Minjok Essay

Living a life in Korea, an individual would frequently be exposed to the term ‘minjok’. It is a term most important in explaining what Koreans are like, and what the society of Korea is like. Without an understanding of this concept, one would not be able to understand the Korea properly. Then, what exactly is ‘minjok’, and what impact does it have in the Korean society?

The dictionary meaning of Minjok is ‘a group of people who lived in the same region for a long period of time, and therefore sharing the same language, cultural aspects, and possibly other aspects like religion, way of thinking, dressing style, and so on. However, ‘Minjok’ in reality is quite different from this. Especially considering what it means to Korea and its people, it means much more than that. In order to take a deep look into the meaning of ‘Minjok’ to Koreans, I think that it is most important to first find out its origin.

Our school, KMLA, includes 'minjok' in its name

Most of the people living here in Korea perceive the concept of ‘Minjok’ to be an essential part of Korean history, as it seems to be an innate feature of us. However, looking at the history of ‘Minjok’, the concept is relatively new compared to the history of Korea, as it first came onto surface during the Japanese Colonial Era. During the era, Japanese tried to unite Korea and Japan into one by advocating the idea of nae-sun-il-chae, which claimed that Korea and Japan were originally homogeneous ethnically, but separated due to unavoidable reasons. In order to prevent complete assimilation, Korea needed something that would serve as a shield that could protect Koreans from Japan’s mental invasion. Therefore, scholars such as Shin Chae-Ho came up with the concept of ‘minjok’ to unite Koreans and stimulate them to resist against the Japan. In order to support this, these scholars invented the notion of a unitary nation with Korean history and myths, which became the start of the theory of ethnic history (Minjok-Sahak), which significantly contributed to the formation of ‘minjok’ and the protection of Korean identity from Japan.

Shin Chae-Ho

After independence, the concept of ‘minjok’ continued to be developed by ideologies that were set up by the following rulers. The most important one was President Park Jung-Hee, who was a dictator who ruled over Korea for almost 20 years, starting from 1961 to 1979 when he was assassinated. President Park, although being notorious for his dictatorship, achieved an outstanding economic development during his reign, which is the reason Korea could reach its level. In order to achieve this miraculous growth, however, he needed a mechanism that would unite people and raise their productivity to the highest rate. Therefore, he utilized the concept of ‘Minjok’ to brainwash people by emphasizing the importance of ethnic nationalism, and to make them sacrifice parts of their freedom and rights for the good of the Korean ‘minjok’. We could say that ‘minjok’ is a concept that eventually led to the rise of Korea’s international position.

President Park Jung-Hee

Above was the history of the term ‘minjok’. However, what I want to focus is the effect of ‘minjok’ in the present. Quite surely, the concept of ‘minjok’ evidently still has a large effect in the modern Korean society. This has both advantages and disadvantages in our society, all of which must carefully be considered for the future of both us and our society. First beneficial impact of the concept of ‘minjok’ is fast recovery from crisis. One great example of this is ‘gold gathering campaign’. Starting from January of 1997, a lot of companies went bankrupt and as a result, the Republic of Korea fell into debt by IMF. In order to help Korea regain its economical sovereignty, Koreans started to donate gold and money. Thinking in terms of economy, this was an irrational choice to make, but thanks to Koreans’ firm belief and affection of ‘minjok’, Korea could recover from its crisis very fast.

Another advantage is that people can unite more efficiently. Koreans perceive themselves to be a part of the same ‘minjok’, connected to each other with a strong bond. Therefore, people tend to unite extremely effectively and fast, usually when it is directly related to the whole ‘minjok’. The 2002 World Cup held in Korea and Japan is a perfect example of this. The summer of 2002 is remembered to be a continuum of excitement, passion, and unity. Millions of Koreans came down to the street and cheered together for the victory of Korean national team. Even people who did not like soccer prayed for the victory of Korea. Medias all around the world were amazed by how Koreans could unite and cheer for their country. Not only this, Koreans’ tendency to unite easily was the main motive power for Korea’s outstanding economic growth.

