Christine Kenneally, Josh Prager, and Stacy Sullivan

Last night I went to hear Christine Kenneally, Josh Prager, and Stacy Sullivan read some of their pieces of work. They all are in journalism but write about completely different topics. Kenneally’s piece was about the evolution of language and how animals are very similar to people when it comes to communication. It was really neat to hear about how animals have different calls for different predators but I was confused about what she was getting at on the evolution of language. I am guessing she was talking about the many languages spoken throughout the world and how they came into existence and how it was spread. Next Josh Prager spook about and read excerpts from his book about the Giants winning the National League pennant in 1951. I found him to be the most interesting because he took something that sparked an interest to him and went so deep into find out more. He had heard that there was a rumor going around that the Giants cheated causing them to win the pennant. No one would come out and say it at first but Prager was persistent and finally was able to interview many of the Giant players. The interviews from the baseball players directly involved gave great credibility and more personal effect to his book. I cannot believe the Giants actually stole the Dodgers’ signs and watched their practices. It really makes you question a lot of things that go on in the world. Stacy Sullivan spoke last and she read from her book on the war in Kosovo. I liked hearing about all the involvement people here in the US had in helping the guerillas in Kosovo. I had no idea all of this was going on. It was really neat hearing Sullivan talk about being right in the action. She really experienced everything she reported on and it gave her book great credibility. Overall the whole night was good. It is good to experience other peoples’ worlds and here people speak on how they interpret the things they experience through words.

Topics from Josh Prager and Christine Kenneally's writings

Things to help you understand Josh Prager’s work:

“The Giants win the pennant”: This is what the announcer yelled after Bobby Thompson hit the winning homerun in the National League pennant in 1951; urban legend says that Lawrence Goldberg was a Dodger fan who sought to torture a friend who was a Giants fan by capturing and replaying Russ Hodges' heartbreak from a Giants' loss. But according to Joshua Harris Prager's 2006 book The Echoing Green about the 1951 playoff, Goldberg was actually a Giant fan.
“The shot heard around the world”: from a classic poem by Ralph Waldo Emerson, originally used to refer to the first clash of the American Revolutionary War, now used toward a dramatic moment, in 1951 Giants’ baseball player Bobby Thompson hit a homerun in the National League pennant, as a result of the "shot" (baseball slang for "home run" or any hard-hit ball), the Giants won the game 5-4, defeating the Dodgers in their pennant playoff series, two games to one; underdogs rise to the top
Bobby Thompson (baseball): Giant baseball player who hit the winning homerun for the National League pennant in 1951
Ralph Branca: Dodger pitcher who entered a game in the National League pennant in the ninth inning and threw a homerun hit to Bobby Thompson that caused the Giants to win the game

Things to help you understand Christine Kenneally’s work:

“I” first person in nonfiction: taught to not use “I” in nonfiction
Creative writing vs. journalism: creative writing, analyzing others work to see how they write, helps one gain the skills needed to work in journalism

Topics within Stacy Sullivan's writing

Here are some things to know that will help you understand Stacy Sullivan’s journalism:

Milosevic: the President of Serbia from 1989 until 1997, President of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from 1997 until 2000, led Serbia’s Socialist Party, was arrested in 2001 by Serbian authorities for suspicion of corruption, abuse of power, and embezzlement
Yugoslavia: existed most of the 20th century on the Balkan Peninsula in Europe, now the area is separated into Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia,the Balkans
Bosnia Herzegovina: a country on the Balkan Peninsula, gained independence from Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia during the Yugoslav war in the 1990s, made up of three ethnics: Bosniaks, Serbs, and Croats, decentralized with two governing parties: the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Republika Srpska
Albania: member of the United Nations, parliamentary democracy
Kosovo: under UN control, has received partial recognition of being independent from Serbia, mostly ethnic Albanians,
Serbia: in 2006 became an independent state after Montenegro left the union, Kosovo is under them but think it is independent
Ethnic Cleansing: displacing ethnic groups from a certain area to make a ethnically “pure” society
The Hague: a city in the Netherlands where all the governmental bodies are located
George Soros: Hungarian-born American financial speculator, stock investor, philanthropist, and political activist, is very rich and fund different organizations
Detente: her eyewitness account
Abu Ghraib: in Iraq, used by United States military where many Iraqi prisoners were tortured and pictures of it were revealed through the media, Saddam Hussein also used it for a place of torture

