cultures there are millions of languages. This vast pool of language creates a necessity to learn many dialects per language.

Some languages become so used though that they become a main basis for all speech like proper English, proper English is somewhat used by every person who speaks English because that was the starting point for the English language.

For my second quarter two Art project, I was inspired by a friend. My friend, Uyen, was painting a blossom tree and she asked for my help to mix the color of the flowers of the tree.  As we mixed the paint for her project together, I was struck with an idea; I wanted to make a tree as my second project. I did want this tree to be boring, however. I wanted this tree to be interesting. I wanted this tree to be made out of paper entirely.

To make my tree, I used paper, paint, tape, cotton balls, and glue. I first made hardened paper in the shape of a tree. This paper was hard, flattened paper. My friend, Vichay, taught me how to make hardened paper. I then proceeded to attaching paper balls to the paper tree shape with tape (to give it some bulk). I then papier-mâchéed the tree with paper, instead of newspaper. After it dried, I painted the tree. I did not have brown paint, so I was forced to mix the paints that I had into a brown color. I painted my tree brown. When I finished painting, I realized that my tree looked too plain. I then grabbed a handful of cotton balls from the bathroom, dipped them in green paint, let them dry, and glued them to the branches of my tree. My initial plan was to attach actual branches on to my paper tree, but the harsh weather proved to be a challenge for that.

In the end, I was able to make a paper tree.  The paper aspect of the tree is symbolic of all of the trees that are killed of and cut down in order to make paper. In this project, the cycle continues, and the paper is made back into a tree. With this project, I hope to raise awareness how truly important trees are for our environment. Trees supply us, and the animals around us with oxygen, so let’s take a more eco-friendly approach and recycle paper.

Overall, I am very happy with my final product. I never thought that the tree would look this good.  The process of this project was definitely very tedious and complicated, but I did enjoy it. I was able to use my creativity to solve problems and make lemonade out of lemons. I was able to get over the challenges that aroused during this process, and use the supplies that I did own to make the tree as detailed and realistic as possible.  

Isabella Tognini 

Final Draft – 1/14/11

Neutral Words

            “Abowt two years aygo, Ah had a business meetin’ with Pat Gilick and Dave Montgomery. In that meetin’ Dave Montgomery he told me, “Charlie, you gotta lot uh seconds.” I don’t have no damn seconds no mo.”

 I really cannot understand what he is saying. It would be nice if he talked a lot clearer, he sounds like a West Virginia hick.  I had to listen to Charlie Manuel five times before I understood exactly what he was saying.  That man with that country accent was the manager of the world champion Philadelphia Phillies two years ago.  He may sound like a country bumpkin to our Philadelphia ears but that does not mean he is not smart. His players love him and respect him and so do all of us. People from West Virginia probably think we speak funny.  I used Charlie Manuel as an example of language because we all know him and can remember when he first came here and people thought that maybe he wasn’t such a great manager in part because of the way he sounded, which to bluntly put it, and to our northern ears sounds dumb.

“You’re not from here, are you?” Said the waiter when I asked for a glass of water.

“No, I am. I’m from Philly.”

“Oh, you don’t have an accent. Where are you from?”

My answers were always the same, “I’ve always lived in Philadelphia.”

My history has produced a pretty neutral accent, though sometimes I find myself falling into an accent, especially with my friends, if I spend long amounts of time with them, I can hear myself pronouncing words a bit different then usual.  A couple years ago I went to a camp in Ireland and after just a few days I found myself adopting an Irish brogue.

Both of my grandmothers are still alive.  My mother’s mother is from Greece, while my father’s mother is from England.  They have both been here for more than 50 years, but they still have accents from their home countries.  I’ve seen my Greek grandmother struggle in a store to make herself understood, and the clerk working in the store soon loses patience.  On the other hand my English grandmother has no language barrier and people seem charmed by the accent. 

