The Global World

For our last unit in history we watched two films, Lost in Translation and Into the Wild and read three texts, which were The Global Soul by Pico Iyer, Cosmopolitanism by Appiah, and Planetary Culture by Gary Snyder (is found on page 123 from Engaged Buddhist Reader). In a way, they were all related to globalization. 

Are you aware of what globalization really means? If you know, or you don't I will give you a quick re-cap about what it is..

According to the Globalization101 by The State University of New York, globalization is defined as " a process of interaction and integration among the people, companies, and government of different nations, a process driven by international trade and investment and aided by information technology." Globalization contains political, economic and social changes. Politically, you have the alliance between the countries (for example the Allies vs. the Axis). Trade between other countries and how it is done is an important economic factor. The media doesn't hide anything for us today and it has a high social impact on the world as well as a political and economic impact. 

We can take action using the Internet! We can raise awareness! 
Globalization has both a positive and negative impact.. What do you think?

“The mercy of the west has been social revolution; the mercy of the East has been individual insight into the basic self/void. We need both.” -Gary Snyder

In this quote, Gary Snyder a Buddhist who wrote Planetary Culture, suggests that we need to have a balance in this world between what the West and the East offer. This relates a little to Taoism and precisely the yin yang.

The yin yang is where two opposites fit and match each other for example darkness and light. It means that the yin and the yang are in perfect harmony and that they flow into each other. We can relate this Gary Snyder's quote and what he is saying in his book of their being unity and how their is no need for negativity. "There is nothing in human nature or the requirements of human social organization that requires a society to be contradictory, repressive, and productive of violent and frustrated personalities." In addition, to Gary Snyder, he describes a planetary culture as, "The states is greed made legal, with a monopoly on violence; a natural society is familial and cautionary. A natural society is one that 'follows the way,' imperfectly but authentically."

If our world had harmony it would be because of conversation as Appiah describes in his novel Cosmopolitanism. "Conversations across boundaries of identity---whether national, religious, or something else---begin with the sort of imaginative engagement you get when you read a novel or watch a movie or attend to a work of art that speaks from some place other than your own." Conversations would bring us together even if we didn't agree on everything that was being said. Take Chris or as he decided to call himself, Alexander SuperTramp in the film, Into the Wild... he met Waine, Ron, Reno, and many other people on his journey to Alaska. He brought them happiness and he gave them advice through the power of conversation. He was special to them. Nevertheless, he did not maintain any contact with any of them because he wanted to be alone and live and be in his mind in Alaska. Bob and Charlotte from Lost in Translation, meet and become friends because of conversation and as Snyder mentioned, they came from the West, and they were in the East at the precise moment and their relationship had harmony. 

"Conversation doesn't have to lead to consensus about anything, especially not values; it's enough that it helps people get used to one another." -Appiah

I feel like what Gary Snyder says in Planetary Culture, and what Appiah says in Cosmopolitanism all come together to form the Global Soul.

What is a global soul according to Pico Iyer?

"I think a global soul is somebody who lives in the cracks between cultures, or lives in a world so international that he or she has to devise some scratch answers to the most fundamental questions: what is your home, what is your community, what tradition do you belong to, and even who are you." -Pico Iyer

At the very beginning of Pico Iyer's book, there is a quote that sums up what the Global Soul is about, "Philosophy is really homesickness: the wish to be everywhere at home." -Friedrich Nietzsche

I have lived and experienced a diversity of cultures such as France, United States, Japan, Brazil, and Spain (even though I've never lived there). For me living in the country where I was born would be tough because I have more of a cosmopolitan view than others and moving to all these different places has shaped me to the person that I am today. I will continue to change as I will continue to adapt to the different cultures. I feel that I am a global soul from Pico Iyer's definition because when someone asks me where my home is? well most of the time I'll say I was born in France, but is that really my home? In addition, I also feel that I am cosmopolitan and Appiah mentions in the video above, and it is true not everyone is cosmopolitan or can adapt and live in more than one culture. 

My View on Genocide

No one in our class doubts that genocides will continue to be perpetrated in our world. What will you do about this? Explain why you will be a bystander or it you decide to take action, what type of action will you take?

