Month: May 2017

Christian Barrett

Project 3 Reflection Letter

May 15, 2017

Professor Martin

 

For my project, I decided to do a podcast talking about the murder of a 66 year old black man, named Timothy Caughman, and how the New York Daily News stated how Caughman (the victim) had a criminal record himself. I continued my podcast by talking about the movie theater shooting in Denver. The shooter was a young white male who shot dozens of people, but was given a positive headline in the news which stated how he was a brilliant science student. My project is trying to accomplish a theory that minorities, such as African Americans and Spanish people, are targeted negatively in the media. I want my project to show people that minorities are not on their own. People do have their backs and do want to support minorities and their families. I want my project to get out a strong message to everyone so people can understand the hardships these people face every day. For my chosen audience (minorities), it shows them that they do not need to be afraid to speak their mind. Don’t think you are alone in this fight. People need to understand what it is like to be in their shoes. I myself have never been a part of being negatively portrayed in the media, but I can only imagine what it does to that person, and their families. To revise my project and remix it multimodally, I first wrote a script that I felt I was comfortable with, and that my audience would be comfortable with as well. I decided to record myself and make a podcast because I felt like my audience would better understand me through listening and not by just reading along. I feel like by just reading along, my audience would not get to physically understand the tone I want to reach them in. I want them to really hear and feel my opinion and facts in this matter. The reason why I talk about the two stories and how these two men were portrayed differently in the media is because I feel they are both very strong arguments for my podcast. They show both sides of how the media specifies their headlines on the same topic. I want my audience to see how it feels to be on both sides. One side where there is a victim who is given a negative headline for something he did fifteen years ago, and the other side where one person murders people, but is given a positive headline about how well he did in science class. The choices I made as I was making the podcast allowed me to accomplish certain things I might not have been able to do if I just wrote an essay about it, like I did for Essay 2. Although I felt that my second essay was very informative and fair to understand, I can see how the reader may grow bored and tired of it just reading it with no “tone.” With the podcast, the reader can follow along with the “tone” that I set. I feel like my opinion is stressed better through voice because it gives my true feeling and meaning of the topic. By remixing this project and converting it from my old piece, I feel that not only did my audience get a clearer picture of my message, but I did as well and I can say I better understand what I really want my message to send. As I said before, I want my message to target minorities, and let them know they do not have to fight alone. I see every day how minorities can be mistreated, whether it is on the subway, at work, or even just walking down the street. Minorities have the same rights as anyone else and should be treated just like you and I want to be treated. After receiving feedback from my group, I immediately took what they said and put it into action. They both felt that I should add in a story other than the Caughman story to show how non minorities can be portrayed in the media. That is where I decided to add in the story about James Holmes (movie theater shooter). After finishing my project and reviewing what I talked about, I feel like my audience is ready to listen to what I have to say and will better understand the topic I have chosen. The reason why I say my project is ready to be viewed by the public is because both stories give both sides of the coin, and with the addition of the story from my friend Hector, they can get a glimpse of how hard being targeted as a minority really can be. I feel that I have made it clear in my podcast who I want to target and what I want to discuss. I feel that I have made the right revisions for my project to be viewable to the public. I think my intended audience will get the message I am sending and it will give minorities another voice in the world and in this fight. It’s a fight that may take some time to win and will test people, but showing minorities we have their back will give them the confidence to stand up for themselves.

 

Christian Barrett

Essay 2

ENG 2150

 

