Author: smith.11471

Text Review Assignment: I Am Not Your Negro

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I Am Not Your Negro was released in 2016. The director is Raoul Peck and the duration of the Oscar-nominated documentary is 95 mins.

It is based on James Baldwin’s 30 pages of an unfinished book project titled “Remember This House.” It is his personal account of his fellow civil rights colleagues, Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King Jr. He personally got to know each one of the men before their assassinations. The director, Peck, attempts to weave together Baldwin’s words – Baldwin’s interviews (various television appearances) or lectures, and Baldwin’s original texts read by Samuel L. Jackson.

Just as the title implies, it is of racism and as we know it, the other. The minorities of the United States mainly African Americans. What they must have to endure because of many of the majority of white folks – especially in the 1960s.

As Baldwin grew up, heroes were white not just because of Hollywood, but also those who own land. What about colored people? Uncle Tom was not his hero because he did not take vengeance into his own hands. He dislikes the white for thinking it was okay to take vengeance into his own hands. They take and they take! His countrymen were his enemy.

As a colored child that does not look into a mirror and you assume you are white because the majority is white. It becomes a shock as that child at the age of 5, 6, or 7 as you root on Gary Cooper for killing the Indians then you realize you are an Indian. He says in one of his lectures in the 1960s. This is the realization as the other or othering.

Baldwin has long been a powerful voice on race relations and the African-American experience and it is expressed in this documentary.

 

Malcolm X is mention first in this documentary. He first saw Malcolm in New York. Baldwin was giving a lecture at the time. He goes into detail about his involvement. Malcolm X assassinated in 1965

The mention of the Birmingham campaign, 1963. MLK, Malcolm X, and Baldwin are interviewed for the Birmingham campaign. Very interesting interview. African Americans calmly protesting segregation even though whites are physically abusing them. Martin Luther King Jr assassinated in 1968

 

Medgar Evers assassinated in 1963

 

 

I consider this documentary more of the chronicles of James Baldwin. To rate this: 1 is the worse I have ever seen to 10 the best. I would rate it 9. It is a very good documentary/chronicles of James Baldwin. I get a better understanding of the other. What it meant to stand by powerful men in the 1960s and what they were fighting for. Excellent!

On Kanopy.com free for OSU students

Podcast Assignment “Yo Is This Racist?”: Today’s discussion is Sexism! – by Cyndi Smith

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Please note: This is my first time ever messing with video/audio software. If anything is off, I am sorry. I did not know what I was doing. I did not edit in fear of messing up something. -Sorry! I tried my best!

 

  • Hi! My name is Cyndi.

 

  • “Yo, Is This Racist?” advice podcast, and today I will discuss sexism. I decided on sexism because of the rude comments I have seen on social media about Vice President-elect Mrs. Harris. Many people (not only men but women also) saying sexist comments. I will not focus on Mrs. Harris, but more on her position as a woman in general.

 

  • According to Harvard Business School’s article, throughout most of the centuries (we were the other for centuries), women were the property of their husbands. Property laws or another name for it is “coverture”. The woman was like her underage child or a slave and could not own her property or control her earnings (except under certain conditions).                                                                                                                       

 

  • If the husband died, the wife could not oversee her children. Widows did have the right of “dower,” a property right they brought into the marriage as well as to life usage of one-third of their husbands’ estate. Though a married woman was not able to sue or sign contracts on her own, her husband often did have to obtain her consent before he sold any property his wife had inherited.

 

  • Women fought for the 19th What is the 19th amendment of the United States Constitution? The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guaranteed American women the right to vote, a right is known as women’s suffrage and was ratified on August 18, 1920, ending almost a century of protest.

  • The movement for women’s rights started in the year 1848 on the national level with the Seneca Falls Convention. It was organized by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott. After the convention, the demand for the vote became a focus of the women’s rights movement. Besides Stanton and Mott, another well-known activist was Susan B. Anthony. These three women plus many other women activists raised public awareness and lobbied the government to grant voting rights to women. After years of battling, these groups finally emerged victorious with the passage of the 19th Amendment.

 

 

 

 

  • However, women of color would have to keep fighting for their rights. Black men and women faced intimidation and often violent disapproval at the polls or when attempting to register to vote. It would take more than 40 years for all women to achieve voting equality.

