The Data Keeps Flying In

     After more asking more students my survey questions I have continued to get two extreme responses. Either the student has held on to their identity and persona or they have completely changed in the attempt to fit in or to be "better." Using the looking glass theory as my theory has fit perfectly well. It has been very interesting the reaction to the students own responses, especially if the student sees what I see and realizes that they have been changing. All in all the surveying part of the essay process is over and I will be drafting soon.

Beginning Surveys

This weekend I started to conduct research about my thesis regarding a social science theory. I am conducting research regarding how students transition from the lifestyle they lived back home surrounded by family and friends who know the pre college students for a long period of time to their current situation of being in college for about three months. Surrounded by new people who are still learning about the students personality, has the students personality from home changed based on what their new friends may or may not think about them? Has a new college students personality changed after leaving the norm of home life?

Since this past weekend was a large event at my college, I started off my survey with students from other campuses. This week I hope to have surveyed students of my college.

The survey was conducted through email asking to answer the questions under them. The survey varied but it clear that many students have noticed small changes in their behavior after the survey. It was important to most students to "start off on the right foot" with their new friends. It was clear that it was important to impress new friends and talk about what they would do back home.

Another interesting note that was made was almost all of the students that I talked to feel this awkward feeling when talking to their parents about their plans. Students still have an urge to ask for permission but at the same time state what they are doing because as college students living on their own they feel like they can do what they want. The urge to ask permission is interesting to point out.

Racist Schooling Response

     Education can really be a deadly tool when it comes to conforming others. The article" Indigenous resistance and racist schooling on the borders of empires:Coast Salish cultural survival." makes some serious references to this being a weapon. Indigenous people were washed of their culture and mindsets while in schools. the children would be taught what the dominating culture considered right and wrong. Most of the wrongs were things their culture thought. This was used a plethora in history, like the natives in the west. As America grew more room was needed and they natives had to either keep moving or join, fighting wasn't an option against the growing country. By joining the natives would have to walk and talk the way the average american would and also have to live they way they lived. The lifestyles completely changed for the natives.

     Education could be used as a serious tool and its very important to keep an eye on what schools are teaching the youth. Education could easily conform.

Food Sustainability

In upstate New York town of Worsbrough there aren't many options to where your food comes from. Choices are limited unless one would want to drive longer then 30 minutes to go to the "local" Target or other main names in the food business including Food Lion, Harris Teeter, etc. In the small town there are about two locally owned shops to buy groceries. The option of growing food for oneself would be near to impossible due to the freezing temperatures most of the year. Some food could be grown but not a variety, nor enough to sustain a family let alone a single person. If a citizen want to buy a specific type of food product or a specific food process done, then options are limited and there is a good chance that citizen will have to deal with it, or venture elsewhere including a minimum of an hour drive.

Environmental Ethics

When the Wilderness and the American Mind was published in 1967 the author Roderick Nash established himself as the head authority in American attitude towards nature. Nash wrote about the evolution of Americans relationship with the environment. Nash discusses the rights of nonhumans in nature and that those must be respected to keep a healthy balance. This respect was necessary to keep a balance between humans and their bioregion, they needed to respect nature in order to keep it healthy and also to sustain themselves. This published piece is also an important today in todays terms, the environment is not being respected as it once was.

What's Up With All This Fracking?

     The Environmental Protection Agency has found contamination in local ground water in Wyoming. The contaminated water was tested and studied and many of the pollutants were likely caused during drilling for gas. The chemicals involved with drilling and pumping gas is generally refereed to as fracking chemicals. This is a very big deal and will more then likely prove how dangerous this practice really is and how much more careful drillers have to be. This is simply the first case to come up, soon more will most likely be found and government officials will set new laws regarding this practice.
     This incident will only prove the point environmental activists have been making about the drilling dangers. Not only has it harmed the environment but now society. Researchers are currently investigating and testing the surrounding area of where the contaminated water has been found. Odd smells and dirty water were just the beginning and most testing will be done to test the true dangers of these spills. Researchers will be testing to see what other problems have been caused due to fracking and just how dangerous it is.
     The drilling company seriously needs to take into consideration how serious these side effects and and how society could be effected. It goes far beyond unclean water, the cement walls used for well monitors were falling apart. These chemicals are very powerful and could easily cause serious harm or death to humans or the environment as a whole. The drilling company is to blame and must be shown the severity of their actions and laws be made to avoid these kind of contaminations.