Media Portrayal of African Americans

Throughout our lifetimes, we have seen the usage of the media, whether it be in film, television, newspapers, magazines, or the Internet, show us many negatives about certain things and certain people. An example of negative reports within the media is the members of the rap group N.W.A. The young movie, Straight Outta Compton is a 2015 film that shows us the career of the rap group. The film mostly focuses on three main characters, who include Eazy-E, Ice Cube, and Dr. Dre. First, we are introduced to Eazy-E in the city of Compton in 1986, who is living off being a drug dealer. Right away, we see Eazy-E, along with a few other black men, running from the cops who barge into the house, giving us a taste of how life in Compton was within the first five minutes of the film. Next, we are introduced to Dr. Dre, a young disc jockey living at home with his little brother, and young mother. We get another sample of how hard life is for Dre when his mother keeps pushing him telling him he needs a job and yelling how everyone said she was too young when she had him. Finally, we meet Ice Cube, a young high school student who is working to become a rapper. Again we are introduced to the struggles of people’s everyday lives in Compton when the school bus he is on is stopped by members of the Crenshaw Mafia, who threatens the lives of everyone on the bus by pulling a gun out. After seeing what these three boys are and go through every day, we learn that Dr. Dre is intrigued by Ice Cube’s raps about street violence, crime, and police harassment and then convinces Eazy-E to fund a label that they would start up. After writing their first song, Boyz N The Hood, a New York rap group turns it down, so Eazy-E raps it, makes it a hit, and N.W.A was formed. While recording their debut album Straight Outta Compton, the group is constantly harassed by the police due to their race and appearance. One specific scene that really stands out to me in the movie is when the group was standing outside the studio just minding their own business, and two cop cars immediately pull up to them. They immediately get out of the car and begin insulting them with racial slurs and ask them if they are lost. They are then told to get on the ground and keep their hands interlocked behind their back. They are searched by the police for drugs or any other paraphernalia they may have on them to put them in jail. This inspires Ice Cube to write a song that attacks the police and it gets the whole country’s attention. During a tour in 1989, the FBI sent a letter to the group telling them to stop performing this specific song because it promotes violence against law enforcement. In Detroit, the police warn them backstage not to play the song, but they perform it anyway, and a riot breaks out, and the group is arrested. As the movie goes on, we are really shown how people of a different race were treated just because they were different than everyone else. During N.W.A.’s rise to fame, the media had some things to say about that. A piece from CBS shows an attorney general from Minnesota (Hubert Humphrey III) trying to prosecute any record store that sold the groups album Straight Outta Compton to minors. The media reports stated that this album was highly offensive to not only Humphrey, but to any parent as well. Another segment from CBS shows us that “gangsta rap” is anti-police rhetoric. It tells us that N.W.A was debating whether or not their music was inciting violence or just describing the social conditions they grew up on and saw almost every day. The group always knew they were telling the truth and was not trying to commit violence, but the media, as we just saw, tries to twist it around and make it look like they are promoting violence. One scene in the movie takes place in Ice Cube’s backyard as he is being interviewed by a reporter along with his camera crew. Just by the questions he was asking it was obvious that Ice Cube was being targeted. The reporter asked what his music promotes and Ice Cube insisted he and the reporter had the same job but Ice Cube was brutally honest with his reports. It seems so quick and easy to just blame African Americans for the problems because it seems to fit right. The whole country truly sees how these people of Compton were being treated and it is turned to the whole nation’s attention. This was a very big positive that this group did for the country.

In today’s society, we are still seeing how African Americans are being treated in the world of media. Although we have seen some change from the times of N.W.A and the case of the Central Park 5, it seems African Americans are still being targeted in a negative way in the media. It seems African Americans are targeted negatively in the media because, as I said before, it has become the norm of our society and we see African Americans being arrested and taken into custody almost every day. Even after we see how these people were being treated years ago, it is still going on today. A question that comes into my mind about this specific topic is, “Why does the media make minorities the bad guys?”. I would like to be able to answer this question, because I believe not answering this question may lead to some consequences, or in other words, more unanswered questions. These questions can include who is trying to target African Americans in the media, what are they targeting African Americans for, and what benefit some people are trying to get by targeting African Americans. An article written by three Stanford students (Yurii Horton, Raagen Price, & Eric Brown) focuses on the portrayal of minorities in the film, media, and other entertainment industries. The main claims that these authors give us are that even though African Americans have come a long way, they are still being portrayed as criminals or lower class people on TV. An example they use is the networks of NBC and ABC are guilty of portraying them that way, where they have African Americans playing poorer roles, or more criminal-like roles. This source argues that why should African Americans have to play a role of a criminal just because African Americans are targeted as criminals in the real world. One of NBC’s most popular shows, Law and Order SVU, was guilty of this act. Although they did have some African Americans as police officers, I noticed that most of the criminals were African American. Why couldn’t there be more African American police officers and less criminals? Another popular show called Blue Bloods, which airs on CBS, is a show surrounding police officers and their lives. In this show the majority of the main characters are white, while the criminals are black. Although these shows are both so popular, this problem is somehow overlooked. This evidence that they provide the reader with backs up the main claim of African Americans still being portrayed as lesser, or different. A theory raised within this source from these authors states that these major networks or not hearing the major protests or cries from the citizens within their respected communities. Instead, they are looking at whether or not the show is making money, and if these bigtime networks such as ABC and NBC continue to thrive with these shows, it will be hard to keep pressure on them to do the right thing and treat everyone fairly, whether it is in real life, or fictional television shows.

