sociology

so for this semester in college, i took sociology, introduction to sociology - study of human behaviours and beyond. though i only attended 4 classes, but the moment i flipped through the text book, i knew i was gonna like the subject/class. and very fortunately, i guess i did not pick the wrong professor. the vital essence of my interest.

anyhooo, i wanted to share the basic 3 perspectives in sociology. i find them very interesting, as they are things that only people so free are able to sit down and think, and come up with such perspectives. well, ya, there are people like that, if not, there would not be a sociology to even begin with. and bla bla bla..

the first is, Functionalist.
- in the theory/perspective of functionalist, is that everything in the society has a function. EVERYTHING. for example, crime, which we all know is bad, but in the perspective of a functionalist, its something benefitting to the society, because it then provides jobs for police, or for security companies, whatever. terrorism, for that matter, helps control population, diseases to helps control population, creates job for doctors, scienstist,... nothing is just bad for the society. meaning, anything that benefits even the smallest group in society, then it is good, it is functional.
- everything in society is interdependant. for example;

..school <--> restaurant <--> hospital <--> airport...

there has to be school to create doctors for the hospital, there has to be restaurant to make food poisoning to have people going to the hospital and airport for better education and it goes on..

- society is always at equilibrium, and if something out of the norm happens, society will be disequlibriumed and then come back to stability, will acquire to the situation and then achieve equilibrium.

-----equilibrium-----~~~disequilibrium~~~-----back to stability----

- functionalist also believe in manifest function which is open and obvious. and product of manifest function is latent function.

eg. we all pay for college to get education (manifest,obvious) and because we go to college, we met the love of our life (latent).

the second is, Conflict.

- believes that humans are full of tension, always in a struggle and society is full of competition.

- wealth, power, prestige - are what society strives for. don't think big, even the most innocent and simple idea of pursuing education, is a way of striving for power/wealth/prestige.

conflict is pretty much self-explanatory.

the third is, Symbolic Interactions.

- symbols.

one word. symbolic interaction meaning society is all about judging one another by symbols. the shoes you where, the way you walk, the way you stride, your jimmy not choo's, your wheels and ya...symbols. very subjective and based on own interpretations.

the 3 perspectives are very different in their own way. like a venn diagram, the over-lapping sections - there are also similarities.

so i ask, what do you think? what do you think society is mainly comprise of? why?

i am a believer of conflict. definately. people never stop struggling, from day one of birth till the last breath, will then you put a full stop to suffering. everything revolves around struggle and suffer. to be in constant tension and competitive mode, is a form of struggle. to always greed for more wealth and good things even though you already own too much is a sruggle because the thought of wanting more, of trying to get more...kills you. you might disagree, but i think it is the truth and it is the reality, no matter how not you think you are not, you are suffering. you are competing in someway, you are... .

look around.

XOXO

today...today...oh my MDF god,...today today...

right before Spring Break, the week before Spring Break, i had an english composition mid-term test. we had a week to prepare for the test, which was writing a critical analysis on any essays from the textbook. any kind of test, which involves essays, as far as i am concern, is suppose to be done in a book, called the Blue Book, its just a book, with only a few pages for ya, writing essays or short answers kinda stuff. so we were to bring those Blue Books in class and write our essays in it.

today is already the second week after school reopened. the first week, we did not get our grades because i don't know why, but according to the professor, many did not do very well, as we did not know the format of critical analysis and yada....yada...yada....

so come this week, today,..everyone anticipated for not-so-well grades. to be honest, i thought i did pretty well. not by college standards, but by my odinary shitty-essay-writing standard, i thought it was better than how i usually write. therefore, i was hoping, bad, but at least not that bad of a bad grade. as i did prepare and read on the right way to write an analysis.

so the professor called, one by one,...came Jane, i stood up, took a few steps towards him and he said, 'Jane, see me after class, i need to talk to you about your essay'. so i sat back down. i was thinking, 'fuck Jane, you thought you did well, well, guess what, you must have flunk so badly, he needs to talk to you...'.

