Totaly intrigued

It all began with being a college student right now.
It happened when Virginia Tech happened.
It was inspired by our conversations about murder not being "common sense" and why?

I began my paper.

I'm discussing VT using many of the Advanced Composition topics. I am reading a lot about the incident and making connections between it and identity, rhetoric, apology, common sense, and I'll somehow work in persuasion. I'm content. I feel like I have something to say about my topic and want to look at VT this way-- Firstly, I have a yearning to learn everything I can about what happened at VT because of personal interest and I think that's important in any research paper (wanting to do the research).

I haven't yet looked through my Advanced Comp. texts to make the direct connections, but this week is dedicated to this paper. I'm not sure if my topic will narrow. At one point I was thinking about the identity of a murderer, but we'll see. I will bring something new to the table and have a lot of knowledge about something that will be a huge part of history, which is important to me.

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/5923915/columbine_whose_fault_is_it
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/marilynmanson/thenobodies.html

ruminate, gloominate

As far as the normal blog postings go I don't have much to update. The Language War readings are going well, mostly, I think, because it's written by someone who understands what kind of language is effective and what kind is masturbatory (that's right, Ramage, I'm talking to you). I also have a solid bead on my final paper. Something about credibility filtered through the text of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, a book I'm in the middle of rereading anyway. It's gonna be two birds, or, some rocks and a stone...I mean...I'm gonna kill a bunch of birds and get stoned.

But what's really important today is the revelations about the Virginia Tech tragedy. We learned that Cho Seung-Hui planned the whole thing. He bought the guns from a pawn shop across from campus weeks ago, took several dozen pictures of himself holding them, wrote an 1800 word "manifesto" and filmed himself delivering a deranged monologue where he equates himself to Jesus and blames this impending tragedy on everyone he's about to kill. But the coup de grace was that after the first spree—in the two hour interval between—Cho mailed the manifesto, video and pictures to NBC news. He did it for fame. Why? Well, he may have been deranged, but even a crazy person in this country today can't help but want to be famous. Paula Abdul ought to be relieved that Cho didn't mail her a demo tape.

What was Cho thinking, anyway? It's better to be feared than loved? They must be punished? Fuck it, I'm taking a few with me? No. Maybe we'll never know how much of his ranting was an act, but one thing's for sure, he lost sight of the green light. He gave up on Horatio Alger.

Sweet Jesus! The bad vibes coming off this one are truly awful and far reaching. They'll be felt generations from now. Maybe not in any literal sense, but what will happen on campuses across the country is a very subtle mood shift. Suspicion will be the prevailing reaction for the next few weeks, hanging just behind our conscious thoughts until it fades to a sour memory that only makes us wince when it comes up in conversation. Months from now the only residue that'll remain in our everyday lives will be the new half-assed gun regulations and maybe a few donation boxes next to cash registers that somebody forgot to pick up. But our children's grandchildren will walk onto KU's campus or U Penn's campus or any campus other than VT (that's a whole different story) and be in a different world. No college will ever be like it was before Monday, just like no high school was the same after 4/20/1999.

VT will be like Kent State—a freak to be gawked at. Not like Ground Zero or the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building where memorials now stand. There won't be a museum on the grassy quad in Virginia like there is on the field in Shanksville, though there will be—must be—some kind of memorial built. Classes will eventually start again, just like they did at Kent State. Tests will be taken. Kids will drink and screw and do all the college kid things. But we'll find out soon enough that no amount of history rolling into the pages will dissolve this heavy phantom. The Great Spirit keeps all things in order. It may let a defining moment in history fade practically into obscurity, but will never let it totally dissipate from the ether. Indeed, Monday is now scarred onto history's side, just below the collective subconscious.

