Clarkjonathanxrxp's Blog

Esay #4 Revision

clarkjonathanxrxp — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:14:51 +0000

Make It Hurt So Good
The sense of touch is a very important sense for survival. It is used to protect the body from serious injury and even death. The human body has millions and millions of nerve endings that detect the slightest stimuli. These nerve endings send signals to the brain at a lightning fast rate so the brain can decide what to do next. If the signal sent to the brain is an urgent one, the brain will react as fast as possible to protect the body. For example, if a finger on the right hand is being burnt on a stove, the brain will send a signal to the finger to move it away from the heat source. All of this happens so fast and so regularly that it is often never given any thought at all. Even though it does not receive the recognition it deserves, the sense of touch keeps doing its job, day after day without complaint. It keeps the person relatively safe from extreme harm no matter how thankful they are for their sense of touch.
The sense of touch also brings pleasure to its owner. The touch of a lover is a heart-warming sense that engulfs an individual completely in a utopia of happiness. Children especially cherish the touch of their mother and crave the attention and physical closeness it brings. Infants in particular need the touch of their mother to develop properly and live happily. Diane Ackerman talks about how premature infants are set on touching schedules when nurses or volunteers hold and massage the baby for a certain amount of time. Ackerman herself volunteered to hold the premature infants and she massaged and stroked the babies three times a day. She describes how she performs each touch session:
“First I stroke his head and face very slowly, six times for ten seconds each time, then his neck and shoulders six times. I slide my hands down his back and massage it in long sweeping motions six times, and caress his arms and legs six times. The touching can’t be light, or it well tickle him, nor rough, or it will agitate him, but firm and steady, as if one were smoothing a crease from heavy fabric” (Ackerman 72).
These touch sessions that she and many others take part in are a vital part of increasing these premature babies’ chances for survival. “Just by stroking him I am performing a life-giving act” (Ackerman 73). Ackerman says that theses babies that are touched and massaged regularly put on weight up to fifty percent faster than those who are left in an incubator (Ackerman 73). For premature infants this is especially important since they are born underweight and undersized. They need to grow to the size of a normal, healthy baby as soon as possible if they want any chance of survival.
The importance of touch is clearly evident in that example of babies’ growth and development but touch is also essential in everyday conversation and interpersonal interactions in the world. The sense of touch is a part of conversation and is important in how a message is received by an individual. If one is touched lightly they usually think of the person they are talking with to be gentle, kind, and caring. For example, when two individuals shake hands, the firmness of each grip shows a great deal about someone. This can greatly affect how the words spoken are received, either for better or worse. If one is trying to convey compassion but roughly touches the individual they are consoling, that individual could feel even more frightened and the gentle words being spoken are rendered completely useless and ineffective. The opposite is also true, when someone is attempting to scold a child but gently touches them, the reprimand is not taken the way it was originally intended.
Deborah Chen and June Downing believe that visually impaired children especially need their sense of touch to be stimulated when they are being communicated with. They believe that this tactile dialogue helps the child to understand and trust their caretaker much more because of the physical connection between the two (Every 29-34). Trust is very important when one cannot see or when they are not familiar with the layout of a certain area because they are completely helpless when it comes to knowing what direction to go.
Although the sense of touch is put to use by everybody every single day of their lives, it is pushed to the back of their minds because they tend to take it for granted. The sense of touch loyally completes its duties quietly and quickly. Touch doesn’t care what color, race, ethnicity, religion, age, occupation, or intelligence level its owner is and has, it is completely unbiased. What would mankind be without the sense of touch? There would undoubtedly be more severe injuries due to not knowing when the body was in danger of being hurt. The feelings of pleasure would also never be felt without the sense of touch. Touch gives life to newborns, comfort or fear in conversation, and trust in visually impaired people, but should not only be cherished by those groups but by every individual that enjoys its blessings everyday.

Works Cited
Ackerman, Diane. A Natural History of the Senses. New York: Random House, 1990.
Chen, Deborah, and June Downing. Tactile Strategies for Children Who Have Visual Impairments and Multiple Disabilities. New York: AFB Press.
Every, David. “Communication. . .” MacKiDo. 1997. 18 Mar 2009. .

