Month: December 2024

In Parable of the Sower we follow the journey of a young woman, Lauren as she travels through a post apocalyptic United states, more specifically the west coast. Lauren is an anomaly in the human population, or so she thought, she has a disease called hyperempathy which allows her to share the pain and pleasures of others. Lauren is forced to embark on a journey to spread her “Earthseed”, a religion that she has developed, symbolizing change and the constant battle people face when expecting that change. Through her travels she’s forced to inflict that change she’s grown so comfortable with, meeting new faces and sharing their ups and downs. 

Parable of the Sower reflects the financial crisis in a few different ways, not only by the terms we discuss in class, also showing what a glimpse into what could have been if things kept getting worse. The book is set in a time where common goods are scarce and have been inflated beyond proportion, like water for example some people not even being able to afford it in the book. Housing has become almost impossible with the amount of crime we see, constant robbing, burning of homes, and just murder. Expulsion, defined as the action of depriving someone of membership in an organization or forcing someone to leave a place. Expulsion is a term that is never really explicitly stated in any of the books we have read over the semester but it plays a prominent role in all of them, Parable of the sower isn’t an exception. The book begins with the community that Lauren and her family live in, a walled neighborhood that offers them the most protection they will get in the world they live in. We watch as that protection and little bit of humanity that those people have is taken away without remorse, you could almost say for fun. Lauren is thrown into the streets and has to fend for herself/the group she is with. I believe expulsion in the terms of the financial crisis and Laurens situation are more similar than anything we covered. We get to see through the eyes of Lauren what being expelled is like and the harsh reality of it. I think besides some very exaggerated details, heer experience is much different then what the actual people would have experienced during the financial crisis. The lack of regulation, crime, and the utter desperateness of people when put into a time of crisis all mirror each other in the book and reality. Laruen is very intelligent for her age and that is picked up on multiple times in the book, at her young age she had such a deep understanding of religion, helped by the fact her dad was a pastor. She developed a religion she followed strongly throughout the book, earthseed and the idea that, “God is Change.” pg 25. Change is exactly what I think of when seeing the term of expulsion, being expelled is defined as depriving someone of membership, changing where they once thought they were welcomed, changing things they thought they believed, and things they thought they knew. This is no different in Parable of the Sower Lauren brings up a lot of change in the book, this quote actually becomes one of her responses to certain situations. I see it as a way for Lauren to combat the change she’s facing, allowing her to accept it for what it is and then move forward. Another term I thought was worth mentioning is Trust, the firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something. Trust is a comforting feeling, trusting in your house to protect you from intruders, storms, etc. It helps you feel a sense of security with a partner or people, knowing that you can trust them. In Parable of the Sower trust plays a role in keeping Laurens community safe, all the families trusted each other to protect everyone. This also holds true in the small group that forms between Lauren and the fellow travelers she meets, they all need trust not just to form connections with each other but to survive as well. Trust has the same values across multiple situations and that stands true for the housing crisis. The trust that homeowners put into the hands of these companies is no different from the trust Lauren had in Bankole to protect her and keep her safe, or the gun she carried to shoot the bullets loaded in the chamber. As we know with both situations that trust fell through and they were both unprotected from the hard reality of the housing market and the post apocalyptic streets on california. I’d like to compare the differences between these two types of trust, in one case you have people acting in bad faith for personal gain and in the other hand you have good faith actors who really do trust and rely on each other for protection, and that protection works. These financers only cared for what would happen to them, pulling the rug out from under their clients feet and banking off that success. The homeowners who thought they could trust these people were shown the harsh reality of what trusting the wrong people can do and they lost everything. Now, Laurens situation is different but her trust in others is the same as the homeowners. Laurens ability to read others played a key role in her ability to so freely give her trust to others in certain situations. She trusted herself enough to trust in what she saw in others and that’s why her bonds with the group were so strong and why her trust in them was even stronger. Bankole says, “We all have to trust each other. We won’t make it otherwise” pg 188, and that’s true they won’t make it if their trust is lacking in each other, this isn’t just about the book. Trust is what keeps people together, it keeps us alive and that is what Bankole is stating in this quote. To form this community, to create earthseed, they need trust not only to live but to know that if something happens they will continue to grow and survive. Bankole was a character introduced late in the book, a love interest from Lauren, but a source of stability for everyone else in the group. Bankole was trusted by everyone because he told the truth, he did what he needed to survive and kept the group safe. Their trust in him and his trust in them helped the group run like a machine, fending off threats when needed. This is the type of relationship that the homeowners during the crisis had in their financiers but it was a two way system only one way and that lack of honesty and trust is what led to their downfall. Throughout the semester we were asked to connect certain ideas, concepts, and vocabulary to the texts we were reading. Expulsion is in the title of the course and plays such an important role in all the books and articles we read. All from expulsion we connect terms like trust, good/bad faith, and countless others to the things we deal with daily and it’s no different for the characters we read about. These words help us to connect not only the housing crisis but our thoughts and ideas too. 