2002 World Cup is an example of unity formed by the concept of 'minjok'

However, there is also one great disadvantage of ‘minjok’. It is the fact that most Koreans perceive the extent of ‘minjok’ to be ‘a group consisting of people from the same ethnical background’. Many Koreans think of themselves to be a member of their ‘Danil Minjok’, meaning that their minjok consists of members sharing the same bloodline. It is quite natural that bloodline is an essential part of the concept of ‘minjok’, as the concept started to be used in a time when Korea was colonized by a foreign country. Especially in this type of era, emphasizing the superiority and importance of their own bloodline would have been a superb way to unite the people. This acts as a serious obstacle for our society to interact with people from various cultures, as many Korean still refuse to accept people with different ethnicity to be a part of their society. 

Considering the fact that the 21^st century is the era of globalization, this is a serious problem. As the boulders between countries are being diminished and people are now actively interacting internationally, it has become quite important to open our mind and cooperate with people with other ethnic background. However, many Koreans even fail to live in harmony with people from different ethnic background living in the same region. Children from multicultural families often get bullied. Workers from Southeastern Asian countries are often discriminated. Not only that, people who committed racial discrimination rarely gets punished. The concept of ‘minjok’, throughout its history, has helped Korea to reach its position, but is now starting to block it from further development in this new era of globalization. How could we cooperate and interact with people from all over the world when we don’t even treat Koreans with different ethnic backgrounds as outsiders who cannot truly be a part of our society?

Even the media often commits racial discrimination.

Another case of racism in Korea

Therefore, people should now change their ideas about the meaning of ‘minjok’. As mentioned above, the present ‘minjok’ is starting to have negative effects in the modern Korean society, and to overcome them, a change in the concept of minjok should be brought. Then, in what way would the idea of it change in the next few decades? As the society is now requiring its members to cooperate with foreigners, not to resist them, I believe that ethnicity would have less importance in the meaning of ‘minjok’ in the future. Instead, I believe that the meaning of ‘minjok’ would be close to that of a nation. People will feel a strong bond to each other not just because of the ethnicity, but because of each other’s nationality. Koreans’ emphasis on pure-blood country will gradually be diminished and therefore, the concept of ‘minjok’ will be more multicultural than before. As the era of globalization has come, we will have to change ourselves into understanding and living in harmony with people who have diverse ethnicity and cultural background. 

We now come back to this question; what is ‘minjok’? It is a very vague tem. Every individual has different opinions about what exactly it is. However, there definitely is a common factor between the different perceptions about ‘minjok’, and this is what formed a very strong bond among Koreans. This strong bond and a sense of belonging became a motive for Koreans to resist being assimilated by Japan, and sacrifice themselves for the economic growth of Korea. It has made Koreans unite and overcome difficulties. To make it short, the concept of ‘minjok’ is one of the most important factors in explaining the development of Korean society in the modern history, and also in explaining the characteristics shared by many Koreans. However, it also causes some side effects in the modern society, such as the racial discrimination. Koreans will have to constantly go through many changes in the concept of ‘minjok’, until Korean society is fully ready to adjust to the new age of globalization.

We must live together.

Learning a third language-French

 

Since I entered middle school, I had a little hope of having the ability to speak three or four languages frequently. However, it was quite hard for me to grasp a chance to learn a language other than English and Korean, due to lack of time. I knew that learning a third language would cost me a lot of effort and time, which made me afraid because I was busy trying to get good grades in school.

Three years of hard work enabled me to enter KMLA. I gave up many of the hopes and dreams I had as a youngster because entering this school was one of the highest priorities for me. Thankfully however, KMLA has provided me a new chance to fulfill one of the dreams I had; learning a third language.

After I came here, I found out that I had to choose between three different languages; French, Spanish, and Chinese. After spending quite some time to make a choice, I chose to learn French. The reason was quite simple. It was because since I was young, I have been thinking that it was simply magnificent and awesome to be able to speak fluently in French.

Nevertheless, let me talk about the way students learn French here in KMLA. French is taught by Ms. Jung. She is one of the main reasons students including me are fond of French class because she is very generous, kind, and passionate. There are about 50 students who take French classes, and as it’s quite impossible for our teacher to teach all these students at once, we were divided into three separate classes. Unfortunately however, 29(including me) of the 50 students were jammed into one class, thereby making the class extremely crowded. Because of this, I was first worried of being unable to participate freely and concentrating in class. 

