Option 1: Write a passive aggressive note. What makes up the genre of the passive aggressive note? What do you have to consider about the audience and context?

Dear Valued Customers

Yes, the idea of a secret menu for your favorite places to stop for a quick drink or bite. Some people are plagued by such extreme feelings of isolation in their everyday lives that they need to feel like they’re part of an exclusive group who order unique items by combining other items on menus in the same way that strangers they’ll never meet have combined.

The thing is, stuff costs money. If you want more stuff, then it will cost more money. If you want to copy strangers on the internet and ingest some concoction they’ve made up of multiple items and shared, you need to pay for those extra items added to your order. Sandwiches don’t need to be combined into one massive sandwich, and it probably isn’t good for your health to do so. It would be beneficial to both your health and your wallet to order regularly when you decide to stop for food and drink.

Note end. When writing a passive aggressive note, you have to walk around the issue and not say directly what the issue really is. You have to paint it in a way that makes it broader than just telling someone what you found wrong in their actions or words. You have to think about the audience and assume that they will respond or relate somehow to the way that you’ve phrased your words. I went with the secret menu idea because I feel terrible ordering any sort of “secret menu” item, and honestly can’t find most of them appealing. Usually, it costs extra to add so much to your order and then people complain that they went to get an item, but couldn’t believe how expensive it is. So I tried to use a bit of a common sense idea that of course adding things is going to cost more in the context, but a lot of people I know who want the secret menu items don’t think about the cost until they’re at the register.

It’s interesting to think about how tools like email have shifted the way that people communicate on large scales in the workplace. It’s a strange sort of development because it has plenty of pros and cons to its use. People at any level in a company can communicate with others who are at any level in the company instantaneously, or to every other employee with the exact same message. Alternatively, it becomes a tool that can be used in passive-aggressive ways or can be misunderstood as easily, or perhaps easier, than in-person communication.

When talking to someone in person, there’s the added nuance of body language and tone of voice. In electronic forms of communication, these nuances are lost and the meanings of the words can be misinterpreted by the recipient. Sometimes, I’ll get texts and think that someone is angry when they’re not, but it’s hard to tell because I can’t physically see them or hear how they meant the words to sound. In the context of company communication, that can be terrifying. If you receive an email from a higher up, it’s harder to ask for clarification if you misunderstand the emotions behind it than if you’re talking to a friend or relative. By sacrificing the personal touch of communication for efficiency, we might make it easier to communicate, but do we sacrifice the clarity of communication in doing so?

I’m analyzing Reagan economics in the form of a children’s book. The advantage of this form is that I can add in visuals to supplement the text, and the text will be put in simpler language as rhetorical and political language are often difficult to understand. I want to try to put it in a simple form to see the connections between Reagan’s policies, how he gathered support through rhetorical language, and then how his policies and ideas have had lasting effects on the economy, even in the present day. In this way, any American able to read would be able to start to learn about some of the events that contributed to the current state of the economy and the economic idol that Reagan became, for better or for worse.

Ronald Reagan’s most famous speech was “A Time for Choosing,” which he gave in 1964. Reagan created a strong speech that persuaded others through the use of his language and the examples he gave to support his claims. From the beginning, he makes himself sound like a regular guy and forgoes starting with political language or jargon that can easily confuse people and leave them feeling alienated because of it. He starts the speech with the line “I am going to talk of controversial things.”  He doesn’t pretend that he’s going to sugar coat his words to make them more palatable to the masses, and this starts off his persuasion and the way that he can sway and evoke emotions in an audience.

Next, he refers to the two-party system battling each other as a family fight, giving a sense of community and belonging to all Americans by calling them all one family going through a rift amongst themselves. One of the important phrases about America is that it’s a melting pot for all cultures, and Reagan uses that idea while taking it one step further and refers to America as one large family. He is able to get his audience to relate to him with the use of one simple, familiar word because it makes him familiar. It makes him “one of us” rather than a distant, cold politician.

That isn’t the only word choice that Reagan makes in his speech that is carefully done to persuade his audience and evoke feelings that he can use to leverage support for his message. He paints America as a place of freedom for those who reside within it, and as a place of hope for those who are in unfortunate circumstances outside of it like the Cuban refugee he mentions talking about how lucky he felt that America provided him a place to escape to. Freedom is a core American value, and Reagan uses that value to advocate for the type of government that he wants Americans they feel they need.

Reagan makes his argument that it’s time for Americans to choose freedom from government control. He wanted the private sector to control more facets of life and the economy rather than the government, and he leveraged his support in his speech for this by saying that to not reduce government control would be the same as submitting the freedom of Americans to the government. And in another use of the persuasive language combined with familiar, powerful references (a tactic Reagan excelled with), he makes his audience ask themselves what freedoms the Founding Fathers wanted for Americans, implying that they would have preferred the freedom of self-government over giving up freedom for the security a more centralized government would provide. Instead, it was what the Founding Fathers did not want, or at least wanted kept to a minimum.

He pushes on with endless examples of how a more centralized government is failing the people it’s meant to govern, who happen to be people that Reagan wants to inspire to believe in their ability to govern themselves. He makes the problems relatable and the solutions sound achievable.

I think the most important question that we should be asking about the economy is “Who does the economy benefit?” I want to understand how the economy that we have today has been developed over the years. Has it always benefitted the same groups? Has it always been designed to promote and maintain inequality? How do you even go about fixing the level of inequality that we face today?

In addition to understanding how the economy is shaping the who benefits from it and maintaining inequality, how do those of us who don’t have the power to change it live with it? How do I succeed when the economy is against my success? How do I pay for my schooling when the schools are keen on making money off of my desire to be educated? Textbook prices have skyrocketed along with the cost of tuition, but minimum wage rarely increases, and if it does, it still isn’t enough to provide a living wage. Why should I have to work myself to death to survive financially when past generations could make a living wage without a degree and support a family with it?

