Author: cbowers2

Final Proposal

Image result for political corruption cartoon

 

We will be focusing on the scene in Chapter Two where Obinze talks about how he became successful with Chief. Particularly when they have dinner for the first time at Chiefs place and Obinze recognizes the business/political hierarchy that goes on, and how it’s corrupt. Adichie describes Obinzes feelings, “Obinze felt repulsion and longing; he pitied them, but he also imagined being like them” (Adichie 30). We chose this specific section of the novel because Chief is a character who is described as a “big man”. This refers to him being wealthy, holding a high political status, and being an egomaniac. Chief’s character in this particular scene shows an underlying issue with the correlation between political status and wealth.Chief says “ Everybody is hungry in this country, even the rich men are hungry, but nobody is honest” (Adichie 30). By Chief holding a wealthy status in Nigeria it allows him to easily get what he wants through fraud or bribery because of the corrupt government. The author depicted Chief in this way to show the culture of corruption and materialism. Not only do Chief and Obinze exemplify the political corruption in Nigeria, but Nneoma says to Obinze “Even Chief has some white men that he brings in for show when he needs them. That is how Nigeria works. I’m telling you” (Adichie 31). This shows that most characters, in one way or another, have been impacted by the political corruption in Nigeria.

 

We chose this specific topic because of the political corruption in Nigeria that is currently affecting immigrants. The Business-Anti-Corruption which is a collection of free anti-corruption compliance and risk management resources including e-learning training, country risk profiles, and due diligence tools is a site that focuses on all aspects of corruption in Nigeria. A specific section in this source describes how Nigeria’s civil society is affected by corruption, Nigeria’s “Civil society is weak, fragmented and lacks resources, although there is a positive trend in its development (BTI 2016). While the landscape of civil society organizations is among Africa’s most vibrant (FitW 2016), civil society organizations continue to suffer from weak representation and limited organizational resources (BTI 2016). Labor unions suffer from similar limitations (BTI 2016). Private media and religious groups have increasingly taken on the tasks of civil society (BTI 2016)” (GAN Integrity).  This is referring to how Nigeria’s civil society get’s relatively no support from it’s government, and the support that it does get, usually involves corruption or bribery of some sort. We can tie this civil society corruption to Obinze’s mother and her situation within the University that she works at, where there are strikes and employees/professors are not getting paid. We can corporate this in our storyboard by adding a dialogue element where Obinze is at the dinner with Chief and he realizes Chief’s corrupt tendencies and it reminds him of the situation that his mother is in, and how Nigeria’s civil social and specifically labor unions are “weak, fragmented, and lack resources” (GAN Integrity).

 

To visualize this ongoing social issue we will be creating a storyboard. In this storyboard we will be tying multiple scenes from the book, Americanah, to provide insight to the political issues and corruption in Nigeria. These issues will be supported by our research and give real world insight. We chose the storyboard medium because we felt that it would best portray the nepotism and bribery in politics within Nigeria. Our storyboard viewers will demonstrate empathy and consideration for the immigrants affected by the discreditable government in Nigeria. By creating a storyboard that contains still images, it allows for expansion into the virtual reality realm. This gives the ability to bring the storyboard to life and create realistic scenarios. By transferring the story to virtual reality, viewers will be so in the moment that the story will leave a lasting impact on them.

 

Collin, Jill, and Mannat.

 

https://www.business-anti-corruption.com/country-profiles/nigeria/

Greece: immigration and right-wing extremism

My articles is based on my ancestral background, Greece. This article mainly discusses the association of immigration, and the evolutions of the right-wing organization, Golden Dawn. This article also discusses the immigration issues within Greece, the political structure of right-wing extremism, the 2015-2016 refugee crisis, and the existence of the populist radical right party, Popular Orthodox Rally.

One piece of this peer reviewed article that really intrigued me was the section about the refugee crisis that happened within Greece in 2015-2016. In this time period, hundreds of thousands of refugees were coming into Greece to seek asylum. After the “implementation of the EU-Turkey agreement on returnees in March 2016, there was a sudden and significant drop in the flow of refugees to Greece” (Vandoros 62). What was the EU-Turkey deal? Essentially Turkey agreed to take back refugees that entered Greece, and then send legal refugees to EU. In exchange, EU gave Turkey six billion euros, and allow visa-free travel for Turkish citizens for a short time period. All though this seems like an immediate solution to the refugee crisis within Greece, but in reality it posed it’s issues. At the time, many refugees were still stranded in Greece. This posed a large issue because Greek government did not have the means to take care of these refugees because of its economy and the relative magnitude of the crisis itself.