 

  • When did the coverture end? Catherine Allgor, wrote for The National Women’s History Museum states, “The short answer is that it has been eroded bit by bit. But it has never been fully abolished. The ghost of coverture has always haunted women’s lives and continues to do so. Coverture is why women weren’t regularly allowed on juries until the 1960s, and marital rape wasn’t a crime until the 1980s.” She admits it goes on today in ways of employment, housing, taxes, or real estate matters.

 

  • Sexism is alive and well. What is sexism? To cover everything, I decided to get the definition of sexism from the Encyclopedia Britannica. Sexism prejudice or discrimination based on sex or gender, especially against women and girls. Although its origin is unclear, the term sexism emerged from the “second-wave” feminism of the 1960s through the ’80s and was most likely modeled on the civil rights movement’s term racism (prejudice or discrimination based on race). Sexism can be a belief that one sex is superior to or more valuable than the other sex. It imposes limits on what men and boys can and should do and what women and girls can and should do. The concept of sexism was originally formulated to raise consciousness about the oppression of girls and women, although by the early 21st century it had sometimes been expanded to include the oppression of any sex, including men and boys, intersexual people, and transgender people.                   

 

  • I would like to discuss one of my admired women: Rosalind Franklin. She was an English chemist and X-ray crystallographer whose work was central to the understanding of the molecular structures of DNA, RNA, viruses, coal, and graphite. She was highly intelligent but received a raw deal. Although her works on coal and viruses were appreciated in her lifetime, her contributions to the discovery of the structure of DNA were largely recognized after her death.

 

  • Her discovery of the DNA structure in 1953; however, since she was a woman, recognition of her work was not rewarded at that time. She passed in 1958 of ovarian cancer at the age of 37. The gentlemen she worked in the laboratory would take claim to her work in 1962 (her photo, their data) and they won the Noble Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

  • This is only one example of a million examples of sexism.

 

  • I stumble over a project called “everyday sexism”. Women write about their everyday episodes of sexism. One example: Isabel wrote “I was in 8th grade and I got an anonymous note in my locker telling me to kill myself. My locker was right in front of the cameras. I went to the school’s dean of conduct who is in charge of the cameras to see who sent it to me. I went there and he told me that I was overreacting and that it was probably a boy who liked me and wanted to get my attention. Long story short I never found out who it was.”

 

  • First, this is wrong on many levels. It was handled wrong. Someone wished death on this child. The adult male did not take it seriously. This is letting the young female know she is unimportant. This could have affected her emotional state.

 

  • What should have been done? It should have been taken seriously. She was being bullied and not a flirtation gesture. Whoever wrote the letter should have been suspended for such behavior.

 

  • According to Forbes, there are three ways to address subtle sexism and they are: Permit yourself to be offended; Call sexism out for what it is; & Counter subtle sexism.

 

  • Permit yourself to be offended – Let it be known you did not like their comments and politely say “I appreciate those comments to stop”. Do not suppress your negative feelings.

  • Call sexism out for what it is – “Explain why you were troubled by the comment and how it reinforces harmful gender stereotypes and could hurt morale in the office. Keep your tone calm, collected, and professional. Make it clear that these comments aren’t appropriate or appreciated.”

 

  • Counter subtle sexism – In Forbes article, they explain with an example, “if someone says about a female coworker “We’re so lucky to have her on the team to keep us organized – we needed a mom around here,” you could counter by highlighting her accomplishments and skills: “Well, that doesn’t seem relevant, but I do know that by streamlining our salesforce last year, she dramatically increased profits.”

 

  • The muse has additional opinions on how to handle sexism: Practice Your Puzzled and Unconcerned Reaction – “Some comments deserve to be reported, but sometimes that’s not a great option. Sometimes the person making the comments deserves a playful—and yet condescending!—mocking. “Did you just say that…in a meeting? Tone it down, buddy.” Look at some other people on the team like, “Get a load of this guy.” Lock him out. He’s ridiculous. Move on. You’re the adult here.
  • Another from the Muse is: Blame it on Generational Differences!                                                           
  • “If your male boss is making the comments, he’s probably kind of older, right? Say your boss implies that women are bad at math.
  • You say: “Wait, what are you saying?” Make sure your voice is neutral–you might as well be asking, “What does this ancient hieroglyph mean?”
  • “Don’t get all feminist on me. I was just saying that being good at math is mostly a guy thing. You know.”
  • Give a confused look, and then shrug. “Ha, at my school we all had to take calculus to even think about getting into college. Must be a generational thing.” Say it cheerfully–you just kind of called your boss old.
  • You’re cool, he’s cool. You respect generational differences—it’s all part of the beautiful tapestry of diversity. If he keeps at it, ask him some questions about what college was like “back then.” If he says his math classes were all guys, respond with amazement, as though he is telling you about riding a horse and buggy to school. You’re not offended–you’re enthralled by his stories about the olden days. If he tries to push your buttons, respond with, “Wow, that’s so interesting! Things have changed so much!”
  • Of course, most real-life interactions along these lines are notably shorter. So just keep this in your arsenal: [Shrug] “Must be a generational thing.”

