Poetry Project
Artist Statement
Through out my years I have faded in and out of many different genres of music. Although, there is one band that has continued to run through my headphones ever since I was in the 5th grade. This is a hip-hop group that is based out of Vancouver, Canada. Sweatshop Union is made up of six males who produce easy flowing song that usually send a very direct message. One of my favorite songs produced by them, “The Thing About It” is a song that shines a light of now todays society is becoming so heavily dependent on development and technology that we have lost a sense of peace within our minds. Once that is not present it reflects on our society as a whole. “How can we be free if the water that we drink is owned by some company?” This could quite possibly be my favorite line from this song. As it much mirrors the message produced by the lyrics. “The thing about it is we can't just sing about it,” a lyric voicing how to find peace we can't just make and listen to song about peace we all have to take part in the movement. The time is always right for this movement to start.
Little did I know that this idea of how we all need to take action and discover the right time is now to begin to make positive steps for peace would become the main inspiration for my poem. I knew from the start that I wanted to base my poem of the root ideas of peace and power, since these two ideas are some what of contradictory term I thought I would be interesting to surround my poem around these topics. The only other thought that I wanted to incorporate was this idea of how we need to work as a team to achieve peace.
The light bulb finally illuminated. Based off of the response of all of the feedback that I got from critiques, I would make my poem based off of a metaphor showing that peace is a game that is in desperate need of a score, and how we all will have to come together to make a world of peace a reality. Within this poem I incorporated what many aspects of a traditional game would look like in this translated version of the peace game. Aspects such as who will be playing, rules, ranking, how we will win, and when we have won. This poem has the phrase, “Within this game” repeating multiple times, followed with a short stanza voicing the many different aspects of this game of peace.
“The face of the Earth changes drastically and we clear space at a high rate for strip malls and factories we risk take a crew fate at a pace beyond gradually, no more crops for us to harvest and feed, self-sufficiency replaced by clone-copy written seeds.” This is the lyrics that is directly before the first line that I stated. This lyrics echoes my point of how today we are getting so caught up in advancements that many of us don't support a self sufficient lifestyle, and are more dependent on developing grocery stores, not to mention the numerous other large developments that we rely on for needs such as clothing. Passed all of the shiny expensive merchandise within these structures there once was wild land without any trace of human destruction.
The Monkey Wrench Gang, a novel written by Edward Abbey telling the story of four extreme environmentalist who sabotage anything from servery stakes to the dam that contains Lake Powell. The gang starts their destruction in a gravel pit 15 miles from page Arizona. They dismantle much of the heavy equipment that is destroying the once beautiful desert landscape. Their modem is to preserve the desert with their radical techniques, we will do whatever it takes to stand up for the wilderness.
Through out my years I have faded in and out of many different genres of music. Although, there is one band that has continued to run through my headphones ever since I was in the 5th grade. This is a hip-hop group that is based out of Vancouver, Canada. Sweatshop Union is made up of six males who produce easy flowing song that usually send a very direct message. One of my favorite songs produced by them, “The Thing About It” is a song that shines a light of now todays society is becoming so heavily dependent on development and technology that we have lost a sense of peace within our minds. Once that is not present it reflects on our society as a whole. “How can we be free if the water that we drink is owned by some company?” This could quite possibly be my favorite line from this song. As it much mirrors the message produced by the lyrics. “The thing about it is we can't just sing about it,” a lyric voicing how to find peace we can't just make and listen to song about peace we all have to take part in the movement. The time is always right for this movement to start.
Little did I know that this idea of how we all need to take action and discover the right time is now to begin to make positive steps for peace would become the main inspiration for my poem. I knew from the start that I wanted to base my poem of the root ideas of peace and power, since these two ideas are some what of contradictory term I thought I would be interesting to surround my poem around these topics. The only other thought that I wanted to incorporate was this idea of how we need to work as a team to achieve peace.
The light bulb finally illuminated. Based off of the response of all of the feedback that I got from critiques, I would make my poem based off of a metaphor showing that peace is a game that is in desperate need of a score, and how we all will have to come together to make a world of peace a reality. Within this poem I incorporated what many aspects of a traditional game would look like in this translated version of the peace game. Aspects such as who will be playing, rules, ranking, how we will win, and when we have won. This poem has the phrase, “Within this game” repeating multiple times, followed with a short stanza voicing the many different aspects of this game of peace.
