in class blogging

If i could i would like to totally abolish all illegal steroid use from sports. This has been a growing problem in all areas of sports and no one can seem to find a way to fix this problem. I hope that people in positions of power will find it necessary to make changes in order to fix this issue.

I liked the chapter about the law of the few. I think that this chapter has been looked at in a negative way of how a few people can make something that is bad or wrong but i think it should be looked at in a way to help fix problems. In my instance with steroid use a few star athletes who people look up to need to get together and find a way to fix this issue in an attempt to stop younger athletes from beginning steroid use.

I think the third question goes back to my answer on the second. A few people need to find a way to get rid of this steroid issue. It may take some athletes that people, especially young athletes look up to to convince them of the dangers involved.

tipping point

My group did our presentation on that chapter about suicide. i really enjoyed how Gladwell did this chapter. There were some chapters in the book that were not as interesting but I did enjoy this one. He first discusses the suicide rates on the island of Micronesia. For some time there was never reported cases of suicide until a famous man killed himself. After that you began to see a steady rise in the suicide rates and the death of the first man is linked to them all. For some people seeing a famous person die can give other people the sense that it is alright to do that type of thing. Gladwell also used the example of famous people in the USA like Marilyn Monroe. When she killed herself you say a rise in the states of suicide rates. Gladwell used the power of the media to influence this rise. if it wasnt for the media portraying her death as they did the suicide rates may not have risen. He did a very good job on this chapter and made it very easy for us to do our presentation on this.

english undergrad conference 2

The second conference was based on creative writing. They had three students who prepared their own creative writing paper and presented them to use. I have a hard time understanding what authors of papers are attempting to say but that is what I think creative writing is all about. They put what they feel into a paper and everyone who reads it may have a different thought about it. I enjoyed listening to them and seeing how much passion those three students had about their papers. I could tell how much work they had to put in to them and they seemed very proud of their papers.

English Undergrad Conference 1

The first conference that I went to was broken down into three parts, stories, research and literature. It was taught that by stories you can actually teach. You can learn from stories and teach others what you have learned from them. The research part had a lot to do with what we have been doing in class. It was about our research writing class and they actually gave examples of projects that past students have done in the class. The last part about literature was basically all about how important reading is. It can open peoples up and makes them think outside of the box. i actually enjoyed the entire conference. The panel did a very good job in being very enthusiastic and it kept me and everyone else interested.

chpt 2

I really like how Gladwell started off talking about Paul Revere. It was a successful way of describing the word of mouth phenomenon. He showed an example that everyone is fairly familiar with and turned it into what he was going to be talking about. The ways that he also described connectors, mavens and salesmen was helpful. They all are pretty similar but he was able to put it in a way to see the differences. He used actors to describe the connectors. He used Rod Steiger and said he is the best connected actor in history because he has moved all over the different subcultures that acting has to offer.

working with your reading

Differences between reading a magazine and reading Gladwell's book would be that with most people when they read magazines they will flip through the book until they find something of interest to them. When you read Gladwell's book you will read everything. It doesn't have titles over every page to let you flip through and find something of interest. It doesn't have pictures through it like magazines do to catch your attention. A magazine will have many different authors writing about different pieces when Gladwell's book is just one authors opinions. There may be one certain author that writes for a magazine and that is the only reason that you even picked it up. Most people read a magazine because they already have an interest in it or of something in it but most of us probably didn't have that same interest when we began to read Gladwell's.

Introduction Chapter 1 summary

The introduction tells you that The Tipping Point is a biography of an idea. It shows the best way to understand why fashion trends, the flow of crime or almost anything emerge. There are three characteristics of this, contagiousness, the fact that little things can have big effects and that change can happen at one dramatic moment. The first chapter talks about the emergence of the STD syphilis. The first reason Malcolm gives is because of the problem with crack cocaine. Because this drug causes risky behavior is sexual behavior it can lead to the spread of STDs. He then begins to talk about social epidemics and says that those are driven by the efforts of only a handful of people. He also then goes on to talk about the "tipping point". Epidemics tip because of the efforts of a few carriers. This is seen in epidemics such as the flu. He finishes up with the three rules of the Tipping Point, the Law of the Few, the Stickiness Factor and the Power of Context. These three rules give us a way to make sense of epidemics.