What is genocide? The word genocide did not exist until 1944. According to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, approved by the United Nations on December 9, 1948, genocide is defined as, "Genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about it physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group." 

I don't think I would take action in a genocide, because it is easy that I would in a hypothetical case, because that's what I would want to do, however there are genocides that are currently going on and I haven't been taking any action. Taking action in a genocide would mean that I would have to risk my life!

I cannot psychologically or physically end a genocide because I would have too much to lose, and of course I want to help others, but I also want to live because right now I am 15-years old, and taking direct action would consequently lead to sacrificing my life to something that would be completely unefficient.

Why some people don't take action and just watch the genocide go by?

A survivor from the Holocaust, Bertolt Brecht, said the following about genocide, "The first time it was reported that our friends were being butchered there was a cry of horror. Then a hundred were butchered. But when a thousand were butchered and there was no end to the butchery, a blanket of silence spread. When evil-doing comes like falling rain, nobody calls out "stop!" When crimes begin to pile up they become invisible. When sufferings become unendurable the cries are no longer heard. The cries, too, fall like rain in summer." 
Do you understand what he's saying? What would you have done?

I don't think anything can be done on an individual scale to prevent or end genocide, however organizations can do something and so can nations as a whole. Nevertheless, it will not be beneficial for some nations to take any action so they won't do anything. For example, no nation decided to take action during the Rwanda Genocide. One organization that tries to make a change, and end genocide is United To End Genocide.

Nevertheless, there are 8 stages of genocide, and the ones at the beginning stages can try to be prevented in a much easier manner than those in the later stages where the mass murder occurs.

1. Stage 1- Classification
2. Stage 2- Symbolization
3. Stage 3- Dehumanization
4. Stage 4- Organization
5. Stage 5- Polarization
6. Stage 6- Preparation
7. Stage 7- Extermination
8. Stage 8- Denial

You can find more information about what each of these stages mean on the Genocide Watch website. The website not only describes what genocide is but they give you a list of the current countries that are at risk in this precise moment of genocide, and in which category they fall.

Currently the Genocide Watch issued a Genocide Emergency on two states of Myanmar (aka. Burma) and a Genocide Warning on the Central African Republic.

Finally, if you are interested, you can watch this documentary made by PBS- Genocide: Worse Than War.

We Can Make A Change!

Review on Amour

Amour won a Palme D'Or at the Cannes Film Festival and an Oscar for Best Foreign Film at the 85th Academy Awards. This film compared to the ones that we see nowadays did not contain blood or violence, and was about Love, as its title says. The director, Michael Haneke made the movie very realistic and the film affected the audience emotionally on certain different levels. Before going into details, for those of you who have not watched the film, or who cannot remember all the details about the film here are a few things you may want to know prior to reading this blog post. I might also add that this blog post might be a SPOILER for those who haven't watched it!

The film is about an elderly couple, George and Anne, in Paris who used to be successful musicians and have always been proud and independent people. The film is absolutely realistic and captures what the other person must do and what they must sacrifice to help their loved one. In this case, Anne has several strokes and goes through an operation, which has a high rate of being successful however ends up paralyzed on her right side and depends on her husband for everything. Their daughter Eva, becomes isolated from the true situation that is going on with her parents, because they feel ashamed and embarrassed of being like this and mostly George does not want anyone to see his wife in such a horrible state.  He closes in and does not want to receive any help that is offered, even from his own daughter. He made a promise to Anne that he would not bring her to the hospital, and he suffers from this decision. In the end he suffocates Anne by a pillow because he cannot stand to see her suffering any longer, fills the room with rose petals and locks the door and tapes it completely. This brings us back to the very beginning of the movie where the firemen come in, and find the room with petals in it, and a really bad smell. After, George finds a pigeon and instead of allowing him to fly away through the open window, he closes it and kills the innocent pigeon. He later procedes to kill himself to rejoin his wife. 

