For my capstone project, I decided to create a project that was very dear to me. I created Krochet Kare Packages which is a project to help families heal from gun violence in the city of Philadelphia. I personally crocheted different items ranging from clothes to blankets and packaged them with motivational messages to uplift the different people/families who had been affected by gun violence. The reason that I chose to start this project was because I began to realize the lack of mental health support that people of color in Philadelphia received. I knew that I had to specify who exactly I wanted to reach out to. After reading ‘Rest In Power’, the memoir from the parents of Trayvon Martin, I decided that I should tackle a big issue, gun violence. After deciding this, I reached out to people around me who had been strongly affected by gun violence. By doing so, I was able to hear the stories of all the individuals and learn about the toll that such a traumatizing event can have on one’s mind. After hearing the stories of everyone who I planned to work with, i personalized crochet care packages for each victim. The point of the handmade crocheted items was to let those individuals know that they were not alone and to give them something that would comfort them in times of pain and or grief.

Annotated Bibliography

AVPPhila. (n.d.). Retrieved January 25, 2019, from http://avpphila.org/families-of-murder-victims-fmv/

AVP stands for the Anti-Violence Partnership of Philadelphia. They offer people who have lost loved ones violently counseling sessions as well as group therapy. All the services there are free because they know that a lot of people in Philly are under  ;privledged and can not afford to pay for full price services to help them cope with death. A lot of the people who organize the different sessions have personally dealt with the issues that they all are coming to get help with. Aside from helping the families of the victims with counseling they also try to help them get the people locked up for the crimes. This is a big help considering a lot of cases go unsolved.

Coping in the Aftermath of a Shooting. (n.d.). Retrieved January 25, 2019, from https://www.counseling.org/knowledge-center/coping-in-the-aftermath-of-a-shooting

Coping with a shooting surrounds almost the same things as coping with a death. Sometimes shootings even sadly end in death. It is understandable for some to want to isolate themselves from things especially like the news and other media that may be heavily discussing the incident. This can sometimes cause panic attacks and unneeded anxiety. This is really called post traumatic stress disorder which happens to some who experience traumatic events that leave a long lasting impact on them. This happens commonly in urban neighborhoods but is rarely treated. When this happens, people can turn to reacting to those events randomly because they are triggered.

Coping with Loss: Bereavement and Grief. (2015, May 01). Retrieved January 25, 2019, from http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/conditions/coping-loss-bereavement-and-grief

This source talks more about how to deal with the death of a loved one compared to others that just talked about what happens when you a loved one dies. One major thing to do is to take care of yourself and not deprive yourself of essential things that help you survive and keep you happy. In a time of such disappointment, it makes sense to try and normalize things instead of trying to become a totally different person. Building with other people dealing with the same issue will also help the both of you cope better and share common experiences.

Crochet Therapy for Mental Health • LoveCrochet Blog. (2017, May 08). Retrieved January 25, 2019, from https://blog.lovecrochet.com/crochet-and-mental-health/

Crocheting is used as a therapy for many because of how it soothes. Different yarns have different textures which come as a healing and comfortable place for people away from their home (comfort space). Crocheting allows people to get their feelings out through the project that they are working on. Whether it be anger or even love, it allows you to express yourself when you are silenced by things that hurt you. The sensation that you get from crocheting, can heal physical pains because mentally you will be at peace and not be able to feel anything.

Crocheting For A Cause. (n.d.). Retrieved January 25, 2019, from http://thecrochetcrowd.com/placemarks/crocheting-for-a-cause/

This is a organization that does something similar to what I will do. They crochet different things for people who are usually sick or veterans and give them to them for comfort. I will be doing that but instead to a more specified crowd. They are located in Jersey and do not do any of the work for money. Everything that they do is free and from the bottom of their heart. Throughout the year, who they crochet for tends to vary because they like reaching out to certain groups and giving each of them an allotted dedication.

