Just looking online for different vegetarian websites, I found that PETA's website was full of information. The first thing I noticed, after looking a bit at very old versions of their website, was that they've really promoted the fact that Paul McCartney is a vegan. Like, this is a really big thing for them. We're talking on the front page multiple times over the course of just a few years. As I continued searching, I noticed that they relied heavily on celebrity endorsement, and many of their homepages featured articles about famous people endorsing vegetarianism, veganism, or animal rights.
I'm also planning on exploring the vegetarian sections of Reddit, a huge online community made up of different various smaller communities called subreddits. Each subreddit can be searched by various criteria, and since Reddit is such a popular website, I feel like it would be a great resource.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Monday, October 10, 2011
Glossary
Vegetarianism is a general term that includes different gradations of strictness concerning the definition of what an animal is, or how one should eat. Below is a sampling of different types of vegetarians, as well as some vegetarian-ish diets.
Pescatarianism: is the practice of a diet that includes seafood but not the flesh of other animals.
Flexitarianism: is a term used to describe diets that are vegetarian based with the inclusion of occasional meat products. No specific definition, usually seen as a transitional diet to vegetarianism.
Lacto-ovo-vegetarianism: a vegetarian who does not eat animal flesh of any kind, but is willing to consume dairy and egg products. One of the most common types of vegetarians, often motivated by ethical concerns about the slaughter of animals.
Veganism: "the doctrine that man should live without exploiting animals." This excludes all animal flesh and animal products, including milk, honey, and eggs, and may also exclude any products tested on animals, or any clothing from animals.
Raw Veganism: includes only fresh and uncooked fruit, nuts, seeds, and vegetables. Vegetables can only be cooked up to a certain temperature
Macrobiotic: a diet consisting of primarily whole-grains and beans. Emphasis on not overeating, chewing one's food well, and buying local and unprocessed food.
This glossary of terms will get us started, and will inevitably be refined with further research.
SOURCE: Wikipedia
Pescatarianism: is the practice of a diet that includes seafood but not the flesh of other animals.
Flexitarianism: is a term used to describe diets that are vegetarian based with the inclusion of occasional meat products. No specific definition, usually seen as a transitional diet to vegetarianism.
Lacto-ovo-vegetarianism: a vegetarian who does not eat animal flesh of any kind, but is willing to consume dairy and egg products. One of the most common types of vegetarians, often motivated by ethical concerns about the slaughter of animals.
Veganism: "the doctrine that man should live without exploiting animals." This excludes all animal flesh and animal products, including milk, honey, and eggs, and may also exclude any products tested on animals, or any clothing from animals.
Raw Veganism: includes only fresh and uncooked fruit, nuts, seeds, and vegetables. Vegetables can only be cooked up to a certain temperature
Macrobiotic: a diet consisting of primarily whole-grains and beans. Emphasis on not overeating, chewing one's food well, and buying local and unprocessed food.
This glossary of terms will get us started, and will inevitably be refined with further research.
SOURCE: Wikipedia
Friday, October 7, 2011
Cohesion and Coherence
Prompt: Write a paragraph that treats one of the following questions... (a) How are you connected to the culture of your project? (b) How is your project important/significant? (What might it help an audience understand?) (c) What is the culture/literacy/Discourse you are studying? (an overview).
This past summer, I ended my two year commitment to vegetarianism. Though I still have a largely plant-based diet and hold vegetarianism in high regard, I found myself unconvinced by arguments I had previously believed, and unmoved by thoughts that had previously disturbed me. My understanding of nature had changed from a fuzzy, peaceful picture to a world of struggle and conflict; if nature is violent, who am I to deny it? Yet I still felt the pull of vegetarianism, and was not ready to completely leave it behind. When I had to choose a topic for this project, I saw it as an excellent opportunity to explore vegetarianism more broadly. My hope is to explore vegetarianism outside the bounds of my reasons, and to get a broader perspective on why one might become a vegetarian.
This past summer, I ended my two year commitment to vegetarianism. Though I still have a largely plant-based diet and hold vegetarianism in high regard, I found myself unconvinced by arguments I had previously believed, and unmoved by thoughts that had previously disturbed me. My understanding of nature had changed from a fuzzy, peaceful picture to a world of struggle and conflict; if nature is violent, who am I to deny it? Yet I still felt the pull of vegetarianism, and was not ready to completely leave it behind. When I had to choose a topic for this project, I saw it as an excellent opportunity to explore vegetarianism more broadly. My hope is to explore vegetarianism outside the bounds of my reasons, and to get a broader perspective on why one might become a vegetarian.
NALC 3rd Week
During my third week, I worked with two students that I tutored previously. The Hungarian woman came in for the first hour. We worked on some new vocabulary and just chatted about our plans for the next weekend. Again, my (limited) German skills were helpful, but I made sure that we only spoke in German when absolutely necessary.
My second student was the Chinese woman that I had tutored before. We started out reading a story, which she read quickly and with ease. But after we finished, she just kept going through vocabulary, getting almost all of it correct. I finally realized that the lessons we were doing were far too easy for her, and she agreed. After that we worked on verb conjugation, especially with the verb “to be.” I made a verb-chart for her of the present and past tense of ‘to be,’ and then we practiced by changing present tense sentences into past tense sentences. It was actually quite fun. At the very end of the lesson, she taught me a little bit of Chinese, and described in general how their language works. It was really fascinating how different their language is from English.