Why does reflection matter for us students, while it changes bad habits. Reflection is defined as serious thought or consideration. It is a time to deepen our understanding of not just our learning but ourselves as well, we can see our strengths and weaknesses, build confidence in our work, and it forces us to take ownership in our learning. Reflection not just on work but on yourself is beneficial for growth. Breaking the pattern of doing the same thing, creating another path. Geneseo’s emphasis on personal and intellectual growth lines up with the idea of reflecting on the ever changing state of curriculum in today’s world. This practice in reflection helps to prepare us for the future, encouraging us to grow and adapt a mindset essential for success. Reflection on personal growth enhances our appreciation for our work and perspectives of others. My biggest takeaway from this class was the importance of other perspectives. Hearing the thoughts and ideas of others was so beneficial for my growth in writing and reading this semester. I found myself stopping while reading all the time, trying to break down what I’m reading and sifting through the words to try and piece together an opinion and understanding of the texts. Not only did my understanding for the books and writing deepen but my enjoyment of reading and writing also grew. Reading became less of a chore and turned into something I looked forward to doing. Reflection allows you to see your work in another perspective, changing your thinking or strengthening it.

Final Reflective Essay

English 111

Dr. McCoy

12/7/24

               The Semester began skeptically for myself, I was unsure how this collection of books could in any way be connected to the 2008 housing crisis, or any economic event in general. It felt absurd Shakespeare could know anything about the housing crisis. My thoughts exactly were about how a writer from hundreds of years ago could know anything at all about a housing crisis. Or how a book about a young slave girl could in any way be related to a market crash. It did not seem likely to me that it could be possible, however, over the semester I realized it was not that they knew about it, but about the themes. Historically speaking, in both Shakespeare’s time, and the time that A Mercy is set housing was very hard to come by if you were disenfranchised in any way. If you did manage to have housing, you could be easily expelled. This meant that over the course of the semester my skepticism of being unsure whether Shakespeare or any of the other books could have any insight changed. In the stories, it’s not about an economic crisis like the housing crisis, it’s about the themes and the lessons. The lessons being expulsion, good faith, bad faith, trust, and human greed.

To this day… I am still somewhat skeptical because to me there seems to be no true connection, it seems as if sometimes we’re pulling sticks to see what connection is “made”. My skepticism is less than it used to be of course, I do not say this to “trash” or disparage this class, I do believe that this course provides very important and valuable lessons about the world (as mentioned above). I have come to see the importance of this class over the semester. That growth has come from reading the courses assigned books and doing assignments in class. Also, from realizing that not everything is as obvious as it may seem and that there is much more to everything than meets the eye.

               As I said, I started the semester thinking that this class was not going to provide me with anything valuable, that it was just going to be a random class taken only because it was required. However, as we got into King Lear I began to see the importance of these readings. The act of expulsion King Lear faced, just as homeowners did, all because his daughters, or the people giving out predatory loans and mortgages, wanted more power or money for themselves. This began to show me the connection between the two topics is one of human greed. Greed is one thing that connects these two unlike events. It is human greed that tears and tears and tears at those less fortunate until there is nothing left.

King Lear also focuses on the act of expelling someone or removing someone or something from a location or group. This is made clear by King Lear himself being expelled from his own kingdom after splitting it between his daughters. Again, when Edmund tried to expel Edgar from his legitimacy through various plots and schemes. King Lear is a good example of both expulsion and human greed and how they can devastate people’s lives, as did the housing crisis.