Family & Survivor Support. (n.d.). Retrieved January 25, 2019, from https://momocares.org/familysurvivor-support/

This service is based in North Carolina and provides some of the same services that a lot of therapist do. A lot of the services include planning memorial events such as funerals and candlelights to bring light to the people that lose their lives. This helps families feel sane because they feel like their family members do not die in vain. They want the legacies to live on and for people to especially know if the cases have not been solved and people are not paying for their ruthless actions. If the person who was killed is the only one that they had left, it gives them a chance to rebuild their family value now that a loved one is gone.

Grief & Depression Coping With Denial, Loss, Anger and More. (n.d.). Retrieved January 25, 2019, from https://www.webmd.com/depression/guide/depression-grief#1

This source talks about the process of grief and how each person may deal with it differently. Usually when you are dealing with grief there are different stages of how you accept it as well as deny it. You can lose feeling over a sensation of shock and even act as if it hasn’t happened. With this comes wishing that you may have spent more time with the person or even was there to prevent what happened. Some people even never recover from death and begin to fall into depression which can lead to suicide.

Health Benefits of Crocheting and Knitting. (n.d.). Retrieved January 25, 2019, from http://www.redheart.com/articles/health-benefits-of-crocheting-and-knitting

Crocheting helps with both long term and short term health. With crocheting comes following different patterns and motions which help with memory when it comes to getting down a routine. Physically it strengthens your hands and teaches them to have structure when it comes to other hand moving techniques. Crocheting is something that is done everywhere and even in correctional facilities to help prisoners build bonds and also social skills. In addition to this, and knowledge from the previous information that I have collected, crocheting can be obviously seen as a way to heal and even the handmade items that are made can heal.

Johnson, P. (2018, February 06). Philly organization Erase the Rate addresses gun violence by empowering the community. Retrieved January 25, 2019, from https://billypenn.com/2018/02/06/philly-nonprofit-erase-the-rate-addresses-gun-violence-by-empowering-the-community/

This source talks about a young lady who had hopes to end gun violence following the death of her cousin. She created a foundation called “Erase the Rate” to try to educate people about how the death rate in Philadelphia is increasing because of senseless violence that people participate in. The sad thing about this is that people are being murdered and their murderers most of the time remain on the loose. By remaining on the loose, their is a high chance that they will strike again and senselessly murder another victim in the city. It also mentions how urban children are usually told to be strong because they can handle anything instead of actually getting help and dealing with the things that eventually haunt them.

Our Founder. (n.d.). Retrieved January 25, 2019, from https://www.mothersincharge.org/our-founder/

This source is about the founder of a local organization that works to stop violence in Philadelphia. It tells the story of how she chose to start her foundation after the tragic lost of her son to gun violence in a parking lot. Aside from using her terrifying experience to help start the foundation, she uses her background in Psychology to help people cope. She reaches out to people around the country as well and educates them regarding resources they can use to help them deal with losing a loved one. Dr. Dorothy makes sure that everyone involved is remembered and upholds a legacy.

Social media was created to help people interact with each other. Many of the people who use social media see it as a safe space to voice their opinions. Although that is the main reason for social media, different views on life cause a lot of tension on social media when it comes to sensitive topics like racial profiling. While racial profiling has been a problem for hundreds of years, it has recently become more recognized. Even though it is being talked about more via social media, it still has not helped prevent racial profiling. Social media has not prevented racial profiling because it allows people to continue stereotypes and oppress people of color.

Although Twitter is not the most popular form of social media, a lot of tweets happen to go viral on other social networks. Most of the tweets that go viral are outrageous statements from popular or famous people that have sparked outrage among their fanbase. Twitter allows people to speak their feelings which causes more hurt than help. Recently singer Sabrina Claudio caught some backlash from recent racist tweets. One of her tweets said “I’d rather be a pasty white girl than a sweaty chonga.”. Although she did receive some backlash from her insensitive tweets, she was also given some support. With her fanbase being so big, she was destined to influence some of her fans and supporters into believing a stereotype that she once believed and possibly still believed. Her inconsiderate words may have influenced some of her fans and even random people that saw the tweet to believe a stereotype about people of color. These types of actions lead to the much bigger problems in the world including issues of racial profiling and stereotyping.

