I finally feel like I’m starting to get the hang of the whole blogging thing –  just in time for it to come to an end. Whenever I try to write a blog it always takes me a little while to get started. I never know what I should say or why anyone would be interested in what I do have to say. One thing we’ve talked about during class is when writing, know your audience. In this case it’s my fellow classmates so I think anything related to school or even life in general is an acceptable topic. Blogging to me feels somewhat personal though, because it’s based on my ideas and thoughts. I can’t hide behind a thesis statement or a topic I’ve chosen from a list. It’s really just about my opinions.

In journalism we’ve been learning about participatory or citizen journalism. A lot of this type of journalism is in the form of blogs. The idea behind this type of journalism is the general public taking part in the process of collecting and reporting news. I haven’t quite figured, however, out how I feel about citizen journalists. Is this type of journalism trustworthy and dependable when just about anyone can become a citizen journalist? For example, if I were to start reporting on news events, I don’t think I should be considered a reliable source. During a presentation by a guest speaker for journalism he said something regarding his views on citizen journalists that made a lot of sense to me. He said “would you let a citizen dentist work on your teeth?” The answer is no. You would go to a professional, which means….should you look to a citizen journalist for a reliable report on the news… no, you should go to the professionals. In today’s society it’s important that everyone is informed, and it’s always important for people to be informed correctly.

After finally handing in my research paper, I am incredibly relieved. It felt as if I had spent forever working on it, but I have to say I quite enjoyed writing it. The topic of my paper was whiteness, and more specifically whiteness in relation to power and privilege. After reading countless articles about this subject, I realized that this is something that is prevalent in society today. I guess for me growing up in Canada, I’ve never really experienced some of the horrors that many people have had to endure due to racial prejudice. Canada is known for being multicultural which I think is one of the great things about it, but while reading an article, I was met with the question, “is it significant that there has never been a non-white Canadian Supreme Court Judge or Prime Minister?” This got me thinking… is it significant? It’s hard for me to say because I have no idea how many non-white people have run for the position of Prime Minister. It’s an interesting question, and perhaps I’ll try to find the answer.

One of the articles I read that I used in my essay dealt with a woman who grew up in South Africa during the time of apartheid. Simply because she was white she automatically held a position of power. The privilege she received for this later led to feelings of guilt because of what many blacks in South Africa had to endure. When thinking about her guilt, I wonder how would I act in that same situation – if I were born in a place divided by the colour of skin would I accept that as an acceptable state of affairs? If that sort of thing is all one has ever known and experienced and that’s what the norm is, would I or anyone else question it? Luckily growing up in Canada I’ve never had to face such things, but after doing research for my paper it is evident that racial prejudice is still ongoing and probably always will be while so much power and privilege is attached to whiteness.

The more I continue to read Watchmen and the more immersed I become in the world that these characters live in, the more I appreciate the story being told. I didn’t anticipate enjoying the book at all. I thought that there was no way I would like a comic about superheroes, but I have been pleasantly surprised. Watchmen is probably the furthest thing from a typical superhero story. It seems like almost every character who is meant to be good is also villainous – they are antiheroes.

So far the main thing I have gathered from the story is it’s trying to give an accurate portrayal of what the world would be like if there was someone with superhuman powers, and the effect a group of masked vigilantes might have. In this world that has been created in Watchmen the presence of superheroes has a devastating effect on the world. Although wars may have ceased because of Dr. Manhattans existence, it has in no way achieved peace on earth. There was one quote in particular from Watchmen that I thought was really powerful and it was, “One single being has been allowed to change the entire world, pushing it closer to its eventual destruction in the process. The Gods now walk amongst us, affecting the lives of every man, woman and child on the planet in a direct way rather than through mythology and the reassurances of faith.” The idea that a superhero is hurting civilization just by its existence really contradicts every other type of superhero story where usually if it wasn’t for this super human being coming to the rescue, civilization would be destroyed.

I believe there could be many interpretations of the meaning behind Watchmen, and I believe there could be even more meanings behind one of the most prominent characters, Dr. Manhattan. The way I interpreted it is the story is an alternate version of the time surrounding the Vietnam War and Dr. Manhattan is an analogy for a nuclear bomb. His powers depict the sort of devastating and atrocious effect that a nuclear bomb can have. He has the power to wipe out entire civilizations and no being, human or otherwise should have that ability.

I am currently about to begin the graphic novel the Watchmen. I have never read it before nor have I seen the movie. I don’t know very much about the story other than the fact that it is about superheroes. I am going into reading it with no expectations or prior knowledge of the plot.