               The Big Short, both the movie and the book, were useful in defining the terms needed to understand the course. Along with this, it shed light on the actions of big corporations during the troubling times of the 2008 housing crisis and recession. Whether or not you look at the “real” or “fake” stories, they are all rooted in the truth. They are all rooted in the same concept that King Lear and homeowners faced, greed. It goes over CDO’s and subprime mortgages along with many other terms that would attempt to allow someone to understand what might have caused the housing crisis. For clarities sake, a CDO is a “financial product that pools various types of debt, such as mortgages, bonds, or loans, and repackages the into trances sold to investor.” (Investopedia). Also, a subprime mortgage is “one that’s normally issued to borrowers with low credit ratings” (Investopedia). The Big Short tells that investors used CDO’s to buy and sell people’s loans to make a greater profit for themselves. Along with this, banks and higher ups would give out subprime mortgages with higher interest rates to take advantage of buyers. Greed, this book shows even more clearly that greed is the motivation behind so many terrible things.

               A Mercy, A story that is so vastly different than the other two. It is focused on a Portuguese slave girl who must race against time itself to find someone who can cure her mistress. Not only is the topic of this book completely different from the previous two, but so is the theme. While the other two were heavily focused on greed, this book focuses on “expulsion”, expulsion is one of the most important course concepts that has been discussed. It has also been one of the main focuses of the class, focusing on how homeowners were expelled by banks and investors when they defaulted. While reading this book the connection between Florens, the main character, and homeowners was made multiple times throughout the time reading the novel. This is truly when I began to believe that his course had something valuable to teach me. Which is strange because I thought connecting a book about slavery to the housing crisis was absurd. However, the connections between the two were becoming clearer with people wanting power, people being expelled, and people acting in good or bad faith.

               Parable of the Sower takes a lot of these course concepts and meshes them together or tries to; when reading I could only really see one course concept that stood out in relation to the housing crisis. For example, expulsion is a large proponent of this book. This includes the economic expulsion of everybody from their houses, Lauren’s (the main character) expulsion from a role model with the death of her father, and violence forcing out her family from their “community”. This book is about a post-apocalyptic world that has suffered severely from economic collapse. This economic collapse expelled almost everyone from their homes. Those who were not expelled immediately, were eventually pushed out by the rampant violence. Referring to the prompt given for this essay, when I read this novel, the only concept that pops up in reference to the housing crisis in my mind is expulsion. This does matter given GLOBE’S insistence on self-reflection because it makes me look back at all I have learned over the semester and put it all together.

Rylie Capezzuto

At the start of  this semester, as a first year student, I didn’t really know what to expect when it came to an English class about the 2008 housing crisis. Honestly, I came into this class with little to no knowledge about the crisis. And now ending this class in these cold winter months, not only do I have a vast understanding about the topic, but I have also been given resources, that may not initially seem like it could tie to the 2008 crisis, but from reading in between the lines and trying to think deeper about the subject matter I was able to. That deeper understanding, in my opinion, helped so much more and made it so much easier to learn about the destructive disaster that was the 2008 financial crisis. I’m leaving this class believing that we, as a society, could greatly benefit from a class like this because it provides us with a new outlook on the disasters like catastrophe of 2008 that we can work together in order to prevent. 

The 2008 financial crisis will forever be a very defining moment in economic history.  It was a real world event that exposed how fragile the global financial system really was. It was triggered by the collapse of the housing market, the failure of major banks and the mortgage lending crisis. In the novel, The Big Short, it states, “If we’re right, people lose homes, people lose jobs, people lose retirement savings, people lose pensions. You know what I hate about banking? It reduces people to numbers.” This also ties in with the subprime mortgages, which are loans given to people with poor credit, which was a key factor in the crisis. When the housing prices began to fall, many people who were given these subprime loans were now unable to pay their mortgages. Since they were unable to pay, their houses were foreclosed. The crisis led to many people becoming unemployed, especially in the real estate market and left many Americans struggling to keep their homes and stay afloat. The effects of the crisis were widespread, which caused many houses to become foreclosed, the collapse of many financial institutions and the global recession that impacted millions of people throughout the whole world. On the other hand, Parable of the Sower, is a dystopian novel that envisions a future that is destroyed by economic collapse, environmental destruction and social uncertainty. It’s easy to draw connections between the two, especially considering that the novel portrays a world that is very similar to the one that people experienced in 2008. 

