Whats up my beautiful, amazing, lovely readers, It’s been a minute since my last post, but I’m excited to share today’s read with you.

Today’s blog entry revolves around our humanities class project, “Fear Factor,” delving into the Cold War. In classic PLP fashion, we embarked on a field trip to Arizona and Nevada in late April to deepen our understanding, researching firsthand accounts of Cold War narratives. While not everyone in our class joined, I was accompanied by 12 amazing classmates and friends, along with our teachers Mr. Hughes and Ms. McWilliam (Ms. Maxwell). Our project’s driving question is, “How has fear been used as a political, defensive, and cultural tool to shape our society?” This question guided our exploration and haunted me from Tuscon to Vegas.

The Field Study:

Anticipation buzzed as we set off on our adventure. The year prior we took a trip to Orlando to visit Disney World and learn about immersive theming. That was one of the best trips of my life, so this trip was going to be hard to top.

Our flight left YVR late afternoon April 18 and what felt like years in the car rental lobby, we were in Tuscon. Our journey commenced with a visit to the Titan Missile Silo in Tucson, AZ, a figurative treasure trove of information that was crucial for our project. Touring the silo, we learned about missile launch mechanisms and the alarming speed at which they could reach targets in a nuclear conflict—just 30 minutes. I and a few of my peers wanted to interview our tour guide after she had shown us the missile silo. Although intimidated, she provided some crucial information that would be some of my strongest evidence from the trip.

Our class had only been to two “out of country” field trips with our last one being Disney World. As we travelled through Arizona’s deserts, we embarked on various outdoor activities, including hiking, and nutritious picnics. We made multiple stops for some amazing national park hikes including Saguaro NP and of course, the Grand Canyon—an unforgettable experience no matter how many times you visit.

Our trip concluded in Las Vegas, NV, where I spent a lot of time collecting resources for my documentary about Civil Defense. We enjoyed some great fast food that I wasn’t used to living in Canada like Rasing Caines and Chick-fil-A Fil and a mukbang at the Cheesecake Factory.

 

All in all, Our trip was an unforgettable experience, and it’s really hard to do justice to how fun it was with just words. Not only was it an invaluable learning experience, but it brought me and my fellow classmates closer together, a bond shared over our best PLP trip yet.

Learning Resources:

To deepen our grasp of the Cold War, we dove into two essential reads: “Hiroshima” by John Hersey and “Fallout” by Todd Strasser. These books, assigned at different stages of our project, enriched my understanding and facilitated organizing my ideas through note-taking, forming a sort of personal knowledge manager called a Zettlekasten.

In summary, the Zettlekasten is like a second brain. It stores important permanent information, as well as fleeting notes, like thoughts that we have coming and going. It’s hard to really get fully in-depth about it so if you’d like to learn more here’s a link to a detailed guide:

The Final Product:

My final product, as I previously mentioned, took the form of a documentary, exploring the question: “How have governments historically used media and fear to shape public opinion and manipulate fear through propaganda and civil defence campaigns?” The documentary explored how government propaganda and civil defence campaigns during the Cold War era utilized media and fear to shape American perceptions, influence public opinion, and control fear. Included are the strategies used, their impact on historical events, and their relevance in the atomic age. I was inspired by wanting to know what life was like back then and the strategies the government used physiologically to resolve and control fear and influence the public. I spent a solid 8 hours (no joke) making my documentary. Because of its topic, There wasn’t a surplus of “new clips” I could’ve used. I had to pull a lot of historical public domain footage, and the process let me say was PAINSTAKING. It all worked out, however, and I was really proud of my final product. Check it out below.

In retrospect, this project was a captivating journey, resonating with past endeavours like our exploration of the Manhattan Project. The trip was a whirlwind of fun and learning, and the freedom to choose our final product was especially nice I’m really proud of the effort I put into this project, and I’m thrilled to share it with you all!

Thank you for reading and have a blessed day.