Non-verbal communication

After the discussion we had in class and the youtube video "non-verbal communication: the documentary" i  can say that I'm agree with the saying "actions speak louder than words" according to the video 93% of the communication we have is not verbal this means that the majority of the things we express are not necessary the words coming out of our mouth.

For example; you can tell how's someone feeling about something by their facial expression, if its a disliking expressing or a happy one, the other person would notice the emotion you have by the expression on your face even when you don say anything with words at all. 

Another example can be that you can say a lot about someone you don't even know just based on the way they look, the way they act and the way its dressed, this means that if you see someone like all dirty with ugly and nasty clothes in the middle of a street you would probably think that that person in homeless or a criminal or something like that, even when you don't know anything about that person at all you can tell it because of their look.

Also is really important to be aware of our whole body image, language and expressions while trying to give a message to somebody, it might get misunderstood because your words need to be connected with the rest of your body, the things you're saying and trying to project need to be connected with the rest of your body. 

To sum up, it's definitely true that actions speak louder than words in my opinion because you can totally communicate without words but you definitely can't do it without the things that your body and expressions emote. 

Arhuaco Culture

The arhuacos are an indigenous group also called ika o ijke, they're an amerindian community that lives in high valleys as the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Colombia. Their population is close to 14 thousand people. The arhuacos are highly recognized for they dynamic organization and level of political knowledge. Their principal source of living is agriculture.

Nowdays arhuacos rights are been discriminated because some business people are willing to take them out of the sierra nevada where their natural environment in order to build an spectacular, majestic hotel in their virgin territory this not only affect them because they're been taken to another place but to the land and nature that they've been protecting for all the decades that they had lived there, also they as indigenous group expect to have the government's support to NOT build this construction not only because of the rights they had as the providers of the land but because that place is a legal possession of the state but in contrast of this the government had support they project of making this hotel.

I think the arhuacos should be respected as a subculture and they should be in the land that they have won and take care of for all this years, they're not only human beings as the rest of the community but they're also our patrimony, the living heritage we have left from our past so instead of trying to destroy that we should be willing to fight and support them in their cause.

MY GREEK FAT WEEDING 

All around the world there're different civilizations, each one of them have their own traditions, languages, religion and culture in general. Later in time, in the majority of the population, people used to marry people from their own society with their same beliefs and culture, now that isn't really a matter, because of the globalization and the fact that culture is not only related with the place where you live in, couple with different beliefs are getting marry without ever worrying about that. 

Talking about the fact that this two people who are from different cultures, they can have a lot of problems because of that specific thing, One of this issues can be the food, every society have their own traditional cuisine and likes and probably the food that one of the two from the couple loves the other may hate it, maybe one of them is used to eat in a certain way because of their society traditions that is going to be different from the other one. For example in the movie my greek fat weeding, Toula, the bride, who's greek  and her family are used to eat a lot of animal meat in big portions while the groom who's american is a vegetarian and he and he's family are used to eat smaller portions than Toula's family.

Another fact that can be a huge issue between the marriage of two different culture's individuals is family traditions, in a lot of cultures the family is the epicenter of their living way, giving the family the most important role in the hole aspects of their live, they work as a family in the same business, they make decisions as a family they act like one single machine but also in other civilizations the importance of the family is not that big of a deal, they just see the family as the people they have around but they don't necessary work in the same thing or have the same interest. For example in the movie we saw in class, Toula's live was all about her family, she worked at a family's restaurant, she lived with a lot of their family members, she was always around her family and she always did what her family decided based on their greek traditions while Ian's family was just composed by their parents and every single person of their family had their own space and interest.

Finally another fact i think is pretty important and can became a big problem in the marriage is the upbringing of the kids this couples have together, they have to get to an agreement about which aspects of each cultures they're gonna pass to their kids, which traditions they want to keep and which one they do not want to, sometimes two cultures can be very contradicting about an specific fact and this can become a huge issue for the marry couple, for example in the movie, Toula who was greek, probably wanted to race her kids under the greek traditions she was taught too but also she had to keep in mind that Ian was American and he was the father of her daughter so they got to the point where their kid was being raced by a mixed of this two cultures, we saw that in the end of the film Toula's daughter was getting greek food to lunch for school but also Toula said to her that when she grew up she was going to be able to study or do what she likes and wants.

