Time Capsule: 2008
Item 1: A travel coffee mug and a cup of 'to go' cereal in an individual, plastic disposable bowl One of the first questions every anthropologist asks about a society is: how did that society eat? A travel coffee mug answers the questions of how our society eats, what it eats, and where it eats, as well as exemplifies America's fast pace and the importance of cars as transportation in the world. Americans are so busy they eat in their cars, live in their cars, and do not have enough time in the morning even to sip a cup of coffee at the breakfast table or to fix a bowl of cereal. Convenience rather than skilled or leisurely preparation of food is what is most important when people select their breakfast menu items, even when consuming is supposed to be the most important meal of the day. It is hard to believe a hundred years ago, few people ate cereal, and many people consumed eggs, bacon, or other substantial meat products that took a long time to prepare for breakfast. Even poor people ate bread prepared at home, or at a local bakery, and took the time to make coffee from scratch. How we communicate is another integral part of what defines our society. We communicate 'on the go.' We are connected to
To remedy this, a small recording of some typical conversations that take place on cell phones that could be activated on a battery-powered tape recorder, and a picture of someone in a car taking on a cell phone, could be included as well. Today, getting into college is determined partly by our performance on standardized exams. Also, it would allow important news events of the day to be included on the playlist, such as health news about AIDS and obesity, information about the fears of terrorism, world politics, and how our government and other governments around the world are run. It will be interesting if the people of the future do well or less well on the SATs, and if they think that the subject matter of the test, and the type of knowledge valued in our society is important, or unimportant, relatively speaking, to what is valued in their society. Professional and amateur athletes wear them during sporting activities, and they have become a symbol of 'America' all over the world, in almost every nation, particularly certain brands like Nike. Mothers and fathers wear them for comfort doing errands, or sometimes with business clothes until they get to the office. Item 3: A copy of the SATs How we view education is another important aspect of modern life that should be included in the time capsule. people 24/7, yet we seldom see their faces (unless it is a photograph taken on a combination cell phone camera)! Of course, when the time capsule is opened, it is possible that the people of the future will not be able to use the cell phone, because communication technology has evolved even further. But sneakers are one type of clothing that is seen all over the world. Including an iPod would allow the people of the future to hear a typical musical playlist, spanning from the classical to modern, and to get a sense of how people in our era usually listen to music-in a disconnected and portable fashion, in a random selection of different tunes. The sampling of recorded conversations could span from the very trivial, like two teenage girls gossiping about a cute boy, to the very final serious and tragic last cell phone messages to loved ones transmitted by the people who died on 9/11. ' A scoring sheet should be included with the SATs, so the test takers of the future could attempt to test their own knowledge against what students are required to know today. Ideally, a typical, worn brand of sneakers should be selected, rather than a very 'high end' style of shoe, or a pristine shoe untouched by dirt, to give a picture of what the average consumer was wearing in 2008. This would help illustrate the fragmented nature of modern conversation, and to show how cell phones were used in our society.
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