Author: lewczak.1

Text Review Assignment- Sam Lewczak

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The book that I will be reviewing is The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult. The Storyteller takes place somewhat in the present, with a glimpse into the past throughout the novel. It starts with a sad beginning, people attending grief counseling due to people that they have lost in their lives. The main character of the story, Sage, is attending these classes due to the death of her parents, which she believes is her fault due to the car accident that they were in. She meets an elderly man there, but he does not announce or discuss his grief at the meetings they attend together. They form an unlikely friendship, which causes Josef, the old man, to reveal his past to her and why he goes to the grief meetings. (Spoiler Alert!) He revealed to her that he is a former Nazi soldier and that he deserves to die.

The story continues to discuss the idea of injustice, which is something that we discussed in class. Whether systematic or personal injustices, something that we have mentioned in class throughout the semester is the idea of one’s personal rights being stripped away from them or not given to them in the first place. Injustice carries itself in many forms throughout this novel, especially when Josef reveals his wrongdoings he committed to the innocent people he came in contact with. He explains to Sage different experiences he had while serving as a Nazi soldier, the people he remembered killing, the different commands he was ordered to follow, as well as why he chose to join in the first place. Sage tries to be understanding of his story, considering it happened a long time before they met and that he became a beloved man in the community he moved to afterwards. But, what ties Sage up in the story is not the story itself, but the similarities it has to what little she knew about her grandmothers’ experience as a Jew in the concentration camps. She persuades her grandmother to tell her side of the story, which allows a new set of injustice of harboring the grief and sadness of living through something like this. This story allows readers to focus on not repeating the past and remembering what you can do to people with the injustices and violence you partake in. It also shows how much being different than someone else can cause so much hate for no reason. This is similar to multiple stories that we read in class, the idea of being the “other”, the idea of being the lower group or a government having complete power, as well as your culture heritage not being respected and trying to be diminished. I think this is a great example of our classwork and a great read.

 

Yo, Is This Racist? – Brandon Chong, Aleksander Kostin, & Sam Lewczak

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Yo, Is This Racist?  The Inequality of Public Schools Throughout the United States

Sam : Public Schools are the way to achieve overall education for people in the United States. Parents send their children to school, with the mindset that they are going to get the knowledge and resources they need in order to achieve greatness and excel in academics as well as physical activity and socialization. But, what happens if there are systemic injustices placed within the school system which allows certain children to excel based on their race, while others fall behind? This, unfortunately, is a common occurrence in schooling systems. According to an article written by the American Psychological Association, a study that was done by Indiana University reported these types of inequalities. They mentioned that “black students were 54 percent less likely than white students to be recommended for gifted-education programs, after adjusting for factors such as students’ standardized test scores. But black students were three times more likely to be referred for the programs if their teacher was black rather than white,” (Weir). This means that black students who may use gifted programs to excel or even to receive scholarships for college are not given their fair opportunity to meet these goals. This can mean that black students may have to work twice as hard in order to get into a school filled with opportunity to flourish. Then, once they get in, they have a whole new set of injustices to face. What happens when this goes further than test scores and college apps? What happens when safety and the ability to walk freely on your college campus is threatened?  Ohio State is familiar with this and is trying to battle these injustices.

Alex: On September 2nd, Ohio State faculty and staff were notified about a Public Safety Notice classified as a “hate crime” and “aggravated assault”.  There were a few reported incidents of a black male and female screaming racial slurs out of their car and then proceeding to fight the victims. The two suspects were then arrested a few days later and charged with felonious assault and assault. This incident has raised many discussions amongst the community, many questioning the treatment of the black student body compared to the white, while others defended the decisions made and fueling more debate. 

When I had first read the safety notice, I had to re-read it a couple of times to understand what was going on. At first, I thought it was a hate crime against black students, possibly due to that being the typical case in the United States. Regardless of what people’s opinions and beliefs are, I believe the assault and hate crimes were wrong no matter who the person was. However, it is hard to see it as a one-way incident. Logically for me, there must be more to the situation than what was described in the very small Safety Notice. People do not typically assault others or say things without provocation, and I wonder what words were exchanged in the incident to lead the suspects to their actions. 

