Being a Cowboy isn't just saying "Howdy Partner"....

Roping - Part of a days work for a Cowboy

  Many people believe that being a cowboy, is just like we see in Hollywood films. You know, the dry dessert land with the dust ball blowing around, and that western music, that has a similar sound to a whistle, the one we all imagine. Then the two guys square up to each other, look eye to eye, pull out their guns and it's on! We all have our own images of our  "Hollywood cowboy", but in reality that's not how it was.
  Watching the short clip of Gun Smoke you would look at it and consider that as a general idea of how cowboys were. However there was a lot more to it. In this photo to the left, is one of Erwin E. Smith's many photo's. I chose this photo mainly because my perspective of it can be looked at in two different ways. This photo may fool you to think of your average "Hollywood cowboy", you know, riding horses and swinging a rope around their head yelling "Yee-ha!" But if you looked further into it was that actually what they were doing? No, not at all. This picture represents a cowboy Roping, which for them was a part of a days work. One reason they would do this is to heard all the cattle. But things weren't just all fun and games for cowboys, they had much work to do out on the ranch. 
  As you can see cowboys aren't exactly what you thought they would be. In fact, being a cowboy was like having a job. There was much work and effort you had to put forth to your daily jobs you were required to do. Im sure many struggles and hardships came along with being a cowboy. So although being a cowboy seemed to be all brave men fighting, that's only in the films. But don't let that take your interest out of the real cowboys in reality because they did things that were just as cool!

Whose side are you on?

During Reconstruction, when the south was granted amnesty by Abraham Lincoln both the north and south were disappointed. The north were mainly upset because in the Norths opinion, what the south did was wrong, and they did not believe they should have been forgiven. On the other hand, although the south was being forgiven, they were still offended at the fact that the north expelled them out of the United States and were allowed back once the amnesty was granted. In this case Abraham Lincoln was taking sides, however no matter what he did, the north and south were still angry with him. Was it right that the south was granted amnesty? Maybe, maybe not, however it did effect us in a positive way by abolishing slavery and having the north and south back in the United States our country was complete again. In other words in the long run, it was a good decision. 

Freedom you say? Then why has nothing changed?

   During the time of the Reconstruction, and also including the Emancipation Proclamation, it definitely did not change as much for black people as everyone assumed it would. Most historians today recognize that Reconstruction did somewhat fail, because it did not achieve its initial goal of rebuilding the Union and giving freed slaves some basic protections, while at the same time helping them transition from slaves to freedom. Although, slaves at this time had the right to own there own property and such they still didn't have the complete freedom whites had. Therefore they were still limited from many things. However, President Lincoln, favored the abolition of slavery having the purpose of rebuilding the Union. Leaving the suddenness of the Emancipation both the blacks and whites unprepared to deal with each other and their new status. There was also difficulty with legal discrimination and harsh imprisonment as blacks attempted to integrate themselves into a white society during a very overwhelming time. The Emancipation Proclamation abolished the legal fact of slavery, but racial discrimination and segregation still remained during the reconstruction era.

   The African Civil rights movement, refers to the movement of which the United states aimed to outlaw racial discrimination toward African Americans, during the 1950's and 1960's. Even though this movement was suppose to change the right of African Americans it  wasn't to different from how they were treated during reconstruction. People views towards blacks were not just going to change, and they surely didn't. Whites still looked at them the same way, and still strongly believed they should be segregated from the rest. However thanks to Martin Luther King Jr. things changed for blacks. Although white people didn't agree with it blacks were given more rights and didn't have to be segregated so much from the whites anymore.

  It's hard to believe that this all happened 50-60 years ago, looking at today's society. Imagine having a black president in the 1950's? It would never happen, not a chance! However believe those times were crazy or not, but look around you and our world today, racism still occurs through out our life everyday. Is it right? Maybe, or maybe not, but there isn't much you can do when that's someones own beliefs. After all we do have a law called the First Amendment! 

      

A Divided Nation

The Civil War took place in the 1860's. It was between the United States of America, or "The Union" and the Confederate States of America, or "The Confederacy." One reason I chose this image is because not only does it relate to our Civil War topic in class, but it also sums up what the Civil War was and who it was between. The two ways viewers can identify that the War was between the Union and Confederacy, are the flags and the two smaller images. The flags on opposite sides are significant in their position because they're literally divided in the image. You can understand the concept that it's a war by the small photo of horses, guns, flags and such in the bottom left corner. As the viewer, there are a good amount of ways you can verify what this image represents. Although this image only gives you basic information, to have a deeper understanding of the civil war, you might want to do more research!

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The Less You Do the Better...

"The government is best which governs least", a quote by Thoreau which I believe means the less the government does, the better off we are. When the government gets too involved and interferes with our life, we tend to get aggravated and frustrated with some of the changes they decide to make, which in some aspects, effect our lifestyle. Sometimes, the government over governs, and has a tendency to complicate things for Americans. I agree with this statement, because the government is always trying to control what we are doing and how we do things. Which on our part is not always fair. The government is currently involved with the Mosque that muslims want to build in New York near ground zero, however they shouldn't really be involved in that. We can not depend on going to the government every time someone gets offended. With the government involved they are going to have to decide a side, which no matter what side they choose one group of citizens will be offended by that choice. So the best kind of government is the kind that does not micro govern our citizens of the United States.

Judging a book by it's cover.

As Americans we should ask ourselves are we really that different? Must we stereotype those who disagree with us? Why is it that we look at someone and automatically judge them by their looks? Whether we believe that this is right or not, we all do it. Which is one of the reasons stereotyping is so widely known by so many in our society. We judge the people we work with and kids at our schools by what they wear, where they live, what car they drive and more. Does anyone ever stop to think about the life they have outside of what you see? Maybe they have a nice car and nice clothes but does that mean they're stuck up and snobby? Or does a poor man on the street mean he's a failure in society? Not necessarily, so why do we do it? Stereotyping is passed down from generation to generation. As we develop into whatever society we're born into, stereotyping is unfortunately part of that development. Most of it has to do with how the past has had an effect on our thoughts on today's society. Previously, we had only white presidents, so when the first black man ran for president it brought up the issue of race and unfortunately stereotypes were expressed. Stereotyping in this situation prohibits some from being able to accept someone for who they are and the good characteristics they gave, regardless of their race. We all stereotype at some point in our life and unfortunately it is something we just have to live with, because it occurs all over our society every day.

Yesterdays past, could effect our future.

"In order to understand where we are now and where we are going, we must first understand where we have been." This quote, by Professor Jennifer Cunningham, describes how our current state in history is the product of events that happened before us. Many of our traditions are linked into the very roots of history. There are many holidays that we celebrate every year to remind us of certain events, such as Independence Day. However history can also be used to help us learn from past events. History never repeats itself...or does it? Can we learn from historys mistakes? What about wars? Genocides? If we learn how past events turned out, can knowing them prevent them from happening again? We had World War 1and 2 and if we truly learned from both of them does this mean we will never have a World War 3? Aren't we suppose to learn from our mistakes? If so then why not use history as an example? Whether we realize it or not, history does matter, history has a immense impact on our every day lives.