In the story How to Tame a Wild Tongue by Gloria Anzaldúa she said, “Ethnic identity is twin skin to linguistic identity – I am my language,” which refers to her belief that language defines your culture and identity.  She did not want to reject her Mexican culture in order to be part of ours.  She is hurt by the way she is treated here because of the way she speaks.  My European grandmothers did not leave their cultures behind, even after all these years, though they love our country, with all of its diverse people.  After all wasn’t this country built on immigration?  I don’t understand all the anti-immigration talk these days.  My mother was born and raised in Philadelphia, and my father grew up in Canada and later outside Cleveland, Ohio.  Neither seem to have any accent at all.  Maybe that’s why I don’t really feel like I have an accent, and have been lucky to blend in with language and culture and have not had a problem with it.

Language is directly related to power.  Even if you were raised in a penthouse on Rittenhouse Square, you may not get ahead in relationships with others if you cannot speak well and convincingly.  If you speak well and with confidence it can help you negotiate with people and helps you express your ideas.  Language, or good use of it can help in an interview for a college or a job.  My grandmother came to this country as an adult, and had difficulty learning the language.  It is hard for a person to get ahead in America if they cannot speak “good English,” even if they had a good job in their country of origin.  How can they teach or be a doctor if no one understands them?  There is a small Albanian population in my neighborhood and I see the men walking together and smoking cigarettes, but they only seem to say hello in English.  They sit together everyday at the Dunkin Donuts.  They have each other.  I guess the next generation will have English as a first language and have an easier time blending in.  I guess what anyone wants from their language is to be accepted.

1-5-10

Knowing the language doesn’t always means that you’re able to pronounce the words correctly, around the world many people speaks different languages

“Say Street” My friend said in a very snarky tone, “ShhTreek” I attempted to repeat. “No Street” she said. “ShTreet,” I said again you could hear anger building in my throat.

She began to try to coach me again with saying the word she said “Okay say tree”

I again repeated her “Tree.” I could tell she was becoming restless when she said “ Okay now put an S on the beginning of tree.” “Okay, streck,” I Said. “No S-Tree-t” She screamed. “Forget it, I can’t say it right, don’t waist your time trying to help me.” I said in a frustrated monotone voice. “ It’s easy, I mean you know how to speak English so I don’t know why you can’t say “street” right?” She said with a sarcastic voice it seemed as if she was making a mockery out of me. At this point I was very upset and shouted, “ I don’t know why, I just can’t! Bye.” I said

I have had many stages in my life when I would reach a point that silence is all I could muster up, my mouth would shut as if my tongue was like a finger that got slammed in the door, it was throbbing wanting something to come out but it just couldn’t. When I’m around my friends, I “talk black” which is normal for me, I say some words differently then I usually say when I’m around my parents. “Sup Yo” I would say when I’m with my friends and “Hello” I would say when I’m around my friends. My friends say they can hear my accent a little.)

I’m supposed to speak another language by the name of Fula, but I don’t because I never lived with my father, that is his native language. I traveled from my country, Liberia to America because my dad wanted us to move here and establish a new life. He thinks there’s better education and changes in America for us. I Spoke English in my country but it wasn’t the same as the way people speak English in America. My English was so different that, whenever I talked to a person from America, they would have a confused face. Some of the words are the same just when we say those words it then becomes different, “Hello, Oo” that’s what we would say in my language.

 When it reaches the time to go back to school, I pray that I won’t mess up when I’m reading aloud in class. I know how to read, but sometimes I get mad at myself because it’s very hard for me to pronounce some words correctly in the way. I listen to how other kids in my classes speak and pronounce words. Their voices don’t have an accent, they don’t sound as if they’re nervous, I don’t hear fear in their voice. In the essay The Women Warrior, (Maxine Hong Kingston), the author describes when her little sister and her had to read in front of their teacher, they were scared that they might mess up. In the story the author was scared when it was her little sister’s turn to read. “She opened her mouth and a voice came out that wasn’t a proper either.” When you know a language, you don’t always know how to pronounce words in that language, the author and her little sister clearly knew or were engage in the English speaking language, but they didn’t know how to say or pronounce some words. It’s very difficult to say some words in a language.  