Shaun King is a 37 year old American writer and civil rights activist who is the senior justice writer for the New York Daily News. After graduating from Morehouse college, a private historically black men’s college, he became a high school civics teacher for about a year, then became a motivational speaker for Atlanta’s juvenile justice system. On October 2nd, 2015, King was hired by the New York Daily News and he would be focusing on reporting on social justice and giving commentary on not only social justice, but on police brutality, and race relations.Just recently, I read an article written by King, which was about the attack on Timothy Caughman, an older New York African American gentleman. James Jackson, a 28 year old white supremacist man, drove up from Maryland and was looking to “quench his racist thirst” according to the article in the New York Daily News. Jackson was dressed in a dark suit coat, along with slacks and a button down shirt, and decided to stab Timothy Caughman randomly at about 11:30 PM on the corner of West 36th Street and 9th Avenue. Jackson used a 26-inch weapon, with an 18-inch blade to stab Caughman in the chest just above his heart. Jackson did turn himself in the next day, telling the police that he was the one they were looking for, and told them where he had ditched his knives. He also confessed to the police that he was a member of a white supremacist group and that he planned to stab a black man, then grab a police officer’s gun and shoot some people. Clearly this was a racist act. However, what really interested me was that the Daily News felt it was necessary to include that Caughman has a criminal record himself, and was arrested fifteen years ago. This is another example of African Americans being targeted in the media, and it is truly heartbreaking. This was a 66 year old homeless man and for some unknown reason, these people felt it was necessary that his criminal record was included. One theory that the police may say is that they feel this man’s criminal history may be why he was targeted. Is it really that believable that a man drove all the way up from Maryland just to kill a 66 year old black man who was arrested for assault when this murderer (Jackson) was only 13 years old? I would say no, and these people were just looking for an easy way out to cover themselves for including the criminal history in the story. Again, the Daily News felt it was necessary to state that he had been arrested 11 times for assault and marijuana possession, after they tried to sugar coat him by stating he loved to take pictures with celebrities, which I found sort of disturbing. After Caughman reports what happened, he gives his own commentary on the matter. He states that there is no place for media attacks on Timothy Caughman immediately after his death. Caughman felt that there was absolutely no need for the media to let everyone know about his criminal past. He was murdered by a white supremacist man who was looking to kill black men. He talks about if there was a terrorist attack and innocent people died, people would be outraged if the victims criminal past for “smoking a joint 15 years ago” was brought up. King was disgusted with the way the media targeted the African American victim and he has every right to be.

An old phenomenon that seems to play a big role in this topic is that the criminal is the victim. This problem of videos or pictures of the murders of black people has been a problem since the late 19th century. This relates back to the Timothy Caughman case. Caughman was a victim, but was still portrayed as a criminal himself for a small crime committed years ago. TIME Magazine shows us how the post modern Civil War era was the beginning of these problems. African Americans, or negros, were being lynched and burned and pictures of these horrific incidents were being sold throughout the country as a joke and as a statement. The reason these horrific things were happening was because black people were thought to be the ones who would start riots and burn down towns after the Civil War. Why would they do such a thing after gaining the freedom they always wanted and deserved just like everybody else? They were just victims of one of the most brutal things done in American history (slavery) but yet were being targeted as criminals just because others thought they would act inhumanely. This relates back to my exhibit because in the film, we see these young African Americans be targeted for drugs because they are just thought to have them on their person because that is what was started in the late 19th century. It truly is a disgrace how something started years ago is still around in todays society.

Back in 2014, we as a country all saw the shooting of an unarmed black teenager named Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. The officers said he was in a match with a police officer and went to reach for the officer’s gun during the scuffle. However, this was starting to become a trend in society of unarmed black men being killed by police officers. In an online post, there was a headline of Brown stating that he struggled with an officer before shooting. On the same website, a picture of the young teenager, James Eagen Holmes, a white teenager, stating that he was a brilliant science student. Holmes shot and killed dozens of people in a Denver movie theatre back in 2012. With these two picture side by side, we can see that once again, a black man is targeted negatively in the media, while the white murderer is given a positive headline. Think about the Caughman case for a second, and how we can see the relation between the two posts. The media felt it was absolutely necessary to include the struggles these black men have went through, even though they were trying to be good citizens.

