This class really opened my eyes to the world of gender and racist issues in the media. The group projects at the end especially opened my eyes to what other people in our class wanted to research and exploit. Racism in the media to me has really been shown not only on a large scale in large magazines, newspapers and television, but also on a small scale such as The University of Oklahoma’s campus newspaper. Racism has always been an issue in our country, and although we have taken huge strides against racism, it is still prominent everyday in media outlets. When we first went around the room in our class everyone said their definition of race and what it meant to them. At the beginning I said that race is a huge part of who you are and how you are perceived. My definition throughout this course has changed. Race to me is an illusion. It is a reason for people to find differences in one another and a reason for people to categorize each other. Race has no bearing on your character, how rich you are, how you act and how you dress. It has no bearing on your personality. The only thing is has a bearing on is how people look at you. In one class we asked if people should be required to take a course like this. I think that people would look at life completely differently if they took a course like Race and Gender in the media. People would no longer look for differences in each other but similarities. The world would be a better place, all sides would be heard and people would love each other for who they are, no the color of their skin. I loved the group projects at the end.
My favorite part of the class was the final group projects. People really did great research on things like women in sports, stereotypes, racism in the media and all kinds of topics. It was really informative and showed how passionate the people in this class are about the topics at hand. The people in this class were very opinionated which made it all that more interesting. If everyone had the same ideas about everything, there would not be this class. In fact there would be no opinions at all. There would always be a right or a wrong instead of just your opinion. I love how people are so different, especially because I am a journalism major. It’s so interesting to interview people that have different opinions on gender and race issues because you never get the same answer twice. Race sometimes blocks people from getting to know each other when instead we should be embracing it and see the person behind that skin color. This will help me become a better media professional because I will look at people for their skills, talents, experiences and stories no matter what race they are. I will also try to spread diversity in the work place so that I can get the best resources for the story or project I am doing.
Before this class, I had never used any type of blogging system. I was very confused at first but excited to be able to share my ideas with the people in this class. Blogging really helped me to write my ideas. It was a free space where I could share my opinions and my experiences and really open up about them without being judged. I also liked the idea of having to find two links about the topic because it really made me do some research about the topic at hand and understand it even more. Blogs were also in my opinion fun! They were more fun than writing a paper about it or doing an assignment because it was simply a chance to voice your opinion and people could comment on it.
This class has been such an amazing experience for me. I would have never thought that I would like a class like this, but instead it really opened my eyes to people of all color, of all experiences and of all backgrounds. I would have never thought about race the way that we dissected it in this class and I never really noticed that racism existed. When we did the project about racism in the media, I was shocked to see how much it plays in our society. I hope one day the barriers will be broken and people will love each other for who they are.
Isn't it time we broke down barriers
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Fight Racism
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