The sad thing about social media is that it comes up with its own story to tell the world. Whether the story be told by a news channel or by a random user, they portray the story they want to portray it. This is what happened with Trayvon Martin. After being followed through a development, he was shot and killed by a man. According to Journalism.org, “On blogs, the racial element of the story was the top theme in the conversation, given Martin’s race and questions that have arisen about the racial attitudes of Zimmerman, a Hispanic man.” The ongoing stereotype surrounding people of color moved to the internet after this situation. Despite the fact that an obviously innocent child had been murdered, the internet still decided to make the killer, innocent. The media especially painted the victim in a disturbing and demonized way. This did not help the victim and the media’s influence resulted in the murderer not being convicted of first degree murder.

Social media has not helped racial profiling of anyone. Instead it has caused for people to repeat and make fun of stereotypes on the internet. By doing so, social media has harmed the outcome of racial profiling by not allowing the guilty party to be charged with the crime. Because the guilty party is never charged with the crime, they always get away with it and situations like these continue to happen to people of color. Social media has not prevented racial profiling because it allows people to continue stereotypes and oppress people of color.

Works Cited

Hitlin, Paul. On Social Media A Conversation About Race. Journalism.org. 2012. Web.

Way, Katie. Angry Fans Are Comparing Sabrina Claudio to Camila Cabello, Selena Gomez because of her racist online past. Babe.net. 2018. Web

I think differently from everybody else. This might sound cliche but I really do. One thing I usually do is overthink and blame myself for things. I feel like I should be held responsible for a lot of things especially if I am aware of the situation. As a human, everybody in this world has the opportunity to do things that they almost never do. There are a lot of reasons that we decide against doing a lot of things that we truly know need to be done. One of the biggest things that I regret is not being there when I know I should have been. I had the chance to help. But I did not. Instead of helping I sat there and said nothing. I did nothing and here I am writing this essay with a guilty conscience that sometimes starts to eat at me. I honestly don’t know what to do to fix it. Someday I will have to realize that I did mess my only chance up. I have to realize that I decided against doing everything that I could have because I just wanted to be to myself and not with anyone else. I did not want to hug anybody or say hello to anyone. I did not want to check up on anyone. I definitely did not want to say things would be okay because I knew they wouldn’t be.

Reading this, you probably have no clue what I am talking about. I haven’t exactly said it yet because it is still kind of hard to process the events. It’s still hard talking about what happened because I wish it did not happen. I was in seventh grade and we had not been too far into the school year. I knew Uncle Bill was sick so I truly don’t understand why I was so shocked when we got the call. I had just got up to get ready for school and my mom told me something that I was not quite ready to hear. She had just gotten a call from Uncle Bill’s wife, Aunt Tiny. I probably don’t even have to say what happened at this point and I really don’t want to. I remember going in the bathroom and not believing what had exactly happened. I was confused and shocked and hurt. All I wanted to know was why this happened. I continued to get ready for school but I felt no emotions at all. It was as if all my senses had been taken away from me and I was left with a body that I had absolutely no control over.

I remember being in school later that day, and while I was having a conversation with my friends laughing, I blurted out that my uncle had died. My friend asked why I was laughing and okay, but I didn’t know why I was. A little later into the school day I got a message from my mom saying that she was coming to get me. Because it was so early in the day when I got my early dismissal, my teacher asked why I even bothered coming to school. I didn’t even bother to tell him about what had just happened. When my mom came to get me I found out that the reason she had left work so early was because her boss wanted her to “go home and take it easy” since she had been at work upset and crying. I didn’t exactly know how to comfort her because I didn’t know how to comfort myself. I then decided to just leave the situation alone hoping that my mom would eventually be in better spirits.

