Davis

Angela Davis’s in-depth analysis on the injustices of the prison system provides valuable details on some of the unfair practices with statistics that support the claims. In this article her goal was to persuade the audience to support of the abolition of prisons, which at first glance even she admits sounds a little deranged, however as she goes more in depth with her claim she makes a valid argument that a world without prison could prove more efficient and effective in the reform of prisoners. Davis is extremely aware how widely unpopular her statement is, she even states, “Prison abolitionists are dismissed as utopians and idealists whose ideas are at best unrealistic and impracticable, and, at worst, mystifying and foolish.” (9-10). This is mostly due to the fact that when referring to forms of punishment for criminals the question of whether or not the death penalty should be allowed comes up very frequently. By doing this her stance falls even further away from the normal stance on the reformation of criminals to a point where her idea sounds completely foreign. Throughout “Are Prisons Obsolete?,” Davis argues that jails in todays world has become completely obsolete due to racism within the prison system and the fact that jail is too oftenly used as a punishment for crimes. She inquires “whether the prison has become an obsolete institution has become especially urgent in light of the fact that more than two million people (out of a world total of nine million) now inhabit U.S. prisons, jails, youth facilities, and immigrant detention centers.” (10). By stating this, Davis questions the statistics that exist within the prison system. These statistics are undeniably glaring examples of the United States’ penitentiary lack to actually prevent crimes, deter future criminals, and reform current ones. Furthermore, the numbers proved that certain groups of color were targeted when placing individuals in prison, this serves as a clear example of racism. For example, there were “mass arrests and detention of people of Middle Eastern, South Asian, or Muslim heritage in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center. (26).” Although Davis made some very valid points about the injustices and fallacies with our prison systems, I feel that abolishing prison completely is not the best way to solve the problem, rather small corrections over time is the most efficient way to completely fix what has been going on in our nations prisons.

Roberts

Dorothy Roberts’s “Killing the Black Body,” perfectly highlights the common displays of racism, stereotypes, and patterns of discrimination against African American women. In this article she specifically targets the discrimination against child birth in African American women. It begins with the story of police officers looking to prosecute women who are smoking during pregnancy. Although it was a reasonable cause for prosecution, it clearly was targeted towards soon to be African American mothers. In fact, all but four dozen women arrested for prenatal crimes in Charleston were black. during this time police officials displayed one of the most basic displays of racism in which minorities, specifically African Americans, were targeted by the law without just cause. Roberts states that we are in “a midst of an explosion of rhetoric and policies that degrade Black women’s reproductive decisions” (3). The issue with African American women has always been overlooked. Racist policies have always suppressed the reproductive rights of African American women meanwhile many feminist groups fail to see this, and solely focus on diminishing male superiority. Roberts then describes some of the extreme policies and measures that have been proposed to prevent black women from their right to reproduction. One of the outrageous policies that was created was to distribute birth control to black communities to diminish poverty. Furthermore at one point black women were even going to be penalize for bearing a child in order to reform welfare in and cut off children born to welfare mothers. For some reason officials felt that “limiting black mother’s reproductive rights will solve all of America’s social problems” which clearly demonstrates our country’s racist agenda against black women. The difference in opinion of the birth of white and black children is massive. White childbirth is “thought to be a beneficial activity” however black reproduction, is treated as a form of degeneracy. Racists have been trying to hide their policies with desire to suppress the rights of minorities for years, and for a long time now, the rights of African American women have been neglected the most.

Coates

Even after the slavery of African Americans became outlawed, a significant amount of discriminatory policies were set in place to prevent former slaves from experiencing true freedom. Coates articles discussed these policies. She was particularly interested in the life of Clyde Ross, a man who faced injustice and discrimination in the state of Mississippi just because of the pigment of his skin. Ross was born in 1923 and was immediately subjected racist Jim Crow laws, because of these laws thousands of African Americans lost their ability to vote through “trickery of the poll tax and the muscle of the lynch mob” (Coates). The lengths that these white supremacists and racists are not only shocking to look back upon but most of all it’s purely embarrassing. Black people would be met with punishments that could make them lose their lives if they even spoke out about these policies. Coates specifically focuses on the problem that was in Mississippi the state that had, “more black people were lynched in Mississippi than in any other state” (Coates). Ross Clyde was a very intelligent man, and back then education was the only way discriminated black citizens can rise up over whites. However he offered the chance to be enrolled in Rosenwald school, He was unable to attend this school because unlike the white children who had a school bus, Ross had to walk. Ross wished he was able to speak out against the hardships him and his loved ones have gone through. However he was always told to keep quiet in order to not putting his family in harms way. Ross lived an unimaginable hard life, he was treated like dirt while while at the same time he worked to the bone to attempt to escape from it. So he then thought he could earn his country’s respect by fighting in World War II. Eventually many of the new black citizens went north where there were new opportunities for a better life. Our country will look back at this time forever as an embarrassing display of what we called “freedom”.

