About me (Blog post 1)

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     Hi everyone, I’m Sam (she/her). I’m a transfer student senior and an English major with a minor in Women’s and Gender Studies.  As for my hobbies, anime and video games are a huge interest of mine.  Specifically, I’m a cosplayer and I love making my own costumes.  I’ve always been crafty, so cosplay is perfect for me, because I get to sew, craft, and make costumes of my favorite characters.  My favorite series of all time (and my favorite to cosplay from) is Fire Emblem.  Japanese media is a huge interest of mine—me and my now husband met when we were younger because of a shared interest in the anime Naruto.  We’re both huge nerds!  As for other interests, I am very much passionate about feminism, I love studying history, and I find reading Shakespeare to be extremely fun (the Shakespeare & Disney course here at Upstate with Dr. Canino is to thank for that).


  I recently started a seasonal job at Bath & Body Works so I’m not sure how many hours I have to work yet, but I also have my own small business selling cosplay accessories that I try to work on at least 8-10 hours a week during the school year (usually just on the weekends, because I really don’t have time otherwise)! 


As for something you should know about as a learner, I am really passionate about what I write about and often go over word count requirements for essays.  I understand the beauty and importance of conciseness and especially of elegant communication, but I have always been a wordy writer…  you’ve probably already noticed!  It’s something I am always working on.  


I was constantly reading as a child (Junie B. Jones, Magic Treehouse, A-Z Mysteries, Harry Potter, Nancy Drew(!), but those were all when I was younger).  

A book series that I feel impacted me the most as an adolescent was The Hunger Games series, which I am sure a lot of us in this class read in our adolescence!  I started reading it when I was probably twelve. 

Katniss was one of the earliest depictions of a strong female lead I can remember being inspired by as an adolescent.  She was a natural badass with a complex backstory and an extremely cool skillset. Even the romantic scenes within the novels served to illustrate the complexity of Katniss as a human being, rather than just showing her as a pretty girl to be wooed and won.

The final scene of Katniss and Peeta in the first book is probably one of my all time favorite reading moments I’ve experienced.  It is absolutely glorious to see a female character “stick it to the man” the way that Katniss did, and it was the first time I’d read anything like that.  I think that Katniss is the character who stands out the most to me from my adolescence because she was a young woman who always stood up for what she believed in, no matter what, and she never allowed herself to be silenced.  She’s the exact opposite of the prim, quiet, subdued woman which I had been taught what I was supposed to become.  

The problem with that is I had always been “loud” in my ideas and opinions and thought I needed to make myself quieter in order to be what a “woman” is.  Katniss showed me I didn’t have to.  In fact, Katniss’s ability to use her silence as a weapon was so epic to me that I admired her for it, because even when she wasn’t speaking, she was making a statement about what she believed in (remember the opening ceremony chariot scene?!).  Anyway, perhaps I should thank Katniss (alongside a myriad of other things that were influencing me at the time, including Tumblr and my nonbinary sibling) for sparking the feminist flame within a young Sam.  :)


Although I haven’t revisited The Hunger Games in a very long time (it’s been almost twelve years since I first read it (!)) I think I’d see myself in Katniss just as much today (or perhaps even more) than I did back then.  I truly believe The Hunger Games impacted me in my adolescence more than I ever even realized at the time, but looking back now, it’s obvious how important seeing a character like Katniss was for me.  (As an aside, I actually dressed up as/cosplayed Katniss a few years later, in the eighth grade, for a school event.  My fellow classmates elected me to be Katniss, and I was so honored to be picked for her!)


The books I read throughout my childhood and adolescence are like a mosaic that have helped shape who I am as an individual.  I will always have books to thank for helping me become a person who is hungry to learn about not just my own life, but about the lives and experiences of others.  They help me remember the beauty and the joy in the world around me.  Although I consume stories in lots of other ways now aside from just books (especially RPGs, TV series, podcasts, etc), the strong foundation I have in reading has taught me how to see myself in the experiences of others, and how to approach the unknown with excitement rather than fear.  


*I wanted to add a pic of me and my husband at a convention to show my cosplay, but I hated that it plastered the image so big on the preview of the blog post, lol! If you were curious, I have pics posted on my Instagram (@kk.lovesong) :)

Comments

  1. HelenAugust 27, 2022 at 11:02 AM

    That's so cool, I did the Shakespeare/Disney with Dr Canino just last semester,.and I loved it!
    I also loved Nancy Drew and Harry Potter and the Hunger Games in middle-school; that series was iconic. Katniss is awesome for sure.
    I also relate to being wordy; I'm always working on being concise, too.
    I love the way you described your reading experience as a mosaic! That whole bit there is a beautiful way of putting it

    ReplyDelete
  2. CameronAugust 28, 2022 at 7:32 PM

    Awesome. As you already know from my post, I too love anime, and other Japanese media. I also read a lot of those books you read when I was younger to. I also dressed up or "cosplayed" as the brother from Magic Treehouse for a school contest in elementary, though I can't remember his name.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AngelAugust 29, 2022 at 5:08 PM

    I am also a huge nerd (as you already know) and will definitely be checking out the Instagram! I currently am obsessed with the game Hollow Knight if you ever want to give that one a try (if you haven't already of course). It is super cute and very atmospheric. The sound track is excellent as well.

    I love that you could relate to the powerful female protagonists in books from such a young age. I remember envisioning myself as Tris Prior from the Divergent series (my big dystopian series at that time) and honestly still search for similarities with certain characters even now. Cultural views of what a woman should be like have a strong presence in my life and I can absolutely understand how frustrating it is to be the only one to see how wrong they are in a sea of others with the same background. But hey, those strong women had to overcome their obstacles as well, so what's a few judgmental faces/opinions as compared to the hunger games ;)

    ReplyDelete

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