When I actually took the French class however, all my worries faded away. It was one of the most exciting and fun foreign language class I have ever taken, and I could easily participate freely in class and learn a lot about the language. Now, French is one of my favorite subjects that I am quite passionate at. I am quite grateful about the fact that I could grasp the opportunity to learn this fabulous language here in KMLA, and I personally hope to be fluent enough to be able to have a conversation with French people.

Choosing the courses for next semester

I believe that it is natural for every single teenagers to have worries about their future plan, especially if the ‘future’ is not so far away. This ‘natural phenomenon’ occurred upon me this week, as I had to make difficult choices that would decide how I would live the next semester. Choosing the courses for next week definitely was a hard job for me, and was also a great chance for me to think deeply about how I should spend the remaining two and a half years in this school.

On Monday afternoon, the list of courses I can take next semester was posted in the school website. Frankly, as I first took a look at the list with little expectation, I was extremely amazed to find out that I, as many other students, was given so many attractive choices. There were so many courses that looked so interesting and fun, and there were also a lot of courses that were directly or indirectly related to my dream. In a matter of fact, the first thought that came upon me was ‘It would definitely be a very painful job for me to choose among these choices.’, which came into reality in the next few days.

As some people might know, my dream is to be an expert in environment who studies about ways to reduce the amount of energy spent by buildings and city systems. Therefore, I am interested in fields related to this, such as environmental science, physics, and chemistry, and I also feel a need to study these subjects more deeply. This made me feel a great motive to choose courses like ‘AP Physics B’, ‘Advanced Physics’, ‘AP Chemistry’, ‘AP Environmental Science’, and ‘SAT Biology’. Not only that, my pure interest to particular subjects like ‘AP Microeconomics’, ‘French Grammar’, ‘AP Statistics’, and so on. Unfortunately, it is impossible to take all these courses as the amount of time I can invest to study these subjects is limited. This meant that I had to make a choice by arranging these subjects in order of priority.

In order to do this, I had to invest time to ask some seniors for advice, read ‘Know How Do How’, and talk with my friends and parents. Therefore, I could get some knowledge about both advantages and disadvantages of most of these courses. Ironically however, having more information proved to make it harder for me to choose between the courses. All the courses seemed to be more attractive now that I knew the advantages of them. At the same time, I was afraid of making a choice as I was afraid of facing the disadvantages of it.

After spending some time wondering what courses I should take, I came upon the fact that I could also take most of the courses next year when I would be in 11^th grade. This made my choice so easier. I finally came into a conclusion that I would spend this semester studying scientific subjects, as I had a goal of studying science more deeply. So, I selected ‘AP Physics B’, ‘AP Chemistry’, ‘AP Environmental Science’, and ‘Advanced Physics’. Of course, I still have two months left until the start of the next semester, which means that I still have time to think more carefully about the choices I have made and change them if necessary. I do really want to spend the next semester effectively and beneficially.

How does the use of genre and writing skills support the main ideas in George Orwell's 'Why I Write'?

 

George Orwell, the author of the essay ‘Why I Write’, mainly talks about the motives for writing throughout this essay. He especially focuses on two motives for writing; aesthetic enthusiasm and political impulse, and concludes that he wishes to be a writer who can satisfy both motives by making political purpose into art. In order to deliver this to the readers successfully, the author uses various types of genres and writing styles in order to support his main ideas. Then, how did George Orwell use diverse genres and writing styles, and what effect does it have on the impression that the readers get by reading this essay?

 

Using the appropriate writing style and genre is very important especially for the author, as using different writing styles results in the readers getting different impressions about the author’s writing. For example, this essay shows traits of personal narrative essay when the author describes his own life and writing experiences. By talking about experiences from when he was young, George Orwell implies to the readers that he first started writing by focusing on descriptive writing. On the other hand, by talking about the experiences he had in his later life, such as going through poverty, having a job in Burma, and experiencing the era of Hitler and Spanish Civil War, he explains how he started to write with a political purpose. He concludes that his goal is to make political writing into an art, as he wishes to fulfill both the world views he acquired in his childhood and in his later life. The author has stated in the essay that one cannot assess a writer’s motives without knowing something of his development. Therefore, by using characteristics of a personal narrative essay, the author supports his main ideas about his own motives by providing readers of knowledge about the development of his own motives for writing.

