Home

        Where I come from is an easy question for me to answer because the place I come from and my ancestry are mixed together to form the place I call home. My home is a family farm in northern Iowa. The farm has been in my family for over one hundred years. My great great grandparents on my dad’s side came over from Germany to buy the land and build the house. The original house burnt down in the 1920’s due to a fire that a traveling farmhand was suspected to have started. My great grandpa Ed built the house I live in today. He built the house to be one of the most modern homesteads in Iowa at the time. In fact, it was featured in an Iowa State journal because of the modern clothes chute and electrical system.

Since then, my house has been the backdrop for many family stories and events. My grandma was born and raised in my house. My dad grew up in my house. There are signs all over the farm of my relatives that lived there before I did. The initials D.H. are imprinted in the cement of the barn and a small house is carved in the doorframe of my bedroom. These artifacts remind me of all my relatives and just how many people have called my house home over the years. In fact, when I talk to me aunts and uncles, they each have a different special place in the house. For my aunt Sandy it’s the heat vent outside the kitchen that was always warm in the winter when the house became big and cold. She would put a blanket over it to trap the heat, and she would read until someone would yell at her to stop hogging the heat.

Over the years, my house has begun to take on a personality of its own. It’s a gathering place attracting people to come and stay. When my dad was growing up, his uncles would come and stay for months at a time. Now, my aunts and uncles come up and stay for the weekend or friends and family gather here for super bowl parties, birthdays, holidays and Sunday dinners. No one ever leaves hungry. The food is always tasty and abundant. A joke among my family is that the house attracts people to visit and never lets anyone leave with an empty stomach. This embodies what I love most about living where I do. There is always good company, good food, and it’s the place I call home.

               

TED Talks: Naomi Klein

I found Naomi Klein to be an effective speaker. She delivers her message in an easy to understand way, and establishes why her message is important immediately. Klein uses both emotion and logic to establish her claim. She uses emotion when she describes the effects environmental carelessness is really having on our world. She inspires feelings of helplessness and disgust when she speaks about the failure to stop the leaking oil in the Gulf of Mexico. A point that inspired the most shame was when Klein addressed the strategy of shooting old tires and golf balls into the oil well to plug the leak. Klein communicates the recklessness and irresponsibility of big business extremely effectively with this point. Another aspect of emotion that Klein uses is her word choice. She uses phrases like “watery improv act” to describe BP’s efforts to remedy the oil spill in the Gulf, and “a hole ripped in our world” to describe the leaking oil in the Gulf. Klein also uses logical appeals in making her claim. A particularly poignant logical appeal Klein made was to err on the side of caution when dealing with our one and only plant rather than pushing the limits of the earth until it becomes uninhabitable. Klein’s use of visuals was another effective way she supported her claim. Klein uses pictures to illustrate environmental damage. Her visuals act as an unavoidable example of crimes on the planet we live. The visuals she used put an image of the damage to the earth front and center.

              Although I found Klein’s presentation to be credible, she could improve her transitions between points. The second time I listened to her presentation, I could follow her outline, but the first time I watched it, I got lost at times. Klein could also integrate more facts and graphs into her presentation to better support her points.

Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front by Wendell Berry

      In Manifesto, Wendell Berry sends a message to return to a simpler, more consientious way of life. Modern life is described as a series of checkpoints and filled with instant gratification. "Not even your future will be a mystery anymore." Society has advanced so much that the mysteries of the future will be unraveled before they enven occur. Instead of a person, each individual is reduced to a credit card or bank account in order to buy the endless turnover of new things.
      However, Berry does offer an alternative to this lifestyle. He says "So friends, every day do something that won't compute." Instead of following the trends and acting for our own interests, Berry says to love others, work hard for no money, honor ignorance, and most or all, be a steward of the land.
     Berry's way of life he praises and describes is a backlash to the influx of technology in the past twenty years. Society has become so obsessed with technology and conveinance, that the simplicity and satisfaction of an honest life working the land has been forgotton by society. In fact, many farmers today are stereotyped as ignorant, when, in reality, those who work the land and appreciate it are wise far beyond being fluent in the latest technology. Berry sends a good, much needed message in Manifesto to forget progress and just live life with love, harmony, wonder, hope, and awe at the world around us.

