Reflections on First Semester

When I first stepped foot into History this year, I’m not going to lie, I was not excited. All I could think about was the number of projects I was going to have to create, the amount of lectures that I was suppose to stay awake through, and the numerous power points that were bound to be shown.  When we were told to write three adjectives to describe our thoughts on history the results reflected my feelings perfectly, but to my surprise it has not met my stereotypical beliefs of how I perceived history itself and the class to be. We started learning interesting facts in ways that did not fit the mold I had created for a history class. One of the numerous facts that I found interesting was how rural people ordered and received their clothes, food, and other necessities. They would receive a catalog that contained anything from horses to kitchen appliances and order it all at once. A while later it would all appear at their door.  Unfortunately along with the interesting facts came facts that need to be known, but are not as pleasant to learn. One of these would be learning about the environment that the tenements were forced to live in. The images that Jacob Riis captured gave the world a glance into the circumstances that people below the poverty level had to live in. Another way that we were able to learn was through movies. The movies that we watched were based around one concept, slavery, whether it was the Civil war portrayed in the movie “Glory” or the life that a slave lived portrayed in “12 Years a Slave”, they enriched the learning experience and kept my attention in contrast to another lecture on why and how the Civil war occurred. I believe that ten years from now I will be able to accurately discuss slavery and the different tactics that were used to try and keep it and to abolish it. I will be able to explain the Jim Crow Laws and  the Plessy VS Fergussen case. I will be able to talk about the limited leadership roles that were available to the Southern states after the Civil War and the stipulations that Southern men had to follow if they wanted to be elected to congress. One problem that is a common thread through out American history and is still apparent today is greediness and the willingness to take whatever actions necessary to abolish the competition. This was exemplified by people such as Rockefeller. If I had to give a name to the accumulative period that contains the years from 1865 to 1920 I would title it the age of expansion. American cities grew in size along with the country itself, but the number of opportunities and ideas grew too. I am very happy that history did not turn out to be like I first expected and look forward to new opportunities to learn interesting facts the rest of the year.

Thinking About Success

The order that I chose to rank the four words in is hard work, opportunity, skill, and luck. I chose to rank hard work first because one may have skill and opportunity, but if one has not put time and hard work in to develop that skill then the opportunity will be wasted because they were not able to take full advantage of it. I chose to rank opportunity second because if you have put in the work then what you need next is an opportunity to utilized what you have worked so hard to obtain. Skill came third because yes it is important to be skillful but if one has a skill and has not worked hard to maintain or improve that skill then it is useless. Luck came last because it is unpredictable. It is not needed in order to be successful and is never an attribute that should be depended on or looked for when trying to achieve success.

Zara

Zara has made huge strides in the fashion world and how clothing is produced and delivered. No matter where the clothing is made, China or Spain, it is all moved to the distribution center, commonly referred to as the brain, immediately after being produced. They are able to do this quickly and efficiently by transporting it via an underground monorail that is 124 miles long. Another way that they increase efficiency is that they built 14 factories that are ran by robots who work all day and night instead of subcontracting out to Asia where they have man powered factories that are only worked in during the day.  These are only a few of the innovative ways that Zara is able to deliver new products to their stores twice a week and create over 10000 new designs each year.

Dear Claire,

                America is a lot different than I expected and to be honest quite overwhelming at times. The transition from the rural areas of Ireland to such a large city like New York is tremendous. Luckily I found a group of people who also came from Ireland that I have become close to. I have not really made any other friends besides them. They are just easier to talk to since they came from similar situation and have similar goals for the life that they are striving to achieve. Other groups of people just do not understand me or my life. That seems to be how it goes in America, when you get here you find a group of people that came from the same place as you and you stick with them.

                The Americans are not the most welcoming people, but I am managing. I have found a job, it does not have the best salary, but it is a job and hopefully I will be able to find a better one so that I can make enough money to come visit you, mom, and dad this eventually. I do have to say that I have adopted some of the American ways of life and am adapting to the busyness of the city pretty well. I have learned and encountered some interesting new inventions and ways of life that I had never even heard of and I can not wait to tell you all about them.

Much love,

Your Sister

Hollie Terry

US History

B-block

Native American Artifacts

                Artifacts, they are valuable and desired objects that some people are willing to do the unthinkable to attain. They don’t observe the fact that to the people that the objects belonged to and their families the objects that they are taking are not artifacts they are family history, they have a deeper story, and are held to be sacred. This is why it was necessary for the government to place laws in effect that dealt with grave robbing and the selling of Native American artifacts. Not everyone has proper ethics that would keep them from grave robbing in the first place but most people do generally try to maintain the law. The government had to put laws into effect to protect the history that was being destroyed and the families whose loved ones belongings were being taken by unethical people.

              Ethics, they define what is right and what is wrong. They are what trigger ones conscious, which makes one want to make good choices and turn their backs on what defies the ethics that they hold themselves to. But what happens if someone does not have ethics or does not have the right ones? This is the case when someone robs a Native American grave. The motives for committing this crime vary. Some people know the value of what the graves contain and let their selfish nature take over and decide to overlook the fact that they are destroying the grave of a human being in order to gain money. Others do not see any harm in grave robbing other than the fact that it is against the law, because it is a tradition that has been passed down for generations. They do not realize that when they disturb the grave that they are also disturbing the spiritual link that the Indians believe in, not to mention the fact that they are also destroying the history behind the person and the burial rituals. They see every item in the grave as just an object instead of thinking about the deeper meaning behind it.

