About Me

My name is Sabrina Jouney and I'm an 18 year old student at the University of Michigan Dearborn. What I'd like to discuss is that community service could go farther than just helping within just your community, meaning while you can start off in your community, you should strive to go outside of it as well and help other people within other places that are in need. Even though I myself are guilty of not making my voice heard as well, I still have a head full of ideas that could help us as a society shape the future. Change lies within the younger generation, and that's why I want to become an elementary school teacher, because I strive to shape young minds into powerful minds that crave change

Introduction

Often, when presented with the word “community”, people think immediately of their own community. However, I’d like to challenge that thinking process and present a new way to think about the word “community”. When I think of community, my thoughts don’t immediately go to the place that I live in. I don’t think about only my neighborhood or only about the people around me. I think about different societies all around the world, and how one community has the power to impact other communities as well. I like to think that we should put more emphasis on getting involved in multiple ways, and making everyone feel like they have the chance to do something great and have a big effect on the place around them and then even further than that. It may start with your community, but it shouldn’t be limited to just your community. Even though I am guilty of doing the same thing too, of not making my voice heard, I'd like to express some of the ideas that I have that I plan to put into action in the near future

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My personal experience- an eye opener

When I went to Las Vegas in 2010, that was my first time being exposed to the homeless. I’ve never been to a city area before (even though I live 20 minutes away from Detroit) and I guess I never really saw someone who was homeless before that day in Vegas when we were walking back to our hotel room and there were several people sitting along the sidewalk with signs saying they were hungry and that their children were cold. I will admit, it was very scary to see at the time and I thought that this wasn’t something that was very common. That poverty isn’t as big of an issue as it actually is. However, now that I’m older and actually understand how bad poverty is in America, I’ve started to notice it more and more. In 2017, there were roughly 39.7 million people in poverty. The poverty rate in 2017 was 12.3%, and that was down 0.4% as compared to 2016 (United States Census Bureau). In 2010, there was an estimated 46.2 million in poverty (Stephanie Pappas, US 2010 Poverty Rate). As you can see from these percentages, we have improved, but not enough.

I think that before, in 2010, I just didn’t understand what it meant to be homeless or in poverty because my parents sheltered me from it. My father even admits to it. He works in Detroit, but more of the run-down areas, and he says he could never imagine even driving though those areas with me there because of what he sees on a day-to-day basis. This brings me to Kozol’s Amazing Grace. In the book, Kozol goes through the South Bronx and explains his observations as he talks to the people and looks around his setting. It was a real eye-opener for me when I first read it as to I don’t see things that were described in the book very often in my everyday life. And the fact that Kozol’s main focus is how the children live their lives in the South Bronx just makes it more impactful for me, because I’m only 18. It wasn’t all that long ago that I was 12 years old. It wasn’t that long ago that I was going through childhood, and reflecting back upon it, I had a good one, but the kids Kozol describes are going through things that no child should ever have to go through.

“He speaks of people who, he says, ‘go like this,’ cupping his hands over his face and making the sound of sniffing. ‘What are the sniffing?’ ‘Something called cocaine, I think. A kind of chemical… ‘Then, in the alleys sometimes, you see addicts with their needles and the rope around their arm. It looks like a bracelet. If they see me, they say, ‘Go away!’” (Kozol 97). This is a quote from Kozol’s Amazing Grace, and keep in mind he is talking to a 12-year-old boy. This is normal stuff for him, same for the rest of the kids in the South Bronx. They see these things and think it’s normal since their so used to seeing this, and honestly I never knew about this issue until I read the book. Granted, this book was written in 1995 but in 2016, 40% of children are below the poverty level (City Data). Not on the brink of poverty, but below the poverty line.

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How does this apply to today's time?

Let’s jump into today’s time. I shared my thought process on not learning the full story when it came to history because I feel like that affects us in today’s time as well. What I’m trying to get at here is that we don’t know the full story about anything when you think about it. Very rarely do we ask ourselves what’s happening outside of where we’re living, let alone what’s happening outside of our own lives. It sounds selfish, but it really isn’t. We have our own lives to worry about too, and we don’t have time to save the world, right? Wrong. No, we literally cannot save the entire world, but we can start it off. How I like to think about it is like a band. In marching band, you have a drum major who gives the band the first downbeat, and then the band starts to play together. There might be solos here and there, but the band always has to come together to play the music beautifully. In any type of movement, it takes the downbeat of one person to make the whole community come together and play. In order to get the full story of what’s happening in the world around us, we have to go out there and see it for ourselves. Establish connections with people within our own communities and learn where they come from. Whether they come from the other side of Telegraph or if they come from Syria, they have a different community than you do. They have a different part of the story to share. No two areas are alike.

