Before I write my story down, I really appreciate that this guy shared a little piece of his story. His writing was deep and eye opening for me, at least. I have visited prison when I was a senior in high school. It was a field trip for psychology class. I would expect that the prison would be very loud and dirty with a lot of wild people. However, it was different than I thought. When my class and I walked around the prison and empty cells, it was clean and mostly quite with neat decoration walls. But, one thing I can feel about was that it was very depressing there. There were different parts by prisoner’s charges and sentences. Then we went to the most violent criminals section. Many people in cell was actually yelled or cursed to us. It was very scary. The one guy kept hit his head to bars. I thought he was going to break his heads. The person who guided our class told us that most people in this section would be stuck here until they die which means they were ‘lifers.’ I did not feel anything, not even sympathy, or pity. To be honest, I just thought that people make mistakes that they should not have done and have to suck it up with what they have done. We also met the guy who was a football player at college, but expelled now since he used drugs. He told us how he regret what he had done and want his life back. It was his first year in prison and had left two to three years more. When he talked us his personal story, I began to feel sorry for him. Since he talked to us very nicely and gently, he changed my mind and thought which all the prisoners would be violent and wild. After the field trip, my psychology teacher told us that many prisoners were not educated, and from poor family. Some did not even graduated from high school like the guy who wrote the letter for the sociology class. May be it wasn’t their choices to be like that. They were not taught what they should have done or should not have done from their parents. My both parents graduated from college, had master degrees, and middle upper class. My parents taught my sister and me about the society standard rules since we were younger. I started to think about if I were born from poor and not educated family, would I still be myself? Nobody knows this answer. But my first thought was, may be I could be the guy in this prison, and I am just a lucky girl who has great parents. This guy who wrote the letter for our class would be different when he was from different family, or in different circumstances. Since he regret his crime and have willing to start new like with fresh mind, he deserves the second chance to live in society.

The class of today was very powerful and extremely intense. I expected today class would be more fun and exciting than it was. First of all, I didn’t like the way Sam talked in class today. I do not even know what kind of message he was trying to deliver in class. I obviously have thought about the Iraq war as ‘the oil war in the Middle Eastern’ and wrote three pages of paper during my high school senior year. However, this is my first time that this war is actually about the fight for religion, between Christian and Muslim. Before I make my point here, I admit that I was raised in Christian family since I was born. Because I am Christian, my point of view might be looked much narrowed or tended to be offending Christians. Though I will try not to make my point be biased as the Christian view. Personally, I do not know much about Muslim, or did not know at all before their suicide bomb got popular and famous all over the world. I was definitely horrified whenever I saw or heard the news about their terrors. I still remember the moment I saw the news of 911 at World Trade Center in New York City. I was in 4th grade in Korea. I was watching the television show with my parents at late night. Then it eventually showed the scene of the plane going into the building. I was not even shocked, but thought it was the part of movie which bad people try to hurt the others. When Sam showed us the video about ‘Jihad’, I felt same thing as I did when I saw the most dreadful moment ever I have seen. The terrors by extreme Muslim were very scary, but I do not agree with the point Sam made today. It is not the issue about Christian or Muslim trying to take over or covert the world to make every single person to believe their religion. I actually think it is about the economy, power, authority, greed of USA. I agree many Americans are Christians, but not all. I have read the data that wealthy people are tended to be more intense Christian. Then if they are Christians, do they really believe and practice the teaching of Jesus from bible? No. Some might be very intense and proud of the fact that they are Christians, but many others would just be saying they are Christians even they do not go to the church on every Sunday. Many soldiers in Iraq are not from the wealthy family. They chose to be in Iraq as American Soldiers, because mostly like to earn more money. This already proves that it is not about the religion war, not even close to describe American soldiers as ‘Christian Invaders.’

I think I am pretty offended about the race most of time whenever it comes to issue. I wasn’t either born or raised in United States of America. I am a girl from Korea, Republic of, and also was raised in the same place I was born. I came to states when I was fifteen years old. When I was in Oklahoma as an exchange student, there wasn’t any Asian students at school, except some exchange students and me. Some ignorant students didn’t call our names but ‘Asian 1’, ‘Asian 2’, ‘Asian 3’ and so on. It definitely hurts my friends’ and my feeling. I also felt there was a huge, think and tall walls between them and me at that time. I still wondered that was it necessary to them categorizing us as just Asians without our own precious names?     
In my opinion, particularly Americans are more intended to categorize people by their race and ethnicity than people from other countries. When I traveled around Europe last summer, European never asked me where I was from.
But why do we have to recognize or categorize people by their race or their ethnicity?
Even when I wrote college application when I was a senior at high school, I had to fill out a million of categories about my race and ethnicity. First, they ask me about either I am an American or a foreigner. Then there are categories to describe my race; White, African American, Hispanic, Asian, and etc. After I check an asian box, it requests me again to describe about which specific countries an area I am from. I applied for eight colleges and every single application requests me to fill all these out. I guess all the college needs this information for diversity in school program, but is it that really necessary?
Most of time when people wondered about  the place I was from, first they asked me, ‘Are you CHINESE?’ then after I said no, they asked me again. ‘Then are you from Japan?; Last time, one American came and directly say ‘Ni Hao’, meaning hello in chinese, to me. I got a little bit upset at that time. I didn’t know the reason why I was upset about but, I was very offended to the person.
People might just wonder where I am from. Most of time I managed them well. Managing well means I correct them that I am neither from China nor Japan, but Korea with my big smile. Even I tried to be nice to the people who are offended but sometimes I get so upset when people make fun of Asian’s unique and unskilled accent and pronunciation.  
Sometimes it hurts my feeling.

