Discuss Spanish “First Contact” and eventual exploitation of indigenous peoples as described in the writings of Christopher Columbus, Hernan Cortez, Bartolomé de las Casas. Explain why the Native Americans were enslaved, why alternative labor source was later required, and where replacements for Native Americans were found
Use the incident involving John and Lorena Bobbitt (see internet) discuss the following:
1. Compare and contrast victim blaming and victim defending perspectives,
2. Who is the victim or victims in this case?,
3. In your opinion, was Lorena’s behavior justified?, and
4. In your opinion, did John get what he deserved?
Purpose: To apply the core assumptions of sociology, including your sociological imagination, to the issues of bullying and school shootings to show the ways in which the structure of society shapes our lives.
What is NOT your purpose: your purpose is NOT to summarize the book, Rampage, or the film, Bully. Rather, you are going to use the book and the film to demonstrate our course’s larger point about the societal/structural forces that shape our choices, our lives. If we are using our sociological imagination, we can see 1) how society and its institutions (like small towns and schools) are structured and are, perhaps, flawed, and 2) how this structure influences us. Rampage and Bully will help us to see, in particular, how that is the case with school shootings and bullying.
Structure of the essay:
Paragraph 1 – Brief introduction.
Here lay out the paper’s assertion, your big idea. This is important: what is your assertion? You need to think about what you’re asserting about school shootings and bullying and how they are shaped by both the structure of society and by our own agency. Then make and support that assertion in your paper. Your assertion could be something as simple as, “the structure of society shapes the options available to the people living in the society. School shootings and bullying are made possible because of how society’s institutions, including small town schools, are structured. Our agency to act is shaped and limited by this structure.”
This part of your paper should be 150-185 words.
Paragraph 2-3 – Introduction to “seeing” sociologically, to using the ideas of sociology to analyze the social world.
In the first of these 2 paragraphs, you will lay out what sociologists hold to be true about the world, about what shapes or influences our lives. Make an assertion about what one sees or tries to understand when looking at the world sociologically, when using a sociological imagination. Here you don’t necessarily want to summarize every part of the “core assumptions of sociology” (from the first set of lecture notes) but you do want to set up the idea that, to understand the social world and what shapes the people in it, sociologists look at how society is “structured,” recognizing that that structure shapes the options available to each of us.
In the second paragraph, you will set up the idea that looking at the world sociologically (that is, seeing something through the core ideas of sociology and sociological imagination) helps us to understand even specific phenomena or issues, including school shootings and bullying. Here you want to set up the idea that trying to understand or explain school shootings and bullying by just looking at the flaws of individuals is inadequate; it can only take us so far. Instead, we need to think about school shootings and bullying sociologically – meaning, to see how they are made possible by the way that society is structured or organized, a product of society’s institutions. We need to ground our thinking in the core ideas of sociology and use our sociological imagination because these are more than just the “private troubles” of individuals, these are “public issues” that involve many and are caused (or magnified) by “institutional arrangements,” as C. Wright Mills said. To understand these problems and why they happen when and where they do, an analysis of the social structure must be undertaken, specifically, the social structure of 1) small towns, 2) their schools, and 3) teen culture. [Rampage explores all three of these, and Bully provides supporting evidence, but you will not need to explore all three – instead, you should narrow your focus to one or two of these parts of the social structure. More on this below.]
It is in one of these paragraphs that you should pull in another course reading (beyond Rampage) for support. Perhaps the Mills chapter or another chapter/reading that helps the reader to see what we mean when we talk about “seeing sociologically” and “using our sociological imagination.” Remember to refer to this reading by name (you can quote if you want to, or just paraphrase), but do so following the required citation format (see the yellow page of your syllabus for “in-text citation format.”).
This part of your paper should be approximately 400-500 words.
Paragraphs 4-8 or so (the “body” paragraphs) – Discussion of the “institutional arrangements” that contribute to school shootings and bullying, to show the ways that the structure of society shapes individuals’ lives.