Animal Awareness

     The image shows a bear clearly trapped in the hands of a clock. The caption in the top left corner states that every sixty seconds a species dies out. The caption provides insight so that the images purpose is more clear. The bear is trapped in time and as the clock runs slowly the bear runs out of time and is killed. The bear is clearly struggling which can be seen by the blood on the bottom paws and claw marks by the bears front paws. As time runs out the bear is more then likely killed or dies by unnatural causes that message is clear the the struggling bear. The image was edited with technology to make a point and technology is also how the image is being spread around the world so that the message may be known. This blog would be one example of technology spreading awareness with technology..

The Themes Continue

Gary Synder is concerned for the future, and that is evident in his poems located towards the end of Turtle Island. In the sections such as "For the Children" Gary discusses his ideas for change in the future for the children. He has all of this ideas for the future to benefit the lives of the children and hopefully they can live a more sustainable life so hopefully in time their children can also continue a sustainable life. Multiple poems from this section all revolve around the same theme. Gary Snyder clearly discusses his ideas for the future, but continues to discuss that this is for the children, hoping that we would change so that the next generation and our children can live in a healthy environment and lifestyle. If we don't things could go badly and lifestyle would change as resources deplete and everything falls apart.

Reoccurring Themes of Gary Snyder

     After reading a handful of poems written by Gary Snyder in the collection of hi writings found in the Book Titled "Turtle Island" I realized how connected to the world around him Gary seems to be. In his poem "No Matter, Never Mind" he maps out a very detailed an intertwined family tree of the world and how he sees that it is all connected in one way or another. I thought it was very interesting how it was mapped out. I flipped a few pages and looked for a longer poem and found "On San Gabriel Ridges" where once again I saw the pattern of connection. Gary starts off writing about his dreams of country but ends up stating that his thoughts are "woven into the dark. Squirrel hairs..." He is using analogies that are very odd to me and I have never heard anything like it. Lastly I read "For the Children" which discussed children of two different places meeting for peace, if it was established a connection between the children and the land.
     The three poems connect everything, each time I re-read one of the poems I find myself seeing a different connection. There are a lot of undertones and can understand why Gary Snyder is studied and his works analyzed.

Learning Experience

     After listening to McKibben's podcast, and taking the bioregional quiz many questions regarding life around the planet come up. The quiz asks questions regarding the planet with questions asking about what types of grass and trees are around, where food and water come from, and other questions. These questions lead to more questions, where does food and sources of water come from? The quiz leads to many questions that help lead to investigation to answer thee questions. The podcast added to that yearn to investigate, in the podcast McKibben discusses how the world around has changed. The podcast ties in with the quiz because the quiz asks questions that would have been easily answered in the past. The new and current world does not care what kind of grass sidewalks are laid down on or where exactly the food found on the plate comes from. A lot can be taken from the combination of both the quiz and podcast, one of the big pieces being the realization that Earth has indeed greatly changed, and that the Earth is viewed differently then the past.

     One thing is for certain the combination of the quiz and podcast is an "eye-opener" in the fact that the combination questions the general view of the planet Earth. How much does the average person know about the food on the table, or the water in the cup, or the area around the shelter. The way the quiz describes the average person is that the average person would not be able to survive very long in the natural wilderness. Clear changes have occurred, the average person has forced themselves to become dependent on the current living style, there is no going back to a more natural lifestyle without serious changes that would have to occur over a large period of time.

Things Have Changed

     In many way things have changed. I came to this realization after I took a "Geo" Quiz (link at the bottom) and listened to both parts of Bill McKibben's Eaarth podcasts (link also at the bottom). Things have greatly changed in this world, when I took the quiz I realized how much I really don't know about the world around me it was honestly a shocker. It asked me questions about my bioregion and I honesty didn't know the answers to some questions. Some of the questions included asking what species of grass were outside of my shelter, what animals are endangered, and where is my food and water from. Just those handful of questions alone got me thinking, then I listened to the podcast which added on. Bill McKibben discusses some of his views which were expressed in his work Eaarth. He made many points about how the world has changed (thus the extra a in the spelling of Earth). He discusses different things that he thinks would help move us in a different direction and how the world could change. I would suggest looking at this links yourselves because it was certainly interesting and makes one think more.


