Thursday's assignment

Culture affects people’s perceptions and opinions regarding various issues differently.  Analyzing the way cultural influences impact the public’s view of the abandonment of animals in the United States, differs according to an individual’s own experience and the extent to which they have learned about the issue whether from media or personal accounts.  A person working in a shelter who takes care of the animals being abandoned compared to another individual who has no pets or any connection whatsoever to animals, has a completely different opinion on the importance of this issue. Everyone is impacted by culture in unique ways; however, their perception and opinion of an issue depends on one’s knowledge, community, position and exposure to the problem one’s opinion and perception of the issue. In my opinion, the difference between truth and fact relates to how the stories are told, including unbiased reporting by the media or other personal accounts.

My love for animals, and dogs in particularly, grew when my family and I got involved in an organization known as “Adopt-A-Lab”. Through this organization I became aware of the great number of dogs that are in need of rescue for various reasons. Adopt-A-Lab’s purpose is to place dogs in safe homes as soon as possible. My mom, sister and I spent many Saturday mornings playing with the puppies and dogs, in hopes that at the end of the day they would leave with an owner who could provide them with a permanent home and the love and care they needed.  

“Yellow Rain” helped spark some new ideas for a fresh perspective, in that I want the truth to be told for these animals.  In addition, I would like my new perspective to be from an individual working in a shelter with these animals. I want to compare truth versus fact, and share a real story of an animal’s life from the day it was abandoned and its life in the shelter. I will incorporate fact by adding some statistics. I am aiming for a more personal and factual approach for this performance. This process relates more the hopper method, because my goal in the performance is to replicate the storytelling as closely as possible to the original.