The aspect of the dominant social practice that I decided to explore, was having interventions with friends and family. When my grandparents started getting really sick, my parents told me that they had to have a "talk" with me and my sister about it. At first I thought that we were getting in trouble, because we didn't visit them as often as we should, but then my mom told us that we had to visit them twice as much. She only said that because they were getting really sick, and she didn't know how much time they had left. This unit helped me understand what the dominant practices were, whenever someone in your family got sick. Now according to the lecture my parents gave me, I can add family discussions to that list.
When I went on the internet, to find out more about teens relationships with their elders, I came across elder abuse. http://helpguide.org/mental/elder_abuse_physical_emotional_sexual_neglect.htm
De Benedictis,Tina.Warning signs, Risk Factors, Prevention, and help.Segal, Jeanne.NY.2010
What the article said was that there are different types of elderly abuse. One kind that cought my eye, was neglecting the elderly. The way my parents described my lack of appreciation towards what my grandparents did for me all my life, sort of matched up with what I was reading in the article. It made me question if I really was neglecting my elders or not.
The way that I explored during this process, was by listening to my parents, and going to see my grandparents when I was told to, and sometimes even taking the initiative to go on my own. I realized that my parents were wrong, I went up to them, and had a second intervention, discussing why I was not neglecting my grandparents, and actually showing them that I care. I never thought that I would have to be this independent when it came to family, but I showed my parents, my grandparents, and myself, that I am a responsible, appreciative, loving, independent grandson. I did enjoy what I did, because I pushed myself to do so, and in the process I learned how to be more responsible.
In this exploration, I learned a little bit more about myself. I proved myself to many people that I am a "good" person. But most importantly, I proved to myself that I can go far beyond the person I actually am. This shows that the dominant practices in our culture when it comes to illness and dying, are expendable. You can basically start off a conversation with your family talking about why you should change, and why you need to be a "better" person. and then ending it by saying "your wrong, I am nice, and I do care, and if you don't believe me, i'll prove it to you."
This matters, because you are observing yourself, and others around you. Finding our cultures dominant social practices help us shape our own, changing our lives for better or for worse.
I think this was interesting because it revolved around how you are complacent with dominant society. I think that you could have made a deeper explorations by finding out how this effects the elderly and why "we" neglect them..
ReplyDeleteI do better comprehend what you were saying after reading your blog, it is a lot clearer.
I think after you speech reading this now, I am better able to understand what you were talking about. I picked to comment on your blog because I actually liked the idea that you had because it was sort of like Amber and how there can be abuse in nursing homes because of neglect but your post is kind of the reverse of this because you talk about how you visit your grand parents. I think something you could have talked more about is what your grandparents thought and why you think you have to go visit your grandparents. You have some good ideas but I think you could have talked some more about your experiences.
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