The black student body has countlessly expressed their feelings of unsafety and frustration with the university’s mistreatment of them. This incident was reported, and the suspects were charged with felonies for them. While many black students may experience the same type of treatment on a regular basis but not much has been said or done about it. To add to this, on October 11th Ohio State University student, Chase Meola, was shot and killed outside of the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity house. The suspect, Kinte Mitchell Jr., was reported to have a history of crime and violence. This incident only further fueled students’ concerns on campus, both black and white. In response to the death, Ohio State University decided to establish the University Task Force on Community Safety and Well-Being. This task force aims to review safety related issues on campus and neighborhoods around. Additionally, they will look into other ways to address crime and violence. This task force will rely not just on itself, but the whole campus community and those around it to find solutions. This is a great start by the University for addressing such issues and taking action against them. It is unfortunate that it took all this time and outcry from the student population for action to be taken. However, this is a step in the right direction by the University to protect its students. The question that still remains is: do certain students on campus receive more protection than others?

Brandon: When looking at the inequalities within the public school system of the United States, the injustices go further than racism in the classroom and the way that racially charged crimes are handled. We mentioned both of these above  but have also found that the systemic injustice that leads to these is partially in place because of the way that public school  funding is  processed and spread. According to a Washington post report in 2019, it was found that even though there were roughly the same amount of students, “overwhelmingly white school districts received $23 billion more than predominantly nonwhite school districts in state and local funding”. In order to better understand this statistic, it is important to note that the funding for these public schools is based upon the reliance of property taxes in the area, meaning that higher property taxes/nicer housing will lead to more funding for a school district. Another study that I found to be extremely eye opening for this discussion was a study posted in Educational Learning about the average amount of money spent on an individual student per state. It is important to note that this study was done in 2000, so the dollar amounts have probably changed but the gap of the amount of money hasn’t. This study found that the average amount of money spent on an individual student ranged from $8,801 to $3,804 over the fifty states. 

Based on these reports, there is an obvious injustice to the way that these schools are funded. The fact that two children, living just miles apart can have such obvious differences in the way the school/classrooms look, the quality of the teachers and even the material they learn, is appalling. To say that the United States prides itself on the education of our students is obviously mistaken. It should say that the United States prides itself on the education of white students. For there to be equal funding for all students and districts of the United States, changes must be made. Whether these changes mean making school funding a federal issue or not relying on the property taxes of the district there must be an effort to close the funding gap of students around the country. 

Sam: Overall, something needs to be said about public school systems. There have been many reforms addressed to the economy, the criminal justice system, immigration, but when it comes to education, people turn a blind eye. Students should not be forced to pick and choose a school based solely on their safety level and parents should not go to bed at night worried that their child is not receiving the same quality of education as their peers of a different race. 

 


Works Cited:

Ascd, ASCD. “A Research Synthesis / Unequal School Funding in the United States.” Unequal School Funding in the United States – Educational Leadership, www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/may02/vol59/num08/Unequal-School-Funding-in-the-United-States.aspx.

Meckler, Laura. “Report Finds $23 Billion Racial Funding Gap for Schools.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 27 Feb. 2019, www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/report-finds-23-billion-racial-funding-gap-for-schools/2019/02/25/d562b704-3915-11e9-a06c-3ec8ed509d15_story.html.

The Ohio State University, OSU. Ohio State Establishes University Task Force on Community Safety and Well-Being, The Ohio State University, 15 Oct. 2020, news.osu.edu/ohio-state-establishes-university-task-force-on-community-safety-and-well-being/.

Smola, Jennifer. “Ohio State Creates Safety Task Force after Shooting Death of Student.” The Columbus Dispatch, The Columbus Dispatch, 15 Oct. 2020, www.dispatch.com/story/news/education/2020/10/15/ohio-state-creates-safety-task-force-after-students-shooting-death/3663811001/.

Weir, Kirsten. Inequality at School. Nov. 2016, www.apa.org/monitor/2016/11/cover-inequality-school.

White, André. “’Together as Buckeyes?’ Ohio State’s Black Community Responds to Public Safety Notice, Emails.” The Lantern, 9 Sept. 2020, www.thelantern.com/2020/09/together-as-buckeyes-ohio-states-black-community-responds-to-public-safety-notice-emails/.