A place like the VT campus will always have a different feel to it. It's something that seeps from the human soul when it knows it's about to die. You feel it at battlefields. That sombre sensation that makes jokes unfunny. I felt it when I visited Ford's Theatre in DC on my tenth birthday. As I walked down the aisle on that day, through the the orchestra level, my parents flanking me, I could tell immediately that the building itself was affected. There was the stage, practically breathing in the dusty light. Above stage left was the balcony where John Wilkes Boothe shot Lincoln. A very old looking painting of George Washington hung with an American flag draped behind it on the front of the balcony. That's it? I thought. That's where the President was shot, right there. A loud bang came from backstage that jerked me out of awe. We were there early and when we took our seats in the third row, a historian in a gray tweed coat started recounting those famous events of April 14, 1865. I stood up and walked to the end of the aisle as he spoke. A few steps and I was bellied up to the corner of the orchestra pit and only two or three feet from the stage. I looked up. Right under the balcony. There was a chip in the picture frame, and I imagined, as Boothe leapt through the pistol smoke that night, his spur catching the corner. In mid-air his arms windmilled wildly because he was thrown off balance. Then THUD! He landed in front of me and shouted either "The South is avenged!" or "Sic semper tyrannis!" I couldn't tell because the wooden pop of his boots hitting the stage still resonated in my chest cavity. My heart felt it. I smelled gun smoke and looked up. Blood red curtains on both sides of the balcony rustled as Mrs. Lincoln scurried on the floor around the body of her dying husband. I breathed deep. There was the stage again. So close. I leaned out over the orchestra pit to touch it. Close to my fingers. Closer. Inches. "Nathan!" my mother yells. She's walking up the aisle with my father and a few other early arrivers following the gray coat. I catch up. "We're going up to the balcony," she says. Soon we're following the historian up a gently curving staircase that's got well-worn carpet tacked down into the corner of every step with rope lights. The walls are adorned with oil paintings that feel...warm. At the top is a Plexiglas panel that covers the whole doorway to the booth where it all happened. It's smudged with fingerprints. On the other side are plush looking high back chairs and I can see the red white and blue edge of the flag peeking over the railing. This was the crux. The axis. This is where the bullet went into Old Abe's brain. I could still feel the boots hitting the stage somewhere deep in my gut. Yes, I thought, the world changed when a man stood here and pulled a trigger. BANG! I heard the shot. My hand formed a pistol and my index finger touched the glass. Bang. That's it. Feel it now, two hundred years on. In this musty old theatre, where Lincoln knew he would die, on the floor right there. Bang. Those boots thud again. And again. And again. They thud and that shot rings out there every minute of every day. Something so tragic and jarring a place—a location—never forgets. And if you visit there, you can't avoid feeling it yourself.

Now the VT campus will be the same way.

Bad vibrations on this Wednesday night. It's approaching 3 a.m. and the coffee at the bottom of my mug is cold. CNN is cold. It's spring. Why is it so damn cold? Because no creature should have to receive a day like Monday on a beautiful spring morning. It's a way of keeping things in balance. Lowering the mood to accept this tragedy. But we don't see it right now, not the way we ought to. The loss of human life each day in Iraq is at least this bad, usually worse. On Monday, five U.S. soldiers died over there. Today, a bomb in a marketplace killed 150 Iraqis. Each of those dead—on both sides—had two parents, maybe brothers and sisters, maybe kids. Maybe they even were kids. We're in a climate of war and to cope we either dehumanize to create distance or hyper-humanize because we know we should feel some grief but all that dehumanizing has left us pretty fucking numb. We didn't know those kids in Virginia, but we're shaken. 3000 U.S. soldiers have died in Iraq, and we're only now starting to get upset. We went to school with them. They were our neighbors. We did know them.

But Iraq is far away. Virginia is just down there, below Maryland, and Monday's tragedy feels suspiciously like an attack on our own soil. It's impossible to draw conclusions now, so close to the event, or even predict where we'll go from here. Outside of tomorrow, nobody knows what will come next. And maybe that's for the best. In this age of global terrorism, pawn-shop terrorism, and the iLife empire, we ought to live our lives with the confidence that tomorrow is definitely coming, but at the same time, never worry about what it might bring.

War in Iraq, Media Coverage, Celebrity Gossip, etc.

