RCL #8:
This assignment dealt with the rhetoric of protest signs in which we were required to embed a link to an image of a protest sign from some sort of demonstration and analyze the main issue the sign references. So I chose an interaction between a lesbian couple and the Westboro Baptist Church, a religious group notorious for their hatred towards homosexuality.
In today's RCL blog, I’m going to provide two enormous pieces of rhetoric that reveal the epitome of an attack and of the perfect retaliation. In the back you see a lady, a member of the Westboro Baptist Church, holding a number of signs defaming gay marriage, even going so far as to say that soldiers die for “fag marriage.” The Westboro Baptist Church is notorious for it’s extreme stance against homosexuality. It has picketed and protested in a number of places, including a memorial for the 2006 Sage Mine disaster (a coal mine explosion that left 13 trapped, with only 1 surviving), arguing that the mining accident was God’s revenge against America for its tolerance of homosexuality. I find the signs as a type of instigation in some respect. When you treat certain individuals as awful as the Westboro Baptist Church does it is expected that there will be retaliation. As you see this lesbian couple quickly took the opportunity to publicly display their immediate disagreement with the signs and their affection for one another. This is in my mind the epitome of stasis. Both groups have agreed to disagree, the Westboro Baptist Church is not going to change it’s ways, and neither will homosexuals. I guess I would associate this photo of conflict along the lines of definition, which refers to the identification of the parameters and components of concern, and its relation to other things. If you look closely, the WBC alludes to the “underlying dangers” of homosexuals on our country, heavily emphasizing their beliefs of a society without gay people, it’s almost a type of genocide in my opinion. I believe what the couple did took a lot of confidence and courage, and is something that will remain in the history books. If only ignorance and disrespect could be eliminated from our society all together. Our country continues to make strides with equality to all unique individuals and I believe hopefully that groups like the Westboro Baptist Church will cease to exist.
PAS #4
Throughout both the fall and spring semesters, each student was responsible for keeping a Passion Blog, where each week we would create a new post in regards to our passion. This semester, my passion was music, which has played an instrumental (see what I did there) role in my life. This passion blog had to do with me analyzing a famous piece of music called The Swan (Le Cygne) along with a hip hop dance associated with it. It's amazing when two different art styles meld together so beautifully.
The first time I heard this piece was about a year ago while perusing through a number of different YouTube videos. I came across a video that combined the immense talent of two artists; one a hip hop dancer from Memphis, Tennessee, and the other, Yo-Yo Ma, an iconic cellist that I spoke about in my This I Believe Podcast. This piece provides the perfect sense of dynamics, and truly feels like a swan taking flight. The violin and orchestra use crescendos and decrescendos (these are terms that describe the music getting louder and softer) to progress the piece. The vibrato on the the violin gives the sound a sense of struggle and then at the climax it reaches a sense of triumph. Music, in all forms, tells a story, and this is a piece that takes you on an adventure. The dance also tells an immense story. Usually hip hop dance is characterized by its sharp movements, with different parts of the body moving almost in a choppy way. Yet, Lil Buck, a hip hop artist from Memphis, was able to move in such a way that complimented the music fantastically, and was an incredible performance.
Here’s the YouTube video of Lil Buck and Yo-Yo Ma, it truly is one of a kind.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=C9jghLeYufQ