after class, i went up to him and WHAT??!!!! WHAT??!!!

do you freaken know why he did not grade my essay???????

when he explained to me, i was like =0 you fucking kidding me? and i paused. and i asked him again, what is the issue here? i don't understand. and i asked him, the third time.

at first, he asked, 'Jane, was this essay done outside class?'

i was confused. so i simply said, 'that is the rough draft (which we were suppose to do, not that i am so hardworking that i did it) and thats the essay.'

then he might have said something or a lot of things, in that spilt of a second, which i was not there with him at all because i was confused as hell.

then only i got what he was saying, he thought i typed my essay! he seriously thought i typed my essay and had done it outside class.

can you believe? i can't.

so i said to him, no, i wrote it, that is just my handwriting.
...
.............
.
.
.
........

i don't think i did convince him, totally.

then he said, i know you are a very detailed person but let me show you some of the characters...
...
........
see, your 's' and the other 's' is the same.. (same something but i was having a nervous breakdown by then, i don't know what he was saying)

i was so dumbfounded. all that went through my head was, how can i tell him i fucking wrote that with my bare right hand? i mean, other classmates would have saw me writing and how could i have printed it in the book?

anyway, he then asked me, did you had Blanko (i think that was what he said, which meant correction tape, in Malaysian term) with you? i said yes.
...........
..............
..
come on, i am Ejane, i have correction tapes. i take my pencil box everywhere i go. and i am probably the only one in the whole college who brings a pencil box, case, whatever.

i don't know if he believed that it is my handwriting. i know my handwriting is neat, but it cannot be at such degree of perfection that it is mistaken for typed. i am sure it has many distortions.

he even suggested, 'how about i take you grades in the final test and make it your mid-term grade too?'
................................................'anda gila ka apa ka ke buta ka ke nyanyok ka?' i wished i said.
'i accept your essay but .................................'
.......
................i had no clue what he said after.

in the end, he said he was gonna grade it.

its not even funny.

this must be the praise of the highest order i have had ever and will ever receive on my handwriting.

i might consider writing like shit now.

it has been a long day..but to overshadow this shitty event, is something real awesome, i purchased my plane ticket home today, finally! its better than the Willy Wonka's golden ticket i tell you.

alright.

lecturers and classes and people.

end of this week means the end of my first week in school, after one year long thrasing out.

ask how i feel? - well, i feel nothing. my excitement has really gone down the drain. after all, its been one whole damn year. all feelings was lost, only neutral. thats the only emotion that runs through my blood now. but then again, i do hope school would take me by suprise and make me excited..

i am taking 4 classes. 3 out of 4 of my lecturers are soooooooooooooo old. so old. 2 are balding and has spotted bald heads. maybe if i look closer, they have mushrooms growing out on those spots.

one of them speaks so soft. and i have a feeling, he is teaching like a robot and not out of passion and interest anymore. he goes on and on and on and on. he is so monotonous, luckily, i do not suffer from ADHD. but he is a good teacher.

another balding spotted lecturer is what-are-you-talking-about??? he is so old that - 1. he cannot write properly because he cannot stop jiggletwicthfidget-ing when writing. it cannot be any more cakar than that. and to make it all worse is that he does not want any report/assignment handwritten. it shows that the fella tidak pernah cerminkan diri. 2. i don't know what the fella merepekkan. what he lectures is like a jigsaw puzzle to me that i am suppose to solve piece by piece as he goes on and on.

this is my Introduction to Engineering class lecturer. and now that i am here in the mahuan country, they have the customary units and of course, the S.I units. customary units are pound (lb), mile (mi) to name a few, whereas the S.I units that are used in the whole world are, kg and meter. therefore, whatever calculations that are done are to be done in both units. so my first class was about converting S.I units to the customary units. one part of that session was like so;

1 feet = 12 inch

1 ft^2 = 144 inch^2

correct?

