Liz, Damnit

What's Next?

2009-05-15T15:49:00.001-04:00

Final post

2009-05-04T15:18:00.001-04:00

This is really (shamefully) short - because I can't think of anything more to add. If I do, I will, but haven't I yapped enough in this blog already? :)

Readings

readings ok - some were pretty heavy, but i like that. some students may have issues - for something like the literacy thing (which i recall we had some trouble with) maybe a short presentation of the ideas first, then have the students read the selection. especially if you have a good mix of majors, or at least a lack of theory nerds like myself.

Assignments

the blogs are fine - I like them a lot! no problems there. the rest I was also fine with, except the wikipedia assignment, since this got very busy this semester and i just didn't feel like ego-stroking the wiki powers-that-be, so this is more of a personal gripe. I got the practical reasons for participating, and I like the idea but...ehhh....

Activities

I think the mix of activities that we had functioned really well to make the monitor disappear...instead of just sitting there scrolling thru pdf's or observing, we did have to get involved.

Best/Least

I liked the hypertext essay - even though it was a lot of work.

What would I have done more of/less of

start website project earlier in the semester - maybe make it a term-long assignment

anything left out?

I really don't think so! :)

do I feel prepared to continue in this area?

Actually, I think I'll be continuing with most of the material for a long time, career-wise. It's a really new field in comp/rhetoric studies, and a pretty exciting one since it's so far-reaching.

still up there....goin' on about a month now!

2009-04-30T12:33:00.002-04:00

Freewrite on Reflective Analysis (Blog 21?)

2009-04-13T14:53:00.008-04:00

The Dung Beetle Essay (see eternal return wiki on scarabs)

Why dung beetles? because they, to the Ancient Egyptians, symbolized "Eternal renewal" (see the wiki), which goes with my loose "eternal return of the same" idea here.

If I can speak plainly, though, the beetles call to mind the sheer amount of sh*t online and the need to pull it all together in a neat ball and deal with it bit by bit. Which is also how I view my research process...if I'm lucky, I'll get a nice neat sphere of an idea and take it for a walk. If I'm not, I go collect more stuff and bundle it up again in a new way.

I love beating metaphors into the ground!

digital mindsets (L&K, B) + "interactions thru and with electronic texts" (Hayles, Rheingold, Baker, Electronic Literature collection, Collins, and Hayles).

my hypertext essay topic examines trolling/sexism/online spaces - issues of power and control that pop up even in the ostensibly free internet...and i've done some work on cyber bullying which relates to aspects of this...

......
computer mediated communication literally "re-mediating" human behaviors, responses (eg, why do people act like idiots on the internet?)

flashmobs & twitter & video chat & ____more_____ as a way to put the humanity back? Whether your primary experience of "the internet" comes from an isolated monitor/keyboard or a tiny cell phone, you may treat it differently...tiny screens may lead to more face-to-face time with people, even ones you're not talking to, which may cause you to "mind your manners" more?

but what's going on there? there's a multiplicity of screens now, even non-interactive - are we really putting the face back onto face-to-face? or are we talking to mirrors? (echo chamber of similar opinons, facebook "friends" .... "facefriends")

"eternal return of remediation" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_return) - human technologies go thru eras where they're in their infancy, then ornate, then stripped down, then fleshed back out again, then new things start and we all go over and over again) Books could be argues to start from skins and tablets then ornate scrolls and codices then back to relatively simple and cheap again with the press, then off in 2 directions of cheap (penny dreadfuls, magazines, paperbacks, pulp mags/novels) and expensive (hardcovers, sometimes with color plates and/or overlays, textbooks and now "multimedia books" (and, PS, I want that one in the link)

also, i'm thinking human behavior - we have all these things we can connect to each other with, to advance our species with - and what's being done? We still return to some of the problems (sexism, racism, etc) that have plagued for how long? Shouldn't we all be past this? Am I being too idealistic here?

Blog 20 Schematic - I think

2009-04-13T11:31:00.011-04:00

I have my site design in sketch format in my folder. Since I'm nowhere near a scanner, I'll try to describe that and hope that works (???)

Splash Page:
-title (linked?)
-pretty picture that links to index
-Text like "start here" or something, also linked to index
-tiny links at bottom for "site map", "help", and "who is this?"

Index page:
-Smaller pretty picture
-Title
-under that title, a sentence summary of what the purpose of the essay is
-a series of text links and linked icons to take you to different categories of the essay.
-text link to citation page at bottom
-again, the "site map", "help", and "who is this?" thigns at the bottom

A Category Page:
-The title of the category
-below it a one or two sentence summary of its general idea
-the body text
-text link to the index page
-text links to the previous and next topics
-the sitemap, etc series at bottom

Citation Page:
-title
-MLA style citations
-text link to the index page
-the sitemap, etc series at bottom

Site Map:
-Title
-text links to index page, topics, help, and who is this?

Help:
-what this site is (a hypertext essay designed for a course)
-how to navigate it
-what to expect
-text links to index, sitemap, and who's this?

Who Is this?
-disclaimer that I'm a student, this is schoolwork
-dummy email address
-text links to index, sitemap, and help

(Note from a book - ignore! "In psychoanalytical terms, the medium is fertile ground for projection...This situation leads to exaggeraated likes and dislikes, to idealization and demonization...p 70 Monroe"

Moral/Ethical Issues Surrounding CB

2009-04-08T14:12:00.041-04:00

There is a nest of ethical issues woven in with the phenomenon of cyberbullying. They range from free speech to parental rights to victimization culture.

Cyberbullying is so new and so technologically sophisticated that the usual power structures (courts, schools, communities) are ill-equipped to handle it. Also, it casts teenagers in a negative light which always sells.

Based on cursory research, I've identified 4 areas that give rise to serious ethical considerations on the topic.

Free Speech

Possibly at the core of every internet-rights debate -how much should the institution (school, state, etc) intervene and how much should the individual and/or their immediate community figure out for themselves.

Teens and Freedom of Speech
Understanding the nuances of freedom of speech, as well as navigating the wider world with its plethora of opinions necessitates a certain level of emotional maturity, the ability to put things into perspective, what to pay attention to, what to disregard. This does not happen in the teenage years, by and large. They are preparing for it, and they fuss and spar their way into shaping their own moral codes and skill sets for handling this business.

A kid's need for privacy vs a parent's need to protect

I am not a parent, and therefore can speak with no firsthand knowledge on raising children, but is there not a point where you have to let your kid have some privacy? Evolving levels, age-appropriate, but can you be in on every...single...thing they are at all times, monitoring carefully? Even before the internet was in someone's sketchbook, this was impossible. As they get older, kids do need spaces where they can stretch their wings a little, not to mention parents need time for themselves. This does not negate the parents' right to protect their children from harm or the kid's right to collaborate with their family if they run into trouble. That's a very, very difficult line to articulate.

Megan was exploring her personality, her sexuality, her self in a way that seems silly to people who've already done it but is an important exercise for someone just starting. That being said, everything in a teenager's world is dramatic, doubly so if they have a condition like Megan. Was she receiving enough alternatives to the culture she subscribed to at the moment? What else was there going for her in Dardenne?

What can the parents do when it looks so real?

Megan Meier's parents did what they were "supposed" to do - set limits, make rules, supervise their daughter's online activity as much as possible. As a young teenager, she was legally unable to decide for herself all that much in the way of right and wrong, and was obviously still ironing out her emotional development. A parental ban on myspace could have done something - could have. But haven't we all got into things our parents disapproved of? That's called being a teenager.

"It's hard not to be overwhelmed by fear," Vannasdall [Principal of Arcadia HS, CA] says. "The students we were traditionally able to control, now know more than you do. And they know how to use it against you." (Brydolf)

Victim Culture VS Healthy Caution

Critics of US culture often seize upon our national tendency to take things to courts. We've been painted at times as a very litigous, very PC society. For example the terms and images that follow: Nanny State, Helicopter Parents, Culture of Victimhood. It's easy to go overboard and assume that a kid's every online action is going to be fraught with bullies, pedophiles, and scammers. Yet they *are* out there and a 'net user, especially a young one, has to learn online social skills to protect themselves.

“The vicious circle of victimization and victimization expectations that forces numerous pupils to adopt a general victim role (Card, 2003) may be broken within internet chatrooms.” (Katzer et al)

Katzer observed that normally victimized kids in her study often rejected that role in chat rooms, sometimes even becoming bullies themselves, which exacerbates the problem, making it harder for the adults to track down the source of the attacks and take action.

Some research on trolling, which is arguably a close cousin to cyberbullying, has found that many people think emotional responses to online attacks indicate some level of enjoyment of a victim role. And, maybe for some people, yes. But that cannot be assumed, especially for kids who are still working out their ways of interpreting and handling stressful situations.

Internet Literacy

''Teens are facile with technology but not fluent with the new literacies the digital world requires" (Rainie, qtd. In Dillon)

People who adopt new technologies with little or no background in similar areas they're now entering are apt to make mistakes and misinterpret. We've all been there. It's common sense. But the idea that throwing a teenager into the internet without any guidance in how to exist wisely online leaves them very vulnerable. Anyone can set up (or get around) a blocking program on the family computer, or read the same advice about not giving out personal info, but how many people are taught how to interact on forums? Games? Blogs?

Reputation damage/Digital immortality

''Aggressive behavior doesn’t have to be repetitive…a single posting…is sufficient because the information is so widely disseminated” (Fauman)

Part of learning to be internet literate is learning that what goes out there stays out there, and it's not really as anonymous as it feels. Reputations are still a valuable commodity, and people look for real-life indicators of personality and ability not just from the image you project to their face, but also the little galaxy of personal data you put out there.

Devices
Also, the plethora of gadgets and their new designs make it easier to be stealthy and speedy. Cameras and video recording capabilities are de rigeur on phones, and those phones are swiftly becoming internet-knit devices, raising new opportunities for harassment when used in the wrong way.

Sources

Sites:
Pew Internet and American Life Project

Articles:

"Cyberbullying: Who are the victims?: A comparison of victimization in internet chatrooms and victimization in school." Katzer, Catarina et al, Journal of Media Psychology: Theories, Methods, and Applications, Vol 21(1), 2009. pp. 25-36

"Cyber Bullying: Bullying in the Digital Age." Fauman, Michael A. American Journal of Psychiatry; Jun2008, Vol. 165 Issue 6, p780-781

"Minding MySpace: Balancing the Benefits and Risks of Students' Online Social Networks." Brydolf, Carol, Education Digest; Oct2007, Vol. 73 Issue 2, p4-8

"The Cyber Jungle." Darden, Edwin C. American School Board Journal; Apr2009, Vol. 196 Issue 4, p55-56

"A Tangled Web." Dillon, Naomi, American School Board Journal; Dec2008, Vol. 195 Issue 12, p14-17

"Cyber bullying pushes teenagers towards suicide." Vaughan, Richard, Times Educational Supplement; 3/20/2009 Issue 4831, p27-27

"Cyber Bullying." Kowalski, Robin M., Psychiatric Times; Oct2008, Vol. 25 Issue 11, p45-47

Blog 19 - please, pretty please can it count as #19? it's in the right spot, Dr. Chandler!

2009-04-06T16:47:00.006-04:00

I just read an interview with the author of Columbine, David Cullen. Cullen is a journalist as well, and spent an enormous amount of time investigating and also debunking the stories that grew around the day. Here's the interview.

I confess a private interest in the intersections of the human propensity for violence, the continually evolving state of mental health care in the US, and how they interact with school-age kids. This is a bit of a detour from the class material, and I'm not sure how much water it holds, but in a way, the famous "school shootings" of *not all that long ago* made a mark on US culture that's still being figured out.

I've heard people go on and on in both (all?) sides of the issue, blaming music, video games, the internet, etc. And people blaming the kids, the families, the area, etc. But I'd like to analyze for a minute a single vein of the phenomena that followed Columbine (and others).

In some way, can they not be considered to underpin a different era of violence, assisted by digital tech? Don't think that I'm saying "these are the antecedents of trolling!" since they're far, far worse. But look at Megan Meier for one, and Mitchell Henderson - the cyberbullying researchers in here should be able to supply more names - I wonder if there's some sort of link, on some level.

Just an idea to bat around and debate. Oh, and I'm going to read the book. At some point. I'm thinking summer at this rate!

Blog 18 - attendance style

2009-04-06T14:38:00.021-04:00

1. List the kinds of media you use/read/engage with on a daily basis. Are your choice of media + patterns for interacting with media the same or different from they wayit was when you were 5? 10? 15? etc Give short descriptions to explain.

Liz's Daily Media:

-Angie Android (fancy-pants google phone)
-email newsletters/subscriptions (NYTimes.com, salon.com, etc)
-blogs (boingboing.net, aldaily.com)
-at least 2 print books
-newspaper comics! (usually over toast and milk)
-music

2. Rank the relative amount of time you presently spend with each medium -- be as specific as you can

Most used: phone, browser (email, etc)

Least used: books, paper, specific blogs, music, TV

This can vary with my workload - eg, if I'm home I'll luxuriate in books/movies/TV (often at the same time) or if its a busy day at work, the only media i get a chance to use is a quick blog browse at lunch, therefore making it a cyber day.

3. Describe any media associated with how you perform the following school related tasks:

do math or other calculation-based homework
calculator, paper

read assignments
TV/film, other tabs open in firefox

compose a paper (answers may be different for drafting, revising + editing)
pretty much the same as straight reading - but when i'm in early composing stages, i have all sorts of things around me cyber-ly as well as physical- other tabs, notes, sketches, sources, etc.

A lot of times I get some of my best outlining and notes at work, so throw phones and people into the mix.

study for an exam
at this point I really don't have much in the way of traditional exams, but i will reread notes/texts in the few days before a test - often at my desk, which means I may or may not be browsing (because I'm silly like this, the during-study browse will often be topical, and i'll add to my notes)

conduct research / find references
I'm a tab queen when I research - I'll have several databases open, my google notebook and usually a paper pad there too.

4. Describe any media associated with how you do the following everyday tasks:

drive
I commute to kean so I get to have some uninterrupted deep attention time every day - which mayor may not pay off - depends on my mood - I never do schoolwork there, but some days I get to read, and others I just sit - which helps me read more later.

eat a meal by yourself
I love eating solo, it's me time - I tend to read a book or web article if i can't leave my desk

eat with your family/friends
it's communal time when eating with family or friends - tho meals with people my own age tend to involve phones more than strict conversation - i actually make a point of turning my phone on silent/vibrate to avoid doing this

household chores (cooking, cleaning, household repairs, work on your car)
some days i throw open the windows and blast music, others i leave a movie on - usually one i'm already familiar with so its background noise, but every so often i'll have a really kinetic day andgive a new one my attention while i fold laundry or run around and dust.

5. Describe what you do to relax or in your free time - and how you relax
I make things - there's a lot of arts and crafts - often multiple projects going on in a day, which often leads me into deep attention. Then there's reading and working on my own writing, both of which often lead to intense focus, or really competent multitasking on some days - eg I've done some of my best poems while answering phones and sending faxes. Other days I hide to write.

I dont' text that much, but I make it a real sidebar to whatever I'm doing - and I tend to call when it reaches the 5th text or so (unless I know you can't pick up) - my reasoning is that if you want to communicate that bad, I may as well set aside a few minutes for you and pay attention.

(e.g. watching TV while looking at a magazine and texting a friend)

Analyzing your patterns for attention:

a. Patterns of attention for individual activities: look back over your list and rank the individual practices listed under 3 - 5 . Use a scale of 1 - 5 where 1 is deep attention (focused on one task - creating an environment with no distractions) and 5 is hyper attention (focused on multiple channels for input - creating an environment with many distracting features). These numbers reflect your preferences for attending for individual activities.

#3

math/similar - 1
reading homework - 2
writing papers - 4
studying - 3
research - 5

#4
drive/travel - tied with eating alone for 1
eat alone - 1
eat with people - 3
chores - 5

#5
craft - 3
read - 1
draft my stuff - 5

b. Patterns of attending within activity clusters: After you have ranked all the activities you listed, give yourself a score for school activities, living/household activities + relaxation activities by averaging the numbers in each category (for example if you have 3 for math assignments, 4 for reading assignments, 2 for writing papers, and 5 for studying for exams, then your school number would be: 3+4+2+5= 14/4 categories = 3.5 (a little more on the hyper attention side than the deep attention side)

average
#3 = 3
#4 = 2.5
#5 = 3

c. Overall pattern for attention. Average all the rating numbers to get your overall pattern for attending.

~3 - of course i have to be difficult :)

6 Questions to think about.

a. In which category were you most likely to use hyper attention? in which category were you most likely to use deep attention? Or do you seem to have a consistent style (all hyper or deep attention)? How would you explain this?

I'm more likely to use HA for school and relaxation things (each scored 3), but life activities are at 2.5, so it's not that big a gap. Since the numbers are so close together, I have to say I have a consisitent medium- HA style. I have some features of DA mixed with that, but it seems to be an even blend. I have no idea why thisis - I can remember using more DA as a kid and teenager - but I can also recall some deep HA tendencies I had to modify or hide. College was more freeing because I did my work more on my own terms, and found that HA didn't exactly hold me back. I learned to manipulate it.

b. In which category was there the largest range of numbers ( for example, some activities rated 1, some rated 5). Can you explain why the range might be large for this category?

School activities got the largest range, literally 1-5. I think its because I've managed to refine/develop different styles for doing my work. For instance, many times I'll be "working on a paper", but I won't be chained to my desk - I'll fold laundry, clean, something and let the rest of my brain work on it for a while. Then, when things gel more, I can sit at my computer for a while and prepare or draft.

Partly this is because i have no supervision now (yay! maturity!) and can do pretty much as I damn well please as long as I deliver, but also I was honest with myself in that I can't sustain deep "laser beam" focus for long periods of time. I'm just not wired like that.

Some may attribute that to the internet/digital tech, but I do this with my non-tech activities - eg, reading several books at once, instead of taking one to conclusion and not touching another till I finish, or keepign multiple craft projects active, etc.

c. In which category did you have the most consistent style? Why do you think this is so?

Life activities had the most consitient style, but not by much (1,1,3,5) compared to the rest. I think it's because I like to sometimes throw myself into them for "mental health day" purposes, so I can just drift along as I fold laundry or whatever.

7. How would you characterize yourself in terms of patterns for attending? Do these numbers reflect how you would characterize yourself (in terms of attention)? What correlations or inconsistencies do you see between your feeling about how you think and these numbers? Can you explain them?

I think I'm a hybrid attender. Technically we're all HA all the time, the difference is how much you recognize it, as well as how much priority you give to each task/info stream. For instance, I'm in the cafeteria right now, I can hear things, smell things, I'm typing this - periodically I'll glance at a TV screen or people moving around. but this is what's getting the weight. Is it DA or HA? Is my post suffering for it? Who knows?!