“The face of the Earth changes drastically and we clear space at a high rate for strip malls and factories we risk take a crew fate at a pace beyond gradually, no more crops for us to harvest and feed, self-sufficiency replaced by clone-copy written seeds.” This is the lyrics that is directly before the first line that I stated. This lyrics echoes my point of how today we are getting so caught up in advancements that many of us don't support a self sufficient lifestyle, and are more dependent on developing grocery stores, not to mention the numerous other large developments that we rely on for needs such as clothing. Passed all of the shiny expensive merchandise within these structures there once was wild land without any trace of human destruction.
The Monkey Wrench Gang, a novel written by Edward Abbey telling the story of four extreme environmentalist who sabotage anything from servery stakes to the dam that contains Lake Powell. The gang starts their destruction in a gravel pit 15 miles from page Arizona. They dismantle much of the heavy equipment that is destroying the once beautiful desert landscape. Their modem is to preserve the desert with their radical techniques, we will do whatever it takes to stand up for the wilderness.
In Order to Find the Missing Peace
Poem by: Riley Wanzek
Because,
Within this game, there is no such thing as power
from as we have foreseen, this seems to turn the user sour.
It will contain not even a posse comitatus.
Within this game, one may not sit behind the distant glare of a wide screen
or destroy the environment, with a diesel burning, earth moving machine.
The time is now as we have foreseen.
As the emotion of the Earth remains unseen
The spirits of the forest mein,
obscene.
In order to make, this finally find
We will have to stop, polluting our precious rind.
As the final seconds diminish to zero,
Prepare yourself, as it will be you.
The one,
the hero.
Poem by: Riley Wanzek
- The people want peace, but the leaders want war
so what is it that we are really fighting for?
Are we all unsure?
Maybe it snuck in through the back door?
I know one thing that is for sure.
The time is now for us to take the floor.
Because the game of peace sure needs a score.
Within this game, everyone is welcome, so please attend
As there will be no crimes to apprehend
nor podium to stand on at the end.
Just a world in desperate need of some spiritual mend.
- The most important, no explosive tools.
As for the iphones, and intricate jewels,
they will be stripped, even from the elementary schools.
Within this game, we will not ever resort to violence.
We will just use the dreadful sound of silence.
Within this game, there will be no borders
Because,
Within this game, there is no such thing as power
from as we have foreseen, this seems to turn the user sour.
Within this game, there will be no place to see your status
and we will all live with equal gratis.
It will contain not even a posse comitatus.
Within this game, one may not sit behind the distant glare of a wide screen
or destroy the environment, with a diesel burning, earth moving machine.
The time is now as we have foreseen.
As the emotion of the Earth remains unseen
The spirits of the forest mein,
obscene.
- To win this game, we need to wind
In order to make, this finally find
We will have to stop, polluting our precious rind.
As the final seconds diminish to zero,
Prepare yourself, as it will be you.
The one,
the hero.
Growth As a Poet
From the first draft I wrote to the last I knew I wanted my poem to be about peace. In the beginning, I also knew that I wanted my poem to have a very well flowing rhyme scheme. In my earlier drafts, I would write about peace, with no clear direction of where I was going with it. As I played with different rhymes found myself making up some well flowing lines. One of which, “the game of peace sure needs a score”, became my main inspiration of my next draft. My critiques also liked this line but told me to take it deeper. So I began expanding with this idea. This influential line changed my poem completely. I now has something I could relate peace back too. My poem would refer back to this idea, of peace being a game that we all have too participate in, all through out the poem.
One of the most critical changes that I made to the form of my poem through out the writing process is how I formatted the stanzas. In my earlier drafts I started all of my stanzas in different ways with different rhyme schemes. But since I was relating this idea of peace to a game I decided that it would be a good idea to start each of my stanzas with a repeating phrase. As I would list all of the different rules and parts of the game and start each stanza with the phrase, “within this game”. I believe that this impacts the message of the poem because it gives a mood that this is the time that we need to start this game and there are all of the different rules that you need to know to be successful. I also think that my poem is very simplistic with the format the way it is.
