Final journal of the course and it has been a wonderful ride for the course ETHN 177. I felt so ecstatic to learn what I believe was to be presented in this class. At first, I felt that the class would be about music that spoke a social message for injustice and common speeches made by popular visionaries, such as MLK and Malcolm X. The class seemed to be obvious on the purpose of what was going to be taught, yet misconception can be a valuable lesson once you realize the reality.
Every class taught me way more than I ever knew before I started the class and I enjoyed every single piece of knowledge learned. Whether knowledge came from an obvious message of what was spoken or came from an analyzation of the message spoken, there’s always something to learn and utilizing for a better understanding of society. For example, rap songs have an obvious message within its lyrics and the performances/music videos make the message a greater, powerful tool to send the message in a way where people who view them gain a true understanding of a song that means more than just hype. Learning these new forms of analyzation of the subjects gives a new meaning towards the right understanding by the people who speak or rap.
My favorite piece to learn and discuss about was James Baldwin’s piece, “Baldwin’s N*****”, because of his ability to speak to a large crowd and teach something that isn’t only an existing story, but an audience’s existing story. The most important quote he mentioned involved how people would approach him and ask him his place of origin and as he mentioned that he was an American, but the constant question asked was, “Where are you really from?”, which insisted that the person asking him that didn’t believe that he was an American and that he looks to be an African. When hearing Baldwin’s input of this certain encounter, I see it similarly with my life because, as a Latino, I encounter the same thing where people would assume that I’m just a Mexican because I’m brown and look like I can speak Spanish. This is not fully correct because I’m also Salvadoran and I’m not fluent in Spanish, so my perceived identity isn’t exactly what people expect. Listening to what Baldwin explained over his input of misinterpreted identities, I can relate closely to what he explained and that is the power of learning the piece in relation to the class; the class taught me to learn about the different sounds and I learned through Baldwin about something that is very closely related to me.
My favorite week of discussion was the week involving rap songs because I’m a fan of rap and not only do I like listening to the different songs, but learning from them makes it a better experience in the class. I love Kendrick Lamar and a lot of his songs, whether the song is meant to hype you up, get you in some sort of mood, or to listen to something important that can change your idea for society. His songs, like “Alright”, “The Blacker the Berry”, and “m.a.a.d City”, inhabit a lot of personal experiences and encounters in his life throughout his hometown of Compton. I can see other rappers that inhabit the same narrative in their songs, like Chance the Rapper and J. Cole, and all these people allow me to engage society into different experiences by these people. AS much as they are highly advertised for mainstream media, I like to listen to them and connect with all their songs for the enjoyment and the messages they instill in their music. I can feel the purpose of the course closely connecting towards how to interpret the lyrics that many of these rappers, including the ones mentioned, since a lot that they advocate in social media or in performances links closely towards what was being discussed that week. With Kendrick Lamar, the idea of a message in his lyrics was a strong example for discussion that I loved to talk about the whole week.
I believe with every positive outcome of anything you encounter, there always exist something negative as well; in this case, I believe the hardest piece to touch upon was the week of podcasts. The main reason is because podcasts are really monotoned a lot and can really drown my ears out to the point where I’d fall asleep on my chair listening to people talking boringly. What I can take out of it that’s good is the creativity in the stories and the interesting aspects discussed through the news podcasts, such as the OnBeing piece, “Listening Beyond Life and Choice.” I was able to grasp the various content discussed in the podcast, including the talk over pro-life and pro-choice, the talk over choosing sides, and the talk over gay and homosexuality. The only problem is that I’m not as smart in the field she’s discussing about, so most of the stuff she talks about is something I get lost easily in and lose attention. I believe there are many people, like myself, that don’t find some sounds interesting or worth attention to listen to and I can state my opinion that I wasn’t at my best to discuss the various things in these podcasts.
In conclusion, I thought that ETHN 177 was one of my favorite classes I’ve taken throughout my time at UCSD. It was the one class that allowed us, as a class, to communicate, bond, and get to know our ideals over the different sounds that exist in the world. I love how my professor was so passionate over the different discussions that we talked about and learned from what we all had as ideas for the discussion. As for the journals, I loved to write them, and criticism was a separate factor I didn’t recognize. The journals meant one thing to me: open your mind and write down what you can imagine with what has been given as sources to enhance your thinking over the different sounds in society. I connected the class to that purpose and now I leave this course with a greater knowledge and approach towards listening to the world.

This week, I looked at today’s discussion of podcasts very oddly to what was presented. My presentation for the class was given off the topic of podcasts and I introduced the idea of how the freedom of choice is given through podcasts as well as spoken word, such as speeches. When listening to the podcasts as I brainstormed my ideas for my presentation, I looked through each podcast and noticed podcasts are strong forms of communication. Podcasts can be used to give stories, share the news, or just talk publicly; all of these have one thing in common and it’s to share the content publicly to whoever desires the proper content. If you’d like to know what’s going on in the world, there’ll be a podcasts about world news; if you want some meditation for your life, there’ll be a sort of yoga/meditation podcast available; if you want to know about sports news, there’ll be a podcast about sports news. There’s a podcast for everyone who wants someone to communicate to them about the content they’re looking for. That’s the beauty of podcasts; they are tools of communication to help us absorb knowledge of subjects we want to take in.

I found one thing interesting in this week’s discussion, but not with what is being presented. One piece of content I found what interesting was the 2016 Grammy performance by Kendrick Lamar, which is taken down from Youtube for “copyright claim.” I saw the Grammy performance on TV and the important thing to grab on the performance and how it has been taken down is that like last week’s post, there are messages within these songs and this performance captured the true essence of sending a message. If you start your performance as a shackled, black man with a bunch of similar men, you can grasp the message he’s sending in one picture: black men in jail = the implication of the prison industrial complex.