From just these argument sources, I feel that there is a lot we can learn as observers. One thing we can learn is that we see part of the norm in today’s society is clearly targeting African Americans in the media. By that, I mean it is very easy for everyone to follow along with what everyone is doing and people seem to be afraid to step up and be a leader to help change this problem. If people see big companies such as NBC, ABC, and the New York Daily News doing it, then people feel comfortable following their lead because they are widely known and have been around for years. However, I think if juts one of these companies choose a different route, such as NBC putting African Americans as police officers, or millionaires or community leaders on a television show, people will begin to follow their transition and help make a difference. Take my exhibit for example. These young black men were constantly targeted and told they would never make it and were consistently laughed at, but they saw things through until the end, even when the road got bumpy. They helped start a new wave of music and helped influence many important African American artists we have seen come on the scene and make a big deal still today, such as Snoop Dogg, Tupac, Biggie Smalls, etc. African Americans are targeted in the media because it has been the normal thing to do for many years, and even when it is a crime against them, the script somehow flips, and tries to make them seem like the bad guy and it needs to come to an end.

 

Works Cited

Parascandola, Rocco, Graham Rayman, and Thomas Tracy. “Attacker in Midtown stabbing admits he wanted to kill black men.” NY Daily News. ROCCO PARASCANDOLA, 22 Mar. 2017. Web. 02 Apr. 2017.

King, Shaun. “KING: No place for attacks on character of Timothy Caughman.” NY Daily News. Shaun King, 24 Mar. 2017. Web. 02 Apr. 2017.

“PORTRAYAL OF MINORITIES IN THE FILM, MEDIA AND ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRIES.” PORTRAYAL OF MINORITIES IN THE FILM, MEDIA AND ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRIES. Yurii Horton, n.d. Web. 02 Apr. 2017.

“Representation of African Americans in media. ” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 13 Mar. 2017. Web. 19 Mar. 2017.

Wing, Nick. “When The Media Treats White Suspects And Killers Better Than Black Victims.” The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 14 Aug. 2014. Web. 22 Apr. 2017.

“An Old Phenomenon: Victims Portrayed as Criminals.” Time. Time, n.d. Web. 22 Apr. 2017.

Christian Barrett

February 27, 2017

Essay 1: Critical Analysis (Close Reading A Single Text)

English 2150-HMWF

 

Brent Hayes Edwards & Thelonious Monk: Looking For Evidence

“Evidence” is an essay written by Brent Hayes Edwards that begins by giving us a very detailed description of his surroundings. Edwards finds himself in the country of Dakar, in West Africa. He came to this country as a tourist, hoping to come back home with a good experience with many stories and memories. However, he did not encounter the greatest experience. As I read the story, I saw that he gets attacked by a group of men while people just stand by and watch. Later on in the story, he is being questioned by some suspicious “police officers” for an unknown reason. He was taken into police custody due to not having his identification papers on him and resisting arrest. While in his cell, which he described at the beginning of the story, he is treated very poorly and surrounded by people who look very sick. While in prison, he refers to a piece by Thelonious Monk, which is titled “Evidence.” One of Edwards’ threads he uses throughout the story includes the usage of jazz music. Here is where I find the intellectual problem, which was the usage of Monk’s song “Evidence” right in the first part of the story. The way it is used in this story is after another prisoner, who was a musician, was brutally beaten to death and left most of the broken pieces of his body to the dogs.

By close reading just this first page of the story, the intellectual problem jumped out off the page into my eyes. Edwards had found himself in a corrupt city that had a corrupt justice system, which treated everybody like dirt. That was the theme of the essay, and inside it was Thelonious Monk being mentioned in the story. Realizing the hidden theme of corruption in this story helps me figure out as a reader why Thelonious Monk is mentioned to the reader. The reason I think the song “Evidence” is put into this story is because Edwards has seen truly how bad the town of Dakar is. He has evidence that can prove his argument about a corrupt justice system filled with corrupt people. The musician being murdered at the beginning of the story shows us how helpless the people of this city are and nobody does anything to help them. Edwards mentions that “In their hands, any object was a weapon: rocks, mud, sticks, scissors, the broom in the corner, the shovel in the yard, the knives and the forks and the corkscrew on the table,” (Edwards 42). This sentence gave me a vivid picture of the animals that these people are. Using anything they saw as a weapon means no matter where you are or where you go in this city, you are always at risk to be hurt, robbed, or even killed, and that is no way to live. Edwards uses a tricky structure to form his story, but I think it is tricky because he is leaving evidence about the wrongs of Dakar. The interpretive problem of Monk being mentioned in the text really put me through a loop. This certain aspect of the text went away from my assumption because I did not expect a jazz piece to be mentioned in this certain story. The claim, or observation I made after reading the story and seeing that piece in it was that the way a reader comes into a text expecting it to go one way can lead us to truly see the real meaning of the story in a whole new way, which is a beautiful thing.

