Starting Out on Our #WritingRace Journey Blog #1

I found it interesting this week that after our class my eyes and ears became mission seeking devices used to obtain information about race and ethnicity. Were people talking about it? How present is it in our society? On TV? In the news? On Facebook even? And what I discovered was that people were discussing race and ethnicity everywhere! There was evidence from watching John Stewart making Jewish grandma jokes, to an article I found on Facebook from the NY Times about a fascinating new book that takes on an anthropological view about how children are raised all over the world, to a great story on CNN about young Native Americans celebrating their culture and discussing the balance between keeping true to their native identities and wanting/needing to blend into American culture (the portrait series "Red Road" that inspired the story includes beautiful and conversational photos). 

So what do all of my thinking and findings mean? Well it means that if anyone didn't think our course was important before, they should now, as conversation about race and ethnicity is happening everywhere. Also, it means that I've been thinking. And thinking. And thinking...about what I would really like to create for this course. In all actuality, I know that I am nowhere near being called tech savvy, more like tech spazzy. This is the first time I am really utilizing Twitter. I don't think I'm the person who is going to make a webcast or even create a movie as that will be crazy challenging for me, but that doesn't mean I do not want to do something important and meaningful for both myself and my own learning process and for the class and my peers. I feel that my short observations and findings this week as well as my love of reading personal narratives over the years shows that people have stories to tell and they want to tell them. They want to be heard. I was thinking of creating a possible project based on interview sessions I would hold with people of diverse backgrounds. After conducting the interviews, I would compare/analyze the findings. In addition, I think as a class I would love to find essays or short personal narratives to read and discuss over the course of the semester. I think this would be engaging and lead to memorable discussions. Finally, perhaps we can create some sort of culminating project at the end where we tell our own stories, an online narrative. Perhaps it can come across as a collection of essays or personal narratives of our own inspired by those that we've read???? We can include photos or artwork to enhance our stories.

I'm sure I will be inspired by others as the class shares out ideas. There is, in the back of my  mind, a possible desire to pursue something in the educational field as well. I just haven't really come up with a concrete idea. However, wanting to push myself a bit out of my comfort zone towards a project that interests me (like the interviews) feels a little exciting (as it is only a thought right now). I am very curious to see what others are thinking up in their heads as we seem to have many wonderful minds at work in our class. Until Tuesday...