The only other experience I have with comic books is Boys’ Love, which we briefly discussed in ASTU and what we covered in Women’s Studies surrounding Manga, unless you count Archie comics.. and even those I haven’t read in years. Another brief encounter with comics I have had would be the many movies which are based on them. I also currently follow the TV series, The Walking Dead, which is also based on a graphic novel. However, I have never actually read it.

Last term when we discussed the popular Japanse, Korean and Chinese comic books, Boys’ Love, I found it incredibly interesting because I had never come across anything like it before. The idea of male homoerotic romance comics seemed so foreign to me. Even more fascinating was the audience that it appealed too, young women. These young women were able to find something liberating surrounding the questions of their own gender and sexuality through reading ‘BL’ comics.

At first I didn’t really understand the appeal of this type of comic book to young women, many of whom were heterosexual but through further reading in Cultural Theory it began to make sense. In regular comic books featuring a heterosexual relationship the women is always portrayed as weak and in need of a man to rescue her. This is usually the general plot for any type of story found anywhere. But it is this type of relationship between a man and a woman that drove many female comic book readers in parts of east Asia to turn to ‘BL’. In the book, Cultural Theory, many women were quoted as saying that they preferred Boys’ Love comic books because of the more believable relationship between the two men who were both portrayed as equals, as opposed to the dominant male in a heterosexual relationship.

I’m not sure if I personally would enjoy ‘BL’ comics, but the reasoning behind the enjoyment by so many of these other women makes a lot of sense to me. Women are constantly being portrayed as weak and dependant on men in many forms of media. As such it has become commonplace. If such depictions don’t change, why wouldn’t people begin to look for relationship portrayals that better reflect equality and also support a healthier outlook on what a relationship in today’s society should look like?

I’ve been thinking a lot about the state of my life since it’s now the New Year. 2012 has passed and we’re into 2013, which is something I still haven’t quite wrapped my head around. I’m sure to be writing ‘2012’ on the date of all my papers for at least another month. This year I’m taking it upon myself to really start fresh, and not be bothered or weighed down with the trivial problems of 2012. As the cliché goes, it will be a new beginning.

I have never been one to make New Year’s resolutions, or if I do.. I have never been one to follow through. All of my past resolutions have been pretty standard ones – things such as trying to eat healthier or doing more physical activity, both of which I would like to do, but they are resolutions that always seem to fall by the wayside. The whole notion of making resolutions for the new year in an attempt to better oneself, makes me wonder if this is a universal tradition? Or is it more localized to Western civilization?  I am curious to know if the classic game of what will be your “New Year’s Resolution” is at all cultural, and if it varies from place to place.

This year I’ve taken it upon myself to make a New Year’s resolution, but not for one specific thing, more of an all encompassing resolution. Put more simply, in 2013 I plan on only doing things that make me happy. I am hopeful that  this will allow me to leave old problems behind, and avoid them in the future as well. Happy New Year everyone!

Today I was working on a project for my linguistics course, and it had to do with whether or not we thought it was important to save endangered languages. I thought it would be appropriate to blog about it because it fits nicely with the culture aspect of our program. Saving a language was something I’d never really thought about before, nor had I even really considered the idea of languages “dying,” but interestingly enough right now we have around 6,000 languages in the world, and its anticipated that in about a hundred years that number will be at around 600. I thought this number was really striking and to me it seems like it would be a tragedy to lose so many languages.

Through doing more research on this I was able to find many arguments for and against the preservation of endangered languages. Some said it would be a great cultural loss if we were to lose a language, while others said that the language itself has very little to do with culture, and that the loss of a language doesn’t make the cultural aspects of any group any less real. Other arguments outlined how by losing a language we lose knowledge and insight about human cognition and the creation of language. Some also believe that if a language is dying out it means there simply is no need for it anymore, and there is no reason to try and save it.

I found all of this really interesting, and was able to see both sides of the argument, but all I kept thinking was that by losing languages we are losing the diversity that makes the world so interesting. I believe that language plays a huge part in what makes different cultures so fascinating, and in addition is what makes multicultural places like Canada so great. And I believe that letting languages die out without any attempt at preservation would be a tragedy.

Hello everyone and welcome to my blog. My name is Shawn Gorman, and here I will be blogging about topics related to the Culture and Media stream, and whatever else comes to mind. In addition to the courses within our CAP program, I am also taking Psychology and Linguistics both of which I’m really enjoying. I look forward to reading all of your blogs and comments and I hope you enjoy mine as well.