Thursday, April 22, 2010

Social Justice Event


When I first went to my event I didn’t even think of it as a social justice event, but when started to analyze it, I could see some interesting ways that I could connect it. I think by being in this class I am more observant and I defiantly analyze things more. In a way I kind of like it because I feel like I now can see the truth.
Well, getting back to my event it was a Titanic exhibit at Foxwoods. It had a ton of information about the titanic and it also had different artifacts that they retrieved from the Titanic. It also had two actors there in complete character. The woman was from first class and the man was from third class and he was Irish. They were so in character it was amazing. I tried to stay away from them, but they kept coming up to me and asking me questions. Even though I didn’t like it I think it really made the experience better because I learned more and it brought me into the moment. There was a mix of people there and a lot of families.

*I found this picture online and it is kind of like the people in Character that I talked to, but they were dressed different.



When I was at the exhibit I saw a women talking to one of the people from the exhibit and her daughter came up to the woman and tried to ask her a question. At this time I figured out it probably was her mother. Her mother looked at her and said “ you don’t interrupt when to adults are talking because that is rude” then the girl just stood and waited for her mother to be done talking. At first I just brushed it off and thought nothing of it. Now looking back at it I can see I had a Delpit moment. A mother teaching her daughter the rules and codes of power. I think that this goes against Delpit because she says that teachers should teach there students the rules and codes of power because they do not learn them at home. This mother was teaching her daughter the rules and codes of power.
Going to the exhibit made me think about the Titanic movie. I remember when I was young I saw the movie and I thought it was so cool that two people could fall in love on the Titanic. When I talked to my mother about it she told me that part of the movie was fiction. I couldn’t believe it, why would a movie with the Titanic in it lie. When I told my friends at school they didn’t believe me and thought I was lying. I think this is like Christensen because she sees the underlining themes or secret education in movies. In the Titanic movie I think that the secret education could be many things, but the one I thought of was that Learning about Titanic was the secret education. I thought this because if the made a movie on the Titanic alone they wouldn’t have a had blockbuster movie. I think that the people who made the movie thought that a movie just about the Titanic would have been boring so they added a love story to make it more interesting. When people went to see the movie they would go and see the fictional love story, but end up learning about the Titanic and how so many people died.
On the Titanic there was discrimination based on the peoples social classes. From the first class to third class there was a big difference. This social class made a big difference because it all depended on how good of things you got. Like your meals and rooms. The room size in first class was far bigger and nicer then the rooms in third class. In the exhibit they had two example rooms one was the first class and the other was third class. The food that was eaten was far better then the food eaten by third class. The first class menu had about ten courses for dinner and third class had about five courses for dinner. In the exhibit they also had a set of fan blades they got from the titanic. The women in character from the exhibit told me that the first class rooms got the fans and that the third class passengers didn’t get them. The thing I found interesting was that third class rooms were warmer and they needed a fan more than first class. In a way I think this is kind of like Anyon because Anyon talks about the effects of school children, but I think it still relates a lot to the differences in social classes. It shows how the different social classes are treated. If you had more money you would get more and better things.
When the Titanic was sinking women and children were told to go on the life boats first and I could understand why they did it. I found this website that told how many people survived and who went out on the life boats. The website was about the Titanic’s demographics. I was surprised to see on the website that on the first life boat that went out that over half the people that were on the boat were man and most of them were not even traveling with there love ones. I was so shocked and couldn’t believe it. When I looked at the percentage of people who survived and found that the women and children percentages were higher then the men’s survival percentages. The women’s survival percentage was 72%, the children’s survival percentages was 50% and the men’s survival percentages was 18%. So I guess women and children did get off the Titanic before most of the men.

1 comment:

  1. SO interesting! I am glad you wee able to make this experience into a SJ Event!

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