Dehumanization

My project in photography class is about how the media overlooks Latinos as school dropouts and kids who don’t care about their education. This topic is personal to me because I’m a Latina student and for someone to make an assumption that I’m botching up in school is very offensive. I attend school everyday and get good grades. I’m not into smoking and getting high like others assume me to be. I actually do care about my education and being someone in life. This affects the like of others around me because they are beginning to believe what the media is portraying them to be and are thinking it’s cool to actually get high and drop out. My image changes the way the media thinks about us by showing how Latinos do come to school and are able to be happy without getting high or popping a pill. I am teaching how many of us Latinos do care about our education and how were planning on doing something out of our lives instead of just kicking it out on the block.
“Through transforming action they can create a new situation,” This quote from Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed means that if we change our actions, it can change the way people see us. It also shows how we can have the power to create a better name for ourselves; we just need to try harder.