The author also uses expository writing style in order to support his main ideas. This writing style is used in this essay when the author tells the readers about the four great motives for writing; sheer egoism, aesthetic enthusiasm, historical impulse, and political purpose. By choosing this writing style, the author successfully provides the readers with necessary information. As it is important for the readers to have knowledge about the motives in order to understand George Orwell’s main ideas about his own motives and goals, using expository writing style is very effective in supporting his ideas, as the role of an expository essay is to provide readers with new information and knowledge.

The poem that George Orwell introduces in the middle of the essay also acts as an important way for the author to deliver his main ideas to the readers. Through this poem, the author describes his dilemma got as he started to write in political purpose. The dilemma is about whether he should focus more on descriptive writing or on political writing, as he thinks that both of them are very important to him. By describing this through a poem, the author succeeds in making the readers get a stronger impression on the dilemma that the author was facing. This is because poetry has a characteristic of maximizing the emotion of the narrator by compressing it into a few well-selected words. As a poem is formed through putting these words together, a well written poem has to be able to provide readers with amplified emotions and feelings. As George Orwell has succeeded in this, the poem in this essay acts as an effective way to support the author’s main idea, as it gives the readers a strong impression on the conflict between the two motives which the writer thinks is most important to himself.

In order to give the readers the impression that the author has intended, the author must choose the most appropriate writing styles and genres in order as they effect the readers’ impression toward the literature greatly. Looking from this point of view, George Orwell has succeeded in this, which therefore lets the author deliver his main idea of his own motives for writing effectively to the readers.

 

Why is 'Tell-tale Heart' a gothic novel?

 

Novels that contain characteristics of various genres like thriller, Romantic, mystery, horror, etc., are called ‘Gothic novels’. For example, ‘Frankenstein’ is a gothic novel, as it contains characteristics of horror, romantic, mystery, science-fiction novels. Let’s now look at ‘The tell-tale heart’, a novel written by Edgar Allen Poe. As we read this novel, we can know that this novel is gothic, as it contains characteristics from several kinds of genres.

To start with, this novel has characteristics of a horror novel inside it. A typical horror novel usually creates an atmosphere of fear and suspense. In the case of ‘The tell-tale heart’, this kind of atmosphere is created several times. On the night that the main character kills the old man, a fearful atmosphere is created from the moment when the old man wakes up, and the main character waits for the moment to kill the old man. The way that the old man is killed and concealed also creates a fearful mood.

Secondly, this novel resembles a Romantic novel. A romantic novel creates an atmosphere of strong feelings, such as passion, madness, etc. The tone throughout this novel ‘The tell-tale heart’ makes the reader feel a strong feeling from the novel. Throughout this novel, the narrator tries to convince the readers that he is not insane. Ironically, however, this actually results in a stronger impression that the narrator is insane, and by the end of this essay, the narrator eventually fails to convince the readers that he is not mad. This strong impression of madness in this novel makes it resemble a Romantic novel.

Third, this novel also contains characteristics of mysterious novel. At the end of this novel, the narrator starts to hear a noise, which is something which only the narrator could hear. This sound drives narrator crazy, and it actually makes the narrator to confess his crime of murdering the old man and concealing his body. Then, where did this sound come from? This question creates a mysterious atmosphere, as it makes the readers think carefully about the source of the sound. Moreover, the author doesn’t tell the readers about the source of the noise, which deepens the mysterious atmosphere of the novel.

This novel also contains characteristics of other genres like crime novel, thriller novel, etc. Like this, characteristics from different genres come together in this novel, and make it a gothic novel.

toefl essay #2: the change in environment

The 21st century has begun. What changes do you think this new century will bring? Use examples and details in your answer.

It is an undeniable fact that the human species is currently suffering from the rapidly worsening environment. This average temperature of this planet is elevating very fast, leading to the rise in the sea level, endangering the lives of countless people. Species of animal and plant are being extinct right at this moment. Because of the gravity of the current situation, the human being has started to realize the importance of preserving the environment. Therefore, the 21^st century is the time that we should focus on preventing the environment from being collapsed through means of government policy and preservation technology, and the change of the society.

