#7

Nonverbal cues are some of the ways that we project our feelings and intentions to others. Sometimes a look can tell more than a conversation. In the game of poker the players look for that certain tell that allows them to figure out if their opponent is bluffing or not. This search for the “tell” of others allows us to understand what another is really feeling. I have many tells that project certain feelings and ideas to others around me. For instance my body language is normally very open and welcoming, I am a big people person and I like meeting new people throughout my day. So my body language reflects that to others. When I am mad though I tense up and you can clearly read it on my face. I get flustered, hot, and do not talk as much as I usually do. I also supposedly make a certain face when I am angry, an old friend and coworker of mine pointed it out to me one day at work. People can usually look at my face and that instantly lets them know how I am feeling. When I am happy I smile a lot and look cheerful, my face is pretty much like a book. I like to think that I have a good outlook on life and figure that we only live once so why not try to be happy most of it. I think that others can see from the nonverbal cues that I feel this way and respond well to it.

I also dress I bit differently than most, I really dislike clothes from stores like American Eagle and Abercrombie and Fitch.  It never really appealed to me and I like to draw my inspiration from different decades instead of this one. I like the fashions from the forties, fifties and this reflects in my dress style. I love, love thrift stores and rather go to them instead of the mall. I do have to admit I shop at Forever 21, and I am so happy to see floral popular again because I have a place to stock up before it goes out of fashion again. And then I am left with having to look hard for it again. My friend say I dress like a grandma and the customers I have at work dig the whole retro look I have. I just like to play with the clothes I wear and believe that they say a lot about the person you are so I pay attention to what I wear every day. So if a stranger was to look at me dressed on a normal day I think they would pick up that I am a person who likes some thins not very mainstream and have different taste and likes. I love when people like what I am wearing and we have a moment were we connect. Fashion bringing people together! That sounds very silly, but the nonverbal cues given out by people can either project that they are open to communication or that you should not even go near them. These cues are a powerful tool that allows others to glance for a moment, into a person and guess who they really are.   

#6

Communication is the way that we explain ourselves to the other people around us. Without out it we would not have any family, friends, relationships or societies. Through communication we build and strengthen relationships with our family, friends, and those around us.  Without this communication relationships can weaken and a distance of can grow between people. In my family everyone is supposed to be close and have close family bonds, but this is not the case. Yes I do have strong bonds with my all sisters and some of brothers, but with my father this is not the case. My sisters and I have always been close and I have always confided in them and talked with them. They have been the ones that helped me when I was having issues or most importantly boy trouble. They have given me the talk about the birds and the bees and given me advice from their own personal experiences. Without them I would have been lost and probably would have made some very bad decisions by now. But thankfully they were always there talking and giving me advice.

On the opposite of all this communication was that relationship I have with my father. If communication ran rampant between my sister’s and I, then it was frozen in solid ice with my father and I. When I was eight my mother passed away and I was left with just my sister still living at home and my father. To provide for us my father worked long hours and usually would get home around six or seven every night.  So I did not spend much time with him during the week and during the weekend he was found outside tending to our grass and doing outside chores. Communication never really grew between us and this chasm was created and it continued to grow as I grew older. As I grew older this gap was never really addressed and it remained the same with neither my father nor I trying to fix it. The lack of communication created a strained relationship between the two of us and it made us almost strangers living under the same roof.  This feeble father-daughter relationship was really thrown to the wolves when my father’s girlfriend came to live with us. Now for the record let’s just say that she and I do not at all get along. So any communication that existed before was nonsexist as soon as the girlfriend moved in; and any communication was not really communication but arguing and yelling. And when the girlfriend and I would get into arguments my father would simply say that I needed to try to get along with her and treat her as part of the family now. This never happened and will never happen.

Even to this day I do not have a close relationship with my father. We do not talk and spend time together like some fathers and daughters do. The lack of communication throughout our lives created this.