I dont' know how much of the HA is inflated or not since I make a point of being more physically active (I'm a fidgiter, I'll get up when I'm at the computer and do things, sometimes typing standing up) to prevent screen-zombie syndrome. Not sure if its me normally or a habit I impose on myself.

Really, I'm not too concerned about my attending style as long as I get the concepts I need, and I know how to get the info necessary and to digest it, ultimately producing somethign viable. I coudl be standing on my head for all it matters, as long as I learn/accomplish.

blog 17 - revisions for Hypertext Essay Draft

2009-04-06T12:23:00.025-04:00

This is still being actively edited - I have a lot of notes, and refrences to put in. I've pinned down an outline, and I'm still working on body text:

Thesis/"home" page: Trolling as we know it has evolved into (among other things) a method of social control, rendered more virulent by the depersonalization, anonymity, and sense of entitlement made possible with computer-mediated communication. Trolling, from the more common verbal barb-throwing to the graphically violent and threatening cyber attacks is an efficient way to censor certain dialogs/discourses (under the protection of free speech) and discourage certain politically "vulnerable" groups from use of digital technologies under the pretense of humor and pranking.

Node 1: Misogyny

One of the many examples of this effect is the treatment of some feminist or female-identified cyber "spaces" (forums, boards, blogs, etc) at the hands of trollers. The ethic of inclusiveness of many online spaces, especially feminist ones (as they require intense dialog) places them in a unique position in relation to misogynist trolling. Either they become seperatist/exclusive ("members only") or they develop, as many other boards and forums have, moderator policies and codes of commenting etiquette, as well as mechanisms for dealing with offenders. These actions of resistance may be coded as "attacks" on free speech of the trollers, attempts at censorship (Herring). A common tactic in misogyny, as with any prejudice, is to cast the group's resistance and protest as harmful to the disagreeing party's liberties, or as evidence that they are not deserving of the same rights to expression and development of their opinions and ideas.

Node 2: Deindividuation and CMC

-"Social psychologists have known for decades that if we reduce our sense of out own identity a process called deindividuation we are less likely to stick to social norms" (New Scientist article)

(loss of personal id on the part of the troller and minimization of personal id of the trolled has a distcinct parallel in the development of the us/them mentality that takes biases and prejudices from the private arena of opinion into the realm of verbal attack and even violence.)

(the idea of freedom of speech, so treasured in American culture easily lends itself to a sense of entitlement to expression at all costs, rather than a sense of privelige, which would perhaps modify the content of mode of a person's expression to fit better with broadly accepted social norms)

Computer mediated communication eliminates the social cues that govern in person communication from introduction to humor to disgreement, even intense disapproval. This is the nature of the media, but sets of cyber-social cues have evolved to bridge the gap between sheer text and human emotion (emoticons, mood labels, video/voice, etc).

Even written communication (source?) coudl be relied upon to maintain certian levels of civility in a broad sense, as the time gap between messages recieved and sent was fairly long. Exceptions did happen, but the speed with which internet communication takes places logically encourages more off the cuff responses, and the fetish of speed (look at a comcast ad!) underscores the devalued nature of contemplation and measured response.

Node 3: "collapsing into Babel" (Mal. article)

"pointless and eristic game" (Malwebolence article)

One of the most effective weapons at the troll's disposal is his/her ability to create chaos, to get the rest of the community to react emotionally, to cast aspersions on the legitimacy of their discourse and presence. The tendency of targets to emotionally respond to the troll complicates the division between victim culture and actual victimized people. Sadly, it is just as popular online to affect offense as it is to give it. The intensity of computer usage (see "A rape in cyberspace" as well as the deindividuation it can cause may shorten the fuse of a troll-ee's temper until they literally loose it, with no tangible gain except the troller's pleasure.

The idea of tolerance helps to counteract this knee-jerk and theatricality fostered in online interaction, but too much easily overflows into instutitional passivity.
****still adding here!****

Node 4: what now?

The responses to increased sophistication of trolling behaviors generally take the form of self-policing spaces. Comment policies, moderation policies and practices are based on the individual users' agreed desires to supervise discussion and handle transgressions. These have taken the place (largely) of monolithic institutions (eg legal system) that people would traditionally be ex[pected to turn to for recourse in matters of libel and harassment. (consider link to grassroots, activism, "Take back the night" etc)

examples to add:

-"Take back the blog", find more
-exception - Yale case
-boingboing's mod policy, portly dyke's blog policy

_________________________

final thoughts - i need to put in the quotes i picked, as well as continue to relate the feminism thing, use it as a recurring example.

Blog 16 - Hypermess

2009-04-02T08:59:00.010-04:00

NB - One of the main thrusts here is pretty much "trolling: where are we now? or "trolling scholarship: beyond usenet" since there are now increased capabilities (for more people I might add) to do more damage than verbal harassment.

I also left in some of the feminist focus, since I like the idea - trolling's far bigger than that, I'm just really interested in the behavior/reception of online "specialist" groups.

This needs focus, obviously, and scrubbing of anything political-sounding and occasional mild profanity - so just have a look and let me know what you'd like me to do with all this.
_____________________________________________________

The Messy Draft:

This is now something different than textual catcalling and insults (turning point - Mr Bungle? See "A Rape in Cyberspace"). More people have more access to tools which can let them take the harassment to the real world (Megan Meier, Kathy Sierra, Epilepsy Foundation Site). Trolling is primarily (according to trolls) an attempt to take the wind out of a group, to get them to not take the net so seriously - my aim here is not to defend overreacting about internet squabbles but to identify a new trend that *is* worthy of attention and *does* necessitate action in real life. (access to phone numbers, social security numbers, addresses - it's all out there, but if you're determined enough you can find them and actually do damage to people, not just their message boards or characters.)

The dramatic, headline grabbing "trolls" (Meier case, Malwebolence article) may not be the norm, but there does exist a "mood" of entitlement, false anonymity, and freedom from the "net'" of physical/nonverbal cues that allow face to face discussion to either proceed more or less civilly, or at least censure offenders in some way.

My focus here is this small time trolling ("little t trolls"), in respect to specialized social groups, such as feminist spaces. More scholarship on little t trolling that I've found has been in relation to feminst-identified spaces online, but suggestive that the little t's behavior is common on other types of spaces/boards, specialized for race, ethnicity, sexualorientation, religion - pretty much any "inflammatory" topic.

Little T's are semi-protected under the idea of free speech, and certain libertarian principles that undergird the internet (Herring?), but the net as we know it has been around long enough to have some sort of ethical code or codes to counteract the little t impulses in many of us.

Example: comment space mod policies (Teh Portly Dyke, BoingBoing), Blogger Code of Conduct, disemvoweling, etc.

The idea of offering a comment space is dependent on an ethic of inclusiveness and even tolerance (to a point) - but having a comment space on an issue that tends to attract trolls and *not* having a mod policy/enforcing it produces an institutional passivity that some people may interpret as "asking for it".

This leads me into the frequent sexual nature of little (and even big) trolling, especially in feminist or woman-identified spaces online. The salacious undertones sell a lot of tut-tut articles, but it is a distrubing element. Sexual harassment is nothing new in real life or the internet, but its virulence online seems aimed at "constructing" any dissent or reaction on the part of the trolled as "censure" to free speech (Herring) and not a logical offense reaction any person woudl take to a volley of violently sexual insults.

(I don't really want to quote any examples - some are too awful - I'll just paraphrase them when I do the next draft)

This construction places a user (let's say a woman) in a bind - if she stands up to the troll, she may be cast as "hysterical" and 'trying to limit his right to free speech" - but a sexual-toned attack, even verbal, is certainly different than a male-to-male barb. (Eg, you don't have to threaten to rape someone to disagree, or even to insult them - even if you have no way or desire to actualyl pull it off). The bind this hypothetical woman is in requires her to either ignore it, jsut take it, or open herself to more attack if she fights back. Trolling a space in this manner uses age-old tactics of undermining a woman's opinion or statements to paint them as silly or overly dramatic, and therefore to be ignored. Not in keeping with the egalitarian ambitions of the internet, eh?

This is not limited to women, and of course not all woman-identified spaces online are feminst, and not all trolls are male. My point is this:

1 - the internet is more suffused than we really anticipated
2 - a hell of a lot more people are on it, people of all sorts of opinions, backgrounds, skills, etc
3 - ergo, women in general have increased access
4 - these net-accessing women often construct spaces to talk about things, sometimes very sensitive things, sometimes not
5 - trolling either has taken on a newer, more violent streak, or at least we hear about it more in "the media"*
6 - these aforementioned spaces (or spaces about religion, sexuality, etc) benefit from the technologies to further and refine their ideas and practices, but this very tech leaves them vulnerable to people that disagree
7 - there's somethign about the net that makes some people behave worse than they normally would.
8 - we are now in new territory because that worse behavior can do tangible harm. now what?

that harm can range from the mild (breaking up a discussion area that may be helping people deal with issues, expand their minds, exchange ideas, etc.) to actual real-life harassment (Sierra) and possibly contact.

*i've grown to loathe that phrase

Further research

2009-03-29T17:42:00.003-04:00

My Troll Project Google Notebook - help yourself to any of the sources I've found so far, and feel free to suggest any! Also: my site brainstorming notes/reflections from last class, and a very preliminary mockup of what i want to do with the hypertext essay/page/thing.

Blog 15 - Wiki update

2009-03-29T17:32:00.004-04:00

EDIT - duh, my username is penguinstympanum

Ok, now that I have a topic and a chance, I've contributed to the Troll entry's talk page and the article itself:

I couldn't come up with anything really worthwhile - I feel like I shouldn't just grab a factoid and post it....I'm more of a research person. I want to read a few articles, maybe a book, *then* put my 2 cents in after thoughtful consideration.

So far, so good - I get the feeling I'm not in a particularly active or combustible area on Wikipedia - I recall making some small forays into the 3rd wave feminism talk page to absolutely no avail, so I wonder if this'll be more of the same. I read the troll talk page and couldn't find a hierarchy if you paid me, so....yay? Who knows?

Now it's high time I go outside or something!

Blog 14 - Research Plan v.1

2009-03-26T12:09:00.003-04:00

Statement of purpose (what you hope to show/discover)

I hope to articulate the nature and uses of trolling behaviors – whether they can be of any benefit to discourses on politics, philosophies, etc.

What are the “rules’’ of trolling? Who does these things? What need or purpose does it fulfill for them?

Where does this come from? Is it only anonymity that causes certain people to jam up otherwise civil discussions? Gadflies and Devil’s Advocates have always existed, but this is something else entirely. The knee-jerk reactions trolls and their ilk engender don’t seem to be pushing people to refine and rethink their ideas, to stop up the holes. All this does is raise blood pressure, far as I can tell.

Detailed statement of your research question

What is trolling, what is the point of it, and how has it helped or hindered this great, big, shiny idea of the internet as School of Athens/coffeeshop/salon/etc?

List of the information you need to gather

Secondary sources on the phenomenon – articles online and in journals, etc

Samples of actual forums/comment sections where trolling has occurred (doable?)

I’d love an actual dialog with a person who engages in trolling behaviors, but the chances of that actually being possible or worthwhile are really, really slim!

A preliminary list of sources

**I still have to go thru Kean’s journal databases – guess what my weekend plans are now! As for the rest, I’m thinking things like Wired, NYTimes’ online, etc. Big name digital publications that have or cocievably have addressed trolling.

If I have time, I’d like to take a quick dip in the psychology pool, see if any work’s been done there in regards to online antagonism. This would probably be pop-psych, but it’s worth a shot, seeing if I can track something down that holds water.

Plan for gathering your information

I plan to sit at my laptop and dredge up the articles by the power of my mighty database mojo.
I’ll also be going thru other, less scholarly arenas where trolling has come up in “conversation” – I’m thinking online magazines, certain blogs, etc. It’s a ‘net thing, so the use of ‘net sources would not be a detriment, as long as I keep an eye on credibility

Anyone interested in wikitheory?

2009-03-24T16:58:00.002-04:00

It's a slow day, so I've been reading a lot of articles online. Salon.com has an interview with Andrew Lih (author of The Wikipedia Revolution) about the pros, cons, and occasional catfights within wikidom. In case anyone wanted to read it.

Thoughts related to trolling

2009-03-24T12:06:00.008-04:00

**WARNING**

The video I'm linking to makes use of the F word. Not that one. The longer one, namely "f*ggot". It's about examining and defusing the knee-jerk insult/response actions that trolls and other unpleasant types engender when they call those who disagree with them "f*gs".

The author of the video, Kirby Ferguson, politely examines this use of this word in online communities, and with a gentle sense of humor. This is not to glorify the abusiveness of the word, just to examine it. It's actually pretty cool.

This dude makes some pretty thoughtful and funny observations on a variety of things, but not always family friendly, so you're warned now if you decide to click back to the original page.

I intend no offense with this link, so if you're ok with the topic, enjoy. If not, tune in for the next blog, no worries :)

Kirby Ferguson's "The F*g Bomb"

Now, for the topic:

Much cooler trolls from John Bauer, 1915

When observing trolls and their ilk at work, you see a variety of skills at play - the most entertaining really go into picking apart arguments and taking the time to take things out of their original context - the really lazy ones just throw a cheap insult out there, something you *know* will trigger a really emotional response. And I find that fascinating. I see this as a chance to get people taking about this weird phenomenon.

I mean, if you disagree with philiosophy or politics with someone in a public setting, what are the odds that they'll suddenly shout something like that at you as a response? Sometimes, in some real world settings, people shout profanity and nasty things for no discernable reason, but there's a greater amount of social censure. Why not online? What makes it ok to throw in an insult in lieu of a real response? And what does that trigger? Raised blood pressure, as in me when I read a trollish response with sexist or racist content? Or a measured, thoughtful reply (genreally a waste of energy with these types)? Or an examination of the issue/topic at hand, trying to find holes in it, weaknesses that can be exploited, and then shore up the framework to prevent further harassment.

One one hand, I'd love to engage in an intellectual free for all online, bounce my ideas and opinons around, do the same to other people's - but I don't. Because of this. Why bother? But am I being too passive, locking myself out of the coffeehouse, or am I being wise, saving my energies for fruitful areas (class, papers, etc) alone? I treasure the presnce of gadflies, but there is no defending people who are clysterpipes for no good reason.

And what the hell does any of this have to do with feminism?! As you may have noticed, there is a slew of unsavory stereotypes and misapprehensions about the movement/s, and they sell like hotcakes. Even today! I'm a fan of a lot of ideas under the feminist umbrella, but personally, I believe that there is far too much infighting over who's more feminist than who, and who's calling who by what term, and what the people who disagree or don't identify with the ideas are saying.

I admit to a personal bias here which informs the project- I'd like to see this movement continue, and make use of all the wonders of digital technologies. I believe it, at its base, is a wonderful idea, and there's a lot of benefits. There's also a lot of work to be done, still, and fighting on the internet hampers progress. Sooooooooo, there. I'm done for now.

Research Plan/Little Miss Lotophagus

2009-03-23T12:31:00.005-04:00

Spring break was a nice break but I was so lazy! Guilt guilt guilt!

I am hopeless with this. I'm having a lot of trouble coming up with a workable question/set of queries. The general topic i'd like to cover is 3rd wave feminism and the internet. Eg, who does what with what resource, what are the bigger blogs/sites, what's organized online, how has digital communication affected feminist scholarship and activism. My interests do lie more with the scholarly and theoretical, but the activism is pretty exciting - I'd have more of an advantage with the academic in terms of ease and time budgeting.....

BUT - how to link it to this course? Does anyone have a quesiton about this area they would like to have answered, or think someone else might want answered? I can tell you right now that my info gathering will be online, I'll be hitting up academic pages/sites, and well-known feminist blogs (I've started a list in my googlenotes, but I didnt want to put it here till I ironed out a research question)

That's all I have for now, and it's quite embarassing!

Produsage

2009-03-06T20:20:00.010-05:00

This is coming rather late and under the influence of my cold. I hope it's reasonably linear. Already skipped one blog - didn't want to miss another! Credit's not the point at the moment, so much as making sure I'm on the same page as everyone else.

I'll be honest, I'm re-reading/more thoroughly reading Produsage and it's a bit of a hard go - I'm finding it rather heady, and I like getting into theory.

I. How Produsage connects to the features of the internet itself

Open-Source: you simply couldn't have these produser, prosumer, etc concepts without a good deal of adherence to open-source production. Everybody in, everybody working on it, everybody contributing what they're good at instead of what they're told (in theory at least) for the betterment of the whole idea. The 'net really started as an experiment, and was originally fleshed out by people jsut mucking around (once we got past the government payroll thing!).

The Collective: priveliging the group over the individual goes against the recently accepted ideal of the creator valiantly striving to keep all hands off his or her creation, and keeping its developments under wraps, as Bruns points out. I don't think the internet as we know it today would've come into being if it had been developed with that ethic instead of the one it had. Eg, what would it have been like if the thing was developed according to, say, a Ford-assembly line principle? The idea of a group getting together to create/refine of their own will is the backbone of Produsage.

Pro-Amateur: Or, as I like to think of it, the Tinkerer's Principle. Letting ideas or manifestations arise from the virtual kitchen sinks of a number of people rather than waiting for drafts to come off a boardroom with the CEO's imprimatur will get many more things done. Pro-am's as Bruns calls them have more know-how than the traditional concept of consumer, and as such may wield more power. For instance, if I loose my patience with myspace (matter of time, people) but I still want a social network to play on, I have the option of not just signing up with a competitor, but making my own, theoretically becoming a "threat" to the "established" networking sites. All I have to do is learn the necessary tech and get enough followers, but it's a real option which lets me say "I've had it with you, I really am going to do it my way" despite the fact that I'm a "nobody".

"Iterative": One of the wonderful things about produsage in a virtual setting is that you can always hit refresh. Wikipedia is a lovely example of this - it's continuously edited, discussed, and worked on in various ways, so if you bear the evolving nature of the site in mind, you can find some great info or at least jumping off points for your own research. Contrast this to a closed, or printed publication which was made to suit a committee smaller than wiki's, whose whims could very well have colored its content...can't put a [citation needed] on that, now can you?

II. Internet Mindsets as seen in Lankshear and Knobel (it gets briefer at this point, I promise!)

A produser, especially one transitioning from the industrial or "educated consumer" mindset into a 'net one will pretty much have to relearn what they think about ideas, manifesting/producing them, and of course how to properly disseminate them into the world. Prioroties would have to be shifted from prizing discrete units to successive "drafts" which may or may not have any tangible presence at all. Ownership will be less important than the quality of contribution, and distrobution will rely on more social communication (have you heard about this site? try this online shop!) rather than buying what you need or want from a place because you have to (eg I can rent all the obscure movies I want from netflix, rather then schlepping to blockbuster and getting whatever they have on the shelf)

III. Re-mediation

Hayles mentions that the 2 big points of remediation are immediacy and hypermediacy. Immediacy involves making the content so compelling that we ignore the medium, and hypermediacy (in an amusing countermove) refers to the proliferation of media, ensuring that we'll have more trouble ignoring them.