Autoethnography Revision

clarkjonathanxrxp — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 18:14:19 +0000

Why Do I Think Like This?
As I walked into my English 101 class, many thoughts filled my head about what I was about to encounter. The major concern I had about Marlen’s class was the amount of writing we were expected to do throughout the course of the semester. My high school English teachers usually made me write about four or five two-page papers during the course of the entire school year. I dreaded writing every single one of the run-of-the-mill papers. I was sick of being required to come up with a thesis, introduce the subject, provide three supporting arguments, and wrap it all up in a conclusion. I had become a robot, programmed to systematically write the traditional five-paragraph essay on virtually any subject I was given. The repetition of these writings had taught me to hate writing with a passion and I expected that I would hate writing even more after the class came to an end.
Marlen shook up my idea of writing within the first fifteen minutes of class when he had us answer the question “What is I?” on our blogs. This was difficult for me because I was accustomed to reading books and regurgitating the information back at the teacher. I was never really required to think and write at the same time so this was fairly new for me.
I though for a while about what this special “I” meant to me before I started writing. I already knew the answer to “Who Am I?” and “What Am I?” but Marlen’s question “What Is I?” somewhat confused me. This “I” we were asked to think about was much more than our names, ages, and any other physical characteristics. This “I” seemed to hold a deeper meaning than just our physical appearances. After reading Kawai’s article, ((ARTICLE NAMEEE)), I began to get an idea about just how vast “I” really was. I answered the difficult question in my first piece of writing and first ever blog post after about five minutes of heavy thinking.
“If someone were to try to figure out the answer to the ‘What is I?’ question they would have to have a completely open mind. They might believe that their ‘I’ is no more than their characteristics and personality. While others might say that ‘I’ includes who they interact with, influence, or even, everyone they have seen and met. With everyone’s opinions being different, this question ‘What is I?’ may never be answered but should be thought about and kept in perspective.”
I really began to understand that I would need to expand my thinking after I completed the first short blog entry of the semester. I became used to “thinking inside the box” during high school just so I could complete the assignments. I thought writing was a chore enough already. Deep thinking and putting meaning into pieces of writing was just extra work and only teacher’s pets and overachievers devoted more than a few hours to a writing assignment. Since I was seeking only a decent grade for my essays, all of that extra effort seemed like a waste of time to me.
Our first full essay was supposed to be a narrative on any aspect of the sense of taste and how it is important to us. When I read the requirements I had no idea what to write about or even where to start thinking about a topic for my story. I had a particularly difficult time with trying to think of a story to tell involving my sense of taste. It was hard for me because I rarely ever got chances to write narratives in my high school writing classes. Every piece of required writing seemed to be a reaction to something that I had read for the class. Even when I was able to write a narrative, the subject was always laid out for me in the requirements. Since I never had to come up with my own original story, I forgot how to use creative thinking in my writing. Before I was introduced to formal writing in high school, I was an extremely creative writer. I would constantly be writing poetry and short stories in my free time. One of my narratives won a contest and was even published at a local library. My free sense of creative writing was hunted down and killed in those four years of high school and was replaced with a more standard form that was confined to the five-paragraph genre.
I wasn’t used to having the sort of freedom Marlen gave us with the first essay. Even after the chains were loosened on my creative writing, I still felt reigned in by my own constraints on my writing. I never thought that any of my ideas were exciting enough to let other people read. I would get an idea and then it would seem less and less interesting the more I thought about how I would want to write it. I had to consult a close friend who is very creative and tells me many stories to pass the time at our jobs. She suggested to me that I write about why I do not like birthday cake.
“‘Hey mom,’ I asked as we unpacked the groceries, ‘do you think I could have a pie for my birthday this year?’ She looked a little surprised and didn’t answer for a few seconds. ‘Well, yeah, I guess, if that’s what you want. It’s your birthday.’ I was half expecting her to go into the tradition and how the grandparents might not like it, but she pleasantly surprised me when she said it was okay. One of my grandmother’s favorite activities during the Cake and Ice Cream’s is to take one of the candles out of the cake after they are all blown out and lick the icing off of it. I remembered that she would get a sad look on her face if somehow the candles ran out before she was able to get one for herself. Then I realized that pie doesn’t have icing.”
