Blowin' in the Wind (Assignment 3)

Lyrics-

Verse 1:

How many kids do we have to corrupt,
before they can grow without hate?
How times can a mountain erupt,
before we examine our faith?

How many prayers do we have to pray,
before we just give up and wait?

Chorus:
The Answer my friend...is Blowin' in the Wind,
The Answer is Blowin' in the Wind.

Verse 2:

How many birds have to fall from the sky,
before we agree somethings wrong?
How many pipes will cough smoke to the sky.
Before they been coughin' too long?

How many times do we have to ask why?
before we just sing our own song?

Chorus:

Verse 3:

What will it take to make people agree,
That we can't always all see the same?
How many times will they poke at our brains,
Before we will scream out our name?

How many times do we have to obey,
Before we stop feeling the pain?

The Answer my friend is Blowin' in the Wind,
The Answer is Blowin' in the wind.

Not your average Joes (Assignment 5)

Back before the workers of America received any sort of breaks, benefits, or even fair pay, the greed infested factories were slowly wearing down and killing the spirit of this great land. An immigrant from sweden named Joel Emmanuel Haggland, came to America after both his parents died on the workforce. Later to be known as the legendary Joe Hill, he begun to conceptualize what we know today as the workers union (then called the Wobblies or I.W.W.), an organization that banned together in protest of  the exploiting employers that were responsible for the oppression of their generation. The song "Joe Hill" performed here by Paul Robeson, is just one of the many story-songs that have carried on the legacy of this immortal hero of the american workforce.




Music in this time was used to strengthen spirits, as Joe Glazer says here "An extra weapon of the heart, not just the head". Songs like "Solidarity Forever", helped people ban together with a simple motto to move the movement in the right direction. Joe Glazer revolutionized these songs by starting Collector's Records and mass producing the sound of the labor union, earning him the nickname of the labor movement's troubadour. The music helped people through the struggle of long protest, making people want to "Do or die for the cause, and go out singin'".



Songs about Joe hill continue to inspire the workers of america to fight for fair pay even today. In the 1980's, Billy Bragg sung in support of a miner's protest in Britain in 1985, as well as the songs of Joe Hill and Woody Guthrie, influencing this powerful american style of song and protest to a different part of the world.

The Diversity Contradiction (Assignment 4)

Diversity is all around us all the time. No matter if we are from the same country or not, we all have our own unique differences. Our background heritage does not make us who we are. Although it may establish the way we look, it in no way speaks the measure of a person's character. A person's character is measured by what they say and do, AND it is always measured differently by different measurers.

To NOT appreciate diversity is to say that you think all people should look and act the same, in which case you would be conforming to the same type of social standards as the nazis.

After 9/11, the people of Staten Island celebrated their diversity to triumph in a time of "fear and Bigotry".   Different ethnic, cultural, and religious backgrounds came together to eat a great pot-luck diner with student, civic, religious, and political leaders discussing the matter at hand. The evening proved to be quite interactive and beneficial to the spirit of the community.

Was the food or music particularly good? Probably. Is that all it takes for people to appreciate diversity though?? What is it that Wagner College in Staten Island, NY has that Westminster College in Fulton, MO does not? Although I could answer these questions rather cynically, it would only be a judgement of my own based on my pre-conceived notion that people in the midwest are inherently more racist and ignorant than people on the east-coast. I think we all have to realize we are hypocrites when we judge any type of people OR place like this, and while trying to appreciate diversity, we have to realize that really appreciating diversity means being ourselves, flaws and hypocrisy intact.