Reflective Essay

This course has facilitated practical learning about relevant social issues in the global village. It has fostered positive motivation to bring about social justice. Education is a vital factor to bring about social justice, whether it is educating the oppressed or the privileged. Debunking is one of the core concepts of this course which I find particularly important.  Debunking is defined as challenging the assumptions that society has deemed objective truths. This is done by further examining the phenomenon for underlying issues. (Quist-Adade 2012: 2) Another concept that I thought was important is related to debunking because our society only teaches a single perspective on the issue. The issue is the negative consequences of globalization. Because our western society strives from the prosperity of globalization, many people are solely aware of its positive impact.

Globalization has undoubtedly enabled us to improve many aspects of our lives;  technology plays a significant role in globalization. For example, individuals are able to use their credit card to book a flight, visit another part of the world, and use the same credit card while abroad.  Advancements such as the cell phone and the internet has made the world interdependent and intermingled creating a global village (Quist-Adade 2012: 14) Globalization has also facilitated an increased standard of living for a number of countries as a result of improvements in trading. It is no question that globalization has improved the accessibility of the world and has given some people the opportunity to improve their standard of living; it has, however, truly improved the standard of living for few out of many individuals involved in this movement.

An example of the negative consequences of globalization is the facilitation of human trafficking. Human trafficking is defined as intentionally transporting people from one place to another where they are either forced into labour or bondage with the purchaser. (Aronowitz, 2009; Lee, 2007; King, 2004) This can be done by deception and other coercive methods. (UNODC, 2006; King, 2004). Human trafficking includes industrial forced labour, mining forced labour, domestic forced labour, forced prostitution, forced child prostitution or sex slavery, bonded labour and military bondage. (Tridico, pp. 55-57, 2009) Globalization plays a vital role in human trafficking because it has become easier for people to communicate with each other and travel from one place to another. (Tridico, 2009) Many individuals from the Global North are unaware of the magnitude of the human trafficking industry; they are also unaware of their indirect impact. For example, a person may buy a cellphone unknowingly fueling the ongoing civil war in Congo and the human trafficking associated with the mining of coltan.  (The Cellphone Paradox, 2008)

The example of western society being oblivious to human trafficking shows how globalization and social justice is related to debunking. The Global North must become aware of the negative impact of this movement in order to obtain a fuller understanding. This is done through classes such as this, where students are helped to debunk the many ideologies of our society.  We learn to understand how they were formed and what we can do to change these beliefs.

This course has enabled me to broaden my understanding of social issues. I never realized that globalization could have negative consequences until I was taught about the arguments against the concept. This class has also equipped me with the knowledge I need in order to make a more positive impact within the global village. I realized that it is beneficial to question assumptions, as it allows a fuller understand of issues. Thank you for a great semester filled with life changing knowledge.  

The Danger of a Single Story

The untold story of Africa: This is Nairobi, the capital city of Kenya.

Reading Method: Paraphrast

The danger of a single story is a video on “Ted Talks” of speech given by Chimamanda Adichie. She explains the dangerous implications a single story can have by using her life story as an example. Adichie grew up reading American and British children’s books although she grew up Eastern Nigeria. Later she started writing stories about American and British characters despite never being outside Nigeria. This showed how impressionable individuals can be when given a single story. She explained that when she was discovered African books that related to her life, it broadened and changed her limited perception about the rules of writing. Another example she gave was the only descriptions that she heard about her family’s young helper. Her mother always talked about him and his family being very poor and pitiful. This suddenly changed when she visited his village and saw the talent and capabilities of his brother. Poverty was her single story about the helper and his family similar to the single story her American roommate had of her when she moved to the U.S. for University. She also explained how power is related to what stories are told and how they are told. The most important segment of the video was that the consequence of a single story is that stereotypes are created unintentionally. It gives individuals an incomplete understanding without the individual realizing; it also  emphasizes the differences among the human race rather than building on the similarities of the global community

American Ruling Class: Nickel and Dimed

Reading Method: Paraphrast

Nickel and Dimed from the American Ruling Class is a video that discusses the impact of the welfare reforms in the US. Because of these reforms, a great number of people experienced a drastic decrease in their standard of living. People were forced to attempt to survive on six or seven dollars an hour and provide for their families. In the video a women attempts to experience the challenges these people face every day by going undercover and working minimum wage jobs to survive. She discusses her findings with two business men, one that is a recent graduate and oblivious to this social issue and another who is an acquaintance. She explains that there are no unskilled jobs and the jobs society deems unskilled require a great amount of learning and experience. She explained that many of these individuals that work “unskilled” jobs work full-time, yet cannot afford basic housing. These jobs are very exhausting and demanding of the worker, yet the worker is hardly rewarded for their labour. She argued that although the US economy was booming at that time, employers prevented their workers’ wages from rising. She also explained that the jobs that the economy was producing did not provide enough money in order to survive, and that this should be a state of emergency. The most important part of the video was when she argued that the real philanthropist of society are the people that provide services to the country yet can hardly find the means to survive.  This is important because it changes the popular perception of these people and their importance in society.