According to CBS news’s 11 poorest cities list, Detroit ranked #1 (America’s 11 poorest cities). I didn’t only stop here however. I checked multiple lists, and even though Detroit wasn’t number one on all of them, it was still up there. According to Mlive Michigan news, going off the census data, Detroit ranked #6 on cities with the lowest median household income (See richest, poorest U.S. cities). Before writing this essay, I’ll admit, I didn’t know any of these facts myself. Like mentioned before, I haven’t really been to Detroit all that much growing up. When we would go down there to go to Campus Martius or the riverwalk, my dad would drive through some of the poorer neighborhoods. I would see houses that had windows that were bordered up, some roofs were ripping at the seams, bricks were falling out of the front of the house, some houses even had evidence of burns. Some of the places that need the most help are the ones that are closest to us.

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Works Cited

Leob, Paul. Soul of a Citizen: Living with Conviction in Challenging Times. St. Martin's Griffin, 2010.

Webb, Paul. Selma. DuVernay, Ava. Pathé UK and Plan B, 2014.

Kozol, Jonathan. Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation. Broadway Paperbacks, an Imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a Division of Random House, Inc., 2012.

Kennedy, Bruce. “America’s 11 poorest cities”. Moneywatch, CBS, February 18, 2015, https://www.cbsnews.com/media/americas-11-poorest-cities/

Fontenot, Kayla. Semega, Jessica. Kollar, Melissa. “Income and Poverty in the United States: 2017”. United States Census Bureau, September 12, 2018, https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2018/demo/p60-263.html

Pappas, Stephanie. “US 2010 Poverty Rate Highest Since 1993”. Live Science, September 13, 2011,  https://www.livescience.com/16034-2010-poverty-rate.html

City-Data.com. “Bronx, New York (NY) Poverty Rate Data”. 2018, http://www.city-data.com/poverty/poverty-Bronx-New-York.html

Reflection

When writing this paper, truthfully, I was kind of stuck on what to write about. I spent a good 10 minutes just staring at the blank paper that would soon be my mind map. But, what kind of got my gears turning was thinking of other classes I’ve taken, not just this one. I’m taking intro to sociology, and I remember during class one day my professor was talking about how even though this generation has social media and so many different outlets that could plug them into different places all around the world and that with the technology and ways of communication that we have today, we are still so clueless. I can’t argue with him though, because as much as we like to deny it, we don’t really know anything that’s happening in the world around us. He basically said that if it’s not happening around us, that we don’t care to find out pretty much. That we’re only concerned with where we are, the people that we know, we’re only concerned with ourselves. Basically, we’re a selfish generation (disclaimer: He didn’t say it this harshly, I’m making him sound harsher than he actually is, but I’m doing this for the point of summarizing). Also, as you saw in my paper, I credited my social justice class last year. I’ll be quite frank, I wasn’t really a fan of that class while I was taking it, but now that I look back on it, it really helped me prepare for this class and for this paper too. I don’t know if I would’ve been able to write the way I do about these topics without that social justice class.

Personally, I was already inspired while I was writing this paper, but honestly I have to say that while I was typing away my ideas, I became even more inspired and more excited for the years to come. I’m excited for my future career, and I’m even more excited to put my plans to inspire others into action. I think I might have even motivated myself even more by writing all of these ideas down. Like they say, you’re more likely to do something if you write it down.

I can safely say that this class had brought a lot of social issues to my attention. Reading Bhutto, Mandela, and Douglass’s stories were truthfully insightful, and especially discussing how these stories contribute to my idea of democracy. Really these stories seemed to bring a new light to my thought process and make me so thankful for the things that I usually take for granted, like education and the right to vote and use my voice. These are things that not everybody gets the opportunity to do, and after this class, I take that more into consideration. Even though I’m constantly complaining about how stressed out I am for finals or how much I dislike going to class sometimes, I’ll always remain thankful that I was given the chance to come to school and learn. Even though when people are voting the lines are so long sometimes and you have to wait for hours sometimes, I still keep in mind how lucky I am that once I turned 18, I was able to vote and have a say in where I want my future to go. Long story short, this class made me reflect more deeply about things I never really gave much thought to before.

 

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Blog Post 1- Bhutto, Mandela, Douglass, and Democracy

When reading both Bhutto and Mandela’s stories, I couldn’t help but feeling empowered and inspired to look and think about democracy in more depth. In our American society, we’re used to the common phrase “with liberty and justice for all”, as stated in our Pledge of Allegiance that most of us were told to do every morning in our classrooms before we started the day. It would come on over the PA and students were told to stand up, put your hand over your heart, look to the American flag that most, if not all, classrooms had, and repeat the common “I pledge allegiance, to the flag, of the United States of America...” and so on. We’re taught to believe that we live in a country of opportunity, freedom, and most importantly, the power to use our voice. Even though our country has had our struggle with it, we now live in a democracy. The whole “power to the people” idea was something that I was fortunately born into. But that’s just the thing: I was born in a democratic nation. Not all people can say the same. Some, like Bhutto and Mandela, had to fight for democracy and their voice. Their stories of hardship, persistence, patience, struggle, and sacrifice opened my eyes and showed me that the idea of democracy is something that some countries are still fighting for. And based on Mandella and Bhutto’s stories, it is something worth fighting for.