“Class, Please take out the class rules sheet” Mr. Kay Said

I Sat down, looking over the paper and praying in my head that he would not call on me. 
“Who wants to read the first paragraph?” –Mr. Kay Said

The other kids raised their hands eagerly ready to read. A lots of kids had already read and it was the time that my heart began to beat extremely fast. I get so nervous it feels like my tongue get stuck between my teeth and the words never come out right when I have to read in front of a large group.  In the Essay, The Women Warrior, By Maxine Hong Kingston, the author describes her reading to her teacher and how she felt, “you could hear the splinter in my voice, bones rubbing jugged against one another.” I always feel exactly the same when I’m reading aloud in class. I let fear take over the fact that I have an accent and I hate the way it sounds when I read. It’s doesn’t sound the same as the other kids when they read in my head it sounds wrong, confusing and people do not understand me.  I get nervous and hate myself because I can’t do anything about it.

Butter

egg yolk/butter mixed

*Note: The egg for this mixture has to be separated into two different things, the yolk & the white.  They're used separately.

Flour is added

Teaspoon of Almond extract and brandywine is added, ingredients are mixed thoroughly in one direction.  Egg white is also added.

Nutrition extends outside of the school walls.

Stephen Holts

“Oreos Are Just Cookies”

            “You’re so white!” One student would always say.

            “Yeah! Why don’t you act black?” Another would always chime in.

            “Or at least sound black!” Ever since fifth grade I’ve been subject to insulting remarks like those. But around sixth or seventh grade people started getting original.

            “Yo, you a Oreo. Black on the outside, but white on the inside.”

            I didn’t understand. How did I go from a person to a cookie? Asking questions like that led me to the most important one I’d ever ask. What exactly makes me white? It surely wasn’t my skin. Not to say that I’m especially dark skinned, but I’m dark enough to be incontestably African American, but I digress.

            My peers’ reaction to the question were all the same.

            “You just act and sound white. You’re black. You’re supposed to act and sound black.”

            After hearing this, I asked myself a question that I regretted not asking anyone. What does black sound and act like? What does white act and sound like? Maybe if I asked people this question, they’d realize how stupid they were being. I answered my own question. By observing my white peers and my black peers, I managed to compile a list of qualifications to be black, white, or an Oreo.

            If you’re black, you’re loud. You have a compulsive need to be the center of attention. You’re obnoxious, and if someone doesn’t agree with what you’re saying or doing, you’ll get in their face and scream at them. That’s what black sounds like. If you’re black and male, you’re good at sports. You’re at home with hip-hop. You know every word to every song on the last Lil’ Wayne mixtape, and you yourself can rap like no one’s business. You’re muscular and know how to fight. And because you know how to fight, you won’t back down from one. If someone gives you the faintest reason to, you’ll fight. You don’t need words. Violence are your words. Your words are for bragging after you’ve won the fight. Blacks don’t read. Blacks don’t play tennis. blacks don’t go to prep schools.

            If you’re white, you speak English like you came up with the language yourself. If you’re white you use big words. If you’re white you have the power of calling on any word in the English language and using them to impress whoever you want. Nothing means more to you than education. You’ll ask questions when in class, you’ll listen attentively, and do whatever your teacher tells you too. Rock and Pop are the only genres on your iPod. If you do have a rap song, you white it up by rapping in your high-pitched non-threatening white voice. Fighting isn’t for you if you’re white. You’ll avoid any confrontation that has the slightest possibility of leading to violence. However, you are undefeated in fights, because you use your words to either talk your way out of a fight, or you simply confuse your opponent, leading them to think you’re not worth it. You possess the power of manipulation, and can get what you want without doing anything yourself. You just stand back and watch your puppets do your bidding.

            Oreos are the scum of the Earth. They look one way, but they don’t act the way they look. They’re hypocrites who can’t accept that they’re born one way, and must stay true to that way until they die. They’re hated because they don’t follow the rules of society. Oreos don’t follow the rules blacks must follow. Instead, they follow the rules that whites are made to follow. Oreos speak proper English, don’t have a strict preference for rap, and avoid fights if at all possible. When pressed into a fight, like whites, they’ll talk their way out. They have very vast vocabularies and aren’t afraid to show it. Oreos love reading, and nothing pleases an Oreo more than discussing theories of books with people. Oreos aren’t the only skin traitors, there is also such a thing as an Uh-Oh Oreo.