According to Rampage, certain institutional arrangements contribute to school shootings and bullying. Specifically, the book looks at how small towns are structured or organized, how small town schools are organized (their practices and procedures), and the organization of teen culture (especially in small towns where school shootings are more common). The authors (Newman et al. 2005) suggest there are flaws in these structures, in these institutions, that allow school shootings and bullying to happen and may even give rise to them. To write this, the body of your paper, consider the structure of these institutions, how they are arranged (how they are organized, the policies that are in place, the procedures that are followed or not), and the norms that extend from these structures/institutions and become the rules for people’s behavior.
Your focus, then, will be on the structures within which people live, including kids, and how this structure shapes them, contributing to school shootings and bullying. So you will need to be sure to do two things: 1) describe the structure and problems or flaws in it, and 2) demonstrate / provide evidence of how the structure and/or these flaws affect people (leading to shootings and bullying, leading kids to not “tell,” leading teachers to not connect the dots, etc.).
You will need to incorporate details from Rampage and Bully about these structures within which people live and the effects of these structures on individuals’ lives.
I like to see quotes – one or two per paragraph in this part of the paper – because they lend disciplinary authority to your paper.
And you will need to draw from both Rampage and Bully. The best papers use BOTH the book and the film in the same paragraph in the body of the paper – not every paragraph, but sometimes – to help you to make a point about how the social structure contributes to school shootings and bullying. Rampage will be your principle source, but Bully should provide important supporting details.
This part of your paper should be about 800-1000 words.
Concluding paragraph – Reflection on the relationship between structure and agency.
You’ve already talked about the role of structure in understanding school shootings and bullying, but now come back to agency and its place in this analysis. How does agency come into play here? In other words, how are school shootings and bullying also about agency, not just structure? You want to demonstrate here why understanding both structure and agency is beneficial if we wish to truly understand school shootings and bullying (and life in society in general).
What are the limiting/facilitating joints and associated structures. Are there any training techniques that may improve chances of a successful outcome? How is this movement critical for success in the sport or daily living.
This assignment asks you to analyze the effectiveness of a website’s “visual rhetoric” and compare it to another website’s “visual rhetoric.” As you analyze and compare the two, you will form an argument regarding which one is more effective in which specific areas, and you will explain and support your claims with examples from each. According to the article we will read by Patricia Sullivan, visual rhetoric is “the melding of visual esthetics and concern with rhetorical effectiveness for an audience” (109). In other words, web sites should be both visually pleasing and functional in their page organization and navigation.
Questions to consider in your analysis (you do not have to answer every question but should focus on the ones that best fit your chosen website):
The following questions about site design will help you analyze audience and purpose:
Consider the following criteria (described in more detail on handout):
Lastly, take all of the aforementioned considerations and determine which website addresses the audience, purpose, and rhetorical situation in the best way. Which site is most effective? Why? It may be in your best interest to take two separate websites that are created for the same purpose, for instance, two restaurant websites, and evaluate them based on the above criteria. Compare and contrast them, and then based on the criteria, determine which one works and which one doesn’t.
Research paper on the Labeling Issue for Monsanto. How are they legally able to deny consumers the basic right of knowing what they are eating? What has monsanto done to keep their biogenetically engineered seeds off labels for so long? Analyze this issue and why consumers have the right to know what they are eating
analyze a natural disaster related to one of the
topics covered this quarter (severe weather, tropical cyclones, coastal hazards,
or climate change) that occurred in your hometown. The event does not have to
be recent. Your paper should discuss the science of the natural and human
aspects of the disaster, including the following topics: the physical and human
geography of the place where the disaster occurred, the meteorological
phenomena that led to the event, the effects of the disaster on the local people,
and the mitigation efforts that were in place as well as what, if anything, could
have been done better. This is not simply a recitation of a news story. Be sure
to thoroughly discuss the meteorological conditions that led to the event as well
as the relevant issues of human preparedness and disaster mitigation.