Angie Powers > Recent Status Updates

Thursday, 4/4

For Sat 4/6

One thing I noticed after researching the "evil eye" was that Palestinian superstitions are passed down from generation to generation. The main character's, Yara's, mother gave her a hamsa necklace when she was child and years later, her mother asked "Are you wearing it?" (Rum 71). When Yara indicated she was still wearing it, her mother said, "The world is a dark and wicked place" (Rum 71). FORESHADOWING!!!

What struck me about the opening of this novel was the relationship between the main character, Yara, and her mother-in-law, Nadia. As the novel opens, Yara is working hard in the kitchen to prepare a meal, and when Nadia comes in, she almost inspects the food and says, "Let's see what we have here" (Rum 11). This was my first indication that Yara feels like Nadia does not like her, which is later confirmed.

Uuuuunnnniiiooooonnn!!

around the time the pandemic hit.

Broussard's experience as a black women & data scientist made her credible. Her ethos shined at the end when she was explaining how important it is that we all ask more questions about the algorithms that rule our lives. She shared a story about one of professors telling her to "pretend [the code] is magic" (187). While the advice worked in that class, she wants society to "keep striving to understand" (188).

Today I read about why the black community distrusts the medical system using cause-effect. The author identifies a couple of examples when the system used black people as test subjects without their knowledge, including the Tuskegee syphilis study & Henrietta Lacks. One of the signal phrases that helped me identify cause-effect was when she wrote there was "solid historical reasons" for distrust (Broussard 119).

update for 2/11 (on a plane and couldn't update)

update for 2/7 (on a plane and couldn't update)

I was having trouble understanding why gender is tough for computer systems. When I read that the Census Bureau used "the first commercially produced digital computer, UNIVAC," I could not figure out why that computer system limited gender to two options (104). After researching this system, I found picture of it, which was the size of a desk, and better understood that this computer used a binary numeral system.

In "Ability and Technology," the author mostly uses anecdotes to point out the problems ppl with disabilities face with technology. The main story the author uses focuses on Dahan, a deaf Apple employee, who eventually quit his job b/c the company wouldn't provide him a live interpreter. Instead, they tried video remote interpreting, which "works well for some situations but is inadequate [for large meetings]" (83).