Another change that warped my poem to perfection is the rhyme scheme that I chose. Being an individual that loves hip-hop I wanted my poem to have lots of word flow. I also wanted each rhyming word to have an importance in the poem so that they would stick in the listeners mind, much like a song that you have just heard, the rhyming words are the first that you can remember. My earlier drafts had mostly rhyme schemes that mirrored my final, other then each of the stanzas featured a repeating line as I talked about before in the final. This attribute gave my poem lots of word flow and rhyme, using significant words within the rhymes to help the listeners remember the importance of each line which showed the importance of my poem.
Finally, to the most important factor in which made my poem that way it is this the content in which I talked about within the lines of my poem. These changed dramatically from my first draft to the last. In my first draft, I only talked about the idea of peace, as for in my my final I talked about all of the factors that are keeping us from peace and how we need to get rid of these walls before we can have world peace. Ideas such as corrupt power, violence, and hate.This gave me much more to expand on as I wrote I believe this also gave my poem more imagery through the ears of each listener. Although many of these ideas are hard to change and get rid of, I wanted to express them in my poem just to get the audience thinking about them which I think is the first step.
Attached above is the video of my spoken word poem recitation.
Seminar Sequence
Global Village Seminar Reflection
A comment that I thought was really interesting was one that Tatum said at the end of our seminar. A summary of what he was saying was how if we are going to become a connected global village this would mean that we would all be similar from a stand point of education, wealth, and culture. But since we are all viewing this situation of Globalization from an American stand point we all had the same view about this. One thing that I started thinking about from this comment is how much will we as Americans have to give up to become just like the rest of the connected Earth. The U.S. is known for being the most powerful country and for all of the other countries to gain the same amount of power as us would be a little weird, I don't know how much I would like to lose that identity of power. A realization this quote made me think about is how many opportunities I have living in the U.S.
As I read Iyers' article, in exploration to find the voice in which it echoes, I discover that the only voice it communicates is the one you bring upon it. The first time I read this article I thought of it as a negative response to the idea of Globalization. The only reason I portrayed it as a negative response is because as I read with a negative thought process it I didn't like the idea of diluting ones' culture. As I read it now the only voice I see is a voice stating the facts, the facts in which show a huge cultural connection that has finally arrived.
Is the unique multi-cultural, culture of America the only culture being diluted by Globalization? I have been pondering this question for a while now. My final answer to it is, yes. I believe that this is true, because us “Americans” were all imported from other outside countries. As being imported we also imported our culture. The only people who can say their nationality is “American” are the, Native American people who lived on the land before Columbus came. If you think about it we should have a Native American culture in forced upon us since that is whose land we are on, much like a Japanese culture is present in Japan. Although we don't have a Native American culture, we have a culture of many different cultures, coming from many different nationalities.
Demonstrating that depending on the culture you live in, your perspective will change on the idea of it being diluted. The American culture is the only culture being diluted as a result of different cultures appearing in different nations, because many different cultures, was our culture. Are these cultures actually becoming stronger, as a result of seeing them is many different parts of the world? Because people from these different nations can still experience their nationality is many different regions, keeping their roots relevant in their lives.
During the seminar I made a connection to something that we have been learning about, diversity = stability, this is a theory that is saying the more diverse an ecosystem is the more stability will come within it. There are two ways to interpenetrate this theory in this situation. One way to look at it is by the more different raced people we have in a certain area will make it more stable. Also I think you could say that the more different cultures we have around the world the more stable it will be, this thought would be saying that our world is heading towards instability. Meaning that we need to stop this culture connection.
In my political cartoon I decided to make it about Americans going to Japan. What I portrayed is a couple of Americans looking for somewhere to have dinner. As they are driving around they see a McDonald's. Since they don't want to go to any of the Japanese culture restaurants they pick McDonalds, because they will feel at home eating there.
A comment that I thought was really interesting was one that Tatum said at the end of our seminar. A summary of what he was saying was how if we are going to become a connected global village this would mean that we would all be similar from a stand point of education, wealth, and culture. But since we are all viewing this situation of Globalization from an American stand point we all had the same view about this. One thing that I started thinking about from this comment is how much will we as Americans have to give up to become just like the rest of the connected Earth. The U.S. is known for being the most powerful country and for all of the other countries to gain the same amount of power as us would be a little weird, I don't know how much I would like to lose that identity of power. A realization this quote made me think about is how many opportunities I have living in the U.S.