Now, the idea that it has been taken down from Youtube for “copyright reasons”, yet there are other performances of that same Grammys that are up and public, shows the performance as a message to the world and to corporate fucking America. This, “I’m scared that he’ll expose the truth, so I have to use a legal tool to save us from the harshness that he’s sending and make it look like he’s crazy.”, bullshit is what the people deserve; to express the truth is such a talent and gift to people who know how to fight for what’s right. The way Kendrick Lamar expressed it in his performance did the job in bringing awareness to the reality of society and in doing so, instilled fear in the eyes of those trying to hide it.

This week’s discussion on rap was one of my favorite topic of discussion because I’m a big fan of what rap has given us in terms of messages. Today’s rap isn’t as strong with messages as the rap talked about in the week. Lupe Fiasco and Kendrick Lamar both have songs that aren’t afraid to go out and speak their mind about issues that exist in the world. “Words I Never Said” and “Alright” have both shown me the importance of bringing awareness to the tragedy and chaos of the world. As previously seen in other discussions, America has sent an incentive to keep history clean and nice towards its presentation. But Lamar and Fiasco inhabit similar traits to Malcolm X and MLK as both share the motivation to bring awareness to the existing pain and hate in society for the betterment of society. The big difference between today’s rap and the rap being talked about is that today talks about success and provocative, sexual interactions, but the rap we talked about is important towards learning the message of how society should fix itself when real problems are occurring in society.

Looking into the topic of week 5, protest has made a presence in many forms of sound. You can hear people call out different chants on the streets, instruments played all over different corners, and songs recited as anthems for protest. In today’s era, I see the song “Alright” by Kendrick Lamar as the catalyst of a movement for protest against the unjust racial system deemed upon minorities. The article, “This is what Protest Sounds Like” by CNN, discusses how powerful the songs like Kendrick Lamar’s have been to movements and protests as his song became an unofficial protest chant in many occasions. The article states, “One, you’re going to be alright because we’re going to get through this day and we’re going to be able to be here tomorrow; we’re going to fight to save this nation and fight to save ourselves.” (CNN) The lyrics send messages that aren’t hard to avoid listening to since they occur in the catchy chorus. Kendrick Lamar keeps repeating, “We gon’ be alright.”, and the first thing I think of is any current event preventing happiness, yet the song gives a presence of security for the pursuit of happiness through the thickness of trouble. Just like “Alright”, protest has led to the notion that the unjust events can keep on trying to bring down the people of the community, but as long as the community stays together and fights as one, “We gon’ be alright!”

The impact week 4 had on me was the video of James Baldwin and Dick Gregory. Although Dick Gregory was a part of the discussion, James Baldwin was the figure that posted the most attention because of his language and motive to exploit discriminatory ideas that existed in America. One in particular that struck me was him being questioned, “Where are you really from?” The term “really” poses such obnoxiousness towards discovering the origins of one’s values and characteristics. For example, as a Latino, I get asked sometimes about where were your parents from and I would mention Mexico and El Salvador and they would react by saying things like “Oh yeah, that’s what I figured.” or “Well, you do look like a Mexican/Salvadoran.” The interesting comparison I can gather from that is that the question of one’s origins tend to be harshly imposed on a specific category to relate to. People like James Baldwin and I are misinterpreted with an idea of who we “seem” to be, but Baldwin gave me this thought where this is a normal way of life because of the format people are raised by.

Although the thought is something that coexists with our lives, Baldwin makes it clear that the thought isn’t reality in contrast to your actual life; your life is guided through the representations you deem unto yourself.

Week 2 touched on Malcolm X, and the implications of history about him seemed to be hinted at a negative review overall. The book, Malcolm X by Robert E. Terrill, exemplifies at the start that he wasn’t the ideal social movement leader like Martin Luther King, Jr. since “he never led his followers in large-scale collective political action, never organized a mass protest march, and never was associated with the passage of any piece of legislation designed to improve the condition of African Americans.” (Terrill, 1) In addition to the things he didn’t do, he had a reputation that built negativity, such as being in jail and converting to the nation of Islam. The importance I gained from looking at how history displayed Malcolm is that he turned out to be a man that didn’t seem ideal to lead a social movement. In significance to MLK and his efforts to the social movement, I could see that he wasn’t the educated preacher that protested peacefully; instead, he was a unique social leader that wanted to make his point of the harsh reality that exists in America during his time and set the record straight to start making a change to reality.
Moving towards that same point, I saw that Malcolm was a man who knew what was happening at the moment and spoke it into existence without trying to focus on time and structure. Terrill goes on to discuss his oratory skills in his book as he mentions, “He did not sit down and write any systematic ideological tract, nor did he formulate any programmatic response to America’s racial strife. He stood up and spoke.” A similar statement of Terrill similarly explains, “, it is not merely that Malcolm X was eloquent or that public eloquence was his chosen instrument. Rather, for Malcolm X, public address was social change…” (Terrill, 6) Terrill helped me understand how Malcolm was a great leader of the civil rights movement; he gave me this idea that HE was the messenger of America. He never looked to make an essay out of current events that showed obvious signs of oppression. All he looked to do was tell everyone that these things were going on and we need to act now as a just society.
In conclusion, I can understand the hate Malcolm obtains because no one likes to hear the harsh news of one’s world or America itself. We always fancy ourselves to listen to good language. That’s what made Malcolm X unique; he taught me through Week 2 that life is filled with positives and negatives. As much as we should value the positives, we should also be aware of the negatives and learn how to change the negativity that exists to create a better world within our society.