 

 

Diary of Systematic Injustices- Sam Lewczak

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I recently found out about such thing as a pink tax. A pink tax is a tax that is on something because it is a women’s service. This would mean something that would be a service or an item for both men and women would be taxed higher if it is for a woman, even if it is the same thing. For example, a haircut. Men and women all have various different lengths of hair, with different textures and styles. But, for the same style of hair and length, a woman could be charged with a higher tax just for being a woman. In NYC, Governor Cuomo recently banned the “pink tax” and claimed that anyone who does not provide services at an equal tax amount could be subject to civil penalties. With that, he even included in the 2021 budget for New York, demanding that it be given the same importance as other things related to the state’s spending. This shows the amount of injustice that has been in place for women. New York, being one of the few states that has implemented the ban of this tax, is taking a step for creating equality for the simplest things for men and women. This story is important to me because not only does it show that systematic injustice for women continues to happen in businesses, but also shows that women are not actively looking for just big steps of equality like voting, wages, and healthcare, but also looking for more simpler requests like just being charged the fair and same amount. A step towards moving away from this injustice is actively requesting that the states in which other people live (like my home state of New Jersey) work towards banning this tax locally as well as federally. Along with that, working towards making services in general cheaper for women if the tax is going to continue to be implemented so that at least it all equals out somewhere. It is also important to educate both other women and men about this tax so that they can see where women’s money really goes to. It is guessed that a woman spends around $1300 just in the taxes for things geared towards women instead of men or gender neutral. It also shows that when society claims that women “waste their money” or spend it all on things like clothing, makeup, shopping, and their hair, it could just be their taxes!

^ This was my original post. After doing more research on the pink tax, I found that this is not just adult women services, but also children’s toys that are geared towards girls versus boys as well. Anything that is in the color pink versus the color blue can be priced higher because it is geared toward women. For example, the Joint Economic Committee used a document in 2016 to show the differences between men and women’s items and their prices. Attached below is an image of computer mouses. This just shows you how the same mouse can be priced differently if it is blue or pink. Many products in general are priced higher for women than men, but personal care products are the highest. Because women get their periods or need personal care products more frequently, I would assume this is the reason why companies believe they can price it higher and make more money. Attached is a graph showing the different prices of certain items that are priced differently.

But, in terms of our class, this injustice can relate to the idea of “subaltern”. “Subaltern” refers to the idea of being an other group, where you are not given the same rights or treated the same way as the superior group in reference. Women are considered the “Subaltern” of the United States, a country in which they work, pay taxes, vote, and have a majority of the same rights as males. But, in terms of consumer goods and services, they are still considered to be the other or inferior group. It is proven that women’s services are priced higher than men, and while some states are working on banning the tax, this is still a prominent issue that needs to be addressed.

 

 

https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/8a42df04-8b6d-4949-b20b-6f40a326db9e/the-pink-tax—how-gender-based-pricing-hurts-women-s-buying-power.pdf

Context Research Presentation – Sam Lewczak

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Hello everyone! This week’s upcoming reading is “Jameson’s Rhetoric of Otherness and the ‘National Allegory’” by Aijaz Ahmad. This piece is included in Ahmad’s book, In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures, which was written in 1992. Ahmad discusses American literary critic Frederic Jameson’s ideas throughout this piece. I will be comparing Ahmad’s ideals of the piece with a somewhat ongoing and current topic, the Nigerian-Biafra war, also known as the Nigerian Civil War.

The Nigerian Civil War began in 1967 and lasted three years. After Nigeria gained independence from the British, Muslim Hausas began massacring Christian Igbos in Northern Nigeria. Many Igbos fled to different regions of the country, but felt that their lives were still at risk. Lieutenant Colonel Odumegwu Ojukwu and other people who other people who feared for their lives established the Republic of Biafra and created a military force in order to fight the Nigerian government because they would not recognize Biafra as an independent state. In the beginning of the war, Biafra had a fighting chance, but in 1970, Biafra had to surrender to the Nigerian government. Many women and children died during this war, as well as the soldiers who fought, because of lack of resources and malnourishment. It has been 50 years since this war, and there is still a movement to separate Biafra. People who live in Nigeria still remember the heartache that the war caused to the Biafra people and have a ceremony to recognize the lives lost. Survivors of the war feel as though Biafra should still become independent, especially with the Nigerian government refusing to acknowledge the suffering the Biafra (and Nigerian) people went through during this civil war. Overall, Nigeria as a whole is in a state of political unrest. There are religious, political, and ethical tensions circulating in Nigeria, not including what the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) are fighting for. The people who are in support of Biafra feel as though the Nigerian government is purposely shutting their protests down or ignoring their calls to action.

This what Nigeria looks like with Biafra separated.