Recently we argued about white guilt a lot in class. And most of time I agreed with Sam. To be with more honest, as a (Asian) foreigner, I didn’t know about white guilt. Before I heard about this, I thought all white didn’t feel about what they have done in the past. Or why should they be? I knew about the beginning history of America but I didn’t know what was wrong with it. It was just an invasion as other countries did like Napoleon’s invasion all over the Europe and some Asia countries. (may be because I am ignorant in finding the meaning of history.) But then I realized that there was irony in U.S. history when Sam started to talk about how this freedom country is based on ignoring others freedom which is Native Americans’. After that lecture, I began to think that may be Americans should feel a little bit of guilt about what they did to the other races. However, as long as I have thought about this issue, I realized that I was wrong. It wasn’t about white guilt but, accepting the truth in history even it is their shame.
Most of American teenagers are not well known about these meaning of facts. Obviously they knew what had happened, not in real way. I don’t think white should feel guilt about this, but at least they should be aware about what their ancestors have done to other race. I read some earlier comments that regarded about ‘Are U.S. children ready to hear all the ugly history and the truth in the past?’ I partially agree with this point.  However, I strongly recommend teaching the ‘ugly’ truth since the kids are young.
It seems like that some classmates (in this sociology class) tried to avoid or not to accept the real truth. (when we did class poll and discussion)
People tend to consider the history as just simple fact in the past, which is not right way to look at the history.
In my opinion, white shouldn’t feel guilt about the things happened in history by their ancestor. However, they must remember the happening and learned how it was unfair. Then they should remind the history and the responsibility to themselves and their children. (teach them that it is bad and was their ancestors’ fault, not theirs) Also people have to put some efforts to try not to happen again.
The children should have responsibility to their ancestors’ bad behavior as Germany still pay money to Jews who suffered from holocaust.
My final sentence is that white guilt is about the responsibility but not feeling and suffering real guilty from what their ancestors have done.

If the producer of this show made up to be in this way (only white people in this show), i think there is a little bit of understandable reason. Most couples who get married are the same race. I don't want to say this because i might sound like a racist. But when i see the couple with different race to each other, I give them second look (even i didn't mean it though) I am a female asian and I don't mind about being or becoming a mixed couple but I just automatically look at them again because i am not used to see them.

Actually I never finished this show with full episodes, but I ve watched this show partially several times since my roommate is a crazy fan of the show. Most times it is so lame to keep watching this show at least to me. Whoever the one who tries to find his/ or her soulmate to get married comes up and has so many dates. I get more embarrased and disgusted when the one actually chose his/her soulmate at final episode. \when \i watched the show, I never realized that how all the people in show are whites. Maybe I didnt pay attention. but \i dont think it matters anyways. maybe the reason why there are only whites in this show is because other race people like black, asian or hispanic didn't apply to be on the show. Personally It would be interesting that if there was a final couple who are mixed races like white man and asian woman.

I remember how everyone in class was intense and some were upset when Sam brought up the topic about how we all live in ‘Red land’; because it was originally belonged to native Americans. I felt very little anxious when some people argued him back why we should feel guilt about this situation in class. The actual point what sam wanted to talk about was that we shouldn’t forget that this land was originally belonged to Native American rather than we should feel guilt about what our ancestor have done. Because most of us forget about this fact and live on. In this condition, this fact will be forgotten and no one would remember this.
What we should try and do is helping those desperate people in need and not discriminating them from us. There are still discriminations going on between white people, African American and Native Americans in United Stated of America.
From the statistics Sam showed us, I saw very high percentage of crime and sexual assaults happening in Native Americans. Also they have the lowest income. Their lives seen on the show was almost tragedy. If I were them, I would be very depressed every day. I thought Sam was very clever when he brought up this topic. because even when i learned about the U.S. history, I never thought it was the one of genocides. Another questionable point is that is it okay to let One of the Native Americans who lives in South Dakota said that when bush was care about the poor from third countries(IRAQ), he didn’t really think or take care his own people who are poor and desperate others’ help in need from interview. This interview was very impressive in personally. Because it reminded me South Korea helping North Korea. South Korea supported North Korea by giving them lots of rice, money, and some other resources. There are many people against this people who help North Korea because there are still many poverty who need help.
I think we should help people whom are near to us rather than people whom live more further than us.

