Blog #1

Hello, my name is Taylar, I am currently a senior psychology major at the university and I will be graduating this spring. I have grown up in Lincoln, NE and lived here for 22 years. Currently I work as a woman’s advocate at Friendship Home, our local emergency domestic violence shelter for women and children. I have worked and/or been involved with Friendship Home for the past 2 and half years. I love my job as an advocate, but have found a different calling and that is to work with children with behavioral disorders, such as ADHD, anxiety, etc. I plan on returning to Miami, FL this summer to work as a counselor at a camp and I will be responsible for applying behavioral modification treatment to adolescents with ADHD during an 8-week program. Although I’m not a writer nor do I really enjoy writing for grading purposes, I enjoy writing my feelings and emotions down on paper. Writing helps me cope with my own anxiety.

I write for many reasons and no reason at all. I write to explain my pain. I write to express. I write for those who cannot pick up the pen. I write for the victims of our community. I write to dream. I write so I don’t explode. I write so I can speak the truth to those who will not listen to the words I have to say. I write for others to see. I write because a voice can be stopped, but words on a page cannot. I write to right the wrongs of all the ignorant people in this world, but if they can’t read I’ll just tell them!

Within any type of community there will be things you like and don’t like. After reading Harris’s work about communities there were a few things that stuck out to me about communities. In the beginning he stated something along the lines that no matter how many communities you are apart of you are never wholly involved in a single one of those communities. One community does not define who you are, but only helps shape you into the person you will become. I am from many communities. I am from a small Lutheran school, a huge university, a domestic violence shelter, my family and many more.  They are communities, because they have one common interest within themselves. However, the little things within the communities I do not always agree with fully

I want to skip the writing role of the community and go straight to the language role that was discussed in Harris's work. Within my domestic violence community, which I am an advocate for victims of domestic violence, there is a whole different language used, than what I use with my friends or family. Every single employee is different and has a different way of thinking. You are praised for having a different outlook on every situation and you are not shamed for your different way of thinking. We grow together as a community and help open each other’s minds a little each day, through our differences. This is not the same for my small Lutheran school community.  I have to stop and think before I speak at times, because with some of my ‘friends’ from high school I can’t be completely honest with them when I disagree with something they have to say. I just bite my tongue and move along, because I know that what I say will only strike an argument. This is where I don’t fully belong in this community, but I still remain. Before I graduated and found a voice within myself, I sadly went along with what they had to say. Which these were negative things about others culture and way of life.  Harris touched on the topic of “common” and “privileged” ways of thinking. I believe we all need to find a “privileged” way of thinking within our communities. Otherwise it will be the same thing day in and day out.  Community is a strong term, but can be loosely defined in many different ways.