POP: Producing Our Power

POP other wise known as Producing Our Power was the final for all Eths 210 classes. On the night of Monday December 8, all four Ethnic studies 210 classes came together and put on a performance at the Brava Theater on 24th and York defining what Asian American Culture meant to them. Each class had their own way of expressing Asian American Culture many forms included expressions through music, dance, skits, poetry, and video. Each class did a fantastic job. It’s not easy performing in front of an audience I know I for one am scared to perform period. But the night turned out great.

My class divided into five different categories groups: video, skit, poetry, dance, and music. Within our groups we were asked to come up with ways to put what we learned throughout the class into a way of performance. We had about a week to put this all together and yes, we can complain and say we should have don’t this, we could have done that if we had more time to prepare, but I think with the little time we had we still put on an excellent show.

Many parts of our performance did not go the way we would have wished. We can complain all we want about how the lighting was not how we wanted it, the microphones were not loud enough, or all the technology stuff was not working for us, but if you think about it. People aren’t going to remember the things that went wrong in our performances, they’re going to remember the message we gave through our performances.

POP was an excellent way to wrap up the semester. The traditional way to see if students learned anything throughout the semester is by putting pen to paper and giving them an exam. But honestly, I feel that exams don’t prove anything at all. I am the absolute worst at taking test. I understand the material and everything but when it comes to test I just can not do it. I am just a bad test taker. That is why I really enjoyed POP. Yes, I said I don’t like performing, but I felt that this was truly a way to show what we learned and comprehended throughout the semester. This was a way to show, express, and voice our opinion and to be heard by others and that is exactly what this class thought us. This final was definitely an impacting one. I say it really left a mark for Eths 210 classes and teachers. If I wasn’t in Eths 210, I know I would be jealous of the students who were and have wished I was in it one of the classes after watching POP.