The Golden Dawn organization then took this opportunity to exploit these issues and the refugees to help push their political agenda. Golden Dawn regularly demonized the refugees stating that “immigrants and refugees as intruders and violent criminals who will ruin Greece, even in biological terms, as carriers of contagious diseases” (Vandoros 63).

 

I generally thought this article was very interesting. It didn’t have that many emotional key words that indicated a specific political bias, and seemed relatively balanced.

 

Vandoros, Sotiris G. “Immigration and Political Opportunities for Right-Wing Extremism.” Mediterranean Quarterly, vol. 29, no. 1, 2018, pp. 48–69., doi:10.1215/10474552-4397336.

Closing the Mexico border would be a logistical nightmare

The news article “Mexico border closing: Trump and US could face logistical nightmare if he follows through with threats” was posted on USA Today by John Fritze on April 3rd, 2019. According to the media bias fact check, USAToday falls under the left-center. This means that they are relatively balanced but slightly skewed left.

Like the first article, this news article focuses on President Trump’s threats to close and/or tariff the U.S – Mexico border. Unlike the other article, this article focuses on the glaringly negative effects that will come from closing the U.S – Mexico border. At the beginning of this article, it references the first time in U.S history that the U.S closed the Mexico border. This was right after John. F. Kennedy’s assassination. They did this as a precaution for the U.S direct national security. This caused bumper to bumper traffic at the U.S – Mexico border.

Similar to the J.F.K situation, President Trump wants to close the border for national security reasons. He states that closing the border could have an immediate impact on illegal immigration. On the other side, experts say that closing this border could have a massive impact on the economy. The article states “the move could disrupt more than 1.5 billion dollars in goods and hundred of thousands of people who cross the border legally everyday”. This is essentially saying that it could have an immediate negative impact on the American economy by the billions.

 

In my opinion, this article seems slightly skewed to the left and slightly biased because this article features a few key emotional words that may try to persuade a reader to agree with this type of article.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/04/03/donald-trump-faces-logistical-nightmare-closing-u-s-mexico-border/3337332002/

Closing the Mexico border

The news article “President Trump Just Abandoned His Threat To Close Down The U.S – Mexico Border” was on Time.com. It was published on April 3rd, 2019, by Jill Colvin. Time.com falls in the neutral side of the media bias chart, which means that there is minimal bias or a balance of bias.

This article refers to President Trump’s threat to close the U.S – Mexico border. In this article, it talks about how recently Trump has decided to take back his threat, but the notion of the threat is still important. So why would Trump close the U.S – Mexico border? Well, he says directly that the “loopholes within the U.S – Mexico border is a direct threat to national security” and he states that he will either completely close the border, or he will heavily tariff every car coming into the U.S from Mexico. He claims that this will “halt” illegal immigration into the United States.

President Trump refers to the border as a national “crisis”. He still proclaims that illegal immigration coming from Mexico is essentially a crisis, and it needs to be taken care of. He took back his original threat about closing the border completely because he thinks they won’t need to do that when the tariff on each car coming in will be a 25% tax. He states that a tax that high will stop anyone from coming in.

In my opinion, this article presents balanced bias. It offers a view from each side, with minimal “emotion” words. I believe that this is a genuinely good news article that anyone could read, and get an accurate and balanced information from.

 

http://time.com/5564974/trump-no-border-shut-down/

Provocation Assignment – Group 1

I wanted to do my provocation on a piece of the second chapter of Americanah. A part of this chapter really intrigued me, and it was about Obinze’s story about how he became successful in the real estate business and how his relationship with Chief began. Obinze met chief through his cousin Nneoma. Chief was a very rich man who bought and sold properties for profit. When Obinze first met Chief, it was for a dinner at Chief’s massive home. He noticed that Chief talked about whatever he wanted, and his guests merely agreed with whatever he said. Obinze then began regularly hanging out with Chief and waited for his opportunity to become an associate of Chief. This then led to Obinze reaching out to Chief and offering his services. Chief replied with how he was going to buy seven properties all for one million each, and then sell them for fifty million because he knew that’s what they were worth. He then offered Obinze to join him on this deal. Nneoma was happy for Obinze and says to him “And after you register your own company, you must find a white man. Find one of your white friends in England. Tell everybody he is your general manager. You will see how doors will open up for you because you have an oyinbo general manager. Even Chief has some white men that he brings in for show when he needs them. That’s how Nigeria works. I’m telling you.” (Adichie 15). This quote from Nneoma is very striking and interesting to me. Nneoma is exposing a racial issue within this culture/industry. She’s saying that you haven’t “made it” like Chief, until you have white men working for you. Even if the role that the white man is in, isn’t a real, significant role.