I'm all over the place with this paper. I want to do it on how there is more coverage on Celebrity bull than there is on the War in Iraq. I was thinking of how whats on the news jumps from one thing to the next. Always looking for the next big thing. The war was huge for a while and was on every tv station. The next thing I knew I was hearing about a marine's wife who killed her husband for the insurance money and went and got plastic surgery. Following that was Anna Nicole and her death, everyone wanted to know how she died. Once that got old, Danny-Lynne came in and now everyone wanted to know who the kid's daddy was. Okay that kept things going for a while. But wait the war came back because Bush won't give a specific time to pull them out of Iraq. Why? I'm going to be a good girl and not say but that was pretty big. And now we have the Virgina Tech incident. That was horrible and it made national news and all that stuff. (Not trying to be insensitive, I'm very sorry about everything, but kinda trying to make to make a point). But to bring it to another step, is it the people's fault everything switches like that. How about the fact that VT happened Monday and everyone here at KU were saddened. Today, we had people on our campus causing riots. Is this the next big thing. Today all i heard people talk about was those individuals causing trouble on campus. There was no talk of VT and there was definately no talk of the war. Danny-Lynne who? And this is whats going through my mind.

Broad is not better

Is it possible to get over-inspired? Probably not, this is most likely simple overstimulation. There are so many awesome things we've been talking about in class and learning about but to narrow them down into cohesive forms to explore, that's slightly difficult, or perhaps a step beyond slightly. Frames in their culturally driven contexts sounds like a great topic, it gets my mind rolling alright, just up until I think about how I would create the frame of the paper and then *poof* the idea has evaporated into an ambiguous cloud quickly disapearing before my eyes and I'm back where I started. So this is my plan, me an google are having a hot date tonight to see what we can learn from one another (well, I'll be the one learning but its more comforting to view the situation as a two-way exchange) and maybe, just maybe, I'll have a clearer vision tomarrow.

good luck kids(meant in the best way possible, I call everyone kid)

I hate everything.

I hate my topic because I have ideas and no information to back them up. This week I am focusing on my research paper for another class, but I did print some things for this class. I just looked over my stuff and it's more bullcrap. I thought I had something, but I don't. Ebsco gave me articles from authors who wrote about common sense within a certain subject and nothing focuses on just common sense-- or the differences in common sense around the world-- The only thing I have to go on right now for this paper is my common sense of the topic--- oh ha ha. (that laughing is total sarcasm).

Your topics all sound great, but I haven't had that freakin light bulb moment and right now I feel like there is no hope for an interesting topic and I'm totally aggravated.

For now I'm going back to my other research paper, which sucks because all the information I find for my topic says the same thing. Once that agony is over, I'll continue this one.

This is not a good semester for me when it comes to topics-- summer will be welcomed with a huge smile. . . and some ice cream. . . and probably a trip to the beach *I can't wait!!!!!*

EUREKA, I'VE GOT IT!!!!!!!!! :0)

All of this talk about language had me pondering the perfect topic for our final paper. Finally I"ve got it. My topic will be...ahem drum roll please ...........................THE 'N' WORD. My inspiration came partially form Lakoff's quote "A great many focus on the respective roles of women and men: who can do and say what and what it means. Others ask the same questions about white and black persons. " she also states that these issues are about language. "who has the ability and the right to make meaning for everyone.

There are many debates about this one word that must remain nameless; shit it's language, I'm talking about the word Nigger. Some feel as if it should be ommitted from everyone's language, the word should be buried, its tombstone reading "The unspeakable: never to be ressurected again" I am in somewhat agreement of this, however we cannot bury language. And truth be told this ugly word is not dead, it is alive and well.

There is a minority of people who use the word niggah as a form of love,they've said things like " I can use it , but any non-black doesn't have the right". I can see where these people come from too, however, language isn't segregated and if these people feel that they can say it, then they should be aware that they give permission (whether they want to or not) for others to say the word as well.

