HW 25- Its crazy how much you learn

Foreword:

In the book, “Baghdad Burning”, by Riverbend, Ahdaf Soueif discusses the impact of the war on a “young Baghdadi woman as she lives through the war.” (Soueif vii) He goes over how Riverbend actually felt moments of pity towards the troops at one point, how ‘she saw them suffering under the Iraqi sun.” (Soueif viii) Riverebnd is not anit-american and this actually angers her when she hears that terminology. She believes in anti-bush or anti-war, but she supports America.

Introduction:

Riverbend is a young girl from Baghdad. She is in her mid twenties and lives in a middle class section of town with her mother, father, and brother, “E”. Before the war she had a job working with computers. She writes in her blog about her life in war. She does not discuss any of the typical ‘war events’ but more on the side of what is it life to live in war. Ridgeway states, “She sits on the roof to watch Baghdad burning and have learned to identify different types of automatic weapons by the sound of their volleys.” (Ridgeway xii) It talks about how Riverbend has to jump up in the middle of the night when she hears the electricity come on so they can try to get a load of laundry done. The Introduction then goes into background information about the country itself. The most interesting part was the more recent news in the sections titled “The 2003 War” and “Liberated Iraq”. “The 2003 War” discusses more about how the United States received false information about nuclear weapons in Iraq and how that is the supposable reason for invasion even though later found information states that Bush earlier in his term said he wanted to invade Iraq. In “Liberated Iraq” it talks more about how “the United States viewed the Shia as allies of the Ayatollah Khomeini and as part of an expanding mob of extremists determined to turn the entire region into some sort of unspeakable medieval theocracy. But the Shia are now monolithic by any means.” (Ridgeway xxii)

From what discussed so far in the book, the only part I can relate to is the information about the United States. I have always thought that the invasion in Iraq was in retaliation to 9/11 and a war on terrorism. I have never really been taught anything different therefore never took the time to look at the other side of the story. It is really interesting to read Riverbend’s perspective on the war and is making me think all the information I am missing out on.

HW 23- With apologies to Virginia Woolf

Different shades and reds, oranges, and yellows are all I see. Leaves are turning color, on a beautiful autumn day. The wind blowing and the cool air is flowing through me. Sitting here thinking about what I read earlier today. The frustration I felt took over me, while looking back at the articles. Everything I read earlier was gossip. Looking over the blog Jezebel, I really found all the women degrading to themselves. Celebrities do certain things fro attention and prove themselves to be dumb. We as women need to stand together and prove to the world that we are just as much equal to men. When I was told to that I was not able to walk on the grass, it frustrated me so much. Why would women act so ignorant? Why do women bring themselves down in the media? One article talked about how Paris Hilton was dressing lately. Why do we care about that? News in the media should be informative information and what we have been reading lately is not informative. They only thing it is, is a disgrace.

HW 22- Why are men so much better?

The definition of patriarchy is as follows: A society in which fathers are the powerful reasonable heads of their families and households, and by extension, a society in which men hold a disproportionately large share of power. This term is very common in Virginia Wolf’s, “A Room of One’s Own”. On page 33 in chapter 2 it says, “The most transient visitor to this planet, I thought, who picked up this paper could not fail to be aware, even from this scattered testimony that England is under the rule of a patriarchy.” (Woolf) This quote basically explains how today society is as a majority run by men. There has never been a women president or vice president here. Today women’s roles in the higher power systems are becoming more common but are still lacking shared control. Looking over news papers it is very apparent that ‘men rule the world’. Mostly all stories are written by and about men. Women are continually being overpowered and shut off from high power positions and the news paper is one of the best examples to prove this.

HW 21- Letter to Jeff

Hey Jeff!!!