            Throughout the years laws have been put into place in order to try and force people to restrain from stealing artifacts from Native Americans graves if it is not already in their ethics to do so. These laws classify Native American crime to be the theft, vandalism, and trafficking of restricted artifacts. The first set of laws were passed in 1906, 1966,1979, and 1992, these laws stated that it was illegal for people to take Native American artifacts from federal land. These laws were then followed by NAGPRA and ARPA which deal with the fact that the artifacts that are found within a state on federal land are the states responsibility. Controversy has risen debating whether or not the laws are strictly enforced. If they are enforced though, one could be fined thousands of dollars and even sent to jail. A danger for prospective buyers of the artifacts is that even if they were unaware of the fact that the artifact was illegally obtained and sold the government can still reclaim it without any financial retribution. One example of this was when a Sioux beaded and quilled hide shirt was brought to an auction house and set to sell at $150,000-$200,000. Before the auction was able to occur, the shirt was pulled in response to an attorney, representing a family on the Rosebud reservation, claiming that the shirt belonged to Little Thunder. When a photo of Little Thunder wearing the jacket surfaced the seller was unable to disprove its legitimacy and the item was taken and returned to the family. Now whether the seller knew that the item was illegal to be sold is unclear, If he wasn’t then he is just another case of a person who got taken and lost their money and the item. This is why when artifacts are being sold at auctions, online or live, they come with disclaimers such as to call the tribe to check and see if the claims made by the seller are true, always get a letter of certification, and to check with a local museum or reputable dealer before purchasing any items.

                Although the laws are still not perfect they are a good start to trying  protect Native American artifacts from unethical people. Native American artifacts are a risky item to buy and sell. It is not always easy to tell what is legal and what is not. This is why it is always advised to make sure that you get a letter of certification and check with a professional before buying any items.

Anasazi pot with a kill hole.

 Ethics

 This is a picture of people illegally excavating Native American graves.

This is the picture of Little Thunder wearing the jacket that was trying to be sold at the auction.

This is another example of an item that was taken from a grave.

Collecting Native American Artifacts

Collecting Indian Artifacts

I used this as a starting point for my research. I also found the picture of a nasazi pot with a kill hole.

Ethics and Morals

                I used this site to find information about the ethics and morals of keeping and selling artifacts.

Protection Acts

                I used this site to learn about the laws that have been put into place to protect the artifacts.

Example of an auction and the use of regulations

                I used this to understand how the rules are put into place

Picture of Little Thunder

                I used this site to find the photo of Little Thunder wearing the jacket

Disclaimer when looking at buying artifacts

                I used this to see what a source that is selling artifacts uses as a disclaimer

Picture of Right decision wrong decision

                I used this site to find a picture of ethics

Picture of people illegally excavating graves

                I used this site to find a picture of people illegally excavating Native American graves

USH- Learning History through Film

                Not all movies are based on facts or have any truth to them at all, but when there are certain movies that have been proven to contain factual evidence of a situation then they can help to enrich the learning experience of the learner. In the movies Twelve Years a Slave and Glory, the directors try to convey a situation that accurately gives the viewer an insight into what it was like to be a slave in that time period. The movies Twelve Years of Slave and Glory may have historical inaccuracies but the benefits of watching movies in class and the lessons that can be learned through these movies out ways the negative effects.

                In the movie Twelve Years a Slave the director, Steve McQueen, takes the viewer into a real situation where a man is taken from his freedom and turned into a slave. Mr. McQueen prides himself in the fact that he did not back off of the violence in the movie because that is a surreal situation that a slave would have been through. Mr. McQueen also stated “If I was to illustrate the book it would be far more worse than I filmed.” Personally I was uncomfortable in the parts of this movie where violence was shown, but it is very important to learn what happened in our history so that we don’t make the same mistakes in the future. Mr. McQueen was able to provide just the right amount of discomfort so that we were able to see an accurate representation of the horrible abuse that slaves were put through without showing too much violence that was in the book. This is a great example of why showing movies in class could provide a clear idea of what happened in situation, and that not every movie is watered down completely or altered by Hollywood in order to make the most profit. While it can be challenging to make a film that draws people to the theater and creates a large amount of income, Twelve Years of Slave had no trouble doing this. They spent twenty million dollars making the movie and made a gross profit of 187,733,202 dollars. Twelve Years a Slave depicted being a slave in that time period quite accurately, but at the same time a few minor details were altered in order to capture the interest of the viewers. Now I understand that this could be a problem for a history teacher that wants their students to learn the true facts of history, but if these details become a problem then an easy way to fix that would be to stop the movie and take a few to explain what actually happened.

                In the movie Glory the viewer is shown the trials that a regiment of slaves would endear in their time in the army. Now while this film did have quite a few inaccuracies such as the fact that the 54^th regiment was made up of freed slaves instead of run away slaves and the fact that Shaw was actually not Jackson's first choice to command the regiment, it does depict what it would have been like for a group such as the one that is depicted in the movie would have gone through. It shows what battles were like and how they persevered even thought they were threatened with their lives if they were caught. It shows you the training that they were put through and how men of color were not treated fairly in terms of pay or their uniforms. While this movie has some downfalls the facts that can be learned by watching this movie in class outweighs the inaccuracies that can be taught in class after or during the movie.

                I understand that there can be some hesitation about watching movies in class because of inactive learning and the inaccuracies that some movies contain, the benefits of actually seeing what happened and learning what happened in these situations benefits the learning of students more than it would hurt it.

Sources, Film Research- Glory & 12 years a Slave

Roger Ebert Critic of Glory

List of Awards won by Glory

Domestic Gross of Glory

Glory- Movie Budget

12 Years a Slave- movie budget and gross

12 Years a Slave Awards

12 Years a Slave Review

12 Years a Slave producers intentions

12 Years a Slave historical accuracy

Glory historical accuracy