Week of Class

The past week in class someone brought in peanut butter spaghetti for their cultural and I thought it was pretty good. I read my article to the class and explained the article the best I could. The class got a few handouts from you and I thought they were both pretty interesting, especially the one that was taking place in Duluth Minnesota. I thought it was crazy it was taking in a small town of Minnesota. I didn’t really think Minnesota had many racist people but I guess I was wrong. This article doesn’t really make sense to me because it says its for people who are sick of getting made fun of because of the color of their skin. Later in the article it states that the rally is to be focused on one group so allowing anyone to attend kind of contradicts the one group thing.

            The other article was about a woman who revealed her true religion on the campus of North Dakota State University. When you showed us a picture of her I would not have guessed she was of that religion. I don’t think it is right for people to treat a person a certain way just because they believe in other religions or dress differently than most people. I think it took a lot of confidence for her to be able to dress like that knowing people are going to look at you different or make fun of you. I think what she did was really neat and its pretty cool how she says it was a really amazing experience.

            A few things I found interesting in class was when we talked about “Christmas break” and how people aren’t supposed to call it that anymore. I think people and schools should be able to call it what they want and people that attend that school should not look into what the school calls the break any further than they have to.  I also learned that the black part of the Jamaican Flag represents the people of the country.

Cultural Article

            The article I was able to find was about troops over in Afghanistan who inadvertently burned more than one Quran. President Barrack Obama apologized to the Afghan President Hamid Karzai for the troops acts of disrespect. After the burning of the Qurans there were many deaths of troops but local officials can not determine if the killings were out of revenge or if the killings just happened to happen right after the burnings. There were also burnings of civilian vehicles but again they could not determine if it was due to the burnings of the Qurans. The Taliban Thursday, which is a newspaper I am guessing, rejected the apologies. “So-called show(s) of apologies, but in reality they let their inhuman soldiers insult our holy book” is what they had to say about the burnings. I think the troops did these burnings on purpose. I believe this because if you are going to be in a foreign country for a long period of time I think you would do some research on the country and the certain religions that are in that country. I also think the troops should be educated on certain countries and religions they will be serving in so situations like this do not continue to happen. The article says they are still uncertain if these burnings of the Quran were intentional or if the troops did this to make many Muslims angry. Whichever one it is, this is still a careless act and considered “a crime committed against the holiest book of two billion Muslims around the world.” I would agree with this statement because if you are not sure what type of book you are burning and you are in a foreign country, I do not think a person should just go and burn it because they want to get rid of it.

week of class

I completely forgot about this weeks blog until now so this is my blog and I know I will be receiving a bad grade for it but that is what I deserve for putting it off so long. Sorry Kim.

Week of Class

During the Tuesday class period we had a speaker from Ole Miss who I thought was pretty interesting. I thought it was pretty neat how she was all the way in Mississippi and we were in Williston and she was able to talk to us over the IVN system. However I did not like when she was saying how the high temperature there was going to be in the 70’s and we had snow falling on the ground. I did learn some things that were interesting to me including how they say certain things after saying the word such as Muhammad and Allah. I also thought the part when she talked about the Qur’an. I found it was interesting how families have a family Qur’an and how people will not touch the Qur’an after they have drank alcohol. I didn’t know that Muslims would have daily prayers and pray up to five times a day. I did not really get into it that much because it was something that doesn’t relate to me to be honest but it was good to learn the basic outline of the religion.

            On Thursday were supposed to listen to Ian talk about the country of Canada but we couldn’t get the video camera so we just decided to watch an episode of Sister Wives. When you first told us we were going to watch this series I kind of thought to myself oh great this is going to be a series about a bunch of women arguing. But after watching the first episode, this is a really crazy and good show! I thought it was crazy how the guy was able to deal with not one, not two, but three wives! I can see from the women’s perspective how being married to a guy with two other wives could be a plus. I think it would kind of be awkward for the children to technically have three moms. At the end of the episode they said the guy was going to soon have another wife! I am beginning to think this is the craziest guy on the planet, or the smartest, I am still trying to figure it out!

Holiday I Do Not Celebrate

My holiday that I chose to learn more about is Kwanzaa. I do not celebrate Kwanzaa because it is a holiday that is celebrated by the people of the African-American race. The festival of Kwanzaa begins on December 26 and ends on the first of January. A guy named Dr. Maulana Ron Karenga created the holiday in the year 1966. Dr. Karenga created this holiday for African-Americans to stress the goals of having a strong family and to learn about the African-American history. Dr. Karenga studied some other African-American festivals and found that a good number of them revolved around harvest. So Dr. Karenga decided he would use the word “Kwanzaa”, which comes from the Kiswahili word meaning “fresh fruits”. He used seven principles of the African-American culture and used them in creating Kwanzaa. These principles include unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity, and faith.

            At the beginning of the celebration there is a straw hat that is placed in the middle of the table. They then place a seven-candle holder on top of the straw hat. I asked myself how they would balance a candleholder with seven candles on it but couldn’t come up with an answer. They then place the seven candles in the holder, including three red ones on one side, three green ones on the other side, and one black one in the center. They also place ears of corn and a unity cup on the hat as well. The black candle represents the people of the African-American race, the red ones represent their struggles and the green candles represent their future. Since there are seven days during Kwanzaa and there are seven principles and also seven candles, one candle is lit each day and focused on one principle a day. During the candle lighting ceremonies, each participant discusses what that principle means to them. They also exchange gifts during these ceremonies and on December 31 there is a feast that includes honoring ancestors, music, and dancing.

            I chose to learn more about this holiday because I figured it was a holiday that African-American people in the United States celebrate and thought I should learn more about it. 

Week of Class

In this past week of class I thought it was mainly based on religion throughout the world. I learned there are many types of different religions throughout the world and religion varies in different cultures. I learned what the term world view means. I learned that world view pretty much is why and how you see the world through your own eyes. It also means how you view others, your attitude toward things, and also your beliefs. I would explain my worldview as being open to try new things, treating everyone equal, and having a positive attitude towards everything that I approach. For example, if I go into one of my baseball practices thinking that practice is going to be hard and we will have a lot of running, the practice will not be any fun. However, if I come to practice with a positive attitude and I will have a much more fun practices than if I were to come into the practice with a bad attitude. I also try to treat everyone I meet the same. I do this because I know how it feels to be treated like a outsider when I meet new people and its not a very good feeling. I also think with having an open approach to people will allow a person to meet new people and make more friends. I also learned about different religions in the eastern and western parts of the world. In the eastern parts of the world I learned that the more popular religions are Buddhism, Hinduism, Confucianism, Shintoism, and Taoism. The religions in the western parts of the world include Judaism, Christian, and Islam. I learned that when a person is Islamic they only believe in one god. Another thing that I got cleared up in the week of class was that Islamic is the religion and Muslim is the people of that religion.