 

To start with, government policies are expected to stop or at least slow down the global warming, as they serve as an effective way to change people’s behavior. Countless research results suggest that in order to protect the environment, we should change our lifestyle to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide and food garbage emitted. However, even though many people know the gravity of the current environmental issue, they do not truly know how they should change their lifestyle to achieve that goal. This is why government policy is important, as it guides people to change their behavior efficiently by setting a standard that people should follow. Government policies which are now being made will therefore serve as a great way to slow down the global warming.

 

Additionally, many countries are now putting great effort to develop technologies that help save the environment. One example is the development of alternative energy sources, which is significant as they greatly reduce the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by the use of energy. Other technologies like CCS(Carbon Capture and Storage), which is being developed to prevent carbon dioxide from being emitted into the atmosphere by storing them deep inside the sea, are also being developed. Furthermore, city systems and construction technology is now changing into a more eco-friendly way. As the majority of the energy spent by the human civilization is used by buildings and city systems, this is a major change that would help our civilization itself to be more eco-friendly. These technologies are still being developed and are expected to reach a level where they can be adapted to our daily lives by a few decades.

Lastly, the society itself is changing, which is a very hopeful phenomenon. The 20^th century was the ‘age of progress’, where we could not care about the environment, as we were so busy trying to feed ourselves. However, the society is starting to change, and people are now cognizant of the fact that the 21^st century should be ‘the age of preservation’. This is because the society is now more mature, as the advance of technology has freed many people from the dearth of basic supplies. Countless people are now advocating the importance of protecting the environment rather than to focus on economic growth, and some of them started to change their way of living to be a help to this planet. The society itself is now starting to be eco-friendly, which will gradually lead to a positive change in the environment.

The new century has started with a collapsing environment. However, we, the human species, still have hope of saving the planet and ourselves, and have started to seek for ways to bring that hope into reality. Hopefully, 21^st century will act as a new start for the human species, a start of the ‘era of harmony’ when human species can develop itself and preserve the environment efficiently at the same time.

Alliteration

 

Alliteration refers to the repetition of the initial consonant sound, like ‘Peter Pan picked a peck of pickled pepper’. One important factor of alliteration is the fact that it depends not on the letters but on the sounds. Therefore, ‘know-nothing’ is alliterative, whereas ‘chemical change’ is not. The purpose of alliteration is to create a consistent pattern that will catch the eye of the mind of the readers. Therefore, writers aiming for a way to draw readers’ attention to a particular scene usually use alliterative phrases in order to focus the readers' attention. Alliterative phrases are used occasionally in poems, song lyrics, tongue twisters, quotes, and even in brand names.

 

 

Let me give you some examples of alliteration. Firstly, let's look at the poem 'The Raven', written by Edgar Allen Poe. In this poem, there is a phrase saying, 'doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before'. In this phrase, the same initial consonant sound repeats, making a rhythm that acts as an efficient way to draw the readers' attention.

 

 

Alliteration is also used in tongue twisters, as it can easily make rhythms that can sound fun. One famous example is 'Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked. If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, how many pickled peppers did Peter Piper pick?'. Additionally, alliterative phrases appear in many quotes, such as 'Busy as a bee', and 'Make a mountain out of a molehill.'

 

 

As alliterative phrases can draw people's attention easily, it is used frequently in brand names. Famous companies like Coca-Cola, Dunkin Donuts, Best Buy are perfect examples of this. Many bands also use alliteration for their band name. Good examples of this would be 'Franz Ferdinand', 'Foo Fighters', 'Beastie Boys', and so on.

 

 



Oxford University

It would be good for me to firstly talk about going to Oxford University. Before I actually went there, I imagined that Oxford University would consist of old-fashioned buildings, a beautiful campus like many other universities in Korea and America. This imagination broke apart even before we arrived in the destination, when the tour guide told us that the university is composed of diverse colleges located independently in the city of Oxfordshire. Therefore, there wasn’t any ‘campus’ that I have imagined of, which disappointed me at first. Luckily however, I could easily become so excited to find out that Oxford was more beautiful than I imagined.

