Victoria Jensen URS Response Paper-The Single Story This week in class we discussed the relevance and the

problems associated with the single story. We watched a Ted talk about an African women with anecdotes about her own experiences with how the single story affected her as a person, but also as someone subjectified by the single story. I though that this particular subject was really fascinating, in that it was another way to percieve the effects prejudices, and even just simple facts, can affect the way people view other people. For instance, knowing only one thing about someone should not be what you base their entire image, but this is what happens almost subconsciously to everyone. In class we picked a specific example to create a single story on, and it was surprisingly very difficult to do. Before the assignment I assumed it would be very simple to just categorize a Wisconsin college student (specifically from the UW Madison campus) but found that all of my preoncieved notions weren't something anyone I really knew, or knew of, could identify with. My own group discussed how this might embody some aspects of a majority, but no single person could possibly identify as this single story we had created. I found this very fascinating because I myself have unfairly judged other cultures and people (perhaps unconsciously) on their single stories. I learned that no person fits any stereotype or prejudice, despite their being some truths to every stereotype. Just because a person exhibits some characteristics of that single story doesn't mean that is who they are, especially when applied to an etire culture; something so big and complex no set of characteristics could encompass it. This applies specifically to my research project as well. I am dealing with foreign students just as well as the American ones, and I should be very careful not to let what little I know about them affect how I conduct research or even converse with them.

- A brief description of your research, especially how it relates to the piece of art My research is something of a development. My professor that I work for is in the process of figuring out how exactly she wants to run her experiment and what kind of data she should be gathering. She basically explained some concepts that she wants to test, and I am helping her develop her project. To say that It is in it's infancy is an understatement, i am currently assigned with helping her develop ways to collect qualitative data, and perhaps quantitative if I myself choose to develop that and discuss it with her. Basically i am working for the Italain professor Tiziana. She wants to know whether or not the internet correspondance between her own American first year students and the Italian third/fourth year students has a positive learning outcome for all involved. She bases her thesis on some studies from a Californian linguist who stated that for any language student to learn they must converse in a way that they will basically understand that other person, but also have something new to develop their skills on so they will not get bored. Professor tiziana is developing methods in recognizing what exactly that plus 1 is and if something greater (perhaps plus n) can still be sufficient to learn from without getting to be too difficult. - Comparing the purpose of your research with the purpose of the piece of art

The purpose of the research is to determine whether or not greater learning can be achieved over online conversing between the two types of students. I believe the purpose of the painting is to show the communication between the two women, however different they may be. - Why you chose the piece of art I chose this specific painting, because of the the obvious communication that is happening between the two figures in the painting. The probability that they are mostly likely discussing something is high. Which is exactly what this research is based on, communication between the students. it was actually really hard to find a painting that I thought centered on communication, so because I though that this painting's main focus was the communication. that is why i chose it. I also noticed, after studying it for a while, how different the people in the painting are from each other. Despite most likely being from the same class and gender. One is portrayed more dominantly and wears mainly black (she appears to be older) and the other is percieved as younger and wears mainly white, or ligher colors. Her position is also a little subsurvient. I connected this to the obvious difference in expertise levels of the italian students versus the American. The american students have literally only had this semester to study italian, and the Italian students have been studying English for a good three four years.