Amour provides the realism of life as you become older. For the audience assisting the film, I became totally engrossed with the characters and could see what they were going through, and I could feel myself becoming sad, terrified, devastated according to what happened. The film is devastatingly tragic, because even though it does not contain violence, the emotions are so strong they become overwhelming. Old age will happen to everyone who does not die at a young age, and it is a terrifying thing that most of us do not really speak of. The film slightly reflects the French families in general, because once your child turns 18 they have their own life and you and your partner will have your life. It is not that much of isolation but more of independence and this can be seen with Eva and her parents. On another note, her father has to much pride to accept the help that is being offered and will not let his own daughter, Eva see her mother.  That goes to show how negative the situation has made him and how it has changed him and degraded him as a person. 

I usually find that in films/documentaries/videos, music seems to be the number one factor that achieves the true emotional feelings, if chosen correctly. Michael Haneke's music choice with the Impromptu that plays throughout the film is the kind of music that holds a hint of sadness as you listen to it, but also seems to contain hope. Nevertheless, when hearing the music in the film it adds to the sadness because you can see the difference in the situations. There were some parts, like at the beginning when the only sound is the water running from the tap in the kitchen, and then suddenly it's silent, and we know Anne is alive and has regained consciousness. There are other cases such as at the beginning when the firemen arrive and make such a loud noise with the door it startles you, or when George wakes up in the middle of the night after having had a nightmare and screams. All these sounds were chosen for a reason and we could go on analyzing the film detail by detail but then in my case it would remove some of the magic that is given to a film by a director. 

This film was amazing, and I recommend everyone watches it once, but I do not think I would be able to watch it more than once because of the emotional hold the film has. It is not something I will be able to forget easily and that is where we can see how good a director is. The movie is PG-13 for the deaths, the illness, and the suffering therefore I do not recommend it for people undergoing a depression or who are younger than they should be. A certain level of maturity is needed when watching this film. 

The New York Times article did a formidable job, capturing the details of the movie and its analysis was true in all possible ways. The Week gave a good overall review about what critics were saying of the film, and one of the best sayings that I saw from the Guardian's article on Amour and the one from The Week was the following: Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian, describes Michael Haneke's film as being "a moving, terrifying and uncompromising drama of extraordinary intimacy and intelligence. It asks what love means as we approach the end of our lives. 'This is film-making at the highest pitch of intelligence and insight.'"

Finally, I would like to say that the movie is honest, and Haneke does not try to hide the sadness that can exist when reaching an old age. In addition, the movie is a love story between George and Anne, and how love can bring you to make sacrifices to help those you love. 

For more information on the cast, the plot, and reviews:

1. IMDb 
2. Amour Review
3. Another Review of Amour

Upcoming Years: IB and Career Planning

We are going to go loose this time: Just simply express your thoughts on the guidance you have received in terms of your IB program and career planning. What have you learned from the process? Especially anything that has surprised you. What worries you about what you have learned? What excites you? What is your plan of attack? How are you going to use what you have learned?

I have heard about the IB since I attended my first international school in Japan, six and a half years ago. The past month we have received IB presentations from teachers. They explained what each course was going to be about, to give us an idea of how the course will flow and so we can make our decision on which courses to choose. This is the famous IB hexagon that you seem to see everywhere you go in IB schools.

I am excited about having the opportunity of choosing my courses, however I am slightly worried because you need to choose a course from the 6 categories and some courses, under the same group look very interesting. It will be a very important choice to choose my IB courses and I am looking forward to it, but I am also a bit nervous, because those courses that you choose will be the same ones for the last two years of high school, so I must make sure that I consider all possibilities before choosing my courses. 

I will apply to universities in Europe, Canada, and the United States. The United States and most universities in Canada allow you to enter the university being "undecided", and in most cases, do not specify which IB courses to take. However, in Europe like the United Kingdom requires specific courses. Therefore if I am interested in choosing psychology as my major, IB Biology High Level is a requirement. Therefore, I feel that my decision on choosing IB will vary on the courses that are offered at the school, and the courses the United Kingdom require depending on what I am interested in studying in the future. UCAS is a website to send applications to universities in the UK, and also offers requirements that universities have to be eligible to apply. 

