Attempting to see beyond the white curtain: The Podcast

The idea for this project was inspired by Indee's topic of choice, being biracial.  Once I heard her discussing what she was going to write about an outline for my own paper began to form in my mind.  Race is a topic I have developed an intense passion for.  Yet, as a majority I always question my place in the discussion.  I figured that by studying the topic intently it would help me come to grips with my inner conflict. Deciding to go through with my topic was hard for me though, because I feared the possible reactions that would follow the publishing of my paper on slate.  My passion for the subject overcame my fear. I determined that my best product would come only if I was truly invested in the topic .
There were many factor that contributed to the stable process of writing my paper. The fact that I had interest on my topic compelled me to dig deep into the realm of research using many videos as well as a documentary as resources. Therefore I had much proof to back up the statements I made within my writing. The only art of the process I found difficult was sitting down to write the paper. I kept returning to pages of research attempting to collect more evidence. I was trying to create a statement that was carefully worded, attempting to be as fair-minded as possible. In the end I learned that in order to have a conversation about race there must be respect given from all sides as well as an understanding and honesty of the past and present. The white race as a whole must remove the veil from their eyes and recognize that they are in a majority position, and with that, the understanding that minorities lead a different experience.

  



Race.... (1)

Quarter 2, Avery Monroe

I had a lot of fun with this quarters pieces. It reminded me of when I was younger in art class and we did block prints a lot. My favorite piece in this would have to be the Golden Ratio collage. I like the contrast of he pinks to the blue. It made me really happy to finish it because I liked it so much. To do these pieces I did a lot of research and it helped me to see what I could take from what I saw and make it my own. I guess other people were a big help in inspiring what I did this quarter. 

I like this class a lot and doing this type of stuff because it shows me the kinds of things that I am good at and what I like to do. I get to learn about all these different types of art, and I am excited to see what we get to do in the rest of the year. 

See Your Skin Podcast

During my writing process I explored the idea of belonging. After watching several  videos and reading excerpts that described how we find our identity. It helped me to examine bigger ideas such as the process of building our identity and how many factors go into the destruction of our identity. But I’ve came to the conclusion that our identity can’t be destructed unless we allow it to be. Our identity can be reconstructed, because throughout life we will have different encounters that help us shape and form our identity. Another idea that stuck out to me during my research was that we do form our identity based off of others people projections,because when we come into this world we are told things and we base our own projections on their own.

I’m very happy with the outcome of my essay and podcast. I was able to interview my family members and understand their perspective on belonging and forming our identity. In the future I want to be comfortable with educating people about identity and I also want to stay comfortable in my own skin and not rely on the presence of others.


My Podcast

Quarter 2 Gina Sorgentoni

This quarter challenged me creatively. There was less work to do, so I payed close attention to all the pieces I created. One of the pieces I am most proud of is one of my sketches for the block print. The silhouette filled with flowers was a piece I worked on for hours. I wanted to create something elegant and almost vintage looking. This piece helped me improve my skill with drawing flowers as well as drawing people. Another piece I am proud of is my golden ratio collage. I wanted to approach the collage using items that follow the ratio. My final product was a forest of ferns on a snowy day. 

Identity And Belonging Podcast

So My goal for this podcast was to be able to relate heroes to identity and how heroes can have impact on them. I thought that getting an interview from both of my parents. I wanted to see how their experience with the people that they considered their heroes impacted them overall. I also wanted to make sure I had said my part for this topic and what I had learned from this experience as a whole 
What I had found that was really interesting and enjoyable, would have to be the interviews that I had done with my parents. They had some interesting points, and it had given me new ideas on how to approach this podcast. It was really cool, not to mention I felt like I got a chance to learn more about my parents. The most difficult part of this project would have to be editing. I severely underestimated the amount of work that I had to put in to make the final podcast really good. However, I would still say that it was worth it.  

Podcast (1)

Identity and Belonging Podcast (Money Jawn)

Podcast
​My theme for my podcast was to find out the identity and belonging. My goal for this project was to find out the word of misjudgment and the word "terrorist." People say this word just to say it and really don't know what it means. I interviewed my fellow friend, his name is Ahmed Ahmed. He is in 9th grade and he attends Science Leadership Acd. Now I feel from another person point of view of getting misjudged and mistreated and what terrorist means. 

