Potential Topics for Solutions Project

1. Poor Public Education System
This topic interest me because I just learned that the St. Louis city public schools were run so poorly that they became unaccredited. I am also interested in this because I feel that this topic would be different from most of the other ideas. I have data from the St. Louis City Schools, from Big Brother, Big Sisters, YMCA, Urban Future, College Bound or any other education foundation

2. Abandoned Buildings/Dead Downtown
I am interested in this because when you go downtown in other cities, it makes you want to be proud of your own downtown, and have fun things to do while in the city besides just going to sporting or entertainment events. I want to be able to just walk around downtown and see shops and other businesses. You could get information about Ballpark Village, Gateway Greening Inc., Revitalize St. Louis, St. Louis Centre, and the Old Post Office Building.

3.Bad Public Transportation
I am interested in this because, yet again, every time a go to like Chicago or Boston, I realize how useful there subway and taxis are, but in St. Louis, the Metrolink isn't very helpful and I have never used a bus or taxi in St. Louis. You could look at data from Metrolink or the Bus companies or taxi companies.

Multimedia Presentation

Here is my presentation for Freedom Riders.

Freedom Riders Presentation

View more presentations from Jimmy Alverson.

Research Questions for Human Rights Presentation

1. What if the Russian government had told the people of Pripyat what happened?
2. How did the Russian government violate the human rights of the people of Pripyat?
3. Why did the Russian government think it was better to violate human rights?
4. Why was the Russian government not charged with human rights violations after the incident?
5. How did the human rights violation affect the people of Pripyat after the disaster?
6. How much about the negative health effects were known during the time?
7. What safety measures, or lack thereof, were taken in Chernobyl before the incident.


Sources Needed:
Survivor stories, liquidator stories, expert histories, scientific facts,

Tentative Research Proposal

1. I am interested in researching Chernobyl Disaster because I have some clips and read some information about it, but I would still like to learn more about this event.

2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_disaster, http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/chernobyl/inf07.html, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSRC1_OZPIg, http://chernobyl.undp.org/english/docs/belarus_23_anniversary.pdf, and http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10166374.

3. I don't have any questions.

Current Events in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

1. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-11480809
This article shows that a huge problem in the Congo today is rape. It is even used as a warfare technique to break-down people psychologically. This relates to the Congo under Leopold because they are also leading their people with fear because they think they will be able to control them more. What I would want to know is the rape statistics in the United States because I would like to know if more rapes occur in the Congo or the U.S. The UN stepping in to arrest the militia leader in kind of like Morel standing up to Leopold. This is different from the previous view because there is no murder, at least the didn't mention it in the article, because of these rapes.

2. http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/africa/10/01/congo.atrocities.un.report/index.html?iref=allsearch
This article releases a report like the one Casement did when he went to the Congo and blames all of these horrible things on the Belgium government or, more specifically, Leopold. This is similar to what happened during Leopold's control because it doesn't blame the Congo leaders, but the soldiers from Rwanda for all of the murders and rapes. The Rwandan soldiers are like the Force Publique of current times. This is also similar to George Washington Williams' book, Open Letter, where he openly criticizes Leopold way of ruling in the Congo which is what the UN is doing here with the foreign soldiers that are occupying the DRC.

ch. 8 Small Group Discssion Wrap-up

1. What is Leopold's Ghost?
When will the rest of the world believe the cruelties that occur in the Congo?
Will Leopold run out of money?

2. I think that our small group discussion worked pretty well. I think that we did a good job using support and at least paraphrasing places if we couldn't find the text. I think we could improve by making sure that everyone is involved equally. I think that we still could support more, but we did a good job incorporating multiple questions into 1 response. We brought 2 questions together to make them more like a super question. I think everyone could pay a little bit more attention to the discussion and not be focused on finding your next comment or support for your comment.

King Leopold's Ghost Reaction pgs. 1-32 and 2 discussion questions

I think that Henry Stanley is a very interesting person. It is really hard to tell what type of character he has because in all of his accounts he never has a consistent story. People at the workhouse describe him as a teacher's pet, but the way he seems to act in writings describe more of a person who wants all of the attention or more of a class clown. I think he is pretty lucky to not have been found out yet that he is from Whales and not New York or St. Louis. I would like to meet him in real life to see if he tries to make everything so fantastic and crazy.

I think that the entire story is pretty interesting because I have never heard about how Europeans massacred millions of Congolese. I also think it is pretty amazing that it took European explorers so long to find the source of the Congo river after finding the mouth of the river.

Questions:
Why were the Africans so welcome to trade with the Europeans in the first place?
Why is the book called King Leopold's Ghost?