The claim I came up with after realizing what Monk’s piece was put in the essay for was that Edwards wanted me, as the reader, to see what he saw. The usage of Monk’s piece was a clue and an example to help me better understand the point that he was trying to make in writing this story. Edwards writes “The song is not what the singer sang. Not the tones that for so many years had bent the oak trees and the poplars, the laurel and the sycamore, the boxwood and the blue-berried viburnum-even the shade itself-toward the house, toward the source of that music. The song is what overtakes the remnants in the river, the sound of the current that washes the battered head,” (Edwards 42). After carefully looking at these two sentences, I saw that the musician, who was brutally beaten in the paragraph before this, was a symbol of hope for these people around him. He helped them not think about the horrors and problems that stared these people right in the face. This was another hint in this odd and tricky structure that Edwards used to write this story. He continues with this hint in the next sentence by writing ” The song is the water’s play against the cracked frets of the guitar, coaxing chords out of that hull as it’s carried away,” (Edwards 42-43). As the guitar was being taken away, it was still making sounds, meaning that there was still hope for these people and that it is not over, even though the musician and guitar are both gone. The intellectual problem of Monk’s piece being used in the story starts to make a little more sense now that I have a better understanding after seeing a musician be involved in the story.

As I read along, I saw more passages with hidden messages to help support my intellectual problem. The theme of a corrupt justice system comes into play again when Edwards writes “I stared desperately into the eyes of a woman halfway across the street, who stared back, blank, unmoving. Is this how you treat your tourists here?” (Edwards-47). He writes this after he is attacked by four men while others stand by on the street and just let it happen. As a reader, I see that the people who are standing by not helping are the ones who have no hope and think they can not change what is going on in this poor city. Edwards becomes uncomfortable as a tourist here and I think he sees that there is also no hope in the city. However, when he sees the musician be taken away along with the guitar, he does see some hope with the guitar still making noise and that is why he includes the song by Thelonious Monk. As a reader, I did become a little lost because the story does seem to jump a bit out of order, but in the very beginning of the story, Edwards gives me a vivid picture of his surroundings. He states “The cell is four meters long and two meters wide. The walls and floors are lined with white tile, gleaming in the half light,” (Edwards-42). As soon as I read that it was clear to me that Edwards wants his reader to understand the trouble and hardship that he is going through as a prisoner. His usage of detailed imagery really helped me picture the scenario he was in. Right away Edwards lets the reader know that he is very uncomfortable and there is no sign of hope yet.

After reading about Edwards’ tough and negative experience, I believe that there are some positives I can take away as a reader. One positive is how grateful and thankful we need to be for our justice system and our police. Although there may be some flaws here and there, those brave men and women put their lives out on the line everyday for us to protect and serve to make us one of the strongest countries in the world. It helps keep us close together and give us the courage and strength to walk the streets at night knowing we are protected. As for my intellectual problem of Monk’s piece being included into this story, I think I have found a resolution and why it was in there. It all relates back to hope. Hope is what gets people out of bed in the morning and keeps people going. We have hope here in the United States and I think the city of Dakar deserves to have some too. Not only do we have hope as citizens, but even our police officers can have some as well. We see the stickers on the back of NYPD patrol cars throughout the city that state if we see an injured officer, a reward of $10,000 is there if we call it in. Although its not a perfect idea, it helps the officers know there can be some citizens out there who are willing to protect them, just as they are willing to protect us. This can be adopted in that city as a way to spread more hope for people who want to become honest police officers knowing their might be someone out there willing to help protect them. This can be used as “evidence” to start the process of gaining more hope.

In conclusion, the thoughts I received after reading this story is that no matter how hard your life is, there is always someone who is struggling just like you. When I first read this story, it made no sense to me why Monk was included in here and it confused me about what the story would be about. However, after close reading this story and seeing how he was treated (very poorly) along with the other tourists and citizens of Dakar, hope must be maintained no matter what situation you find yourself in. I found the answer to my intellectual problem by reading on in the story and Edwards helped me understand why the problem was raised. It really made me think as a reader about the situation he was in. I am glad I got to share my experience of this story as a reader and writer, although it did make me really think at times. Even though Edwards did not get the greatest experience he might have been looking for as a tourist, he might have came back with a better understanding of what hope truly is and how people should carry it with them everyday.