13th

The Netflix documentary, 13^th, tells a story of injustice and discrimination that African Americans must deal with throughout their daily lives, however it specifically targets those in prison. In the documentary, one is shown a variety of statistics that bring the current discrepancies in our system to light. For example, despite the United States having only 5% of the population, 25% of worldwide prisoners are locked up in the United States. To my surprise the documentary mentioned a technicality in the 13^thamendment that is unknown to many.to most the 13^th amendment is the amendment that “ended slavery”, however few would have the knowledge of knowing that it allows a special case of slavery with those who are criminals “as a punishment for a crime”. the freeing of 4 million slaves proved to cause major damages to the southern economy after the Civil War, leaving many of the southern plantations with no labor. In order to exploit this loophole in the 13^thamendment, many southern plantation owners would utilize prisoners who committed a very minor crime. One of the numerous cultural events that 13^th utilized was the release of The Birth of a Nation to analyze. For example, Birth of a Nation displayed freed African Americans in an extremely unfair and barbaric manner, it also shined a positive light on the Ku Klux Klan, and led to their revival in the south. A couple of years later a man named Trayvon Martin, an unarmed black man, was shot and killed by a neighborhood watch patroller because he looked suspicious. Although the shooter was prosecuted and arrested, he was let off on the “Stand your ground” law, which states if one feels threatened than they have authority to fight back. The law was introduced by a private lobbyist group of corporations and politicians which draft bills to be introduced into legislature called ALEC. ALEC allowed the elite corporations to influence and affect laws that the people elected the politicians to do, which violates the legislature process. 13^th is an eye-opening documentary which informs the audience on countless statistics. on the social injustices that African Americans have to endure.

Source analysis

http://archive.independentmail.com/news/pcbs-play-dominant-role-in-hartwells-history-ep-407756078-348292811.html/

http://balancingthebasin.armylive.dodlive.mil/2015/02/18/hartwellspringcleanup/

For my research proposal I have chosen the topic of the polluted state of lake Hartwell. This topic is important to me because fishing is my absolute favorite thing to do, and when I learned that a big beautiful lake such as this was actually unsafe, I felt I had to learn more. During my research I came across two academic articles that would give me the appropriate data and knowledge to identify the problem and find an appropriate solution. Both of these links serve a purpose, one is to go over the history and current problems concerning the pollution of lake Hartwell, and the other provides a solution. The first article, published in 2012 goes over the specific events that lead to the pollution of the lakes, for example it goes over how it all began due to an electric company’s dumping of PBCs into a dumping pond near the lake. the second source focuses on the cleanup of the lake and was published very recently. It speaks of a “clean up, green up” volunteering activity that will be held this fall by students and members of the lake community. This document relays a variety of methods that can, and are currently being taking to clean the lake. Both sources are reliable due to how recently they were published and the fact that they were created by former Clemson students who are familiar with the area. with these two articles I feel that I have the appropriate amount of reliable information to make an excellent research proposal.

Calhoun Analysis

In 1836 there was a collection of readings sent to congress concerning the ending of slavery. In this case, it was whether or not to allow petitions for the abolition of slavery from the citizens of Pennsylvania to be presented to Congress. The debate over whether slavery was to be abolished or not was of great importance during this time period, where slave owners tried desperately to maintain possession. Calhoun, a resident of South Carolina, was clearly interested to prevent the abolition of slavery. In order to do this Calhoun attempted to prevent these petitions to be read. He begins by using the rhetorical device logos, by reviewing past rules and regulations, Calhoun states that if there was a rule against these petitions being read in 1789, then it should uphold now. By doing this he made a logical argument that would help him in persuading congress. Calhoun then continues his argument in an ethos-based aspect, pulling text from the Declaration of Rights, the Magna Carta, and the Constitution. Calhoun uses these reliable well known and credible documents and relies on using the idea that since our Constitution has rules limiting the rights of petitions, that it should apply to this specific instance. Without the use of ethos, Calhouns argument would lack the credibility to persuade congress. Calhoun then concludes with the utilization of pathos to make the audience reflect on themselves. For example, he states that the movement for petition readings is distracting and divisive, he did this to infer that if people supported this petition then they would be supporting that as well . The negative connotation involving the petition then stirs the thoughts and emotions in Congress. With the utilization of ethos pathos and logos helped him promote his cause in stopping the abolition of slavery, however thankfully they were not extremely accepted throughout the country and slavery was abolished.

