On The Reservation

Reservations are known to be a region of land given to Native Americans. Land that is not desirable by anyone. The land is not good for farming or even to live on. Resources like oil were found on some of these reservations, however, Native Americans could not get to them due to the lack of technology.
Indian culture has affected the way others treat them. Heritage is something many Indians are proud of but many others neglect it. It affects the ability to fit in to modern society.
The stereotypical Native American is known to be lazy, a drunk, and a bad temper. Both Natives and outsiders view the reservation as if it were a separate state. Separate state meaning as if there was a border line to cross.
The reservation as described in the movie, Smoke Signals is home to many Indians but still holds a small population of people. Technology in the reservations is also not as modern as the rest of the U.S. People do view Indians as less educated and with a stereotypes of them being mean or as strangers. In the book Montana 1948 it shows clear evidence of how they were mistreated back then. People viewed their ridiculous ways as a sort of demonic worship.
Native Americans are the real owners of the Americas and they should have been given fair amounts of the land and instead helped to make sure their old ways remain.
Just as all races have their stereotypes Native Americans have some too. Today, however, stereotypes are used more for jokes rather than racism. I believe stereotypes should only be used among friends or kept to oneself.

Propaganda in 2011: Teachers' assign Project About Teachers' Salaries

A school assignment at Penn Valley Elementary School Pennsbury School District asks to write about teachers' salaries. School Board Director Simon Campbell totally disagrees with this situation. This 5th grade assignment is written in form of a letter titled, "It's time to pay the price." It shows statistics about their salaries and states that "we" don not pay teachers enough. Many will agree, however why are teachers bringing this up with kids? This is just between the Board and the teachers. Some parents are really worked up about this. Others say its does not bother them. The school used the excuse that this assignment had come from an old booklet. That is why some parents are okay with it.
I think that this assignment is totally inappropriate especially for a group of 5th graders. Yes it is true that they are less unaware about these things, but teachers should at least encourage students to want to become teachers because that is what we will need in the future. Why let them be aware of the fact that teachers are not payed enough? This is I think more of a college research project of some sort. This kind of propaganda makes me think of how many people use others with the power they have to take advantage of them to make themselves rise. How does that assignment help the kids?
The average Pennsbury teacher currently makes more than $81,000 a year.
Check it out!!http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/local&id=7955295

Response to Beat Street

Beat Street is a movie about Art and Music. Music as in dancing it and making it. I personally like the movie because of all the awesome moves and some funny things that happen in the movie. There is also sad parts and weird parts. Movies with a little bit of everything are more interesting. Even if the action is so unreal. You have to admit that part where they chase Spit was hilarious, like a messed up slow motion chase.
This movie made me think of how much technology has advanced but how we have very similar ideas from back then. It also portrays what the average teen use to do. Some of them poor, but they still have the same likes as the rest. The movie seems to try to show some racism. Dancing and fighting are not the same thing. :)
Beat Street made me realize how important family is and to lead my friends into nothing, but good. The people in this movie tried to make themselves better in many ways some of them have done bad or dumb things, but they do their best make it better. I liked the fact that this movie is not over and it already feels like it accomplished something. Anyways this is a movie I would recommend especially to those not into music, dancing, etc..

Hungry For Attention!

Richard is a young black boy that has a family which is never in peace. The family always has a new problem to deal with. The house setting on fire, Richard's dad abandoning them, the rent, food, etc. Richard causes lots of trouble due to many different reasons. He feels as if the world revolved around him, yet no one pays attention to him. He does many things to pay attention, but he does them without thinking.
He sets the house on fire out of curiosity, but he already knows if one thing burns it is useless. He killed the cat because he was ordered to do it, even though he knew his father meant to just shut the cat up. He started to drink because he thought he liked it, but he really liked all the attention the people were giving him. Running away and writing those words on the windows are also examples. He comes up with different ways to receive attention. However, when he is given lots of attention he has this way of freezing up not knowing what to do like at the police officer and Miss Simons.
He has some reason for the things he does, but he does most of these out of hunger for attention. He is sometimes hungry for food or hungry for fighting, but these just help his figurative hunger.

Resonse to "On Being A Mexican American"

Joe I. Mendoza is a Mexican American and he feels as if he has drifted away from his Mexican Culture since he started living among more European American people. He was not just removed from his culture, but he was forced to do it in order to try to become someone in life. He mentions lots of stories of how he used to be part of a group of Mexicans and how he had to move and change his ways. He also mentions one of the most segregated things I have hear, where as there was an actual line on the ground that he could not cross. Then he realized he was treated differently, but did not seem to bother him much.
He seemed to be very close to his grandmother and he tells us a story of him standing up for himself because of what he thought he was forced to do was unfair. He stood up to his grandmother and he was not able to win the arguments even if it meant running away. He was "beaten" by his grandma for not wanting to do the work. He had decided that he needed to do that in order to be a man.
He was involved in many other things in his life that made him change like the Army and going to school was the biggest part. He omce went back to a get together and when he tried to shake hands with an old friend he was not able to get the hand shake right. Usually that hand shake was natural but to him it was no more. I guess he had forgotten the small things that helped him in being a Mexican and was more of an American after.

King Still King?

Martin Luther King Jr. was a great man with an intelligence that far exceeded others. He knew exactly what moves to do that were always legal. The laws said things about what colored people could not do, but even the greatest American leaders throughout time have said it themselves; All men are equal.
King is still King today because he is alive in lots of colored people and without him many of them would have been to afraid to do anything. Obama shows us a great accomplishment of what MLK did in order to change the ways of the government. In less than three centuries slavery was abolished and in less than one century was a colored man elected as leader of the white men.
MLK is here because we still remind of ourselves us his birthday, his death, his great movements, and he is a very big part of African American History Month. I am no only thankful for him making us have one less day of school, but that I am allowed to be at school with colored people.
There is no difference between people just because of the way they look. All humans go through similar things in life(in America). MLK made a difference that is as big as anything any other person in America has ever done.

Response to "The Sacred Soil" by Chief Seattle

In this narrative the author is telling how he feels about the White Men and his people. He also mentions plenty about God and that our God hates and does not protect his people. I guess it is because all these bad things that have happened to his people throughout history and because they are treated differently among us.
Seattle says that our beliefs and what we do in life about death and of those dead is wrong. That we forget our ancestry and that we do not prepare for the transition of worlds. In our lives we do lots of bad and offending things that would not allow us to change worlds. I think he is for the most part right, but he seems to put all of us as one, but we are not all bad.
God is loving and loves all, but he does not seem to believe that. Seattle also makes a big deal of the Big Chief of Washington, pretty sure it is the president, and how he controls us and them by putting them in a reservation. His tribes are much less than before and for that reason he thinks that God and the Big Chief of Washington do not care of his people because we are more.
Seattle speaks of Death as if it did not exist. He says that there is just a change in worlds and that his people respect and remember their past more than us(true). He also mentions that the dead are not powerless and I agree with him because one's life can cause great change after he is dead. I thought Seattle was an interesting author and he seems to know what he is talking about when he speaks of afterlife and death, but he is wrong about God and all Americans.