a welCoMe and a Challenge deeply – to move beyond what I wanted to do and to really question how I thought, who I was, and most importantly who I wanted to be. I learned a concept that is critical to sociology and I would submit is critical to one’s college experience. The sociological imagination, coined by the sociologist C. Wright Mills, challenged me to make the connection between individuals and the society in which they live. In short, this perspective helped me realize that we, as individuals, are not created in a vacuum, but our experiences and behaviors are shaped by social and historical contexts. In so doing, I was able to re-see myself. For example, I thought about how growing up in Appalachia shaped my ideas about community and family. I examined how and patterns, and, ultimately, behaviors shoes purchased with a pair of new shoes the intersection of race, class and gender of individuals in our world? given to a child in need. Blake returned to influences my thoughts and behaviors. This Yes, these are the questions with which Argentina that year with 10,000 pairs of introspection and examination allowed me I love to grapple. And I owe my ability to shoes made possible by his customers. He to understand myself. do so to my college experience. lived on purpose. And I believe if you live On a broader scale, the sociological So as you begin your own journey, I on purpose, the money will follow. imagination affords us the opportunity to encourage you to do 3 things: Finally, Class of 2016, use your imagi- examine and understand those in our fami- Number 1: Challenge your own thinking. nation. And not just the term meaning to lies, in residence halls, in our classrooms, Once I left the comfort of my community conceptualize what you’d like to see or what and in the world around us. Through this and met friends who were from different you’d like to be, but use your sociological imagination, we, like Michelle Alexander parts of the country – many of whom imagination. Over the next few years you in her book, The New Jim Crow, can ask the thought differently than me – I began to will have the unique opportunity to raise question, How can we in the age of color- question ideas I had always taken for granted. some significant questions: questions about blindness still operate seemingly as a caste This challenge was a gift because it made people and circumstances around you system where African American males me think critically and to realize that the and questions about yourself. Know that find themselves 6% of the population but world is much bigger than me, my ideas, sometimes it takes more courage to ask the 40% of those incarcerated? Is it simply the and my community. question than it does to find the solution. behavior of a particular subpopulation as Number 2: Pursue your passion. Resist I challenge you – we challenge you – to we might surmise from the popular media, the urge to be motivated by money or to be tap into the power of now (the only space or something else? Or we can ask, as those content focusing only on what you want to of time that’s guaranteed you) to answer in the occupy movement, why the bottom “do.” Yes, even in this economic climate. those questions, both critically and honestly. 99% of the U.S. has only 60% of the wealth, Ask yourself, Who am I? Who and what We challenge you to both look within and while the top 1% has 40% of the wealth. do I want to be? And lastly, how can that outside yourself, to embrace “the other,” What contributes to this incredible gap? translate into a meaningful contribution and to go confidently in the direction of Is there something innately different about to my community and to my world? That’s your dreams. Welcome to Bellarmine. I those at the top that causes great success? what Blake Mycoskie did when, after be- hope you have a great year! Or is it, perhaps, something deeper – friending children in Argentina, he found something to which only our sociological they had no shoes to protect their feet. Dr. Matisa wilbon is an associate professor in imagination can lead us, to a social and Wanting to help, he created TOMS Shoes. the Sociology Department and director of the historical structure that shapes systems This company would match every pair of Brown Scholars Leadership Program. winter 2013 41
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