Blog Assignment 7 - Claim and Counterarguments - Due on November 16th, 2009

Essay read: The Publication of Your Personal Profile, written by Megan Ramirez.

In the first and last paragraph, the writer presented her claim: profiles of networking websites such as Facebook and Myspace is not secure, and if we want to post out pictures or personal information on the websites, we must exclude illegal and inappropriate aspects of data because these information can cause us into trouble if they are seen by employers or people from administrative organs.

At the same time, the writer raised counterarguments about her claim. She stressed that some people, even including herself sometimes, think there is no need to fear this publication of personal profile and ignore this problem. But she also presented audiences with concrete statistics, lectures from famous people and examples to support her idea.

I think this essay is really persuasive and I think so especially because of the 2 real-life examples. The first would be the one that eight resident assistants were forced to resign due to posted pictures of themselves drinking on their Facebooks; and the other one would be the one that Amy Polumbo was nearly forced out of her position because she was being blackmailed by someone who possessed questionable pictures that she posted on her Facebook. These examples are really close to my life that I need to be alerted of.

Blog Assignment 6 - paraphrase and quotation - DUE on October 26, 2009

Research Paper read: Radical But Right, by Sarah Wells.

In this research paper, the writer first reminded people of the good aspects of animals. Then she described the relationship between animal and human beings, which was that people could live healthily without killing animals for food, fur or other sources. At last, she introduced her point: human beings should give animals the right to live by not making them suffer from being killed. The writer presented her materials in the same order because it is very logical to convince people not to eat meat in order to help animal gain more rights to live. When we read about the “emotional” aspects of animals and our better desired life without eating meat, it is enough for us to decide not to kill animals and give them the rights to live that they deserved. She did a very wide range of researches. The researches, either example and statistics or famous people's remarks and ideas, supported her paper in a large degree.

Example of a paraphrase: Animals in factory farms undergo painful procedures without anesthesia spend their short lives in cramped, dark, putrid conditions, and only find escape in slaughter, many of them “still alive while they are skinned, hacked into pieces, or scalded in the defeathering tanks” (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, 2008, para. 4).
Example of a quotation: These creatures depend on an intricate social system and have been documented mourning the loss of fellow elephants (Cabamongan, 2008,para. 4).

Blog Assignment 5 - Two Aspects of History - Due on October 12th

History is he aggregate of past events, and is what truly happened before. However, history could not be known to people in the future unless "story tellers" keep them down.
As the society develops, some “story tellers” gradually became “story distorters” who work for the governments. As a European, the person would stress how Columbus bravely discovered American and brought development to the deserted inland, while an Indian American may describe how his ancestors welcomed the Europeans but slaved and finally killed or even encountered massacre by these monsters that they helped before. We can imagine two writers, one from Europe and the other from an American Indian tribe, describe the very same history. While reading the examples, let’s call for responsibilities towards the people now who are eager to know the facts, and those in the past who died with regret.

European Writer: More than three centuries had passed since Christopher Columbus landed on San Salvador, conquering all the difficulties with his infinite wisdom, European people devoted themselves into contributing this deserted island into a more powerful area. We got full use of the resources in this island that the islanders could never learn how to exploit, helping them to have a better life with higher enjoyment. However, we suffered from these non-appreciative people who later tended to fight against us as a consequence of their curmudgeonly nature. With the will of God, we punished them by killing them. Thanks to the European ancestors, justice was done.

American Indian Writer: For more than three centuries, American Indian people suffered from European’s insult and killing. We welcomed them to our island, but mistakenly welcomed their bullets pointing at our heads and leather scourges heating on our backs. Finally they used up our resouces and left a deserted island which used to be colourful and vivid, and with dead people and animal, who happily lived together in the heaven of nature, which became a hell for the masters of the island.


Massacre: The intentional killing of a considerable number of human beings, under circumstances of atrocity or cruelty, or contrary to the usages of civilized people.
Savage: wild; not cultivated
Avarice: Excessive or inordinate desire of gain; greediness after wealth; covetousness; cupidity.

Blog Assignment 4 - American or Chinese? - Due on Sep. 28th

For two whole years, I was dreaming of coming to America, to the place where everything is so perfect that nowhere else could ever compare with. Although I knew, that there must be something not that wonderful in the US, it was still the heaven of all human-beings. One of my friends here, whose name is Eric, proved my thoughts thoroughly, because he’s so delightedly making friends with American people and enjoying his American life. However, after living here for nearly a month, I don’t meet my expectations here, not because America is not good enough according to my judgment standard, but the culture differences make me confused.