 

  • Women have come a long way in the past century alone. We are no longer the “other” – like women once were. It has been 100 years since voting became legal for women. As women work beside men, sexism is real and living well. Women must voice their opinions openly to men to let them know sexism is not right. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, sexism does not only affect women; however, it mainly focuses on women. Intersexual and transgender people are affected and men and boys can be affected as well. We must work side by side and achieve our goals we must put sexism to the side to be victorious.
  • Thank you for listening!

 

Works Cited

Allgor, C. (2012, September 4). Coverture: The Word You Probably Don’t Know But Should. Retrieved from National Women’s History Museum: https://www.womenshistory.org/articles/coverture-word-you-probably-dont-know-should#:~:text=The%20short%20answer%20is%20that,a%20crime%20until%20the%201980s.

Beilock, S. (2020, January 7). How To Address Subtle, ‘Friendly’ Sexism At Work. Retrieved from Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/sianbeilock/2020/01/07/how-to-address-subtle-friendly-sexism-at-work/?sh=46d59b56350c

Dziura, J. (n.d.). 6 Ways to Shut Down Sexist Comments at Work. Retrieved November 13, 2020, from The Muse: https://www.themuse.com/advice/6-ways-to-shut-down-sexist-comments-at-work

Editors, B. (2020, June 15). Rosalind Franklin. Retrieved from Biography: https://www.biography.com/scientist/rosalind-franklin

Editors, H. (2020, August 14). 19th Amendment. Retrieved from History: https://www.history.com/topics/womens-history/19th-amendment-1

Masequesmay, G. (n.d.). Sexism. Retrieved November 13, 2020, from Encyclopædia Britannica: https://www.britannica.com/topic/sexism

The Everyday Sexism Project. (n.d.). Retrieved November 13, 2020, from Everyday Sexism: https://everydaysexism.com/

Women and the Law. (n.d.). Retrieved November 12, 2020, from Harvard Business School: https://www.library.hbs.edu/hc/wes/collections/women_law/

Week 12 Context Presentation “Regarding the Pain of Others” History of American Journal Censorship

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Hi, my name is Cyndi, and today I am going to be providing some context to Susan Sontag’s work on “Regarding the Pain of Others”. As a nation, we are privileged. We do not see a war in our streets like the countries across the oceans must-see. No wounded or dead bodies at our feet, no ruins, no one screaming for help, no bombings, no tanks in our fields, no foreign military attempting to invade our states, and so on. American journalists decide on what to show us over the years when it has come to the wars that we are involved in. Of course, our government has control over some photojournalism to muzzled what they disagree with.

First, I would like to explain what censorship is according to the author, Elizabeth R. Purdy, censorship occurs when individuals or groups try to prevent others from saying, printing, or depicting words and images. Censors seek to limit freedom of thought and expression by restricting spoken words, printed matter, symbolic messages, freedom of association, books, art, music, movies, television programs, and Internet sites. When the government engages in censorship, the First Amendment freedoms are implicated.

The document, Media censorship: Freedom versus responsibility, by Irum Saeed Abbasi and Laila Al-Sharqi, prints A common ground for censorship is the maintenance of an orderly state, whereas, the underlying motive is to keep the public ignorant of the information that can potentially threaten authorities. For example, the author, Jasmine Alinder, of the book, Underexposed: The Controversial Censorship of Photographs of US War Dead, the armed forces first censored photographs of the United States war dead during World War I, Espionage Act of 1917. “The Act was later amended to include any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language concerning the United States government” (Abbasi & Al-Sharqi, 2015).  Abbasi & Al-Sharqi go on to mention that soldiers’ letters were censored during World War II (1939-1945). The government erased any information that potentially could be used by the enemy. This included symbols of hugs and kisses (XOXO) that were eliminated because of possible spy codes.

