Who I am

Growing up, I struggled a lot with feeling culturally displaced. I didn’t have anyone except my older sister to relate to. I went to school in a small town in upstate New York which consisted of mostly white people with blonde hair. And there I was a skinny little Indian girl with big glasses, bushy eyebrows, and crazy curly hair. I didn’t even realize my parents had accents until one of my friends said something about it. I was different. My family was different. As a kid I would watch television and tune into award shows to see the stars and while I was fascinated, I still felt like I had no one to relate to.  None of the women on magazines or on TV looked like me.

Who am I? I don’t know if it’s as simple as me just typing up a two paragraph summary. I’ll do my best though I’m a first generation American, a daughter, a little sister, a singer/songwriter, a pianist, an actress, an artist, I’m diabetic, I’m a fighter, I’m smart and I’m a smartass, witty, thoughtful, a full-time college student and a part-time sales/retail queen.  I’ve worked at Aldo on 5^th avenue and right now BCBG Max Azria http://www.bcbg.com/.  I’m the black sheep wild child with piercings and tattoos who did not have any desire to follow in my entire family’s footsteps and go to medical school. I have always loved performing, art, music, entertainment and fashion. I think the world and the cold hearted people in it are way too serious way too often. I like being silly and being around silly people. If you can make me laugh, you’re a friend of mine.

Ze says:

I am who I say I am
but am I who I say I am,
because you say I am that which I am?

Were the world a kinder place to outsiders, I would proudly introduce myself as a panromantic, asexual, agendered blandly original superhero. But alas I cannot remake the world, I can only make my way within it. As I exist now, I'd like to think that I am indescribable. I posit further that I need to be experienced for full effect. I've chosen to be who I want to be, yet I haven't figure that out yet; So today I am everyone and everyone is me. I've chosen Jay because I can. I've also chosen to cancel my subscription to any particular religion, culture, lifestyle, heritage, place. That is who I am, but it is also who I am not. Floating fearlessly in the void between homes means that I have chosen to reject every thing I have been conditioned to be.

I am who I am
because you said I couldn't be
who I am going to become.

I'm in the midst of a complicated relationship with Media. A few years ago, I could not be found without a connected device in close vicinity. Now, however, I have a phone which does not have internet capabilities, a laptop which functions as a stationary desktop, and a kindle which stands as an exception to the rule. I don't tweet, or blog, or deal with the print medium at all. I don't go see movies or follow the news. I sleep, and eat, and occasionally fulfill my media cravings with a telly marathon. YouTube, though, has become an ally for quick entertainment when I delve into withdrawals but Media and I don't really go beyond that.

Staceyann Chin is the reason I took my first Womyn studies class. I was introduced to her by a teacher in Jamaica and ever since, her words, her struggle, her guidance has helped to shape me.
"Feminist or Womanist", she asks.

Who I Think I Am

I guess if I had to use a word to describe myself it would be privileged. Born in the US, I moved at age 5 to my parents native Colombia when I lived till I was 12. While at the time I didn't see it, I always had food on the table, a roof over my head and was getting an education even though many of those around me were not as lucky and I think because of this even though I don't have what some what call a luxurious lifestyle, I am more than happy where I am with where I am headed towards. This privileged lifestyle has also brought on to me sense of responsibility to educate myself in what ways, however small, I could change the world for the better . I feel like that by educating myself and paying closer attention to the media I consume, I can help mold it in such a way that others can maybe change the more problematic parts of our media and therefore make it better.

As for my interests, I am currently majoring in Computer Science which I feel is a consequence of always being the one that fixed the computer in my house when it broke down. I also do some volunteering with New York Cares mostly in the various homeless and animal shelters around the city. I usually carry some kind of book or comic book with me everywhere and spend some of my free time playing football and baseball especially during the summer. I've also recently taken an interest in reading about portrayals of minorities in the "younger" types of media such as comic books and videogames and follow blogs such as 

The Social Justice League

http://www.socialjusticeleague.net/

which especially focuses more on the comic books/graphic novels side and their portrayals on the subject.

Who Am I? - Jonathan Chin

It’s pretty hard to distinguish yourself in a world with well over 6 billion people. I am one of the many Jonathan Chins in the world.  Born in the city but lived in a city just outside of the Bronx called Yonkers for most of my life.  Though I lived Yonkers for most of my life, I never really called it my home. The New York City always appealed to me with its music, food, culture and its ever so reliable subway service.

As a media major with a concentration in journalism, I have been beginning to learn that the world of journalism that I grew up with is rapidly changing.  We are being taught to not only how to become journalists but media makers as well, with training in video editing and photography.  
Now being in my 3rd year at Hunter College as a media major, I’m learning not only how to be a media maker, but also how to be a better media consumer and critic.  With the media being saturated with partisan news outlets, its difficult to find unbiased content.  Who’s gonna change this?  Maybe its me, maybe I’m the one to signal in this change.  As a music blogger, a DJ for the Hunter College radio station, and aspiring photojournalist and cameraman, I am still trying to figure out what my role is in the media.