As I read Iyers' article, in exploration to find the voice in which it echoes, I discover that the only voice it communicates is the one you bring upon it. The first time I read this article I thought of it as a negative response to the idea of Globalization. The only reason I portrayed it as a negative response is because as I read with a negative thought process it I didn't like the idea of diluting ones' culture. As I read it now the only voice I see is a voice stating the facts, the facts in which show a huge cultural connection that has finally arrived.
Is the unique multi-cultural, culture of America the only culture being diluted by Globalization? I have been pondering this question for a while now. My final answer to it is, yes. I believe that this is true, because us “Americans” were all imported from other outside countries. As being imported we also imported our culture. The only people who can say their nationality is “American” are the, Native American people who lived on the land before Columbus came. If you think about it we should have a Native American culture in forced upon us since that is whose land we are on, much like a Japanese culture is present in Japan. Although we don't have a Native American culture, we have a culture of many different cultures, coming from many different nationalities.
Demonstrating that depending on the culture you live in, your perspective will change on the idea of it being diluted. The American culture is the only culture being diluted as a result of different cultures appearing in different nations, because many different cultures, was our culture. Are these cultures actually becoming stronger, as a result of seeing them is many different parts of the world? Because people from these different nations can still experience their nationality is many different regions, keeping their roots relevant in their lives.
During the seminar I made a connection to something that we have been learning about, diversity = stability, this is a theory that is saying the more diverse an ecosystem is the more stability will come within it. There are two ways to interpenetrate this theory in this situation. One way to look at it is by the more different raced people we have in a certain area will make it more stable. Also I think you could say that the more different cultures we have around the world the more stable it will be, this thought would be saying that our world is heading towards instability. Meaning that we need to stop this culture connection.
In my political cartoon I decided to make it about Americans going to Japan. What I portrayed is a couple of Americans looking for somewhere to have dinner. As they are driving around they see a McDonald's. Since they don't want to go to any of the Japanese culture restaurants they pick McDonalds, because they will feel at home eating there.
People of Omelas Seminar Reflection
Part One:
For much of my life I have lived the life of the bland utopian, happy as can be. Although ever since I saw the boy, I have been inspired to feel the emotions that he is experiencing. In this world of Omelas this type of feeling can not be experienced, I will have to leave, leave to some unknown place where I can feel this painful emotions. My plan for this achievement is to walk alone in the darkness of the night to the mountains of the north. I have no idea where this adventure will take me but I know in the long run it will be worth it. My modem is to experience true happiness, through the pain that inspires me to keep on over coming obstacles. I will feel the emotions of the boy, I will leave this world for the sake of the boy.
This world we call Omelas, I have seen it at its worst all wrapped up, starring me in the eyes as it, the child sits on the floor of the smallest, most disgusting closet inside the most beautiful building in our city. The Transit Center, a place that is many peoples final destination. Although this is the place that makes me want to leave this dark, corrupt world. A world full of a lot of really happy people, and one small boy who lives a life that makes up for all of the violence, suffering, and pain that a society needs.
Part Two:
The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas, a short story that is written by Ursula K. LeGuin. I found this short very abstract story very interesting. The overall plot and setting within a utopian world was very intellectual but another aspect that I thought was very interesting is the way some of the ideas are expressed through this story. LeGuin writes in a way that you imagine your own understanding of the story. One example of this type of writing is in the 3rd paragraph starting at the top. “King, mounted on a splendid stallion and surrounded by his noble knights, or perhaps a golden litter borne by great-muscled slaves. But there was no king. They did not use swords, or keep slaves. They were not barbarians. I do not know the rules of the society, but I suspect they are singularly few.” Within this text you mostly likely have read many contradicting statements, such as the description of a king, but a sentence later it says there is no king? This is the writing style that I really took interest too. These are also the statements that make me think that LeGuin wants us to make up different pictures in our minds. Making different world in our minds that have the same overall ideas is what I think the writer is trying to get at within this text.
