Scholarly Sources

This was a journal article on a study that was done on sixty men and sixty women to observe the effects from the media. The effects that they were looking for were the image of the perfect body and what was needed to achieve this. Then it goes on to talk about differences of the perceptions of the men and the women. For example, “Most women believed that their body image began to be affected by the
images in the media between the ages of 12 and 14, whereas this was between ages 14 and 16 for men.” Most of the article talks about acquiring the perfect body image that is seen as pictures in the media across America. Then there are a couple tables that show some of the interesting facts from a questionnaire and what the media can influence them change. Lastly there is a discussion part that pretty much sums up the whole study and clearly explains the results. One of the results is that women overestimate their whole body when men just overestimate certain parts of the body like the chest.

McCabe, Marita, Kelly Butler, and Christina Watt. "Media Influences on Attitudes and Perceptions Toward the Body Among Adult Men and Women." Journal of Applied Biobehavioral Research (2007): 101-118. Web. 13 Apr 2010. .

The second article was titled, The Media and Violent Behavior in Young People: Effects of the Media on Antisocial Aggressive Behavior in a Spanish Sample, and its main focus was the violence that in young adults that was an effect from violence in the media. It’s just like the last article being it was a study that was conducted to see the effects on a group of antisocial aggressive behavioral children. This is an article we can use to show how the media can affect the emotional of side people. It also shows the differences between the violence factors of both male and female children. Towards the end of the article its talks about how they found out how the media does have negative effects on the violent behavior of antisocial children. Even though the results are the same there were some differences between the male and female children. Here is a quote I think would be useful in writing our paper, “…reported that males (but not females) who watched more television during early adolescence (i.e., age 14) were prone to being more violent toward others, although no effect was found for other types of antisocial or criminal behaviors.”

Clemente, Miguel, Pablo Espinosa, and Miguelangel Vidal. "The Media and Violent Behavior in Young People: Effects of the Media on Antisocial Aggressive Behavior in a Spanish Sample." Journal of Applied social Psychology 38.10 (2008): 2395-2409. Web. 13 Apr 2010. .

Sources

There’s a lot that comes into play when looking for sources for an English paper. The first that comes to mind is the kind of paper you’re writing will affect what kinds of sources and how many sources to use. For example a research paper needs reliable and scholarly sources to make an acceptable research paper. Then when it comes to just an opinion paper there isn’t much need for sources but if needed then maybe a magazine or some random book will be sufficient. The next thing is finding sources that are reliable and would help influence the point of the paper. A way you can tell if they’re legit is simply if they have an author. Most sources that don’t point out an author are usually artificial and might be correct but not reliable. Another way would be to see if they were peered reviewed by other authors in the same category or subject. Where to use them depends on the paper and how the citation will flow with what’s being said. For instance if writing an argumentative essay putting the opposing viewpoint quotes and facts with the non-opposing part of the paper. The way I would improve my method of finding reliable sources would be to use the journal search on the library’s website and to use websites that I know or can find out they’re legit. Usually when I work on a paper that involves sources I go the library or the databases on the library’s website but occasionally I will just use the internet and, make sure the sources I use are credible.

End of The Omnivore's Dilemma

The last third of the book was about Pollan planning and getting the items he needed for his perfect meal. He starts out by talking about how to hunt and kill a pig for the meat part of his meal. The second part is the gathering part where he finds mushrooms and other greens. During both of these events he has a help from a friend that gathers and hunts for most of his food. The rest is him making his meal and eating with the people that helped him out along the way.
In my opinion I believe this part of the book is really interesting and could be helpful to someone that wants to try foraging. It was nice that he was in great detail when talking about hunting and the gathering of mushrooms and other plants. I think the main point of this part and book was to show it was possible to do something like this and also to show that it helps if we know where our food was made and what exactly our food is.

Chapter 16 and 17

In the chapters sixteen and seventeen of The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Pollan talks about what the dilemma is for an omnivore and the ethics of eating animals. In the sixteenth chapter he goes into detail what the omnivore’s dilemma is to him and I would agree with him. He believes because we know what to eat and what not to eat, we are in a dilemma on choosing what to eat. I agree with this because I always think and choose carefully what I want to eat and sometimes that can be hard to do.
In the next chapter Pollan talks about the ethics of eating animals and if it is ok to eat them. Pollan thinks that as long as the raising, slaughtering and eating is done in a humane way then it is ethically alright but if this is not done then it could mess up the ecosystem somehow. I agree when it comes to the raising and slaughtering that it needs to be humane and clean but how do you humanly eat an animal? The only way I can think of is to cook it and season it just right. I think would be hard to survive if we didn’t eat animals like cows and chickens.