The hardest thing about writing this essay, is trying to write this essay as the person I was when I first received information of his death. I can no longer be that emotionless person especially because I still haven’t gotten over the death of Uncle Bill. I’m not sure if I ever will. I still find myself balled up in the corner crying on his birthday, August 24. I still cry on the day of his death, October 29 because I find myself replaying the events of that day in my head. Saturday, November 2, 2013 was the day of his funeral. I was not sure what to expect at the funeral. I was okay until we got to the funeral. The church was packed as I walked down the aisle next to my aunt, who was one of his many nieces. When we got to the casket I could not look at him. He was not the same person that I had always known. I began to cry and I don’t remember stopping until the end of the service. During the service everyone kept telling me that things were going to be okay because he was no longer suffering from the cancer that we thought he could handle. But I honestly don’t think that anybody understood how I looked at this.

I have probably been to about 100 funerals in my lifetime. Growing up my family was very active in church and I would always end up at any event that they had to attend. Since my grandparents were ushers, and I spent a lot of time with them, I would usually attend the funerals at church that they ushered. Sitting in the back of the church, I would see all the families crying but I never knew exactly why. Yes, I understood that they had just lost a loved one. But it seemed that going to all these services caused me to build a barrier to protect my feelings when I went to funerals. I would never cry at any of the services  including those of strangers and the family members I saw laying in the casket. In third grade I was even hysterical when my mom did not allow me to go to my cousin Aaron’s funeral. He was a teenager who had just been killed in Southwest. Something about these funerals engaged me and interested me. That wasn’t the case for Uncle Bill. For the first time I felt what those families had felt. Seeing someone that you can no longer hug or hold laying in a casket stiff and cold has to be one of the most devastating feelings ever.. You start to feel empty and cold inside because you don’t know what is next for you.

We knew Uncle Bill was sick but we didn’t know it would end like this or even end at all. Everyone was telling me that he was going to be okay and I believed them because what else could I do. For weeks we would go over his house and there would always be a people there either speaking the word (reading the bible), or bringing comfort food to his wife. Crowding around him, people would hold his hand and talk to him about past memories just to see him smile. I never did this though. Everytime we went over, I sat on the couch watching television, Sometimes I wouldn’t even go over and greet him and at that moment I wasn’t quite sure what was causing me to stray away from him. One of the days that we went to see him, I was sitting on the couch sneezing. As he lay on his deathbed, with little to no strength at all, he said “bless you”. This was the man that I grew up knowing and loving. Someone who was very protective and caring about his family especially the girls in his life.

Now that I look back at that year, I felt the most hurt from my grandfather, Uncle Bill’s brother. As a young teenager I was never really as concerned about how he felt in this situation until now. During the process he was always very quiet and to himself, which was unlike him because he was known for “talking someone’s ear off”. Whenever we went over Uncle Bill’s house, Pop Pop (my grandfather) would sit next to Uncle Bill’s hospice bed and hold his hand while he talked on and on about memories from their childhood up until now. One of my favorite stories was the story about how Pop Pop and their other brother, Uncle Walt, had pushed Uncle Bill down a hill in a little wagon which caused him to end up with a broken arm. Stories like that brought tears to my eyes because it made me realize how tight their bond was. That right there was an explanation of what would happen next.

Throughout this whole process, I tried as much as possible to stay to myself. I wasn’t aware that this would get me into trouble. One day, I came home and I did what I had been doing everyday, staying to myself. Things were pretty quiet in the house until Pop Pop approached me. Yelling at me, without yelling, he asked me why I wasn’t worried about Uncle Bill and why I never ask him how he was doing. I distanced myself because I never knew what was coming next. All I knew was that I had been told everything was going to be fine and somehow things were never okay. Those endless nights of me crying my eyes out never stopped because I still never found out how to deal with death.