My Thought on NCLB

Teachers are only focused on teaching to test, not to help students learn information that will be useful. Schools know their students must do well on assessment test in order for them to get funding from the government. Since schools do not want to lose their money all the focus is on how well students do on the tests. Students are being taught only the information on the tests and how to take these tests. They are not adequately taught reasoning skills but only to spit back information. Teachers are not as creative in their lesson plans because they are more worried about students being ready to take assessment tests rather than using creative and more helpful ways for students to learn. This new curriculum is only damaging to students. It is taking the focus off the students’ individual needs and placing all the emphasis on the schools performance as a whole.

No Child Left Behind overall appears to be working but has many hidden glitches. We must evaluate every aspect and the real affects it has on education. Schools seem to be making better test scores, but the standards being used are not properly chosen in regards for every student. These are the leaders of tomorrow and we must make sure they are gaining the proper knowledge. Schools need to have the magnifying glass taken off the overall school and look closer at the students individually. These tests take away from the students’ importance and the real reason students are in school, to learn. The intentions of No Child Left Behind are good but I feel it is not be the best way to achieve its goals.

Tennessee Lottery

Recently Tennessee has changed the way the winning numbers are chosen for the lottery. It used to be that balls with numbers were spun around and then dropped. Whichever balls came out were the winning numbers. Now there is a computer system that chooses the numbers at random. Right when I heard about it I did not understand how that could be equally fair. I was actually proven to be right that this electric drawing was too good to be true. They have found that there was an error in it and duplicate numbers could not be chosen. People are allowed to choose reoccurring numbers so this caused a huge problem. Those who choose reoccurring numbers had no chance of winning and therefore had to be refunded the money they spent on their tickets. The lottery is also suing the computer company that made the system. They have now done more tests and are hoping all will be fixed. Really I think this is too much trouble for something that really takes more money from people than giving. I still would not trust it because computers can get viruses and such anytime. People already have a small chance at winning the lottery and this only makes it even more unreliable.

Herenton Resigns

I was very surprised to find out Mayor Willie Herenton resigned yesterday. I do not know much about him, but from what I have seen living in the city, he has not made any obvious positive change. I think this will be good to have someone new as Mayor. It will let someone with a new point of view come in and help where things seem to be stuck in a rut. I only hope the person who takes over will be better than Herenton. I have also heard that there is talk about Herenton taking over as head of the school board. I do not know if this is a much better place for him than mayor. In either position I think he is given too much power. Our school boards need someone to come in and care about the students and not be there just for their own glory. I feel if he did take the position that he would only be doing it to help him get into a higher office. This is just what I think. I do not know exactly how things have gone while he has been in office but I do know that I am not the only one who is against Herenton.

Brooxie and My Adventure

To add a personal twist to the night of Floyd Skloot’s reading, I will tell you about Brooxie and my adventure. So like a wrote in my earlier blog, Monday night Brooxie and I went to hear Floyd Skloot speak, but there is a lot more to that night that I left out. To begin I was late getting to Brooxie’s house. That is not very hard to believe if you know me; I am always late to everything. Since I got to her house late we rushed to get downtown and parked in the first parking garage we saw. The garage was close to the corner of Union and Main. Now we knew the gallery was on south Main but we were not aware quite how far down that was until we began walking. As we walked we discussed the meaning of blocks, as in the distance. Neither of us knew exactly, but we always took it as one block being from one street to the next. Using this definition I would say we walked a good five blocks or so. We finally got to the art gallery and went to the reading. We got out of the reading about a half hour early and both were excited because we wanted to see our boyfriends that night. We were thinking about taking the trolley, but got too inpatient and decided to walk. This probably was not our best decision considering we are dumb and got lost, but it was fun none the less. I think since we were having such a good time that is why we got lost. We pasted the street our parking garage was on and did not realize we had passed it until a block down. It was pretty sad because both of us had seen two obvious landmarks by our parking garage and still did not realize that is where her car was. In the end we made it to her car around 9, at least thirty minutes after we got out of the reading. I am not sure downtown Memphis is the best place to get lost, but just because it was the two of us we had fun.