Jessi Jackley: Poverty, Money – and Love

Reading method: Paraphrast

In class we watched a video on “Ted Talks” of speech by Jessica Jackley called “Poverty, money — and love”. Jackley is a co-founder of an online organization called Kiva, which offers microloans to entrepreneurs who are faced with poverty. The speech is about her past and how it led to the founding of the organization. She explained that at the young age of six, she was taught about the poor in Sunday School. She learned that these people needed food, shelter, and/or water and that it was her job that God gave her to help these people. She later was confronted with another teaching in the bible that the poor will always be here and she felt angry and hopeless. This gave her a feeling of negativity toward the poor. As she grew older, she learned about wars and diseases that occur amongst the poor, and she concluded that the poor lived lives of suffering and sadness. This gave her a feeling of guilt because of the wealth she had compared to the poor and anything she did to help was never enough. This made her distance herself from this group, but she still gave to relieve her guilt and negative feelings. These feeling, however, changed after hearing Dr. Muhammad Yunus speak. Dr. Yunus is an economist, who later won the Nobel Peace Prize, from who had developed the idea of microcredit. This idea of loaning to entrepreneurs that cannot afford regular bank loans led Jackley to establish an organization that could make this concept a reality. Dr. Yunus also changed Jackley’s perception of the lives of poverty-stricken individuals; he spoke about these individuals as hardworking and filled with potential if given the chance succeed. This was a major contrast from the prior perception of these individuals being passively and hopelessly suffering in a world of sadness. After interviewing some people who were given the opportunity of a micro loan, she learned that most of their lives changed quickly and positively. She also realized that these people did not want others to feel sympathy; they wanted a chance to show their capabilities. I feel most important segment of this video was the introduction; she argues that the telling of people’s story is very important, including our stories about ourselves, and how we intervene in each other’s stories. This part is important because it keeps issue of poverty of a personal level. It is also important because people will perceive things differently based on the story they choose to believe about themselves and others. Jackley co-founded Kiva in order to share the stories of individuals faced with poverty and who possess the potential to better their standard of living through micro loans of other individuals.

In- Class Discussion: What are the Similarities Between the Homeless in Vancouver, Canada and the Homeless in Bangalore, India?

In separate groups, the class was asked to identify the similarities between the homeless in Vancouver and in Bangalore. The group argued that homelessness is evident globally yet the majority of societies perceive it as a personal issue. They believe that a homeless individual deserves to be without shelter because they are not as hard working as the rest of society. Many people believe that their society is based on a meritocracy; therefore if a person cannot afford housing, they have themselves to blame. This is problematic because individuals in both societies do not use their sociological imagination to debunk this prominent assumption. The government and industries of both societies take advantage of the negative stigma attached to the homeless and use it to exploit them for labour or to avoid distributive justice. It is only when the majority of society is educated about this issue that the welfare of the homeless can be changed positively.

 

In-Class Discussion: The Gacaca Court System in Rwanda

The Gacaca Court system is a justice system that Rwanda has used to deal with the horrendous crimes committed during the genocide of 1994. After watching a video about this system, the class was separated into groups and asked what would be some advantages and disadvantages using this method to bring about justice. In my group discussion, we argued that there may not be adequate witness protection. This could hinder the progress of trials because individuals may omit vital information due to fear of negative consequences. They may also distort their accounts of events intentionally or unintentionally because of the loss of memory of the traumatic experiences. Individuals may also use scapegoats and wrongly accuse suspects of crimes, as well as suspects may deny accusations of the crimes they committed. There lacks hard evidence in these trials, such as DNA testing, and they rely very much on witness accounts. There are many advantages for using this system to deal with the genocide. Because of the vast amount of crimes committed it would be hard for the modern justice system in Rwanda to deal all of the cases efficiently. This system also facilitates the individuals associated with each trial because the Gacaca court travels to different locations as opposed to the individuals travelling to the court. Another benefit of the system was one that a classmate mentioned later during class discussion; she explained by having justice dealt with in a collective setting, it enables victims, witnesses, suspects, friends and family to remember together as a community.  This video and discussion made my group and I realize how easy ideologies can become crystalized as truths in society. It also made us realize how dangerous these ideologies can become. Furthermore, it has caused us to become more aware about the ideologies that plague our society.

In-Class Discussion: Are Males and Females Opposite?

In a group discussion we were asked to discuss if male and females are opposite. My group agreed on the argument that they are not necessarily opposite but they do differences. The reproductive organs are the major differences between the genders. One classmate mentioned that they have hormone differences but both genders have the same hormones with the difference being the amount in the body and how they are used. When thinking critically about the question, the other difference were socially constructed. These differences were based on superiority and values of society, so they differ among cultures. This caused us to realize that what we first perceived as objective realities of each sex was actually constructed, such as the docile and nurturing and emotional character of women compared to the aggressive and rational behavior of men.  Without removing these social constructs on the roles of each sex, social injustice will prevail in society.