Uh-Oh Oreos are white on the outside and black on the inside Uh-oh Oreos listen to rap, wear baggy clothes and speak fluent slang. Even though they’re white, they will call other people white if they act like it. They think like blacks and nothing disgusts them more than a traitor that acts different than they look. Which is funny, because they themselves are traitors. Uh-Oh Oreos follow all the rules that blacks are supposed to. They listen to the “right” music, they’re aggressive, and they’re “ignorant”. Any type of Oreo is a traitor because they don’t follow society’s rules of skin.

After defining society’s rules of skin, I realized why I was hated. I was different. Many people followed the rules of race, but I wasn’t one of those followers. I disturbed the racial balance everywhere I went, and to get everything back in balance, the followers of society’s rules had to make me feel bad about myself. They had to make me hate myself enough to change myself.

Through all of the pressure to change myself, I learned two important lessons. The first was that I am who I am, and no one is going to change that. The second is that society’s rules and expectancies of race are only real to the people that follow them. Giona Auzaldúa once said, “I am my language. Until I can take pride in my language I cannot take pride in myself.” I couldn’t agree more. Oreos are just cookies.

Stephen Holts

“Oreos Are Just Cookies”

            “You’re so white!” One student would always say.

            “Yeah! Why don’t you act black?” Another would always chime in.

            “Or at least sound black!” Ever since fifth grade I’ve been subject to insulting remarks like those. But around sixth or seventh grade people started getting original.

            “Yo, you a Oreo. Black on the outside, but white on the inside.”

            I didn’t understand. How did I go from a person to a cookie? Asking questions like that led me to the most important one I’d ever ask. What exactly makes me white? It surely wasn’t my skin. Not to say that I’m especially dark skinned, but I’m dark enough to be incontestably African American, but I digress.

            My peers’ reaction to the question were all the same.

            “You just act and sound white. You’re black. You’re supposed to act and sound black.”

            After hearing this, I asked myself a question that I regretted not asking anyone. What does black sound and act like? What does white act and sound like? Maybe if I asked people this question, they’d realize how stupid they were being. I answered my own question. By observing my white peers and my black peers, I managed to compile a list of qualifications to be black, white, or an Oreo.

            If you’re black, you’re loud. You have a compulsive need to be the center of attention. You’re obnoxious, and if someone doesn’t agree with what you’re saying or doing, you’ll get in their face and scream at them. That’s what black sounds like. If you’re black and male, you’re good at sports. You’re at home with hip-hop. You know every word to every song on the last Lil’ Wayne mixtape, and you yourself can rap like no one’s business. You’re muscular and know how to fight. And because you know how to fight, you won’t back down from one. If someone gives you the faintest reason to, you’ll fight. You don’t need words. Violence are your words. Your words are for bragging after you’ve won the fight. Blacks don’t read. Blacks don’t play tennis. blacks don’t go to prep schools.

            If you’re white, you speak English like you came up with the language yourself. If you’re white you use big words. If you’re white you have the power of calling on any word in the English language and using them to impress whoever you want. Nothing means more to you than education. You’ll ask questions when in class, you’ll listen attentively, and do whatever your teacher tells you too. Rock and Pop are the only genres on your iPod. If you do have a rap song, you white it up by rapping in your high-pitched non-threatening white voice. Fighting isn’t for you if you’re white. You’ll avoid any confrontation that has the slightest possibility of leading to violence. However, you are undefeated in fights, because you use your words to either talk your way out of a fight, or you simply confuse your opponent, leading them to think you’re not worth it. You possess the power of manipulation, and can get what you want without doing anything yourself. You just stand back and watch your puppets do your bidding.

            Oreos are the scum of the Earth. They look one way, but they don’t act the way they look. They’re hypocrites who can’t accept that they’re born one way, and must stay true to that way until they die. They’re hated because they don’t follow the rules of society. Oreos don’t follow the rules blacks must follow. Instead, they follow the rules that whites are made to follow. Oreos speak proper English, don’t have a strict preference for rap, and avoid fights if at all possible. When pressed into a fight, like whites, they’ll talk their way out. They have very vast vocabularies and aren’t afraid to show it. Oreos love reading, and nothing pleases an Oreo more than discussing theories of books with people. Oreos aren’t the only skin traitors, there is also such a thing as an Uh-Oh Oreo.