Part One:
For much of my life I have lived the life of the bland utopian, happy as can be. Although ever since I saw the boy, I have been inspired to feel the emotions that he is experiencing. In this world of Omelas this type of feeling can not be experienced, I will have to leave, leave to some unknown place where I can feel this painful emotions. My plan for this achievement is to walk alone in the darkness of the night to the mountains of the north. I have no idea where this adventure will take me but I know in the long run it will be worth it. My modem is to experience true happiness, through the pain that inspires me to keep on over coming obstacles. I will feel the emotions of the boy, I will leave this world for the sake of the boy.
This world we call Omelas, I have seen it at its worst all wrapped up, starring me in the eyes as it, the child sits on the floor of the smallest, most disgusting closet inside the most beautiful building in our city. The Transit Center, a place that is many peoples final destination. Although this is the place that makes me want to leave this dark, corrupt world. A world full of a lot of really happy people, and one small boy who lives a life that makes up for all of the violence, suffering, and pain that a society needs.
Part Two:
The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas, a short story that is written by Ursula K. LeGuin. I found this short very abstract story very interesting. The overall plot and setting within a utopian world was very intellectual but another aspect that I thought was very interesting is the way some of the ideas are expressed through this story. LeGuin writes in a way that you imagine your own understanding of the story. One example of this type of writing is in the 3rd paragraph starting at the top. “King, mounted on a splendid stallion and surrounded by his noble knights, or perhaps a golden litter borne by great-muscled slaves. But there was no king. They did not use swords, or keep slaves. They were not barbarians. I do not know the rules of the society, but I suspect they are singularly few.” Within this text you mostly likely have read many contradicting statements, such as the description of a king, but a sentence later it says there is no king? This is the writing style that I really took interest too. These are also the statements that make me think that LeGuin wants us to make up different pictures in our minds. Making different world in our minds that have the same overall ideas is what I think the writer is trying to get at within this text.
Genocide Project
An Unsuspected Country Contributing in Genocide?
The Holocaust, many of us heard the disturbing facts of Auschwitz while it was going on,or informed as small children . Yes the holocaust is the most severe, but many people have no idea that there have been 10 Genocides in the 20th century. One of which took place in Guatemala over a 36 year span finally ending in the 1990's. There were 200,000 innocent native Mayans who were tortured, raped, slaughtered, or “disappeared” in this period.
The U.S. pushed to establish democratic laws in Guatemala, Since the communist movement was on the rise and many more leftist (supportive of the political views of polices of the left) organizations were appearing, the U.S. did not like this and decided to take action.
In fact, The Coke Cola Company and United Fruit Company (also known as Chiquita Banana) owned much land that many homeless native Mayans were living and working on. These companies did not like their land being used by the native people who were now revolutionizing into communists. Being American companies the CIA did not like this and supplied vehicles, weapons, and torture devices to the Guatemalan Army. 93% of the human rights violations were government lead.
The dictator as the time, Efrain Rios Montt, denies his action of the massacre of 1,700 indigenous people during his 17-month rule in 1982 and 1983. He sought to “exterminate the enemy” who he thought where supplying the Guerillas. Today 30 years later, Former ex-dictator Efrain Rios Montt is facing charges. During an interview with Pamela Yates regarding the documentary Granito, she mentioned a secret hearing in which Montt denies knowing about what was going on in Guatemala at the time. He was in the city and too busy for the people of his country.
The USA overthrows democratic socialists in Guatemala. United Fruit master-minded its empire and corrupted every level of the Guatemalan government. United Fruit also managed to exempt themselves from any taxes, due to supporting dictators in Guatemala. While charging large fees for using the large facilities that ran through the nation, crippling the Guatemala trade. The US backed government butchers and burns alive 200,000 Guatemalans during political oppressions.
Many, at one point secret documents, from the CIA have been released to the public. These documents contain information about torture and killing techniques that the U.S. supplied to the Guatemalan Army to train troops to carry out. Also many of the documents are records of the people who mysteriously disappear. If the document had a serial code with the number 300, usually meant that this person was killed.
President Reagan says that he won the Latin American Civil War but he actually prolonged it. These wars were supporting the anti-leftist (also known as the guerillas). Reagan’s Cold War obsessions that emboldened right-wing “death squads” that slaughtered tens of thousands of their own people across many parts of the Third World but no place more so than in the desperately poor countries of Central America. On those rare occasions when major U.S. news outlets do make mention of the Guatemalan genocide of the 1980s, they circumspectly reframe the story to avoid mentioning Reagan’s role.
