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TOPIC REFLECTION

Posted by Kristina Gozar on

 

According to the IPCC, net emissions must be reduced to zero in order to stabilize global temperatures. Any scenario that does not involve a reduction to zero, according to the research, will fail to prevent climate change. Because even little changes in the amount of CO2, methane, and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere cause the Earth to react so strongly, emissions of these gases must be reduced until the entire system is returned to balance. All man-made greenhouse gases must be removed from the atmosphere through reduction efforts after natural and manufactured sinks, bringing the Earth’s net climatic balance to zero. Humanity would be carbon neutral in this manner, and global temperatures would stabilize.

Heat waves, droughts, catastrophic flooding, and wildfires are shattering world records and inflicting devastation across Europe, North America, China, and India, which account for 58 percent of global CO2 emissions. This interests me since architects and designers play such an important and distinct role in developing and influencing the built environment across the world. Right now, they have the choice of designing and building to a zero-carbon standard. Building operations account for approximately 40% of total global CO2 emissions. If the world wants to stay below the 1.5 degree Celsius carbon limit set forth in the 2015 Paris Agreement, we must set an example and decrease CO2 emissions in the built environment by 65 percent by 2030, with zero emissions by 2040.

I’d want to learn more about zero-carbon design. Architects, engineers, and other building industry professionals continue to follow current code standards. All new structures, major restorations, and developments should be planned to use no onsite fossil fuels (gas, oil, or propane) and be fully powered by on-site and/or new off-site renewable energy. As a consequence, more renewables will be able to assist decarbonize the power business and, as a result, the present building stock. Because of the creative and construction community, we now have the knowledge, standards, techniques, and technology to build zero-carbon buildings in all climates across the world.

 

Essay 1 Reflection

Posted by MATTHEW CZARNECKI on

A social issue that I find fascinating is the refugee crisis, not just in the Americas but additionally in Europe aswell. Fleeing one’s home in search of a better life or better opportunity elsewhere is not something knew and was and, today to a lesser extent, is still considered as one of the bravest and most heroic act one can do, especially to improve your own offspring’s life. Today we see and hear, as Americans, the migration crisis on our southern boarder every day, the inhumane treatment and the desperate acts taken by the pilgrims traveling all the way from South America. As a Pole, I additionally hear about the Syrian refugee crisis where nations are either taking refugees by the millions placing the nations into not only financial but a social crisis as well; or nations deciding to limit or even close their boarders entirely to the migrants. During today’s age where we are all already connected  through the internet, are able to see the events taking place, speak to the people experiencing these conflicts first hand, why do we speak so lowly about them, where as we speak highly of those the immigrants during the last century, especially as New Yorkers, we or the people we encounter are more likely immigrants ourselves or even first generation than not. Why does the United States want to erect a border wall on the Mexican border whereas on the Canadian border we have nothing but green grass? Why does the Italian navy intercept and turn away people barely floating upon planks of wood and dirt; and why do the Slavic nations close their borders entirely?

Short writing essay #1 topic reflection by: Enrique Cortes

Posted by Enrique cortes on

The topic that I’m writing about is about police brutality, the reason for this is because police in new york and police from other parts of the world have abused their power and authority. Furthermore people must know that they can stand up and defend themselves from police officers and hold them accountable for their actions in court. Also you see police misconduct all the time, it maybe be online or on tv or even in news articles, all of these medias cover and show police brutality and it’s a very bad thing that this has become common in our society. We need to start doing something about our system to further prevent things like this from happening, we need to make both officers and people understand that fighting with one another can lead to lack of trust when it might be needed the most or it might result in a big fight between police officers and civilians when they come into contact. Also fighting doesn’t solve any of our problems if anything it fuels the chaos and it results in even more crimes being committed we have to understand that we live in uncertain times and instead of ripping each other apart we need to come together and help each other out because we don’t know when this pandemic will end and even when it ends we need to be on the same page and stop police brutality to form trust in the people and police officers and also punish police officers who over step the over the line as well as civilians who cause trouble just for the fun of it. 

Topic Reflection for Essay 1-Maithili Sharma

Posted by maithili sharma on

Ever since I’ve moved to new york, I’ve seen a lot of things, some things that have amazed me and some things that have shocked me. New York is a beautiful city when one looks at it from the outside, but as we go deeper, we can see the people around us and how loud, crowded and dangerous the city is. But this is what I think so far because I still haven’t gotten a chance to know the city that well. The one thing that I’ve noticed a lot amongst this chaos was the homeless people around me. The weird thing about this was, that some of them looked homeless, but didn’t act like they were, or maybe some acted like they were homeless but didn’t look like one. I remember walking down 8th avenue and seeing a bunch of people just sleeping on the sides of the road, some were near times square, and all I could think about is, “why don’t they just get jobs?”. I found that very interesting because these people looked intelligent, they were smart enough to make a tiny tent for themselves in the corner of a block. It was clear that they could read and write, as they had signboards next to them. I even think I saw a lady with a laptop under all her clothes. that’s when it struck me, that some of these people are just here, because bankruptcy led them there, and now that they don’t have a place to live they can’t do simple things like sending out job applications, because you obviously need a mailing address and a mailbox for that. Many employers wouldn’t even consider homeless people for job openings. they have the same misconceptions about them as everyone else does. Addiction may play a part here, most people think that addiction prevents homeless people from looking for work. Not all homeless people are addicted to drugs, but most people think that they are, including employers. Most people think this is the major reason homeless people don’t get jobs, and it may be true for many chronically homeless people. I think the main context about this topic is homelessness in general, and the exigence would be why can’t they get jobs. The main audience who are most likely to react to this analysis would be the employers, who choose not to hire these people for jobs. and I am looking forward to getting to know more about this topic.