Works Cited

“Evidence” pages 42 & 47- Brent Hayes Edwards

“Bibliography.” Controlling Police Corruption. N.p., n.d. Web 14 Feb 2017

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Christian Barrett

Final Reflection

Professor Martin

5/22/17

 

Before this class started, writing was always considered as one of my weaker topics to tackle. I always found myself repeating things, coming up short of my potential as a writer, getting lazy due to lack of preparation in drafts, and just not wanting to write. However, now that the semester has come to an end, and after three projects, I feel like writing, although it still may not be my strongest subject, is definitely one of my better ones as I grew. As I look back on Essay 1, Essay 2, and my remix project, I can see the differences from each project as I moved along through the semester. In Essay 1, a big tool that I used was close reading. Taking down notes while reading the story helped me tremendously because I felt that it somewhat gave me  a starting point for the essay. I knew what I wanted to talk about after highlighting certain points in the story. Another tool I used as I wrote my essays and did my project for this class was the writer based prose and the reader based prose. I wanted my work to be more reader based prose because I was writing for them, not for myself. I wanted my audience to understand where I was coming from and not have them guessing about what my argument was, who the intended audience was, and where the sources came from that I used in my work. As the semester went on, I saw my progress grow from project to project. One of my biggest problems as a writer was not finishing strong and not having enough evidence to support the main theme of my essay. I would always find myself falling short of what I really wanted my essay to sound like, and that would affect my final grade. However, with the tools used from class and the peer review groups, I gained new ways to help me adjust my essay and make it a strong final product. For future classes and future writing, I would like to continue to do the same thing we did in this class. For example, I would like to have a group of classmates who read my essay and see what are my strengths and what are my weaknesses. This exercise was very helpful because I got feedback from audience members on what to expand on, and what I should use less of.

Looking back at the course goals and objectives on the syllabus, I can see what I really improved on as a writer. In critically analyzing texts, I would incorporate the close reading tool into this matter. Reading the text and writing down important sentences in the text, whether it was a magazine, story, speech, newspaper article or online article, helped me focus on what to include into my final product. As far as the rhetorical situations go, I used many tools to help me get my point across and try to persuade my audience into buying my argument. I used tools from the internet, media, and newspapers. I read articles from people who write them professionally, such as Shaun King, and learned from how he persuaded his audience in his own way. I involved multiple drafts, that included bullet points on what to include, followed by a paragraph or two on what my main argument will be (which was reviewed by me peer review group) and then a draft of my final essay. I wanted my final product to be as clear and understanding to the reader as it could possibly be, and by drafting beforehand, I think I did that. My style of writing has changed tremendously to being more reader based and I feel like my sentence structure is a lot stronger. In the first assignment, finding an intellectual problem was challenging, because it was something that I had never done before. However, once I found it, it made the argument of my essay very strong and made me find my motive, or “so what” point. In the second essay, my intellectual problem was found right away, which led to my exhibit (Straight Outta Compton). My problem dealt with why minorities were being targeted negatively in the media. This will always be remembered as one of my biggest takeaways from this class because by doing this essay, it opened my eyes to a major problem in this country that I used to just turn my head from and ignore. My view of myself as a writer has very much changed within the past few months. As I said before, writing was never one of my better subjects, but I see the improvement I have made and it truly amazed me to see what I am capable of. When I look back at the email I sent at the beginning of the year, I see I was lacking confidence and always came up short of what I wanted to accomplish. Also, looking back at my first free write, I talked about why I write, which was to fully understand what I was writing about, and what my writing process includes, which was just a draft. However, now my writing process includes everything we worked on in class, such as close reading, etc. All of these things have made me a stronger and better writer.

In conclusion, I feel that this writing class fully covered my expectations and I was very pleased with the tools and ideas our professor made us use and helped us understand. I will take away many things from this class and as I said before, I hope peer review is something my professors and instructors include because it helped me tremendously. I really enjoyed doing the 2nd essay because as a class, we all learned important lessons on how certain people live, how people are treated, and what is happening right in front of us, even though we may not be paying attention to it. The third project was a good way to end the semester off because it let us expand on what we know and use different tools to get our arguments across, whether it was through a podcast, drawing, or video. This class was very helpful to me as a student and I am proud to say it helped me grow as a student.