So far, I have really enjoyed tutoring. I have always had the hunch that I would be a good teacher, and my experience here at NALC has really confirmed that. But not only am I good at it, I really enjoy it. It’s something I will keep in mind when trying to figure out a career.
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Interview 1: Elli
My first interview was with a friend of mine named Elli. I chose her because I know that she has thought a lot about why she is a vegetarian, and has some unique views about vegetarianism, among other things. She became a vegetarian her first semester at Belmont as part of a bet she made with a friend: if he quit smoking, she would quit eating meat. From this humble beginning her experience with vegetarianism grew. She joined the Service house at Belmont and met a few new friends who identified themselves as Christian Anarchists. Many of these people were vegan, and as she met more people who questioned her about her vegetarianism, she began to think more deeply about it. She realized that vegetarianism was an expression of compassion, one of the supreme Christian virtues in her opinion. By being a vegetarian, she was showing compassion not only to animals, but also all the people that are negatively affected by the mass-production of meat. As she put it, "I don't think there's such a thing as overly caring about a living creature... I don't think you can have too much compassion for anything."
This interview was extremely helpful because Elli was the perfect example of someone who is a vegetarian for religious reasons. Even though the initial cause for her vegetarianism was something as playful as a bet, her ultimate justification for it that she has grown into is rooted deeply in her Christian faith.
Monday, October 3, 2011
NALC 2nd Week
During my second week, I tutored two new students. The first was my first American student. He was an African-American man born and raised in Nashville, and came to NALC to work on his reading so that he could graduate from Barber School. He didn't say too much about himself, but we did some great work together. It was clear that he had a firm grasp on speaking, and could use visual clues to guess at what words meant. But it was also clear that he wanted to sound words out for himself and do his own work. It was encouraging to see that he really desired to learn.
My second student was a man from Korea. He told me he was studying at Vanderbilt's business school on a grant from his company. He had been reading English for about five years, but admitted that his biggest weakness was listening and speaking. After blazing through our written lesson, we worked for the rest of the time on speaking different sounds he had difficulty with (th, t, d, and l) and just talking, so that he could practice listening. I was amazed that he was able to get through his classes based on his reading skills alone, even though they were quite advanced.
After I left, I reflected on how different my two students were. One was a native-born speaker who struggled greatly with reading, and the other was a foreign speaker who was a very good reader. In a brief encounter, one might be inclined to write off the poor speaker as uneducated, but my experience with these two students proved just the opposite. An inability to speak and listen well does not indicate a lack of education, merely a lack of experience with the spoken language. This experience really brought the old saying "don't judge a book by its cover" to life.
My second student was a man from Korea. He told me he was studying at Vanderbilt's business school on a grant from his company. He had been reading English for about five years, but admitted that his biggest weakness was listening and speaking. After blazing through our written lesson, we worked for the rest of the time on speaking different sounds he had difficulty with (th, t, d, and l) and just talking, so that he could practice listening. I was amazed that he was able to get through his classes based on his reading skills alone, even though they were quite advanced.
After I left, I reflected on how different my two students were. One was a native-born speaker who struggled greatly with reading, and the other was a foreign speaker who was a very good reader. In a brief encounter, one might be inclined to write off the poor speaker as uneducated, but my experience with these two students proved just the opposite. An inability to speak and listen well does not indicate a lack of education, merely a lack of experience with the spoken language. This experience really brought the old saying "don't judge a book by its cover" to life.
NALC 1st Week
During my first week at NALC, I tutored 2 different students. The first student was a woman from Hungary who lived in Nashville with her husband. She had been in the US for a few years but wanted to improve her English, so she decided to start coming to NALC. Her English speaking skills were surprisingly good, and she was anxious to improve her reading, which was the area she struggled in. One of the coolest moments was when she told me that she spoke a bit of German. I too have been learning German, and it gave us another way to communicate with each other, and even helped while I was trying to explain the differences between 'could,' 'should,' and 'would,' (using the german verbs können, sollen, and wollen).
The second woman was from China. She had moved to America many years ago and had learned to speak English fairly well, but had never learned how to read. We practiced reading a few new words, and she did very well. It was interesting to see how quickly a speaker can pick up reading without much encouragement.
I was a bit nervous about my first time tutoring, but both students made a point to thank me for being such a good teacher. I was taken aback. I think it wasn't so much that I was a skilled teacher, but that I was willing to help them, something which is probably fairly rare among people they encounter in their average day.
The second woman was from China. She had moved to America many years ago and had learned to speak English fairly well, but had never learned how to read. We practiced reading a few new words, and she did very well. It was interesting to see how quickly a speaker can pick up reading without much encouragement.
I was a bit nervous about my first time tutoring, but both students made a point to thank me for being such a good teacher. I was taken aback. I think it wasn't so much that I was a skilled teacher, but that I was willing to help them, something which is probably fairly rare among people they encounter in their average day.
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