We can relate immediacy to produsage when contemplating "virtual goods" or services - by which I mean exchanges that have analogies in the physical world, but can be done just as well online, with a minimum of physical markers. For instance, I can call up my netflix list right now and watch a movie *just* like I would by going to a video store and renting it. I get the same pleasure for less cost and resource use. The medium doens't matter as much as the movie. And I'm goign against the traditional grain of hollywood makes/shows/releases ----> i buy ----> i watch. I get to have more of a voice and sense of adventure in what I see (yay! bring on the Almodovar!)

Hypermediacy related to produsage just as easily, because more consumers morphing into producers means *more* media outlets as people can now (in theory) make whatever outlet they want. Or they can opt in to a company/corporate hosted outlet as they see fit, thanks to the larger entities anticipating the desires of us groundlings. For instance, I can listen to NPR on the radio, or online, or read the stories, or download a podcast, or even listen to it on my cell.

IV. Flashmob ideals:

The intense information exchange of flashmobbing can apply to produsage because a "hive" of people ruminating, creating, drafting, and editing *requires* that intensity and even intimacy. The tangible technologies that make flashmobs possible also make produsage possible, as more access, more knowledge is in the hands of more people. Finally, there's the idea of "always on", which you need for flashmobbing, and makes banding together to respond to/create new products much easier than waiting for someone to report to the think tank at X o'clock AM.

Fooling Around

2009-03-05T15:30:00.003-05:00

Live from New Mexico! (freewrite for wikipedia ideas)

2009-02-28T17:44:00.002-05:00

I’ve been wanting to do something with gender and online life for a while now. The idea of mis/representation, self-construction, and performance fascinates me, especially in respect to that slippery question of gender. I’d love to perform a little semi-experiment and sign up to wiki (or something) with 3 accounts: one somehow coded female, one male, and one “neutral” – and see what happens. I’d probably need 3 different isp addresses, though, wouldn’t I? Perhaps different forums, just to see what sort of commentary/reception I’d get based on a friggin’ username. That fascinates me – I tend not to participate in forums and whatnot, but I’ve heard tell of feminine sounding monikers getting sexist reception, and I wonder if that’s still the case, and if so where? (that of course would have nothing to do with a wiki article, but I find it a cool idea)

Are there different “areas” of the internet that are coded for gender? I’m not talking about sites that explicitly concern themselves with a gender issue (eg feminist blogs or something) but things that ideally should not give two hoots about what’s between the user’s legs. (in meatspace or cyberspace, leaving room for those ubersophisticated personae some create)

Some of the sources I’ve found so far concern gender rep and gaming, which looks interesting, but I’m not sure how much time I have to delve into gamer cultures. And yet “gender representation online” is far too general. I’m terribly amused by the salon.com Broadsheet comment threads (it’s like Doritos and fritos all in one!). Seeing the battling of misogyny, indifference, feminisms, etc and *performed* stances (eg, acting like a d**che just to annoy people, instead of it being indicative of an actual opinion^).

I’m not sure if that last point could result in anything valid – the performance and receptions of gender in spaces that ostensibly represent free exchanges of thought and opinion, unhampered by social problems…but in are reality prey to them just as much as face to face exchanges.

Another idea would be the presence of 3rd-wave feminism online. I’m interested in feminst history, and now-story, if you pardon the cuteness….there’s a plethora of blogs, sites, for a(e?) and more for the 3rd waver and beyond. I haven’t read any scholarship in this area *yet* but I’ve been throwing the idea around. Sounds like it might need some more direction, though, and I’d welcome suggestions if this sounds like a valid area.

^some of us call this playing devil’s advocate. I go for the gusto, instead.

"Queen Mob; A Philosophical Post; With Notes"*

2009-02-23T10:31:00.013-05:00

Pre-Print and Print Communication
I would like to think that the first "proto-flashmob" activity was coordinated by people on horseback, with scraps of parchment tucked in their little proto-pockets, racing from village to village to coordinate some sort of activity, something political...defenestrating a rival political leader, perhaps?

And from there, perhaps people were incited to gather by telegram, early newspaper, pamphlets (Thomas Paine comes to mind), or notes in pneumatic tubes. It wasn't all that long until the impulse to gather was utilized for more creative purposes, such as artistic performances/happenings (Dada, Surrealism, Fluxus), be-ins (San Francisco, NYC, and whole festivals (Burning Man, anyone?)

The media at play here has ranged from clay tablet*, parchment, paper and printed media (magazines, newsletters) to the ultra-convenience of "personal" media (notepads, post-its, actual bulletin boards, 'zines, and more).

Changes in communications
The third stage of media would of course be digital, with the usual list of email, blog post, IM, text, and even unusual things like facebook/myspace apps (eg, a friend of mine uses facebook "bumper stickers" for her Pride events). I'm reluctant to detail these further, as we're all at least passingly familiar with these devices and services by now. If anyone knows of one I've missed, please tell me!

Effects of re-mediation
Digital media are wonderful tree-savers, but they lack the tactile joys and emotional immediacy of pulp-media, in my opinion. Of course, digital media are also easier to follow, disseminate, and interact with. You can change the content or your affiliations to it any time you like, should you disagree or want to keep certain opinions up front/hidden. Lastly, it's a lot easier to display a certian level of faux-irony with digital toys like "stickers" and "banners" and whatnot - if I want a tee shirt poking fun at a certain social institution or belief, I have to shell out money, and use actual resources (manufacturing, shipping, maintenance), but I can plaster my facebook page with all sorts of snark if I want at absolutely no cost, and (what feels like) a negligible amount of resource use (eg, just enough money and fuel to power the servers and computer that deliver fresh tasty net access to my desk).

*Shelley wrote a long poem called "Queen Mab; A Philosophical Poem; With Notes" about an elaborate natural and social revolution. I like the Mab/Mob pun as well as the insinuation of revolutionary acitvity, which necessitates mob activity, smart or otherwise.

**eventually I will find evidence of a cuneiform-planned flashmob!

Lit/Tech narrative final

2009-02-08T22:06:00.003-05:00

Ok, we're a day late here, and I regret that. But here it is in its more or less complete state. I noticed that the google "powerpoint" doens't behave well if your'e not signed into google. If you're reading this, you're signed into blogger which should get you into the rest of the google package, but please let me know if it's still funky - when i'm logged in my links work - do they work for you?

Thanks!

Le Roman de la Web**

2009-02-05T10:54:00.021-05:00

Guillaume de Lorris hard at work on the poem

(old-old-old school "textuality" from wikimedia commons)

It's really easy to get caught up in the romance of new technologies - or to spend your time disapproving. I like to imagine there were people grousing about those highfalutin new codices when they first caught on. And before then people who snickered into their cuneiform as some upstart kid started using papyrus scrolls. "It'll never last!...It's too complicated!" "But dad, look at all the cool stuff you can do when you don't have to wait for your clay tablet to dry!"

The internet as we have known it and continue to define it is a wonderful idea. I refuse to pooh-pooh digital literacy and the unique demands it places on people transitioning into and native to it. As a species, we've done some pretty cool things, so I believe we're up for the challenge.

I'm supportive of the open-source ethos, and I like the idea of "Trust [as] a key operating principle. the ethos is to reach out to all of the Web for input, through limitless participation, rather than the traditional belief that expertise is limited and scarce..." (Lankshear and Knobel 18). Blindly applied relativism is a trap, but with a little thought, you can use its general definition to poke holes in the idea that the presence or lack of degrees, titles, positions, etc. are absolute indicators of a person's "expertise". That just warms my heart, because if humanity had always waited for "the establishment" to endorse ideas before running with them, we wouldn't get very far. So I dig on the slight preachiness of parts of the article, when it praises the postitive aspects of new literacies.

The introduction to folksonomy, for one, stood out, since it's such a good idea. Let users come up with their own tags and eventually, you will have a significant number of people with the same idea, and the tag is rendered useful. I use del.ici.ous to keep track of my bookmarks, and I can see this happen - it suggest tags for me like "art" or "blog" and sometimes I use them....sometimes I replace them with personal shorthand such as "articlestoread" or "litandhistory". I can opt in or out of the folksonomy, but it does help when I want it. If there was a more traditional (closed) naming system for tags, where the hell would I put my favorite trilobite blog? Maybe I want to file by subject and not medium!

But I digress. Part of me wanted at least a little harshness aimed at new literacies. Where is the inveighing against those proverbial "kids" who can't focus? Who can barely read a novel? Who prefer Myspace to libraries? I'm used to seeing harrumphing disapprovals of this sort. But are they there for accuracy, do they succeed in fairly interrogating these new developments - are they a healthy skepticism or do we feel compelled to put them in discussions to serve as bogeypersons?*

What if a kid doens't read a huge canonical work? If they read other things of equal merit, if they can analyze and interpret a text, if they are not afraid to tackle new lines of thought or problems placed before them, does it really matter if they learned to do all that the way their parents did or not? I've read things that would've never made the cut in my Mother's school - the ideas of what constituted literature have expanded to include women, international writers, writers of other races, LGBTQ writers, etc. And that has been a benefit. Should it matter as much if my eventual kids read hypertext versions of, say, EE Cummings' work? Read a poem, read about its reception, maybe see a few scans of his notebooks, learn about the era it was written in, see parts of his bio?

We already do a lot of that, but not always on computers. What's wrong with one stop shopping? I doubt that this will be the end of print as we know it, or the end of education. Balance, balance, balance woudl reconcile the literacies. Close the book once in a while and cruise for (academcially vetted) sites about your subject. Play with a database. Blog on your findings. And, conversely, turn off the computer once in a while and nurture your brain with a book. It doens't have to be hours and hours of toil - 15 minutes given to yourself - it's not that awful.

Maybe maintaining a sense of play and exploration with both formats would calm everyone down. Nothing wrong with opening your mind, or admitting your developing - not perfected - technical prowess.

________

Yet again I've wandered pretty far afield. The article is packed with info, and useful info at that. It'd be nice to see it broken down a little, but that's my job as a student. I like the emphasis on the sociocultral side of literacies. Especially now, with digital literacy, it is not skill so much as how you act to it, with it, and with others about it that matters more then mechanics.

If I can think of anything else, it'll be stuck here later!

*yes, I know "bogeymen", but "bogeypersons" is making me laugh this morning!

**dorktastical title refrence: Wiki for "Roman De La Rose"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_de_la_Rose

I'm not trying to be pretentious - just playful :) Also, when the poem first circulated, it was pretty controversial, given its references to sensuality (according to its wiki, mind you)

Blog 2 On the course readings

2009-01-31T12:07:00.004-05:00

The 2 that stood out to me most at first were "Hyperattention" and "Friend Game", since they deal quite heavily with young people and internet life. I've written an embarassing amount, more or less coherently, so I'm going to post here and edit as I see fit.

Not trying to run off at the keyboard, but they got me all fired up and I can't help myself! :)

_______________

Is it my own prejudice or am I justified in a certain level of apprehension when looking at the various innovative techniques Hayles mentions. They're dazzling, but also expensive and demanding....how many schools can get this sort of special treatment, realistically? How many students? I'm lucky - middle class, federally funded, at a liberal arts college. What about other schools? Kids? Other socioeconomic groups?

Next up is the big question - should we consider print culture over? No! I resist the sharp delineation between one category and another. I often joke that my mind works like a Venn diagram - I think this is a better way to envision things. There are and will be overlaps between print and digital, and it's far more important to be "biliingual" than set in your ways. But there really is a pleasure in old fashioned activties such as sustained reading or writing. Again, this may be my prejudice because these activities come easy to me. I've heard many, many people say they hate writing, reading, or combinations thereof. Is it because they've been browbeaten into reading things they hate and writing things that are unrelatable OR do they really truly hate it? I favor the former.

I keep going back and forth here - I'm ntot sure what to think of it. I like the new techniques - they're sexy, they're fun, and in my own experience, they make life easier. Look at what I'm doing now - reading and preparing a response in my own home, in my jammies, with the TV behind me. I may or may not come out with anything satisfactory in a traditional lecture situation, where I'm obliged to extrude a perfectly formed series of paragraphs with the clock ticking. And no do-overs. Here I can edit as I go along, or come back later and toy with my own writing. In fact, I will probably revisit this tomorrow with a whole new slew of ideas that have percolated overnight. Or maybe my ideas will be scattered around in classmade's blogs...collaborating at 100 miles an hour...This arrangement woud've been considered scandalous even when I was in grade school! But it really really works. At least for me.

I've also had "regular" classes - even one with a single word written on the whiteboard all semester. I was in awe of the prof's erudition, which he thankfully kept to a modest level. He did have a high demand for verbal contribution, however, which makes him closer to this model than the stereotypical shut-up-listen-and-regurgitate. The man demanded you take risks in analysis and interpretation, and graded accordingly. Even the "stodgiest", old-fashioned professors allowed a certain level of that. Perhaps I've been lucky to not have my intellect smooshed unduly. Or maybe I'm just cheeky enough to not care if indeed someone is attempting to smoosh.

Collins - "Friend Game"

This was a hard one to get through. Childhood, especially the early teen years, is anythign but idyllic. I remember feeling like everything was that important (not to the point of suicidal thoughts, thank god) but that sense of drama, that all-encompassing fear of rejection which sits together with enthusiasm. The amount of biological, social, and emotional adjustment needed in the teen years is staggering.

Thing is you learn to handle the fear, and eventually you learn to not give a f*ck. But this "you" I refer to is probably someone my age who has long since been able to thumb their nose at their peers if they need to. Is 14 too early for that level of maturity? We've all been 14 at one point, and been there, and felt that, but we dont' all harm ourselves. I really think that some of this lies with the girl's chemistry at that point in her life. Not the blame, but some of the cause - there has to be some differentiating factor between kids that get bullied and take to some level of self-harm and kids that have similar experiences and yet don't.

The blame, a word which implies something that could have been avoided, lies with the people that took it into their heads to create an entire person and harass this kid. I can't begin to fathom it - how does this get to be a good idea? At the risk of sounding shallow, did these people have nothing better to do? Isn't one of the priveliges of adulthood being able to call kids out on their BS and lead by example, demonstrating various skill sets to handle social difficulties? (provided you're a more or less mature adult with your heart in the right place)

The fact that it was that easy to set up a persona, and that easy to make it believable is distressing (understatement!) but each new technology has the potential for disaster, if you think of it. Which does not excuse the behavior of those involved - just because its easy and seems funny at first doens't mean you're not responsible for your own behavior. The "virtuality" of the virtutal world is swiftly diminishing - it's getting really hard to hide behind the excuse that it's "a game" or "a fantasy", etc.

There's an undercurrent of perversity and sadism in each human mind which needs to be addressed and handled properly or at least damage controlled. But there's only so much you can do with an arena liek the internet to safegarud against those undercurrents without hobbling the higher mind which most of us operate from (most of the time). I'm not even sure what you coudl do *online* to prevent anythign liek this from happening again.

The expected reaction is to somehow clean up the net, to lock it down, and censor it. But I'd fear censoring and filtering the net almost as much as I would another set of Drews'. I dont' want to sound callous, but how common is myspace-suicide? Enough to warrant changes to the site or restricting the entire structure it resides in? When there's a child-related tragedy, there's a formulaic reaction, a rush to blame "the media"/a rush to blame the family. None of which does anything as action is called for offline. The real world is still real, and it's there that shifts can be made in mores and behavior to channel the insecurities and aggressions into more postitive areas. And an ethos of the net as a part of life, integrated rather than invading. Turn off the TV, turn off the computer once in a while. It won't stop "cyber bullying" but it might strengthen the psycho/social skills kids need to navigate both spaces, online and off.

About GoogleDocs

2009-01-27T23:53:00.005-05:00

I don't mind the idea of a group document. I've never shared one with this large amount of people before, but it's ok. I enjoy the challenge. The only major complaint I have at the moment is the layout - the footnotes are crowding that third ''context" column. That should be easy to fix, but I would experiment on a private document first.

My interest in the project lies more in the culture and social effects of the internet/WWW than the technical - but I am enjoying that part, too. I'd like to see more offbeat items that still fulfill the assignment (eg what cool web projects/movements/etc started and when?) and any contributing women in fields related. That's something of a pet idea, but I've been looking here and there for some grand list of female contributors which I'm *sure* will be out there somewhere! Or I'll have to make it.

Blog 1 Literacy and Technology Narrative

2009-01-26T15:02:00.005-05:00

Warm up prompts:

What do you remember about your first experiences with reading and books? Did your parents read to you? Did you have books of your own? Do you remember some of the first books that you read (or pretended to read, or tried to read) on your own?

I was raised in a very literacy-positive environment. Books everywhere! More books than toys! It was a family affair, teaching me to read and love books, but my Grandfather spearheaded the effort. He was retired at the time, so had a bit more free room in his day to read to me - we'd tick off Ma and Gramma by leaving books tucked in between armchair cushions. I can remember trying to twist around in my bed to see the pictures as he read me bedtime stories. I think I began on Disney books, Muppet Babies books, and played with my Ma's college texts. Eventually I was old enough to read those and found them most illuminating - especially when she took Human Sexuality.

My first recollection of literature proper was an old collection of Poe. I'm sure it was my grandfather's - I'm not sure if it was anyone's before him. I still have it - it's falling apart, so I don't take it out of the house. It's hardcover, thick creamy yellow pages, each at that perfect level of old-book mustiness. The cover is a deep brown with victorian-looking gold decoration. I can remember reading "The Pit and the Pendulum", "Masque of the Red Death", "Premature Burial" and swooning over the imagery and Gothic tropes. My first introduction to myth and lore was a set of Time-Life books, cloth bound and goregeously illustrated. They're hardly a scholarly resource, but they're a treasure to me - the texture, the size, the illustrations (many of which are from those "obscure" pre-raphaelite artists I now love!) made them a magical experience for me. Horrible cliche, but true.

I've still not recovered completely from either one of those experiences!

What do you remember about learning to write? Did you play at writing before you went to school?

When I was little - pre-school little - I'd play with Ma's office supplies, "working" at a little desk next to hers. I'd mash buttons on an old calculator and scribble with pens and hilighters. Aside from being cloyingly cute, it got me used to the idea of sitting down and putting something to paper. This was of course encouraged. I don't recall any more than images and stories Ma told me, so my early writing life is really piecemeal.

When did you first start to read and write for your own purposes? What did you read and write? Why? How were school v home experiences similar and different?

I was selectively introverted as a kid - more impressed with books and drawing and museums, etc than my classmates. At some point, I just commenced to write - stories mostly, with some thoughts mixed in. Nothing regular, no real diaries. Aside from heavy-duty sexual or violent material, no books were forbidden to me, so I soaked up whatever took my fancy. Histories, art, mythology/folklore, literature (still tending toward the morbid or gothic).