It’s important to understand the setting of the novel Parable of the Sower and how it has connections to the 2008 financial crisis. Parable of the Sower is set in a future America that has fallen into a mass chaos due to climate change, economic inequality and a breakdown of society as a whole. The rich people live in gated communities, away from the chaos, while the poor people struggle to survive in a world that has extreme violence and an economic collapse. As stated in the text, “The rich are getting richer, and the poor are getting poorer, and everybody’s in danger.” People are forced to fend for themselves due to the government no longer providing support to the people. The main character of the novel, Lauren Olamina, has the ability to feel other people’s pain and throughout the novel discover a new belief system which aims to help people adapt to the world that is falling apart all around them. 

In both cases, there is a common theme of a breakdown in the economic system that causes social and personal distress. In Parable of the Sower, the economic collapse is worsened by environmental destruction,”The System is failing. The people are failing.”, and in the 2008 crisis, it was a result of corporate greed and unchecked financial mishaps. Both events also revealed deep inequality in society. The novel’s description of the rich being walled off from the poor reflects how wealthier people were less affected by the 2008 crisis compared to the lower income residents that lost their homes. 

The way the characters in Parable of the Sower responded to the collapse of their world is also something that stuck out to me in relation to the main focus points of this class. Lauren creating Earthseed is a representation of the lack of trust that is in traditional systems of society. This was represented in the text by saying, “There’s no time for apathy. You have to act. You have to care.” As a religious belief system, Earthseed states that the way for humanity to survive and progress is dependent on adaptability. This belief system promotes the idea that “God is Change” and emphasizes the need to embrace change in order to prosper. Earthseed is a way for people to organize themselves, be able to form communities and find a sense of belonging and hope in this novel’s uncertain future. 

In the real world, the response to the 2008 crisis is less of creating a belief system to prosper but still aimed at finding solutions that will fix a broken financial system. We learned throughout the semester, through books, podcasts and documentaries, that the federal government intervened with bailouts to businesses and some reforms were created to prevent any crises to this extent to happen in the future. We learned that while this recovery was helpful, it was a very slow process, and many Americans were left on their own to deal with the aftermath of the crisis without much financial support. This crisis left a lasting impact on many people who were affected by it and left many to distrust financial institutions as a whole. 

The way the characters in Parable of the Sower came together in the face of destruction is opposite to how the real-world responses seemed to be very small in the grand scheme of the destruction the crisis did to many people. The quote,”We have to learn to thrive in a world that is coming apart.” shows how even though the book is fictional, the subject matters are all too apparent in the real world. The 2008 crisis revealed a deep divide in society between the wealthy that came out of the destruction with only scratches and bruises while the poor came out weathered and immensely injured. The crisis and its aftermath exposed many flaws in the financial system and the limits of economic responses to a crisis at that magnitude. 

The novel’s world shows an exaggerated version of the kind of economic uncertainty that was due to a financial crisis, but in many ways, it shows us the potential consequences of ignoring pressing systemic issues, as said in the text, “It’s easier to destroy than to create.” Parable of the Sower encourages readers to reflect on the underlying causes of climate change, wealth inequality, and the lack of trust in institutions, and think critically about how these factors might play out in real world situations. 

When we read Parable of the Sower during class, and we were able to connect our prior knowledge of the 2008 crisis, we were reminded just how fragile economic systems are and how when they fail the consequences can be very extreme. While the 2008 crisis was a financial one, Parable of the Sower suggests that the real issue lies in our ability to adapt and how we respond to change. This is backed up by the quote, “We don’t have a choice. We have to make the best of the world we’ve got.” The crisis revealed how unprepared many people were for the collapse of the economic system and the novel encourages us to think about how we might be able to create systems that are more sustainable, and more adaptable in the face of potential future crises. 

For me, reading Parable of the Sower in light of the 2008 crisis has been eye opening. It made me think more deeply about the long term effects of the economic systems and how important it is to address inequality before it may lead to disaster. The book challenges the idea that society will always be able to bounce back after a crisis, which was an assumption that was often made in the aftermath of the 2008 destruction. But instead, the novel offers a vision of the future that is surrounded by a need for change, both on a personal level and as a society as a whole.

Finally, reflecting on how engaging with Parable of the Sower and the 2008 financial crisis connects to GLOBE’s goal of helping Geneseo students reflect on changes in learning and outlook over time is important. This process of reflection allows myself and other students to not only understand how our perspectives shift as we learn but also helps us engage with real world problems in more meaningful ways. By going in depth with the connections between the novel and the real world financial crisis, I was able to better understand and appreciate the importance of thinking critically about social, economic and environmental issues. I believe, as students, we are encouraged to not only think about what we learn in the classroom but also how our learning can shape our views of the world. I was challenged to question the status quo and envision new ways of responding to crises in both our personal lives and in society.  