Uh-Oh Oreos are white on the outside and black on the inside Uh-oh Oreos listen to rap, wear baggy clothes and speak fluent slang. Even though they’re white, they will call other people white if they act like it. They think like blacks and nothing disgusts them more than a traitor that acts different than they look. Which is funny, because they themselves are traitors. Uh-Oh Oreos follow all the rules that blacks are supposed to. They listen to the “right” music, they’re aggressive, and they’re “ignorant”. Any type of Oreo is a traitor because they don’t follow society’s rules of skin.

After defining society’s rules of skin, I realized why I was hated. I was different. Many people followed the rules of race, but I wasn’t one of those followers. I disturbed the racial balance everywhere I went, and to get everything back in balance, the followers of society’s rules had to make me feel bad about myself. They had to make me hate myself enough to change myself.

Through all of the pressure to change myself, I learned two important lessons. The first was that I am who I am, and no one is going to change that. The second is that society’s rules and expectancies of race are only real to the people that follow them. Giona Auzaldúa once said that “I am my language. Until I can take pride in my language I cannot take pride in myself.” I couldn’t agree me. Oreos are just cookies.

Stephen Holts

“Oreos Are Just Cookies”

            “You’re so white!” One student would always say.

            “Yeah! Why don’t you act black?” Another would always chime in.

            “Or at least sound black!” Ever since fifth grade I’ve been subject to insulting remarks like those. But around sixth or seventh grade people started getting original.

            “Yo, you a Oreo. Black on the outside, but white on the inside.”

            I didn’t understand. How did I go from a person to a cookie? Asking questions like that led me to the most important one I’d ever ask. What exactly makes me white? It surely wasn’t my skin. Not to say that I’m especially dark skinned, but I’m dark enough to be incontestably African American, but I digress.

            My peers’ reaction to the question were all the same.

            “You just act and sound white. You’re black. You’re supposed to act and sound black.”

            After hearing this, I asked myself a question that I regretted not asking anyone. What does black sound and act like? What does white act and sound like? Maybe if I asked people this question, they’d realize how stupid they were being. I answered my own question. By observing my white peers and my black peers, I managed to compile a list of qualifications to be black, white, or an Oreo.

            If you’re black, you’re loud. You have a compulsive need to be the center of attention. You’re obnoxious, and if someone doesn’t agree with what you’re saying or doing, you’ll get in their face and scream at them. That’s what black sounds like. If you’re black and male, you’re good at sports. You’re at home with hip-hop. You know every word to every song on the last Lil’ Wayne mixtape, and you yourself can rap like no one’s business. You’re muscular and know how to fight. And because you know how to fight, you won’t back down from one. If someone gives you the faintest reason to, you’ll fight. You don’t need words. Violence are your words. Your words are for bragging after you’ve won the fight. Blacks don’t read. Blacks don’t play tennis. blacks don’t go to prep schools.

            If you’re white, you speak English like you came up with the language yourself. If you’re white you use big words. If you’re white you have the power of calling on any word in the English language and using them to impress whoever you want. Nothing means more to you than education. You’ll ask questions when in class, you’ll listen attentively, and do whatever your teacher tells you too. Rock and Pop are the only genres on your iPod. If you do have a rap song, you white it up by rapping in your high-pitched non-threatening white voice. Fighting isn’t for you if you’re white. You’ll avoid any confrontation that has the slightest possibility of leading to violence. However, you are undefeated in fights, because you use your words to either talk your way out of a fight, or you simply confuse your opponent, leading them to think you’re not worth it. You possess the power of manipulation, and can get what you want without doing anything yourself. You just stand back and watch your puppets do your bidding.

            Oreos are the scum of the Earth. They look one way, but they don’t act the way they look. They’re hypocrites who can’t accept that they’re born one way, and must stay true to that way until they die. They’re hated because they don’t follow the rules of society. Oreos don’t follow the rules blacks must follow. Instead, they follow the rules that whites are made to follow. Oreos speak proper English, don’t have a strict preference for rap, and avoid fights if at all possible. When pressed into a fight, like whites, they’ll talk their way out. They have very vast vocabularies and aren’t afraid to show it. Oreos love reading, and nothing pleases an Oreo more than discussing theories of books with people. Oreos aren’t the only skin traitors, there is also such a thing as an Uh-Oh Oreo.

