Yay for no class!

Question 1

My ex boyfriend and I still speak frequently with each other. We spend most of our time arguing about each other’s actions, and more times than not, I am upset about his actions. One of the main problems that we had in our relationship was communication. JT would never want to talk on the phone, and we lived an hour away from each other. When I would ask him about it he would tell me that he doesn’t even talk to his mother everyday, so why should he have to talk to me everyday. He would accuse me of trying to be more important than his mother. This would make me furious because he was unable to see that his relationship with his mother and his relationship with me are very different. Continually we would argue about this same topic. If I were to want to change something about him he would say, “This is the way that I am, why would you want me to change? Tiffany I can’t change.” I feel that most of our arguments were level 2 arguments. Most of the time he misunderstood my frame of reference and I would do the same. Finally one day after arguing over the same issue of the phone call he was able to understand my point of view. I explained to JT that he does not talk grandmother the same way that he talks to his “homeboys”. Their relationships with him are much different. Just because his mother is important to him and I am important to him does not mean that we are at the same level and should be treated the same. At this point, I was also able to understand that when he doesn’t call me it doesn’t mean that he doesn’t care about me, it is something that he is not used to doing. He also asked me one day to stop being so sensitive and stop crying. I then told him that being sensitive was a part of who I was and I can’t change everything about myself, just like he told me. Because we were able to understand each other’s intended frame of reference, the problem was solved.

Question 2

In this article it is apparent that Savio is arguing against the administrators at Berkeley for free speech for students. Although this is him main point, he is arguing much more than that. He continues to refer to bureaucracies and says that “the greatest problem in our nation—depersonalized, unresponsive bureaucracy”. Again in paragraph 11, he discusses America’s “crucial problems” of automation. Savio is not just concerned with the free-speech at Berkeley, but also the dehumanization in the United States. His analogy, “Sproal Hall is to student rights as Mississippi was to civil rights”, gives a historical reference that all administrators would be able to recall. It shows the importance of the issue. The allusion to “This chrome-plated consumer’s paradise” corresponds with Savio’s statements towards America’s major problems. He is able to tie the analogy with the allusion by stating that because “America is becoming a ever more the utopia of sterilized, automated contentment”, people are not only losing their jobs to robots and machines, but eventually they will lose their voices completely. Being “well-behaved children” does not allow people to speak against the government and what is wrong. These are the things that Savio is seriously concerned about. Administrators should be able to see this tie, and the unforeseen future that could be ahead it student’s are not allowed to speak their minds.


Question 3

Throughout Senator Obama’s campaign, he has focused on the middle class, hard working man and women. When he focuses on the cause and the history of his own background, he is not only saying “this is how I am”, but he is also allowing others to see that he is the American Dream. Because he has a mixed background with a white mother and a father that is from Kenya, he is able to appeal to a diverse crowd. His mother raised him alone like so many other women in the United States. Obama continues to use many examples of how he is just like everyone else. A kid with a dream to do big things, and with the help of his hard working mother he was and is able to do so. He is able to defend his character by focusing on how he was raised and what type of person he really is. He becomes more credible when he is open, honest, and sincere. If Well and Savio had constructed more appropriate ethos for their audiences they may have seemed more credible and even personable. I feel that Wells actually does do this well by focusing on cause and the history of lynching. She is able to stray away from the black/white issue, and allow the reader to understand that the action of lynching is “barbaric” and “uncivilized” regardless of whom it happens to. Savio could have been more personable and even more credible if he too had constructed ethos for his audience.