Christian Barrett

Project 3 Reflection Letter

May 15, 2017

Professor Martin

 

For my project, I decided to do a podcast talking about the murder of a 66 year old black man, named Timothy Caughman, and how the New York Daily News stated how Caughman (the victim) had a criminal record himself. I continued my podcast by talking about the movie theater shooting in Denver. The shooter was a young white male who shot dozens of people, but was given a positive headline in the news which stated how he was a brilliant science student. My project is trying to accomplish a theory that minorities, such as African Americans and Spanish people, are targeted negatively in the media. I want my project to show people that minorities are not on their own. People do have their backs and do want to support minorities and their families. I want my project to get out a strong message to everyone so people can understand the hardships these people face every day. For my chosen audience (minorities), it shows them that they do not need to be afraid to speak their mind. Don’t think you are alone in this fight. People need to understand what it is like to be in their shoes. I myself have never been a part of being negatively portrayed in the media, but I can only imagine what it does to that person, and their families. To revise my project and remix it multimodally, I first wrote a script that I felt I was comfortable with, and that my audience would be comfortable with as well. I decided to record myself and make a podcast because I felt like my audience would better understand me through listening and not by just reading along. I feel like by just reading along, my audience would not get to physically understand the tone I want to reach them in. I want them to really hear and feel my opinion and facts in this matter. The reason why I talk about the two stories and how these two men were portrayed differently in the media is because I feel they are both very strong arguments for my podcast. They show both sides of how the media specifies their headlines on the same topic. I want my audience to see how it feels to be on both sides. One side where there is a victim who is given a negative headline for something he did fifteen years ago, and the other side where one person murders people, but is given a positive headline about how well he did in science class. The choices I made as I was making the podcast allowed me to accomplish certain things I might not have been able to do if I just wrote an essay about it, like I did for Essay 2. Although I felt that my second essay was very informative and fair to understand, I can see how the reader may grow bored and tired of it just reading it with no “tone.” With the podcast, the reader can follow along with the “tone” that I set. I feel like my opinion is stressed better through voice because it gives my true feeling and meaning of the topic. By remixing this project and converting it from my old piece, I feel that not only did my audience get a clearer picture of my message, but I did as well and I can say I better understand what I really want my message to send. As I said before, I want my message to target minorities, and let them know they do not have to fight alone. I see every day how minorities can be mistreated, whether it is on the subway, at work, or even just walking down the street. Minorities have the same rights as anyone else and should be treated just like you and I want to be treated. After receiving feedback from my group, I immediately took what they said and put it into action. They both felt that I should add in a story other than the Caughman story to show how non minorities can be portrayed in the media. That is where I decided to add in the story about James Holmes (movie theater shooter). After finishing my project and reviewing what I talked about, I feel like my audience is ready to listen to what I have to say and will better understand the topic I have chosen. The reason why I say my project is ready to be viewed by the public is because both stories give both sides of the coin, and with the addition of the story from my friend Hector, they can get a glimpse of how hard being targeted as a minority really can be. I feel that I have made it clear in my podcast who I want to target and what I want to discuss. I feel that I have made the right revisions for my project to be viewable to the public. I think my intended audience will get the message I am sending and it will give minorities another voice in the world and in this fight. It’s a fight that may take some time to win and will test people, but showing minorities we have their back will give them the confidence to stand up for themselves.

Project 3 Draft

 

Christian

On March 20, 2017 in Hells Kitchen, New York City, Timothy Caughman was stabbed by James Harris Jackson, a 28 year old white man. Jackson used an 18 inch sword to stab Caughman to death. Caughman was a 66 year old black man who was collecting cans for recycling during the time of the stabbing. After the stabbing, Jackson did turn himself in later on March 22nd, saying that he traveled by bus from Maryland to New York with the intention of killing black men in order to prevent white women from having interracial relationships with them. He also told police that he intended on killing more black men in Times Square. He stayed at The Hotel Times Square on W. 46th Street. After the death of Caughman, the New York Daily News posted the story. What really caught my attention as I read the article was that the Daily News felt it was necessary to include the criminal history of Caughman. The newspaper stated how Caughman was arrested 15 years ago for assault and marijuana possession, even though he was the victim in this scenario. Not only did this catch my attention, but it caught the attention of many others, like Shaun King. King is the senior justice writer for the New York Daily News and a civil rights activist. King felt that it was disturbing and stated how there is no room for media attacks on Timothy Caughman immediately following his death. King felt that there was absolutely no reason for the media to let everyone know about Caughman’s criminal past, and I agree with him. On his Facebook page, King posted about the Caughman incident, saying “What in the hell does the fact that this man had an old criminal record have to do with anything? My understanding is that the initial excuse for including this fact was that the NYPD were wondering if his criminal history had anything to do with why he was targeted. Really? You think this white supremacist murderer came all the way to Maryland to kill a homeless 66-year-old black man because he got arrested for assault when the murderer was 13 years old? Really?”