Citations for Research Project

Louv, Richard. Last Child in the Woods. Chapel Hill: Algonquin Books, 2005. Print.

Faber Taylor, Andrea, Frances E. Kuo, and William C. Sullivan. "Views of Nature and Sale-Discipline: Evidence from Inner City Children." Journal of Environmental Psychology 22 (2002):  49-63. Web. 6 April 2011.

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Photo Project

 

 

 

Photo Project Summary

                The photos I took represent a place that’s come to mean a lot to me in the past nine months, Iowa State. As a new freshman in the fall, I felt as if I would never know where my classes were or be able to call Ames home. Looking back, I realize how much has changed in the past year. I have changed. These photos represent my journey as a person through the past year.

                The pictures I took depict the places that I have come to think of my own throughout Iowa State. I included pictures of the Memorial Union and the Campanile because, while they are Iowa State icons, I have come to think of them as my own. I will always remember walking through central campus on a nice fall day and hearing the campanile play “Bad Romance”. The Memorial Union is where I have met friends for countless lunch dates.

My picture also depict where I spend most of my time academically. It seems like I lived in Hoover, Gilman, or Molecular Biology this year. The picture “Chemistry” represents the bulk of my first semester worries and concerns as many hours were spent working out problems, writing protocols, and memorizing formulas for Chem. 177. Another building I included was Mackay. Mackay is where my orientation class for Dietetics was held. The picture of the benches on the inside of Mackay is significant because that is where I met my friends Holly and Marie. I have many classes with both of them. They are part of what makes Iowa State special for me. I could not leave out a picture of Parks Library. It’s been such a good place for me to study, grab a quick lunch, read the Daily, or study some more.

                Many of the photos I took are pictures of friends because they are what make Iowa State unique to me. I have met awesome, lifelong friends here at Iowa State. I have laughed with them and figured out college and life on my own with their help. Without them I would not be the person I am now or had the awesome experiences I had my freshman year.

                Iowa State is a great university. This past year, it has become my home. The people and places are now my own. I can’t wait to continue my journey at Iowa State.

The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollen

     In The Omnivore's Dilemma, Michael Pollen claims that the beef industry has industrialized and wasteful, disregarding nature. One way Pollen supports his claim is through his use of facts. Pollen uses factual information about the natural diet of cattle, how a steer's digestive system is affected by corn, and the implications of feeding corn to cattle on our natural resources and health. For example, by the time one steer has matured enough to be slaughtered, it will have taken 35 gallons of oil to support the food supply for that one steer. Pollen backs up these facts with reliable sources like a veterinarian, an economist, and a USDA microbiologist. Another method Pollen uses to support his claim is his use of personal experience and observations. Pollen goes on the journey from farm to feedlot with the calf and witnesses feedlot practices personally. Since the experiences are firsthand, Pollen's claim seems more credible. A third method Pollen uses to support his claim is word choice. To introduce the feedlot, Pollen uses the term "premodern city". He goes on to describe the feedlot like a city referring to the feed mill as a "local landmark" and the gravel roads as "streets". Through this choice of words, Pollen creates an industrialized image of the feedlot. This contributes further to his claim that the beef industry has become industrialized.
     The success of Pollen's argument is compromised by his bias in the excerpt. Throughout the piece, Pollen villianizes the beef industry. He brings up facts that have little to do with feeding corn to cattle, and only serve to create bias against the beef industry. One such fact is that farmers fed rendered bovine meat to steer until 1997 when it was banned by the FDA. Pollen never addresses the beef industry's point of view or the flaws in his own argument. Ultimately Pollen is unsuccessful in his claim.

Everday Writer Chapter 7

      One thing I learned from chapter seven was different ways to make outlines for my essay. I found the storyboard technique especially helpful. Outlining my essay in this way would allow me to move ideas and support around without having to constantly restructure my essay. Now that I can visually see the points I want to make, creating a storyboard can help me present my essay with a logical flow of ideas. A storyboard will contribute to the organization and logic of my analytical essay.