Uh-Oh Oreos are white on the outside and black on the inside Uh-oh Oreos listen to rap, wear baggy clothes and speak fluent slang. Even though they’re white, they will call other people white if they act like it. They think like blacks and nothing disgusts them more than a traitor that acts different than they look. Which is funny, because they themselves are traitors. Uh-Oh Oreos follow all the rules that blacks are supposed to. They listen to the “right” music, they’re aggressive, and they’re “ignorant”. Any type of Oreo is a traitor because they don’t follow society’s rules of skin.

After defining society’s rules of skin, I realized why I was hated. I was different. Many people followed the rules of race, but I wasn’t one of those followers. I disturbed the racial balance everywhere I went, and to get everything back in balance, the followers of society’s rules had to make me feel bad about myself. They had to make me hate myself enough to change myself.

Through all of the pressure to change myself, I learned two important lessons. The first was that I am who I am, and no one is going to change that. The second is that society’s rules and expectancies of race are only real to the people that follow them. Giona Auzaldúa once said that “I am my language. Until I can take pride in my language I cannot take pride in myself.” I couldn’t agree me. Oreos are just cookies.

January 14, 2011

Second Quarter Art Blog Post

            My second quarter art project was all about basketball, the NBA specifically. In the beginning of the quarter I did not really know what I wanted to design.  Starting was the hardest thing to do because I didn’t have a clue on what I should do. Finally, I decided that I wanted to make a poster about my favorite NBA team, the Miami Heat. The poster is a reflection of the team and it’s three best players, Dwyane Wade, Lebron James, and Chris Bosh.

The top of the poster reads HEAT across it. The right side of each letter is outlined with a black marker but the colors of the letters are painted orange.  Right beneath the letters that spell out Heat is the team’s logo. The logo is a red basketball that is painted in the shape of a flame that goes through a white ring, which is, suppose to be the basketball hoop. The end of the basketball flame is painted yellow. I outlined the lines of the basketball with a black marker as well.

            To the left of the logo is a picture that I printed out of Chris Bosh shooting a basketball. The picture is in color. On the far left side of the poster are 3 concentric circles. The first concentric circle has Dwayne Wade written on top of it and it has a big 3 inside of the circle that is colored red. Dwayne Wade’s name is outlined black and red, while the outlines of the circles and the 3 are with a black marker. The middle concentric circle is the same thing but it has Lebron James name on the top of it. His name is outlined with a black and yellow marker. Instead of there being a 3 inside of the circle, there’s a 6 that is colored in and outlined with a black marker. The circle is colored in yellow and is outlined with a black marker as well. The last concentric circles is the same thing as the other two but it has Chris Bosh’s name on top of it that is outlined with a black and orange marker and there is a 1 inside of the circle that is colored orange and outlined with a black marker. The circle is also colored orange and outlined with a black marker.

To the right of the team logo there is a picture of Lebron James. That picture is in color.  To the bottom right of the logo there is a picture of Dwyane Wade, which also is in color. The last symbol on the poster for is located at the bottom right hand corner of the poster. It is the alternate Miami Heat logo. The logo is upper case “M” and “H” that is connected.  Both the “M” and “H” are painted red.   The “H” is outlined by a black marker. The top right of the “H” is a flame. Half of the flame is painted orange and the other half is red.

For the second part of the project I decided to draw a couple of NBA logos and post them on a paper. The logos that I drew were the Boston Celtics,  Philadelphia 76ers, Atlanta Hawks, Dallas Mavericks, Oklahoma City Thunder and Washington Wizards. For extra, I drew the NBA logo. This was a fun project, I just wish I knew how to be more creative. I could have done something else.

By: Kimberly Parker

“I told you, I don’t got your eyeliner!” my sister screamed.

“You don’t HAVE my eyeliner?” I yelled back, making sure I emphasized the have because it really gets under my skin when my sister uses improper language.

“Nah, I don’t got it. That’s your fault, keep track of your stuff, it ain’t my fault you always loosin’ your stuff.”

Just hearing that sentence coming from her mouth made me cringe, improper language is my number one pet peeve. My sister and I were raised to always use proper English. Both of our parents talk virtually flawless all of the time. Growing up, if we said one word out of line, we were immediately corrected. My mother especially held zero tolerance for improper language. If we walked past someone who was talking improperly, a disgusted look would come across my mother’s face and she would warn my sister and I to never use that kind of language, she would say, “You will sound like an idiot if you talk like you are dumb.” I was brought up to believe that improper language is any word that is slang, shortened or when poor grammar is used.

