Cultural Literacies

"Knowing a lot of words means knowing a lot of things."
- E.D. Hirsch

The problem with this statement is knowing something and understanding something are vastly different ideas. I know about a lot of things, but this doesn't mean I understand them. So if you want to talk to a person that is outside of your culture, to be able to carry on a conversation you need to understand there culture not only know it. Knowing a culture in my mind just lets you have a friendly chat, but a in depth conversation where you learn about the person you really need to understand where they are coming from, or you need to really try to understand. I want to learn this semester a lot about the Gullah culture along the coast of South Carolina and Georgia. This is a very closed off culture to the rest compared to most of the other African American cultures. Looking at common Gullah names are typically of African decent, and are most similar to Sierra Leon area, these examples are Tamba, Vandi, and Fatimata.

Orignal Image

Image editing

Took an image of my best friend setting up my tent before he left to serve over seas... figured it would be a good picture to use, plus used my iphone 4 to take it which for me is like having gods knowledge in my hand....

Digital Composition Sites

NOT THE MOST SURPRISING THING!!!!! 27 Million hits on youtube, that's a lot for a video from '87. I have used youtube to look at shows from my past. By the way I don't have facebook, and refuse to get it. I kinda feel like it is huge social blackhole, as in it is ruining the way we interact with one another, soon I'll sit in one room my fiance in the other and we will be typing to each other about are day. I don't really use much of any online media though, my typical online experience consist of looking at a vehicle forum, searching google scholar on a topic I'm interested in at that moment. As stated before I do not have a facebook account, youtube account, or really most other social networks, but beeradvocate.com and iH8mud.com I frequent. While looking at the social map, I see Skype, i use that almost daily to talk to my best friend who is Afghanistan, I enjoy being able to see him with the video features and hearing him. That is a cool experience almost as if we are hanging out at our apartment but are a world apart. The map shows a lot of things that I almost didn't think would be considered social networking, aka WoW, which i feel is a lot larger part of the MMO world. I feel as if I am in the soical network dark ages though, for instance just the other week I learned about Anton Fisher. It does amaze me that if you do something stupid you can become so famous.... ever see the movie Idiocracy.

Introduction and Blogger Tutorial

Still trying to figure this blog thing out, have used a blog for another class and it was enjoyable, still glad to get a update and refresh myself on blogging. Also am wondering if this should be more of a formal blog or informal.