How do you feel about this? Is this a representation of Obinze’s character? Do you think this might have a greater impact later in the story line?

 

 

Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi, and Hilde Stubhaug. Americanah. Gyldendal, 2014.

Reflection on Carlos Hernandez Talk

Writer Carlos Hernandez came to class on Wednesday 2/27/19 to talk about his work, career, life in general, and to answer any questions we may have had regarding any of these topics. Carlos gave great insight on varying topics in class and it was a great experience to hear him talk.

Carlos talked a lot about digital publishing, which pertains a ton to our class. He gave great insights on the advantages a disadvantages to digital publishing. One advantage was that white space isn’t very relevant as it is in print. Meaning that you could waste all the white space you want to when you publish digitally rather than if you were to publish in print. A disadvantage to publishing digitally was that to most writers and authors, it’s sort of a bucket list or an accomplishment to publish in print. To most authors and to Carlos himself, print has more sentimental value.

Another aspect of Carlos’ talk that intrigued me was his game design/development experience. As someone who is very much involved in video games, and will hopefully work in the industry some day as a developer, it was very interesting to see his thoughts on the whole thing. I, as a developer, was also very impressed with his programming knowledge. I was not expecting someone who has a been a writer their whole career to understand the nuances of python.

Lastly, Carlos gave some great general life advice. He was talking about when/where should you publish as a beginner. And he said that you should publish everywhere and send out your writing to everyone you possible can. The piece that was important was what he said about rejection. Carlos stated that rejection is a necessity for growth, and the fast/earlier you rejected, the better you will get. So send out your writing, and don’t be afraid to get rejected! This advice not only applies to writing, but anything you may be passionate about.

 

Programming For LIRS

According to LIRS website, they help refugees with economic empowerment. Which helps them with work opportunities and training programs. For my grant idea, I’d like to have a coding session for refugees and other migrants that are interested in a career in IT and other technology industries of the like. We could teach the basics of programming, and other IT fundamentals. This could help the individuals with building knowledge and skills for a job in the technology industry. I believe this is a great thing to do because the technology industry, unlike other industries, do not require a four year undergraduate degree in order to get a job. This way, incoming refugees and migrants who are interested in a career in technology, they do not need to necessarily go to school for it. Our programming basics session could be the beginning of a career in technology.

Career Services: Entrepreneurship

After attending the careers entrepreneurship panel, I was able to gain a lot of knowledge about what it’s like running your own business. The panel was made up of a select few business owners and entrepreneurs that had a range of different background. From young to older, from college drop outs to college grads. They all were genuinely unique, which was great to see. Their uniqueness offered great insight on entrepreneurship. The panel was hosted by Stevenson’s own Jeannine Morber who is a lecturer within the school of business. She founded the Morber Marketing group in 2010 with the goal of helping businesses integrate new marketing technologies into their current marketing processes. The panel included Garret Pfiefer who now works for his family business at Maryland Brand Management which produces all kinds of merchandise that are tailored for specific companies. Another panelist includes Andy Brown the founder and CEO of Eat Pizza. Eat Pizza is a frozen pizza manufacturing company that covers more than half the nation. Andy also owns a music entertainment company and a local pizzeria.  There is also Elizabeth Trimm who is the hunt valley branch manager for Rent-A-Car. This specific branch is the largest in the Baltimore area. Another panelist was Andrew Murphy who is the partner and owner of Flying Frog Publishing, which specializes in the publishing of children’s books. Chris Daley who is the founder and principal of Whirlaway, LLC. Chris’s company specializes in public relations, specifically media relations, social media strategy, content creation, brand building and sales. Last, but not least, John Dinkel is the principal at Dinkel Business Development, LLC. This company is a business development strategic advisory based in Baltimore City.