In conclusion, reading Parable of the Sower alongside the 2008 financial crisis shows us how economic collapse and social instability are connected, and how important it is to adapt when things fall apart. Even though the novel is fictional, it helps us think about the real world effects of system failures and why resilience and working together is so important. By looking at these connections, I can better understand how the world works and think about what I can do to make things better in the future. Engaging with Parable of the Sower this way encourages us to reflect on how we learn and grow over time, which is exactly what GLOBE wants students at Geneseo to practice.

Lily Gallagher

The 2008 financial crisis wasn’t just a headline or a moment in history; it was a lived experience for millions. Families were losing their homes, jobs disappeared overnight, and communities that once felt stable started to unravel. As I try to compare my experience in my first semester at SUNY Geneseo to Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower, I notice some similarities. 

When I first got my schedule over the summer, I was a bit confused as to what the Expulsion and Housing Crisis class would even be about. Just based on the name, I was under the impression that we would be learning about how living in poverty impacts people’s mental health, families, and opportunities or that maybe we would be learning about different socioeconomic inequalities as I didn’t have access to the syllabus yet. When I saw that we were reading Shakespeare, I was even more confused about what this class might be about. When we finally got into class, it didn’t make much sense. I couldn’t figure out how centuries-old plays or a dystopian novel would shed light on topics like foreclosure or poverty. But as the semester went on, the pieces started to click together. 

Connecting some of the readings to the 2008 crisis at points seemed like it was a bit of a reach. One example was when we read King Lear and A Mercy. While some of these topics connected, it seemed trivial to make these connections. It is true that in King Lear, Lear was expelled from his home, and in A Mercy, Florens search for answers led to her expulsion multiple times. But I often found myself thinking “How does this relate to modern times?” or “How can we connect this economically now from centuries ago.” At some points, I had to step back and think about why I was making these connections in the first place. The whole point was to make me think outside the box and bring upon lessons I might not have otherwise seen, and that in itself, was valuable. I tried to connect what I was learning to how it would benefit me in my future career. Specifically, as a future teacher, it is so important to be able to make connections to outside life events to what may be presented in my classroom one day. The most valuable lesson I was taught when it comes to teaching was to look beyond a student’s behavior, as you don’t know what kind of home situations they endeavor. Students don’tpurposefully come in trying to make your life more difficult.  Learning how to make connections with things that at first seem irrelevant will most times shed light that most connections made aren’t so little after all. Knowing how to deeply think outside the box will be a valuable skill for my future.

Engaging with Parable of the Sower while thinking about the financial crisis raised deeper questions about power and responsibility. The crisis exposed systemic inequalities, much like Butler’s novel does. Both show how the most vulnerable are often left to fend for themselves while those in power escape accountability. Reflecting on this through Butler’s story isn’t just an academic exercise, it’s personal. It’s about understanding how crises shape us and force us to reevaluate what we value and what we’re willing to fight for. Unlike some of the other books that we read in class prior like The Big Short, this book talked more about the social and moral themes of the crisis rather than the financial and legal matters of it. We often think of these events as distant or abstract, something that happens to other people. But reflecting on these issues through Butler’s lens forces us to confront how they shape our lives and values.

I’ve found a lot that comes to mind while engaging with Parable of the Sower in the context of the 2008 financial and housing crises. The novel paints a picture of a world where society has broken down, and people are left to fend for themselves in a world that’s become unsafe and uncertain. It’s a world where housing is no longer a given, but more of something fragile that can be taken away in an instant. And when I think about the 2008 crisis, those same feelings of instability and loss come to mind. Millions of people lost their homes, and their sense of security, and in some cases, their entire lives were uprooted. Reading Parable of the Sower alongside learning about this real-world event made me realize how closely Butler’s dystopian world mirrors what happened when the housing market crashed. The crisis revealed just how fragile our systems are and how easily people can be displaced, not just physically but emotionally and socially as well. 