After I wrote my first sense essay, I realized how easy it was for me to write narratives when I was given the freedom to write on any subject I wanted. If I decided to write about real-life experiences I could expound more and add a lot of details because I was actually there when the events happened. Even though I have an awful memory, details that cater to the five senses really stick out to me and most of my memories are associated with them. Déjà vu is constantly happening to me, usually through noises and feelings. I realized that I’m not very good at making up details to add to stories and that writing about personal experiences help me to make my narratives more exciting and informative for my audience to read.
Our second sense essay was on the sense of sight. We were to find a picture that held special meaning to us and describe how it related to our sense of sight. This assignment was also fairly difficult for me to begin working on because I don’t usually place very much importance on certain pictures. I like live sights in the real world because they are more exciting to me. The one aspect of photography that I love is how pictures capture so much of what was happening at that specific instance.
It is said that a picture is worth one thousand words, but I believe they are worth even more than one thousand. The pure, unadulerated, raw emotions that are captured during that split-second are enough to tell and epic story. I tried to think of a picture that captured someones unsuppressed feelings and emotions. After about two days of thinking what picture I have strong feelings about, I finally chose a photograph of Mario Lemieux holding the Stanley Cup above his head.
“Every time I look at that picture I am reminded of how much happiness he received when he finally accomplished his goal of winning the Stanley Cup. The recognition of playoff MVP was very special but a secondary thought of his as he raised the treasured trophy high above his head with pride. The sight of his tears of extreme joy show how hard he worked to get to that point. If Lemieux had not worked as hard as he did and decided not to battle through all the adversities he faced, then the Pittsburgh Penguins might still be on the quest for their first Championship Title.”
I learned exactly how much importance the game of hockey holds in my life after I completed the essay on sight. I just as easily could have chosen a picture of one of my family members, a family pet, or a particularly beautiful landscape to write about. When I remembered the photograph of Mario Lemieux receiving the Stanley Cup, I knew how much I admired and looked up to him. His passion and self-determination influenced me to always try my best and never give up in life. His values affected the way I thought and acted and that is why I place so much importance on his picture.
The third required essay was to show the importance that we put on the sense of smell. This essay was extremely difficult for me to write, mainly due to the fact that I could not figure out what genre I wanted to write in. I only knew of a few main writing genres, such as narrative, persuasive, and informational. Most of my high school writings were either informational or persuasive and those were what I was used to writing. I never knew that there was such a thing as a multi-genre essay and had no idea which genres would even work together. I did not think that I was ready as a writer to write in two genres consecutively and was nervous and somewhat confused about the process.
I knew that Marlen wanted us to expand our ideas of what writing was so I chose to attempt a relatively easy mix of genres. I decided to write a newspaper article exposing information on the sense of smell. I knew that newspaper articles usually told a story or exposed information using descriptive details. It almost seemed like writing a research paper to me. I was to go on a fact-finding mission to find information and tell what I learned about the subject. I strengthened my thought that I was mostly interested in facts and information after I was done writing my essay.
“The action of smelling is easy to perform but it takes a very complex chain of events to smell a certain scent. Smell starts with microscopic odor particles that are floating in the air that enter the nose. These particles are filtered out of the air by the thousands of mucus-covered hairs in the nose, called cilia, which are found in the nose. The mucus on the cilia dissolves the odorants and they cling to receptors on the cilia. The binding process releases a G protein which activates adenylyl cyclase, which then makes its way to the Cyclic AMP. The cAMP controls the flow of sodium through ligand-gated channels and the introduction of sodium to the cell causes an electric signal to travel from the olfactory nerve to the brain. The brain then processes and interprets these signals and identifies the odors and smells.”
