GET MOTIVATED PEOPLE!!!!

Do you like reading? I do. Read these. Inform yourself. Don't be a couch potato and rely on the late night talk shows and comedy skits to get your info on current events. It is important to seek out multiple sources. Check out the CNN, The New York Times, The Huffington Post, or The Atlantic. For a more cultured view, check out BBC News, The Moscow Times, Xinhua News, or Al Jazeera. I think it makes sense to check out news sources from other countries because we live in a global community. If we are to interact with other cultures, it would benefit us to understand their perspective. However, just because something says this-is-this or that-is-that, doesn't mean it is 100% accurate. You have to take responsibility for understanding what is going on around you. We have to have the willingness and sensibility to realize that everything that happens in the world influences us in one was or another.

Quintilian and Cicero

Quintilian believed that in order to be a good orator, the individual must be a moral, honest, and knowledgeable member of the society in which he or she lives. According to Quintilian, this individual:

Can duly sustain his character as a citizen, who is qualified for the management of public and private affairs, and who can govern communities by his counsels, settle them by means of laws, and improve them by judicial enactments”

The individual is knowledgeable when he or she can speak of justice, equity, and goodness, as Quintilian questions, “For what person (if he be not an utterly corrupt character) does not sometimes speak of justice, equity, and goodness?” but the individual becomes an orator when he or she professes these topics with eloquence and meaning.

            With Cicero, there is also the belief that the orator must be knowledgeable in various areas, or causes. The intention of the orator is to inform, persuade, and even argue his or her ideas to the audience. To Cicero, the orators are the ones who help with the continuance of a society’s history and spark the intellectual livelihood of the society’s citizens. If the orator is ignorant about the causes, then the orator answers Cicero’s question about human worth, “For what is the worth of human life, unless it is woven into the life of our ancestors by the records of history?” To illustrate the importance of knowledge even further, Cicero uses an analogy of how the ugly roots of the tree are essential in obtaining the tall, beautiful trees. The orator must have knowledge about the facts in order to sustain his or her ideas. There can be no ideas if the orator does not know the facts.

The recommendations of both Quintilian and Cicero surprised me in a happy way because they call for orators who are going to mean what they say and present with realness while speaking. Both Quintilian and Cicero emphasized the point that the individual does not become an orator until he or she speaks from true knowledge and acts within the moral realm of their society. An individual cannot become an orator if he or she has little knowledge or corrupt motives.

In Cicero’s On Duties, he claims, “Trust is basic to justice. By trust I mean stability and truth in promises and in agreements.” Therefore, a person can be called just if he follows through on promises and agreements that he may be involved in. Also a just person is one who will voluntarily look out for the wellbeing of others. However, Cicero goes on to say that there are not many just men because many have abandoned the idea of protecting the weak:

As for protection of the weak, several causes may be mentioned why men overlook and abandon this duty. Perhaps they wish to avoid unpopularity, or hard work, or expense. Or indifference, laziness, or weariness, or some private concerns and preoccupations hamper them so much that they allow people whom they ought to shelter remain unprotected.

The just people are the ones who are not pulled down by greed or the desire for power.

Why Young People need to Care

I attend a liberal arts college where most people are aware of what is happening in the world. People reading the newspaper is not an unusual sight, nor is having the television switched to CNN in the Commons. However, some people I know have said they do not think it is important for them to know what is happening in the world or who is running for the presidency. They justify this by saying they do not live in the real world. They believe owning a house or having a job are the qualifying factors for being in the real world. Their belief of not being in the real world and not having a responsibility to care about what is happening in the world is by far the most ignorant view I have come across to date.

Young people need to care about what is happening in the world. The events that happen now will influence what will happen in the future. For example, whoever wins the 2012 presidency will create policies that will affect the ability of young people to find jobs in the future. One of the many jobs that could be influenced by upcoming presidential policies are educators. A person who wants to become a teacher ought to be aware of the presidential candidates standing on education. If the candidates are willing to cut funding for education, it will likely inhibit the individuals ability to get a job as a teacher. This is why young people cannot hide behind the belief that they are not in the real world. The longer they try to stay out of the real world, the harder the real world will hit them when they begin to enter it.

I, John Gast, know exactly what I am talking about.

I am a famous painter and you should know who I am. I, John Gast, painted Manifest Destiny, one of the most important and famous paintings that represents the progress the great Americans made. My wonderful masterpiece emphasizes the greatness of the Americans by Colombia bringing technology and education to the west. The wonderful westward expansion civilized the Native Americans and unified the entire country. Now moving away from my painting and all the wonderful things it represents, I am most pleased with the death of Osama Bin Laden. We Americans, have once again made the world a better place. With stars on our foreheads, we have lead the way in destroying the greatest evil of the 21st century. Americans are in a sense, moving westward again. They are one step closer to defeating al-Qaeda. GO AMERICA!

I AM SO FRUSTRATED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

In our last class, we discussed how John Neihardt was adding to Black Elk's testimony in order to bring justice to the Native Americans. At the time, this seemed like an okay thing to do because more information regarding the Native Americans can only be beneficial when most people do not know enough about their history and culture. However, when Neihardt starts adding in entire paragraphs, in what seems like every other page, I think it begins to harm the legitimacy of Black Elk's story. By adding in paragraphs and quotes that Black Elk never brought up, but relates to the history of the Native Americans, I think it takes away from the personal story Black Elk is trying to tell. I think it is frustrating Neihardt thinks it is okay to add to Black Elk's story when some of the things he brings up are not relevant to Black Elk. Even more, there are most likely going to be people who read this book and not read the footnotes. Therefore believing that everything Black Elk, or other Native Americans, say as being true.

Another thing that is frustrating me is the amount of people who do not know who Dan Rather is. Even more, there are people who do not know who Walter Cronkite, Tom Brokaw, or Brian Williams are. I am frustrated by people who do not know who these men are because they are some of the most influential journalists of the 20th and 21st century.

Black Elk Speaks

I thought an interesting part of Black Elk's vision was when the morning star was brought up, "Then the day break star was rising, and a Voice said: 'It shall be a relative to them; and who shall see it, shall see much more, for thence comes wisdom; and those who do not see it shall be dark.' And all the people raised their faces to the east, and the star's light fell upon them..." I think this quote represents the goodness in the Native Americans and the evil in the white people because the white people were too focused on moving westward. In their attempts to push westward, their faces would not have the light of the morning star upon their faces.Thus hinting that the white people where more corrupt than the Native Americans because they were in the dark. This can also relate to how the Native Americans considered themselves one with nature. Obviously the white people in this time period did not consider themselves to be one with nature because they exploited it and destroyed it for their own personal gains.

The Railroads are BAD

In Ronald Takaki's A Different Mirror, he presents evidence on America's progress in the West. This includes details regarding the mistreatment of the Native Americans by the white settlers. One of the major factors that allowed the "civilized" Americans to settle the West, was the development of the railroad. "Senator Henry Dawes recounted an experience he had while traveling by train on a recently completed railroad track across five hundred miles of Indian territory. The potential of the terrain impressed Dawes. 'The land I passed through was as fine a wheat growing country as it could be.'" When looking at progress in the West by white settlers from a Native American's perspective, the railroad is a bad thing. It opened up and exposed the West to Americans. It fostered greed in Americans because they wanted to reap the benefits of the West at the cost of the Native Americans. Americans became willing to remove the Native Americans from their homes, convert them to the "correct" way of living, and even in some cases kill them.