Intro

After an airplane landed on the State College Airport, complicated feelings that consist of thrill and tension came over me. Step by step, I walked into the new world and felt similar feelings that might be the ones which pioneers who first came here in this land felt. From that day, my life of Penn State began. Back to fall 2011, everything was new to me in Penn State. I did not know many things about college life in the U.S. because not only it is the first time studying in abroad in my life but also it is the first time studying in the university. Though it was not easy to leave all of the familiarities behind in my motherland, there was no hesitation to leave home because I had a clear purpose that I want to achieve in the U.S.: To know how the U.S. became one of the greatest powers in the world and the way the U.S. maintaining its status.

As a student who has a history of the colonial era by Japanese, I want to know why it did happen. I found the reason from history; it was the wrong politicians and policies which could not overview the trends of that age. From this thought, I decided to study about how to manage or make the better future for my country to avoid the heartbroken past but my goal that was focused on my nation had been changed over time to the one that focuses on changing the world for the better place. That was the origin of my goal, to know how I can make the better future for my nation and the world by studying about the U.S., leading country in the world, in its lands and curricular. I was in great hopes studying about the U.S. and its power leading the world.

From this point, as spending almost a year in Penn State, it is surprising how I had been changed over time and what I learned in the U.S. within a year. Except common college life’s aspects, I learned many things about what roles we have in our society and how we view the world and act to successfully role as citizens who lead our nation. By investigating several issues or rhetorical materials, I come to a conclusion that if I want to be the one who can change the society and the world, I should be the one who stays awake about real meanings that leading powers want to deliver and know how those powers address their messages to people. Moreover, I realize that I should know about the rhetorical strategies that are used by leaders to clarify their messages and also to use those strategies to address my messages to people. Therefore, from this point, I would like to share several works and reflections that I worked during semesters.

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Run

            Wealth, power, honor, love… What is your purpose of life? Where are you heading now? Why Do You Live? As living in a contemporary society which is rapidly changing day by day, sometimes, we ‘just’ live our lives. In other words, without any specific purposes or values, we leave ourselves in the flow of the society and meet the social requirements. We have to know where we do go. Without clear purpose, it is easy to being eroded by the power of society.

Today, I’m going to introduce a sermon that was preached in first Sunday after the 9.11. Though there are not many rhetoric strategies that I can cover, I really want to cover this film for me and us who is living in a contemporary society. The sermon’s message is simple: “Run for your lives”. The reverend Carter kept saying run from all of the evil things, something that obsessed you. Because this is a sermon by Christians most of its message seems to focus on the God. However, this sermon can be adapted for all of us without having a status as a religious people. It alerts us to the purpose of our lives. Sometimes, we overlook worthy values such as love, duty because it is hard to glance over those ‘true’ values to catch up with social flows and needs that society forces us to do. In other words, we live our lives not because of ourselves but for the society itself. This is why we sometimes forget the true human values. In the sermon, the reverend commented about the fire fighters and the police officers who devoted themselves for their duty and for others. Why did they give their lives? Why did they run to the disasters not run away from? They are not dumb who do not know worthy of their lives and other social values. The reason why they did that is simple; they did know what they should do and what they sacrificed for ‘the true human values’.

It can be uncomfortable for some people who do not familiar with the church sermon but from this article, I do not say about the God’s message rather, I want to look back ourselves what direction we had gone so far. Didn’t we live our lives well without ignoring the true human values? Where are we going now to wealth, honor, and other social values? Or the true values of our lives? Run away from the society and values which forces us to do something for it. Run to yourselves and values of worth. Do not let yourselves to be catch up with and eroded by social factors Run and find true values.