Final Blog

This semester in sociology has taught me a lot about concepts I already knew about but this time, I was learning them in a much different way. The idea of race or gender to me was something I took for granted. It was a social norm to think of race as the color of ones skin or gender as whether you're a boy or a girl and this is exactly how I thought too.

When we were given the prompt in the beginning of the year about who we are I only talked about the individual that I am. Although many of the characteristics I had listed were probably true, there is a lot more to me than what I wrote. I did not talk about all the other aspects of my life that made me the person I am today. I didn't talk nearly enough about my background, the different enviornments I've lived in and the ways that those enviornments made me who I am today. I also left out a lot about the people around me. I have learned over the course of this semester that while you might be who you are or percieved in such a specific way, there is reasoning behind it and that reasoning is almost just as important as the actual charateristics itself.

I have began to think in a much different light about this than I did before I took sociology. I question more and find myself thinking more outside of the normal social box now. I think this is because of all of the lessons I've seen in the last 18 weeks. They have made me realize that although people perceive the world to be a certain way, it is ok to question it and find out more because you might take a whole new approach to an idea after learning more about it which can help and individual grow tremendously.

Race

This week in sociology we watched the movie Crash. It tied together all of the concepts of race we had been talking about in the past few weeks. A lot of the characters while they were being stereotyped into a certain race were taking offense to it but doing it right back to another race which I found interesting and the more I thought about it, the more I believe that really exists in our society. These people create such harsh judgements based on a persons skin tone or people they surround themselves in and the movie shows how these people are actually very different from the way people portray them. 

I see it everywhere around me people being portrayed in a specific way. Blacks as the bad kids, asians as the smart ones, whites as the good ones and these stereotypes mean nothing. We learned that the color of someones skin does not determine their race and in America we have a very broad generalization for what race a person is. I think it is also unfair to think of these people in a certain way because while there may be a few black trouble makers or a few really smart asian kids, there can also be extremely intellegent and successful people who have dark skin (for example our president) and people from asian descent who are not smart at all. The color of ones skin should mean nothing about their personality, morals or beliefs, something that I feel like the movie we are watching represents very well.

Race

This week in sociology we talked about race. We discovered that race is a creation of society and there is no clear definition of race because every society thinks of race in a different way cWe learbed how some countries have over 50 (in some cases) descriptions of what race is which, living in the United Stares is something I have never thought about doing before. I also found it interesting how America categorizes race by a few main categories such as White, Black, Asian, Pacific Islander, or Latino. Although it was common to see most of those on applications and questionarres i never really put much thought into how discriminatory that actually was. And it doesn't have to be done like that.

This new concept of race I want to apply to my life. I want to start thinking of people more in the way that other more accepting countries do. I realize it is hard because in the United States we think completely differently but doing my best not to automatically categorize people by the race they were given is a very good start.

Students Helping Soldiers Community Service

For my 9th and 10th hours of community service I helped out Mr. Moran and Ms. Bush in the Stevenson ran Students Helping Soldiers club. They were preparing for the Veterans Baseball Game against Buffalo Grove High School so me and some of the people in the club wanted to help out since it was such a hit last year. We went out and bought all sorts of things and found restaurants that wanted to donate to the baseball game. We also decorated the field with cups in the fences and american flags all around the baseball field, after school, the day before the game. Some people in the club made a Facebook event that people could RSVP to and we did our best to get the word out there about the game. We spent a lot of time preparing for the game and it ended in a total success. I was not able to attend the game because I was out of town but from what I heard the turnout was amazing, it was a nice, warm and sunny day so tons of people came and the veterans were proud to be able to be there and all of the members of Students Helping Soldiers were glad they were there too!

Kildeer Book Fair Community Service

For my 1st and 2nd hours I helped out at the Kildeer Book Fair by selling pizza. Each year the school puts on a book fair and the proceeds go towards the school to help with projects within the school and the money sold for the pizza does too.
When we got there we met the women in charge of the book fair. They showed us around a little bit and then took us to the cafeteria where we had to set up. We put up the signs showing where the pizza would be so that parents could find us and then took some of the pizzas out of the warm oven and cut them up. There were a few people there also volunteering so some of us handed out pizza, while others passed out napkins and others collected money. I was mainly in charge of the pizza but we all switched off a little. We interacted with the kids and their parents, learned about the books they got and had a lot of fun. At the end of the two hour shift we took down the signs, and distributed the left over pizza to people still in the building. We also cleaned up the cafeteria and in the back where we kept the pizzas and other things we were selling.

Feed My Starving Children Community Service

For my 5th through 8th hours of community service I went and volunteered at Feed My Starving Children in Libertyville. Since each session is only and hour and a half, I went twice.
When you get there you have to sign in on the computer for the party name and sift you signed up for. Then you go and sit down and wait for the presentation to begin. The people who work at the organization put together a video informing the volunteers what their company is all about and what their food and our help can do to impact these hungry children around the world. Once the video is over you have to go and wash your hands so none of your germs get on the food you are packaging since the people in these countries may not have the immunities we do to certain things. Then we stand around and the lady who is in charge, Kathy, talks about what we will be doing. She explains the different things that go into each bag, how much of what to put in each bag and how many bags go into each box. Then we split up into tables and get to work.
I traded off my position a lot and went from pouring the vegetable pieces to sealing bags mainly. After an hour and a half of working we had to clean up. The person doing each job in the creation of the food bags is assigned a clean up job. I had to wash the dishes so I took the dirty supplies over to the dish washers, waited for it to go through their cycle then I had to dry them and bring them back.
Once everyone was done cleaning up all of the volunteers had the option to go into the storage room and pray. After that, we all went back out to the main area where we watched another video as they tallied up how much we had boxed that night. I was amazed when I heard the numbers! We had boxed 97 boxes which they said would feed 57 kids for an entire year.

Donating Blood For Community Service

For my 5th hour of community service I donated blood. My dad has always gone and donated every few months for as long as I can remember so when I heard about the blood drive at school, one of my friends talked me into doing it with her. Although I was extremely nervous, I decided to go with her anyway. After watching a small mishap with her veins and the doctor, I became way too nervous, wimped out and left before I had the chance to donate. After I left though, I was so mad I did.
A few weeks later my dad went and took me with as a way for me to redeem myself and I did! When I went and donated for community service this was the second time that I had done it.
When I went inside I signed in and waited for my turn. They called me back and I answered a lot of questions and they had to check my blood for the correct iron levels. Once they cleared me I went and sat in the chair. They poked me with the needle but it wasn't too painful and it only took about 10 minutes. When it was over they put a bandaid on it which I had to keep on for a few hours.