CLASS 9

So this is my last post! I am not going to deny that writing a blog have been a new interesting experience but I’m glad is over!

So in the last class we talked about the American culture, what do people think about American culture? And how they see Americans?

When I think on American culture the first thing that go into mind is Coca- Cola, McDonalds, and series and movies. The picture of friends (series) is for non American people and example of the American life.

In my opinion most of the people have a picture of American which is not always correct, they believe they are all white, with blue eyes and tall but in fact America is a very diverse country, with different traditions, weather and their people is different too. As in any part of the world people in the US is unique and different, not everyone like the same music, art or fashion.

The US has a lot to choose from, they have great singers like Pink, Adele, MJ, writers like Christine Fenahn, Jennifer Meyer and so on. But in my opinion what really make them unique is that they have the liberty to do and become whatever they want because America give them that liberty.

So I find this course really interesting! It was my favorite this cycle and I have the opportunity to learn about American and now thanks to that I can gave my opinion in different topics with a strong base.

CLASS 8

So today we talked about the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and we saw Fahrenheit a Michael Moore documental about what really happened that day. I enjoy the documental because Michael has a really interesting way to tell the truth.

With the information provided by the documental and my own I realized that Bush administration did a catastrophic job for their people and for the world. I cannot deny that American had the right to protect their people from the terrorist but President Bush had the opportunity to avoid the attacks and save a lot of lives! But he didn’t do anything, he spent the first months of his government on vacation what kind of president does that? He knew that terrorists were planning to attack by planes; his counterterrorism department gave him the information months before the attack so why did he not stop it?

And when he reacted he started a war but instead to send a lot of soldiers to Afghanistan where it was supposedly Osama Bin Laden, he send massive forces to Iraq that had nothing to do with the attack! The US alleged that they had mass destruction weapons but they didn’t, even when they realized about that he did not withdraw the US forces. Many innocents both Americans and Iraqis were kill in a war without any logical reason. But Bush saw the opportunity with the oil and went crazy! But it justified the death of those people? I don’t think so!

Up until now Americans are there helping those countries’ reconstructions but if it wasn’t for Americans those person wouldn’t have to reconstruct anything.

CLASS 7

So this class we talked about the American dream! But the magical question was: have the American dream become a nightmare?

There are several definitions of the American dream, for some person it was the dream of having the typical house, with a big backyard and the white fence in a residential zone and having the perfect family! Well nowadays these dreams have a different meaning for each person, for some it’s having a great job and having money, for others is having a family or just be happy but as humans the moment we obtain something we want something else immediately so our dream is always changing.

But in these days of recession for some the American dream has become a nightmare! Some people don’t have jobs anymore, the house market is a nightmare, and people cannot pay their mortgage; all these have created a lot of tension in Americans.

But is the American dream really over? In my opinion the dream never existed! The idea of having something better and expect something better is universal! Is not just an American dream is a worldwide dream so in my opinion this “dream” can be fulfill in each part of the world.

CLASS 6

I’m back! So today we talked about a very complicate subject EDUCATION, we talked about the program no child left behind and bilingual education.

The program no child left behind was install by Bush and it require that each state test kids from age 3-8. This program has been highly debated because one sector believe that is good that the capacities of children be tested, because it helps them to study instead of just memorize but on the other hand some people believe that is not ok to have just one type of test because education varies on each state so some kids have advantages over others. In my opinion this program does not work because in the US children don’t have the same education so instead of helping them and reinforce their education the government just confuse them without a logical reason.

We talked about bilingual education which is the right of every kid to study in his or her mother tongue. I do believe that this help immigrant kids to adapt to the US education system but this kind of education is just for a few years because the universities only teach in English. There have been a controversy about this because some persons believe that if this kids are going to live in the US they are supposed to adapt and enroll to regular schools, but other specially the parents of this kids just want their kid to learn in his or her native language but here is the problem because the parents want the best for their kids but if they don’t let them mixed with Americans or study how they study how do these kids will be able to work or get a job or just mix with American if they don’t even understand their cultures?

I do believe that parents should teach their kids their cultures and let the kids study in their native language as a way to adapt to the American schools system but they should give them the opportunity to know more of the people and the country their live in.

CLASS 5

So I’m back again!!! Today I talked about the role of big companies in the United States and I realized that the US economy is control by these companies so if one of them makes a mistake it could prejudice the entire economy of the country! I believed that this kind of responsibility cannot be trusted just on a few companies it is just not right.

 I cannot deny that these companies are important to the overall economy because they tend to have more financial resources than small companies to conduct research and develop new goods, can supply goods and service to a greater number of people, they can often sell products at lower prices because of the large volume and small cost per unit sold, they can offer more job opportunities, higher wages, better health and retirement benefits and they have the advantage in the market place because costumers are attracted to well-known brand names.

On the other hand, on these times of recession, American people questioned severely these big corporations because the big companies not hire a lot of people anymore, they are moving abroad to decrease the production cost leaving American people without job stability. This is causing a wage of terror in the US.

But overall we can deny that these companies, like Coca Cola, Apple, etc, are the ones that promote the US helping it economy to grow.

CLASS 4

I’m back, so after 2 weeks of break we returned to classes and the topic of today lesson was economics! Not my favorite topic but I found the Great Depression quite interesting. There were different causes for the Wall Street Crash that led to the Great Depression I summarize them into 5:

·         Blind faith in the Bull Market driving up stock prices, the speculations of the price of the shares turned to be completely wrong causing the crashed of the stock market.