To my mother, if you don’t talk as perfectly as she did then you are either uneducated or just stupid. It doesn’t occur to her why people use different ways to talk the English language. People speak ‘loose English’ because it is a part of their culture and everyday life, they especially use this ‘improper language’ around people they are especially close to.

In fact, improper language is very popular considering it is constantly being used in some of the music we listen to. In the rap and hip hop industry, the lyrics to songs are heavily flawed with grammatical errors. This music uses all kinds of slang and curse words and yet people are getting paid to produce it. Rap and Hip Hop music is in high demands, especially for the younger generations. What these rappers and singers are not thinking about are the children that they are influencing with their lyrics. This kind of music does have a huge influence on people, especially younger kids like my sister. They think it is cool and hip to use the type of language that there favorite singers are using. These kids see these performers as role models and use their language. Ever since my sister has been hanging around a new group friends and listening to rap music, her language has defiantly been effected in a negative way. This just shows how easily children’s language can be influenced. This drives my mother crazy, at first she constantly tried to correct my sister and remind her that she goes to a good school that taught her how to speak the correct way. My mother was implying that my sister was being a fool for using improper language because my sister is in fact educated. This leads to another conclusion that my mother is drawing which is that people who use improper language are not educated, which is not true. I personally cannot stand when people use improper English intentionally but I do think it is also unfair to label people and jump to conclusions. You cannot just assume because a person talks improperly that they are stupid and or uneducated.

Sometimes when my sister uses this improper English, I tease her saying that nobody is going to hire her for a job if she still talks the way she does today. She always just gives me a sour look telling me how dare I think that. I am only trying to help her by informing her that in reality, improper English is not desired in the working industry. If she did go in for a job interview and used improper language, chances are she would not be hired. Jobs are a formal matter, appearance is key and if you speak improperly, it is going to be noticed and frowned upon. Improper language is very unprofessional and in the business world it is never used. It is looked at as being low class and everyone in the business industry wants to be on top. Nobody wants to appear as being low class and that is why the vast majority of the people in this industry have close to flawless English speaking skills.

My sister has been using improper language for two years now and does not see the significance of using ‘proper English.’ Other people as well do not see why speaking properly can be beneficial. Clarence Darrow who was an American lawyer in the 1920’s said, “Even if you do learn to speak correct English, whom are you going to speak it to?” This quote is questioning if speaking correctly is really worth learning. I respectfully disagree with this quote because in this day and age, you can speak correct language to your boss and coworkers who do not want to hear any kind of improper language. By reading this quote, proper English must not have been too important to Clarence and being a lawyer, I don’t see why he would that speaking proper is a waste of time. Being a lawyer, speaking properly is a big part of the job because speaking is in fact your job and the use of proper English is critical. 

The way that English is used is up to the person who speaks it. There are countless variations on how the English language is used and there are many ways to use the language properly and improperly.  This all depends on the person, the person’s history, and surroundings. The way that you use English effects how other people think of you and can often be stereotypical. The use of different variations on the English language can affect your life in both negative and positive ways. What my sister doesn’t realize that she is developing a bad habit that might affect her life down the road in the working industry. If she doesn’t start practicing proper English now, she might always be an improper monster.

Throughout the process of finding information and ways to stop the bill S.3804 Combating Online Infringement and Copyrights act. (COICA) A lot of worry was spread through the people, but due to the late introduction to the bill, It didn’t have enough time to get signed as It was introduced in the 111^th congress, It is now the 112^th congress which means the current bills slates were wiped clean to be introduced in the new congress. However I am unsure that with the new senators and house members, and the change of Majority in the house switching over to Republicans, I am not sure if this will affect the outcome of the bill if it is reintroduced.

I have a good feeling that it will be because something like this is introduced every year or so, it is only a matter of time before serious consideration is put on hand towards the future of this bill and change the balance if it will be passed or not.