Just after arriving at the city of Oxfordshire.(This building is one of the oldest museum of U.K)

 

I don't exactly remember why I took this picture, but anyway, I'll post this here.

 

As I expected, there were a lot of beautiful old buildings, letting me imagine about what they would have looked like when they were first built. It is quite well-known that the university has a history of 1000 years, enhancing the human civilization by producing countless scholars who strived to deepen the knowledge of mankind. Scientists would have verified their hypothesis, and philosophers would have expressed their opinions freely throughout the history of Oxford. I came into thinking that this was the Great Britain could have the glory it had throughout its history, as the works of these scholars would have surely led to various technological and social advance. The buildings of the university looked so beautiful and meaningful for me now that I had these thoughts. Of course, there were also modern buildings which added to the beauty of the university.

 

I don't exactly remember where this picture was taken

 

This is a library.

 

Some parts of the movie 'Harry Potter' was filmed here.

 

I was also impressed by the system of the university. Oxford University was quite different from other universities that I knew of, most of which are located in Korea and America. Firstly, as I have mentioned, the university composes of colleges, and in order to enter Oxford, students should apply to a specific college. Secondly, Oxford has a tutorial system. Students have a tutorial class every time, and by doing the work that the tutor demands, students can improve their skills by great extent. This factor made me feel as if Oxford University has more interest to every individual student.

Trinity College

I might have mentioned earlier in this blog that I am planning to go abroad after I graduate from this school. Since I had that plan, I have only thought of going to a university in America, mainly for three reasons. First, I had more information about American universities. Second, I have experienced education system of America. Third, I have an American citizenship, which makes me feel at least a bit comfortable about America. However, by going to Oxford University, I came into thinking that planning to go to Great Britain for university might be a good choice too.

 

The city of Oxfordshire itself was also beautiful.

 

 

 

 

 

The start of the vision trip-May 8th

On the 8th of May, which was roughly about 10 days ago, I took a flight heading towards London, the capital city of the United Kingdom. The flight was quite enjoyable, and I spent time watching a few movies like Banchanggo(반창꼬), Wolf Boy(늑대소년), Hobbit, and some documentaries about soccer and American football.

Me and Woo-Hyeon at the Incheon airport

 

Waiting to get into the bathroom

Although the movie was fun, the superior external feature of the actor Song Joong-ki made me feel inferior.

 

It was about 6 o’clock in the afternoon when the plane arrived in London, and we went to a restaurant where we ate dinner. Although I remember the meal to have been quite good, I do not remember what we ate that day. I do have pictures I took in the restaurant, so I will post some of the pictures here.

 At the restaurant

 

 

Hello, Seok-Jun!

 

After dinner, we went to the hotel where we would spend two days. It was not a bad place to sleep, except the fact that I could not use the Internet. Therefore, I turned on the TV and watched a comedy program which I don’t remember the name of, which was funny enough to let both me and my roommate to spend some time laughing. I remember to have fallen asleep in the middle of the show. What a peaceful night to start a trip!

Nacirema-What it tells us

The essay about the Nacirema describes how cruel and hideous the civilization is. According to the article, people from the civilization often commit cruel acts, believing that it is good for their body. Therefore, members of the society of the Nacirma go through magical procedures in order to protect their bodies from illness. The article states with examples that a certain amount of sadism is involved in this procedure, and that most of the population shows masochistic tendencies. The procedure usually involves harming people in immoral ways, such as poking them with sharp object, and making a hole through their teeth.

Reading this article brought total disgust to me. Therefore, as I was writing the in-class essay, I kept on writing about how cruel and inhumane the culture of Nacirema was. However, I also considered the concept of cultural relativism, and therefore stated that we need to understand this culture. I thought that as we have a ‘superior and civilized’ perspective, we could not truly understand the culture of Nacirema, which I considered to be uncivilized and inferior compared to our modern society.

However, what Mr. Menard told us few days after we wrote the in-class essay brought total shock to me. He told us to read ‘Nacirema’ backwards. It is quite evident that I, like all the other students in my class, was impressed to find out that ‘Nacirema’ was ‘American’ spelled backwards. We couldn’t say a word, and Mr. Menard just kept laughing at us, looking as if he was extremely pleasured.