As I got older, I kept reading and writing, more than the requirements. I usually got good grades for it. Starndardized tests showed me lacking in math but routinely high in language, so I guess its' a knack. I began, as I said, with stories in my gradeschool years - heavily influenced by the folkore and sagas I'd read. In high school I delved into my love of the morbid as well as a burgeoning appreciation for the erotic, which found a (heavily encoded) outlet in poetry, which I got serious about in those years.

I connected with a teacher in sophmore year who I'm proud to still call my friend/voice of reason, and she mentored my writing, exposed me to scads more literature, and prodded me to enter contests. Which I did to some measure of success. I began my portfolio, which I've continued to work with thru today.

Home-writing and school-writing blurred together for me. As things wore on, I had more and more papers and assignments, which influenced my personal writing, giving me structures to lean on and a drive for clarity. Focus came later, but at least I was structured!

What were your first experiences with digital technologies? How old were you? How did you feel about it? What were your first experiences with digital technologies for writing? How old were you? How did you feel about it?

I was frightened first time I went online - this was some point in grade school. One of Ma's trekker friends (long story) dumped me onto her user-unfriendly browser and left me alone. I had no idea what I was doing, where I was going, and she had her computer set to sound an alarm after a certian amount of time logged on, so I was convinced I'd crashed it when I hear the thing growl (yes, growl). Before that, I have vague recollections of an ancient word processor I had to type a limerick on in third grade. That one left me unimpressed overall.

We didn't get a compter till fairly late in the game - the trekker friends built us one to play with. It ran Windows 3.1 in the post- win 3.1 era. But at least it was windows! I fooled around with that and its successors (it wasn't till about 4 years ago I owned a non-home assembled PC - I got used to newer models at school), gaining experience online and with various desktop publishing areas. Most of my tech use was for school (papers, etc) and that continues to be one of the top uses.

Describe some of your activities/interactions with your friends, family, on your own in grade school, middle school, high school, that involved reading and writing - either digital or print.

-Christmas cards

-editing Ma's fic

-participating in her trek stuff (the newsletters and whatnot - editing, contributing) - she took me along for the ride for some reason

-working on my high school's lit mag

-contributing to lit mags in HS and college

-being read to and reading when I was little

-constant reading and writing now - print and digital

How - or do you think digital technologies influenced the way you feel about reading and writing?

I, for one, think in 1" margins and 12pt font. Being able to have a mockup of a pristine page in front of me and do all sorts of cool formatting actually helped me write - provided instant gratification (thank you google). I can think of something, mash the appropraite keys, and see it look like "real" writing, all legible and ready to print. For a long time the "official" look mattered to me. Not that I devalued my regular media of pens and paper, but my perceptions shifted with maturity and familairity.

How do you use reading and writing to be with, or be in touch with your friends in your present life?

List some skills or practices have you learned from or with your friends?

Write some particular examples of activities or interactions with your friends that use writing.

How do you feel about reading and writing in this context?

Despite the social networking world, it's a task to stay in touch with people. I wish I knew why. My friends and I IM/text and whatnot on a fairly regular basis, but without that constant infiltration other peopel seem to have/treasure. There's more talking than writing, unless you count a couple IM-centric friends. Far as I know, I'm the leader of the writing tech pack, with my google-dependence and sheer workload amount for writing.

I'd rather call someone or hang out than write a long e-mail. Facebook and Myspace are momentary diversions, and don't need a lot of energy writing-wise. IM's tend to be conversation-like - with punctuation, wordplay, etc. rather than the sterotype of netspeak and blunted expression.

Most of my family is 40 years+, and have opted out of digital life by and large. Occasionally, there'll be a digital photograph or desktop generated Christmas newsletter, but that's it. We're a phone family.

How do you use reading /writing for school & work. What do you like best? What do you like least?

Constantly. I take notes - many times on googledocs/notebook. I do my research online (databases, etc) and shop for library books before hitting the stacks, which requires some level of reading skill, sifting thru abstracts and whatnot. I love the brainstorming and journaling, as well as the compilation. Editing gets to me, since I'm my own worst critic, so I tend to put it off.

Describe some experiences you have had reading and writing on the internet.

My daily routine involves the reading of emails and several blogs and webcomics. I pop by boingboing.net several times a day, and recieve NYTimes headlines which I hunt down and read. By the time I hit lunch on a normal day, I've read anywhere from 3-5 boingboing items and about 3 times or salon.com articles, as well as their comment threads, and any neighboring items of interest.

List some of your recent experiences reading and writing. Which (if any) of these experiences have re-shaped your identity as a reader/writer?

My most recent and fruitful experiences in reading/writing would be my courses at school, especially in the last several semesters. I feel I've improved technically, but also gained a little bit of wisdom? insight? into my own process and what's required of me as I continue.

Reflective prompts

2008-12-10T14:21:00.001-05:00

1. What are your plans as a writer (how do you expect to use writing in your future)?

I'll just keep doing it and gradually the gnawing sense of dread will subside. I don't know how much Creative Nonfiction I'll do, but I intend to keep my hand in it, along with other genres as well as academic writing.

2. Describe any changes in your writing style

Seeing as this was the first time I attempted CNF, it's hard to track changes in my style of writing it. I expect I'll improve with time. I'm more aware of audiences now, and give more thought to the possibility of publication.

3. Describe any changes in your writing process

I've learned to edit more for concept rather than contents and mechanics, and I keep the reader in mind more now.

4. Describe any changes in your attitude toward/interest in/understanding of writing in general, and CNF in particular.

Despite the griping and fretting, I still love writing, and I have an affection for CNF now. It's probably the hardest genre for me, but I'm alright with what I've produced and learned.

5. What have you learned about yourself as a writer?

That I move at a glacial pace, and so benefit from direction.

6. What features of your writing do you feel are most important for you to work on?

Concept, and plot. I'm comfortable with drafting and editing, but I sometimes forget that things that make sense in my head don't always make sense out of it.

Tiny Lights Venue Presentation

2008-12-02T23:49:00.000-05:00

Essay #3, working title "Eidos" - I'm favoring "Signal" or "Symptom" or something else

This one received the most positive response from the class. The subject matter is fairly approachable/universal. This one also has the most detailed revision blueprint out of the four. I also happen to like it the most, so I can see myself devoting more energy to it in the near future. With some work, I could see this essay fitting in with some of the works I've read in their archives, because it is personal, relatable, and quietly emotional.

Tiny Lights was my first choice because of its focus on "personal narrative". It doesn't demand innovation and daring artistry, neither does it appear conservative. It began as an essay contest and grew - the site archives go from 1999 to today.

My subject and vehicle are intimate, and my style's hardly "avant garde", so this seems like a good starting point. The essays I read are simple and personal, and usually intimate (eg there's one about the author's migraines - "The Lightning In My Eyes" by Jean Hanson 2002). There's a lot of discussion of bodies, physical conditions, sex/sensuality, interpersonal relationships.

Tiny Lights' voice is plain. There is humor, there is irony, there is sorrow, and tenderness, but no one emotion or trait rules over the others.

Maureen Stanton won 3rd prize for her essay "Pirhana" in 2004. In addition to boosting my confidence about the site ("look, it's a real thing!") that lets me know Tiny Lights reviewers enjoy a certain level of metaphor. The preferred style seems to be subtle and time-delayed. The essays range from funny("Two Kids, A Corolla, and the Journey to Silence" by Eileen McVety - also in 2004) to serious and introspective ("Trauma Chic by Holly Leigh" 2005).

Most of the essays I see in the archives are first person, and conscious of narration.

There are two categories in the contest: Standard (2,000 words max) and Flashpoint (1,000 words max).

I don't see any particular politcal slant. It is not overtly concerned with feminism, gender, religion, etc. but none of these are forbidden.

The forms tend toward the traditional, but not rigorously. The artistry inthe pieces lies more in the content and "mechanics" (eg devices like metaphor, allusion, etc) than form. I think a hybrid of traditional/segmented might be a good description. They relate to my form because I'm not going too far in the directions of traditional or experimental. Segmentation is acceptable here, judging by the archives.

The modes are narrative, largely.

Entry Rules from site:

"15th Annual Contest Deadline: February 14, 2009

Tiny Lights invites entries that feature a distinctive voice, discernable conflict and an eventual shift in the narrator's perspective. We are looking for writers who weave the struggle to understand into the fabric of their essays."

And that's more or less what I was trying to in the first place with my essay.

Venue Shopping

2008-12-01T14:48:00.004-05:00

If I'm going to revise "eidos", i might try to put it in Tiny Lights - since it's so personally oriented.

Tiny Lights Submission Page

"Tiny Lights invites entries that feature a distinctive voice, discernable conflict and an eventual shift in the narrator's perspective. We are looking for writers who weave the struggle to understand into the fabric of their essays."

Deadline 2/14/09 -- for the essay contest

I think with another couple of revisions, I could pull off "an eventual shift in perspective". The conflict is already there (tho they don't say if they prefer internal conflict or interpersonal conflict. I'll scan some of the published things later and answer that question.) I think I have the voice thing down. And lord knows I'm trying to understand in that essay....

Tiny Lights seems modest enough for something as personal as eidos - It doens't demand heavily innovative form or lengthiness. 2,000 word max for a standard essay, half that for a "flashpoint" essay - which coudl be fun to attempt - now that i think of it. Better to hit hard and fast than yammer on about my feelings. I'd be bored with that myself, and it would probably not impress any reviewers. The yammering I mean.

As for something non-contest, Im still shopping.

So to Speak
"interconnects with issues opf significance to women's lives and movements to women's equality."

If I was to spruce up #4 (the essasy about the ornaments) it might be a fit here.

Brevity Submissions

I'd have to eliminate almost 400 words from essay #3 to get it to fir into Brevity. But this is encouraging:

"*Bernard Cooper suggests that short nonfiction “requires an alertness to detail, a quickening of the senses, a focusing of the literary lens, so to speak, until one has magnified some small aspect of what it means to be human.” We agree."

The magnification i think I could do easily - the hard part would be doing it in the physical limtations imposed by the venue.

Essay #4 draft one

2008-11-22T21:51:00.000-05:00

I'm not there yet by a long shot - please bear that in mind. As I come up with changes, I'll alter this, but for now, here's the draft!

We're not big on domestic things anymore in my house. This is not without its advantages, as I can go about my days and indulge myself in all manner of eccentricities and experiments without having to answer to a familial authority. I can eat when I want, do laundry at 10:00 at night, or pin a length of brown wrapping paper to the wall for term paper notes. None of this would be possible if I was beholden to the small, homey compulsions that govern other houses. I don't thumb my nose at all domesticity. One of the features I still indulge in is decorating. My grandmother and I live together, and we fight a continual, loving war over the aesthetics of the place. I believe in bookshelves and candleholders and soft furniture. She believes in creaky hardwood chairs, clear surfaces, and minimal clutter. I am a strange child of both 80s excess and 90s individuality while she's straight from the Eisenhower "household of the future" era. Once a year we meet at the demilitarized zone of holiday decor.

Thanksgiving does not go unembellished, but since we've had more than one spat over artificial vs real mums and the superiority of store-bought pinecones over the filthy crap we can pick up in our driveway, it's still contentious territory. But Christmas. Oh, Christmas. All those ornaments and things. Useless, utterly, happily, beautifully useless, like grotesques in an 18th century print, I treasure these little glass and wood doodads nestled in my tree. The ceramic pieces from her oldest sister - they turn tacky every 5 years or so, and magically back again as my tastes shift - I love those, too. And of course the plaster houses my mother labored over after trashing the manufacturer's suggested color schemes. Those are painted in tropical, candy-shoppe colors with glitter and decopaged tissuepaper in the windows.

This is the women's art in my family. The seasonal peppering of surfaces with red and green (amber and purple for me). We've always expressed ourselves in subtle ways - a scrap of embroidery, or a vase of dried flowers - something deceptively small and unassuming. The ornaments in particular are masterstrokes of expression. They're shiny, colorful, covered with glitter, feathers, and more. But there are repositories of family history. Case in point: there's one ornament, a white, blown glas ball, about 5 inches in diameter. My grandparents bought it in 1953, the year they married. It has a delicate feathery pattern of glitter on it. This thing had to have been handmade. The work put into it amazes me. The ball has ritual associated with it, too. It's the first ornament on, and the last one off. This gives it an element of romance, and yet it's just a sphere of glass and pigment. This thing that could break in an instant, has a treasured place.

.......................................................................................................................

Perhaps its the conceit of a writer, but these make me feel a kinship with everyone who's ever turned some random object into a thing of beauty. And that's a long list. It started seventy five thousand years ago, when someone sat down in a cave in South Africa and thought about seashells. Maybe they had just pried the squirmy meat from them, intent on a tasty dinner, and threw the things away. I can imagine them laying back, digesting, letting their eyes roam around the camp, stopping at the garbage pile where they tossed the shells. Those shells, still gleaming with slime, triggered something. He or she got up and picked up a bunch, maybe holding them up to the ending rays of the sunset. The sea and its denizens had bored some holes into the white surfaces. And maybe that created the idea of stringing the things on some sinew or plant fiber. Maybe they jingled them around like a bunch of keys. Maybe they dangled them in front of their baby to keep the kid occupied. Maybe they wound it around a wrist, ankle, or neck. Or did all of that.

My interest lies not with the historic details but rather with the social effect, the cascade of ornament and embellishment that came as a result of that and similar ideas. If I think about it, I can trace this impulse to decorate right up to the endless consumer buffet of items that serve no practical purpose. Pillows covered with glass beads, carved candleholders - carved candles for that matter. I dare you to find one domestic surface or object that has not been fussed with creatively. Decorating and handcraft has long been relegated to a secondary status, often associated with women, given the short shrift in the face of larger works. We should not disregard painting, sculpture, and architecture. We do right to revel in its beauty, in the skill of the creators, and the nuances provided by historical context.

But we should also not disregard the other half of human expression - textiles, jewelry, ornament, and more. The creators of these may not be known to us,or even considered. But think of this - the person who did that embroidery on this shirt or dyed that piece of leather or attached that bead was as real and vital as the person who labored for years at a fresco or block of marble.

.......................................................................................................................

This swarm of affection for the decorative arts is not without some misgivings. People have been resourcefully "fabulizing' their surroundings for millennia. And they're still doing it, in fact, it's very fashionable right now. The individual, handmade aesthetic is hot. You can buy ornaments, gewgaws, and kits to make them for $5.99 at your local department store. I consider that wonderful. What I don't consider wonderful is the cookie cutter aspect. The fact that I can see 10, 15 people in the same day with the same "trendy bohemian" bag with the exact same details. Chance are, too, that that bag was made in a sweatshop somewhere, which brings me (like so many things) to a whole new level of peevishness. Is it still personal expression if it comes off an assembly line-style setup?

I can look at the family ornaments, or the ceramic pieces, or any number of other things we hold dearly and get a sense of history and connection that I'm hard put to find in a Target display. Of course, objects do not automatically have "personality" - you have to have years of use and handling to make them that way. Have a fight in front of them, or make love, or let a kid play with them, or splatter sauce on them. Possessions have a life parallel to our own, and, often, longer than ours.

Beside me as I write this is my grandmothers' jewelry box. She graciously allowed me access for the purposes of this essay. She has pieces that are easlily 50 years old, 60, and more. Butterfly pins from when she dated my grandfather, baby rosaries from when my mother was small, watches she got in high school, miniatures of her mother. All of these things are "unnecessary", "useless" if you look with a cold eye. But it's like a story when you open this box, which is a lovely almost art deco piece in its own right. It's a dusty gold color, with a deep green lining its belly - it opens without a sound and smells like passed time. I've examined some of the pieces to try to imagine their history. I know how to make some of these things, all the effort that goes into design and construction. The pearls with the tiny verdigris-colored clasp - I held them up, staring at them, the knots on the string, the crimp beads holding the necklace together, and I've tried to think of all the places she wore them, how they must've looked in the store before she bought them home, made them a part of her. There's lilliputian watches that have long since stopped. They were slipped onto her wrists for cocktail parties, weddings, baptisms.

These pieces, like the ornaments, like the shells in that African cave, will outlive all of us. They are all evidence of a greater drive, to realize beauty even in the smallest ways. They are pretty and playful, but they speak of humanity even when the people who made and loved them change to memory and story.

Essay #4: more mess (blog 18 3/4)

2008-11-18T18:54:00.008-05:00

My plan so far is: a series of vignettes relating to my opinion that decor/crafts/embellishments are every bit as valid as traditionally-accepted art.

Ornaments - I've already introduced everyone to this idea - the ornaments as artworks in and of themselves, as well as their display being a form of art for primarily the women in my family. In addition to tree-baubles, there's the plaster houses my mother painted, the 50s-retro felt santa decorations, the ceramic pieces from my aunt...

Home decor - the continuing argument/conversation between my style and Rosie's - I believe in lushness (warm colors, full bookshelves, embellishments) and she believes in her living room the way it was in 1953 (spaces, surfaces, spotlessness) - each style is an expression, and loaded with emotional weight - reflecting both of our ideals about life. It coudl bear some examination.

Advent - we're not quite in Advent yet (well, for the roman catholic folks, anyway) but it's cold enough for me to start thinking along those lines. I don't count myself as formally religious but I maintain a great deal of affection and respect for the traditions I grew up with- and Advent was always a favorite of mine because the church would be draped with deep purple fabric, there'd be a big wreath with industrial sized candles, and all that lovely medieval-sounding whole-note music. Very, very evocative. All that religious training and what moves me is the decor?! I don't know if this renders me perceptive or just really shallow, but that's one of the things that started me really considering how we adorn our spaces - besides, traditionally, at least in my parish, the women made the decorations, they arranged them, they did all the scene-setting. Who knows who does what now, but it seemed like an extension of my mother fussing with pointsettas at our dining room table - also it would seem to contribute to my "thesis" about domestic/handcraft art being essential yet not given the same weight as other forms....

The advent thing I'd have to be careful with because I don't want to fall into an essay about religion (not at the moment, anyway - believe me that one is in the works!) i only include it because I had a conversation about it recently with a friend and we joked that I was "only catholic for the decor". It's tricky, but look what happened - it's the biggest paragraph up there. Is this telling me something? Hmmm.

Somthing I'd like to work in (not sure if I could, though) is the recent trends towards physical/sensual luxury and personalization/customization (skins for laptops, scrapbooking, pashminas, affordable colognes and lattes for all....) and its inherent ambuguity. Yes, I'm all for good tastes sights,sounds, and accessories, and vases/flowers/curios - whatever. But I'm unnerved by the fact that you can buy those vases at a big store - and they were made on an assembly line - sometimes by someone living under horrible conditions - and how "individual" is it, really?

People have been adorning various things for various reasons since we've had the brainpower and muscular coordination to do it...tattoos, jewelry, cave art...it's a human impulse, whether for aesthetics or spirituality, or some combination thereof...my impulse to glue pinecones to grapevine wreaths or hang beaded birds everywhere with a hook is just another iteration of some woman sitting in her family's cave thousands of years ago, carving some bits of bone and ivory to hang on herself, maybe watching one of her sisters smearing charcoal on the walls in the shape of bisons and whatnot.

