Thursday, July 26, 2012

Backwoods Boy

  1. I don't really think the cave artists where really trying to say anything, I simply believe that they were just painting the world around them. Freud even said sometimes a cigar is just a cigar and i think that we re just reading into this too much. People have  naturally artistic side and enjoy exploring that even if its only simple drawings.
  2. Maybe the people at that time held some sort of mystic view or pedestal view of the animals in the cave maybe the depended on them for food or had some sort of religion which worshiped them. 
  3. I believe intelligence in the people is most likely forming faster than ever before because art is a huge jump from the physical world. The cave dwellers lives also heavily revolved around animals.  
  4. First of all they need the simple coordination in order to draw in the way they did, the use of colors and what makes certain colors. They would also have to find a way to draw all over the caves including the last bit which seemed to have a little drop. We also cant forget the cognitive ability to move past the physical world into putting their thoughts and sights onto the wall.
  5. The art could be a crude form of written language for storytelling or instructional purposes. The art could have been just a simple way for early man to explore themselves and the world around them. The art could also have been the equivalent of a bored kid drawing on the walls with marker. 
2. Modern art today is often use to communicate some point, look at the street art of Banksy. Visual cues usually have a powerful effect on humans even more so than the spoke word and the images can often stay with us for many many years. Modern art is also a way for people to express themselves or tell stories such as which music, this could be a simple attempt at that by the cave dwellers.

3. Country Music

  1. Personally this type of music has always been pretty dear to me, i think of it as almost story telling and a way to express yourself in a more musical way. it can be a way to play away your troubles, you can sing about a girl who broke your heart, your boss who works you to the bone or a bottle you cant seem to put down, it can sometimes be the thing that helps keep you sane.
  2. Well a tucked in button down, nice belt buckle with some worn out jeans with a skoal ring, a scuffed up pair of boots and a nice stetson with a purdy leather band is pretty stereotypical but there's no needed dress code except everyone should have a good pair of boots. There is a language i suppose its more of the language of a blue collar crowd.
  3. Music can help anyone through a hard time so of course it helps out quite a bit, and there's a few people that could learn to just cowboy up instead of complaining about life. on a more personal note a country girl and that's kept me going on more than one occasion so I do think that it can have a pretty amazing effect it just takes some people getting used to if they weren't raised around it. Only detrimental effects I could think of would be the amount of people who have been smacked for changing the radio on Hank. 

Wednesday, July 11, 2012


For my interview I decided to interview my father so that I could get the most information possible.  I know that I would have been able to get more interesting stories had I interviewed his mother but that there are people that she won't talk about that my dad could tell me.  I was hoping that he would know why contact was cut or why those people were not included in his life, but unfortunately he didn't know much.  My father is turning 51 in just about a week.  He has one older sister.  His parents adopted him shortly after his birth and he knows nothing about his birth parents or ethnic background.  He grew up in the San Fernando Valley and moved to Lancaster, Ca in 1989 to start a family and open up an auto repair shop.

When asking my dad questions I wanted to dig a little deeper than what he was willing to offer.  He is a very closed off man and his family has a lot of secrets.  He doesn't even know much of his family history so even if I had pried there still wouldn't be much to learn, though this would not have changed had I talked to a different family member.  I tried to ask questions in a way that he didn't feel as if I was intruding but would still let him answer to an extent that would allow me to do this assignment.  There was some awkwardness when I asked questions that he either didn't know the answer to or wasn't comfortable talking about, especially if I knew that he has never talked about it before.  This would have definitely been easier if it was someone that I didn't know because I would have no way of knowing whether or not that specific topic or family member could or could not be talked about.

There is a difference in my dad's family between maternal family and paternal family.  I know that this is because no one talks about his dad's family, though I still haven't learned why no one talks about them.  His mom has always been very sentimental about her mother and her time in Indonesia so there are more ties to her side of the family, especially since her brother showed back up.  There aren't so much different attitudes towards young and old in the family but rather different attitudes towards individuals.  For example, my dad talks about his parents and his mother with great respect, while he talks about his nephew and his mother's step-father with contempt.  There is a huge tendency towards smaller families on both sides of my family.  With my dad, he has a single sibling, and a single aunt and uncle.  His dad is an only child, his mom has a half sibling, and all of his mom's parents were only children, and I am an only child.  Essentially, our family stays as small as it can while still continuing on.
There are huge social impacts on my family based on where they are from.  These mainly come from my grandmother since she is the one who actually grew up in a different country.  Growing up in Indonesia she has a strong Hindu faith, and a love for and understanding of nature.  Being from an extremely wealthy Dutch family she also has manners and etiquette that would make a debutante look savage and those manners have been passed down (though also watered down) through my family.  There is also the history of the war, with my grandfather fighting in it and my grandmother being a victim of it, that affects how my family has learned to view the world.