 

Topic Reflection (essay#1) 9/21- Anna Plotnick

Posted by Anna Plotnick (she/her/hers) on

Something I feel passionate about is the issue of youth mental health awareness in the US and talking about/ normalizing youth mental health awareness. Mental health awareness is an issue that affects everyone and is very difficult for youth to address and properly manage. Mental health disorders can also be commonly rooted in other daily social issues that people face and struggle with. Youth are more likely to be long term impacted by mental health because it affects developmental aspects of life such as social life, academic life and proper  In today’s society, mental health is frequently overlooked and has a large negative stigma around, especially for youth in this country with an environment of “boys don’t cry” and “when I was a kid we didn’t care about this stuff” as just some toxic examples of stigma around mental health. Along with the daily pressure of school, athletics, extracurriculars, social time, and the presence of social media, standards of living can be hard to achieve and live up to, mental health becomes increasingly difficult to take care of. This issue interests me because I know lots of people who are affected by mental health and suicide, and I believe very strongly with the idea that it is vital to end the stigma around mental health. The issue of youth mental health in this country is not something that will be solved in a day, but that is why working to end the stigma is vital to this social issue. 

 

Rhetorical Analysis- Kevin Henriquez

Posted by Kevin Henriquez (he/him) on
  • In today’s society, Abortion is one of the most controversial topics. Women are often told what they should and should not do with their own bodies. To make matters worse these opinions come from people who have no say in this kind of decision. The article that I chose to use is State Actions Undermining Abortion Rights in 2020 by Nora Ellmann. Nora is a research associate for women’s health and rights at the center for American Progress which is why I trust this article as a credible source.
  • The author explains how abortion is becoming more inaccessible in the United States due to all of the restrictive laws that are being passed. These laws are making it difficult for women to have abortions or make their own choices.
  • The intended audience of this article is for pregnant women all around the world or people who have had abortions. But the main audience is for the States that are constantly passing restrictive laws.
  • In this article the authors purpose was to prove how the passing of restrictive laws is undermining the rights of women in the United States. She makes it clear in her conclusion of the article where she states “States’ ongoing pursuit of laws restricting access to reproductive health care—even in the midst of a global public health emergency—is a clear signal that the federal government needs to act.”
  • The genre of this article is expository writing because of how she introduces her ideas of a certain topic which is in this case, the undermining of abortion rights. She also includes details and facts that support her ideas.
  • Throughout the article, the author wanted to make it clear that she wanted the government to take action in order to protect women and their health. She hopes for the government to end unnecessary restrictions on abortion care.

 

  • https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/women/reports/2020/08/27/489786/state-actions-undermining-abortion-rights-2020/

RHETORICAL ANALYSIS

Posted by Vianny Feliciano (She/her/hers) on

The social issue I chose to write about was equal rights for women. I am using an image of the dress that Carolyn B. Maloney wore it to the 2021 Met Gala. Carolyn B. Maloney is a representative of the United States and she has been speaking about the equal rights of women for a long time now. She has published a book speaking about the fact that women’s lives are not getting easier and ways on how we can help ourselves and other women around the world. For years, women have not been treated equally to men in multiple cases. Whether it was with work pay or just mutual respect, men always received the upper hand. On the dress Carolyn B. Maloney, in big bold letters it says “Equal Rights For Women.” Since the Met Gala is such a big event that is known & watched all around the world, she took the opportunity to raise awareness on the issue due to the laws that are being passed by men about females. I believe that her audience were women all around the world. In a way I feel like she used this event and the dress to encourage women around the world to stand up for their equal rights because females deserve to be treated equally. Carolyn B. Maloney seems to have a very strong stance on equal rights for women. This is not the first time that she mentions the issue and the fact that she used such a big event to spread awareness just proves that she wants as many people as possible to see her dress and be aware of the issue. 

https://www.instagram.com/p/CTxyZO9o56V/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

Rhetorical analysis

Posted by Evelyn Mosso Pareja (she/her) on

https://www.texastribune.org/2021/09/10/texas-abortion-law-ban-enforcement/

 