After I wrote the essay on smell I finally realized that Marlen was having us write about each of the five senses. I never gave much thought on how my senses worked or how important they were to my life before that point. I, like my essays assume everyone else does, took my five senses for granted every day. I began to really consider how each affected my day-to-day life and what it would be like without even one of them.
I started thinking what I was going to write about for my touch essay earlier than I had for the others. A good idea for this essays subject too, eluded me and I still could not come up with my own. My mom gave me the idea to write about how blind people use their walking sticks to find their way around the world. Since I usually gain my ideas and brain-storming patterns from what other people might say, I came up with a few more examples of how touch is used in everyday life. I also decided to incorporate some of what Diane Ackerman had to say about touch in her book. The part where she described how she cared for new-borns by gently massaging them daily interested me very much and I studied into that subject further.
“These touch sessions that she and many others take part in are a vital part of the chance of these babies surviving and ‘just by stroking him I am performing a life-giving act’. Ackerman says that theses babies that are touched and massaged regularly put on weight up to fifty percent faster than those who are left in an incubator. For premature infants this is especially important since they are born underweight and undersized. They need to grow to the size of a normal, healthy baby as soon as possible if they want any chance of survival.”
Along with how the sense of touch is vitally important to premature infants, I discussed how different touches can affect how communication and messages are received. When I added the section on how the firmness of a handshake can affect what type of first impression is made, I realized that my business side was coming out in my touch essay. I had never thought that I would ever mix the ideology of two of my classes together, but the openness of the assignment allowed my mind to draw seemingly non-existent relations between the two.
I thought that the fifth and final essay on hearing would be impossible for me to write just one week after my touch essay. I was completely out of ideas and had no idea how to write another four page essay on one of the senses and still make it interesting to read. I began to feel like I was resorting back to how I wrote for my high school papers. I was just stringing together grammatically correct sentences that had almost none of my personal voice. I knew that I needed to start writing about things that were important to, and affected me.
I went home the weekend before the essay was to be due and begged my mother to help me think of a subject to write about. Almost immediately she blurted out that I should write about deaf people an how they communicate with each other using Sign Language. This subject had more importance to me than the previous one because my entire family used to study Sign Language. The main reason we learned Sign Language was because one of our best family friends’ daughter was deaf and we needed a means to communicate with her. I took my mothers idea and expounded on it to include the importance that is placed on being able to hear and communicate in today’s business-oriented world. This also affected me, again, because of my future involvement with the business world.
“The need for communication in today’s business-oriented world has forced those with hearing disorders to find ways to cope and be able to function normally. This is the reason Sign Language was invented and is used so frequently by people around the world today. There are even different languages within Sign Language in which one can sign their thoughts and communicate with other people. Sign Language lifts the barrier of communication for deaf people that was forced there due to their lack of the sense of hearing. Even after they are able to fully communicate through the use of their hands, they are still seen as being disabled.”
The fifth and final sense essay really brought me back to where Marlen had wanted us to be as writers. I felt like I had already met his expectations for having us open up as writers but had strayed from that at some point during the semester. My high school writing style really came to the forefront in the middle three sense essays. I had more than likely resorted back to my cookie cutter writing simply to get the essays done on time. I had not allowed myself enough time to let my personal writing style take over and make the paper my own. I did not use my “I” to help me write the essays on sight, smell, and touch. I learned that our personal “I” can really influence us as writers and help to make writing more interesting.
After I wrote an essay for all five senses I came to realize that I was a zombie writer. I blindly followed the same pattern every time I wrote and had difficulty breaking from it. My fear of writing differently came from getting poor feedback whenever I tried to stretch the norm and write freely. Marlen’s class helped me to reach beyond my comfort zone in writing and try different things every time I write.