In both the novel and the real world, the collapse of these systems isn’t just an economic problem, it’s a deeply human one. One quote that resonates with this from Parable of the Sower can be found in chapter four when Lauren Olamina, the main character and protagonist, says “That’s all anybody can do right now. Live. Hold out. Survive. I don’t know whether good times are coming back again. But I know that won’t matter if we don’t survive these times.” During the crisis, many families were expelled from their homes due to foreclosure and mortgage payments. For those affected, the question wasn’t about when things would return to “normal” or when the “good times” would come back. It was about making it through the present moment, coping with the uncertainty, and finding a way to survive. The economic collapse shattered people’s expectations of stability, just as in Parable of the Sower, where Lauren faces a world where survival itself becomes the priority. The uncertainty about whether “good times” would return reflects the long-term impact of the crisis. In many ways, recovery seemed like a distant hope, and for many, the focus shifted to survival. Just as Lauren doesn’t know when or if better days will come, many who faced the housing crisis couldn’t predict when, or if, their financial situations would stabilize. The immediate need was to hold on, adapt, and survive both in Butler’s fictional world and in the very real world of 2008. 

Reflecting on this through GLOBE’s framework helped me see how much my thinking has evolved over the semester. In the beginning, I saw housing crises as mainly financial events and problems to be solved with better policies or regulations. But through readings like King Lear, The Big Short, A Mercy, and Parable of the Sower, I came to understand the deeper, human impact of displacement and instability. It’s not just about economics; it’s about what happens when people lose their sense of home and how they rebuild their lives in the aftermath. That shift in perspective is exactly what GLOBE encourages, which is learning to see connections across disciplines and reflecting on how those insights shape our outlook over time. One of the lessons that stood out to me most was learning about how important literacy is. While reading books like A Mercy and The Big Short, the very intriguing question of “Can you read?” came up. But it got me thinking as to what this means. There is a huge difference between being able to read something and being able to understand it. Being able to read is something so many of us easily take for granted. This connects with how housing companies and banks will purposefully make contracts long and complex so they can get away with more bad faith practices. Still, they’re rarely questioned or challenged because they’re hidden in complex language. When people can’t grasp the fine print, it can lead to dire consequences, putting them at a disadvantage and leaving them vulnerable to exploitation, sometimes to the point of losing their homes. This can relate to my college experience thus far when it comes to reading textbooks or books for a certain class. I have never been a big reader. I have to be into the book or the topic and when someone forces me to read something, any motivation that I had is typically gone. I found myself often reading textbooks but not grasping what was being said. I was reading the words on the page rather than the meaning behind them. I have gotten better with this throughout the semester. It’s been a gradual process, but I’ve noticed how much more connected I feel to the material, and it’s made a big difference in how I learn and apply new ideas.

What struck me most about Parable of the Sower was the way it focuses on resilience. Lauren Olamina doesn’t just survive in this broken world, she builds something new. Her Earthseed philosophy, rooted in the idea that “God is change,” felt like a response to the chaos and instability of both Butler’s imagined world and the real-world fallout of 2008. It’s a reminder that even amid loss and uncertainty, people adapt, innovate, and try to create meaning. Transitioning into college was something that I had to persevere through. Being four and a half hours away from home and starting completely new. There was a sense of refreshment but also fear. But like Lauren, I could also build something new. This Was the start of creating the life I wanted as I was completely in control now. One quote that particularly resonated with this experience is found in chapter one when Lauren says  “All that you touch you Change. All that you change, changes you. The only lasting truth Is Change.” While change can be a scary thing, it is necessary. Life only happens when change occurs. I realized that moving to college was my chance to embrace that change and let it shape me into the person I wanted to become. Just like Lauren in the book, I was figuring out how to turn the uncertainty of a new environment into an opportunity to grow.

Being in the Expulsion and Housing Crisis class taught me valuable lessons and made me more aware of how crucial it is to connect things to a bigger picture. While I still hope to learn more about those living in poverty and socioeconomic inequalities, understanding other themes, such as the 2008 financial and housing crisis, is just as critical. Looking at Parable of the Sower in light of the 2008 financial crisis opened my eyes to the ways these two worlds are connected, even though they’re separated by time and place. Butler’s story shows how the most vulnerable are left to struggle while those in power escape consequences, much like what we saw during the housing crisis. For Geneseo’s  GLOBE instance, this kind of thinking is exactly what we’re encouraged to do. It not only challenges us to think critically about the world around us but also allows us to reflect on how our understanding of these issues evolves. More importantly, it is necessary to reflect on how our views change over time and how we can learn from both the past and the present. My little but valuable time so far at Geneseo has made me realize that like Lauren in Parable of the Sower, we have the power to adapt and build something meaningful in the face of uncertainty and I hope to take these skills beyond my time at Geneseo.