The problem here isn't the word, but what the word represents. It represents racism, hatred, discrimination. But to some it represents love, I've heard ""that's ma niggah so many times" The issue is when do you determine if this word is hatred or not. Some may even argue that the racism is so engrained in our society that when blacks say the word, it is out of self hatred. I say it is a language struggle, my conclusion is none right now...sorry. I do know however that the word was taken from the spanish word negro- which means black(the spanish being very active in the slave trade)....it then morphed to the word nigger, probably by some racist bastard in Mississippi who can't read (don't worry Prof. Mahoney, I will do my research) and here we are in the year 2007, and we are battling this ugly word, which was a big mispronunciation and you wouldn't believe the pain it causes. I was called nigger by a passing driver, my freshmen year and it hurted. I started to cry and then I stopped myself realizing this was probably the response he wanted. Then I said "FUCK YOU, YOU ARE THE NIGGER!!" It made me feel better and I'm sure the driver wasn't expecting that one at all!

I couldn't think of a fitting title for an imcomplete thought.

So rather than discuss anything specific about Lakoff, I would much rather take this moment to discuss my own feelings about this entire semantics thing.

It fascinates me. The more I learn about the English language (or simply language in general), the more I love/hate it. People can be torn apart--psychoanalyzed to their bare bones--simply by isolating the words they use.

Eggshell mines line every square inch of this battlefield, and if you don't watch your step, you might lose some limbs. Analysis of language is such a powerful device, it seems that by arguing the use of language, one can shut down another almost too easily.

I know I said I wasn't planning to discuss anything specifically Lakoff, but look at the entire thing about the apology.

Nine-million ways to apologize for something, and each letter of each word offers a window into a person's subconscious. Ugh... it's stressful to think about it.

The worst part, I feel as though I am slowly beginning to abuse the use of this tool as well. The more I learn, the more aware I become of its power. It is control and it is manipulation. It offers insight, and sometimes too much of it. It is the flux capacitor of the defense mechanism. It is a cloud.

And the irony of it? Without understanding it, one cannot protect himself from it. Yet, once one understands it, he is fully capable of succumbing to it. He now has the potential to use it against those still unaware, and seemingly--more often than not--will . Sounds like that symbiote thing from Spiderman. It grants one power, but almost too much. People lose control too easily. We're quite the glutton.

So rant I shall. I can go on forever and ever and an even longer time than that. But what good would it do? All that will come of it is a lot of stress. I can see from all sides. I can understand them. Hell, make me a good enough point, and I'll surely agree with you, only to find an even more convincing point sometime later on some opposite shore of the argument.

I guess what I'm saying is "I get this." I don't fully understand all of it--I'm just a sophomore in college, far from being an expert anything. Well, I'm an expert at being me. I guess I have that.

Final Paper= Agony

PLEASE- I am having trouble thinking of a final paper. I thought about it for a while now and I may have a few ideas but not enough for 10 pages...............

Is anyone else feeling like this???

Mahoney we need major talking about this paper tom!!!!!
hahahah

See you all tom:0)

Final paper topic anyone?

I hope I'm not the only one floundering for a topic...I should be used to this annoying "process" of last minute brilliant ideas, but the moments before that last minute is always so painful.
In class the other day I noticed some of us have a pretty solid idea for a final paper topic, and yet I barely have a focus. *tear* I do know, however, that I would like to focus on time- how things exist in our world in a very final manner- to be very cliche- they exist only in a moment in time. Such as a conversation, a communal feeling (like in a crowd at a concert), music, etc...I have no idea where to go with this or if this will even work in this assignment. But there it is...

ps- I really like to use ellipses...

Oh, Lakoff

So, I tried to post this last Wednesday and for some reason it didn't show up. Let's hope it works this time...

I have come to the conclusion that getting anything done once the weather is nice is nearly impossible. I have been so far behind in reading Lakoff it’s ridiculous. I finally got caught up over break while working from 5:15 am until 12:30 pm. The worst shift in the world, but the best time to get things done. When I finally had seven hours of free time (and yes where I work it is free time) I got to know Lakoff.
I found most everything she had to say interesting and though provoking. I understood what she was trying to say. The section on apologies which we talked about in class, I completely understood what she meant. Putting yourself out there and admitting you did something wrong, making yourself vulnerable to the person you wronged-dead on. What also interested me was how she incorporated news stories into her book. The latest story that received Undue Attention was the Anna Nicole’s death and “baby daddy” scandal. It’s funny to see in a scholarly text book all the stories that have fascinated the world and for reasons that seem somewhat unnecessary.
As I read this book I realized how useful this would have been for me while writing our last paper. I focused on word choice and how people in power use them, Lakoff explores just that. She says that language is constantly changing and evolving along with the times. “If we can stop language from changing, and if language both reflects and creates our reality, we could…just maybe…stop real-world change,” (75). I loved this point. She says that language really does have an impact on the world, which was just the point I was trying to prove in my paper. Wow, this Lakoff sure makes a lot of sense.


