Stepping into the Annenberg building, room ANN 106 for the first time was compelling. However, not knowing who I was going to meet was an understatement. Not being familiar with Communications or Journalism I had some worries I was not going to fit in as well as the others. However, that was not the case, everyone was filled with open minds. Knowing this on the first day, left me comfortable to share my experience with all these new people I would soon learn and grow with.
With the first day being on Juneteenth, our instructors took the time to educate us on the history behind the holiday. Watching a presentation with many speakers, including USC’s very own president Carol Folt, emphasizing the importance of the Holiday and the fact that not many people have a true understanding of Juneteenth. This could tie into the fact that the education system does not cover this much, personally I did not learn about this in school. With the idea of education, in Journalism class, I am conducting a project on the ideas of Curriculum. Specifically with access to technology and how it expands curriculum, giving students access to all sorts of information to educate themselves on important topics, maybe not being taught directly to them.
The idea of governments and democracy has also been a big topic this week. With Professor Turner taking us into the podcast room for about an hour and giving the free discussion from every student and their thoughts on the 2024 elections. After hearing everyone’s opinions it seems that we are pretty comfortable with each other and have strong opinions. Continuing with that idea in Communication class, and how the media ties into Politics. Referring to the book The Creation of Media: Political Origins of Modern Communications by Paul Starr, he claims the United States adopts the ideas of Democratic culture, Autonomy from State, Media in Law, Mail Networks, and Free Market Funding. Something else that is big in the media as there was wide reach around the world, was the idea of propaganda. Which is mislead information used in newspapers, shows, or anything to publicize a one sided story. This can also connect to Journalism class and one of the relative topics being written about current world issues.
One last way I can connect the two classes is using the idea of Civic Imagination to literally imagine different ways of social, economic or political problems. In Communication class I learned about the ideas of imagining a better world, processing change, and having social connections with bigger communities. I can connect these ideas to the class field trip to Olvera Street. There at the Museum of Social Justice the curator spoke about how the different groups of people, such as mexicans, chinese and all sorts of indigenous people started building up the city of Los Angeles starting in that little part of the city. Since we obviously were not born when this was happening in the city, we can use civic imagination and try our best from the knowledge to put ourselves in their lives and really get a good understanding of how the city was built. Including all of the culture behind it, which is most likely misunderstood by most.
Overall, the first week of this has shown me that there is a lot in the world that is not understood, and this all connects to the ideas of the way that the United States runs the government and curriculums. Sometimes ways to put ourselves in others places is to use civic imagination and gain new experiences just like I have in participating in AYA.
– Cipriana Jimenez
Communicating Change 