To sum up, culture can be a really problematic fact in a marriage, that doesn't mean that a marriage from different societies people is going to fail, it just means that they have to put an extra effort to be tolerant with their partners beliefs.

xoxo, Olga 

Endangered cultures, the truth or the myth

Since the beginning of the times, society have always tried to find the way to overcome themselves in all the aspects, financially, technologies, health care issues and more; but after all this years that had passed by and all the advances we had made there's an ugly part in all this pretty good things happening. One of the biggest issues that society in their need of progress has left behind is about cultures, every day while the "normal" people that lives in the city are being fascinated with some new thing in the other part of the world there's an endangered culture hiding in the jungle or mountains and by saying endangered i mean the pain and the effect that we're probably causing to an extraordinary, fascinating and mystic little society.

In this matter, the word endangered have a lot of content because we're not just talking about their security as human beings but the dangered caused to their culture and their traditions.

As Tom Colls says in his article "the death of language" there's an estimated 7000 languages spoken all over the world but he also points that this number is getting lower and lower everytime and i get his point because why would someone to learn their native language if they also have to learn another worldwide spoken language in order to communicate with the whole world? would it be really worth it? and i think its not a problem inside the endangered cultures i think the problem is on the society in general, or wouldn't you just overlook someone if they're on the streets talking to everybody in an strange idiom, you'd probably think that that person need to learn your language asap but you would probably never be open to the possibility of you learning theirs. 

In 1992 a US prominent linguist said that by 2100, 90% of this 7000 languages won't be spoken in the world anymore and theres a huge possibility for that to happen, for us "the normal society people" this could not have a value of but have you ever though about this other cultures? wouldn't just be boring the world if all of us were exactly the same, act the same way, dress the same, eat the same? 

In my opinion is really REALLY important to protect this different cultures, they are our begging our ancestors, they are part of this magical world were we just got out from, we owe them what we are today or isn't it english a mix of different native languages and so do the other idioms in the world? i think we should be more aware of this issue and don't let all this heritage and traditions fade away just because of globalization, we can advance without losing our beginnings there's no need to eliminate them for our lives and even worst we don't need and we shouldn't be allow to eliminate all this culture points from others lifes.

On the other hand, while talking about traditions and heritage i don't just mean language I'm talking about every single aspect surrounding this endangered societies, the UNESCO has identify some endangered cultures as mariachis from mexico, poetic duelling from cyprus and chinese shadow puppetry, this traditions that had travel in time and had being alive for so long could just be death anytime and i think the main reason why this could happen is because of the lack of interest we as the majority of the society have on this kind of cultures, we just don't care enough about it.

To sum up, i think its very important to protect this different cultures not just because they deserve it and have the right to stay alive but because they're what we all come from they are our ancestors our living past, this cultures bring to society traditions, stories, history and a quick look of where we were first, of where we started, they also give us different additions to our culture as music, food, dress, religion, thoughts and the majority of this endangered cultures try to clean up the mess we've been made to our environment, they take care of the nature because they live from it. I think is vital to keep the cultural diversity because we all have the right to do what we're been conditioned and taught to do, if we are changed from what we used to be to have society wants you to theres always going to be a pain inside your soul, it wasn't really nice at all to be taken out of your comfort zone and as i said before wouldn't just be a boring world if we all were the same? let's just let everybody do what they believe in.

xoxo, Olga

Hi, my name is Olga I'm 17 years old and i'm from Cartagena, Colombia but i live in Barranquilla, I study mechanical engineering and right now i'm in 3rd semester of this career at la Universidad del Norte and also i'm a student of the english content I spring 2012 class with the teacher Paige Poole, i hope you like my blog and read all my post.