I agree that lesbians are more acceptable than gays in this society as many other students think. There might be several reasons and phenomenon for explaining this fact. The major fact I think that is because women are more acceptable than men in general which means the society usually don’t refuse whatever women do, but guys. To explain this more detail, women can be either girly or tomboy like men (or something else like both mixed character), but guys should be tough and manlike. If they show a little bit of sensitive or girly character people say ‘it’s gay’. Also when little kids are raised, the parents’ perceptions are different in accord with the sex of their children. For example, when the parents raise their own children, it is perfectly fine if they buy either Barbie dolls or soccer ball for their daughters. However, most parents wouldn’t buy Barbie dolls or other girly dolls for their sons (because it is gay). It gets more obvious when we see the students in high school. We think the girls whom are very good at sports are cool (even being good at sports is men’s role according to stereotype) We also don’t care the girls whom are very girly like always wearing skirts, make up, and have all the pink stuffs, because they are being as a stereotype of girl. However when a male student hangs out with just only girls and acts like a girl, other students call him a gay. This is also shown in the high school movies and dramas; High school musical, Glee, and so on. We can see different attitudes clearly. From ‘High school musical’, male students think that it is so gay that boys are singing in musical club at school because singing is not enough to be seemed tough. And when they get used to it, we see some bully students making fun of them by their singing and performance in the middle of the show. Another example would be when a gay student passes by in hallway, people make fun and stare at him with whisper. However, we don’t see many lesbians in movie or drama in often. It seems unfair that how we act differently by people’s behavior or their genders. There are not much difference between gays and lesbians. They both are homosexual and there is nothing wrong with it. People are just attracted to the same gender. As I have heard many famous scholars were gay and had own wives, I guess being gay or lesbian is one of unique human nature. Lastly, I don’t know exactly why we have discriminated between different genders, but i know that is it not right when we treat them unfairly.

I found a few interesting facts from this article. First, I didn’t realize that there are still more than 7000 languages around the world today. It seems a lot. If I estimate the number of existing language now, I would guess about few hundreds languages. Personally, I can speak few languages. I speak English, Korean, and some Japanese. I also learned Chinese when I was a little girl, but I forgot them all. Learning Language is very difficult and important. It is not just about learning how to communicate, but also understanding their different culture. For example, as I am a Korean, I had very hard time in speaking English when I first came to American. Even I was educated and taught English since I was seven years old. The grammar, vocabulary and expressions are so different from the place where I came from. I didn’t have that hard time learning in chinese and Japanese. It is because Korean, Japanese ad Chinese share lots of common culture, life style and similar expression. Lastly, I didn’t get the sense of losing languages before I read this article. Honestly, I am not quite sure about it yet. When I first listened to Boa Sr speaking, it sounded like kind of baby’s murmuring. We now remember this as the language which just disappeared but, it will be forgot as time goes by. Will any of our descent remember this language? The answer is NO. Before some people who speak the ancient language in India passed away, is categorized as a language.
However no one would either speak or remember this ancient language from India since she died. As I mentioned before, the language represent its peoples’ the way of life. I am a little bit upset and disappointed that we lost one of human races’ precious culture and their achievements.

The world is becoming one in stream of the globalization. Most people in this world nowadays speak in English. Being able to speak in English is power and advantage in this world. (because USA is the strongest country now) Even they don’t speak perfectly English, they can use some simple English words and phrases to express basic circumstance. In Korea, there are some words that are almost disappeared because Koreans used so many English words like ice cream, bus, and sign instead of using real Korean. Those words almost become Korean; so people don’t even realize that it is English. From the documentary I watched before, this might lead to the destruction of Korean language. Obviously it will take long time, like few several hundred years, but there are still possibility. I guess this is not just phenomenon in Korea, but also around all over the world. My conclusion is we all should value and consider every culture preciously.

First I didn’t watch this film yet, but I have heard about how this movie was great and most people loved it. Even I didn’t watch ’Avatar’, I know the plot of it from people talking and the media. When I read Brook’s column, I was disagree with most parts he wrote except that is true that we saw many movies about whites doing good or bad things and becoming saviors. In my opinion I don’t think the white people should be offensive about how the whites were described as the people ruin the environment and harm the nature. Because this movie was made by American (and also filmed in United States of America), it was easier to describe themselves for those producers. Also it is true that Americans have been wasted the enormous amount of the nature sources since Industrial Revolution anyway. On the other hand the whites (Americans) are the most population who are awaken about eco friendly campaigns and try to protect nature. The influence of technology and money in America is prodigious.They can either destroy or save the earth. It is possible that the story of this movie would become real in future. Who knows? As I mentioned earlier, the whites are portrayed as either the saviors or the destroyers. But the theme of movie is not about this. The point in this movie is how all human races on this Earth should protect and keep the Earth. (Especially developed countries; maybe that’s why they bring Americans into play for one of examples) One of my Asian friends who watched this movie told me this movie reminds her again about how we are all greedy and selfish. Even the whites (American troops) were used in the movie, she found out herself in those American troops. This movie is not just about white but all of us. I still desire to watch this movie (even I know the facts and plot of the movie), because the movie also will strike me to be good and nice to our nature.