From you guys, I just need general input at this point. Suggestions, things maybe you'd like to see (or not see, for that matter). I haven't done any formal drafting yet, I'll be honest, so I can't get too specific here.

Plans for Eidos

2008-11-17T14:27:00.004-05:00

Vehicle: the "eidos" term
Story: this funny love/not-love thing
Concept: the nature of love itself

What I need to do: I need this evaluated for focus and clarity

Where I'm stuck: linking the idea of "eidos" with my personal experience

I'm worried I'm getting too wrapped up in the personal and not making it accessible enough for everyone else. It all makes sense at my head - the events, the association, everything - but does it make sense to you? If you picked this up in a magazine or a website, would you get it or is it too subjective?

I'd love to know if anyone has any suggestions for addition/deletion? Any questions you'd like answered? Anything at all!

Further Mess for Essay #4

2008-11-17T14:19:00.003-05:00

I can't help but imagine this like a term paper, so I'm imposing an outline on it. Here's what I'm thinking about discussing and where I intend to discuss it in the piece.

I. - an introductory blurb or three

II. - my "thesis"/concept - the dual nature of commodified taste - all the readily available design decoration, and embellishment, the current trends towards expression and decorating...how they fit into the history of "Secondary" art forms.... I'll be refining this point sooner or later and editing this post so I make an ounce of sense.

III-? a series of anecdotes/vignettes about design and decor that I've really thought about...this is where I'll talk about the christmas ornaments, home decor, church decor, etc)

"conclusion" - just another blurb where I sum it all up and leave you with a warm fuzzy feeling

mess for essay #4

2008-11-15T15:39:00.003-05:00

Class Exercise: Rosie, Pots and Pans, and Christmas Ornaments

This is the workshopping I did in last class - I'll be writing about ornaments and decorative stuff. If anyone feels game, take a look and suggest, query, and otherwise carry on!

Also, in the entry before this, I've posted a second draft of Eidos, my third essay. Again, if you want to, please go thru and comment/question.

Eidos Draft 2

2008-11-10T14:07:00.001-05:00

Eidos is a greek term, a noun. In my limited understanding it means tangible with a side order of ineffable. Whatever is presented to your eager hands and eyes merely points to the ideal, or is part of it, depending on how you take your philosophy, Platonic or Aristotlean. There are more layers, of course, more ideas to contemplate the dilettante's life. I'm sure I'm missing parts - vital parts - of the term and its uses. But I admit the actual definition is immaterial to me. I'm after its soul.

..........

Some men say love is multi-tiered, a hierarchy of intent, pure to profane. And they give meaning to each and every level. Some men say it binds the universe, and others say it is a distraction from the unimaginable power of a god. I have no idea what the thing might be. I don't even know if I've ever had it in my grasp. I've felt it, but I may mistrust my senses some days. And on others, I know this thing I feel. What is the use of defining it, if its so strange? Why should we say "I am in love with this person" or "I am not"? Why bother interrogating ourselves, when we're so quick to lie, to fill in the blanks, and construct conclusions to make ourselves feel better for a moment? What do I do with I think I have it? My first instinct is to freeze and watch carefully, like it's something in the woods. Don't rejoice, don't ignore it - just memorize every detail before it bounds away and I trudge off alone.

..........

I have in my head an idea of love. I have in my body a formula of desire. A series of signifiers that I will respond to, something triggered deep in my cells. My personal eidos, my Form of love. Since I am blissfully weak and happily impractical, I will cleave to this when I find it. Even if its only a moment, since what is life without it?

There's been several people that have bought me closer to this essence, and some that have pulled me away. He falls into the first category. We've been close for years now. There's a significant amount of history and an array of intimacies that I'm finding it harder to ignore. But we're not in love. We've revelled in the luxury of ourselves, twisted into my sheets, straining, panting, clinging to the pure crystalline moment, but we're not in love. I've listened to his breathing in the small hours, but we're not in love. He's held me as I've cried, but we're not in love. I've grumbled about his tendency to complain too much, to not follow things through, to not leave other things alone, but we're not in love. He's griped about my laziness, my tendency to interrupt, the way I talk too much, but we're not in love. Neither one has ever left the other, but we're not in love. You could say everythign is there but the word. Eidos without an anchor.

Where does a woman draw the line? Is there such a thing as defacto love? Can you shrug, exhale, and stuff your hands in your pockets and say you may as well offer your heart, since they've had everything else? Can it be decided like that? Does that manifest or ignore the essence I seek?

..........

There was a day, not all that long ago, that it was dripping-down hot. We had too many appliances running on too few lines, so the lights and AC crapped out as we lay curled in post-coital bliss. We threw enough clothes back on to be legal and headed outside to the other unit's basement, where the breaker is.

I felt grimy, coated in dust, still smelling of sweat, and sex. It was nasty down there, and I had to pee. My arms bristled at the cobwebs, and I swiped and slapped at them before I crouched down low to reach the box, holding the flashlight between my knees. A few clangs of metal and greasy plastic and we were running again. I went right back out and stood in front of him. He had said he'd have to run soon, so I demurely pecked him goodbye, babbling something about making plans next week, looking at the dirt, the gravel, my flashlight - anything but his eyes. We'd parted like this before - oddly casual again, warmly flip.

But this time he snatched me up mid-word, making me drop keys and flashlight onto the concrete, holding me closer and longer than before. I didn't know what to think. This felt different. "Are you trying to tell me something?" I asked. He held me tighter, breathing into my hair, pressing into me. If I was to indulge in projection, I'd say that he was trying to do the same thing with his frame taht I do with my eyes - memorize every detail, every delicate nuance of the other person, unwilling to let this moment fall into the void of memory.

"No," he said, "but I guess it doesn't look like that, does it?" He shifted us around, holding my right hand out, his on the small of my back, and started to dance with me. Slowly, slowly, very slowly. There was no sound but our giggles and the crackle of gravel, and the usual assortment of highway sounds. We turned and swayed for a while before he kissed me again, tucking me away safely somewhere between his shoulder and ear. "I don't want to loose you," he said. He said it softer and lower than anything else. He's not a man that plays with tone. Everything comes out in a deliberate and gentle line. "I don't want to loose you." He's not a man that plays with hearts, but what do I make of this? "I don't want to loose you." He's not a man that loves me. But he's not a man that's ever left.

**********

I have in my head an idea of love. I have in my body a formula of desire. A series of things I am unable to ignore. There is an essence I need, that I can barely articulate, something craved on every level. Once in a while it peeks through into my mundane life. That angel taps me on the head and I try my hardest not dismiss it. I am afraid to admit my suspicions to the honest eyes of day. We're not in love, but I see all this and what the hell am I supposed to do?

Places

2008-11-09T17:38:00.004-05:00

You know, some of these "plumb the depths of your past!" methods turn out a little depressing! There's some things I can never hope to revisit. But from melancholy can come great beauty, or at least, as I hope to produce, semicompetence.

1 - 185 Bonnie Burn Rd Watchung NJ - this was my first house - i was there from baby to 12 roughly. I've moved several time, but I was really sad to leave this one behind. Probably 'cause it was the first one. It was hardly perfect (there were some problems the landlord was trying *not* to fix, hence the move) but it was home. It's still standing, probably - hopefully - remodeled. Right there on the side of a hill, off in the woods, right near 22. Logically, I wouldn't want to be back there now, since it's so far away from everyone, and winters were a pain, but there was something magical about the giant plate glass window shrouded by trees, the stretches of woods on all sides, baby deer scampering around...There were smells and scenes which are still lodged in my head (the smell of the attic, taste of dress-up pearls, grainy old book pages, avocado carpeting) and still feel powerful/symbolic, even if they're really not.

2 - 816 Randolph St NW Washington DC - My Gramma's family home. It's been sold, since the one aunt that lived there decided to move in with her daughter. 816 is a good old fashioned rowhouse, all dark wood floors and victorian doorknobs that never quite turn. We used to go down every month until Ma got too sick. Then it was a few times a year, and after that once every couple of years. Aside from Bonnie burn, I have the deepest emotional connection to this house. I can still smell it, I can still feel the weight of history, I can imagine every detail of a room. I dont' know who's living there now or what they've done with the place, but I don't care to know. To me it's still creaky floorboards and jars of bacon grease and puffs of old-lady powder. A rusty swingset out back and piles of yellowed snapshots I probably wasn't supposed to get into. Steep old staircases with old ajax cans and brooms. Half told stories and closely kept secrets - things I can still only guess at.

_________________
Ok, these are the two strongest ones I have for now. I'll be plucking more out of my journal as I go along...I wanted this to have some meat, so I skimped on number and focused on meaning.

Spent

2008-11-05T09:49:00.002-05:00

I really have no idea what to do, what to focus on. I've been throwing ideas around my head, and nothing makes me sit up and take notice. There's a whole slew of objects/places that trigger emotional responses but I cant come up with a larger game plan.

I could go into objects like jewelry, old Revere-ware pots and pans, vases, old hand-stitched linens - things I tend to hold onto since they're a part of family history. There's a cache of civil war letters (1970s transcriptions and xeroxes which are almost artifacts in their own right), WWII letters, Grampa's navy stuff...I could pull something lovely and emotional from any of these. But for what focus?

There's places that grab me - Gramma's corner of the living room, my favorite diner - places I only remember like our house in Watchung, museums, whatever.

And people - that might be easier - I have of course friends and family, former signifcant something-or-others, people I work with, people I see but don't know - I could do pages on pages of descriptions and "character sketches", but again with no larger purpose.

I'm running on fumes, people! I officially have no clue!

Warp and Weft

2008-11-02T10:42:00.003-05:00

The shoes are tiny - 6, maybe 6.5? Many of them are black, with a few brown and maroon thrown in. They're round toed and flat, eminently sensible. They're well worn but still in good condition - you'd never be able to guess just how many steps were taken in them.

There's an assortment of underthings. Girdles, bras, cotton panties, anklesocks. All white cotton, all plain. They're hung on skirt hangers off the arms of the floor lamp, or draped on piles of things to sort. There's also stockings, freshly unfolded from their demure lilac packages. They're an weird shade of tan - never meant to blend with any natural skin tone. It doesn't matter, since they live their lives under little elastic waist jeans.

The jeans themselves are tiny, barely a 12. They share the closet with little slacks, all of them in sensible, coordinating shades. The pants retain their shapes well, and rest precisely a half inch apart on the metal rod.

The blouses are also dangling in the closet, neat and precise on their wire hangers. They are all the same style, the same fabric (short sleeved nylon-spandex shell, wash cold with like colors, dry flat, don't iron) and they range from blue, to green to purple, all in the darker scales. They go from mass to funeral to grocery store and back.

There are linen-look jackets that are every so slightly too big. They've been worn for years and its showing. There's tiny bits of surgical tape scum along the hem of the green one (quick fix), and in the same spot there are dozens of little stitches, in doubled-up thread, every 5th stitch or so crooked (long term fix).

Finally there are nightgowns and robes and housecoats, in pastels. They're far too thin, far too old. Probably never to be replaced. There are pilly green and white cardigans and a long beige wool coat, probably dating to the 60s (judging by the fact that it's stylish again) and a new one from the early 00's with grey leopard print on the cuffs and collar.

________________________

God, but I feel creepy doing that. It's a little Norman Bates, I'll be honest with you!

Photos

2008-10-29T09:59:00.007-04:00

Much of my life has become linked with the internet, for good, ill, or anything else. My recent doings are not preserved on chemically treated paper but are vast collections of 1s and 0s, now flickering on a screen. I can call them up anywhere I have a net connection. I do love the sensory joy of flipping through a photo album, but space is really at a premium. So I've largely gone digital.

These are not photos, or even snapshots. They're something weirder and more fluid. I can edit my past without the flicker of guilt at tearing up a picture. I can even add and subtract from them. With no negatives to hold the truth, I can do whatever I like with the display of my memories.

The photos I'm looking at are on my flickr streams ("streams", not collections or albums - the word connotes slick silvery things, high-tech baubles, and a relentless push forward) They're from Christmas last year, and a vacation this summer. They have an awful lot of a friend of mine and her family. Things are much more complicated now, but they look so happy there.

I've got my Gramma in there - if she knew I used these she'd shoot me - she's pulling things out of boxes, untying knots, sorting decorations. In some she has no makeup, and her hair's undone. In other's she's church-perfect. Most of the shots were staged, but I can tell you which ones are candid - they always make me kind of melancholy. She's not getting any younger (or less formidable) but she's all that's left. And seeing her on-screen, how little and grey she is - it does things to me.

I'm feeling the time of year, and so I'm more attracted to the Christmas photos. We'll be doing all this again very shortly. Like we've always done. Bring the boxes up, let them warm, turn on the TV, open the wine, cajole the landlord or any local strapping young thing to put the tree up, then Rosie (Gramma) and I will descend upon it and not let up till it's festooned with memories.

This is one of the few traditions we've kept up on, so it's very significant for me. We (ok, just Rosie) have this "sub tradition" of taking pictures of the decorations every year. Every. Single. Year. The same. damn. things. It wasn't till I came into my own and got a little more "avant garde" that we have these black and whites, and images that have nothing to do with the Christmas morning product.

I also still have the 2 pictures of Ma I mentioned in Visual Aid - both Chrismas themed, actually. Those are going to need some journaling - there's a lot to be sorted out in them.

Objet d'Liz

2008-10-27T10:19:00.011-04:00

I'm torn with this one. It all makes sense to me, and I think I might have a chance with any of them, but I've starred the likeliest one - but let me know what sounds more workable.

The Yenta Bag: I'm famous (notorious?) for my purses. I'm not into designers or price tags, or trendiness. What I'm into is storage! I carry quite a lot at any one time. In my bag now I have a makeup bag (eyeshadow, lipstick, burts bees, jewelry), a "pharmacy bag" (stomach pills, pain pills, pads, bandaids) at least one notebook, a bag of pens, a hole puncher, sunglasses, umbrella, wallet, napkins, gloves, recepits, change, perfume, more jewelry, jump drive, usually a water bottle ad at leaset a granola bar, equal/splenda, teabags, whole universes...

The Craft Room: Good lord. I actually dont' spend a lot of my time in here, but I do spend an awful lot of time crafting, so maybe it's significant (enough to talk about). AC Moore exploded in here...there's jewelry parts, flowers, collage work, fabric - things in progress, things to be repaired, things to be scavenged for parts. When people ask what I do outside of school this is what I tell them. And sometimes I worry about that. No, I don't go clubbing, or bar hopping, or malling. I make shit!

*The bookshelves: this is the other thing I do outside of school...I have (to me) a perfectly suitable amount of books. To others I'm sure it's excessive. But nuts to them. At one point I had them neatly divvied up according to read, not read, and in progress but last year's "vehicular intrusion" into my bedroom wall killed that idea*. The point is literacy and the sheer enjoyment of books is a big part of my life. I've got Calvin and Hobbes next to Dante next to Wallace Stevens, over Dracula, and under Susan Sontag. And my greedy self has a pile of library books each for my art history paper, and my own pleasure. And the magazines (Smithsonian, Archaeology, Seed, etc). It's either admirable or problematic.

The Christmas ornaments: All Reilly women have this deep-seated need to have a stunning collection of Christmas ornaments. And buy a couple new each year. It's probably encoded in our DNA in glitter and beads. It's not merely acquisitiveness - it's history. I can give you at least a ballpark date when I got all of mine, or maybe who I was with, what we were doing, what happned that year. And Gramma can do the same with her collection. There's cartoon characters, fabric angels, popsiclestick things I made in PreK, and handblown glass creations with old-style metallic (carcinogenic?!) glitter. I would not want to do a laundry list of ornaments, but rather an overview style meditation or something. Not a catalog by any means!

*I live on a highway - last year a car indeed crashed into my house. didnt' come thru the wall thanks to the "prewar" lumber but it did a number on the drywall. As a result, half my bedroom had to be madeover. There were clothes, books, candleholders, and papers *everywhere*

The essay wars

2008-10-22T09:32:00.002-04:00

As you may recall, I took a vote in class about which essay I should run with and "Visual Aid" won out. My personal evaluations led me to the same conclusion. I think that the sheer amount of material in essay #2 makes it a better bet to concentrate on for the moment. I did a lot of legwork and outlining for this one, so maybe its more developed. It'd be the "easiest" to revise concept and style wise. My ultimate ambition for the piece (like almost any other prose I write) is for it to be a good "bathroom read" - not too long, not to short, with just the right mix of entertainment and deeper meaning. A nice tidy package.

I'm not giving up on "Speaking Ill of the Dead", but it needs some more drawing board work. I'm tired of the story on a personal level, but (1) I think it needs to be told and (2) I think its emotionally potent enough to sustain itself given the proper framework.

Visual Aid 1.0

2008-10-18T20:41:00.003-04:00

If I come up with anything cool tomorrow, I'll be taking this down and reposting, still as a draft. But for now, in the name of getting it out of my googledocs, here's "Visual Aid"

_________________________
Today is takeout day in Kean Counseling. I'm manning the front desk while Olga and her friend run off to the little market where armies of old ladies spoon out herculean portions of rice, beans, and meat at frightening speed. Soon they'll be back, white plastic bags swinging from their arms, their hands wrapped around cups of good black coffee. I've got my share of the feast ready - guava paste and fresh baby mozzarella, ready to be sliced and placed on crackers, after we've already declared ourselves stuffed. Because what's one more bite?

There are mysterious things in those bags, things I don't know the names of yet, jostling for space with my container of bacalao. There's things that "taste better fresh", there's things that "once you taste this you'll practically have an orgasm!" When I first started here, the half-joking requirements for me were to like rice and beans and come to the gym. An ideal arrangement, I think.

Somehow, the spread is laid out among the computers and files, and we all sit there, having "just a little" of this and that, answering phones, making appointments. Work and lunch and conversation are not separate things here. The topics are varied and the tangents are many, and it can be interesting to watch the meal evolve.

"Wow Liz, you really like that, don't you? I've never known an Irish person to like so many things!" My culinary tastes never cease to fascinate Olga. Here I am, little white chick, freckles and green eyes, and I love of all these goodies, even the shots of strong coffee - I always end up drinking more than they do.

The conversation turns off into all sorts of other directions, but my inner monologue keeps on. "Irish" in her lexicon is a polite term for "white", and I don't mind it. I am indeed of Irish stock, but it's not nearly as recent as some might think. Yet somehow I often get caught with my shamrocks out. About a month ago, I was in the locker room, stuffing my bags into one of the little cabinets, my mind set on getting this abuse over and done with when this voice pipes up. "Ooh, you're Irish! Have you ever been to Ireland? I went last semester and I had a marvelous time..." Ba-ba-ba-bahhh. On and on.

Now, the locker room is generally not a meet-n-greet place, so unless I see someone I know, I get a deer in the headlights feeling. I can't help it. I've got an automatic "leave me alone leave me alone leave me alone" ticker running through my head, especially in a place I'm frequently naked.