This genocide is also called the Invisible Genocide of Women. 100,000 women were raped during this mass killing. Some women raped as many as 150 times, killing their families right before their eyes. In 2011 706 women were killed as a result of Femocide in Guatemala. 93% of these cases are undisputed. One women told the story of how herself and her seven children escaped to the mountains of Guatemala. But she could not supply food for each of them and started to die slowly.
Torture techniques that were used, were used in an order that achieved maximum pain. An example of these devices were an electric shocker that would be used on the genitals.
As people attempted to escape, the military would have air support chasing down the victims, and using very flammable solutions such as Napalm, the ones used in fire bombing, they would drop these solutions on the victim. Also the air support would give the location of the escaping people and ground troops would find these people and kill them.
Many of the people who were visiting Guatemala at the time of the genocide had a very frightening experience. For example during the interview with Pamela Yates she told the story of how she had to sneak into any sort of hearing in Guatemala because everything at the time was very secretive. The CIA and military troops were killing any type of journalists or writers who were in Guatemala trying to gather information about the status of the many people who were being killed, raped, and tortured under the power of Efrain Rios Montt.
One of the most disturbing stories of torture that I have heard from the genocide is what they did to the children. In some cases the persecutors would put live children in mass graves. Then they would throw the corpses of their parents over the top of them. Then the grave would get filled. These types of actions are very unacceptable and inhumane.
The Holocaust, many of us heard the disturbing facts of Auschwitz while it was going on,or informed as small children . Yes the holocaust is the most severe, but many people have no idea that there have been 10 Genocides in the 20th century. One of which took place in Guatemala over a 36 year span finally ending in the 1990's. There were 200,000 innocent native Mayans who were tortured, raped, slaughtered, or “disappeared” in this period.
The U.S. pushed to establish democratic laws in Guatemala, Since the communist movement was on the rise and many more leftist (supportive of the political views of polices of the left) organizations were appearing, the U.S. did not like this and decided to take action.
In fact, The Coke Cola Company and United Fruit Company (also known as Chiquita Banana) owned much land that many homeless native Mayans were living and working on. These companies did not like their land being used by the native people who were now revolutionizing into communists. Being American companies the CIA did not like this and supplied vehicles, weapons, and torture devices to the Guatemalan Army. 93% of the human rights violations were government lead.
The dictator as the time, Efrain Rios Montt, denies his action of the massacre of 1,700 indigenous people during his 17-month rule in 1982 and 1983. He sought to “exterminate the enemy” who he thought where supplying the Guerillas. Today 30 years later, Former ex-dictator Efrain Rios Montt is facing charges. During an interview with Pamela Yates regarding the documentary Granito, she mentioned a secret hearing in which Montt denies knowing about what was going on in Guatemala at the time. He was in the city and too busy for the people of his country.
The USA overthrows democratic socialists in Guatemala. United Fruit master-minded its empire and corrupted every level of the Guatemalan government. United Fruit also managed to exempt themselves from any taxes, due to supporting dictators in Guatemala. While charging large fees for using the large facilities that ran through the nation, crippling the Guatemala trade. The US backed government butchers and burns alive 200,000 Guatemalans during political oppressions.
Many, at one point secret documents, from the CIA have been released to the public. These documents contain information about torture and killing techniques that the U.S. supplied to the Guatemalan Army to train troops to carry out. Also many of the documents are records of the people who mysteriously disappear. If the document had a serial code with the number 300, usually meant that this person was killed.
President Reagan says that he won the Latin American Civil War but he actually prolonged it. These wars were supporting the anti-leftist (also known as the guerillas). Reagan’s Cold War obsessions that emboldened right-wing “death squads” that slaughtered tens of thousands of their own people across many parts of the Third World but no place more so than in the desperately poor countries of Central America. On those rare occasions when major U.S. news outlets do make mention of the Guatemalan genocide of the 1980s, they circumspectly reframe the story to avoid mentioning Reagan’s role.
