Isaac's Storm

Class was a discussion about how we are connected to the global culture at large in some way. Isaac’s Storm was used to illustrate this. In a way, the hurricane at Galveston was connected to global happenings. It most likely had its start close to Africa and affected several international nations or citizens of those nations.

This makes me think of how I am connected globally to people I may never have met. I have lived in Texas all my life. However, I have been outside the United States several times. I buy products everyday from other countries. I have friends who are immigrants to the U.S. from other countries. I even attend a university that has at least one international branch.

So everyday I have contact with someone or something that originated outside of my nation. We seem to have more outside contact than any generation before us. My first thought is that this phenomenon first started 200 years ago as sea trade and colonization was in its full swing. But I think nations have always been part of the global community at large. The amount of contact has exploded, however, in the information age. Anyone can access news, blogs, websites, etc. from other countries in a few clicks of the internet. It is really amazing if you think about it.

For example, I have a friend who is studying abroad in Italy this semester. I cannot call him. But thanks to technology, I can facebook him at any time or skype him occasionally. It is insane how we can keep in touch with distant friends. We are apart of a global culture.

Yet it seems that we are more individualistic than ever. I don’t think there will ever be anything close to a “global” nation. Some people seem to think so. But it seems that all of this available interaction with the world mostly causes us to withdraw further into our own nation’s protective culture circle. Millions are enslaved each year yet we don’t take the time to help even though tons of resources are available to us.

Part of the problem for our seeming withdrawal from a deeper interaction with the world is in my opinion from differences in culture or pride. Take for example the case of Google in China. It was a big news story earlier this year about how Google pulled its business out of China because the Chinese government was hacking Google’s databases to obtain information on Chinese bloggers. I think this is a main example of culture differences. In America, if the government attempted to control private life in such a manner, there would be an out roar. So Google being an American company, pulled out of China.

I am not sure of what I am going to write my paper on. I am thinking that I may write it on one of my favorite music artists. So far I don’t have any other ideas. I want to write a creative one but it will be hard to connect my favorite artist with the global culture. It should be an interesting project though.

Isaac’s Storm was a poorly written book in my opinion. I didn’t like it very much. The author spent way too much time on the build up to the hurricane. His prose was boring and nothing special. We talked in class about how the book was very biased toward Isaac Cline. I would like to read another book written from another perspective on the disaster that struck Galveston.

Still, it was nice to read a book about a disaster that I have heard about but I have never found out the details. I am glad this is the only book that we will have to read this year.