I looked up at this girl, she's sitting on a bench, combing out her hair. I scan her face for signs of craziness, which I'm sure I'll be able to identify one of these days. Again, it's that reflex of suspicion. Comes with the territory. I smile my work smile, the one that I've perfected over several reception desks. "Ah, sorry, I'm plain old American, ha ha" All the while I'm wondering what the hell she's up to. Then it hits me - I'm wearing my "lush of the Irish" tee shirt.

She tells me about her travel blog from the trip, scrawling the address on a paper towel, which I accept politely, still somewhat off kilter, but not minding as much now. Though I feel "falsely accused". I have no claim to the label "Irish". Of course, she based her initial judgement on a frickin tee shirt. But it did make me think.

After we make small talk and she wishes me well, I look at myself in the mirror. I'm pink. Freckled. I dye my hair red. I'm wearing kelly green. My gestures, accent, entire personality say Jersey, but my looks say "oh no, they're after me lucky charms!". It's a stereotype, I know, a tired social script that still lights up the proper neurons to put me in mind of that idea, "Irish", my allegory for the nagging feeling of disconnect.

..........

What is this thing? What is this label? And why do I ponder it so much? It's not jsut me, it's heriditary! Ma and I both filled the house with books on its history, recepies, ancient life, music, art...She'd go nuts every march, blasting bagpipes and turn of the century protest songs as she kneaded dough for brownbread at our table. I busied myself with researching the Celts and every aspect of their lives, from religion to handicrafts, digging through journals and texts for a tradition that'd turn green beer its tacky ear.

Why did I call aging relatives and ask for anything they had on "the family's" immigration, any ephemera, any stories? I kept all the old photos of plump, stern looking people in cravats and bustles. I sneezed from dust and mold, balancing on rafters in attics, to collect and keep the faces of people who, if they saw me, would probably wonder about the wisdom of coming to this odd land. I kept watch over dates and stories of the distant dead as if they were my own. And I still do.

.........

I have two photographs I've been carrying around with me for weeks now. One of my mother, one of my father. I've diplomatically kept them separated, out of respect for the dead: she's at the front of my journal, he's at the back. So far, this has kept her out of my dreams (she always interrupts a good one) and she's refrained from hiding my things (which I always blame on her, since I'm unwilling to admit how disorganized I really am).

Ma's photo shows her pregnant with me, standing in front of our Christmas tree. She looks good for someone 3 weeks overdue. She must've been up all night decorating that monster, hanging tinsel and pouring wine for Gramma. She's 20 here, maybe 21. Her hair tumbles down in big loose curls, her skin glows, even with the 80s makeup. She's not smiling, probably caught mid-word, but you can see her face has good high bones, and her body, even at this point is long and broad. We carry our weight well, she and I. Just wide enough at shoulder and hip, faces oval and well balanced. We could be sisters, really. I look at her and I feel all the years we had together, the weight of shared memory and experience spreads gently over me and I know I have a tether to the world.

My father's photo shows him standing on our back porch in Watchung. He's wearing a camo tee and skinny 80s jeans. One photo shows him smoking, pinching the cigarette in his fingertips. He's pale, razor thin in body and face. Blue eyes and straight dark red-brown hair. Who knows how old he was. I don't know him. I've met him all of 5 times and I doubt I could pick him out in a crowd. This man gave me half my genes and I don't see any feature, any expression, anything that links us. There's no common ground, but he's this fixture in my mind, the heritage I can't escape.

The morning my mother died is the morning I found out he was first generation American. As a strange act of (?) kindness, Chris had put me in touch with my sister. I had never heard her voice before. All I knew about her was the pink and unicorn-festooned letters we traded when were about 9. But here she was on the line, asking how I was doing.

It was a revealing conversation, on several levels. First, I find out that she's just plain too cool for me, with a strong bohemian vibe and a seen-it-all manner that has really seen it all, from what I can tell. I feel no connection, really. I feel like a guest that has fallen between the cracks at a party. We're polite, warm as we know how to be, but we're just not bridging the gap. The second interesting revelation is her description of "Gramma Chloe"...apparently a warm, if not outright loving lush that moved to America decades ago.

"Gramma Chloe" also declared my mother to be a few awful things, and me the bastard grandchild she had no interest in ever seeing. Until she called my mother from her deathbed and professed a miraculous change of heart. I'm not sure what Ma told her, but it must've been something. Queen Margaret-level invective.

So that's it. That's my blood link to Ireland. A vicious old woman and her son, a violent drunk, fixture of Ma's nightmares for years. The very formula of everything I try to avoid in myself, and in others. This is the only bloodline I can identify. This is half of what swims through me. This is the reality - not whatever I've cooked, read, admired. This is it. This is what I have.

Can I get a transfusion? Can I give up that half and replace it with my friend Ruth's genes, so I can be half Russian-Jewish? Can I have some of Olga's, so I can replace Chris and Chloe with some feisty old Cubans? Or can I just erase a few generations' breeding - there's got to be something good in the gene pool.

..........

What has this got me? Not much. Here in America, especially my corner of it, I'm blank. Blanca. No extended family to give you a clue. Just a complexion. If you stuck me in Ireland now, I'd be American. (Hopefully not a godawful tourist but a classy traveler, interested in the actual culture and history, polite to a fault, willing to learn.) But unless I have a secret stash of relatives somewhere, I'd still be a guest. Like I always am. To some level I'm still on the outside, even in my own family. I crave the heat of belonging and where I can't find it I'll make it. I'm still conscious of that remove, though, however slight. It's less a burden than an interesting knot in my mind. One more story to tell.

_________________________________

I'll have you know I postponed a craft project for this! Damn schoolwork getting in the way of my gluegunning...bah!

Class post - what I need from you to have my draft by Monday

2008-10-15T14:52:00.004-04:00

If you could throw an extra 24-48 hours into my weekend, please, by all means do. 'Cause that's what I most need from you! Either that or someone else to read James Joyce and do my annotated bibliography and my Art History paper. While I write.

When you critique my draft, I'd like you (or anyone else) to first and foremost interrogate me on my point. Since I tend to loose track of it. Make sure the skeleton's identifiable to you - tell me what you think the concept, story, and any other literary tools are. And I'll compare it with what I thought I did and see where they match up. This will help me stay concept-oriented.

I can't really think of anything else I need at *this* point - if anything pops up - I'll post away.

Notes on essay #2 - "Visual Aid"

2008-10-13T15:18:00.003-04:00

I'm thinking about appearances, shorthand, symbols.

Culture as a topic comes up pretty often in my life - as does family history. My friends have traditionally been within 3 or so generations of their "home" country, or have some other strong linking factor (say, religion) that makes them American-plus-something.

Then there's me. I'm Whitey McWhite White. "Caucasian" is not nearly as descriptive as "Cuban" or "Peruvian" or "Jewish", even. There's distinctions within the realm of Caucasian, to be sure, but even those I wonder about. To wit - I'm from Irish stock. Irish is a small but notable distinction.

I quibble on the semantics all the time - If anything, I'm "Irish-American", which implies (to me) having some family I know back there, a more direct link. I could very well have family there, close family, but do I know them? Nope. It's because the strongest link to Ireland and its attendant baggage branches off one of the trickiest parts of my background: my father.

The heritage, if there is any, is problematic. He's first generation American. His family pretty much disowned Ma and me, tho. So why do I even claim it? And what is there to claim?

People like to use symbols in describing themselves. "Parent", "Democrat", "Lesbian", "Intellectual", etc. Words like this signify a set of behaviors and outlooks that are not uniform in everyone using the symbol, occur often enough that you're somewhat safe in presuming them. If I use "Irish" or "Irish American" as a symbol in describing myself, I'm linking me to a whole lot more than green beer and bad accents. It's more than Bridget's in the mall. It's more than Angela's Ashes (good read, incidentally). By invoking that, I'm linking myself with a history and culture, which was made by actual people, not the abstracts we all turn into if we're lucky enough to be remembered. So this is not light for me.

Luckily, I'm not pressed to assume that or any label. But I cannot contemplate the cultural symbol without making it concrete, applying it ot my family. As you may have noticed, it's not a traditional one (does anyone still think that exists? thought not! :) ) I have always felt some level of isolation from people my own age, which has since levelled out now that I'm no longer at the kid's table. I came from a warm but very self-sufficient, very private family. Benign aloofness? I dont know. But what I do know is that the model of self-sufficience falls apart when you start loosing family members. I've had to traipse out of my shell and live in a way that would baffle Ma were she not in the cheap seats. I drive my grandmother up a wall with my habits of going out on dates, accepting help if I need it, and including friends in family things (like setting up the Christmas tree) enjoying life rather than making do - stuff that it's ridiculous *not* to do!

So - the sum of all that is I'd like to write into my twin fixations of (possibly mythological) cultural heritage, and my (actual) kin heritage. I'd like to use the broader, more nebulous cultrual one as a foil for the actual family. For instance, Ma was a great armchair historian - our house was stuffed with books on Ireland, her bookmarks on AOL were similarly concerned, she'd blast bagpipes on CD and bake "traditional' recepies - we shared the fixation, but I suspect it was less a fetish than it was a way to create some sort of identity, some passion out of the demure hush around our lives.

Our fascinations have a great deal to tell us about ourselves - even things we don't think about. Another example that's come to me recently - most of the guys I've seriously dated have had some sort of really strong connection to another culture - Latin, Mediterreanean, etc. I can explain that away by noting the dearth of "whitebread" guys in my general area - but am I also not driven (at least in part) to people that have a legitimate, tangible connection to something larger than their own immediate families? A fetish, a preference, or a coincidence? Who knows...

Or is it just the cuisine? 'Cause lord knows I'm not shy about a plate of food...

Now, for the technicals. I'm planning to use two photos as a springboard for the essay, hence the title Visual Aid. One is of Ma, one of my father. I've started with a description/meditation on them, but I need to link that into the (dare I sound so liberal artsy?) "meta narrative". Let me spell it out so we can all keep it straight:

Meta narrative: person searches/longs for connection (universal, we all want that)
Sub Narrative 1: person wants connection with a specific culture, is conflicted about that
Sub Narrative 2: person is conflicted about connection she already has to her crazy folks
Friggin' Point: person will say to hell with it all and revel in the neverending question / remain proud of the heritage *she* has built for herself.

The writing I've done so far can be found here:
http://additionaldamning.blogspot.com/2008/10/visual-aid-notessketches-for-later.html

It's not much, but remember it's been a while since I've updated that. So, yeah, someone throw their hat into the ring!

What went well, what didn't and what just went

2008-10-08T10:16:00.006-04:00

I made a sizeable booboo right away - I neglected to mention my mother! Jennifer got it right off the bat, but I did have to clear it up for Dr. Chandler. I wanted to see what woudl happen if I witheld the identity as much as possible - see how people responded. Thought it might let more people in - maybe they could identify more if I didn't put the word "mom" all over with its attendant emotional baggage. But now I see that was detrimental! So, that's one for the "not so well" pile.

Jennifer also mentioned that I did not include the cause of death. I really debated on that since it would require a little jargon, and the point was not so much her death as how *I* felt about it. However, leaving too many questions for the reader shuts them out. They're not sitting there emoting with me so much as they are outside the story going "so...wait...what happened?" You can see from my various comments that I am a firm believer in the power of info witheld. But somtimes I do go overboard ;)

What I felt went well was the conveying of emotion. I'm obviously not skimping on it here. You *will* be affected, I can promise you! Confused, but not untouched!

In the next essay I will endeavor to let the reader in a little more. Just enough, cause I want to see y'all work for it. And I would like to identify the focus a little more in my pre-writing. When I did this one on Ma, I wasn't 100% sure where I was going until I was a third of the way through and it shows. An identifiable skeleton would help, at least for the first draft of essay #2.

Bonus Post Personal Responsibility and Truth

2008-10-06T15:51:00.006-04:00

After class, Dr Chandler and I had a nice little tete-a-tete about the idea of truth, the rights of storytellers, etc. Perhaps its a tangent, but we hit upon the idea of the *responsibility* of truth-telling. Sometimes you have one - look at some things that have been socially dealt with lately that benefit so many. Look at feminism, LGBTQetc rights, abuse survivors, torture survivors, PTSD, racism, environmentalism etc.

How much would we be dealing with the problems attendant to these areas if noone told the stories? Maybe the progress we've made (and have still to make!!) would still have been made, but, ah, would it be the same? Would there be the same fire in the movements without the stories? The writers?

This is a tangent here, and its my own....I'm thinking of the Celtic cultures and the positions they gave poets/storytellers. They were not just supposed to sit there and be creative for creativity's sake, but they *had* to tell the narratives and tales. Granted, this was a good part fiction, but there's some nubbin of truth to every myth....BUT: the idea of writer-as-worker, and sometimes socially responsible worker is intriguing. Any other cultures where that happens? Anyone know something I don't?

So yes - that was the product of that chat. I'd love to know if anyone can connect on a personal level with anything I just wrote. Is there a writer/writing that has made you passionate about a certain cause? Anyone turned you off to a certain cause? I'm just limiting it to causes social/political because everyone's read something that has touched them "just because" but I love to know what puts the fire in your belly.

It's ok, Liz...let it suck...

2008-10-04T18:55:00.003-04:00

Drafts are hard for me. This beast comes out to 3.5 pages in MS word, double spaced, 1" margins. That's as close to 5 as I can get for tonight.

I hope to whatever gods that this is CNF. Or close enough. I started with one idea, then watched it sputter and cough, so I pulled this from my metaphorical nethers a couple of hours ago.

I don't think I'm questioning enough here. I'm revealing a lot, as you'll seem but I dont know if I'm revealing enough of my "self in relation to the subject". The structure is not creative enough - I was trying to get the barrage of a certain set of emotions I had during my mother's death across to the reader, but I don't want it to read like a checklist. Aesthetically, It's either good with potential or it stanks. You tell me.

Good lord, showing drafts makes me nervous. Here's to more information than you ever wanted about me! :) Huzzah!

Onto the draft:

Speaking Ill of the Dead

I'm getting really tired of this. This story. The entire Norse saga of her illness and death. There's too much I've forgotten, too much I remember. It's too intimate, but I feel compelled to share it. Who knows how many times I've mined it for writing projects. Once it was an essay. There were a couple poems, there was even a one act play where the drama of loss was encoded in a tale of lovers. Even if I don't say her name, even if I don't say how we were related, it's there.

The truth is I was relieved at her death. Sure, there were many other emotions, but when we got that phone call, I rolled over and went back to sleep - "thank god". In some ways, I can love her more now that she's gone. Having her here, sharing a house with her, sharing a wavelength, it was all too much. She was far too big to let me breathe.

One of the things they never tell you about death is that you won't always miss the person. Sometimes you'll be alright with the whole idea. There were nights I'd pray to whoever, whatever to take her...make her well or take her...I'm too weak for this. A decade and change of constant, chronic illness. Of pain. Of hospitals. Of frustration, the stench and weight of things unsaid, unlived.

Just make her clean again, make her whole. Take her home. No. She lingered for 10 weeks in that room. 10 whole weeks! A slab, twitching every now and again. Her brain made into useless jelly at the whim of some god, some errant cell or mass floating through her blood. Her spirit may have been somewhere. Not there. Not that bed. Not under that crust and pus and drool.

Don't tell me she'll fucking walk again - I've seen her these weeks. I was there when they said there was nothing above the brain stem. I've watched her turn clammy and yellow, jaw slack and dead eyes far away, dry and dim. Don't cry on my shoulder and tell me how you wanted to marry her - I know. I was there when she told me about you two. I was fine with it all, but don't tell me this shit now. Don't mix potions for me, don't hand me a saint's medal, don't hand me a prayer card, don't hand me holy water. Just go home. She's not here. This is a corpse, this is just meat. Let it go.

All I wanted was to go home. I couldn't stand to be alone or with anyone. I coudlnt stand my own skin. I couldn't even touch her after the third week. I'd go in there, put on my gloves and gown, staring at the MRSA poster, the handwashing sign, the disinfectant label. And then I'd sit on the windowsill, dreaming. Anything to take my mind off Gram's reedy singing, anything to ignore her massaging her swollen useless feet.

All I wanted was to go home to someone else. I wanted to pick someone up in a bar, go home to a warm body that could pour some life back into mine. Hell, even the EMT's looked tasty, or that nice young nurse with the spiky hair. Someone, anyone. Id watch the rain go from silver to grey to black on the window, my temple pressed to the glass. Someone. Make me remember I'm alive. Take this from me for a few hours.

By the time we left each night, the sickly orange street lights would be on. My hands were cold, the knuckles scraped from shoving them in the zippered pockets of my coat. Without gloves. It was early spring, still raw and cruel, and I was running around gloveless. My lips were dry, shriveled and chapped. Gradually, circles grew under my eyes, and I forgot to be neat with my hair.

I dropped my classes that semester, one by one. I still went to school, though. I hid in the library, the bathroom, an assortment of empty classrooms. There was no way I could keep up the facade - at least I had the good sense to admit defeat and let her dying take over. She belonged on the center stage anyway.

I wanted it to be cold. I wanted to wander the streets alone, the wind beating this out of me. I wanted my blood to freeze and my skin to turn white. I wanted. I jsut plain wanted. I wanted to be cold, dry, and alone. I wanted another body slamming into mine, not letting me hide. I wanted to run off somewhere, but escape's a luxury. I stayed there, tethered to her, to my house, to my empty bed.

I wanted some small, intimate violence - a dish thrown at a wall, a scream, a bite. Anything but a rosary decade or a sympathetic look. Heaven help you if you patted my back and asked if I was ok - I was primed to tear out your throat. But rage's a luxury. I stayed there, tethered to our misery, to the small courtesies that hem in true emotion.

I stayed there, each night, tethered to the dying woman. If I could have, I would have flicked a switch or pulled a plug. If there was something to inject that would have been painless and safe, I would have done it. If it had been in my power, I would have, as the last act of love I would ever be able to show her.

What followed was stripped of meaning and passion. I'd been more moved with the closing of a book than I was with the bland ceremony and overpriced casket. But those rituals were not for me. They were our gift to everyone else. When it was all said and done, I knew just how little I could do. I knew how to catch my breath when the universe ripped something from my core. I knew how to catch my breath and keep going.

The truth of the matter is I was relieved. I really did roll over and breathe a small prayer when I got the call. I did have all those emotions, but at a calmer pace. There were days I laughed. There were days I put it aside. There were days I was ok. And when it was all over, I I stripped off a glove, and stroked her hair, singing Tura-Lura. That was the most I could do at that point. I forgave her everything. I meant it.

And I still mean it. She's taught me more now that she's "gone" than I can remember from when she was alive. There were so many pains and regrets, but I told her it was ok. There is so much more than can ever be told between us. And that, along with her herself, haunts me. How will I ever tell anyone, except in fragments. No one will ever know it jsut the way I did.