A Victim that Survived

     To understand me is to understand my past. My parents are of Haitian decent, my father highest level of education is the 8^th grade and my mother is the 4^th or 5^th grade.  Both of my parents were blind but education for their children was their highest priority. I was a troubled child until a teacher realized that I was bored and was not learning much in my current grade and suggested that I be skipped from 4^th to the 6^th grade and once I got into the 6^th grade I went into the 8^th grade immediately after. At the age of 11 I was gang raped and molested in that same year but I never allowed my education to suffer. I continued to excel in school. At the age 14 I became pregnant with my first child, 19 is when I had my second and last child. With the assistance of my mother I learned real quick what it was to raise children. We struggled but I did not want my children to be another statistic of the streets so we pushed forward as a family. 

     My major is in Women and Gender Studies, after working with victims, survivor and what I call over comers in KBCC I realized that women, that should speak don’t and those that do shouldn’t. I say this, because when I attended KBCC I was the student that wished that the professor never called on me to present, making a speech and even speaking in forums out of fear of sounding stupid or not having the correct answers, but I came to realized that my voice was helping other students in different challenges in their lives, career goals or educational aspirations. The women I said shouldn’t are the ones that judge another person for their skin, hair or even their appearance just to make themselves feel good. My ultimate goal is to become a Social Worker and later obtain my Phd in Psychology and I realized what my career path was going to be by speaking to other women. They peeled my shell and allow a flower to bloom in me, by shattering the fear I had of speaking in front of others (speech).

     While learning how to use my voice in a powerful setting, I also, learned how to use technology and media to teach others. As a volunteer in a women shelter and using my home as a safe haven for teens, I've been using skits, art, media and literature to assist victim across the threshold of victim to survivor.Victims tend to stay in the position of victimization and not allow the healing process to begin.

http://youtu.be/iv3VT9jP6Cw

The Essence of Myself

Who I am now is a direct result of what I've worked to become. I am a perpetual student, a writer, a web-designer, a futurist, and a robotics technician. Media has helped me to become who I am because of it's salient presence in today's society. When I was in my early teenage years, the internet developed right before my eyes- completely free and replete with knowledge. I was always a bookish kind of guy who knew I could never know everything about one thing, but I always aspired to know at least one thing about everything. The ubiquity of information on the internet made knowledge so easy to obtain that I spent hours researching whatever it was that interested or inspired me.

As a result of this, I learned the ins and outs of various computer systems and networking environments. When I was 15 years old, I got in trouble for creating a Linux based computer system that would hi-jack incoming cable streams, which allowed me the luxury of on-demand television. (To this day I don't know who snitched on me). This was nothing extraordinary- many people had done it before. It was just a turning point in my life where I realized that the tools we have at our disposal can help us accomplish anything we set out to do- as long as we persevere and stay determined. Upon enrolling in college, I've taken up a major in English and Media Studies, with a minor in Computer Science. These days, I work in IT at a small business downtown, I work with medical robotics through a program with HPEC, and I am a web designer and writer for flatironhotnews.com.

Here's a glimpse of the future: http://hpectechtrends.wordpress.com/category/1-robotics/

An example of the types of robots I work with: http://youtu.be/cFVlzUAZkHY

An article I wrote in tribute to Aaron Swartz: http://www.flatironhotnews.com/2013/01/16/aaron-swartz-the-death-of-a-genius-and-birth-of-a-martyr/

And me:

Who am I?

They say I’m a guy with a complicated personality. Maybe it’s true.

Ex Citizen of Soviet Russia, I was born and raised in the deep forests of one of the republics that no one ever heard of. Chuvash Republic, in case you care. The village I was born and spent my first 19 years is still called Yatmankino and still consists of one street and 12 small houses lined up facing each other. Similar poorly constructed buildings with similar huge fields instead of backyards in the back still remind me of the painful mornings when I had to wake up at 5AM and spend whole day crawling around potato fields in order to make sure that coming winter we have enough food on our table. I don't remember being unhappy or complaining about my life throughout my childhood, until we got our first TV. On a 15 inch black and white TV receiver with two channels, for the first time in my life, I was able to see that the life is beyond the ideas of communism.

During my teenage years I moved to the nearest city where I became a DJ on one of the local radio stations and was eventually moved to an affiliated TV company where  I was introduced to the world of media production. I was amazed how small group of people driven by their creativity, was able to accomplish amazing projects. I learned how to create exciting script, record it, add audio and video content and polish it all up into a great media product.

My path to becoming an American had started almost 7 years ago and like many immigrants, I have changed my views on many of the aspects of life. I had to expand my thinking and challenged my beliefs, they only thing that didn’t change, is my passion to create media. I hate writing, but love telling the story with video camera and Final Cut. My goal is to dedicate my life to creating a media but my dream is to amaze people with it.