Overall Integrative Narrative
I decided to pursue Spanish as my major due to my appreciation for Mexican culture, as well as to polish my linguistic skills. I am very interested in many aspects of Mexican culture, including food, music, pastimes, traditions, etc. Even though I wanted to improve my linguistic and written accuracy of the Spanish language, I chose literature and culture as my focus instead of linguistics. I like reading and I am very interested in history and culture, so the choice was easy for me. I have learned much about the history of various Latin American countries from this major, and this has proven rewarding to me. It has led to new conversations with my Mexican friends, and helped me gain insight into certain cultural characteristics of Mexico. Spanish 307: History and Politics of Mexico remains my favorite class that I have taken at CSUMB, and the one from which I have retained the most information. This class satisfied MLO 3: Literary and Cultural Knowledge, which has proven to be my favorite learning outcome. In order to satisfy MLO 4: Secondary Cultural Knowledge, I took a class called SBS 381: U.S., Vietnam, Asia-Pacific. A large portion of this class focused on the Vietnam War. I was very interested in this because the Vietnam War is a subject that I knew was very important, controversial, and generally had a very negative connotation around it. The opportunity to learn the historical background, causes, effects, and almost every other aspect of the war is something that I enjoyed and appreciated. MLO 2: Language and Linguistic Knowledge, is the one that I really want to improve in the future. Though I took two classes that satisfied this MLO, Span 301 & Span 302, I have vast room for improvement. My upper division Spanish classes were taught in Spanish, giving me ample opportunities to improve my Spanish speaking, reading, and writing skills. However, the formalities of the language and when to use them are still my biggest challenges.
I saw completing my Service Learning requirement as a fun way to do some volunteer work. I worked at the information booth/food demonstration booth at the Alisal Certified Farmer’s Market in Salinas. I was able to practice my Spanish while volunteering, as well as perform surveys at the request of the organization that ran the farmer’s market, Everyone’s Harvest. It was a good experience, and I found it refreshing/rewarding to do volunteer work, as I hadn’t done any for quite some time.
My Capstone Project proved to be more challenging than I originally anticipated. Having to come up with a specific topic to write an extensive paper on was very challenging. I ended up being very happy with what I did, though I had doubts at times whether the topic was satisfying enough for me. It really forced me to sit down and think about what I was trying to do. I interviewed twenty people whom I know, but the interviews allowed me to learn some very interesting things about their lives and their outlooks on things. Learning people’s stories through the interviews was definitely my favorite part of the Capstone Project. Overall, I have learned some valuable things at CSUMB. I have been forced to think differently about some things, which is a very good thing.
I decided to pursue Spanish as my major due to my appreciation for Mexican culture, as well as to polish my linguistic skills. I am very interested in many aspects of Mexican culture, including food, music, pastimes, traditions, etc. Even though I wanted to improve my linguistic and written accuracy of the Spanish language, I chose literature and culture as my focus instead of linguistics. I like reading and I am very interested in history and culture, so the choice was easy for me. I have learned much about the history of various Latin American countries from this major, and this has proven rewarding to me. It has led to new conversations with my Mexican friends, and helped me gain insight into certain cultural characteristics of Mexico. Spanish 307: History and Politics of Mexico remains my favorite class that I have taken at CSUMB, and the one from which I have retained the most information. This class satisfied MLO 3: Literary and Cultural Knowledge, which has proven to be my favorite learning outcome. In order to satisfy MLO 4: Secondary Cultural Knowledge, I took a class called SBS 381: U.S., Vietnam, Asia-Pacific. A large portion of this class focused on the Vietnam War. I was very interested in this because the Vietnam War is a subject that I knew was very important, controversial, and generally had a very negative connotation around it. The opportunity to learn the historical background, causes, effects, and almost every other aspect of the war is something that I enjoyed and appreciated. MLO 2: Language and Linguistic Knowledge, is the one that I really want to improve in the future. Though I took two classes that satisfied this MLO, Span 301 & Span 302, I have vast room for improvement. My upper division Spanish classes were taught in Spanish, giving me ample opportunities to improve my Spanish speaking, reading, and writing skills. However, the formalities of the language and when to use them are still my biggest challenges.
I saw completing my Service Learning requirement as a fun way to do some volunteer work. I worked at the information booth/food demonstration booth at the Alisal Certified Farmer’s Market in Salinas. I was able to practice my Spanish while volunteering, as well as perform surveys at the request of the organization that ran the farmer’s market, Everyone’s Harvest. It was a good experience, and I found it refreshing/rewarding to do volunteer work, as I hadn’t done any for quite some time.
My Capstone Project proved to be more challenging than I originally anticipated. Having to come up with a specific topic to write an extensive paper on was very challenging. I ended up being very happy with what I did, though I had doubts at times whether the topic was satisfying enough for me. It really forced me to sit down and think about what I was trying to do. I interviewed twenty people whom I know, but the interviews allowed me to learn some very interesting things about their lives and their outlooks on things. Learning people’s stories through the interviews was definitely my favorite part of the Capstone Project. Overall, I have learned some valuable things at CSUMB. I have been forced to think differently about some things, which is a very good thing.