Bhutto’s story really forced me to open my eyes, especially since I am an Islamic woman as well. The topics she touched upon, such as how Islam and democracy can work together, but the West tries to prevent that from happening, was hard to swallow. The first 12 minutes of the documentary were also very thought-provoking, especially since I could hear her voice and how confident she sounded despite all the threats made against her. Even in her book, her writing doesn’t express and haste or anxiety. With the West saying that Islamic countries could not possibly live with a democracy because “Muslims believe in the sovereignty of God and thus cannot accept man’s law.” (pg. 180), she never showed any anger. She only displayed her thoughts and opinions with quotes from the Quran, explanation of the Islamic religion, and how all mankind, even people of Islamic belief, understand the responsibilities of humankind to create a just society. 

As mentioned before, it was stated that I was happy to be born in a country where we live and breathe democracy. It’s something that I thought I should be proud of. However, Bhutto forced me to open my eyes once again. She pointed out that the United States “speaks of democracy almost in context of the values of religion, using rhetoric about liberty being a ‘God-given’ right. And Western nations often take that standard abroad, preaching democratic values like missionaries preaching religion. The problem arises, of course, in its selective application to bilateral foreign policy relationships.” (pg. 187). This quote got to me because we, as Americans, are proud of our democratic system, but we don’t like to share that ideal. That we, the West, believe that Islamic countries cannot handle their “God-given” right. That we “deliberately blocked any reasonable chance for democratic development in Muslim-majority countries.” (page 186), yet we say how great it is. Long story short, Bhutto’s story hit home in more ways than one. It hit the country I live in and the faith that I believe in. But I am glad that it hit home for me, because it made me connect to her story and really see things the way she did. She was determined and more than willing to put her own life on the line to give the people of her country power.

Bhutto’s argument also ties in to the story of Douglass. The West brags about their democratic values and beliefs, yet they choose to ignore that at one point in time, they weren’t as democratic as they claimed to be. In the 1800s, Fredrick Douglass, along with thousands of other people of color, were denied very basic human rights, including the right to vote and even have their own voice: so, they couldn’t participate in America’s “democracy”. Blacks weren’t even allowed to learn to read and write, so they probably didn’t even know about the democracy that they couldn’t take part in. However, Douglass went against that right and taught himself how to read and write, despite it being deemed “unlawful and “sinful”. In a book he learned to read, “The Columbian Orator”, Douglass soon began to develop his own voice and opinions, and it appears the words on the paper were becoming his own thoughts. “They gave me tongue to interesting thoughts of my own soul, which had frequently flashed through my mind, and died away for want of utterance... What I got from Sheridan was a bold denunciation of slavery; and a powerful vindication of human rights.” (page 334). This explains that once Douglass learned how to read, the idea of human rights and democracy made more and more sense to him. I take Douglass’s story as a huge eye-opener to realize that America hasn’t always been democratic and as great as I thought it was, and that we like to hide our bad pasts under the rug, just like Bhutto states in relation to her argument (“This so-called incompatibility of Islam and democratic governance is used to divert attention from the sad history of Western political intervention in the Muslim world...”) (page 186).  

Something that Mandela’s story showed me was the importance of knowing your enemies and your allies. “It would be very hard if not impossible for one man alone to resist.” (page 73). You must understand what the enemies (the authorities, in Mandela’s situation) are trying to do, so you know what you have to do in order to survive. Mandela couldn’t have done anything without his fellow prison mates, because they stuck together, supported one another, and gained strength from each other. “But the stronger ones raised up the weaker ones, and both became stronger in the process.” (pg. 74). We benefit from a group of people because we cannot grow alone, we cannot conquer alone, we cannot survive alone. Like stated in our previous reading “Soul of a Citizen”, it benefits us more to speak out about what we believe in and get involved in our causes and create new bonds with people who feel the same. The way I like to think about it is to imagine if Mandela or Bhutto never spoke out about their cause, if they never formed allies like fellow prison mates or the people of the Pakistan People’s Party. Would things be the same way they are today? What if Douglass gave up on learning how to read and never fully understood what he was missing out on, thus never having the idea to escape and publish a book on what really happened within the life of a slave?  

 I believe that the fight for democracy is an important one. As mentioned before, I never realized how important our democratic government is to our society. For Bhutto who didn’t have democracy in her country, to Mandela and Douglass who were denied that basic right, the fight is worth it, but it’s a shame that they had to sacrifice so much for it. Although, through this sacrifice came great stories of heroism.

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