I’m glad you’re coming to me for help! This is some improvement. I defiantly agree with you that this book is hard to understand. I had to read it a few times myself to fully get the importance of chapter one. The weird thing about this chapter was that the narrator isn’t Virginia Woolf. The narrator said that it’s not important who is writing this. However, Chapter one basically explains how she was asked to write and speak about women and fiction. She basically sits on the side of a river bank most of the chapter thinking about women in history. She talks about how one time when she was in college she was walking on the grass one day and a man came up to her and told her that she wasn’t allowed to walk on it. She also refers to another story when women were not allowed to be in a library alone. She said that they had to be “accompanied by a Fellow of the College or furnished with a letter of introduction.” The overall point of this chapter was to discuss how women’s role in history has changed and evolved over the years and how when asked to write about influential women she was confused about what to write about. That was pretty much what I got out of that chapter, but good luck! As your English teacher if you need any more help.

Much Love,

Leanne

HW 19- Is it really a huge influence?

After reading the chapter, "Web of Influence", I was caught on edge after reading the paragraph starting on page 92 ending on top of page 93. this paragraph explains how blogging can change countries. But what change? I was really confused on this paragraph and thats why it caught me on edge. My point is, I didn't understand where it was coming from. How can a blog change another country? Especially if not your own? It discusses publishing abuses but what abuses? What are they talking about? It also says that blogging can change "transitional networks", what? To put in another way, how can a little post on a web page change a country? In conclusion, I understand that blogging is becoming more and more popular as the days go by, but globally changing in the government? I don't think so.

HW 17B- I Vote DailyKos

After reading both blogs and looking over the web pages, for me, DailyKos would be more likely to influence the way I would vote in this upcoming election. I found Wonkette to be kind of annoying. I think that the way that they approached some topics wasn’t as interesting as the other one. DailyKos really brings out the truth in a lot of cases throughout political figures. Some say that it can be just gossip, but I think knowing who people really are in their personal life is a big factor on how they will withhold their position. I don’t really care about the jokes that someone makes, I would more care about how they present themselves all around. When DailyKos talked about a woman posting about her personal life anonymously and then being discovered, I find that more intriguing than how someone says they will handle certain situations. It is easier to judge someone one what they have already done in their life, than what they will promise for the future.

HW 18- WHAT!!!!!

Looking over blogs that I am watching, I got really upset. I decided to look over the democratic blog that I have been tracking and a specific woman popped out to me. Her name is Ann Coulter. She titles her post, “‘Personal Fantasy’ To Take Away Women’s Right To Vote”. WHAT!!!!! Coulter is a Republican columnist that I absolutely disagree with. What kind of woman would ever think that? I’m so confused by this statement that I really do not even know what to say. I mean, this is a republican woman more on the conservative side apparently, that does not think women should vote. I don’t understand why a woman would think that, ever. It is so degrading of her to think that. Women have come up in society throughout history and this was one of our major accomplishments. Women in history worked so hard for this and it should never be taken away. I mean, does she think that men are better than her? This women is a disgrace to the female race.

HW 16- Five Pillars

Scoble had his own way of describing the reasons why blogging is so ‘hot’. He liked to call them the Five Pillars. If you do not understand what they are, here is a further explanation of each.

Ease of Publishing- Blogging is a really simple way of keeping an online journal, communicating with others, and posting information for others to view. It does not cost money and it is user friendly. If you were to try to publish things or keep a journal in some other form it may be more difficult to accomplish. I went right to blogger.com and registered and I was able to blog within a few minutes. I do not consider myself a computer person either and it was really simple for me to figure out.

Discoverability- Blogs are very simple to discover. You can search topics in which you want to view. You are also able to attach different websites to your blog and are able to watch different sites. Writers are able to use indication words about their blog in order for it to be more assessable to others also. I am currently watching a democratic page and I can just click on a link that I have on my bloglines page. Very simple.


Cross-site Conversations- This is the ability to see who is viewing your blog as well as what they have viewed. It is helpful to see how many people have looked at what you have to say. I would love to see how many people have looked at my blog.

Permalinking- Permalinking is the ability to save links in which you view. This way it makes it easier to look at things you like to read a lot. It saves time being able to go directly to the page rather than going to a site and having to search through all the work trying to find what you wanted to read. People can just get the link to an article they like to read and view the comments on rather than searching though all the blogs the writer has done.