The conflict of Nigeria brings to mind Ahmad’s discussion of Jameson. Ahmad talks about how Jameson discusses the sense of the “third world” and how the comparison of third world literature would not even be possible without first world literature. Ahmad recalls that Jameson believes that third world literature does not have the same nationalism as first-world literature does. Ahmad mentions that what Jameson does not see is that the idea of colonialism and imperialism affects these so called “third world” countries and creates an environment where being a nationalist for your country may be difficult because the people who are in charge are not really “your people”. I see this on page 14, when Ahmad writes, “Likewise, Jameson insists over and over again that the national experience is central to the cognitive formation of the third-world intellectual and that the narrativity of that experiences takes the form exclusively of a ‘national allegory…’” (Ahmad 14). The pieces that third-world individuals write do not have the same nationalistic views due to the country they are in.

This is what Nigeria looks like today.

 

I believe this relates to the Nigerian Civil war because the Nigerian government feels as though the people of Biafra have a sense of disgrace for their country, and people try to stand up for the independent state through social media, literature, and images. The Nigerian government has yet to speak in public to recognize the war at all, whether they make a positive or negative statement. But, according to the supporters that want to separate the regions, they believe not saying anything is making it known that that the government has no desire to listen to their people or create a better unity in their country.

This is an image of Nigerian soldiers during the war.

Next, Aijaz Ahmad mentions that he despises the idea that Jameson keeps discussing third world vs. second and first world. He does not believe in the Three World Theory and he believes that it is a way to put certain regions such as the United States or European countries at a higher stance than the countries he was discussing, such as those from Asia. He says this multiple times throughout the piece, but the statement that stands out the most reads, “Ideologically, this classification divides the world between those who make history and those who are mere objects of it, elsewhere in the text, Jameson would significantly re-invoke Hegel’s famous description of the master/slave relation to encapsulate the first/third world opposition…” (Ahmad 7). This stands out, one, because the first assignment was this exact piece, but also because Ahmad is specifically saying that those who live in third-world countries are oppressed and continue to not be taken as seriously as countries in the Eastern regions due to the Third World Theory.

This is an image of protestors in support of separating Biafra.

Similarly, the people of Biafra are consistently marginalized by the Nigerian government. The Biafra people and groups such as the Indigenous People for Biafra (IPOB) continue to call for action and the government pretends they are not saying anything. There are peaceful protests in the streets and they plead for the government to at least recognize that the war occurred, yet the government will not. Their people, whether they were part of Nigeria or Biafra during the war, all suffered and many lives were loss. While the United States has civil war ceremonies (no matter which side), Nigeria continues to pretend it never happened. By doing this, they are putting their own people in the third-world idea and keeping the elite government officials as first-world individuals.

This is another image of protestors, specifically highlighting the Biafra flag. It is very different than the Nigerian flag, but it does pay homage to the soil that both nations are part of.

Additionally, Ahmad thinks it is interesting for Jameson to have such a big opinion on this topic, considering he is not a “third-world” author. Ahmad seems to somewhat allude that Jameson has probably not read the appropriate literature to truly understand what he is arguing. Many works of literature that are from areas which he discusses are normally not translated to English, and there is so much knowledge lost because it does not fit into the “first-world” ideals. Ahmad discusses this, again, throughout the piece, but on page 11 he writes, “To say that all third-world texts are necessarily this or that is to say, in effect, that any text originating within that social space which is not this or that is not a ‘true’” narrative,” (Ahmad 11). He continues this argument on page 15 as follows: “… the vast majority of literary texts produced in Asia, Africa, and Latin America are simply not available in English, their exclusion from the US/British ‘canon’ is self-evident,” (Ahmad 15). Jameson continuously argues this perspective, but because third-world literature, the true pieces that give insight to the country and social climate of where they live are rarely in English, he probably has not read them.

This is the Biafra flag.

This is the Nigerian flag.

Ahmad’s discussion of the exclusion of Asia, Africa, and Latin America from the Us/British canon is similar to the United States’ opinion on the Nigerian Civil War. The United States had no involvement in the Nigerian-Biafra war. They did not supply aid specifically to keep peace with a united country or the divided ones. But now, since the war is over, the United States can comment on how they feel about the IPOB movement. The US government believes that they are not a terrorist group because they are peacefully protesting (even though the Nigerian government has classified them as such) and they can understand why they are protesting, but they still fully support Nigeria as a whole nation. Looking at today’s political climate in the United States, that also shows that Nigeria and the United States are not much different with protesting for something people believe in. In comparison, Ahmad believes that Jameson (like the United States government) should not speak on an issue that they are not properly educated about, nor have any direct involvement in.

 

 

After reading “Jameson’s Rhetoric of Otherness and the ‘National Allegory,’” I am interested to hear what my fellow classmates have to say. Do you agree with my analysis? Do you see other perspectives of the piece that I may have missed? Let me know!

 

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