I am a pure Chinese born and brought up in China. The reason I call myself “pure” is that I am somewhat very indulgent in traditional Chinese culture and devote myself in learning Chinese culture as much I can. But still, I want to come out of the small world to the global center, where everyone around the world meets their needs, to experience freshness of life. I made up my mind to make friends with American students here after I moved into the school dorm. However, the more time I spent here, the more desire I have towards company of Chinese people. That is what my culture forwards me to do.

But why do many Chinese, including Mr. Liu and I, look forward to being with other Chinese here? The reason is the call for culture complement. Nineteen years is enough to decide what we are and what we are going to be. No matter where we live, we need a support in our heart. This is not what mere family and friends can give us, but a five thousand years of culture in the back that will constantly push us forward. We have a need to fill our mind and heart with resources from our culture to get us work. It is like the need of gas for a car to run. Nobody can live without the support of a culture. But when we come to America, we lack the base sufficiency. And this lack of base sufficiency requires us to turn to Chinese people here for help.

Being among Americans, my eyes become more and more sensitive to Chinese looks. I can easily turn my attention to a single Chinese stranger in the crowd of Americans on the road. When two Chinese meet, it is like two family members’ reunion. We can express our feelings without any doubt because we know what the other is thinking about and we understand how this happened. We can get a great deal of comfort from each other by just talking, and get our mind renewed. And this is the amazing affect we experience every day.

Is living in America just suffer? No! We are learning here. We learn knowledge and technologies that our country doesn’t have, we acknowledge the pain of being alone, and we know how to adjust ourselves to face life optimistically no matter how hard our life is, because we have experienced the biggest difference in our lives – the difference of culture. Although somebody who came to America with me had gone back China, I will continue until I finished my American dream here, and the dream is insistence.


humble: blieving you're not any better or more important than other people.
lectern: an object with a sloping surface that you put an open book or notes on while you are speaking to people in public.
delegation: 1. the giving to someone of part or all of your power, rights, or duties.
2. a group of people chosen to represent others.

Blog Assignment 3 - Chinese and American Nonverbal Communication - Due Sep. 21st

A certain culture can determine everything. People from different cultures speak different languages with different accents, eat different foods with different condiments, wear different clothes with different styles, and have different behaviors with different standards, while the last difference can cause some trouble. Because of the different standards of behaviors, people’s nonverbal communications, commonly known as body languages, may differ. We can see this with the following examples of Chinese and American body languages.

When foreigners come to China, if they stay long enough, perhaps the most attractive thing that motivates them to stay or live here is “the milk of human kindness”. As a person who has lived in China for 19 years and in the United States for nearly one month, I was always trying to find what this “milk of human kindness” is. Of course there is an element of truth that friends and family care about each other more than people from other parts of the world, but another element I found very obvious is body languages.

There are many common scenes in China that cannot be easily seen in the United States: boys on streets walk together holding each other’s shoulders, singing perhaps; girls on roads running together hand in hand; friends, no matter boys or girls, behave so closely to each other with “normal” body contact, like leaking each other etc. Attention! They are not gays or lesbians, but close friends together, with special ways of showing love and intimacy. I still remember a American friend asked me very surprisingly: how many homo-sexual people are there in China? I had to explain very patiently to him that those people he saw were just close friends, because he wouldn’t believe me anyway. It was quite normal that a westerner of 20 years old might be shocked by another culture’s “strange and unique” body language.

The other difference of nonverbal communication between Chinese and Americans is that Americans move really a lot more than Chinese. In China, it’s commonly accepted that people speak with some gestures, but too much gestures, shaking heads, waist or even the whole body all the time while speaking may be considered ridiculous. Affected by the ancient Chinese philosophers’ ideas, Chinese people are more likely to “stay” and behave quietly instead of “move”. That is a very important reason why China has never invaded any country or area in the world.

However, except for the above differences, the nonverbal language of Chinese and Americans are generally the same. We shake hands with new people, nod our heads when we agree, and even the gestures mean the same.

Nonverbal communication occupies a central place when we communicate with each other, so it’s very important for foreigners to fit in the new environment and learn the new meanings of nonverbal communication. It’s another beauty we will acknowledge in a new culture.

