Introduction Post_Ramandeep Kaur

Hello everyone, my name is Ramandeep Kaur, but I also go by Raman (Ra-men) for short. I’m 20 years old and currently a junior at NJCU, majoring in Criminal Justice with a minor in Data Analytics. I’ve lived in Carteret, New Jersey, for most of my life. Some of my ambitions include traveling, exploring new cafés, getting my masters degree after graduating, going on hikes, and doing as much community service as possible throughout my lifetime. Most of the community service I do is through my church, where we often work with an aid group called Khalsa Aid who help people in need. In my free time, I enjoy playing tennis, listening to music, cooking, baking, and hosting get-togethers for my loved ones. I also consider myself an activist because I’m not afraid to speak up or call out injustices in my community; I believe that at some point, someone has to step forward in order to make a change. Below, I’ve attached two images. The one on the left shows my pet bunnies, whom I adopted this summer, they’re now six months old and a mix of Lion head and Netherland Dwarf breeds. The picture on the right is from one of the hikes I went on this summer at Fall Hills, NJ.

 
    (My pet bunnies Toffee & Dodo)                    One of my hiking spots

1- Understanding Patriarchy by Bell Hooks

"Patriarchy demands of men that they become and remain emotional cripples"(Page 4)

Short Response: Patriarchal thinking still exists within men. Most of them are still trapped in the old ideas of masculinity which makes them suffer and pressures them into issues like making sure they are as dominant as possible and violence which would make them feel or appear more "manly." While some might believe that we are moving past this, with a new generation who are open to showing their feelings and talk about their problems and not feel "weak," at the same time the older generation is still stuck and cant live past their ways, raising their kids according to what they have been taught.

"Most of us learned patriarchal attitudes in our family of origin, and they were usually taught to us by our mothers. These attitudes were reinforced in schools and religious institutions."(Page 2)

Short Response: Where does the patriarchal attitude comes from? Most of the time, our mothers who teach us; it is not only men, everyone in our family who pass down the thinking. Some of the most common places include churches school or even your own community. This ideology has slowly become a part of us before we even get to process it since we have been taught since we were little kids. One of them is gender stereotype, which we don't even question these days. We have all heard "boys shouldn't cry" or "Girls should know how to cook" these norms have been passed down to us and appear to be rather common in society.

2- What Memes Owe to Art History

"Memes offer a highly accessible and interactive platform of production that is ripe for challenge and dissent with disagreements and controversy only fueling the fire of a successful meme truly going viral." (Paragraph 4)

Short Response: Since memes are easy to create and share on any open platform, they've become a way for us to express our ideas for or against something. Memes can be easily changed, and it's simple to give your opinion on them by commenting, agreeing, or disagreeing. The more interaction a meme gets, the more it spreads. Because they're so accessible and not time consuming to make, unlike traditional art from the 1960s, memes are essentially our conversation starters, making it easy for anyone to have an input.

"Through humor, memes incite a collective reaction to everyday life as well as reveling in it, in a format not less playful that it is political, decoding the murky structural screw-ups paradoxes and hypocrisies of our current political climate." (Paragraph 5)

Short Response: Memes can be both used both in funny and in a serious way in order to get people talking on a situation. Memes use humor to get a whole group of people to react to things in their everyday lives. They are a playful but also political way of pointing out the confusing problems and hypocrisies in the world. Basically, memes turn complex issues into simple jokes that everyone can understand and share in todays world where some scroll through memes for hours.

3- Memes Are Our Generation's Protest Art | VICE

"They reflect what’s happening in society, and help justify feelings of rage and fear while helping us feel less alone."(Paragraph 9)

Short Response: Memes are a way for us to share our feelings with the rest of the world. By using a picture and a few words, we can express ourselves without feeling stupid or alone because everyone else gets it and joins in. It's like finding out a random thought you had is something everyone else feels too, giving you comfort by putting your thoughts out there and seeing that they're valid. And a meme doesn't always have to be something unserious it can also be something significant going on.

"You can express yourself with one picture of a meme better than a whole page of text." (Paragraph 10)

Short Response: A single meme can communicate more effectively than a whole page of writing and in my opinion most of us wouldn't read that one page. In our modern age, where everyone's attention span is super short, a meme works like a shortcut. Think about TikTok, you only have a few seconds to get your point across. A meme instantly connects with a shared joke or feeling, letting you express something complicated with or without a few words. It's powerful because it creates a collective understanding, allowing people to get the point across and feel a connection without having to read a lot of text.