Diversity & Discrimination
Project Proposal:
Write a statement on what your project is on (read BASELINE 2). This is a brain dump, a cognitive learning exercise designed to force you to articulate on paper an idea in your head, so it should not be that difficult ... be aware that some great ideas in your head look awfully irrelevant when you finally write them down].
i. State what YOUR project problem is.
ii. THEN put EVERYTHING you currently KNOW about the problem (off the top of your head) and explain why you think your project is important (if you are building OFF of baseline 2, this part has been done).
iii. Address the different levels of importance: how is it important to you personally & you know about the problem (have you experienced or witnessed the problem in real life)? How do you think knowing more will help you in the future?)? How is it important for the rest of us (what will this understanding mean for society) - or, more simply, why should we care?
iv. Now expand ONE dimension of the problem - FIND ONE piece of formal evidence for your interest. Formal means that you have some kind of artifact (something that others can look at) that illustrates the problem.
v. Now SPECULATE - what do you think is happening? Essentially, hypothesize what your findings will be
vi. Given what you just wrote, what else do you think you will find out?
Length:minmum of 3 pages. 5 pages is the maximum.
For some reason, I have been interested in the category of media representations in general since I started this course. We're far more influenced by the media than we actually think. There are many issues that we deal with regarding media representations (especially of minorities).
I am going to focus on the consequences of negative media representations of the "other" in the American society as well as other societies. One example I can think of at the moment is Islamophobia. Is it a real thing? If so, does it influence the polices we have in different societies today?
Not too long ago we witnessed the president's Muslim ban policy placed on certain nations. This exact policy makes me think of what constitute "normal" muslims according to not only the president but the general population. Since we know for a fact that the vast majority of 1.6 bilion followers of the religion of Islam around the world are not the cause of terrisom, it is important to educate ourselves about the outlier groups.
We see these groups terrorize, touture and kill other muslims on a regular basis. We see it in Syria, Iraq and many other Muslim countries. I am generally interested to learn how and why Media spread the worng perceptions/images to the general population about religion and terrorism for many years.
Also, I personally get discriminated against on a regular basis, and sometimes one of the main reasons is people having false perceptions/images about me and the place I come from.
I choose not to blame the media just like everyone else does. However, based on a lot personal experiences in many different parts of the world I learned how media could seriously affect societies and how they perceive different groups of people.
I definitely catch myself discriminating against others too from time to time, even if they do not know about it and it's just thoughts in my head I still think it is very negative to have prejudice against any human being without knowing them on a personal level.