Blog Assignment 2 - Is First Impression Always Right? - Due Sep. 14th 2009

First impression: the word that has been mentioned by billions of people for trillions of times is now remembered once more. The only reason that psychologists stress it so often is the importance for people when meeting new guys. First impression will be regarded as the standard to judge what kind of person the new guy is, or what kinds of behaviours will he or she has in the future. Sometimes, this is true. However, in a lot of occasions, fist impression can be misleading.

I am a person who likes to judge people from the appearance. When I see a person looks friendly, no doubt, I will definitely think that he or she is friendly. Reversely, if I see a stranger who seems to be cold, I would believe this person is cold rather than warm no matter how warm he or she would behave in the future. I was taught that I should never judge person from the appearance, and I deeply know it. But I can’t control the first impression to be formed by the first look of a new guy I meet. And this happens so often in my life.

Take one example I encountered after arriving in America. During the International Student Orientation in UD, I was talking excitingly with new friends, especially new Chinese friends, I met. All of a sudden, a boy came and slapped very hard on the shoulder of one of the girls I just met, and without any expression on his face, he spoke to her with a very cold voice, “Why did you not call me?” I was stunned by him. Women are considered to be not as strong as men are, and we should respect them even more instead of being this rude. Especially, he was not her boy friend! After that day, whenever and wherever I saw him, I would rather not talk to him. However, later I found that we have an exactly the same course together. So as a classmate, I tried to get to him but amazingly, I found out that he’s friendly, warm-hearted and cool. This is another lesson I should remember this even once more: never judge a person from the first impression.

People judge me wrongly, too. I’m a happy person. This is true. When a new person sees me, I must be smiling and behaving as if I'm supposed to be always this happy. So they might think that I’m just a naiive happy person without many emotions. However, when they found out that sometimes I also feel sad or especially, when they had a bad mood and came to me with very tiny slight hope that I could possibly understand them and made them happy and I did do it as they wanted, they were surprised! And hence I’m no more a just-happy person to them.

First impression is misleading when meeting new people. However, it is still important to behave properly to give others a good first impression. What we should do is to continue to be nice to everybody we meet, and contribute to the society to be a really nice member.

Blog Assignment 1- The Use of Language - Due Sep. 8th 2009

There are about 5000 to 7000 languages in our world (according to the research of UN professionals). Each one of them has its own specialties and systems. However, sometimes even the same language can have different effects when spoken by different people in different situations. But only if we use it properly, can we make advantage of and benefit from it.

Languages are changing in every second. As the countries in the world develop at full speed, the languages are also changing accordingly in order to adjust themselves to fit the new generation: sometimes new words are created, or sometimes grammars are altered. When we think of generation gap, a language gap is already included.

We can see how this affects our life by looking at an example of mine. My homeland, China, has been developing so fast since when I was born. Loads of new technologies were invented to change our life better. So my generation accepts new things easily, getting used to them without difficulty and even use them soon after we acknowledge them because there are new things coming out every second. Internet is one of those most spectacular inventions that had very deep impressions on us. A new way of speaking, “Internet language” as we call it, has come to everyday life. I am one of those young people who do this, but my mom, who stands for the last generation, disrespects and tries her best to avoid these new things because the casual way and the new words make her feel strange. The difference in using language makes us communicate even harder. And even though kids who are younger than me use similar way of expressing themselves, we can find some slight differences still.

When we come to one person, we’ll see that the language is used differently in 2 different situations, too: one is formal, the other is informal. When I’m in a formal situation, I will choose every word carefully, speak with a perfect Mandarin, and even make drafts, prepare and correct the sentences before showing my thoughts to others. This is a kind of aspect I show other people. However, when I’m with my family and friends, I speak whatever my first though wants me to, and use a bit but still obvious local accent. This is how I show my trust to them.

There are sorts of languages, too. They may differ from area to area, field to field or person to person. When people speak their natural fist language, they can’t be more fluent. However, when they speak a second or even third, fourth language without enough training, they may speak with words popped up from mouth. When speaking the first language, some people like to be polite, others prefer bad words. I feel avoided if I hear those dirty words too regularly. This is also a language called “dirty language”.

Language is a tool we use to communicate, a bridge we use to reach each others’ mind and connect the countries in the world. Let’s use the right language and create our clean and beautiful life.