This careers’ panel connected to my personal career goals more than I thought it would. As someone who is in the technology industry, I didn’t think a lot of this advice would be relevant to me. I thought this panel would be mainly how to run a business. Instead is was more about how to properly run your life, and that make include running a business. This was good for me because a lot of their general advice wasn’t all about running the best business or making the most money, but rather how to have the most enjoyable life. This connects to our class because they preached that advertising is a huge piece to a successful business, and in order to advertise correctly in 2019, you need to be able to utilize the internet.

Rhetorical Analysis of The Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service

The Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service is a non-profit organization that specializes in helping incoming refugees get asylum within the United States. In this essay, I will be giving a rhetorical analysis of Lirs.org, which is the home website for the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service. In this rhetorical analysis I will be analyzing the website’s author, audience, purpose, context, and genre. I will give support to this analysis with my own words and visual captures from the website to help give a better understanding.

The author of this website is technically not defined, but we can say that the website is a representative of the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS). I inferred that the author of this website may be the board of directors for LIRS. The board of directors for LIRS consists of 17 members who are experienced with immigration and refugees. These 17 members are also located throughout the United States.

Who is the intended audience? The primary intended audience for the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service is potential donors and/or volunteers. I know this because on the main navigation bar of the website, the only navigation option that is a different color is the donate button. This tells me that they want this specific button to pop out and grab the users attention.

As you can see with the provided screenshot above, all of the other navigation options are the same color/size. But the “donate” option is not only a different color, but also bigger than the rest. This shows that they are trying to grab the attention of potential donors.

The second intended audience for LIRS are the potential refugees that are seeking asylum within the United States. I know this because of the “resources” section on the LIRS website. This section contains a ton of information about how someone could seek LIRS services if they are in need. How do I know this is secondary audience and not a primary? Well, the resources sections is the same color as the rest of the navigation options. Unlike the “donate” button which is designed to stand out to the user.

The purpose of the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service website LIRS is to be able to efficiently collect donations and volunteer support. I find this conclusion because as stated above,  in the navigation bar the main section that clearly stands out is the “donate” button. This is them clearly wanting to drive the users attention to the donate button. Another reason why I came to this conclusion is that the entire main homepage is that of a sales pitch. Everything they’re talking about on the home page is essentially giving the user a reason to donate.

The following images above are the examples of them trying to sell themselves to donators. These two information graphics are on the landing page of LIRS’ site. These info graphics clearly are stating their accomplishments and their upside. Each graphic then links to their “about us” section which describes better in detail these accomplishments and what exactly they do at LIRS. In my opinion, these feel like a sales tactic in order for them to gather donations and support.

The medium for the LIRS is the web. I believe the organization chose the web because it offers the largest reach over all the other potential mediums. The web is also completely free and is accessible to anyone who can access a device that can access the internet. You do not have to pay anything to be able to access this site and it’s information. Unlike other mediums like print, newspapers, CDs, etc. where you actually have to buy the service just to get exposed to the information it contains. The site follows a relatively strict color code of blue and white. This gives the sense that it was professionally built, which is also a means of recruiting donations and support. A donator isn’t going to donate to an organization with what seems like a poorly made and designed website. There are a ton of images on this site. Most of them are images of the people that help or have helped in the past, other photos are of immigrants or refugees or are in need of help. This is a play on emotions. It makes the user emotional which then would help them donate or support the cause.

The genre for this website is a non-profit charitable organization. This is a non-profit because it does not use its earnings as profit. I would classify this as a charitable organization because it accepts donations in cash form and uses those donations to help the immigrants and refugees. This website is very similar to other non-profit organizations’ websites because they all follow the same format. They have a professional theme and color scheme. Followed by an image with their navigation bar on top of that image. They also all share the same mentality of making the “donate” buttons or section stand out. The images they use capture emotion and makes the user feel like they need to help so they can make a difference.

I genuinely believe that this website is great. It properly appeals to its primary and secondary audiences respectively, its purpose to clear and simple, and it utilizes the web to the best of its capabilities. I do believe that there are a few changes that I would make to the site to better improve it. One would be to add more images and even a video.

I think they should replace these images on the landing page with a short video that loops and has no sound. This video should consist of some of the organizations day-to-day operations, their accomplishments, and compelling images that appeals to the readers emotion. I think that would greatly improve the ability for the homepage to grab the readers attention. Another change I would make that would improve this site is to offer more “resources”. Although these resources within the “resources” section are good, some of them are vague and do little for the reader. I think if they added some more content that is actually useful to the user, it would greatly improve this section of the site.

 

Citation:

“Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service.” LIRS, 6 Feb. 2019, www.lirs.org/.