Side note: When I wrote this is was sooo sunny and nice out, what happened? I hate the rain. That's all, see you in class on Tuesday.

If I Only Had a Brain

Unfortunately, I was not as enlightened as you Kristi. Yesterday, I found myself driven by our class discussion of apologies, but it has since yielded no fruit for a final paper. It is however interesting that we crave attention to our wounds by means of receiving an apology. In this sense, we do not seek the apology at all, rather the simple words "I'm sorry" as meaning "I recognize that I hurt you. Are you OK?"
I also think it strange that as Americans we have adapted our language to become lazy. Words generally have several meanings, and without context clues or extensive knowledge of our culture, our American words can trip you up. We have condensed our language to say what we mean in the least possible syllables, leaving much to interpretation. When did this happen? Why did this happen? And are we only going to continue in this word cutting, or will one day will we wake up to find that we no longer understand what the other is saying?

Today's Discussion on Lakoff

Today's discussion on Lakoff really left me a bit inspired. As I thought about it on my drive home from class, I thought of a few ideas I should have bought up in class, but unfortunately didn't think of them at the time. Therefore, my post for this week will include my "afterthoughts" of today's discussion.
My first epiphany, I guess you could say, has to do with our talk about apologies. Someone mentioned that sometimes an apology is unwanted or unneeded. For example, if someone rear-ends you in traffic and they get out of their car and say "I'm sorry" it doesn't matter, it won't fix my broken rear fender that now has to ride shotgun until I can get it replaced. HOWEVER, if you were in that situation, and the person that rear-ended you just got out of their car and stared at their handiwork, wouldn't you get a bit angry that they didn't apologize for their mistake? It may make you think that they don't care, or even meant to do it. In a situation like this, sometimes an apology is better than no apology at all, whether or not it is accepted.
Secondly, our discussion about common sense and the norm. It is difficult anymore to say what exactly is common sense or the norm. Is common sense simply knowing that a green light means "go" and red "stop"? Or is it more geared toward how one should live their life totally? What kind of car we should drive, what type of house we should live in, how big our salaries are. Common sense/norm is such a broad subject now, it is hard to define exactly what it is.
Well anyway, I'm thinking of exploring both these topics in next week's post about my final paper idea.
Until then...

It's not what you know, but who you know

Much like the wars of our fathers of yesterday and our brothers of today, the outcome of Robin Lakoff’s “Language War” depends on who is wielding the sword. In the hands of a skilled and feared soldier, a sword can level a battlefield of opponents; but in the trembling grip of a boy quickly turned killer, a sword is nothing more than a clumsy, heavy burden to the one who holds it.
Throughout the Language War, Lakoff emphasizes it is not just what is said, but who says it. In one example, Lakoff describes the politics involved in hiring university staff. One candidate may be more qualified, but the other is a woman, and to satisfy the quota, the university hires the woman. In this case, it didn’t matter what each candidate said, it only mattered that one was a woman.
While on the surface Lakoff describes to her readers scenarios which individuals fight for his or her words to be heard. Underlying all her examples Lakoff, however unknowingly, feeds to her readers the importance of who said over what is said. Take for example her introduction. Throughout she searches for a definitive characteristic of the “linguistics,” but she leaves the reader with a brief overview of her liberal viewpoints rather than lead them into the first discussion with several possible definitions. She laid the groundwork for her readers who are potentially susceptible to her “liberal” views to accept her arguments by stating that she is a “liberal.” By defining what she is, rather than letting her arguments define her, Lakoff has successfully won the attention of a certain demographic of readers, and more hopefully the attention of those who will take her arguments to heart.

