Okay....okay...okay (says the Joe Pesci)...here's an intro message

So, we're not even one day into this and I'm behind already...well, not necessarily behind, but well, OK, behind :-). Thanks for your energy on our first day of class...I'm hoping this will be a great semester!

Take a couple of minutes to introduce yourself and get used to posting comments to the blog. Welcome again!

Essay Duex

Im almost 100% sure i am going to use the cocktail waitress essay for my paper seeing that i have had experience in the food industry that essay interests me alittle bit more than the others but i am still debating and tossing around some other ideas for right now.

Broad Summary

I think I'm going to write my paper on the Barbara Ehrenreich "Nickel-and-Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America". I think I can relate to this paper more in the sense that I know what its about and the issues are everywhere in America. it would be easy to explain the same situation she was talking about in her essay and give present day issues and facts to go along with it. I believe it will easiest to explain to an outside reader, easy to summarize and give view points on it as well.

Assignment #2

I think I'm Going to use the cocktail waitress essey for my paper. I have insight in this topic since i have doned some waitressing. The author uses a lot od decriptive words, which i picked up on. The author is really tring to get the reader to get a feel for the job. I <3 decriptive writing. However Im not exactly sure how to go about this paper...

I think....

I'm not really sure what I think. I am thinking about "Passport Photos" and I am thinking about "Nickel and Dimed Cocktail Waitress." If I talk about the passsport story I know what I say and think will be different then what other people think. If I choose the cocktail waitress I could be more pesonal using examples of regular waitresses and experiences I had. Those are my ideas that I have but I'm still thinking.

The other side to work

I want to write my paper on work. I have been working since the age of fourteen and now that I think about it has made the strong person that I am. My first job was not just a fast food restuarant but it was in a completely different atmosphere. I worked at HersheyPark's Boardwalk fries stand and it changed my view on the whole park and just people in general. I could now see what the workers go though as well as the customers everyday. I was an experience that showed me how some days people were nice and mean at the next minute. But the whole time I dealt with the attitudes of the customers and employees, I had to keep a Hershey Park happy attitude and smile on my face. So I wanted write a story that would get my readers to understand the change.
Bracee

rhetorically speaking

I'm going over the syllabus trying to get an idea for assignment 2, but am having trouble. We are told to write about a rhetorical conversation involving public opinion. But I'm finding that most of the stories we have read are tied so closely to political issues that this rhetorical debate is lacking the authors own feelings. Anybody can find an issue online then find other peoples opinions about a particular political problem and simply rhetorically analyze it until your blue in the face. The problem with this assignment is that it lacks personal direction. When talking about something that nobody can fully understand like these universal issues we tend to tie radical positions to personal experience, whether maybe having extremist parents, or simply not being tipped often as a waiter at applebee's. Without speaking in a biased voice during this assignment, after it's completion each of our papers will share the same run on voice that's used by backwards politicians who talk them selves in circles about the same problems.

passport

dont ridicule people, dont judge a person on their personality or their behavior, or the way they look. Just becuase they dont seem to be a good person on the outside doesnt mean they arnt a good person on the inside. When people move hear or come hear doesnt mean they should be disrespected. Give them a chance because maybe they come hear for a better way of living so they can get through life and get a better paying job.

passport photos

I didn't like this essay as much. It didn't make me want to come back and read it again. Infact I'd be glad to never read it again because I found it extremely boring. The story has been done a million different ways. It teaches and shows the same message over and over. The theme is that judging people by their cover is a world wide issue. Each country looks at foreigners as just that, foreigners. They think they are lesser beings. It also spoke of the fact that immigrants coming into this country should infact have to speak our language. It actaully angers some people that there are others living in our own country who don't even know how to speak its home language. Although this topic can be controversial to some I believe it to be futile because there is always going to be prejudice everywhere you go.