What happened?

It’s frightening to think of educational institutes (regardless of how well they fit that definition in the realm of for-profit schools) use the same or similar tactics to televangelists, who are rather pushy and the money given in hopes of some false reward being preached adds up really quickly. The worst part is that the people who are generally swindled into giving money to those televangelists can’t afford to be doing that.

Not only is that frightening, but it’s disgusting that students like Jason, who just wants to better himself in one of the few ways available to him, is being seen as more-or-less a bag of money by the staff members of the for-profit college rather than as a student who they should be helping in ways that are in his best interest. It’s difficult to believe that they would send students towards programs that weren’t very practical or useful in the long term unless the students specifically mentioned an interest in the criminal justice program, which had some practical use for getting jobs after completing the program.

It was difficult to read this piece, not because of the writing or the language, but because of the content. It makes me believe more strongly in the need for revisions to the education systems and the policies guiding them at all levels of government. Even recently, there are the occasional articles that come up about students who are unable to get loan forgiveness who have attended for-profit colleges because politics have gotten in the way of education. But like the reading discusses how colleges rely on inequalities to some extent no matter the college, there are more issues contributing to the problems of for-profit colleges and the problems of students like Jason than just the way that the colleges present themselves as a Godsend for those who are in need.

Melissa

Adrienne

Kyri

Christian

Artifact: Song – Just a Stranger by Kali Uchis

Analyzing this artifact begins with looking at the lyrics and the way that they are delivered with the music in the background. On a closer look, the song has a similar message to Gold Digger by Kanye. Then, we look at the target audience that the musician is trying to persuade or influence. It comes off as a social criticism with the singer addressing the women who use men for money because they aren’t looking for love, but they will latch onto men who are looking for love for the sole reason that they have money to give her and support a certain kind of lifestyle that they demand. The singer is sharing her point of view on the idea of gold diggers and women who use men for money, as it is repeated multiple times, “She wants my hundreds.”

However, looking closer into the lyrics, the singer says that it doesn’t matter how you get money when you have needs that need to be met. She pulls in a bit of sympathy with this idea because you don’t know why a woman does what she does, and it might not be as straightforward black-and-white as people assume.

She has a message that takes a stance, to explain or persuade with a song. She has a purpose behind the lyrics that she uses. She also includes an appeal to emotion in her lyrics that offsets the general view of gold diggers.

Zelizer mentions the eventual rise of e-banking and the ability to put restrictive uses even on money transferred from one person to another through such a system in a way that the money could only be used for a specific purpose (Zelizer used the example of buying office supplies). The use of such systems already exists with e-gift cards and websites (like Paypal and Venmo) that allow for transactions through electronic means. There are also phone applications that offer rebates for purchases of certain products that can then be cashed out into one of the available gift cards in their selection, which fits into the idea of Zelizer that people would receive money with restrictions as gift cards can only be used at their specific locations.

I feel like Zelizer missed a category of exchange as it can be used as a form of manipulation as well. Yes, it acts as gifts, compensation, and entitlement, but there are negative uses of money as well and those uses are part of toxic relationships rather than the employer-employee or any of the other relationships between which currency is exchanged that Zelizer mentioned. Money can be used to play on people’s emotions for the benefit of one person. “Psychics” and “churches” send out requests for money in exchange for insight or guidance into the receiver’s life, but no matter how much money is sent, the receiver never gains anything of value in return. They form parasitic relationships with their victims, and it leaves the vulnerable left spending money they don’t have for the hope of a return on their investment that they’ll never see. Maybe this doesn’t fit in Zelizer’s work or theories, but it is a part of currency that felt like it was skipped over in this reading. It is a part of exchange and part of the economy, but it shows the negative side of currency rather than the positive or purely transactional and impersonal sides that were thoroughly covered.

Analyzing The Great Gatsby would require looking at the time that Fitzgerald wrote it, possibly finding if he spoke about his inspirations for the novels at any point or what scholars who study literature believe about the piece to build a foundation for analysis. Next, I would focus on the social class representations in the novel and what that means in the time that it was written compared to social classes throughout history and in the present. I feel like this would lead me to the effects of social classes as they have existed through history and how they still influence modern times even though the official labels have changed to become more “palatable” to the lower classes to make them not feel like serfs.

All of this would help me understand the artifact better because social class is an important part of Gatsby’s ability to be with Daisy, and he’s aware of that. It’s what leads to him making choices that try to attract her attention, gain her love, and ultimately lead to his death. How would that have been different if a higher social class wasn’t needed for Daisy’s attention? Why is it still important in the time in which the piece takes place to socialize and marry within the same social classes?

Question: What is one piece of culture (a song, movie, book) that you encountered recently that has to do with money?

Answer contains spoilers for F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby.

The Great Gatsby revolves around money heavily through the idea of Old Money versus New Money. Jay Gatsby worked to acquire wealth purely for the goal of attracting Daisy’s attention because he loved her, but she was from the world of Old Money and he knew that he wouldn’t be able to impress her or give her the lifestyle that she would demand from a man without him having wealth. There’s an expectation that Daisy has about life that Gatsby would need money to fulfill, and he then uses his money to throw extravagant parties to catch Daisy’s attention. While everyone else thinks about the money and wealth that Gatsby has, Gatsby doesn’t care about the money itself as much as he cares about how the money can lead to him gaining Daisy’s love, which has been his goal for years.

Yet in the end, Daisy is able to continue her life with Tom after Gatsby’s death in the comfort of Old Money, seemingly not caring very much about the death of Gatsby and his love for her as much as she cares about living a lifestyle built by anyone’s wealth.