What I Have Learned

During my time at Defiance College I was not happy to find that writing was required. I dislike writing and I find it very boring. However AH120 was a lot different then what I thought it was going to be. It was not the normal writing class. I thought that we would only learn writing techniques or how to cite sources. While we did learn better ways to do both of those we also learned about history. We learned a lot about the Holocaust, the Armenian Genocide, and lynching in our country. We watched such movies, as Ararat, Strange Fruit, and a documentary on Emmett Till. We also read Maus. It was different from other novels I had read because it was a graphic novel. It was fascinating learning about the Holocaust from that point of view. Before this class I thought I knew a lot about the Holocaust. Throughout the course of the class, however, I learned some things that I never knew. I also learned about the Armenian Genocide. Honestly before this class I did not even know there was an Armenian Genocide. Therefore, this part of the class was very enlightening for me. I found out that there was genocide of the Armenian people by the country of Turkey and that Turkey is trying very hard to sweep it under the rug like it never happened. Also I learned about lynching this semester. Like the Holocaust I already knew some things about lynching. I, however, thought that lynching was only hanging which it is not. I also did not realize how many people were killed. This in total was a very eye opening class for me.

Which Image is Most Haunting

The picture i found most haunting was the picture of Ami "Whit" Ketchum and Luther H. Mitchell. This picture took place in Nebraska in 1878. This is a very disturbing picture because not only were the people in the picture burned alive but they were partially skinned. All the pictures were very disturbing. I found this one picture particularly disturbing because the people in the picture are just laid out. There are just lying on boards for all to see. Even in death they could have no peace. I do not understand how people could act and be so cruel to other people just because the color of the skin. There were pictures where people were burning or hanging for all to see. People would bring their children to watch these. How people could act like this is beyond words. The fact that the police usually knew what was going on is another thing that blows my mind, in this picture the men were taken away from the sheriff before being burned to death. These are real people who have thoughts and feelings. To be treated like that just because of the color of their skin is indescribable. The two people in this picture and a lot of the people in other pictures were just trying to live their lives when a mob decided that they did something wrong. They were dragged from their homes and beaten, humiliated, and killed for all to see.