Harriet Martineau was a woman social thinker in the 1800's in a society that was male dominated. She wrote scholarly articles about society that were received well. She believed that you needed to be out in society to know what was going on. She reached out to the masses to explain society to everyone. She wanted to understand the 'why' of things, how society worked, and how inequalities kept people from achieving human happiness which she saw as the essential fairness of society.
Martineau saw disruptions in society. She focused on America in one of her studies and saw how the constitution was built on natural rights and how these rights were not extended to everyone. She saw that these inequalities would affect the society.
The way she looked at society is still important in today's world. Inequalities still exist and keep people from achieving happiness. People look at the American dream, what ever it may be for the person, and they want it. An example would be of someone living in poverty with a family and low income. Both parents may work but if their job pays minimum wage, that really is not enough to pull themselves out of poverty and getting them to the point that their dream is possible.
http://billmoyers.com/content/slideshow-poverty-in-todays-america/
The eighth picture is this slide show shows a family in poverty who does have inspirations but no way of attaining them. The rest of the pictures make one think, is it really fair that some people have so much when some people have almost nothing?
Great job. Everything that you had to say was well said. the slide show was great and the pictures were fantastic. I liked how you ended with a question....it really makes on think. It is crazy to see how happy people can be when they have so little....it amazes me because we often find ourselves wanting more and more when we have enough to survive. Overall great job. One thing that you could have expanded on was Harriet's understanding of human happiness and why she thought what she did.
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