Ok so...it's almost 12:30 and I really wish I could write a better response but I don't have the energy right now. So..here's my response:

Who is to say, really, what is “correct” grammar and what isn’t? I feel like this correct grammar is shoved down our throat, but what happens if we are taught something differently due to the way things are spoken at home? Perhaps in certain urban schools, the teachers speak in ebonics? Does that mean the students in that classroom are taught to speak incorrectly? Or just differently from the norm.
Now, I am an English major and I fully believe in every way, shape, and form, that there should be a certain ruling when it comes to what’s proper for the workplace, and what slang should remain at home. I just feel like sometimes we jump to conclusions too quickly when it comes to grammar.
For example, my mother is a very educated woman. She is a registered nurse and on her way to becoming Director of Nursing at the hospital, but when we are in our kitchen her grammar is so completely wrong that someone who doesn’t know her could claim her as unintelligent. She is anything but.
Therefore, I feel like we shouldn’t be so quick to jump to conclusions about people when it comes to grammar. It almost hurts me to say this, because of my major, and because anyone who knows me knows that I am such a stickler for grammar it’s ridiculous, but we need to be a little more lenient when it comes to grammar nowadays. I think there could be a good system if we actually thought about it in regards to grammar levels and systems of acceptance in this country.

PCed out...But digging the frames

Reading through Lakoff's war of language has proved to be a dynamic experience thus far. There are moments when I'm rolling right along with her, linking the concepts she discusses with my own life and the society I'm surrounded by. Then, without a bit of warning, I'm sliding to a stop as Lakoff goes so deeply into the ins and outs of particular topics that I find my thoughts wandering, my eyes sneaking to the window and my entire focus shifing out of the book completely.

But lets look at the good first. Frames and their connection with the human perception and expectation of reality is one of the most facinating concepts I've come across in college. So much of how people think is based on what they've been taught to expect from certain situations, to the extent that we base our realities off of those perceptions. When I first came to college I had this frame in mind that had been formed through college brochures full of studious twenty-somethings and rolling, green campuses with historical buildings. I associated college with learning, meeting people, taking out loans to pay for it and then scoring a job afterward to cover the debts. It was at first difficult to see things any other way when I began my freshman year, but eventually it hit me that the reason I wasn't crazy about college was simply because it wasn't in sync with the idealistic reality I'd created it to be in my head. This is a powerful thing, the concept of framing ideas and concepts.

Also enjoyable was the discussion of language and control. Some say language is changing, losing its propriety and this is a bad thing because language should be within our control when the rest of the rapidly changing world is not.

Lakoff began to lose me, however, when she introduced the topic of PC. At first it was all well and great, yes! so what exactly does PC mean anyway? But then she went on for pages, and pages, and then I lost track of the pages because I honestly stopped caring.

So it hasn't all been a pleasant journey, but wholly informative regardless, what else was I expecting anyway?

Lakoff

When considering Lakoff, the most profound area that caught my attention focused on Apology.
This as a whole got me thinking that about our society and the society norm. When people apologize, do they really mean it or is it just something that we say when we technically want to end the issue or just say "I'm sorry" so no feelings are hurt. On the contrary, sometimes I apologize for things that I actually really meant at that time but just throw in the over used phrase just as a defense tactic.
Until this reading, I have never really thought about apologies or how they are used all the time, and probably not 100% sincere. But why do we say I'm sorry? Do we mean it? Do we just say it because it is what we are used too? I think it has become such a habit that we do not care what comes out of our mouths or think before we say something because we can always say "I'm sorry" for something that was not taken lightly.
When considering the situation with the cat, all phrases in some way or another, place blame on the owner of the cat, the cat itself, or the person who stepped on the cat. Just a slight shift in words can change the apology from a personal offense to putting blame on the other. With this in mind on such a trivial situation, we can see the larger picture as people changing a few words just to fit a right response, Thinking of the 'right response,' it brings me back to the word labs ( hahah I know I know) that we studied for our last paper. I drew connects between apology and word labs. If we consider apologies giving another person what they want to hear, are we or are we not using what Luntz demonstrated.
For me it is strange to think that the apology is in a sense giving another person what they want to hear, but how many times do we do it? How many times do we do something and apologize for it later, whether we really and honestly mean it?
This is just one notion that I find extremely interesting.
This is how we work and how words and phrases become a"language war."