All those terms

• authoritarianism
• romas
• afro-descentents
• burakumins
• food sovereignty
• WSF
• agro-ecological production
• neoliberalism
• G8
• ideological
• Mr. Lee
• mercantilization
• agrarian reform
• GLBT
• embargo
• GMO foods
• IMF
• WTO
• apartheid
• refusnik
• ecological debts
• sexual tourism
• latifundarios

Passport

This essay teaches to not judge a book by its cover just because someone is different does not me there are a good or bad person. you should always get to know someone before you pass judgement on them.

passport photos

when looking at a person do not judge them just because they are different than what your comfortable of... different does not always mean something negative... immigrants are people just like me and you... they deserve as much respect as a human being that is a citizen... most of the time, its not even their faults for the language they speak or having to come here... they are just trying to make a decent living just like me and you...

After reading these two essays, I've decided to marry rich.

living on hardly anything

After reading the nickel and dimed essay makes me thankful that I don't have to live like that. Sure Americans our age work low wage jobs when in school. Yes, there are people in the real world who make a living off 7 dollars a hour but some have could of done alot better. I'm sure nobody has a dream of living out of a van all their lives. Some people say once your rich you stay that way and if your poor you also stay poor. I don't agree with that statement, you always hear the rags to riches stories that get you pumped. Overall I say that if your on the bottom you can improve yourself to make a name for yourself.

passport..

I think this essay hits the point about passports and identity and immigrants head on. In the United States when we see someone who isn't of the same race or ethnicity than us we look at them like they have eight heads or something. I'll be honest I do it sometimes too. I think that it got worse after 9/11. We look at muslims and others as they may be terrorists that we should keep an eye on them, or mayb just throw them an evil eye. Also we do the same thing when some speaks a different language. When I'm in a mall or a restaurant and i hear another language being spoken I get annoyed. I think that if you want to live in this country you should speak the language. If everyone spoke the language in public with everyone else then stares and dirty looks would be eliminated. If you are in your own home you can speak what you want but you are in a country that speaks English, than speak it! But I believe the essay got to the point and I agree with it.

response to nickel and dime and the cocktail waitress

the other essays we read to me were boring... i believe these two essays were much more interesting because the people are actually experiencing low wage jobs and how it is to not have much... i can completely relate to this... i remember my mom having 2 or 3 jobs just to get by to pay the bills and put food on the table... yes it was hard but if you need to do things to survive... i cant complain so much now... yes we do struggle but its not as bad before... people need to learn not to take things for granted because anything can be taken away from you... just be grateful of what you have...

Structure of Paper

starts off with the closing of another segment
introduce myself
introduce the segment that will be going on
introduce each peron individually
start off with the topic of lieteracy and go from there
im the middle person (host of the radio show)
pause between times for commercials
each author speaks
take calls from the audience listening to the show
give answers to questions
closing words
conclude radio show

Wages

In the story she gave up everything in order to see how someone can live off of minimum wage and the methods they use to survive. she dropped herself from the middle class to the lower class and put herself in there shoes to begin appreciating how they live and realized there work is just as hard and stressful as any other jon yet they were hardly making any money. she soon realized how hard it is to live off of $6-7

Nickel n' Dimed

Ehrenreich left behind her car, house, well paying job and ATM card to take part in an interesting experiment. She left behind all her middle class belongings in search for a lower class lifestyle. she wanted to see how mothers and other people that make minimum wage live and the difficulties they deal with everyday. She found it ironically hard to find a job that requires little to no skill becuase the main reason of hiring is job turnovers. She finally lands a job and finds it very hard to stay afloat only make 6-7 dollars an hour at a local resturant. I feel bad for the people that are in these situations but without these people willing to work these jobs our society wouldnt be functionable, they are a necessity to the work world.

the working class and minimum wage

I enjoyed both of these stories because I could understand them and relate to them in certain ways. In Barbara Ehrenreich's story Nickel-and-Dimed she takes us through the life of the underpaid working class. She introduces characters to us as well as a little bit of their background. She goes mainly into their living conditions, because that mainly is all they talk about. her story just goes to show you how hard it is to survive on minimum wage and to jsut get by with all the expenses in life.
The other authors James Spradley and Brenda Mann discussed a similar topic but less people based and more social grouping. In their essay they discussed how there are three classes or categories of people, customers, employees, and managers. From there on they give us a layout of the social network of a particular resturant, Brady's Bar. I didn't like this story as much because to me it wasnt really about the people. You didn't get to know anyone personally, but with the Nickel-and-Dimed story you did.