Autoethnography Reflection

clarkjonathanxrxp — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 12:15:06 +0000

When i first started my autoethnography i really didn’t know what i was supposed to do. my main goal was just to get the first five pages done and over with and then worry about what the requirements for the paper were. the first five pages were failrly easy because of the quotes from my five senses papers. when is started to write the ten page version i knew that i would have to add a lot more of my own wording and expand on my thoughts. i really didn’t know if what i was doing was exactly right but it seemed ok because i was writing about my experiences with writing during the semester and what i learned about myself after and during each paper or essay i wrote. if what i have isn’t exactly right it won’t be hard to change it.

Blog Entry #10

clarkjonathanxrxp — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 05:15:22 +0000

After I read over my rough draft of my auto ethnography it obviously needs to be doubled in length to fulfill the ten-page requirement. One way I plan on making it longer is by explaining my thoughts on how my struggles with my sense essays showed me who I am as a writer. I will also explain more on how I thought of the subject and genres of each essay.

All of the paragraphs need more work to make it better, especially explaining how I found myself as a writer through the timeline of writing the individual essays and blogs. I don’t think it needs anymore outside sources than my other essays for examples. I do think I need to work on the transitions, but when I explain the relationships between the essays and my progress as a writer that should do a good enough job transitioning naturally.

Autoethnography Free Writing #2

clarkjonathanxrxp — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 12:47:23 +0000

After reading some other autoethnographies I will probably ask myself why I chose to write what I wrote about for my five sense essays. Also what genres I chose for the different essays and why I chose those specific genres. I will aslo probably evaluate the content of my essays and how I connected those experiences or ideas with the individual senses. I will try to find similarities between the examples I gave in my essays and blog entries and if there is any importance or information about me through those similarities.

Publishing Sites Information

clarkjonathanxrxp — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 05:19:32 +0000

The three publishing websites that I chose to investigate further were The Atlantic, Authspot, and AlterNet. I chose all of these because Marlen had suggested them on the class website. I chose The Atlantic because they conduct a student essay contest in which the first prize entry wins $1,000. Second and third prize receive $500 and $250 respectively. I also chose this site because the contest is for full-time students only. My second choice, Authspot, is a hub for new, creative, and innovative writing. Viewers can search tags, comment on pieces of writing, and search different writers for what they would like to read. The third publishing site I chose, AlterNet, is a little bit more difficult to publish on than the previous two. They only accept a small number of entries so it is challenging to get a piece of writing published on this site. I think it would be a healthy challenge to try to publish on AlterNet.

The Atlantic: http://www.theatlantic.com/a/contest.mhtml

Authspot: http://www.authspot.com/about

AlterNet: http://www.alternet.org/about/guidelines.html

Autoethnography Free Writing

clarkjonathanxrxp — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 12:27:48 +0000

Susan Bennett says that an atuoethonography is an “opportunity to explain differences” usually cultural,

Question 1. My blog template is very plain with a dark background and dark green design at the top.

Question 2. I chose the picture that is on my about page because it was the only digital picture of me at the time I created that page.

Question 3. I wrote descriptively about myself with some narrative in it. I was writing to my english classmates like they had no idea who I was or what I was about. I tried to make it humorous so it wasn’t boring.

Question 4. I linked to two of my videos on YouTube, Facebook, an online TV site, and the Pittsburgh Penguins homepage. Beside the videos, these are the sites I visit most often. You can see that I love hockey, especially Pittsburgh hockey.

Question 5. My very first blog entry that answered “What is I?” is very similar to my current writings but also very different. It has basically the same style and sentence structures but some ideas and how I elaborated on them are different.

Question 6. I completely agree with my entry and wouldn’t change the content of it at all. I still have the same ideas about what “I” is and how some people can interpret it differently.

Question 7. Even though I didn’t deliberately prove my point in this entry I could do it now. I might use some autoethnographical

Question 8. Autoethnography is a form of phenomenological research because phenomenology is an approach to researching a certain groups behaviors from that groups perspective and point of view. Autoethnography is a reflection of oneself from the perspective of others and how they might see that person. It is also an inward search for who that person is as an individual and how they are different.

Hearing Workshop

clarkjonathanxrxp — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 12:47:11 +0000

After listening to the two different songs I would guess that this person likes music that is softer and easy to listen to. The first song was a classical piano/orchestra piece that had no lyrics. I would say that they like to sit down with a book by a fire and listen to this soft music. The second song gave me the idea that this person likes folk/hippie sorts of music and doesn’t follow a set daily routine or schedule.