Reading Response

Reading through "The Language War" by Robin Tolmach Lakoff there were a couple of issues that caught my attention. The first point that I chose to focus on was the section titled, "The Uncommonness of Common Sense" (48). This idea was brought up in the bok by Ramage as well. It brings up the question of what exactly is common sense and is it even a real thing? Lakoff says, "What seems common sense at one moment, or in one society, is anything but in another"(49). So what we have always thought of as the definition of common sense really doesn't hold true. Things are only common sense when grouped into a frame of people with the same views. Therefore, someone from another culture would have a different set of common sense ideas because they are grouped in a different frame. Expanding further on this idea, Lakoff discusses the struggle to not only stay within that frame of "commonsense" but also to stay "mainstream". People seem to be content with staying in the middle and avoid being labled an "extremist", which seems to label anyone thinking outside of the box. Isn't it ironic how when we are young, we are told to be individuals and make a unique life for ourselves, yet, as we grow we realize that as much as we are told that, we are still bombarded with the ideas of society that require us to be "moderate" to "fit in".

Christine M Henry

Advance Composition

April 9, 2007

1 page

“I’m sorry I stepped on your cat.

I’m sorry the cat got stepped on.

The cat looks upset.

Why was the cat under my foot?

Can’t the damn animal watch where it’s going?

You shouldn’t have let the cat in the room.” (The Language War, p. 24)

This quote presents several interesting scenarios. The point of these series of statements is to demonstrate the forms that an apology can take.

The first line may be genuine. It acknowledges the action/wrongdoing, “stepping on”. It sort of acknowledges the hurt party, “the cat” (although the apology is directed at the owner). And it might be assumed that the person making the apology needs to be forgiven, but you really cannot be sure.

The second line isn’t as genuine, or at least isn’t as clear. It does everything the first line does, except, acknowledge that the speaker is the wrongdoer.

The third line isn’t an apology at all. All it does is state a fact. The emotional state of the cat.

The forth line starts to place the blame on the cat. By trying to make it seem like the cat placed itself under the foot.
The fifth line places all the blame on the cat, and don’t mention the action at all.

And the sixth line places all of the blame onto the owner of the cat.

Oh My...

Response to Lakoff
One of the many sections in Language War that I really liked was on “The Stories That Make The News.” I was able to understand how we, as people, put entertainment before importance and urgency. We would rather hear about Anna Nicole and her baby drama, then to hear about our soldiers who are over there dying for this country. Yes it is true that many people don’t agree with the war and yes the war has been going on for a long time now. However, the bottom line is that anytime people are dying daily and anytime there is a severe debate like the war or anything else on that level that should be number one. But instead of that being number one we are watching Judge Judy and then at the bottom of the screen there is a line talking about the war or decisions made by Congress.
Another section I liked was “Apologies As Language Politics.” According to Lakoff, “In making an apology, the maker (1) acknowledges wrongdoing; (2) acknowledges that the addressee is the wronged party; (3) admits needing something (forgiveness) from the addressee to make things right again.” If one were to go by this definition of an apology it would be safe to say that it is very rare for people to apologize and actually mean it. An apology today is some one saying, “I’m sorry” or “I apologize”. There is no meaning in this! Why is the person apologizing? In my opinion, apologies today have become routine and therefore no longer mean anything. It’s just become a standard way especially for women. A lot of the time women apologize for things that don’t even really need an apology but it’s a learned behavior.
Next we have “Linguistic Prescriptivism”. This section was all about language and I definitely agree that language is constantly changing. I also believe that it is a good thing. In class we talked about ebonics being accepted in schools. I have to say that I think that’s okay to a certain extent. I am okay with ebonics being used in elementary school. At that point I feel that trying to hear the students is more important than how they are saying whatever it is that they are saying. I do believe that ebonics should not be accepted in high school or college at all. I feel that at this point people should be speaking proper English.
These are just my opinions about Lakoff and the text and how I took them.