My interview went well than I expected it to go. It was very frustrating at one point of time but I overcame it and got done my podcast. This was a very hard process for me, it felt like I had to do everything perfect or it will mess up my whole project. I listened to my interview probably a good 10 times to make sure everything was okay. Making a podcast takes a lot of time. For my first podcast, I don't think it was that bad. I learned a lot of new things about working with a podcast. 

Identity and Belonging Podcast - Kayla Cassumba

Podcast
My goal for this project was to get my audience to understand that education and knowledge is key to success. Through my father's example I was able to extract some of his key values and help me further understand who he is. Throughout the podcast I have Congolese drums playing which are one of my father's favorite instruments.  

What went well during this project was getting my interview. I had a lot of material to work with but it was challenging to boil down the information to the most important part. It was challenging to edit the podcast and take out any unnecessary material and also to have it all flow without it sounding bad. Overall, the project had its rough patches but when it was completed I felt good.

Quarter 2 Art Portfolio

I wanted to make a collage of something/or someone that I love. I’ve always loved Audrey Hepburn and so I decided to make a collage about her. Before making my collage I did a little  research on Audrey Hepburn and discovered that she was born during the time of Nazi Germany, but the most interesting fact I learned was that she at bulbs of Tulips to stay alive and so I decided to make the shape of my collage a tulip bulb.

For the draw fabric assignment I decided to draw a gown. I’ve always loved and been interested in fashion and so this was my favorite assignment in quarter 2.  Before I started drawing I did some research on what draw fabrics looked like. I found a lot of images of what looked like to be drawing of a big sheet or clothing.

The picture I chose to edit is of my sister and I. I chose this photo because this is one of my favorite photos of my sister and I. This photo was originally taken in color.

I based my illustration off of a Shel Silverstein poem called: Early Bird. The first poetry book I had had this poem in it. It’s also where I learned the phrases: early bird get the worm. I decided to draw a picture of a bird because it’s the main subject of the poem.


Identity & Belonging Podcast

My goals for this podcast were to bring to my viewers an overall idea of how identity is found. I wanted talk about the introduction of trends and how social media affects the lives of everyone who is starting to find themselves. Things and people that you encounter throughout time affects your personality depending on how you interpreted it or them. Trends are turning this generation into a world of plagiarism. With this being said, trends can be both bad and good.

After creating my podcast I was mostly pleased with my work. The editing took a while and so did the audio of the podcast but I was happy with the outcome.  I had the most fun with adding the music to my audio. This was also one of the most difficult parts of creating this project. Overall I learned how to gather information from a person rather than online and I learned more about how to be open minded when looking at arguments.
English Identity Podcast

Podcast -220 Poppin'

Podcast

My goal for this podcast was not sit down and get to know my great grandmother more and also receive some elderly knowledge. I think some of our youth could use some of this knowledge and use it throughout their life.



what went well with this podcast was my grandma responded to the questions I asked well and she also elaborated good too she made it somewhat easy to  interview her . what was challenging about this podcast was I used my phone so I  had to keep switching my phone from her mouth to mine and some times I would move the phone before she finished speaking and I got stuck in between questions so I would start stuttering too much.


Xavier's Podcast: Intellectual Identity

xcarroll's song #2 (2)
I created this podcast with the idea of intellectual identity. I interviewed Harry and Eva, two friends of mine who I consider to be very smart. 

Through this experience I discovered the concept of intellectual elitism. I don't think That I would have come to the same conclusion that I did without the input of my interviewees. The actual editing of this project was very painful and the time limit was really damaging to my podcast itself. 

Accepting my Name: Identity and Belonging

The gift of name giving (1)
My goal for this podcast was to showcase the history behind my name and it's significance attributed with my father and mother and how I somewhat struggled accepting it. I didn't just want to give my point of view of my name, so I interviewed my father and mother as well. I asked them the same questions so I could get different perspectives. To change it up a little bit, I had a friend interview me rather then just me speaking of my experience because I wanted to have my recollection of memories in the moment to show raw emotion.
Completing this podcast, it wasn't much of a struggle. I had a bit of paranoia working with Soundtrap because of previous experiences, but other then that, it was easy. I would say that the only other struggle was remaining in the time limit. My first draft of my podcast was 15 minutes so I had to edit a lot of audio out that I wanted to keep :(. I learned a lot from this podcast. First, I learned the skill of podcasts with the help of videos of Ira Glass and during class with Ms. Dawson and Mr. Block. I also learned that there are multiple other ways to story tell of then writing and that later on in life, I can use the tool of audio and literacy to present other ideas and narratives. I had a lot of fun doing this benchmark! Hope you guys enjoy!