The second set of two songs that I listened to were very different from each other. The first was an alternative rock song that gave the impression of someone that liked new and different music and didn’t follow what everybody else listens to. I got a sense of individuality of that person when I listened to the first song. The second song was a very fast hardcore metal song. I guessed that this person liked to get rid of their anger and frustration by listening to this type of music.

I have heard each of the two songs that you played for me. I had heard the first song on an iPod commercial and liked it very much because it was peppy and upbeat. I researched the band and liked many of their other songs too. The second song you gave me a sample of plays on the radio a lot and I hate it. Although Beyonce is a good singer her music just doesn’t interest me and I never listen to it. After hearing two of your favorite songs I would have to say that your overall taste in music is decent.

Blog Entry #8

clarkjonathanxrxp — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 05:35:21 +0000

Blog Entry #8

Hearing, vision, and smelling are the senses that do not require physical contact to be able to work and give information about the surroundings. Vision, however, is only possible when the object is in the line-of-sight of the individual. Also, smell is only effective in a very small area with humans. Some smells are very strong but are diluted the farther away from the source of the smell they get. Sounds, on the other hand, can be heard from very far away and do not require the person to see the source of the sound to hear it.

Communication is very important in today’s world and hearing is vital to verbal communication (Fabian). This is especially true in the business world where millions of transactions are made every day all over the planet. If communication is not used one can only imagine how many mistakes and wrong trades would be made and carried out. If one individual’s hearing was not up to par they might misinterpret or make up what they are hearing be told to them. Diane Ackerman says that “we hallucinate sounds more often than sights” (Ackerman). When researchers attempt to study why some people hear certain things they come to the conclusion that “the variability of listening skills and the imprecision of the language combined to make psycho-acoustics a rather frustrating field of study” (Elsea).

Although hearing is a difficult sense to study and examine, it is very useful and vital to survival. It protects people from oncoming dangers, informs them of other’s thoughts and feelings, and allows them to enjoy calming music.

Works Cited

Ackerman, Diane. A Natural History of the Senses. New York: Random House, 1990.

Elsea, Peter. “Hearing and Perception.” 1996. 17 Mar 2009 .

Fabian, Sharon. “Our Sense of Hearing.” edHelper.com 2008 17 Mar 2009 .

Blog Entry #7

clarkjonathanxrxp — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 01:28:25 +0000

An autoethnography is similar to an ethnographic piece of writing, where the author delves deeply into a certain culture, or way of life, to gain more understanding on it. They acquire information by reading about that culture, interviewing an individual that associates with the culture, and sometimes even go as far as to live in that culture to observe some inner workings and less-known information. While an autoethnography is a specific genre of writing in which the writer reflects on his/her own culture as if they were not part of their culture but still had all of the “inside” information about it. Susan Bennett says that an autoethnography is “an opportunity to explain differences from the inside” and that it is “usually written to an audience not a part of the group” (The Way of the Program).

Autoethnographical writing was first used by historians, travelers, and journalists. The majority of these first writings are from the early twentieth century, but there are a few that date back as far as the sixteenth century (“Autoethnography”). Autoethnographies differ from other forms of research writing in that they are written from an insider’s perspective to people who are not a part of that certain society. They are also descriptive of how the culture being studied is different from other cultures (Bennett).

If a person wanted to write an autoethnography they would either need to already be a part of the society or culture they are revealing, or immerse themselves in that culture to gain an insider’s perspective. Then they would need to compare that culture with the culture they are aiming the autoethnography at to show the main contrasting characteristics of the two cultures. Autoethnographies are basically writing about how one thinks others view him/her or their society.

Works Cited

Bennett, Susan. “Autoethnography.” Susan Bennet’s Workshop July 1, 2004 15 Mar 2009 .

Bennett, Susan. “Autoethnography.” The Way of the Program July 1, 2004 15 Mar 2009 .

Jones, Stacy Holman. “Autoethnography.” Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology Online. 2007. 15 Mar 2009 .