This genocide is also called the Invisible Genocide of Women. 100,000 women were raped during this mass killing. Some women raped as many as 150 times, killing their families right before their eyes. In 2011 706 women were killed as a result of Femocide in Guatemala. 93% of these cases are undisputed. One women told the story of how herself and her seven children escaped to the mountains of Guatemala. But she could not supply food for each of them and started to die slowly.
Torture techniques that were used, were used in an order that achieved maximum pain. An example of these devices were an electric shocker that would be used on the genitals.
As people attempted to escape, the military would have air support chasing down the victims, and using very flammable solutions such as Napalm, the ones used in fire bombing, they would drop these solutions on the victim. Also the air support would give the location of the escaping people and ground troops would find these people and kill them.
Many of the people who were visiting Guatemala at the time of the genocide had a very frightening experience. For example during the interview with Pamela Yates she told the story of how she had to sneak into any sort of hearing in Guatemala because everything at the time was very secretive. The CIA and military troops were killing any type of journalists or writers who were in Guatemala trying to gather information about the status of the many people who were being killed, raped, and tortured under the power of Efrain Rios Montt.
One of the most disturbing stories of torture that I have heard from the genocide is what they did to the children. In some cases the persecutors would put live children in mass graves. Then they would throw the corpses of their parents over the top of them. Then the grave would get filled. These types of actions are very unacceptable and inhumane.
Project Reflection
The idea that I decided to base my political cartoon off of is the role the U.S. played as part of pushing democratic policies against the people of Guatemala. The U.S. wanted to do this because it affected the economy in which many U.S. bases companies where located. These companies where United Fruit Company (also known as Chiquita Banana), and The Coca Cola Company. Since CIA coups were going into Guatemalan and changing the political policies of the country there was much disagreement among the native people. The CIA did not like the leftist competition and decided that these people needed to to be exterminated.
I am very happy with the level that my cartoon drawing has achieved. When I was making my political cartoon for the Rwandan genocide I could not think of any good ideas or concepts to represent. As for the latest cartoon I had to draw about the Guatemalan genocide I had a good idea from the start, with a quote in which I think made it very clear and understandable. One of the techniques that I developed over the course of these drawing is the ability to represent ideas through simple symbols. For example, my rough draft of my cartoon had many different people in it. Since I am not very good at drawing people I decided to pick a simple symbol to represent the same thing. As you can see I used an eagle to represent the U.S. also I used the CIA logo on the box of weapons to connect the relationship the CIA had to the Guatemalan genocide, by suppling vehicles, guns, and torture devices to the Guatemalan army to carry out this mass killing. Another symbol that I used was the top hat that the eagle is wearing, I could not draw Uncle Sam very well so I decided to pick a simple image that would still get the message across and this symbol was the hat Uncle Sam wears. Another element that I did not use every well in my first cartoon is the text that I put into the text. The text of a political cartoon is very important because it needs to be understandable to people who don't have much of an idea about what it is about. My text, “ If they don't come to democracy. Democracy will come to them.” Anyone from the text can conclude that democracy is going to Guatemala because they have not come to democracy yet, and whatever idea that is saying this is going to be the one that is doing the forced democracy. The eagle is carrying weapons which were supplied by the CIA to kill the people supporting the leftist organizations.
This type of writing for me was a little bit on the difficult side. Instead of building flowery descriptive sentences, the ideal structure was short to the point sentences that were compact and informational. It was a challenge for me to make each sentence. Although it is a challenge I am glad that I am being faced with it because if I have to write another Op-Ed this will give me a lot of background understanding on how to write it.
The idea that I decided to base my political cartoon off of is the role the U.S. played as part of pushing democratic policies against the people of Guatemala. The U.S. wanted to do this because it affected the economy in which many U.S. bases companies where located. These companies where United Fruit Company (also known as Chiquita Banana), and The Coca Cola Company. Since CIA coups were going into Guatemalan and changing the political policies of the country there was much disagreement among the native people. The CIA did not like the leftist competition and decided that these people needed to to be exterminated.