We have to be smarter and more informed about the things that will drastically shape the way we see and do things in our daily lives, the Internet isn’t just the internet anymore, it’s a part of people, and taking away the freedom of the internet is taking away the freedom of the people. Information has been exploited since the beginning of man, It is only when somebody exploits them does it become a problem and they feel the need to pursue the cause.

Iraida Serrano

Gold Stream

Language Essay

The Truth

“¿Que Pasa?”

“What did you say to me?”

“All I asked was what’s up I don’t see why you have to get mad.”

“Please, for all I know you said something else in that made up language of yours.”

As he, one of my classmates from the 8^th grade walked away from me to join the swarm of kids that were outside playing at recess. As I turned to my friends and all I received was laughter. At the when that this happened I hadn’t been able to understand what he meant. As a way to avoid having this happen again I refused to talk to my friends in Spanish. To me what I had said was simple and easy to understand. For some time after that I felt stupid that I hadn’t switched back to talking in English as soon as I saw him walking towards me.

As I went through the routine of going to class for the rest of the day, I couldn’t help but shake the feeling that what I had said to him was wrong. When I spoke to my mom at home that day, I had accidently spoken in English. Knowing that she barely understood me, I just decided to not talk at home. A few days later back at school, at another recess, the same kid came up to me and made fun of me.  He was saying sounds to act as if he was speaking Spanish. At his parting words he once again repeated what he had said just a few days ago, that my language was made up. This time I decided to gain the courage to ask him what he meant.

“Oh look, she don’t know about her dumb language.”

With that he left with his newfound friends, my friends. Ironically my next class was Spanish. I walked into the classroom only to see that the only seat left was the ‘danger seat’. It was called that because sitting there was a guarantee that you would be speaking in class. The boy was sitting two seats behind me and was laughing loudly with my old friends. The teacher went up to the front of the class to start her lesson.

            “O.k., I need someone to come to the front of the class to write and recite a sentence about what you do in the summer. Who would like to come up?”

Everyone had turned his or her head to the side and away from the teacher. I knew that if she picked on me I would have to speak Spanish in front of him again. If the language wasn’t real then what was the point of speaking it, but just my luck, the teacher had picked me. In a desperate attempt to get out of speaking I complained of a sore throat so I could only write the sentence. I did and went back to my seat when I finished.               As I sat there looking at the desk in front of me I heard some people saying that I thought I was better than them because I could write a sentence in Spanish. In the following month I started speaking in Spanish again at home. It was comforting knowing that somewhere, someone accepted the fact that I was bilingual. I now knew that I would have to change how I talked at home from how I talked in school to how I talked with my friends.

            In the words of James Baldwin, “To open you mouth…you have confessed you parents, your youth…and, alas, your future.” He believes that speaking a certain way can led people to figure out your parents, youth, and future and in a way he is correct.             If I hadn’t changed the way I spoke with my classmates, they would have thought that I was acting like a ‘know-it-all’ without even bothering to see if it was true or not. In their eyes, I was a kid with Spanish speaking parents and in the future at the school I would past every test in Spanish just because I spoke it. From then on I only spoke English in school and when in Spanish class I tried to make excuses or just try to not get called on.   I was starting to fit in again.  I was able to talk to my friends and gain new ones. I thought that not being myself had given me a new perspective on the things happening around me. Yet still, in the back of my mind a small voice wouldn’t stop nagging me, telling me that I should be myself and every time that happened I would just push the voice further and further into the back of my mind.

After almost three months of this, I found out the answer to the question that I had asked a few months back. I was helping my mom on researching different languages.       I don’t remember why but I do remember what I found out. Through the research I found out that Spanish originated from Latin. That was not the only one; there are other languages, such as Italian, French, Portuguese, Romanian, and Catalan. I was surprised to say the least. I had spoke Spanish for so long thinking that it was its own language and to my amazement, I was okay with this not being true. I think it was due to the fact that I was apart of something bigger, something unique. It wasn’t just a few words that originated from Latin like in the English language; it was the entire language.

            After that I started to speak in Spanish more freely in other places that weren’t my home.  I finally realized that it was stupid of me to think that talking a certain way in front of people made me fit in. What made me fit in was the fact that I was being who I really am. Sure I lost some of my newly made friends but I gain new ones as well. From then on, I spoke how I wanted and even tried to teach other people how to speak the language, my language.