Colorism towards Black Women

My goal for this podcast was to explore a topic that affects me. Colorism is a very sensitive topic to African American women. My essay also focuses on colorism in the black community. For this podcast, I wanted to interview light skin black women and dark skin black women. Another goal for this podcast was to improve my editing skills. 
I learned that forming a story arc in a podcast is very hard. Some of my struggles were forming the climax and my interview questions. At first, I didn't know what questions to ask my interviewees. However, over time I learned to let the interview be more of a conversation than a podcast. 
English Podcast - 1_28_16, 11.28 PM

Quater 2 Senior Art (Jordan Meriwether)

Through my current work I wanted to begin stretching the limitation on what I could do for a project. I did not do the different checkpoints of this project as they were conventionally described. My first creation was to be a fern, the directions were very open. I decided instead of doing an average fern I wanted to do a particular form of a fern. I looked over many pictures and  found that ferns uncurl as they develop. I intern, decided to create a fern while it was uncurling. For my next project I was told to do a golden ratio collage. I interpreted the word collage in a different way that normal. Most people would just add special materials and pictures from magazines. Google defines a collage as “a combination or collection of various things”,  decided to do that through imagery. I gave the golden ratio a collection of many things: a lizard, a man, a pencil, and even a flower. From there I had a final project which was broken into multiple parts. First, I needed to create a sketch for something that would fit on a tile, it was supposed to be organic. In the end of my sketches did not interest me, so for the next section I drew something new. We were supposed to make a negative space drawing to eventually be turned into a block print. I chose to make a sketch showing a heart surrounding a plant, it represent my love towards nature. With the final block print I decided to do something tedious and difficult. I made two block prints, they both were negatives of each other, and wanted to get them both printed on the same paper to get a multicolored print. It took a minute, but in the end I was able to a multiple colored print that looked very nice. Overall, this project helped me experiment on how I could attempt to interpret projects more creatively. I will take this with me and use it to create more intriguing works.

Identity & Belonging

This project mainly focuses on my sisters ideas and experiences relating to identity and belonging. She talks about why she left public school and went into homeschooling, and this was because of her not feeling as though she belonged and also because of an issue involving her, her "friends" and a cyber-bullying page that was created. My goal for this project was to focus mainly on a story, and making that story suspenseful like the examples Mr. Block showed us in class.

Overall, I can honestly say I enjoyed working on this project. I learned a lot about my sister and her experiences, and also about different definitions of identity and belonging. The checkpoints were really helpful for me, although they were frustrating. The first interview I did with her was a failure, it related to identity but was not what I pictured my final product looking like. So, after I redid the interview I was very satisfied and looking forward to editing and showing her the final product. I really did like this project, though, simply because light was bought to my knowledge and I was definitely enlightened. 

Podcast (1)

Identity and belonging Podcast

So My goal for this podcast was to be able to relate heroes to identity and how heroes can have impact on them. I thought that getting an interview from both of my parents and see how their experiences with people who they considered their heroes impacted them and their identities. I was then going to say my piece with the whole matter and what I learned from the experience of making this podcast  
What I had found that was very easy would be the interviews. They were very opening and brought up some interesting points or stories that I feel really helped me make my podcast more creative. They really helped to inspire me for how the podcast could. What I thought that was really challenging would be the amount of editing that I had to do. I really underestimated the work that I had to put in to make this podcast really good. I feel like it was worth it though. 

Identity and Belonging Podcast

In both my advanced essay and podcast I discussed whether or not a person can change their identity. My goal for the podcast was to get as many interviews as I could and use all those interviews to show the listeners why I believe change doesn't exist. I didn't necessarily want to convince the listeners that I was right and they were wrong, I just wanted them to give another perspective and opinion a chance, and whether they believe me or not, that was up to them. Unfortunately, all my interviews were so great and full of information and stories that I was only able to use two. I made sure that I included the stories of my interviewees so that listeners could connect with them. If listeners can't connect with anything in my podcast, than they wouldn't be compelled to listen to the entire thing. 