I can never quite do justice to the depths of emotion, just tell it in pieces as they work their way to the surface. That holds not just for the story of her death, but for her, too. She works her way up to my skin in fragments. Sometimes I'll find one with relief, sometimes I'll bleed a little. Sometimes I'll ignore one, and sometimes I'll drive one in deeper. There's no one version to this whole mess, no pat ending. Summation, reconciliation, closure....these are luxuries better appreciated by others - I really don't know what to do with them anyway.

Tim O'Brien / there is no spoon

2008-10-01T11:49:00.016-04:00

In high school, I was something of a beta tester for a modern lit course, and my teacher (later friend and mentor, too) went through this Vietnam Phase every couple of years. I caught her in the middle of it, right after she had discovered Tim O'Brien. We spent quite a while with him, a classroom full of artsy, bookish seniors and me the one of the few sophomores in a Catholic, girls high school. Perfect place, no?

Reading "How to tell a true war story" puts me in mind of that class, since we spent a long time on the nature of truth, and how it conflates with traumatic events. The peculiar effect of a war on the human mind. She was quick to drill into our heads that the damn buffalo's not the point, the word cooze is not the point, and neither is the war, so much. Mind you, this can be read as a Vietnam story, but it functions equally well as a lesson in CNF.

As with "Decent" you have to read between the lines for the lessons here. O'Brien's not kind enough to provide us with italicized words. Several paragraphs instruct us in what he's doing:
-"A true war story is never moral..."
-"In any war story, but especially a true one..."
-"In many cases a true war story cannot be believed..."
-"Often in a true war story there is not even a point..."

The concrete point of a CNF story is not the point. Although it can be, too. Sometimes. Why would this be simple? What's the fun in that? What matters more is getting the reader into the mindset/emotion set you had yourself. O'Brien can't possibly let us know exactly how it felt to watch his friend die (if indeed that did happen, the way he intimated or at all) but he can translate the "vibes" for the reader. The resonance of the story makes it valuable.

Iterations of a story can reveal more layers....like being in therapy, sometimes you have to revisit a subject time and time again to process it and extract its essence. O'Brien tells the Lemon story again and again, in various ways. I don't know if he ever reached the truth here, nor do I care - he recreates the essence of his experiences at that part of his life for me. And he does it brutally well.

Trauma has a way of altering facts. If you asked me what I was wearing, or what I was doing/thinking when my mother had her stroke, I couldn't possibly tell you. And furthermore, it would be small (literary) potatoes compared to how I felt. The point is not the physical details or the exact arrangement of events. Those don't' make for a compelling story - my emotions would. If I described my selfishness that night, my fatigue, the tension, etc - that would hook you. Apply all that to O'Brien and you have *my* point!

**further thoughts pending**

I'm the little comment fairy!!

2008-09-28T21:47:00.003-04:00

I think I lost the essay handout, so I can't remember the criteria for this lasted entry, so I'm skipping this one! In exchange, I've read everyone's blog and left what I hope are pertinent or at least entertaining comments. Let me know if i I missed you.

Blog Concentrate - The Danticat and Drummond Entry

2008-09-23T20:10:00.004-04:00

I'm going to see if I can hit every point I need to in the least amount of words possible. As you may have noted, brevity is a challenge for me.

"Westbury Court" and "Alive" are about the way experience irrevocably alters a person. Danticat focuses on tragedies (deaths mostly) that her family's witnessed and Drummond focuses on how her experience as a police officer changes even small activities.

Danticat uses the fire as a turning point, symbolizing loss of innocence, the first taste of pain in life. She mentions various murdered, injured, or otherwise violated people (the "girl who scalded her legs" and her father's camera theft) as extensions of that symbol. She describes people by their tragedies, and from that we can see how she believes these events become inseparable from their identities. Her structure is more of a traditional narrative, but she repeats the phrase "after the fire" just enough to be noticed. It introduces and summarizes tragic events and bookends periods in her life.

Drummond uses the stalker as her primary symbol. Others may dismiss him as a "creep" (as she first does) or ignore him, but her experience as an officer is activated by his presence. Once she gets that sense/feeling/whatever, all her more current moods and mannerisms leave and she is "hyper alert", recording his description, watching him just as much, and even experiencing physical reactions (the leg twitch). Her paragraphs, already brief in the beginning, shorten until they are mere lines as she approaches the conclusion. The tension conveyed by this structure breaks with the final message about her vulnerability.

"My father always said" - Rough copy

2008-09-21T14:26:00.038-04:00

In her essay, Schwartz details the moment (more properly a collection of them) when she first encountered her family's history, when it all crystallized for her. She, speaking from her own perspective, can only answer for her own transformation. She describes the first sting of maturity, the first burden - when you realize that your life is not all there is in the world. That people have been through incredible struggles that ultimately allowed you the life you enjoy. You can hear that for years and years, but until you let it pierce your skin, it does no good. In her own American environment (here/now/fun/optimistic) Schwartz can't grasp the enormity of her family's journey. When she is no longer surrounded by the comfortable distractions, she may see the traditions herself (symbolized by the cemetery) and the attendant emotions (the touching scene where she lays stones on her distant family's graves).

Focus of each section:

She introduces the focus, describing her adolescence, and her frustration with her father's "old fashioned" point of view. She also describes his frustration with her small mindedness ("Forest Hills, Queens, is not the world") Next, she is immersed in her father's past, describing the physical details of the town and its environs, even switching times to describe her return visit decades after.

She then meditates upon her father's devotion to his town and his past and contrasts it with his less pious daily behavior (such as not going to temple). The conveying of the Kristallnacht story acts as a turning point for Schwartz, the (symbolic) moment where her father's experience and her own are united. this event unites her father's past and her own, as the faith and culture are united in history. She admits to not knowing about it at the time, but she invites her father to explain. She opens herself to his past by allowing him to speak.

After that, she continues to draw on her father's memories in this section, comparing them to her own experience, like the mention of Ta classmate's antisemitic remark. Then she literally confronts the collective past of her family as she's ushered into the cemetery.

The gaps serve primarily as breathing space, points of transition the reader needs, especially when the content gets very emotional. A good musician, I feel, knows how to use silence as judiciously as sound. The same with a good writer. What I'm trying to say is Schwartz knows when to shut up. The second purpose of these gaps is to represent gaps in the actual experience. She doesn't detail her trip from Queens to Germany because the emotional narrative would be interrupted, or loose its punch. Linear time is not the point here, the point is what she discovered and how. She's giving us highlights of the whole story to let us have a sense of what happened psychologically (or spiritually if you like that tack).

2008-09-16T21:38:00.011-04:00

I am at a disadvantage here, since I didn't even hear of Montaigne until this assignment, and it's been years since I had to read "Shooting an Elephant". I really don't feel comfortable picking them apart until I read (and re-re-reread!) and nibble at a little background info for both men. however, the assignment is due, so here I am.

At first, it seems that Montaigne and Orwell gave CNF a personal touch. Both men, in their own conventions, are writing from their hearts, their own lives and opinions. But Montaigne, given his position between the Renaissance and Enlightenment, is more rational and rigorous - he logically examines his claims, backs them with research. Orwell, writing in the early 20th century, strikes me as closer to Modernism in his "irrational" (highly personal, emotional, anxious) treatment of his topic.

Both set up their essays to have a distinct conclusion, but Orwell's is confessional ("I often wondered....") while Montaigne's is more declarative. Both treatments as well as endless variations can be seen in CNF.

Orwell gives much more attention to sensory detail than Montaigne (all or partly due to convention?). Montaigne packs in research, with quotes and personal anecdotes, while Orwell relies on "selfsearch". Both these tactics are present all over CNF.

Kincaid and Lott

2008-09-16T11:01:00.021-04:00

Kincaid's essay really blurs the line between CNF and fiction, given that she presumably has invented large chunks of the story (some recollections are in such detail they "have" to be somewhat embroidered. To add to this, she hops between times and awarenesses (eg: all the parentheses - "but I did not know then and do not know now" - and so on)

These qualities at once make it a stickler for truthfulness and self interrogation in ways the other essays have not. The Beard piece comes close with its lush and wrenching detail, but it stays largely in one timeline. Beard also does not literally show her self interrogation as much as Kincaid does.

"Biogrpahy of a Dress" broadens my idea of what CNF can be. It veers away from the drama/memoir of "Out There" and the somewhat didactic memoir of "Superman and Me". in light of these works, CNF may be imagined as less of a genre and more of a continuum of possible expressions.

As for Lott's essay, it gave me a structure to work/think from, which is so crucial in a nebulous area like this. The first thing that struck me was the title itself - "towards" - we'll never have a set definition of CNF in the same way we have other NF definitions which is part of the fun.

There are moments - rare, but present - that I stop and think "I'll never remember this". Lott's first point of preservation strikes a chord, because all writing, CNF especially seeks to make something eternal. A mood, idea, whatever - to pluck it out of the realm of the everyday where it will surely be covered with a million other things in an instant. The page rearranges time for us, so we can hang onto things and elaborate them in ways we just can't in regular existence. CNF does this with more fidelity than fiction because, after all, it is "real". I'll leave it to the philosophers in the class to slug it out over what precisely is real.

The second point, of "writing about oneself in relation to the subject at hand" - CNF is not meant to declare a finished product or self. It allows recognition of change, loss or gain of information, evolution of the personality and intellect. Lott's essay makes me consider that CNF does not move vertically (this was me then, this is me now) or horizontally (this is me at this moment, in this place, doing this thing) so much as it moves in a spiral or one of those really fun organic shapes. (this is me today, doing this thing, but this was me last year in this place, and perhaps it will be again at this time...)

Lott's idea of CNF as a test run jells with me. It offers a place for trying out new iterations of one's beliefs or personality, which are constantly evolving anyway. Fiction is largely said and done, even if it has personal dimensions (I created this character, he does XYZ which relates to me, but his story's finished). CNF is more of a scrapbook - pages are added, old photos cut up or re-presented - labored crafting metaphors are added to class blog posts...

Lott's piece also gives me the idea of interrogation of the self. The writer and reader must engage in a dynamic relationship, asking both ask not only is this true, but was this just true for myself (or the author) at the time, in that place. was this you (or me) at that moment? was this an invention of the current you to replace or supplement your memory? - There's a lot of work to be done, as the author uncovers themselves and introduces their find to the reader. And the reader must respond by relating it to their experience or knowedge otherwise the piece is just noise. Both ends of the conversation have to use their "whole fund", as Welty put it, to approach the piece. Emotion, information, instinct, logic - all parts of the mind must be used to write or react to a piece.

CNF

2008-09-09T21:32:00.002-04:00

I've never really thought about CNF. The work I've had to do in my English classes largely revolves around literature and its attendant joys. But - after the readings (especially Alexie and Didion), I realized that most of my off hours revolves around this area. The notebooks, the compulsive listing, recording, etc - all of it, in varying stages of truth - have now led me to believe that creative nonfiction is aboutcreating the self. The self changes, the self varies over time, between situations, in interaction with others. When you create a character and its environment, you imbue that character with some of your "essence" but you also get the luxury of distance - oh, she can rob that bank, he can take that lover, they can kill that person - these are things you'd hopefully never do in real life, but you can get very intimate with them in fiction.

Nonfiction does'nt let you hide as much. You may take some liberties, but the bulk of it is you, how you acted or felt, (or how you mis/remembered it all). Your identity is mutable, your motives myriad, your midn all but inexplicable - but you have to own up to it sometimes, and CNF lets you have a space to work out all that. It's the truth with a twinkle in its eye - or so I've heard.

And if someone could tell me just where I've heard that line, I'd be most grateful...'cause it popped into my head just now, I had to have picked it up somewhere, but I can't recall!

Inaugural Post

2008-09-08T15:56:00.002-04:00

For anyone wandering in here, this is an old film history blog, so please ignore the old posts :)

The Sixth Sense/ Finding Nemo Twofer

2008-06-18T15:57:00.024-04:00

Ok, at this point, I'm loosing it. I didn't realize watching movies could feel a little like work ;) But anyway, onto business!

The Sixth Sense Stats:
(boxofficemojo.com, imdb.com wikipedia.org)

Released: 8/6/99
Domestic Total Gross: $293,506,292
Budget: $40 million
Nominated for 2000 Academy Awards
Five weeks #1 movie in US

Finding Nemo Stats:
(boxofficemojo.com, imdb.com wikipedia.org)

Released: 5/30/03
Domestic Total Gross: $339,714,978
Worldwide: $864,625,978
Budget: $94 million
Academy Award for best animation
$70 million opening weekend (highest at the time for an animated movie)

Ok, the first thing that comes to my mind when considering these two movies is the representation of single parents in film. "Aww! Fishies!" is the second.

Single parenthood may not the main thrust in The Sixth Sense, but I found Toni Collette's performance believable. The single mother in popular consciousness is a repository of all sorts of resentments - she's selfish, she's oversexed, she's a workaholic, she leaves her kids in daycare, blah blah. No, I'm not a parent, but yes, I take the depiction personally. Collette and Osment had pretty decent chemistry, she was that affectionate-tough hybrid that single moms need to be to get through the day, "fiercely maternal" according to rottentomatoes.com. She was neither neutered nor put on display, turned into an iceberg or made into an emotional wreck, just depicted as a woman first, attractive second. I really can't find anything to say about Marlin as a character since he's a CG fish - not much in the way of style and looks there.

Thanks to the human love of anthropomorphizing, in Finding Nemo we see a young couple just starting out...new home, a family. We can all identify, right? Disaster strikes, as disaster does, in the form of a big ugly fish, and Marlin finds his world upside down. The Sixth Sense's tragedy doens't occur in the course of the movie - by the time we meet Lynn and Cole the marriage/relationship is already over and they're learning to cope with the fallout. Lynn Sear's main problem is her afflicted son, and Marlin's is the death of his wife and kids. Both characters are obliged to devote their lives to protecting their offspring at all costs. We can see this in Marlin's paranoia about Nemo reaching school age, and Lynn's frustration at Cole's withdrawal.

Both children characters, Cole and Nemo undergo a period of being unreachable. Nemo literally gets lost, thanks to his need to defy his father and assert his independence. Cole is emotionally lost due to his inability to handle his psychic gift/burden. Over the course of the movies, Cole and Nemo learn to trust themselves. Nemo manages to break out of the dentist's fishtank (that must be part of the "mild peril" mentioned in the rating) and Cole, through his "sessions" with Dr. Crowe learns to overcome his fear and listen to the ghosts' messages. Both kids are reunited with their parents after a sort of " night sea journey", if I can drag a bit of Jung into this. (Nemo's trials being the open ocean and imprisonment far away from his home, and Cole's being the nonstop encounters with ghosts and the terror that inspires).

The Sixth Sense's overall look I find to be quite elegant. The light doesn't change too much for Cole-and-Lynne scenes or Malcolm-and-Cole, or Malcolm-and-Anna scenes. Instead the supernatural is indicated with the red trick and visual representations of chilliness, as opposed to elaborate theatrics. Day and night are the same for all the characters. I don't recall the camera being very intrusive here - we are treated to some birds-eye views, the occasional glimpse from the back of a cabinet or through a door - the lack of acrobatics allows one to fall deeper into the experience.

Nemo lent itself to all sorts of tie-ins and merchandising - cuddly animals are always a sure bet with kids little and big. I have two little nieces that were just young enough to really go nuts when it came out, so I know firsthand the amount of paraphernalia it generated. I don't recall any similar effect from the Sixth Sense. You can make Nemo plushies, Dory shirts, and sea turtle kiddie sneakers, but what do you do for the other? A Haley Joel Osment see-n-say? Bruce Willis bobblehead? In this "sense" (sorry), Nemo was more of a modern blockbuster since it had so many multimedia possibilities, as well as selling a lot of tickets. The Sixth Sense hearkens back to the era when pictures were pictures, and that's that. I can't recall much of the pre-opening hype for either, but I imagine with budgets like they had, they were plugged just this side of mercilessly.

Hedwig and the Angry Inch (6-24)

2008-06-18T15:56:00.019-04:00

I'm biased. Horribly biased. I love the film version of Hedwig. I've seen it many times and I just love it. Never saw it on stage, though, more's the pity.

The story itself is more about the process of self-acceptance than a love story. Hedwig (nee Hansel) does what many of us do - he tries to complete himself with his romantic relationships, and finds out each time it just doesn't do the trick. Eventually, he seems to learn that he has to be complete in himself first. At least that's what I get from the ending, which was deliberately ambiguous.

Perhaps I should summarize before I go further, since I'm not sure how well-known the film is outside its fanbase. Scott, if you know it, just skip the next paragraph! I don't know who wanders in here and reads, so I want to be covered...

_________________________

The protagonist Hansel grew up in East Berlin, falls in love with an American sergeant, who offers to marry him to get him out of Germany. his original plan to be married in drag won't fly because of the physical exam he needs to proceed, so he undergoes a sex change operation. That also goes awry, horribly (hence the infamous "inch"). He marries the sergeant, emigrates, and is promptly abandoned by him. Hansel (Hedwig at this point) decides to form a band to get on with his life and support himself. He tours, goes through a couple boyfriends, one of which makes millions off their songs and refuses to credit Hedwig, so H follows his ex's band, trying to confront him. Drama ensues, as well as massive amounts of drag, cheap one-liners, and poignant/catchy musical numbers.

_________________________

The movie is far from the filmed-play look - the camera work is very creative, we have a mixture of live action and animated interludes. John Cameron Mitchell makes for an acrobatic Hedwig - he prances, pounces, dances all over - even flies at one point in a dream/memory sequence. From what I gather he really drew on his stage roots to construct a physically dynamic character.

The sets are almost an overload of detail, from the trailer in Kansas to the flat in Berlin - the objects, the detritus of daily life are all over. Laundry, food, even nail polish and posters. They don't look like constructed sets - it's as if you just walked into the character's lives. it's not sterile or glamorous. The first time I saw it I had to rest my eyes for a little while after because there is so much visual detail in each scene. There is a recurring theme of fractured identity (the mutilating surgery, the numerous "faces" needed to get by, the nature of drag -or any- performance) and lonliness (the "origin of love" number, the various romantic abandonments). This is reflected and supported by the look of the film. The Berlin scenes are largely bluish-green, bleaker looking than the American ones. The performance scenes are crowded, highly artificial in light and environment. The "Hedwig in love" scenes with Tommy Gnosis (Michael Pitt) are often in daylight, with natural elements such as rain and trees present in one way or another.

Perhaps that idea of chaotic, unrestrained creativity emerged from the punk aesthetic that the Hedwig character originated in (Cameron developed him in various drag clubs, at least one of which had punk performances by the queens themselves. Colorful stuff.)