Insert some sort of music here to transition to another story and show I am changing from one story to another.

Christian

We saw a clear representation of how the media can negatively attack African Americans in the media. With that being said, I found a story about a white criminal who shot people in a movie theatre, but was given a positive headline in the papers. In 2012, James Eagen Holmes, a white 24 year old doctoral student, put on a gas mask and shot dozens of people in a movie theatre in Denver during a midnight showing of the new movie “The Dark Knight Rises.” After this horrific situation happened, the website that posted the story (CBS) made a headline that reads “Theater Shooting Suspect Was Brilliant Science Student.” I found this very odd because a criminal was given a positive headline by the media, but the victim in the last story (Caughman) was given a negative headline. Why does a criminal deserve to get a positive headline but the victim of a crime doesn’t? Could it be based off of their skin colors? If so, why does that seem like the right thing to do? To get another person’s perspective on this topic, I asked my Spanish friend, Hector Gonzalez to see what he thinks about this.

Hector

From these two stories that we looked into, I feel that the minority is clearly being targeted negatively in the media just because he is African American. As a member of s minority group myself, I can relate. Although I am not black or white, I can see how it feels to be on both sides of the story here. I once went for a job interview with one of my friends, who was white. When we were both 17, we got arrested for marijuana possession. While on the job interview I was asked more about my criminal record, while my white friend was only asked one question about it. The questions I was asked dealt with where I grew up, how did I get caught, who was I with, where was I. I ended up not getting the job, but my white friend did, even with our similar criminal records. I felt as if I was targeted because I am considered a minority and I can understand why the family members of these victims of negative headlines in the media would be deeply saddened. In my opinion, overcoming this problem will not be easy and there will always be negative media headlines, but if everyone shares their stories and starts to get everyone’s attention, I think something can be done to get us in the right direction.

Have more music play to indicate an ending of the podcast.

Christian Barrett

Reflection Letter

 

        Since I turned in the project proposal a week ago, my audience has been narrowed down to 1 main audience. That specific audience I would like to target is the people in minority groups, whether they have been victimized as negatives in the media or not. In my proposal, I mentioned that I was in between targeting the media, or the people in minority groups. The reason I want to target my attention to the minority groups is because I want them to see that they are not alone and they have every right to team up with people and fight for themselves. I want them to know people will be behind them and minority groups should not just lay there and accept the negativity in the media. Over the past week, my vision on what I need to do has become more clear and I know I definitely want to make a podcast that includes not only my opinion, but they opinion of others, including a personal friend of mine. My vision has become more focused because of the information I have gathered and reading stories on how people can be affected by negative influences towards them in the media. When I say the word media, I mean newspaper articles, tv shows, movies, books, magazines, etc. As far as revising my argument for the remix goes, I want to give my audience two sides of the coin here. I will talk about one story that includes the horrific murder of a black man named Timothy Caughman, and how he was talked about negatively in the New York Daily News (showed his criminal record). Another story I want to include in my podcast is the brutal killing of dozens of people in a Denver movie theatre and how the shooter (a white male) was given a positive headline on the CBS website (stated how he was a brilliant science student). I am still working on including new modes in my podcast, which I have never done before, but I am looking forward to completing this podcast because I want to grow as a student and show myself what I can continue to grow in. In order to complete my project, I definitely want to include some type of music in between stories and people. Without the music, I feel like it will be very boring just listening to someone talk. I want it to sound good and stick out. Listening to someone talk without any interruptions is not only boring, but it can be challenging as well. Compared to drafting an essay, doing a project like this is more fun and challenges me more. I often find myself getting a little lazy while drafting an essay and looking for facts to include. However, through talking to my audience I feel like I can get my point across clearer and they can better understand where I am coming from. At times it is similar, because I am still trying to prove a point I am trying to make to a specific audience, but I feel like doing it this way is more fun and helps me focus more. As my draft is read, I would like to receive feedback on what I should include more or less of, and where I can include my music in this podcast, or if I should have any at all. I want this project to be as clear and fun as it possibly can and feedback with those things included will help me tremendously.