Chapters 10 and 11 Omnivore's Dilemma

In part two of The Omnivore’s Dilemma Pollan goes to a farm in Virginia and learns a lot from the owner on how a farm should be ran. Specifically in chapter ten he focuses on the grass part of a farm and how crucial the grass is for the animals. The farmer says that the quality of the grass and fertilization determines the quality of the food whether it be animals or vegetables. This being the basis of his operation, he developed a plan that makes the grass perfect and always in good health. His plan is to balance grazing, fertilizing and rest to make sure the land isn’t destroyed and actually improves the quality of it. Then in chapter eleven he talks about the animals of the farm and how they contribute to the cycle. He rotates the cows everyday to a fresh pasture of grass and has the chickens follow to sanitize the pasture. This strategy works for him very well because he can produce tons of food without hurting the land. If he did want to expand the land wouldn’t be able to take it and eventually run out of important nutrients.
Both of these chapters had a lot of details on how he keeps his farm in good health without using artificial chemicals or fertilizers. It’s amazing that he thought up this system to get the best from the grass without hurting it and that he is able to do this all year long. It makes me wonder if other small non industrialized farms are doing the same thing or if they are just damaging the land, leading into unusable land in the future. In a way it seems the farmer is improving his land by using this system which can only lead to a future of more and more foods that he can sell.

Chapter 4 They Say, I Say

Chapter four in They Say, I Say is all about how to respond to someone else’s research or publications. There are three main answers that you can use, they are agreeing, disagreeing or both agree and disagree. It then goes on to describe how you can make your opinion stronger and make sense to whoever is reading your paper. The most important thing you can do is provide fact and details that help support your viewpoint as your own. There is one problem that sometimes comes up when doing this and that is when you agree with something then you will end up disagreeing with something else.
I thought this was a really helpful chapter showing how to respond to someone else’s paper. I don’t think I have written a paper on agreeing with somebody but if I do end up writing one, this chapter will help me so I don’t write a horrible paper. Also I like how it gives templates on how I could make my disagreeing papers better. From now on when I write a paper in response to another person’s paper I will look back at this chapter to figure out the best way to prove my point.

Chapter 9

Chapter nine is about the organic farms and how they operate. Pollan talks about how back in the day the organic farms weren’t industrial and they were about the product and not the money. He talked to a company owner that was forced to go to the industrial way of farming because there was no money involved in organics. Next he talks about how organic farms aren’t that great for the soil because in order for them to keep bugs off they need to till the soil more which gets rid of the nutrients.
My opinion of this chapter is that I think the only benefit of organic food is its healthier and pesticides aren’t used. When I go to a whole foods store all the food is way more expensive and there are fewer options to choose from. Also the industrialization of organic foods has some positives but being an industry makes it the same as normal processed food. The food still needs to be shipped and packaged which takes oil. The benefit is it makes the food cheaper because the farmers are growing more of it and most likely selling it for less.

Omnivores Dilemma Part 2

In part two of the book Pollan visits a farm in Iowa owned by a guy that’s been growing corn since he was pretty much a kid. He explains that corn had changed so much over the years and how it’s barely edible anymore because it’s chemically altered to grow bigger with fertilizer built inside the seed as well as pesticide. He also goes into how this kind of corn is making people go bankrupt because the yields aren’t near as big as they were in the past and its worth less now a days.

After reading the second part of the book it made me think this is kind of depressing for the farmers who base their whole lives of their farming and end up going bankrupt or have to sell parts of their farm to break even every year. I also don’t get how the government can control what kind of seeds these people can plant, especially when they end up to be low quality products. Since corn is in almost all our processed foods shouldn’t it be good quality corn and the people growing it should be able to make a descent amount of money that they can live off of. The government shouldn’t lower the price of corn so the only way for people to make it worthwhile is to grow more. These people almost spend more money growing it then they do selling it, which isn’t what should be happening.