This leads me into the Big Fat Gender Issue. I love to see a character's gender/sexuality/etc. made matter of fact, instead of being whapped upside the head with the diversity bat. This is accomplished quite neatly here...there is no big placard saying "I'm Gay! I perform in drag! But I'm human too!" - it's obvious to us, but presented as part of Hedwig's "normal". I think this is a far more mature handling of Hedwig's identity. It doesn't insult my intelligence, and it doesn't hide in shame - it just is. You can take Cameron's performance as a pride statement, or you can set the gender and sexual aspects aside and still get as much from the film.

On a final note, one of the commenters on imdb.com mentioned that s/he at first expected it to devolve into camp, and was happy to see this was the opposite. I agree and hesitate to call "Hedwig" campy. Susan Sontag had interesting things to say about camp's use of double meanings in her essay "Notes on 'Camp'": "Camp is the glorification of "character", " the theatricalization of experience" - The whole movie revolves around Hedwig inventing and reinventing himself, always playing a role, always performing. But this is where the similarity ends, since the movie is making emotional points rather than sociopolitical ones.

Pan's Labyrinth

2008-06-09T14:09:00.009-04:00

Ok, I had to digest for a while. Ideally, I'd watch the movie at least twice before blathering on, but we are pressed for time here. Pan's Labyrinth has lodged itself into my personal list of "Good Movies". I've always liked a dark fairy-tale atmosphere and so see someone besides Tim Burton doing it well is nifty!

The fact that this did not come out of America makes a big difference - our big defining wars Revolution and Civil War** is so long ago that it's effectively sanitized. Really recent works seem like they can inject some life into the story, but sometimes its a little hard to get all emotionally wrapped up in queues and knee breeches. Probably because I've heard the story told so many times.

I don't know all that much about the Spanish Civil War - it's simply not a part of my consciousness, but the demise of childhood amid social horrors is (well, should be!) accessible to anyone. del Toro apparently draws heavy inspiration from old-style fairy tales, the oral traditions, Hans Christian Anderson, Oscar Wilde - "the form itself lending easily to disturbing images" (panslabyrinth.com). The visual style of the film is almost as universal as many of the tales - if you change a few uniforms and switch to another language, it could really be almost any facist regime, any mother and child. The forest setting liberates the movie from having to lock itself in totally, location-wise or culture-wise.

The light in the film, when there is any, is as grimy and drizzly as Seven's. The few brief moments of golden, dappled sunshine are restricted to the beginning, before Ofelia and her mother are drawn deeper into Capt. Vidal's brutal world. (not counting, of course, her dying hallucination at the end of the film) The cg "light" is a lovely mystical touch, too. Sometimes cg lends itself to cheesiness when used in conjunction with live actors, but it works well here.

PL doesn't move much slower or faster than movies I'm used to - the sound and special effects are certainly more subdued. The textures of each scene are very rich - the old woods, the old house - even the books Ofelia brings with her are lush and detailed. Ivana Baquero plays Ofelia well. All little girls have moments of introversion, or adventure - but some of us have more, and as a former Introverted, Bookish Little Girl myself, I found her performance held water :) She's not snivelling, she's not totally fearless - she's not restricted into a prolonged babyhood or pushed into maturity to far - she performed Ofelia like a regular kid. And by golly, that's impressive on its own, because American cinema often does weird things to its children, especially females.

I rather liked del Toro's treatment of women here, overall. He doesn't' resort to misandry in order to make believable women like I see in some American films (Thelma and Louise, anyone?) , nor does he emasculate his female characters. Fairy tales were traditionally the domain of women - telling, retelling, etc - so that may explain the gender imbalace I saw here - with the exception of Sergei Lopez's Vidal (standing in for a wicked stepmother, I might add), there's "men", relatively exchangeable soldiers but no memorable "man".

The typical Big American Movie will have a handsome (or lately, rather schlubby***) hero, the impossibly "hot" love interest, and some sort of redemption at the end. Whether that's a bittersweet or happy ending, it will always be wrapped up, unless its destined for the sequel mill. There certainly will be no dead child at the end. There will most likely be no non-sexualized women (hello Maribel Verdu's Mercedes - not neutered, but not overt) - not necessarily nymphomaniacs, but please point out to me one big movie female character whose love life is not a defining feature. Men don't escape unscathed, either. But, moving on....

On a final note, one similarity would be the rebels "winning". Americans love to see underdogs make it...but do they really make it? No, the Republican army in the woods manages to inflict damage on the Nationalists, but we get to see both sides blood spilled - both sets of corpses. And the war is not won in the course of the movie - a temporary advantage is gained, and the story feels like it continues, as the actual one did. Revisionist American history and film recognizes the complexity of depicting wars, but the ten-gallon popcorn chemical butter bajillion dollar aspect of the industry does like its easily resolved conflict formulas.

And that's that. I liked it and I'm buying the thing!

**Humor my inner historian: WWI and WWII, as well as Korea, Vietnam, Gulf, and this current fiasco are important but we were already well established as a nation before we got involved. The fact that their fronts were/are so geographically remote makes a difference as well.

***sidebar: the young Harrison Ford as Indy vs. Seth Rogen in Knocked Up - please, is there any contest? KU may not have been a "blockbuster" in the usual sense, but it was big enough....and so help me if you're going to be formulaic, pander to *my* shallow side, too!

Seven

2008-06-09T14:08:00.008-04:00

Yep. Another placeholder. I do this to remind myself what I'm renting next!

**Actual Entry**

You know, I'm really on the fence about whether or not Seven counts as noir. I think a noir-horror hybrid is more apt a label. "Noirror".

Anyway, given the changes that have occured in filmmaking since 1944, I find it almost unfair to compare Seven and Double Indemnity. Perhaps some of those differences are merely "cosmetic" Seven is far, far more gruesome and grimy. DI takes place in the standard 40s/50s glamourland, with the usual props - endless cigarettes, potted plants, art deco decor. Everyone's looking their best at any given moment, using their minds to spar more than their bodies (both murders are hidden from the camera's and our eyes). The camera stays fairly still, but it's definitely a movie, and not a "filmed play". When we screened it in class, the sun glare obscured quite a few details, since there were so many dark scenes, so I missed some visual devices, I'm sure.

Seven looks like a graphic novel (I can't take the term seriously...to me they're comic books) not from any faults, but from the constant visual cues that the setting is a pit of despair and degradation - the constant rain, worn objects, washed out colors - the most vivid is red, in the darkroom, blood, brothel, etc. Red is usually not a sign of anything good in the Western mind. The camera movement is more inventive (this was 1995 after all) - we get views thru windows, doors, from the air, over people's shoulders, and more. Most of the darkness was metaphorical - the light was generally dirty and wan, with the exception of the creepy interior shots (eg- flashlights in the killer's apartment, the darkroom)

The dialogue in DI is the clipped, tense, "dame and broad" speech so popular in period movies. All lines are delivered thru gritted teeth, past cigarettes, and in haughty femme fatale tones. Seven's dialogue is naturalistic in style - though I did find the calm-Freeman/ hothead-Pitt manners to be a little formulaic. (Who really says "fuck" that much...anywhere but the military, maybe...of course, in movie terms, police departments are pretty close to it). But that's why it's a movie. If every actor displayed every possible complexity of their character in speech, we'd have a culture of miniseries.

There's no female femme fatale in Seven. There's barely any female presence at all - Paltrow's character being far to sweet and wan to seem like a grown woman, and the other women are corpses. One of my favorite directors, Pedro Almodovar uses a different definition of the femme fatale that I find useful here. Granted, this is about a protagonist in one of his films, but it fits:

"He also represents a classic film noir character - the femme fatale. Which means that when other characters come into contact with him, he embodies fate, in the most tragic and noir sense of the word" (Almodovar's wiki)

I've been doing a little background reading on the fixture of the femme fatale, and I find most people get hung up on the gender, and go off on all sorts of neo-Freudian limbs about gender relations in American cinema and culture. But the idea of the FF being fate - Spacey's character John Doe is the vehicle for both Pitt's and Freeman's characters to reach their fate, by becoming part of the murders themselves. Stanwyck's character is what we expect - a sexy woman bewitching a man into doing her will. Only it doesn't seem like she was alone in the manipulation - MacMurray's character jumps right in. She doens't represent fate to me as much as the concept of free will - he *could* have refused her, *could* have ended the affair. The detectives in Seven did choose to cooperate with John Doe to close the case, but faced with professional and ethical dillemmas, they seemed "fated" to see the plot through. I'd have to see DI again to really judge whether or not Phyllis Dietrichson is a completely irresistible force.

If I could revisit the "hidden murders" idea from above - midcentury convention prevented DI from displaying overt violence. Late-centurty convention pretty much obligated Seven to show some pretty gruesome things. Both do make use of the "what you think you see is worse than what you really do" device Hitchcock employed so well in Psycho. But with DI, you know you see a woman shot, but you don't have the same sense of revulsion and horror you do in seven where the camera lingers (relatively briefly) on mutilated bodies. There's really no point to all that, except that they represent two extremes of the American way of showing violence.

Mind you, Seven, for all its deaths, doens't devolve into a pornographic river of gore. Which is one of the reasons I like it! It was produced before the oneupmanship of the 28 Days/Weeks/Sequels Later and Saw era - I admire its relative restraint and lack of desensitization. Of course, a drunken viewing of 28 Weeks with some literary-minded friends did leave me somewhat impressed. There was intelligence in the film, even with the rotting bodies and raging murderers.

All right, then, I think this post has gone on long enough! Poor Scott, having to schlep through all this!

Casablanca

2008-06-02T19:12:00.005-04:00

My Classic Hollywood choice was Casablanca, as you can probably tell. It's always struck me as more a movie that you know about than actually know. We're all familiar with the frequent (mis)quotations and general look of the film, even if we've never seen it.

At this point, given the rising trend towards realism, it felt less like a filmed play. Compared to modern films, the camera was more static and the acting of course pretty formal (eg they drink like fishes, but Jack's oddly has no restrooms...an artifact of post-code prudery?) , but that adds to the charm of the picture. All the appropriate 40s characteristics are there - the moody lighting, the general sense of atmosphere, general glamour - everyone's dressed to the nines at all times, constant cigs and bourbon. Since Casablanca is of the beginning points of the style, it didn't feel forced to me the way some films do in their imitation. It was the bit of originality at the center of the stereotype.

In watching, you can see some of the earlier attempts at using space artistically - with various closeups and some modest angles. The light - or rather the shadows - really make it. Humphrey Bogart's craggy face pretty much does a good part of the acting for him. It's almost a convention in American cinema that the conflicted, mysterious hero look as weathered as he did, although not unemotional. In contrast, Ingrid Bergman pretty much stays in the light the entire time, all glittering tears and shining eyes. Her face was just plump enough for the american girl-next door ideal, but without the milky vagueness usually assigned to the type. So we have two favorite American types with typical lighting - the man openly brooding and dark, and the woman much more visible, brooding more subtly.

Now, the viewing public apparently wants its heroes and/or heroines to be much more conflicted, to see more of their psyche, and even (many times, almost sadistically) to watch them degraded by hubris, fate, or enemies. Perhaps the idea of self-sacrifice and saving the day went a little farther back in the 40s. I can't decided if we're jaded now or just morbid. However, it's still a pretty good picture!

El Topo

2008-06-02T19:11:00.002-04:00

This is a placeholder for my western assignment..apparently, Netflix is taking its sweet time!

Update: It came yesterday, I'll be watching it tonight..."El Topo". I wanted something unusual, and upon reading its wiki, I'm wondering what on earth I have got myself in for :) I'll be popping it in the player tonight, and posting duly.

Up-update: Yes, I forgot to do my post-Topo write up. Mea Culpas all 'round! Now, to business! Oh, good god, what did I see? I'm fond of the odd, but this was weird even for me. Maybe because it was so earnest in its artisticness...I couldn't help but think of John Waters as I watched, but I do love his tongue-in-cheek attitude even during really outre scenes. It came out in 1970...maybe sarcasm wasn't in style just yet! Perhaps because of where it was in the decade - still early enough for the 1960s and all its events to have an influence. Given its status as an underground film, I don't know how seriously it may have been taken at the time.

It has often occured to me that the mantle of "art" allows people to get away with some pretty dumb things. I'm really tempted to cast this into that pile, take my late 90s mental makeup and call it trash. But, movies had to start somewhere, and slick editing and special effects just weren't there until a few "days" ago in the grand scheme of things. Of course, I found silent films more esthetcially impressive than this. But that's just me.

The story (which I will not even begin to unravel here) is thick with symbolism as well as Eastern/Western spiritual reference. If I had to, I'd pin down the central theme as the journey from disillusionment to understanding, since the Topo himself is dealt a series of emotional blows (fails at his last gunfight, abandons his pupil, looses his woman), and gradually puts others' needs before his own (tries to liberate the colony of misfits), which allows him to finally do some good (kills the cruel townsfolk). Here's the wiki for an exhaustive account of the goings on, just in case anyone but Scott peeks at this!

Or maybe it really was jsut a bunch of hippies in the desert.

Still, it came across to me as rather chintzy, even for 1970. Am I jaded, unable to appreciate earlier decades' work? Am I missing the proper genes that would make me ooh and ahh? It just didnt' do it for me - but I can appreciate the spark it must have made in others who decided that they could pick up a camera and do all that, too.

I do like the sense of the "midnight movie" going on. I'm 24, and movies for me involve a whole marketed package of family-friendly, culturally-sanctioned "items": air-conditioned theater, previews, trailers, annoying patrons...the most subversive part of the movie experience is smuggling in candy. I totally missed out on "the era" (if there was ever just one) of weird films shown in sketchy places.

I'd watch it again, in the spirit of love/groan that I watch good old black and white B movies, or more recent clunkers like "Gothic".

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

2008-05-26T17:28:00.007-04:00

I've long been enamored of German Expressionism - in fact, I've turned it into a sort of slow "quest", tracking down famous expressionist films and articles about them. When I had a chance to see Caligari about 2 or 3 years ago (these were my pre-Netflix days) I was psyched. Quietly, and with a modicum of dignity. Last week, I borrowed Prof. McHugh's copy and revisited the film today - still liked it as much as the first time.

One of the first things that hit me on this viewing was the "staginess" of each scene. Things being what they were in 1919/20, movies were still fairly "primitive" - I suppose the idea of moving the camera came a little later, of course I'd love to know if I'm wrong on that! What I'm getting at is the line between theater and film was probably still nebulous. Given the artistic movements in Germany at the time, permeable boundaries and surreal style were the norm - and they leave their footprints all over the film.

The artifice is intriguing - the makeup on both sexes, the absurdly exaggerated shapes of the sets, even the painted-on "light" forming jumpy patterns on the faux-walls, mimicked by the actual light. The light alone was fun to watch, since the decay of the film produces lovely atmospheric effects, heightening what was there to start with.

Since I'm not a film person, I find it hard to pick out traits of directing unless I have a little guidance. The acting I find similar to other films in this area: the overwrought emotions, exaggerated gestures, the symbolic "tone" of actions. The easiest comparison is with Tim Burton movies - Edward Scissorhands in particular. It's all there in Burton's work. The darkness, strange architecture (especially the mansion in ES), the doll-like misunderstood man (Cesare/Edward), and the intense surreal layer over common enough actions.

I'll come back and edit as more things occur to me - I really should have begin this earlier, since it takes me a while to digest a movie properly :)

Movie memories

2008-05-22T15:39:00.001-04:00

The first movie memories I can come up with are the "collage" of moments from my childhood and early teen years of my mother, grandmother, and aunts peppering me with detailed questions about movies as I tried to watch. Especially a movie I'd never seen. That damn near made me give up on ever seeing a movie in peace - ever. Luckily, the years went by and gifted me with a PC and TV in the privacy of my room, as well as a Netflix subscription. I've been making up for lost time for a while now with foreign, silent, old hollywood, indie - just whatever strikes my fancy and ends up on my queue.

I really prefer watching in the comfort of my own home. I have nothing against theaters, just the people in them, and the atrocious prices. A night at the movies is an investment, anymore, even if you're an inveterate water-and-candy smuggler like me. The seats are never comfy enough, the A/C's always up too high, and the intermittent gleam of cell screens distracts me from what may or may not be worth my 10 dollars.

Lest I come across as completely cranky, I have some decent movie-memories and associations: Mel Brooks marathons with extended family, watching "The Audition" sans subtitles (much more disturbing, a recent late night showing of "Rebecca" that I watched with my Grandmother (questions were at a minimum)..."Silence of the Lambs" and "Psycho" with my Mother...various flicks caught on a TV channel with select gents....my own odd collection which ranges from "Metropolis" to "Priscilla: Queen of the Desert" (which is on in the background as I write this. Then there are the dorkier, english-major moments: the papers on Whale's "Frankenstein", "Nosferatu", and more Shakespeare than you'd care to know - which necessitated frequent viewings and anaylsis of not just the story, but the film itself.

There's no one penultimate Liz Movie Moment (tm). As long as I'm moved, amused, disturbed, or intrigued, I'm happy. And occasionally I'll even settle for a cheap thrill, but usually my innate (but relatively benign) snobbery wins over my hormones, steering me away from "the" movie of the moment filled with attractive yet vapid actors and straight into the arms of gothic horror, drag queens, or whatever else I can find.

Liz, Damnit

What's Next?

Final post

still up there....goin' on about a month now!

Freewrite on Reflective Analysis (Blog 21?)

Blog 20 Schematic - I think

Moral/Ethical Issues Surrounding CB

Blog 19 - please, pretty please can it count as #19? it's in the right spot, Dr. Chandler!

Blog 18 - attendance style

blog 17 - revisions for Hypertext Essay Draft

Blog 16 - Hypermess

Further research

Blog 15 - Wiki update

Blog 14 - Research Plan v.1

Anyone interested in wikitheory?

Thoughts related to trolling

Research Plan/Little Miss Lotophagus

Produsage

Fooling Around

Live from New Mexico! (freewrite for wikipedia ideas)

"Queen Mob; A Philosophical Post; With Notes"*

Lit/Tech narrative final

Le Roman de la Web**

Blog 2 On the course readings

About GoogleDocs

Blog 1 Literacy and Technology Narrative

Reflective prompts

Tiny Lights Venue Presentation

Venue Shopping

Essay #4 draft one

Essay #4: more mess (blog 18 3/4)

Plans for Eidos

Further Mess for Essay #4

mess for essay #4

Eidos Draft 2

Places

Spent

Warp and Weft

Photos

Objet d'Liz

The essay wars

Visual Aid 1.0

Class post - what I need from you to have my draft by Monday

Notes on essay #2 - "Visual Aid"

What went well, what didn't and what just went

**Bonus Post** Personal Responsibility and Truth

It's ok, Liz...let it suck...

Tim O'Brien / there is no spoon

I'm the little comment fairy!!

Blog Concentrate - The Danticat and Drummond Entry

"My father always said" - Rough copy

Kincaid and Lott

CNF

Inaugural Post

The Sixth Sense/ Finding Nemo Twofer

Hedwig and the Angry Inch (6-24)

Pan's Labyrinth

Seven

Casablanca

El Topo

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

Movie memories

Bonus Post Personal Responsibility and Truth