Prompt #2

After reading the packet, I think I have a pretty good idea of what the "New World Body" Looks like. When I think about the "New World Body" I picture a figure that is strong and proud. He stands tall and fearless. The main reason I say proud and fearless is because of the encounter with a Seminole warrior and William Bartram on page 351 in our packet. Bartram describes the stray rider "with dignity in his look and action..." in their exchange with one another. This to me shows that this Native American man was proud, respectful and fearless, especially to ride up on Bartram as he did.

Earlier in my post, I said "he" when describing the "New World Body" because I picture a man. In the readings the writers talked mostly about their interactions with the males. There were a few descriptions of females, but the males seemed to play a bigger part to the people telling the story. As a representational figure, I think the descriptions the authors give shoes how the people of the "New World" are powerful, but because of how different the Native Americans' and the European travelers' customs are, the Native Americans are seen are barbarians.

In looking at the pictures of the people on the of the map of the "New World" I see some similarities to what I pictured. Although there was not an exact duplicate to what was in my head, the similarities I noticed were that the figures were not ever fully clothed and that the people were always holding something in their hands. I'm not sure why I pictured the figures of the "New World" with objects in your hands, but it was something that I noticed my figure had in common with the drawings.

Prompt #1

In my environment, bodies function in many different ways. One of the environments I am in every single day, usually for a decent amount of time is my apartment. My apartment complex is a body of many different people from different families and different backgrounds. I live off of E. Riverside, which is known to a bad part of town. The body of my apartment complex does nothing to help change this idea. The people I live around, as a whole, are very inconsiderate of the rest of the people that live here. Just in the apartments around me, people fail to pick up any trash they may drop in the short trip to the dumpster and constantly pile up trash around, not in, the dumpster. The body of residents in my apartment complex live up to the expectations of the Riverside community.

With my rant about about my unhappiness about my living situation over, at work I encounter a vast amounts of bodies on a daily basis. As an optician, I provide service to many people. People from every type of body you can think of need some kind of vision correction. I have helped doctors, military personal, students, policemen, teachers, and of course, the elderly. Of those groups of people, I have been in contact with those looking to stir some kind of trouble, those who are just looking for a bargain, those who know what they want, those who are indecisive about the many options they are given and many more.

Those of you who have worked retail have experienced the true essence of people and how self-centered and ignorant they can be. Although many people exude said essence, there are some who are very kind and are easy to deal with. These are the two main bodies I separate customers in when at work. This to me is an example of their personal body. It seems as if customers feel like they have two choices: Show respect for someone performing you a service because they don't necessarily have to, or on the other hand, show little to no respect because the retailer is not someone they know, therefore it does not matter how they are treated.

From what I see almost every day at the university, the student body doesn't really forget about the bodies they are a part of. The different bodies people are involved in can be the cliques they follow. In every large class I've had, athletes sit together based on what sport they play (football players with football players and baseball players with baseball players for example), people of the same race tend to stick together, and people who tend to know each other stay together as well. Each small group can be considered they're own body. Everyone knows that's how it happens because everybody does it. Bodies and who forms those bodies are important to all parts of our society. As a general public people are broken down into different bodies such as upper and middle class, grade levels among student, graduate and undergraduate just to name a few.

I believe, in today's electronic world, our bodies can still be considered fundamental markers of our identities. One example of this, in my eyes, is tattoos and various other body art. To me, tattoos are a way of expressing who you are inside and your emotions. Tattoos, in most occasions, are things that are very personal because they will be a part of you for the rest of you life. Most of the time people pick to design their skin with something that is very close to their soul such as a name of someone they loved who passed away or an image to represent a hardship they had to overcome at some point in their lifetime. The clothing we choose is another way that I feel is still a very relevant way we exude our identities. I like to wear shirts and hats with my favorite sports shirts. Sports are a huge part of my life. I played baseball for over 10 years and am studying to gain a career in the sports industry. Those shirts and hats are a small portal to my heart and soul. Those teams, as for many other sports fans, are what we base our year and sometimes our schedules on. Whether our teams win or lose is something that can easily make or ruin our day, week or even longer.