Playing Devil's Advocate with Barbies

This week, we examined about how toys affect the way society views how certain societies should behave. In the Barbie the author found that the doll was “made by men for men” to create a standard of how each women should be like and what kind of lifestyle they should have. We as a class determined that since all these things seemed against equality, that Barbie was anti-feminist. Although we have reached this conclusion, I feel like we did not look at every possibility, which led me to play as devil’s advocate. I still believe that when Barbie was first developed that it was made to set a standard by men for women. Although now after some research I think that the company itself is trying to stop that one sided view. When looking at the 2014 Collection of Barbies, new Barbie models are introduced such as , entrepreneur dolls including 4 races :White (It doesn’t say it’s a white doll it just says Barbie), African American, Asian, and Hispanic. Possibly, this could be the turn around that Barbie needs in order to show that they can defeat the stereotype of the modern day women. When I saw that there was some diversity in the new line-up, I began looking for more that would help prove my point. However, when I dug deeper only more stereotypes began to rise. The good news is that Barbie is at least trying something to be more diverse, the bad news is that they are doing way to little. 

If you want to check it out yourself:

http://www.barbiecollector.com/showcase/category/2014-collection

Authors freedom

In the last week we talked about different perspectives on freedom. We glanced over different documents to see how different authors see different pros and cons to certain situation and although now we have these stories public and available everywhere it made me wonder, since these documents were published back in the day by the lower class, does that mean that they were not received at all to the public? Was it strictly to those who were present? So than I went back back and thought what authors have also been neglected or had different views. And of course I find that practically every author we have read about has had difficulties releasing their point of view. Take George Orwell. He had escaped his country and created a new “freedom” but yet he still had to change his name and even some parts of his story to avoid legal trouble. Also Ayn Rand who has been controversial to people for ages.  Even though America is not at 100% equality I still feel that we are really fortunate that we can have a freedom of speech that even if the government turns down or ideas, that enough people believe in Freedom of Speech and will try to make every voice heard.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8m8cQI4DgM&list=PLmKbqjSZR8TYD9bf1-N9MYe_cSEwQAx43

Wow The World has Changed...A Lot

This week we finished the tragedy that is The Scarlet Letter. Although we have finished the revelation, we have just begun to expand our views on literature. In today’s busy society, many don’t proclaim their views in life like they used to. Back then, people would stand on street corners and yell at the top of their lungs to proclaim what they believed in much like how the mayor's wife did  about witchcraft. Than as society became more civilized newspapers were formed and many began to share their opinions right next to where your monthly update on how an election or debate in the government. Than everything changed when the internet was invented. Reading turned into a slower way to deliver news. Communities and media became closer together and now rather than reading news stories, many have turned to social media or even videos to display their ideas and views. Instead of the news being limited to those who were approved by the staff of a newspaper, anyone can go online and publish a work of their views without facing interference. Even comedians like John Oliver in Last Week Tonight can deliver today's modern problems with a bit of humor to help raise awareness for real life events that need more public attention. So really in today’s day and age, we are in the most open idealistic society ever in history because of the widespread communication and to think what one author during the 1850 can write a story about societies view on others sin, it is almost impossible to see what kind of evolution will happen next.

A Blast From the Past

This week we discussed how The Scarlet Letter even though it is written over 100 years ago, can be compared to a modern piece of writing. We also discovered that even though the diction and connotation were written in  a more ancient way of English, they still carry a strong message when deciphered.  Now I know that to most of us this has become obvious because of all the older stories we have analyzed but I think there is something really cool behind the fact that even though hundreds of years have passed so little has changed in the world of literature. The fact that people are still writing about social problems, opinions and self reflections is actually pretty neat. Going back to before written languages, people told stories orally to either entertain or to teach each other lessons. As time progressed, mankind created theater and arts from these stories to further immerse themselves. So the human race evolved even more having the ability to widen their ideas  about the meaning of a society and even life as a whole. Of course a large reason because of that is because of civilization but I think that it is still important that even through the struggle of staying alive, humanity has never forgotten how to further their knowledge.