We started a six-week program on career orientation with Ms. Vanessa Benaci (college counselor). The first exercise was to write down what we would do if we have five lives, and she said that we can try to merge all these interests into one career, and then find possible college majors. To give us more knowledge on what our personality was exactly we did a few exercises to find your Holland Code, and then some quizzes to find our Myers-Briggs Typology. My highest Holland Codes were Social (helper) and Enterprising (persuader), and I was pretty shocked at being a persuader because I never saw myself as being that strong of a persuader. My Myers-Briggs Typology was ESFJ, and for most letters I was able to understand my results. I have learned more about the kind of person I am and how I am most likely to react to situations, from my Myers-Briggs results. What career do I want to have? How to decide? Those are the questions I am dwelling on, at the same time as deciding on my IB courses.

My plan of attack is to organize and manage my time a bit better, and study ahead of time, as well as not wasting time, because from talking to some of the seniors, when you enter the IB, time is precious, and cannot be wasted! However, I do not want to turn myself into some sort of workaholic because I do not believe that is good for my health but neither is procrastinating all the time and wasting time. I will strive to find a balance between studying and enjoying life!

Useful Resources:
Everything about IB
IB Diploma Programme
Is IB worth it?
Plan Your Career
The Career Key

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Seattle Boycott

At Garfield High School, teachers have been boycotting the MAP (Measure of Academy Progress) tests since January. They have received support from other schools around the country, including a high school in Florida and Chicago.  They have also received support from the student government, and from associations such as the American Federation of Teachers, Iowa Education Association, San Diego Education Association and Seattle Education Association.  Teachers are saying that the MAP tests do not test a student's knowledge as they only test a student on one day not the whole school year, thus that is no good way to test a student's knowledge. According to The Seattle Times, “The teachers say they don’t oppose all tests, but think the MAP exams are not appropriate or useful tools for their students.” MAP tests are not standardized tests that will allow you to go into a good college, and a grade is not given to a student for taking the test. I think most students do not know what the MAP tests are testing. In addition, the test is tiring because there might be areas that you have not covered in class and some of the reading passages are quite long to only answer 2 or 3 questions on them. On the other hand, using personal experience, the test creates a sort of competition among the students to see who will score the highest. Nevertheless, most students will start off with some sort of positive attitude as they are missing class, but towards the end of the exam are rushing through it to finish because there seems to be a never-ending amount of questions to complete, one after the other. It is a standardized test and is therefore not adapted to each school’s way of teaching students. 

Jesse Hagopian, a history teacher at Garfield High School mentioned, "None of us is against accountability or rigor, we just want assessments that reflect what we teach in the classroom and that mold our students into successful participants in our various communities".  I think that in today's world, we as students need to learn how to solve problems in life and we will not learn that from standardized tests. For most of us, these tests evoke stress when instead of MAP tests we could be evaluated with an Academic Portfolio that we would work on throughout the school year. This would be a much better way to test an individual because a student would have the whole year to work on their portfolios, they would have more freedom to be creative and really show themselves as individuals. A portfolio would make us unique and focus on strengthening our strengths as well as our weaknesses.  

In the video, Jesse Hagopian makes several good points including one that I feel I should mention below because it is something that most of us will be relate to. He talks about how the MAP tests are taken on the computers thus students who need the lab aren't able to use a computer because of MAP testing going on. I must say that from personal experience this is a frustrating thing mostly because the MAP testing takes a long time. 

Thinking of College

Prompt: You briefly met with a college recruiter last week, and you reviewed a number of questions to ask about colleges. This must have gotten you thinking about your future, so tell us about it: Without any strict requirements, write about your expectations, goals, fears, concerns, questions that you have concerning your future in college. Additionally, now that you know that recruiters want to hear about you and your intellectual interests and pursuits, how do you think being an aware Academic Leader will give you an advantage when applying to the college of your choice?

I think that being an Academic Leader will give me an advantage as I decide to apply to colleges. First of all, I will have some skills that as an Academic Leader you will gain with time. To me a few of those essential skills would be engaging your audience when you are presenting, explaining something, talking in an interview or even just having a simple talk with someone. This does not mean that I will not be nervous but I will already have that skill, as I become an aware Academic Leader.  In addition, as an Academic Leader I have learnt to go along and use my strengths. I will improve my weaknesses to make them less weak but I should show my strengths because they are my strongest point. Being an Academic Leader will also have its advantages when applying to the colleges of my choice because I will be able to make an impression, and hopefully a positive impression! I hope that colleges and universities will be considerate as they select people out. 