This essay is especially hard for me to write because I am still dealing with how to deal with the death of a loved one. Since the death of Uncle Bill, I have not looked at death the same.  During 2017, I lost 3 people who I truly love. Uncle Jazzy, Aunt Jo, and Aunt Stelle lost the life that once graced their bodies. I regret every second that I passed up because I was being selfish and laying in my own bed of pain while I ignored theirs. It takes such a toll on me because I always feel like there is so much more that I could have done to help that person and to help myself. It is incredibly hard to deal with change that not only takes a toll on you, but also the people around you. I am supposed to be answering the question, “How does the self react to and deal with change?”. It’s simply hard to answer that question because I am still unsure about how to deal with change. I would explain how others deal with change but everyone around me deals with it differently. When things begin to change, it begins to disrupt the normal flow of how things go and as hard as it may be to say this, things will never go back to the way they were before the change happened. So I guess the best way to deal with things like this are to adapt although it might be one of the hardest tasks life throws at you.

When babies are first born, the grown ups there to raise them often already having an idea of what they will be. These expectations are based off of the parents talents and personalities as well as what the parents do. As a result, They are never given their own identity until the early ages of adulthood because they are told that they can not do necessarily everything that they want because they are still minors who are undecided of who they are or want to be. The same thing happens to a lot of minorities and for longer amounts of time because they are not raised the “ideal” way. It sucks to have to be seen as someone else because someone set an example before or because it happens that someone might be “judging a book by its cover”. Unfortunately, the situation is similar and common for Black males. In addition to family expectations, they face the limiting stereotypes presented to them outside of the home. This stereotype loop, perpetuated by the news media, causes them to be demonized by the rest of society.

The media in America infamously identifies and calls out Black men as if they are a strange species that no one can control. The reason that these ideas of Black men are even imaginable is because the government has allowed them to be, by believing the stereotype themselves. On television news, they are not usually seen as news anchors, or even commercial spokesmen, but criminals. Michael Myers from The Huffington Post called out one of the biggest news stations for their demonization of Black men.

One blatant example of the discrimination of Black men happens to be from tv show hosts who usually sit down and invite celebrity guests on their show to talk about problems and situations going on in the world. Bill O'Reilly has gone as far as blaming Black men for majority of the violence in America."The media will not spotlight that much of the violent crime in America is being committed by young black men. There is a violent sub-culture in the African-American community that should be exposed and confronted."  Having a platform as big as Fox News broadcast that type of language was appalling. Fox allowed him to shame Black men as a whole with no repercussions. Black men are hardly ever given the chances or opportunities to become something other than the stereotypes they are given. If the tables were to have been turned and a Black man blamed White men for most of crimes in America, they definitely would have been penalized and made to issue an apology to his peers. Other Fox Show host such as Tomi Lahren and Megyn Kelly has even ridiculed the Black Lives Matter movement by making fun of the senseless murders of innocent Black men by police and other “higher authorities.”  This movement was made to let people all over the country know that they valued Black Lives, and they were going to make sure that they could do as much as possible to prevent as many unlawful deaths as they could. The intentions of the group were never to make a certain group feel better than the other, but more of a motive to bring people together. By criticizing that moment and the injustice it seeks to address, the Fox host totally disregarded Black families who have lost their loved ones to police brutality.

Prevalent racial name-calling not only happens on national news channels, it also happens locally as well. The majority of the stories covered on the news are in a negative light rather than a positive one. So if the news station is in a predominantly Black area such as Philadelphia, people would see Black men plastered across the screen for supposedly committing numerous crimes. One blatant example of the discrimination of Black men happens to be from tv show hosts who usually sit down and invite celebrity guests on their show to talk about problems and situations going on in the world.

One significant difference is the way Black men are portrayed on the news for crimes versus how White men are portrayed. When a Black man’s face is plastered on the news for a crime, people will often see mugshots from previous arrests, pictures of them throwing up (what are called) “gang signs,and so called evidence from their social media accounts linking them to the crime. When a White man commits a crime and is less likely plastered across the television screen. you will see his graduation photos, family photos, and casual photos of him. America’s media uses these photos to show the world the image of scary Black men because they don’t want to see them as anything else but that.