Everything in the article of ‘Nacirema’ became so clear at that instant. We could easily find out that all the inhumane acts committed by the fictional civilization were just sarcastic parodies of the daily routines of the American culture. For example, the shrine represents the bathroom, and the holy-mouth-men represent dentists. All the features of the civilization of Nacirema that have brought unpleasant emotions to me all proved to be features of American cultures. The only difference is that the culture was observed in a different perspective, a perspective presuming the American culture to be an ancient culture.

As I have read this essay, I unconsciously thought that the culture of Nacirema was full of violence and irony. It is probably because I unconsciously had the prejudice that I was living in a ‘superior’ and ‘civilized’ culture. However, reading this article, which observed America in a different point of view, I started to feel a sense of disgust without an objection. Therefore, I came to a conclusion that my perspective of ‘civilized’ and ‘superior’ was somehow wrong and quite prejudiced.

At the end of the essay, the writer states that it is easy to think of the Nacireman culture to be cruel when we try to observe them in a higher position. Therefore, I believe that from the writer was trying to tell us that we are usually wrongly prejudiced in diverse situations, and that in order to fix this problem, we should try to observe these matters at a different point of view. Furthermore, this essay was written in 1956, which was the time when many incidents related to ‘prejudice’ happened, especially the ones related to racial segregation. For example, in 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested in Montgomery for refusing to give her seat to a white person, which led to Montgomery bus boycott. In the same year, a fourteen year old teenager was killed for not showing respect to a white woman. It was an era when many people suffered from racial prejudice. It was also an era when these issues started to turn into serious social problems. Therefore, it was becoming necessary to get rid of these prejudices. From this evidence, we can conclude that the writer would have wanted to convey the importance of thinking in other points of view to get rid of prejudice. Through his essay about Nacirema, the writer showed to us how our prejudices can block us from making wise decisions, and also the fact that we need to change our points of view to stop those prejudices.

'Age of Stupid' film review

     The movie starts by hurling from bigbang to 2055 at light speed, only to find the debacle of human being by seeing the dystopian image of drowned London, buried Las Vegas, and burning Sydney. Why did the collapse of human civilization, which once ruled the whole planet, happen? The clue to the question is given by the Archivist (Peter Postlethwaite), who shows to us the lives of six people from the early 2000s, the era he calls as ‘The Age of Stupid’.

     Piers Guy, a wind farm supporter and a wind turbine developer, tried to develop a wind farm in central England, but faced severe opposition from the neighbors. Eventually, he failed to persuade the neighbors, as they were so opposed of building a wind farm near their town just because it would harm the aesthetics of their views. Even though they were cognizant of the importance of wind farm for saving the environment, they just didn’t want to change their conventional and comfortable way of living and overcome their NIMBY mentality. Human instinct definitely seeks not for any loss but for profit, which becomes an obstacle in other situations, especially when it is related to saving the environment. It is an evident truth that we must overcome this in order to save ourselves.

     The development of human civilization is also causing an extreme amount of harm to the environment. ‘The big problem is flying. Just one return flight, say London to New York, would blow our entire carbon-budget for about three and a half years.’, said Lisa Guy. Apparently, apart from ‘crimes’ such as dumping oils to the river and setting the forest on fire, flying is one of the most disastrous thing an individual can do to the environment. However, most individuals are not aware of this. Who of us would have thought that we were doing one of the worst thing we could do to the environment when we were on an airplane? This film shows that the advanced human civilization, along with the ‘stupidity’ of human race, may make it harder for us to protect the environment. Of course, scientific development may act as an effective way to soothe the environmental problems. Scientific technology can be used in various situations, such as developing ecofriendly energy, and capturing CO2 gas. Thus, we will need to have an insight about the consequences that would occur from every footstep that we make.