Quiz: https://sites.google.com/site/plenzdorf/bioregionalquiz
Podcast:
(Part 1) http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=bill-mckibbens-eaarth-10-04-21
(Part 2)http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=bill-mckibbens-eaarth-conclusion-10-04-22&WT.mc_id=SA_emailfriend

Claiming Back Our Beaches and Oceans

          Floating around our oceans are massive “Garbage Islands.” These islands are made of tons upon tons of garbage created by the garbage that does not make it to the dump. All of this garbage comes from debris and liter thrown into the water and eventually ends up in our oceans. Currents from across the globe have pulled all of this garbage together and have formed actual islands that spans miles long. The current estimated guess is that the “islands” span the size of Texas, but research has suggested it could be larger.

            The “Island Civilization” could prevent this because everyone would have to be self-sustaining and take care of their garbage, but humans could still be too lazy to take care of their garbage properly. Though the “civilizations” that choose to live near the oceans would more than likely take care of the oceans and treat it with respect, the responsibility cannot fall on them alone. Other colonies could still dump their garbage into the rivers and streams that would eventually end up in the ocean. The beaches would not be able to handle all of this on their own; the “Island Civilizations” who live near water would have to take care of their water sources. IF the civilizations were to actually be self-sustaining and take care of their water source then the issue of the garbage islands could be taken care of and prevented from ever happening again. It would be a huge step in a cleaner direction.

            The place that would benefit the most would be the beaches, no more liter and garbage would wash ashore if all went according to plan and the beaches would be cleaner and the water cleaner. The wildlife nearby would also once again have a fighting chance without having to dodge sinking garbage and have to seek shelter elsewhere when the garbage ruins their homes and habitat.

Garbage Island Source: http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/translating-uncle-sam/stories/what-is-the-great-pacific-ocean-garbage-patch

Response to Roderick Nash’s Island Civilizations.

Roderick discusses in his piece Island Civilizations about his own ideas and thoughts on his vision of human occupancy on earth. He discusses his ideas regarding how we as humans could make changes in our society during the fourth millennium. The concept of moving into an age of being “future primitive” plays a serious role. This role would include taking both steps forwards and backwards in society. That may be a confusing idea, the writer was suggesting that we not only take steps forward to continue to help society but also go back to the more “primitive” times when we would live of the “fat of the land” as some would say. The writer does not simply suggest that we revert back to the simple times as primitives because he does argue that we are making serious advances in technology and medicine that would most likely help society continue to succeed in that aspect. There are some aspects, which we could tone down and go back.

The concept of “wilderness” is also mentioned numerous times. The concept has greatly changed in the past millennium. Once the woods would be considered easily safe and the rolling hills was a simple place, neither considered wilderness nor wild. The writer discusses how in present society we fear the wild and feel the need to tame it and control it. We feel the need to flatten the rolling hills and cut down the unknown.

The writer makes some bold remarks regarding society but was very straight foreword in his ideas and explaining his beliefs. The concept of an island community where society would only make small impacts on the wild and let the rest be self willed.

I though his theory was quite interesting, generally on subjects of social change I have not read where going back and going forward have gone hand in hand. There is a balance, we as a society can grow in technology and medicine along with other things and still convert back to the wild and free will of a natural society. The balance is what was key for me as a reader to hold on to, along with the clear message that did not directly attack the current society. The writer simply was suggesting and publishing his theory in a manner that could not be taken as an offence to current society, while making remarks about change

I very much agree with his theory, the term “wilderness” has drastically changed over the past hundred years. Society today seems to want to control everything and tame the wild. It wants to flatten the rolling hills, tame the lives of the wild creatures, and remove the unknown to make more room to expand the known world. Taking steps back is a good idea and let the earth make it’s own decisions for a bit, before we use up all that we have.

I also agree that even there are some issues with society, we are making steps in the right direction and it is essential that we continue to do so. We are making advances in technology and medicine that are also friendly to Earth. Also mentioned was that we are taking steps to protect our environment and to conserve the “wild.” Laws protecting land and endangered animals have ben signed and enforced. We have not lost all of our ideals regarding our planet and the things around us.

I strongly agree with the piece that Roderick Nash wrote. It was very well written and informative, he had strong ideals and they were clearly original. I enjoyed reading this piece and thought the balance of retracing our steps in history and moving forward was done in a way where it was balanced and understandable.


-John Walsh