Black men are categorized as these evil things and then told they do not qualify for certain positions and jobs when in reality the people broadcasting these stereotypes on the news are at fault. America’s news media institutionalizes the stereotype that Black men are demonized monsters. The media victimizes innocent people nationally, and seeing these negative images starts to make people think that Black men are really these evil beings. But Black men play so many roles:  fathers, husbands, sons, lawyers, doctors, teachers, psychiatrist, humans. By not seeing them in their true positions, you are allowing them to fall true to their stereotypes and not be the best person that they can be.

Soy Lauryn Lewis y me crié en ¨Uptown¨. He vivido aquí la mayor parte de mi vida. Esta comunidad me ha enseñado muchas cosas. He ganado una familia así como aprendido que no llamar a la familia. Mi barrio ha sido parte de la familia desde hace más de 50 años. Ha sido seguro y peligroso vivir en mi comunidad. Usted no sabrá las luchas de vivir aquí hasta que usted viva aquí usted mismo. Recomiendo que la gente se quede en mi comunidad porque será una gran lección. Si usted quiere visitar mi comunidad está en la parte del noroeste de philadelphia.

Yo pintaría mi mural en la calle de mi casa. Por la calle de mi casa hay un centro de recreación. Este es un buen lugar porque mucha gente lo verá. Animará a la gente de mi comunidad a hacer mejor. Elevará el estado de ánimo triste de algunas personas. Puede inspirar a otras personas a hacer sus propias formas de arte. Ojalá pudiera ser visto por alguien que podría darlo a conocer a nivel nacional. Quiero que este mural impacte el mundo entero y se destaque. En este lugar creo que puede alcanzar tanta importancia y honor.

Los diferentes elementos de mi proyecto serían las diferentes formas de arte. Mostrarían lo que los diferentes tipos de arte y Filadelfia. Actuación y la música es una gran parte de la técnica y Filadelfia. El tema está apoyando el arte, Filadelfia y ayudar a mostrar el apoyo a los muchos artistas. Estoy tratando de comunicar la importancia de hacer las cosas positivas. Tantas personas quedan atrapados en las calles y empezar a hacer cosas malas porque no tienen nada que ver. Esta es la voluntad de ayudar a la gente de la calle y hacen más seguro Filadelfia.

Mi obra de arte muestra una buena idea. Muestra un buen ejemplo de comunidad y trabajo duro. Estoy orgulloso del diseño porque muestra la creatividad del teatro. La razón detrás de ningunos colores es que la comunidad del ht puede llenarlos adentro en sus los propios. Les dará la oportunidad de participar en el proyecto por su cuenta.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cWogj19OGbS-sxwPTRLCV2UdZoijRHJYfEEIsMtpm7k/edit?usp=sharing

-Lauryn Lewis

Digital Nations

1. The show was about the how children are online and unsupervised too much. It also touched bases on what kids are hiding from their parents online.

2. The most memorable moment was when the group of girls realized how petty the fight they got into was over something that happened online.

3. It is important so that children and adults will know what they are getting into in case something bad might happen to them.

4. I will keep my future family safe by warning them about situations like these and monitoring their internet time.

5. It is important to talk about these things with your family so you will not have to hide anything and they can help you if you get into some kind of trouble.

6. If you do not know how to keep your kids safe at least have a talk with them about what can happen and what is already happening.

Soy Lauryn

A veces me encanta escuchar música

           divertida y simpática

              No soy ni baja

                 ni aburrida

                   yo soy!

                  YO!!!!!!!

Hello everybody, my name is Lauryn Lewis and today I will be presenting my me magazine via slide. As you can see I have a love for my family and writing that is so profound you can not even describe it. Without my family and being able to express my life through writing I would not be as nice of a person as I am today. They have given me life, and a good one at that.