Reviews of movies, books, and educational materials.
Americanos!
This movie was extremely funny! It was made by HBO so it was meant to be somewhat educational, but also to be very interesting to watch. It talked about the contemporary lifestyle of Puerto Ricans and Cubans in American Idol.
It showed a young man who was from Puerto Rico and it talked about what he liked to be called. I never really realized the differences between, Mexican, Hispanic, and Chicano etc. I had always thought that they meant the same thing. This young man said he didn’t like to be called Hispanic because he said it sounded like he was ashamed of his true culture. It said that he liked to be called Chicano because he wasn’t ashamed of where he had come from.
Hispanics are the single largest Minority and growing. This is according to the 2000 census. They will soon no longer be a minority. So why are they still feeling ashamed? I think the basis for this movie was for Hispanics to not be ashamed of who they are. This was a calling for them all to embrace their true origins with pride. This is hard thing to do in this culture.
This young man was an Elvis impersonator and he was very funny. I thought it was great that the movie was so funny yet it had a very important message in it. They also had the first Mexican woman to be on a presidential cabinet on the movie. It was interesting to see how her pride in her culture varied from the young man who was an Elvis impersonator. Although they both had great pride in which they were they went about different ways of expressing it. The purpose of the movie was to show people that no matter how they chose to express it, it didn’t matter as long as they did express that pride in their culture.
I think this pride in your culture should be a universal theme, not just for Hispanics, but also for everyone. Everyone should have pride in where they came from, and nobody’s culture is better than anyone else’s. Some people think that they are better than others based solely on where they came from. But these stereotypes are not true. Just look at the woman who was on the presidential cabinet.
Blue Eyed
Blue Eyed
This movie was a real eye opener. There is a woman like Hillary Clinton who is running a sort of class that shows the amount of racism still present in today’s culture. She takes all of the blue-eyed people and treats them how blacks are treated today. She takes the brown-eyed people and teaches them to behave the way whites behave towards blacks today. She makes the people with blue eyes sit on the floor and the brown-eyed people get to sit in chairs. She then gives each group an “IQ� test. She tells the brown-eyed people the answers. She doesn’t tell any of the blue eyed any answers. She does this to show how culturally biased standardized tests can be.
I really found this interesting because the whole time I was watching the movie I was thinking,� I have blue eyes, that could be me.� I thought it was amazing. The people on the TV were so impacted that grown men and women began to cry. They soon began to realize that they too had been discriminating against African Americans.
Some of the African Americans told stories of the persecutions. They talked about how their children feel about being black. I thought this was very interesting because I never realized that these children would still feel persecution even today. I really liked this movie because you really had to wonder if you were causing some of the pain that African Americans experienced. I really thought about it and realized that I too had probably caused some sort of pain, even if I hadn’t realized it.
I am glad that I watched this movie so that I can be more fully aware of the pain I may cause people on a daily basis. When the activity was over the people talked about how much this activity was going to change the way they felt and acted. Most of these people were like me and had never realized that they ever caused anyone any type of pain.
I would definitely recommend that all teachers do a similar activity in their classroom. The benefits that come from this experience far outweigh the possible repercussion from doing it.
Enduring Columbus
Enduring Columbus was about the Native American experience after the first white settlers came to America. I also have a lot of Native American blood in me so I was very interested to see what my ancestors experienced. I had always read whatever was written in my textbooks as a child about Native Americans, however I had never gotten the other side of the story.
In this movie it talked about how the Spaniards arrived in the West. They killed the men and then sent the women and children to be slaves. Their relationship does get better. The Spaniards and pueblo people pulled together to protect themselves. They began to understand each other’s ways. The Spaniards gave the Indians land grants, but the Spaniards still tried to convert the pueblo to Catholicism. There was much trade at these trade fairs. Pueblo people were sold as slaves. However the Mexicans lost their lands. The pueblos were dissatisfied with the Mexican government. Tribes of Indians revolted against the Mexicans. The revolt failed.
During the rebellion of 1847-indians took a stand against the U.S. Colonists who were trying to take their lands. Indians killed a governor and news spread and so did the rebellion. The U.S. won the revolt, they took the Indian leaders to Santa Fe to “talk�, but these leaders were actually hung.
The Pueblo people went from fifty thousand to seven thousand. Indian slavery was very acceptable, even after the civil war. There was a treaty signed that was supposed to end the war against the Indians, but it didn’t. Non Indians settled on Indian land, so did the U.S. government. Roosevelt took Blue Lake, a sacred place for the Pueblans. They took Indians to an Indian school to become more “civilized�. They taught them English and Christianity. They were trying to make the Indian culture vanish.
But the Indians refused to disappear. This is what I found so amazing. The Indians never gave up. They refused to conform to the ways of the White man. It is difficult to stand up for what you believe in, but the Indians still do today.
Irish In America
I was really excited to watch this movie because my ancestors came from Ireland. As I watched I was really captivated about the terrible things the Irish had to endure that I had never heard about.
The story talked about Clarice Wolf one of the seven million Irish that came to America in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. Many Irish were told stories form their grandparents; some made American look good, and others made it look very bad. Presbyterians of Scotch ancestry came looking for land in the U.S. They all had different experiences due to the fact that they were catholic. English armies had taken away their land in Ireland. They oppressed them and took away any land belonging to Catholics. Two brothers had to pay rent to liver on the land that had been stolen from them by the English. To own land was considered very powerful because it was hand in hand with the government. One of the brothers moved to the United States, the other brother enlisted the help of a Blacksmith and made weapons for an uprising against the English. They attached in 1798 and were a success. Then in June the “Piteman� (Irish) were defeated. Then this brother too immigrated to the U.S. The first immigrant brother became a mayor of a town and was very successful; the rebellious brother was never heard form again.
Nationalists’ say that immigration was forced exile by the English. It was the only option left for the Irish. The Barrats, an Irish family, immigrated to Canada, they left behind their eldest daughter Mary Rush. She had her own little potatoe crop. Despite poverty, they ate well due to the potatoes. There was soon a potatoe famine. Over one million people in Ireland died of starvation. Mary rush could not afford the passage to America so she was forced to stay and starve to death.
It’s these types of situations that I really thought were amazing. I had never realized the amount of persecution that was endured by the Irish. I am so glad that I watched this movie because it gave me a greater understanding of what my ancestors went through. I also feel better aware of the truth surrounding what was experienced while they stayed in America.
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