but instead of 144inch^2, he wrote 12inch^2. so i asked. and the only answer he gave me was, 'i could have wrote that.' ya, so why not???? why shitting not? what? what do you mean you could have? gisssss. i truly hope he is not lou moh. ergh.

next old lecturer is after all not that old but he has had multiple heart attacks before and recently had a heart surgery. i do hope he stays healthy and do not suddenly... ... ... you know. i sure do not need that kinda adrendaline to pump me up.

and the fourth lecturer is the only one that does not absorb all my good energy away...

kill me if you can.

so in this lou moh's class, at the end, i understood what he was scribbling and mumbling about. so i manage to go with him on my notes. therefore, at the end of the class, two girls came up to me and asked if they could borrow my notes for awhile to jot down, then bla bla bla...one girl is from Thailand, and another one from err, Africa? but whatever, this Thailand girl, said, 'i am gonna sit beside you next time.' i smiled. how not ejane right? but this was what ran through my head, 'you gotta be kidding me! i seriously do not feel like sitting beside you. i will only consider if you change that outfit of yours, but i do not guarentee.' i am mean, aren't i? besides, i am not any smarter. i do not wanna dissapoint her. and also the guy sitting beside me right now is not bad himself, so i rather not have her. typical loner, but thats just me. i seriously do not need someone bugging me all the time about notes while the lou moh is talking. so yaa..go figure.

well......though only a week. life is getting so tiresome.

this counselor..

for the last few days, i have been doing some revision for an evaluation test that i have to take in order to enroll into college for the spring intake in January. i found out that i totally dang it, forgot my trigonometry and some math formula. i seriously cannot imagine that something that comes so automatically to me a year ago, i would totally forget it now. anyway, so on Tuesday, i took the test, finally, praying that i will somehow pull through.

it was a 4 paper, untimed test. reading, writing, essay-writing and math. because its untimed, i took my time to do it. and math was the last section of the test. and trigonometry was the last topic in the math test. and by then, it was already since 4 and 1/2 hours ago that i sat there. so when came to the trigonometry questions, i was too washed out to even think. so those long complicated questions, i did not bother thinking and just guessed an answer. but anyway, overall, i did well for math, just not that well for the trigonometry part.

so after that, i went to see a counselor. this red-headed counselor was a lil eccentric. i think. she talks to herself and has an eccentric fidgetty manner. but anyway, so after she put my test results in the system, and then we talked about what classes i must take for the first semester...blablabla...and there are 3 classes that i have to take in my first semester. and that makes 9 credit hours. at first, i have no idea what '9 credit hours' meant. the counselor was explaining to me that probably 3 classes would be more than enough for me.

to me, 3 classes, is like, what? only 3? but then, i asked her, can i take more than 3 classes? she said yes, but you will be spending 9 hours for this classes already. and she was advicing me not to take anymore classes if i don't have to.

so i was like huh? what talking you? so i asked, err, 9 hours, being 9 hours a day? and her answer was, no, 9 hours a week. [9 hours a WEEK. <>. i was thinking, she must be kidding me. is 9 hours a week a lot? my god.] in a week, i have 168 hours, and taking up 9 of that 168 would kill me? i don't think so. and besides, come to think of it, i have spent 9 hours and more in school before. and many times. sometimes, more than 2 days in a row.

this counselor, ah, was of no help. whatever that i asked, i did not get the answer i want. real bedebah.

anyway, i was asked where i came from. so i said Malaysia. and she said, 'oh, Indonesia, the country with the most population of Muslims.' then i said, 'i came from Malaysia.' and she went 'oh,oh, but its near Indonesia right?' so to not make her feel bad about herself, i made as if it was an ok mistake. so i said, 'yes, it is, it is also near Singapore.' and she was, 'ya. ya.' but i doubt she knows.

and then at the end of our fruitless session, she said, 'so Malaysia huh, not Indonesia. ah, stupid Americans.' i was like, oooook, you don't have to be so hard on yourself. gis. what the hell? haha.

haih. apala.