My Artistic Freedom of expression!!!!!

A small tear in my eyes

As they say all good things come to an end.

This is my last blog for the semester. My heart is still beating fast, I just finished writing my semester test. I think I'm going to do really well. I have worked hard and consistently through out the semester so all that hard work will pay off, I'm sure of that.

Last week we our last news group piece , here I what my group and I did.

I have learnt a lot this semester, this module has helped me realise that it is very important to be aware of what is going on around and that it also affects me. I must admit I was not consistent with attending lectures but when I did attend, I learnt a lot.

Thanks to Patrick, our tutor I personally thought he was a good tutor( I'm not just saying this because he is marking this blog).Thanks to Thembisa I may sometimes have looked like I was not listening during your lectures, I actually was, I think my marks will speak for themselves.

When you are feeling stressed and about to breakdown, Just remember: Stressed is just Desserts spelled backwards… It’s a piece of cake!

SO DO I REALLY HAVE A RIGHT TO SPEAK MY MIND!!!!

Second to last week.

Last week Wednesday we watched a dvd, which I thought was very interesting and got me thinking and looking at the internet in a different way. Fridays lecture we went over Mondays the quiz and talked about the end of the semester test. I the lecture early because I felt I didn't need to stay for the part on kompozer because I felt I can use kompozer in my sleep.

This week was our second to last tutorial. Next week Monday I am going to write my end of the semester exam. I am ready for it and I will do very well for it.

During this weeks tut, we had to work with kompozer,I did INST last semester so for me it was a revision session for me. I had fun working with it and was able to finish during my tut.

Our news article.

The past two weeks we interviewed some international students to find out how they felt about censorship and to get their opinions and views on censorship in the media and the internet. What we found was that all of the interviewees were aware of censorship and what it entails. Most of them associated censorship with the government and with control. The students we interviewed felt that censorship has both pros and cons. The cons being that the public should be able to access everything (information) and it should be up to them to choose what the believe and what not to be and they felt it does not benefit the public as a whole, Nsisong said, “people should choose what to believe and what not to believe and they should have a choice". The pros where that if things are censored children cannot access certain websites, as Cynthia mentioned, "Censoring various pornography sites, which children are viewing in great numbers daily, makes the web a safer place for children.”

When asked how they felt about the censorship in China, we found that some of the students had not even been aware of the censorship in china. The ones which new about the censorship had the following things to say: Nontobeko said, “I cannot even being to imagine how my life would be without being able to access websites such as facebook and twitter. I live on these sites. The Chinese censorship is wrong and the only people who truly benefit in the case of censorship in China, is the Chinese government.” This was the general response we got from the interviewees. They mostly felt that the censorship in China was wrong and that as much as the Chinese government tried to justify the censorship, they felt is still wasn’t justified.

We would like to say thank you to the following students for allowing us to interview them: Nsisong Okon(Nigeria), Zakhona Sibisi, Delaine Geduld, Cynthia Singine (Zimbabwe) and Nontobeko Gamedze (Swaziland).

Informed Citizenship

Am I am informed citizen?
This week, we had to do a blog workshop. I thought this weeks blog workshop was helpful in the sense that as I was assessing the three blogs , I realised there where things missing in my blogs. the blog workshop helped me improve my blogs.

After I finished doing the blog workshop, my news team got together and discussed our next and final news article. We came up with five questions and we decided we where going to interview international students.

I really thought Wednesdays lecture was interesting, we watched a documentary. The lecture got me thinking about the amount of data and personal information I put on line. I did Internet expertise last semester so I was aware of some of the things, but what was scary to me was how the information we put up online stays there , even after we think we have deleted it, it like leaving a trail of yourself all over the web. It made me look at Facebook in whole new way.


I have started preparing for my final project. I am really not looking forward to writing the essay, but hey I have got no choice I have to do it.

After watching that dvd and reflecting on it I think I am an informed citizen.

View all

Get your own

This is my slide show.

Freedom To Speak Without Censorship and/or Limitation.

Hi everyone

From Claiming my own right to Freedom of Expression

Today as a news team, we revise and edited our news article with the help of your editors.Once we had finished that, we published it on the news portal. I was happy with the way my news team and I worked together putting the news piece together.Here is the our new piece Censorship in China
We also discussed what our next news piece would be on.

The issue of press freedom in South Africa is a very sad one in my opinion. What I find more disturbing is how many people are not aware how negatively the Information Bill and the Media Tribunal will effect their lives. Many think that it will only effect the "reporters , newspapers, the news people".

I really hope that the ANC will review its ideas or that the general public will stand up together to fight against it, otherwise freedom of expression as we know it will be jeopardized.

Week Seven: Photography and visual literacy

On Friday Thembisa demonstrated how to use Open Shot.There was no quiz on Monday this week, so I spent the time I usually spend studying for the quiz, I spent that time putting my news groups piece together. I submitted my groups news story to my editors and tutors via the 'speak to your group' forum.

From Claiming my own right to Freedom of Expression

For this weeks tut we started working on Open Shot,we played around with. I really enjoyed making my first movie. I made two more when I got back home, using Windows Movie maker. I feel more comfortable using the Windows Movie Maker. I'm looking forward to making a movie for my final project.

Why is freedom of expression an important civil right?

Honestly before doing INST, I truly took my freedom of expression for granted. I hardly ever thought about how it would impact my life if it was for what ever reason taken away from me.

This article to me shows or illustrates why freedom of expression (of any kind) is an important civil right: Freedom of Expression.

Week Five

Greetings everyone.

I did the quiz yesterday, I really thought I was well prepared for it. Honestly I felt like it was the hardest one I have written so far this semester. The readings really had me thinking about my life, the crime rate and the AIDS pandemic in South Africa. I related to the article by Justice Malala more because crime has effected my life directly a couple of times too. Ive lost family members and loved ones to crime. This past Sunday, some men broke into my 76 year old Grans house and held her at gun point.

When my group and I chose to do our news on China I did not know much about the great firewall. After spending this past week researching I have come to appreciate South Africa. As much as I do not agree with all the laws of South Africa when it comes to freedom of speech and press at-least the South African government has not tried to take away my right to express my self as Chinese government has. I really cant imagine not being allowed to go on Facebook, or having facebook blocked in the entire country. I cant imagine not be able to access all of the social networking group that i am part of because they have been blocked by the country.

These last two weeks I have found a couple articles which talk about different ways in which China is censoring the internet. From using the Great Firewall of China to having legislation set in place which sensor what people many say or talk about.
Here are a couple of the article which I found interesting and which will help my news group. i have one web page, one newspaper article and one journal article.
1. Freedom of Expression and the Internet in China: A Human Rights Watch Backgrounder
2. Scaling the Digital wall in China
3. The Great Firewall

The Golden Shield Project

This week I had my first tutorial for INST. We where suppose to choose two editors for our group, but no suggested any names, so two people ended up offering to be our groups editors. My group decided we wanted to look at Censorship of information in different countries. We then divide ourselves into sub groups, my sub group decided we wanted to work on the "Golden Shield Project" often referred to as the "Great firewall of China".

I had a hard time trying to decided what direction or what questions I would address. But we ended up deciding we would look at how the Great Firewall of China infringes or affects the freedom of speech and freedom of the press of its citizens and its press.

I offered to be the editor for my news team, once everyone has written their individual pieces I will be the one who puts the pieces together so they sound like one coherent and well written piece. I will also have to make sure that the references that my group has are correct.