I found that the in the writing by Andrea Noble, she raised/mentioned a few points that were particularly thought-provoking and interesting.

The one I will focus on is when she says that tears are for an audience; “it involved not just the weeping, condemned man, but also an audience, to whom the tears were addressed” (Noble, p. 252). This statement made me think on what tears are and how they are used/can be used. In Villa’s case, one can assume his tears were used in an attempt to pause his execution. Although his execution turned into him being sent to prison instead – for reasons unrelated to his tears –  Villa’s tears were also most likely a build up of his emotions.

Biologically, tears are released when there is a build up of chemicals (that make up our emotions) in our brain. Tears act as an exit for excess chemicals, which is why the molecular structure is different for tears of different emotions. This is why humans cry when we feel happy, sad, angry, etc. In addition to this, because humans can be very empathetic, seeing sad scenes or scenes of other people crying can cause the audience to cry as well (an example could be when we cry during sad parts in movies). Also, because we are empathetic creatures we can usually tell why someone is crying – happy crying looks different from sad crying which looks different from frustrated crying, etc. All of this lead me to think about how tears and crying are used in popular culture and media today.

One of the first things I thought of was advertising. Marketing and advertising can make up large parts of companies and corporations, and recently I find that more companies have started using/manipulating human emotion into buying their products. Sad commercials (ones shaped almost like a short film) can be used by companies to get people invested in watching it, then by making them (usually) cry, it causes people to remember the commercial and therefore the product associated with it.

Another, more obvious use of tears is its presence (or absence) in movies and videos. The presence of tears in movies are usually used to subconsciously cause the audience to feel a certain way; even if we already know that it is a happy or sad scene, the addition of tears (when used correctly) can add intensity and emphasis to what the audience should be feeling. Opposite of this, the absence of tears in media can be used in the same way. Mostly seen in sad scenes, having someone not cry while everyone else does (or someone cry while the rest do not) can convey a variety of emotions depending on the scene. It is also used as a partition between scenes, to switch from one emotion to the next.

There are many other ways that tears can be used, both in media/popular culture and more personally, but I think that Nobles writing was very interesting and thought-provoking about what may seem like a mundane aspect of popular culture.

Question for class: If tears can affect the way we feel, do you think tears (and other forms of emotion) can be weaponized/are already being weaponized to “control” the way we feel?

Reading Raymond Williams’ “culture is ordinary”  made me think a lot about what culture is/can be and he described culture in ways that I never would have thought of, although it all made perfect sense when reading.

The phrase “culture is ordinary” was something that really intrigued me throughout this reading. Because, culture is ordinary; both in a personal sense as well as a larger, national/regional sense. Everyone is part of one or more cultures whether they know it or not, and these affect all aspects of our lives. This phrase also got me thinking as to whether there really are set-in-stone cultures. Are there “borders” between different cultures? Is there a definite line where one ends and another starts? Or is culture more fluid, in a sense that it is a constant yet changes for each individual? In addition, this made me wonder if there even are different cultures. There are differences between cultures, however, if one was able to “travel” between cultures would there be stark differences or would it be more of a gradual change and you only realize the differences after some distance, like a spectrum?

Williams also emphasizes in his writing that culture is for everyone, and that there is no good or bad/right or wrong culture. I think that for things such as holidays or traditions, (usually) anyone can participate and they are for everyone to enjoy. However, although I do not disagree that culture is for everyone, I think that there are some cultures only accessible depending on your place in society. Richer people or people who are part of the upper class have access to a larger variety of resources, as well as their personal cultures typically being different from the lower class. I think it is inevitable that these elements shape our cultures, therefore I believe that although culture is for everyone to enjoy and be a part of, I also believe that certain cultures are only attainable to a specific demographic.

Question for class: Although Williams says culture is for everyone, there are exceptions to this such as attainability due to social class. That being said, can there also be right or wrong, good or bad cultures?

Hi, my name is Nyah Rice and I am currently a second year student hoping to major in international relations. I have very little previous knowledge about Latin America and the countries within it so I hope I can learn more about them through this course.