Women’s rights has been an issue around the world for many years, especially a women’s right to bodily autonomy. In the text “Texas’ near-total abortion law”, author’s Erin Douglas and Carla Astudillo break down this law in a way that educates and informs others on how unreasonable and unconstitutional it is. I do believe these author’s to be credible because both Erin and Carla studied journalism. Throughout the text, although mostly informative and evidence based, they seem to be pro abortion since they mainly write on how the defendant of this law is affected. As well as how this law is “tilted” in a way that supports the anti abortionists. One thing I found interesting throughout the text was the fact that this law encourages civilians to sue people, in other words this act is called “expand standing”. Expand standing is the concept of governments empowering “civilians to sue for civil remedies.” Meaning that these people don’t even have to be related to this case in any way shape or form in order to sue for “generalized grievances, or harms that weren’t committed against them personally”. Not only that but they also encourage this by providing an award of “$10,000 as well as costs and attorney fees.” As if that wasn’t enough, to add salt to injury this law was made to restrict the defendants from using the 14th amendment, Rod v Wade decision, as a defense. Meaning that they made this law structured in a way that allows for a greater guarantee for the plaintiffs win. As well as the fact that the plaintiff can ” sue in the county in which they reside”. Causing great inconvenience and burden, finance wise, towards the defendant. The law was also made in a way that even if the plaintiff does lose the case, the defendant loses more than them. Since the law “bars the court from awarding costs or attorney’s fees back to the defendant even if the defendant successfully wins the lawsuit.” Although the defendant can only pay relief once, regardless of how many lawsuits they have, they still lose so much money trying to continuously fight off law suits. To add on, women are only allowed a 6 week period to have an abortion. This time line is very unreasonable because the majority of women aren’t aware of their pregnancy until about 4 weeks in. Especially women who have irregular periods and wouldn’t suspect a late period until a week of it being missing. Leaving only about  1-2 weeks to have an abortion. But this time frame is reduced even more because before having an abortion the patient has to have 2 ultrasounds before an abortion. Meaning that they would have to wait for these 2 visits, but these visits are mainly used to ensure the pregnancy as well as the cardiac activity. But because of the new law most medical sites just completely stopped performing abortions in order to avoid the risk of legal actions being taken against them. Most times the patient that was cleared for an abortion is denied that procedure in the second visit because cardiac activity was detected, causing the patient to be forced to conceive the child. To conclude, this law is not only unconstitutional and unreasonable its also unfair since it supports the plaintiffs side and denies women bodily autonomy, which shouldn’t even be up for debate since they should be able to do what they want, it’s their bodies after all. A government official or law shouldn’t be able to dictate what a women can or cannot do with her body. It is a clear violation of the 14th amendment.

rhetorical anlaysis

Posted by Arlyn Tejada (she/her) on

This image is capturing what India really looks like in black and white and what people outside of India see through the eyes of social media with the text saying Beautiful India and in the back there is garbage and the text is broken India.

The author is Martynas Klimas. He may not be credible because he does not normally write about social issues or any issues at all. He writes reviews about video games, is a copywriter, and used to write movie reviews. Even though he is not credible he did do extensive research when writing this piece.

There are many issues that are going on around the world, but the one issue that Klimas is communicating with the audience through his words and the pictures is that there is always a side not many people want to capture and show the world. Social media sugarcoats on what truly is happening. I know what he wants to say to his audience because it is clearly shown that you may never know what is happening because your only view of what is happening, is the small picture.

When I say audience I talk about Americans who use social media. This group of individuals is the targeted audience because Americans are known to take pictures of the pretty view but not of the sick children. The author’s assumptions about the audience are that Americans are naive.

The purpose of this image is to capture what many people see India as but how it really is the opposite. While Klimas was writing this piece I believe he wanted it to be informative by using these pictures to represent that there is always another side when posting that not many see or want to capture.

 

 

 

 

Rhetorical Analysis

Posted by Dali Smith-Harding (She/Her) on
  • Women’s Empowerment in the Indian Community is the topic I’m tackling. In our society, certain males prefer to believe that women should be at home caring for their children and the house. Article on Women Empowerment: Issues and Challenges by Murthy S is what I’ve decided to utilize. As an Indian, Srinivasa Murthy is a trustworthy source since he performed his study, and he obtained more material from both male and female authors.
  • Women in India confront difficulties like as sexual harassment, underage marriage, and Dowry and Bride burning, which the author addresses. Bullet points are used to describe each of the difficulties women in India face.
  • Specifically in India, this essay aims to shed attention on the struggles women face on a daily basis. The essay is aimed at everyone, especially those who are interested in understanding more about women’s employment and the challenges that women face in India. As the author explains, he wrote this post to help promote women’s rights, growth, and empowerment.
  • In the article’s goals and objectives, the author argues that women deserve equal rights. Considering that this is a research paper, the genre of the article would be expository writing. It shed light on what women empowerment is and the challenges women encounter.
  • It is believed by the author that strengthening the regulatory frameworks will help eliminate all forms of gender discrimination. With the involvement of both genders in altering cultural attitudes and community actions.
  • Women Empowerment: Issues and Challenges » The International Journal of Indian Psychȯlogy (ijip.in)
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