#5

English is on its way to becoming the main language of the world. There are more nonnative speakers of English than native speakers now, just in China alone there are more children studying English than there are Britons! With all this globalization of the English language there is bound to be some effects on the language itself. The English language is evolving and changing more rapidly than ever before seen, with all these nonnative speakers changing and adding to our language. English is evolving into different dialects around the world were each version of the English language is very different than the next. Just in the United States we can see the change with our huge Hispanic influence. New words such as enchiladas, chimichanga and leche are known to all Native Americans. Spanglish is spoken everywhere and many Hispanic nonnative’s are infusing the English language with their bold culture.

This changing of our language can be seen throughout the rest of the globe as well. Carla Power writes in her article titled “Not the Queen’s English” that “the new English-speakers aren’t just passively absorbing the language they’re shaping it.” Power continues on that “New Englishes” are being created everywhere in the world. These new dialects of the English language are complex and completely different from the other. We have Englog (Tagalog-English), Japlish (Japanese-English), Hinglish (Hindu-English), and a different version of English spoken in South Africa that they obviously have not come up with a nifty name for yet.

English is becoming the main language for anyone in the world to learn and communicate in if they want to succeed in the business world. Millions and millions of citizens from every country are clamoring to learn this language to better their chances of making a better living for themselves and their families. So with all these different people learning one single language there will be the evolution of the language. When any person learns a new language different from their own they will always have trouble mastering it. I know when I took French class during my second semester at AVC I had some trouble, luckily for me though French was similar to Spanish another language I am somewhat proficient in. But imagine a Chinese middle schooler trying to learn our language which has nothing in common with their native language. Of course these new speakers are going to change some words and make it easier for them to learn the complex English language. With all these new cultures and personalities learning and speaking our language there is going to be splicing and infusing of their languages and cultures into our own. The globalization of the English language is having an extreme effect on the language we all speak in the United States. New dialects of our language are growing everywhere on the globe and soon we may not be fluent in our own language. This evolution of language and culture is inevitable and I think it is something that should be embraced and not something that should be frowned upon. 

#4

Artist:

At first glance the beautiful colors of blacks and grays envelope my eyes. The blouse is of a soft, form-fitting black fabric that follows the contours of her collarbones down in a curvaceous circle. The sleeves are of lace of the same hue of the blouse and the soft color of flesh peeks through the lace. In the indentation above her bosom a necklace of a Day of the Dead skeleton nestles and flashes at my eye. The pants are of tight grey material that follows the curve of her thigh and legs and stop at the ankle. The metal rivets at the pockets blink and flash in the bright sunlight. Lastly are the small dull, black flats that envelope her feet. These flats have flecks of color about them that reveal stains of brown and grey, I wonder if they are small spots of oil paints. Maybe she too paints the beautiful world around her; I should ask if she would like to partake in a double espresso with me at that coffee shop near my studio….   

Tailor:

Looking at this girl’s outfit shows the perfect example of extreme tailoring. The unwrinkled shirt is a scoop neck comprised of a black cotton-nylon mix that has sleeves comprised of appliqué lace. The sleeves reach down almost to her elbows and thus she may have to hand-wash this shirt. Because of the cotton-nylon mix the shirt is form fitting and hugs her figure. This young girl is wearing a skeleton necklace and it rests above the shirt. She is also wearing grey denim pants made of a mostly cotton-spandex mix that clearly have been sewn. The pockets were made with small silver rivets and the pants appear to be a size zero. These pants have been altered after they were bought it seems by a novice sewer. They have been fitted to be much tighter than intended and one can see the new seam if you look carefully. Then on her feet are plain black flats.

Nudist:

This young girl has the most awful, restricting clothes I have ever seen. I wonder if she can even breathe or feel her legs in those tight pants! She is being seized at the top by a tight shirt that covers almost every inch of her skin from the warming rays of the sun. And needless to say she is probably being encircled by a rigid wire bra that shoves her breasts up and cramming them together unnaturally. And look at those pants she is wearing, goodness I wonder if the blood has stopped circulating throughout her legs. I do not understand how she could wear those pants and successfully function throughout her day. Can she bend over without splitting them open or even run through a field of flowers and fully appreciate the feel of dew-stained petals against her skin? I think not. This girl is also wearing black shoes that appear to be barley anything; maybe like me she loves the feel of the Earth beneath her toes.