Meeting with the college recruiter and reading about colleges did get me thinking about college. After being to many different schools and having studied so hard, I would like to get accepted to the colleges I apply to. The college recruiter mentioned that it gave scholarships, and I wonder if I will qualify for these scholarships. Universities and colleges are becoming more expensive over the years which is why I think scholarships are interesting and I believe that if you have the grades and the components that your college asks for, then you should be given a chance. My goal is for me to fulfill my Undergraduate Studies, by getting a Bachelor’s degree as the minimum, and then maybe change universities or college for my Graduate Studies.  I am concerned about grades and how my CV  will look when I graduate. The IB is also a very important factor that is hard and seems to be a stressful program according to some of my friends that are taking IB examinations this year. On the other hand, having seen the college recruiter last week, brought up some questions, such as, what is the difference between a university and a college? Do your after-school activities count when applying for colleges? Can you go as undecided when applying to a university in Europe? What is the best way to decide what college to go to? Is it possible to visit a campus before you go to it or before you apply to it?  Do things like tutoring or being in NHS count? How do colleges decide if they want you? Is it by having an interview or just through your application? Nowadays, what are colleges looking for? For example your grades is one of the most important parts that they will look at, however what about your personality, the activities you have done or groups that you participate in, or maybe even your qualities as an individual person?

Academic Leadership Overview

Prompt:"In our first two weeks, you have read several articles, seen several videos and been engaged in several discussions related to the concept of academic leadership. At this point, and in your own words, what does the concept mean to you? What subjects or interests do you have a sophisticated, intellectual understanding of that you may want to turn into a major academic project in this class? How do people sometimes abuse academic knowledge to manipulate others? How would you feel if someone used your work to manipulate others (as Jared Diamond claims Mitt Romney has)? How can creating academically sophisticated, intellectual leaders help prevent such people from taking advantage of others the way they do? How can this create a stronger democratic society?"

Academic Leadership is when you learn to take matters into your own hands. You become a leader academically. Academic Leadership can help you develop your abilities and can enhance your confidence. This new course that we are going to have this year will be a good experience for us to get ready for IB next year. As John W. Gardner implied in his book Educational Leadership, “In our society, leaders are among the many “performance elites”". He is right; leaders are elites in both profession and the performance. I found a YouTube video on leadership that to me represented what leadership is all about. The quotes that the video had were significant as overall they summarized what leadership was to me. This video was made by a group of Graduate Students at Winona State University. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4rX4rWhX6A

I am interested in psychology and particularly in positive psychology. For my academic project I want to interview people who experienced the Tohoku Earthquake last year, like I did. Each person will have a different story and will have experienced the earthquake in a different place. They will also have a different perspective now on what they plan on doing and how they are holding up. I am hoping to have people of various ages and for some international people. I will combine these interviews and make them into a movie with some facts on the earthquake and pictures on the incident. In order to turn this into an academic project, I was also thinking on writing an essay on how positive psychology can help you in cases of trauma such that of the Earthquake. In order for the essay to be good it has to have an argumentative point of view as well.

People sometimes abuse academic knowledge to manipulate others. It can be done in several ways and one of them is doing it psychologically. If someone manipulated other using my work, I wouldn't be happy because I would prefer for them to ask me if they could use my work and I decide if I want to give them permission or not. In this way less people would be able to manipulate others using someone else’s information, in this case my work. I think that creating academically sophisticated, intellectual leaders will help prevent people from taking advantage of others because these leaders will not allow for that to happen. They will see in the long term and in the short term and can see what is happening with our society and they would be able to find long-lasting solutions. By having, academically, sophisticated, intellectual leaders, we will create a stronger democratic society, because there will be order but these leaders will be cultured and will have a global perspective thus they won’t rule out what one person says. They will listen to everyone and will bring a fresh and new start to the country. They will have some goals and will carefully weigh their decisions, maybe having to sacrifice some things but this leader will think on the long term. John W. Gardner described such leaders in his book, Educational Leadership.