Slave Narratives

The text of interviews from former slaves are authentic firsthand accounts of daily life for those forced into slavery. The first interview is with a slave named Henry. In total, he has lived through 6 different owners. His interview revealed the effects of being born into slavery has on the human mind. When Henry spoke of his future with his last owner he states “I’m wonderin’ if she is goin’ to le’ me stay”. By making this statement one can see that Henry would prefer the life on the plantation rather than his newly earned freedom, this is due to the fact that he was born into slavery and is completely oblivious to what life can be like out of slavery. Henry then speaks about his family and about the emotions he was going through during their separations. however he holds no ill feelings toward his owners and makes sure to inform the interviewer that his latest one never whipped or abused any slave. Despite being a slave, Henry spoke very contently about his life. He always had access to plenty of food throughout the week besides the weekend where food became scarce. One can assume assume that since this lifestyle is all he ever knew, then this can explain his apparent satisfaction with his conditions. His religious beliefs also could have contributed to this way of thinking for he recollects his fathers teachings of heaven and hell. This could mean that despite growing up in these conditions, along with not knowing what life is like without slavery, Henry could have kept his positive way of thinking so he may pursuit an afterlife in heaven.

Twigg

In Right Reginald Twigg’s “The Performative Dimension of survailence” the author analyzes the photographs used in Jacob Riis’ “How the other half Lives” and identifies the visual rhetoric utilized in each picture. Twigg attempted to to display the techniques Riis applied to capture the audience with his use of images that rejected the societal norms.

The photograph displayed. on page 28 was a great example of Riis’ use of societal stereotypes from the late 19nth century to capture his audience. The picture was a black and white photo of a family sitting in a small apartment in which each family member seems to be occupied with a task. The title of the image is “Bohemian Cigarmakers at Work in a Tenement”(Twiggs 28). Knowing that, one can confirm that each and every member of the family is taking part in the manufacturing of cigars, including the children. Twigg states that this picture is showing its audience a place where gender and age roles are not apparent, for each member of the family, man, woman, and child, have the same objective. Twigg states “The children, presumably, must surrender play or school time in order to help the family earn a living. Each family member participates in the same economic activity, suggesting in its subtlety that the “domestic” activities of the family are dysfunctional.”(Tiwgg 28). This was exactly what Riis sought out to expose and it spoke volumes to his audiences. However, photography of that time required subjects to remain completely still for long periods of time or else the picture would not come out correctly. This means that Riis would require his subjects stand completely still, which destroys the actual candidness of the photo because he is not taking a photo of the actual moment itself and he could manipulate the image however he wanted. Twigg correctly states that Riis’ pictures are presented in “powerful realist” manner, when in reality he is able to manipulate the pictures, along with their captions/context in order to convey the rhetoric in his ideal situation to his audience.

Self Interview

Christopher Byrne born in Morristown NJ may 19nth 2000 is a fresh new Clemson student who graduated from Ridge High School, and intends to look into the business side of the health industry by perusing health management as his major. His current goal is to start his second semester at Clemson university off at the right foot.

What Brings you to Clemson University?

My father and my uncle both went to Clemson so it has been one of the only colleges I learned to love while growing up. I love football and most of all I wanted a school whose students have a sense of pride, an who doesn’t have more pride than the students at Clemson?

What do you Love to Study?

I have always loved science and things involving health because a lot of my family works in the medical industry and I find it fascinating how the human body works and functions.

What do You Plan to do After Clemson?

I plan to either to pursue a career in health insurance or if I get my grades up enough I hope to enroll into medical school. I’d say if there were a different major that I would go into it would most likely be Bio

What do you do in your Free Time?

I love to hang out with friends, play video games, and football, but most of all, if I’m bored, I like to fish!

Do you have a Hidden Talent?

I happen to be double jointed in my thumbs

What was the Last Great Movie you have Seen?

I watched bohemian rhapsody and I thought it was phenomenal, mostly because I am a huge Queen fan and basically all classic rock.

Top 5 Favorite TV Shows

In no order, my top 5 are, The office, Parks and Rec, The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, and America’s got Talent

What is your Favorite Song?

I have a million favorite songs, but my most recent favorite is Take it Easy by the Eagles

Do you Read?

I love anything mythology, greek, roman, Egyptian, norse, I love all of it, my dad had my read the odyssey when I was in 6th grade and I actually liked it.