My Perspective
I have a very small and very closed off family.  It is easy to start grudges, and very hard to start talking to each other again.  Because of this the family that I do know well is extremely limited.  I know my grandparents, and I know my aunt on my dad's side very well.  I don't know my cousin very well because I don't agree with his lifestyle or want him to be a part of my life.  On my mom's side there was recently a coming together with her brother and his wife so I am beginning to know them well.  I don't know any of my parents aunts or uncles with the exception of Rob, and I never met their grandparents.  
I definitely socialize more with my mom's side of the family because growing up when my parents were working I stayed with her parents rather than with my dad's family.  I also socialize with them more recently because we have finally started talking again and we have a lot of time to catch up on.
The person with the most influence in my family is definitely my mother, and I suppose by extension my father.  This is because my grandparents are all at a stage where they won't be with us much longer unfortunately, so my parents are starting to make the decisions for them.  My mom is also the most stubborn person in the family and once she has made up her mind there is no changing it.  She even has the most influence on my dad's side of the family, which shows you that everyone in our family has been treated equally regardless of whether they are a part of the family due to blood or marriage.
Gender plays a role in my family in the sense that the women are not to be messed with.  While the men may be the ones who bring home the money, that is all they do.  The women make the decisions, they are the real heads of the households, and they are the ones that control our lives.  At the same time though it is also expected that since the men are out earning the money the women will not only take care of the family issues but they'll play the traditional house wife role.
This exercise has helped me to realize that my family has very strong opinions, and that those opinions are not easily changed.  I knew that my grandfather's parents were never talked about but I never realized how far back it went or that it was to the extent that my father doesn't even know their names.  I also learned some more about my dad's uncle and how happy of an occasion it was when he was reunited with our part of the family.
Overall I wish that my family was more open.  All of the stories that I have heard have been so interesting that I want to know more about more people.  I feel like a kid who has had a taste of candy and whose parents aren't letting them have the whole piece.  Hopefully one day I'll know more. 

Thursday, July 5, 2012

Supermarket Hunter

Part 1

1. The benefits of a hunter gather type of lifestyle could be the closer we are to our food creates a better quality of food we can usually get. If we have to chase our protein across miles of woods we expend calories for a comparatively low gain which could quickly take care of any obesity problems. A nomad lifestyle allows us to leave or fallow the food and fallow the growing season rather than being devastated by drought you can pick up and scurry on off. Monetary value also crashes because an economy weights heavily on the money and taxes we pay for food. While an agricultural society there is more stability in larger groups where as in larger groups HG societies can quickly be literally screwed if game is not plentiful, as a hunter I can assure you typically game isn't plentiful. Having agriculture also allows for a more stable economy and import and export.

2. Some of the disadvantages of HG lifestyles is the fact if there is a large population to sustain you can deplete the game in the area and if there is no game you will starve. In a HG society those who are not as agile or strong are not viewed as useful and any with any serious issues can hold the group back. A huge disadvantage of agriculture is the fact the food is so weather dependent. If weather is poor or there is a blight it could be a repeat of the Irish potato famine.

3. The healthiest diet depends on your living conditions, hunter gathers tend to be healthier but overall I believe the best would be a mix of the two.

4. I think early humans made the transition because its simply easier to supply a population with a steady almost predictable amount of food. For a population which is growing rapidly this a huge plus and give them stability in a unstable world.

Part 2

1.  Your population has a minimum need to survive what ever isn't used is a surplus which can be readily traded. Its a dangerous game to trade on supplies that could possibly be needed and you could end up starving yourself just because you canted to trade without having the proper resources at your disposal. 

2. A social benefit of trade is the exposure to other cultures which allows different thoughts and views on life. Along with expose to other people you also gain new technology passes on similar to how it was on the silk road.

3. Trade gives a some people all the power and some people nothing due to the uneven distribution of wealth, and the wealthy can pick on the poor. Another negative could possibly be exposure to new pathogens that the native people do not have antibodies for could cause a epidemic.

4.   Only some foods will grow in some areas so if some people have things others do not but those others want it they can arrange a trade, simple supply and demand.