I am very happy with the level that my cartoon drawing has achieved. When I was making my political cartoon for the Rwandan genocide I could not think of any good ideas or concepts to represent. As for the latest cartoon I had to draw about the Guatemalan genocide I had a good idea from the start, with a quote in which I think made it very clear and understandable. One of the techniques that I developed over the course of these drawing is the ability to represent ideas through simple symbols. For example, my rough draft of my cartoon had many different people in it. Since I am not very good at drawing people I decided to pick a simple symbol to represent the same thing. As you can see I used an eagle to represent the U.S. also I used the CIA logo on the box of weapons to connect the relationship the CIA had to the Guatemalan genocide, by suppling vehicles, guns, and torture devices to the Guatemalan army to carry out this mass killing. Another symbol that I used was the top hat that the eagle is wearing, I could not draw Uncle Sam very well so I decided to pick a simple image that would still get the message across and this symbol was the hat Uncle Sam wears. Another element that I did not use every well in my first cartoon is the text that I put into the text. The text of a political cartoon is very important because it needs to be understandable to people who don't have much of an idea about what it is about. My text, “ If they don't come to democracy. Democracy will come to them.” Anyone from the text can conclude that democracy is going to Guatemala because they have not come to democracy yet, and whatever idea that is saying this is going to be the one that is doing the forced democracy. The eagle is carrying weapons which were supplied by the CIA to kill the people supporting the leftist organizations.
This type of writing for me was a little bit on the difficult side. Instead of building flowery descriptive sentences, the ideal structure was short to the point sentences that were compact and informational. It was a challenge for me to make each sentence. Although it is a challenge I am glad that I am being faced with it because if I have to write another Op-Ed this will give me a lot of background understanding on how to write it.
Truth of war
Attached below is my Truth of War essay.
war_essay | |
File Size: | 14 kb |
File Type: | war essay |
EXHIBITION Reflection
For the past couple of months in 10th grade Humanities we have been learning about WW1 and WW2. But specially what we have been concentrating on the truth of war for a soldier. In order for us to get an understanding of war they read the books, Slaughter House 5, and All Quiet on the Western Front. We also had an in class writing about the Dresden bombing. Although I have never experienced war all of these activities showed me for myself a rough idea of the emotions and the thoughts a soldier has as they go through war. From all of this knowledge that we gained we were asked to put our perspective about the truth of war into an essay, along with that we also had to make a creative project to go along.
Here at Animas High School we live by the habits of heart and mind. Perspective, Advocate, Perseverance, Relevance, and Evidence and for my project I see the Habit of Heart and Mind that stands out the most is perspective. I believe that perspective is the best HOHAM for my project because I tried to used what a soldier sees and feels in my project, in other words I incorporated their perspective into my project. For example the emotions a solider would feel is represented by colors in my painting.
One of the biggest revisions that I made to my essay during the revision process is incorporating a range of emotions into my essay. These range of emotions are the emotions that I believe soldier would feel as they go through war. Before I revised I only had one type of emotion for each different time in the war. Since I only had a minimal amount of emotions I was basically saying that the soldiers would only feel one type of emotion. Incorporating many emotions made my essay better in a sense of not saying all soldiers only feel specific emotions when every soldier is different.
One revision that I would make to my essay is I would of liked to make my essay express even more emotions then I did. Although I made more when I revised, but I think even more would be better. Also looking at my project I would of liked to play around more with colors to make my painting even better. Also I would of liked to do more painting to warm up my painting skills because this project as the first time I had painted in about 4 years.
Here at Animas High School we live by the habits of heart and mind. Perspective, Advocate, Perseverance, Relevance, and Evidence and for my project I see the Habit of Heart and Mind that stands out the most is perspective. I believe that perspective is the best HOHAM for my project because I tried to used what a soldier sees and feels in my project, in other words I incorporated their perspective into my project. For example the emotions a solider would feel is represented by colors in my painting.
One of the biggest revisions that I made to my essay during the revision process is incorporating a range of emotions into my essay. These range of emotions are the emotions that I believe soldier would feel as they go through war. Before I revised I only had one type of emotion for each different time in the war. Since I only had a minimal amount of emotions I was basically saying that the soldiers would only feel one type of emotion. Incorporating many emotions made my essay better in a sense of not saying all soldiers only feel specific emotions when every soldier is different.
One revision that I would make to my essay is I would of liked to make my essay express even more emotions then I did. Although I made more when I revised, but I think even more would be better. Also looking at my project I would of liked to play around more with colors to make my painting even better. Also I would of liked to do more painting to warm up my painting skills because this project as the first time I had painted in about 4 years.