Syndication- This is the ability to be able to look at anyone’s blog and able to write or comment on them without giving out information. It was is way to keep information personal yet able to reach out and communicate with others at the same time.

HW 14- Joi Ito

Joi Ito is a very inspirational man. Besides the fact that 125,000 others agree with me, his work discuses a lot of topics covering several different areas of interest. Ito is also involved in several other organizations. Ito is the leading player in the internet industry. Although, he is heavily involved in the blogging world, he is the founder of the venture capital firm, Neoteny. As well as Neoteny, Ito helped create Infoseek, which is the second largest internet search site after Yahoo. In fact, he helped create PSINet Japan, the first commercial ISP. Ito’s opinion on blogging has helped to create his place in history. In fact, he also states that in the next ten years, the internet is going to be like what cable television is to us, old. In conclusion, Joi Ito is very well accomplished man and is going to continue to influence the technology field as much as he already has.

HW 13- Business or Communication?

After reading, “Blogs Will Change Your Business”, by Stephen Baker and Heather Green, I think that blogging has more of an impact on communication because it literally is another way of communicated with others. I agree with its larger influence being on communications over business due to the fact that businesses have been run for so long without blogging. These businesses have been running smoothly and successfully so why add another possible downfall. There have been issues with business already regarding blogging. One incident was when an employee was talking trash about a company through a blog and it caused him to be fired. Why risk blogging through business when it could just cause more troubles? Blogging as a form of communication however is a new good thing. They are already so many ways of communicating why not add another. It is a easier way of spreading mass media. Blogging at first was geared toward teenagers but now I feel that it is incorporating more age groups. At first glance, teenagers might say that blogging is just for them, but on closer inspection, all ages are using blogging as an easier form of communication.

HW 9: Waldman

After reading, “A Blog of One’s Own”, I chose to write about Ayelet Waldman. I found Waldman a very intriguing woman. The interview she had, discussed how blogging has impacted her life. As you can tell from the title of the chapter, it was an enormous one. Waldman had many psychological issues and her blog was an easy and convenient place for her to talk about issues that affects her life. Although I disagree with her passions about blogging, I do feel that blogging helped her get her life back together. It had a huge impact on who she was as a writer, wife, and mother. She believes that blogging is a place where you can meet others and discuss certain topics. She mentions how there are parenting blogs where mothers can discuss issues they are facing so they do not feel alone. She stopped her obsessive blogging after she got help and I agree with that completely. All the blogging that she was doing interrupted her lifestyle. Imagine how her children would have felt if they read about her mother wanting to commit suicide. She also mentioned how blogging was bad for a writer because they are getting all their ideas that usually influence their writing out of their head so they don’t think of it for book ideas. I agree that blogging is a positive influence in Waldman’s life, but a point that needs emphasizing is that most people believe it is a new form of overall communication and it has not gotten to that level yet.

HW 5B- Will blogging really take over?

“Today, once again, we confront the possibility that a new communications and publishing technology-in this case blogging-will engender massive change in our society, most especially in the role and power of the traditional mainstream media. But in trying to assess the likely shape and scope of those changes, we would do well to remember that tomorrow’s possibilities are always forged upon the anvil of today’s social and economic realities. Change, in other words, comes to the world on the world’s terms, constrained by the limits of our political economy and human nature” In the chapter, “I Blog Therefore I Am”, Kline discusses how the world of blogging will take over the world of mainstream media. He seems to think that blogging is a new and improved way of communication. I do not deny that blogging is getting more and more popular as time goes by, but I don’t that it will ever be so popular, that it will take over mainstream media. Kline in some ways believes blogging to be the new and best thing to come to earth. However, never have even heard of blogging until I entered this class, I really question how that could be. He tends to think that blogging is “a new communication”. How is that? I do believe that it literally is a new form of communication but not THE NEW form. I truly reject is ideas of it taking over and becoming ever so popular.