The podcast itself took a long time to make, and was very frustrating. I probably listened to each interview five times, and the shortest interview I had was ten minutes, so you could understand my frustration of having to listen to the same thing over and over again for three hours. Next came the deciding factor of whether or not I wanted to use certain information/recording (because I had a lot of good stuff to use). Making a podcast definitely takes patience, and it's a lot of hard work that I was definitely was not anticipating. The final product turned out alright, but I know that I can do much better. The final product wasn't too bad considering it was my first podcast. 
Podcast

The Namesake vs. Media

Throughout current culture in America, and arguably all over the world, communication is constantly evolving, and so are the mediums we all choose to express ourselves. Instead of walking up to each other and establishing a connection, or explaining to each other why we like the things we do, we just read it, maybe in the 140 characters of a tweet, or the 150 characters of an Instagram bio. The information we choose to post or the media we share with our followers is our definition of ourselves, ‘This is what you see, and that is how I want you to see me.’ In other cultures names or titles define who people are, what relationships they will have, and can convey storybooks worth of information, with just a few syllables. For the purposes of this paper the culture that will be examined is that of Bengali individuals and their lives portrayed when immigrating to America in the book, The Namesake written by Jhumpa Lahiri.

The main character, Nikhil Gangoli spends the entire book agonizing over his name, torn between his inherited Bengali culture, and his born to America lifestyle he spends all his time letting his name define him. He thinks people don’t take him seriously because of his name, originally Gogol, when he finds out, or rather as the reader you find out the only person not taking him seriously, or constantly doubting every move he makes, is himself.

“He is afraid to be Nikhil, someone he doesn't know. Who doesn't know him...It's a part of growing up, they tell him, of being a Bengali.” (Chapter 3 Paragraph 13) This quote taken from The Namesake is from Gogol’s early youth, when he gets renamed from his pet name, Gogol. Originally he is not fond of this name, because it is unfamiliar and uncomfortable for him to change what everyone calls him, his life title. So as a young boy, he chooses to stay Gogol, which later on he regrets, thinking his pet name is stupid, and changes it back to Nikhil. This back and forth struggle over, what people will call him, how people will view him, and the struggle of defining himself through a title that, at the end of the day doesn’t matter is the biggest theme of the book, and for many throughout their entire lives.

Through the way media has evolved, to include every part of our lives, people no longer know what it is to define one’s self, everyone simplifies and belittles what and who they are, to be interesting at a glance. This makes everything less meaningful, when people throughout the world should be able to just embrace their complexities. In a recent podcast titled, Finding the Self in Selfie (This American Life, 2015) a few teenage girls were talking about their experiences and familiarity with the rules of interacting on Instagram, and what it means to comment or double tap.

“Especially because we, like just started High school, so we’re meeting a lot of new people, so you would comment on someone’s photo who you’re not really super close with or that you don’t know really well, and it's sort of a statement, like, ‘I wanna be friends with you’ or ‘I wanna get to know you’ or like, ‘I think you’re cool’. If someone that you don’t know very well commented on your photo, it's sort of like an unspoken agreement that you have to comment back on their photo. Like when you’re making new friends, if they comment on your photo, you comment on their photo.”

 Almost to say that the way to meet new people and force friendships is through your online persona, how you present, or even more to the point, sell yourself. Later in the interview the incoming freshman girls admit, that the way you present yourself online, is almost like you’re marketing yourself, like you are the product, manager, and the marketing team, trying to keep people interested and concerned with knowing about you and your life. Squeezing anything cool or notable about yourself into an Instagram bio, or caption, and sticking a filter on a group picture of your friends having “Tons of fun!” being the only thing keeping us, in this generation current. And beyond that, people making friends and even romantic partners or hookups in the private message sections, or DMs of Instagram.

“...I tell her, don't you hate when you get screenshot, Bitch that DM wasn't for everybody, I love tha gram I love tha gram, I'm addicted to it I know I am...” A piece of a very popular rap right now, brought to us by Yo Gotti, who may not be a credible source at first glance, but as a voice for the young of this generation, and the behavior now known as normal, very trustworthy. People being debased to a steady photostream on their phones. This is being highly studied all over the world, and the impact of the internet in general on the mass public has been scrutinized by many since the mid 90’s, but the most powerful words, come from an actress, a media personality, and someone you think would be completely uninvolved in public speaking, Thandie Newton, who in her thirteen minute TED Talk addressed embracing self, and otherness.

“We each have a self, but I don’t think that we’re born with one...The fundamental state of ‘oneness’ is lost on us very quickly...it’s no longer valid, or real...” This transition from having a fundamental sense of ‘oneness’ to being completely withdrawn from everything comes quickly, almost without warning. Unfortunately though, most young adults choose to isolate themselves into different internet profiles in an attempt to recreate that oneness through a self-constructed image that in truth can never fully capture their entire presence. That being said, this trend will likely never end, but the self imposed need to sell ourselves on our media will hopefully be less impending through the different voices pointing out this almost self destructive behavior.



