Andy Werling T3 Pruisner 1. Reread confusing material from assigned chapter 2. Read USA Today 3. Read from Hannaford, I., (1996). Race. London: John Hopkins University Press 4. Read from Shipman, P., (1994). The Evolution of Racism. Cambridge: Harvard University Press Date Time Material 1/28/06 1 hour Shipman 1/29/06 1 hour Hannaford 1/30/06 1hour USA Today 1/31/06 1 hour USA Today 1/28/06 Chapter 4 of Shipman’s book is where Darwinism runs into trouble. Darwin’s theory of evolution, and natural selection have stirred up a hornets nest. Darwin was not out to cause an uproar when he studied finches, but when people stated applying his science to human kind, there was a huge backlash. Darwin was unable to defend his theory by himself, so in cam Huxley with hot rhetoric and brilliant oration to combat critics like Richard Owen. This chapter is about how people like Owen twist Darwin’s theory to apply it to human kind in a way that will cause people to reject it without having to use any actual science. Owen’s arguments were a mix of bad science and theology which were no match for Huxley’s year of research and debate skills. This is one of my favorite chapters so far because it get down to the very essence of the argument. 1/29/06 The last chapter in Hannaford’s book is a good transition into Shipman’s book. Hannaford leaves the reader with a great ending note. Race has moved from the realm of politics into the arena of science and society. Race is being used to describe social phenomenon, race is being studied in the field of biology and physical anthropology. It is almost as thought the two books could be combined into a two part series. It is fascinating to see the progression in ideas from the early Greeks to 19th century Germans. It has been a long road, with interesting twist, turns and dead ends, but I think Hannaford as done a good job explaining his point and used fairly good resources. I think his last chapter does leave some loose ends such as racism within the cotenant of Africa, specifically black on black racism. 1/30/06 One of the only articles in today’s newspaper that wasn’t sad was on the upcoming Olympics on the front page of the sports section. I’m not a big fan of the winter Olympics but there are two events that I really like. First is Hockey. I’ve loved Hockey since I was little. Since last years strike, many Hockey fans have become disenfranchised with the NHL. This gives them something to look forward to. Olympic hockey is the best hockey around. Especially for fans of team Canada because they have one of the greatest teams of all time this year and the article mentions that a few times. My second favorite event is curling. It is a very odd sport to watch, and if you have never played it before and don’t fully understand the game it is incredibly boring to watch. I enjoy it because it is one of the silliest sports around and because it is one of the few Olympic sports where strategy thinking plays a major role. 1/31/06 On page 8A of today’s newspaper is one of the strangest stories I have heard of in a long time. Luigi Cascioli is an Italian atheist who s suing a priest over the existence of Jesus. Mr. Cascioli claims that the priest is making a profit by tricking people into believing in Jesus. It doesn’t matter what your religious back ground may be, there are reliable secular records that a man named Jesus lived around Nazareth around 30 C.E. I don’t know how he is going to prove that Jesus did not exist, or how he can prove that Jesus did perform miracles. It will be interesting to see how this turns out. Weekly Reflection It is the end of the 21 days of assigned reading. At the beginning of the 21 days I really didn’t think that 21 days of reading would impact me in the slightest. But it has affected me more than I ever could have thought. The reading assignment has kept me on track with my assigned reading in all my classes, and has even helped me get ahead in two of them. Also, I have been able to read the news paper at least once a week. This has helped me understand the world around me, keep up on current events and think of ideas and subjects to add into possible lessons in a future teaching job.