"How do you know that?" . . . "It's common sense!"

I wrote a list of topics we covered in class. It was difficult to pick one that interested me so much, I would want to write a 10 page paper about it. I am still thinking of ideas, but for now, what most interests me is common sense. Luckily, this topic is covered by Lakoff and so I will use this post as a starting point for exploring my ideas.

I have always used common sense to make my decisions and to decide right from wrong. Lakoff writes that “We think of ‘common sense’ itself as based on reality and our own down-to-earth, theory-free, hardheaded observations of that reality.” I completely agree, but what makes it common sense is that many other people think the same way.

What intrigues me is who decides what common sense is. How do so many people decide to believe in the same thing? What makes that idea right and why should people follow? How is common sense changing and why are things that were not acceptable before, acceptable now?

Lakoff also writes that people who have views other than the ones of common sense, must justify their positions, while those who use common sense don’t need any validation. I can see how this is true. While I don’t need any explanation for having manners (“Please can I have that?”), I expect those who don’t to have some excuse or at least to say ‘sorry’ (“Give that to me.” --- “What?”).

It is easy to see the change in common sense when using scientific examples. One thing Lakoff writes is “That a woman played an active role in determining her child’s genetic characteristics would have seemed equally absurd: it was ‘obvious’ that she was only the vessel that contained the homunculus donated by the father, which came complete with all heritable traits.” We now commonly know that it is both the mother and father who contribute to the traits of their offspring, thanks to science.

In social situations, there is usually no tangible proof for change. It used to be common sense for a man to be chivalrous. To open a door for a woman, or simply act like a gentleman was just done, but now it is common sense that a woman is independent and is perfectly capable of opening a door herself. Also, men tend to act more like burping/farting men, rather then well-behaved men.

The above example is something that is still in the changing phase because many women still want to be swept of their feet, yet want to be seen as independent, which put men in a difficult situation; however, that’s another topic. It is also an example of how we hold on to old common sense. Lakoff writes “Change always entails struggle, often as now taking the form of a ‘language war,’ because we defend old frames, and create new ones, through language.”

Yeah… the more I explore common sense, the more I want to use it for my final research paper.

Wow...

So my first thoughts reading Lakoff was I'd rather be reading Ramage. However, I have to say that there are a lot of god points in The Language War. One part I liked was The Stories that make the news. We talked about that in class, specifically about Anna Nicole and how everyone is always looking for the next best thing. Starting off with this definately grabbed my attention, especially after that dry introduction. As I was reading I began to think more and more about the paper we just wrote and how if I had read that introduction beforehand, maybe my paper would look better. J/k, my paper is...my paper. I also liked when Lakoff talks about apologies and it made me think about how much people really mean it when they apologies. I thought about whether or not I really mean it when I apologize. To be honest, a lot of the time I apologize because I'm supposed to so whether or not I feel sorry doesn't matter because apologizing is what's suppose to be done.
"Neutrality is advantageous only if it can be exploited and extended into an effective means of persuasion." Thankyou Lakoff for making me regret, already, having to read this book. I'm going to leave it at that.

Yeah...

So I've kind of come to a conclusion about the topics of this course and it has helped me understand that I will only ever slightly understand anything we talk about and that it's Okay.

Everything we've read is air. Not concrete or solid-- nothing easy to grasp. Just floating thoughts that can cause a frustrated break down unless we somehow make sense of it- even if the sense is a bit off-center.

Not every concept of every reading results in the above, but I think you'll agree that a lot of it does.

That is what ties this course together-- the theme is confusion based on the question 'how' and the number of possible opinions on each topic.

I came to this conclusion while reading Lakoff's ideas about the words we use to define male and female. This whole language thing is another mix of who and why and how, but never exact-- just like persuasion and rhetoric and opinion. It's all a bunch of ideas because these are topics that allow for many ideas, which isn't a bad thing, but a thing that I have to accept. You cannot tell me 1 + 2 = 3 because guess what... in this class there are a million different ways to get to three and while were on the topic, who decided to create these numbers and what makes three the answer?

I'm not complaining, though it may sound that way. It's just a WoNdErFuL conclusion!