·         The president Hoover administration and the Smoot-Hawley Tariff that reduced imports and exports caused more damages in the economics and did not put an end to the depression.

·         The unequal distribution of wealth and income. In 1929, two hundred of the biggest corporations controlled 50% of the nation's corporate wealth so if just a few companies went under after the Crash, the whole economy would suffer.

·         Bad banking structure, the structure of these banks was bad so when the Crash happened most of these closed.

·         Lack of government regulation, the government did not intervene and when it intervened just made things worse.

Some consequences were:  Many businesses went bankrupt, Banks began to fail wiping out personal savings and further decreasing demand, the Government relief funds ran out and foreclosures increased along with homelessness, hunger, and crime.

Learning about the Great Depression make me understand that no matter how strong and how prepare the economics of a country is, with just committing an error it could all disappear within seconds.

CLASS 3

So I’m back! In this class we learned about the American Government and the Political Parties. This was a class with a lot of numbers and facts. But I understood that: the government was formed in 1789 and it laid out in the Constitution and that the United States was the world’s first modern national constitutional republic, oh and that is based on the principle of federalism.

Ok it comprises in 3 branches: legislative, executive and judiciary. Each has its own distinct responsibilities, but they can also partially limit the authority of the others through a complex system of checks and balances. The legislative branch is composed by the Congress which is bicameral, comprising the House of Representatives (The number of representatives each state has in the House is based on each state's population) and the Senate (the number of senators from each state is two, regardless of population). They have the power to levy and collect taxes, declare war, raise and support armies, etc. The executive branch is represented by the President and vice-president, some of the powers they have are: in the case of the president, he can firm treats with foreign nations and the vice president is the President of Senate. The judicial branch is represented by the Supreme Court as the highest court in the federal court system, something curious about this branch is that the Justices are appointed for life by the President and confirmed by the Senate, and various lower or inferior courts and that the first congress subdivided the nation jurisdictionally into judicial districts and created federal courts for each district!

In the case of the political parties, America has two principal parties, the Democratic Party and the Republican Party. The Republican Party was found in 1854 and this it supports an American conservative platform. Some Republican presidents were Abraham Lincoln and George W. Bush. The Democratic Party is the oldest political party in the United States and among the oldest in the world, it currently positions itself left-of-center in American politics, supporting an American liberalism. Barack Obama is a democratic president.

So this is what I learned in today’s class. We have a two weeks break and a lot of hw! See you need class…

CLASS 2

So hello again, this class was interesting. Today we had our first presentation! The topic was Immigration. This class had lots of history but the conclusion was that many people from all over the world decided to move to America for the promise of a better future.

So our classmate explained us the immigration in 5 periods, the first one was the colonial period, the first wave of immigrants came from Europe (England, France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, etc), some colonist sought adventure in America, others fled religious persecution, some were convicts transported from England jails, but as always most immigrants went looking for economy opportunities. As many could not afford the ticket to America they went as indentured servants (I really think this is interesting) such servant signed an indenture to work for a master for four to seven years to repay the cost of the ticket. Also blacks went to America but involuntarily as slaves. The second period started around 1820-1870, the new immigrants entered the United States from northern and Western Europe, but about a third were Irish, many of them seeking escape from the potato famine that struck Ireland in the mid 1840’s. Also Germans went to the united states searching for religious freedom, in this period the flood of immigrants began to alarm many native born Americans. During the third period more than 30 million European migrated to the United States because of this the congress passed the emergency quota act (1921) which restricted immigration to the United States, later on, the Congress passed the immigration Act of 1924 which limited the annual number of immigrants who could be admitted to the country to 2% of the number of people from that country who were already living in the united states. Asians were hardly discriminated and a law against Chinese immigration was passed.

In the fourth period the immigration and nationality Act of 1965 abolished the National Origins Formula that had been in place in the United States since the immigration Act of 1924. This Act changed the ethnic make of the United States by equalizing immigration policies, after the great depression a lot of immigrants from Latin America and Asia arrived to the United States. Chinese immigrants were welcome again when these two countries became allies during the World War II. Finally in the last period that is the contemporary, immigrants tend to be younger but after the attack in September 11, immigrants are less welcome, and even when less people is in favor of immigration, illegal immigration has increased. I can name lots of consequences of immigration but the principals for me are economical (not enough job) and social (racism and violence). So yes the second class topic was BIG but quite entertaining. See you next class!

CLASS 1

Ok so this cycle I’m studying U.S Panorama, in this class we are going to learn about America’s Political parties, Immigration, the great depression and other things.  Up until now this class has been really interesting, we read a lot but that’s not a problem for me I really enjoy reading that’s one of the reason I love this. Ok so the teacher suggested we create a blog and write what we learn each class and I find this way of evaluation quite awesome. So the first class we talked about America being a Melting pot or a salad bowl (each describes the multi-ethnicity of America). After checking each theory, the first one said that all the cultural aspects that one brings into are blended together or melted, to form a new culture and the identities of each original culture are extinguished to bring out a complete new mixture. The second one said that the newcomers bring different cultures, where each of these cultures is kept as an essential part to make a whole, therefore its original shape and characteristics are maintained. In my opinion America is a salad bowl because although immigrants work and make connection with other persons and respect their traditions and follow the rules of their society, when they return home they follow their traditions and live as they would live in their country. But there’s an anti-melting pot movement that brings up the differences between immigrants; they have their own segregation for exe. Black people live in an area and Peruvians in another one they have a separation even when they are both immigrants.  So that’s what I learned in the first class, we have a lot of hw for the next class, lots to read, so bye!