Blog #4 Gender Roles

For my fourth blog about gender roles I decided to look at the earnings of males and females because that has been a largely talked about subject. a few hundred years ago there was a large difference between what men and women could do and we may not think there still is but you'd be surprised. After finding an educational webpage with the statistics it showed that the average male makes about $38,000 a year and women make and average $27,000 a year. This is a large difference which brings up the question of discrimination. I don't believe that their is discrimination but in society, women have taken more of a motherly role. Rather than working, we are moving closer towards a single income nation. One person works, one stays home. This article helped show the difference between genders very distinctly and with nice visuals.



http://www.womensmedia.com/new/Lips-Hilary-gender-wage-gap.shtml


Lips, Hilary M. "Gender Wage Gap." Women's Media. 2008. 11 Feb. 2009.
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Blog #3 Different Culture

For my third blog about a culture different from mine, I chose to write about the book Nectar in a Sieve. This book is written in India, so there are a few aspects of culture that differ from our society. The first I noticed was the time where Nathan killed the cobra when it scared Ruku. In our society this wouldn't be a big deal, but cobras are considered holy in their culture. This was a little bit of foreshadowing. After the cobra was killed there has been a drought, flooding, lack of food, and they have lost two children. The other aspect that is non-religious was the idea of arranged marriages. These marriages are supposed to match social classes together. For instance, the larger the dowry that you have, the higher you can marry in the social classes. These are two aspects of Indian culture that are different from ours.


(Not a website)
Markandaya, Kamala

Blog #2 Overcoming a Struggle

For my second blog post I found an article in the New York Times about the pilot whose plane crashed into the Hudson River. The article starts with quotes from the pilot's transmitter saying that they lost thrust in both engines and were going to crash. After this the pilot knew that he was going to have to crash land in the Hudson. Long story short, they gently landed in the river where they were met by multiple rescue boats. This article fits the topic of overcoming a struggle for multiple reasons. The first is the physical struggle. The pilot had to control the crashing plane and guide it onto a target. The more important struggle that was overcome was the mental struggle. Knowing that so many people's lives are in your hands puts tons of pressure on you, let alone the panic that you face when you are in a life-threatening situation. The pilot overcame both of these and led all the people on the plane to safety, even though it was in a river.

"http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/05/faa-releases-flight-1549-tapes-2/?hp">


Otterman, Sharon. "F.A.A. Releases Flight 1549 Tapes." The New York Times. 5 Feb. 2009. 5 Feb. 2009.

Blog #1 Natural Disasters

For the outside reading blog on natural disasters I found an article on Hurricane Katrina. I found the article from the L.A. Times and it is about the large amount of money Hurricane Katrina took away. Now that the victims lost their possessions and the cost in the economy is rising, the number of homeless people has gone from 6,300 before, to 12,000 after. There have been a few attempts to assist the people that were harmed, but when a group called UNITY offered temporary housing, only 61% said yes. This is a great opportunity. Finding an affordable apartment is growing close to impossible. The cost of an efficiency apartment has gone from originally $463 to $764. There may be people trying to help out with natural disasters such as hurricanes, but they can only help if the recipient is willing to try.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/21/us/21suit.html

Schwartz, John. "Judge Allows Katrina Lawsuit Against Corps of Engineers." The New York Times. 2009. 1 Feb. 2009.

Class Activity Post

I felt that the activity we did in class was surprisingly effective for helping realize what is important to you. The way that it helped find out who you are is that it separated the important stuff from the non-important stuff. I originally struggled finding eight unique things about myself so the first couple rounds weren't very challenging. As we started throwing away more and more traits the difficulty increased. The choices suddenly became more important because they were the ones to separate me from everybody else. Since this activity showed what is unique about me, I thought that it was very useful.

Reading Minute

I recently read the novel Crispin by Avi. This book is about a boy named Crispin's journey from town to town after being declared a "Wolf's Head." The book starts with his mom and his priest dying, two people he was close to. He was blamed for the priest's death so anybody who saw Crispin was allowed to kill him. He abandons his home searching for a safe place to live when he meets a man named Bear. Bear takes him in and they travel together as performers. When they reach England, Crispin finds out he is a prince. After receiving this good news the steward from his hometown finds him and corners him with his other soldiers. Crispin narrowly escapes with Bear by killing the steward and the book ends as they leave together and return home.