http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Terminator-2-judgement-day.jpg

www.google.com

For this assignment my three icons were The Terminator; Google®; and a firefighter.  The Terminator comes from the television and film series of the same name, Google® is one of the most common and well-used internet search engines, and firefighting is the global profession that involves emergency, fire and medical response. 

I chose each icon for various reasons, but the each has a symbolic status.  The Terminator icon was chosen for many different reasons.  The Terminator character definitely has the recognition factor, as do many different quotes from the movie series.  Statements like “I’ll be back!” can be easily identified from the movie, even by people who haven’t seen the movie.  I also chose Google® because of its recognition factor.   The word “Google” has replaced the words “search for” in daily language.  For instance, many times when we are looking for something on the internet, we will say, “did you Google it?”  For my final icon I chose firefighters.  Whether it is the firefighter with ice hanging off his mustache, the firefighter raising the flag over the ruins of the World Trade Center towers, or the buff firefighter in the calendar, firefighters have become a universal sign of help. 

I grew up watching the Terminator movies, so I have used the quotes from the movies and I can identify with that “you are destined to be something great” idea. My wife uses the phrase “I’ll be back” from the Terminator movie, even though she has never seen it.  I use Google every day, and I didn’t realize how much it is ingrained in our everyday lives until I heard the phrase “Google it” from my mother.  Finally, the firefighter; my grandfather was a firefighter, and I remember looking forward to the fire station tours that every American child experiences at some point in their elementary school education.  Now, I am a firefighter of fourteen years.  Most of us can remember the iconic image of the firefighters raising the flag above the World Trade Center disaster and the role firefighters played in that disaster elevated the profession to hero status.