 

     The film tries to make a pathos appeal in order to bring sympathy to people’s mind. Fernand Pareau, who has experienced the climatic change and its effect on Mont Blanc for the last 50 years, explains to the Guy family that the glacier had melted by 7 to 10 meters in that year while taking them on a tour. Nevertheless, it is quite evident that the environment is now starting to get out of control. Such evidence can be found in current natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina, which was a disastrous hurricane that struck regions including New Orleans. Natural disasters nowadays are becoming stronger. According to a report by Oxfam, the rate of natural disasters has risen by 400 percent in the last two decades. It also concluded that the rise of the number of natural disasters was mainly due to the effect of global warming

     As the archivist ends his recording, he says ‘I find it surprising, that after so much effort the final act of our existence should be suicide. So why build this archive? It's a cautionary tale. Not for us. It's too late for us. But for, well, for whomever, whatever eventually finds this recording.’ The archivist is from a fictional future, a future that we might have to face. The archivist has made this record for us living in ‘The Age of Stupid’, facing the same situation that the archivist would have faced before the end of his factional world. In the film, we saw not only the selfish and ignorant attitudes of people, but also the ones who changed. The people from Chamonix made a protest in order to stop the tunnel from being widened. The Guy family changed their way of living in order to reduce the amount of CO2 they emit. Having watched this film, we must not be stupid anymore. We should not only be cognizant of the danger we are facing but also the importance of the changes we have to make. As the aphorism ‘Little drops fill the mighty sea’ tells us, every change we make will come into a big change that might save both the environment and ourselves.

As I was resesarching, I found a video you might like.

Speech script

Have you ever done something that failed you, both physically and mentally? Well, I have. I’ve done something that harmed both my health and hope, hope I had as a pure youngster full of passion and expectations.

A few days after the summer of 2006 faded away, I was told that my aunt had invited my family to Japan for a trip, which made me feek excited as I was fond of Japanese culture. For instance, my favorite animation characters were from Japan. Plus, many kinds of food that I loved originated from that country. These were enough to make a nine years old like me full of passion.

So, from the day following the announcement, I started preparing for my trip. I was so passionate that I even tried to learn Japanese by looking up words with my dictionary. Sadly, my language learning strategy was extremely ineffective, so all I actually learned after a few days were the most basic expressions like ‘Nan-da-yo’, ‘So-deskka’ and ‘Arigato’, which are still the only expressions I know. Even though this was the reality, I was really looking forward to my trip which was then only about two weeks left.

Time flew until the mid-term test, and there were only about three days left before I could sense it. I remember having spent the remaining days very cheerful and carefree, which is probably why I didn’t care about the due date of the milk I had with the cereal the day before the trip. Unfortunately enough, I already devoured two bowls of cereal when my mother started scolding me for drinking something that should have been thrown away at least one and a half weeks ago. I was able to assuage her by saying that everything would be fine, as the milk was in the fridge.

If everything was okay, however, I wouldn’t even be saying these things here right now. From the very next day, when my family arrived in Tokyo, I started to suffer from food poisoning. It was three hours after the arrival in Japan when the pain struck me. Imagine…I was just an innocent, pure child who was nine years old, crying and screaming, feeling as if every part of my organs were being torn apart. My body temperature peaked 39.0 degrees Celsius. The situation got worse as time passed, and we eventually had to call the emergency.

After I arrived at the hospital, I had to get the IV injection, and as I expected, I found out that my body was not in a good condition. I remember being told that the number of white blood cells in my body had risen by more than six times than usual. The doctors told me to get enough rest, and not to eat any kind of food that might stimulate my organs. Thanks to that advice, my family’s schedule for the trip in Japan was immediately canceled. Instead, we had to spend the week in my aunt’s house, constantly checking the state of my body. I was totally depressed about this because I had high expectations about this trip. I even prepared a list of 20 things I wanted to do in Japan, but only one of them was accomplished. Arriving safely in Japan. I couldn’t even grasp a chance to fulfill the other wishes. I was mentally broken, and it took me quite a long time to relieve the shock I got from it.

From this, I learned a lesson that I should be cautious about everything that I do. Everything I do, not only in important moments, but also in daily life. I have learned so thoroughly from this experience that one tiny mistake, such as ignoring the due date, can result in a disastrous consequence. We experience this kind of things a lot in our lives. We make mistakes when having conversation, taking tests, and keeping promises. These mistakes can be reduced if we just care a bit more. Keep in mind that the most disastrous incidents usually do not happen because of the biggest mistakes, but because of the small or normal mistakes that occurred just because we didn’t care. So, be cautious. Think about the consequences before you unconsciously do something. Even though this might make our lives a bit complicated and noisy, it would someday help us thoroughly.