Alinder goes on to explain, the post-Vietnam era brought a significantly high level of censorship, which threatened to disembowel press autonomy (one of the most valuable democratic checks against government and military abuses of power). Attempts to regulator the fabrication and publication of photographs of US war dead expose the request of the government and military to express and generate the public image of war.

Since World War I the government has invaded our rights of the First Amendment to view what journalists have witnessed on the battlefields and other locations. It is not just journalists who are affected. The soldiers sending home letters explaining the horrors of the war were censored. We may have the First Amendment but the government controls it and what they want us to see.

 

Works Cited

Abbasi, I. S., & Al-Sharqi, L. (2015, July 29). Review Media censorship: Freedom versus responsibility. doi:10.5897/JLCR2015.0207

Alinder, J. (2012). Underexposed: The Controversial Censorship of Photographs of US War Dead. London: Palgrave Macmillan. doi:https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137283542_8

Purdy, E. R. (n.d.). Censorship. Retrieved November 6, 2020, from THE FIRST AMENDMENT ENCYCLOPEDIA: https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/896/censorship

 

 

Diary of Systemic Injustices Showcase: United States Immigration Court System: Do Undocumented Immigrants Have a Voice in the US Justice System?

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For a diary of systemic injustices, I found an article about injustice in immigration courtrooms. Unlike the regular court system, we know of, immigration court is different. The chief prosecutor/attorney general selects the judges (not legal judges – only called judges). They are employees of the Department of Justice. Through his authority to certify decisions, the attorney general of the United States, that one person can single handily pull the removal case of any person, in any court, anywhere nationwide, and issue a sweeping decision. Making that person an example.

A nine-year-old migrant girl from Guatemala sits in the back of a U.S. Border Patrol vehicle after she was apprehended for illegally crossing into the U.S. from Mexico in Sunland Park, New Mexico June 14, 2018. REUTERS/Adrees Latif

It is a system that is lost. Any symbolic of independence and the proof of that is the backlogs of cases 1.1 million cases caused by a process called aimless document reshuffling (one gentleman named it). There is not one specific administrator, but it is the problem of being fundamental to the core. With every administrator that has come in has rearranged the pending court document cases to order a political message with their decision on their law enforcement policy.

Undocumented immigrants’ attorney said, “I worried because I want my clients’ voices to be heard.” He goes on to say, “The judges are facing numerous backlogs and they simply do not have the time to listen to our clients who are facing exile from this country.”

They believe the true solution for immigration court would be the court is no longer run by a prosecutor. The immigration court needs to be removed from the justice department and give it true independence like any other court we have in our judicial system. The immigration court needs to be reform. They say the foundation is in place. It only needs independence.

Undocumented immigrants are the “other” and what I have read about our system, it almost makes the immigrants, subalterns. The reason I said this is because the lawyer said the judges do not have time to listen to his clients’ voices. I will put the undocumented immigrants as subalterns. I am sure most of the judges mean well, but they are back up in cases.

To add to the conversation, I came across another article, 10 US Immigration Issues to Watch in 2020, in the media Trump administration focus on undocumented immigrants; however, the administration has restricted legal immigration. Last year, Trump attempted to restrict most family-based immigration by signing a proclamation that barred immigrants who do not have health insurance or could not prove they could afford to pay for medical care. The courts blocked Trump’s proclamation. “In addition, his administration has proposed policy changes that would reduce the number of people eligible for green cards and other visas by expanding the definition of who qualifies as a “public charge.” (Karas & Campbell, 2020)

Even though the United States citizens have freedom of speech, freedom of speech does not apply to undocumented immigrants. They come to the United States for a better life and Trump and his administration are making it difficult for undocumented immigrants to become US citizens. While many undocumented immigrants wait patiently for their time for court, they hope to be heard. But does it make a difference? One immigrant lawyer says his clients’ voices do not get heard in the proceedings. I place the undocumented immigrants in the subaltern group for now until the US comes up with a better reform.

   

Works Cited

Featured Issue: Immigration Courts. (2020, October 6). Retrieved from American Immigration Lawyers Association: https://www.aila.org/advo-media/issues/all/immigration-courts

Karas, T., & Campbell, M. (2020, January 3). 10 US immigration issues to watch in 2020. Retrieved from The World: https://www.pri.org/stories/2020-01-03/10-us-immigration-issues-watch-2020