Sources

Ghosts in the Machine, NY Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/27/magazine/ghosts-in-the-machine.html?_r=0

Quotes from The Namesake

http://www.shmoop.com/namesake/identity-quotes.html

Thandie Newton: Embracing otherness, embracing myself. (TED Talk)

https://www.ted.com/talks/thandie_newton_embracing_otherness_embracing_myself?language=en#t-560227

This American Life: Status Update

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/573/status-update

Yo Gotti, Down in the DM

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/yogotti/downinthedm.html


Identity and Belonging Podcast

My goal for this project was to give an immigrant’s perspective on identity and belonging. I interviewed my mother who was born in the United States but grew up in Ecuador. I focused on how immigrants begin to feel that they belong in a new country.
Interviewing went well; I enjoyed getting to know more about my mother’s past and identity. It was hard to cut all of the clips exactly the way I wanted them. It was also hard to decide what parts of the interview to include. I learned a lot of new things about storytelling and what makes a story compelling.

Podcast

Identity And Belonging Podcast

My goal in my podcast Is to focus on how Haisha see herself vs how other people see her and how she identifies identity. She focused more on a personal experiences to better express what she knows and to inform everyone real life issues people are going through. I am proud that I get to have her talk about an experience that she has struggled with personally. This podcast is a common topic nowadays and I wanted to get the point across that we live in a place where you get judge no matter what you look like or how you are their is always someone there to bring you down but you just have to ignore the others on what they say because you know who you are and that's all that matters.

Working on this podcast was a really great experience. I feel like hearing her talk about her situations made me realize how people are judging on something that means so much to a person. I got to connect with Haisha personally from this and I feel like I'm not alone with the situations I went through because now I know others go through it too. I feel like creating this podcast overall and adding the final touches went really well.
Podcast

Identity and Belonging Podcast- Michaela

I wanted to create a podcast that deals with the reality of dealing with stereotypes and societal pressures to be and act a certain way. I interviewed Amanda Bolli and Chelsea Middlebrooks about their experience with both those things. They talked about what they've experienced and growing up the immense pressure on them from their moms. They also spoke about what it's like to be a woman in the world.

This project was frustrating to work on, because I didn't have any story to focus on. Instead, I focused on the emotions and experiences of these to girls. I was interested in working on it, but I'll admit, I am far more interested in telling stories on a written format. Editing was frustrating, but it was done, as well as finding music.
Identity and Belonging

Identity and Belonging Podcast - Chiara Nemati

My goal for this project was to share my fathers story about moving to America. He is an immigrant from Iran, who can here to study and escape the war. He ended up living here for more than half his life. I wanted to create a story that displayed the struggles that immigrants go through and help others see his journey to success. 

Overall, I think I created a nice piece. I was able to get the stories I wanted to share and structure them in a way that flowed. I had a little bit of difficulty with Garageband and feel that my editing skills can be improved on. My editing process was not the smoothest but writing out a script really helped me when I needed to cut information out and decide what to keep. 
baba english 3 Q2 BM - 1_29_16, 1.25 PM

Identity and Belonging Podcast - Katarina

What I wanted to accomplish was to get my stepdad to say an interesting story about how his identity was shaped. This was in response to the question: "Who is the person who influenced your identity the most?" This story was the answer to that question, and it was 10 minutes linger, but I had to cut it. 

I do good in the interview, were I got my stepdad to easily speak for the whole 45 minutes, were he told a few good and long stories. Something I could have done better, was made sure that my voice was the same loudness as his. Something I would do differently if I were to redo this project is I would ask him to conclude too.
Podcast

Identity & Belonging Podcast - Jun-Jie Zou

English Podcast
    Since this was my first time turning a long interview into a short podcast, you can say that my goal was to be able to cut things down and have it still make sense. It was most definitely a lot of work, but I felt like it came out pretty satisfying considering the fact that I am not very good with editing audio. 
     I think the most difficult part is to cut down on the amazing things my interviewee said. As a matter of fact, I had to pass the limit because I was not fully able to cut down some things. But I don't feel like my audience will be bored out because he is speaking from his raw experience. I thought that I did a really good job with music selection. I felt as though the tone of my music was very mysterious and calmly suspenseful. I don't want my music to be very hard and violent, although the things my interviewee talked about has a lot of violent in it, because the topic that I chose to write about isn't something that should be intensely hyped up on.