CPE Rough Draft

Hello All:

My Critical Photo Essay will be entirely video based, in the form of interviews.  Although I am not filming until Thursday (Nov. 18th), I have included my list of questions that I will be asking each interviewee.  My project will explore the perspectives of the older generation (65+) regarding technology, and whether or not it helps our hinders our progress as a society.  So far, I have 5 subjects to interview, but I suspect that I may not use all of the footage I shoot because for a 10 minute video, it only gives each person ~20 seconds to answer per question.  My intention is to interview each person alone, so that 'group think' is less likely to occur.

To My Group Members:
If there are parts of my rough draft that are confusing, or you can think of another question that I should be asking, I'm all ears.

The Individual VS. The Network

I certainly prefer videos to readings for these blogs, which is not at all surprising considering the generation I'm a part of.  Anderson said that in 4 years, more than 90% of the webs data will be video composition, and although my initial reaction was surprise, the more I think about it the more I think that 4 years may be a lengthy estimate.  I already try to avoid texts by looking up videos that sum up the ideas, and if a video isn't available, I go to the next best thing: audio.  There have been quite a few times in college where I knew that I didn't have the time to read any texts at all, so I buy audiobooks instead so that I can listen while I'm at work, or cleaning the house, etc.  This is an aspect of my life that I'm kind of quiet about, because as a writer it's blasphemy to be open about NOT reading.  The truth is, from what I can remember about reading, I loved it.  It's easy to get lost in a book (especially fiction), and leave the real world behind.  The only problem is that the real world currently doesn't cater to the proper amount of time it takes a person to sit down with a book.  We're too busy responding to texts/emails/voicemails/social networks to really set aside the time to get lost in literature.  All this networking is valuable though, because the more people that are on board a particular train of thought, the faster that train rides into something revolutionary.

But what about our daydreams?  What about our introspective moments that allow us so sort through the sub-par ideas, and reach the really good ones?  When we are in constant 'network' mode, we have the ability to bounce ideas off of each other and make joint decisions about what's worth developing and what isn't, but something about this approach takes away the magic, or "epic win" feeling of hatching an idea.  When you take away the magic, you diminish the desire that Chris Anderson was talking about...at least in my experience.  Anderson also focuses on the positive effects of global recognition that ultimately lead to a spike in passion and desire among the public who generate this recognition, which causes me to think of the different implications this has on an individual vs. a group effort.  Jesus what a boring sentence, I would have stopped reading at 'ultimately' if I were you.  Anyways, when I see a video of a single person being awesome at something, I look at them almost like a mystical creature; someone who does something so incredible that it pushes the boundaries of what I thought our redundant piles of protoplasm were capable of.  In that moment, I want to become a mystical creature too, and believe that I can do it.  On the other hand, when I see a group of people do something amazing, I'm almost completely unmoved.  Something about the collaboration of people to complete a task is common and taken for granted, and I find myself thinking, "Of course you can do this one thing when you string 50 brains together to do it.  Big deal." The fact is, it IS a big deal, but there is something far more appealing and inspiring about an individual instead of a group.

Why the hell is this? Do any of you feel this way?  Shouldn't 10x the amount of 'mystical creatures' result in something truly incredible?
Even the first video we watched in class of thousands of voices recorded via webcam was easy to look past.  Perhaps it's a personal problem, or a case of me projecting, but I find myself rooting for the individual, and hoping that the group effort fails just so it highlights how awesome the individual is.

Despite my bitterness toward social networking and group efforts, I completely agree with Anil Dash's concept that creating as an island will only get you so far, because networking will always get the ball rolling faster.  This notion feeds into my CPE in an interesting way, because as I start to come up with questions for the elderly about technology, I realize that the older generation has a common belief that each person takes care of themselves, and earns their rewards without help from others.  I was raised this way too--if you need help, help yourself so that you don't owe anyone anything.  Can't make rent?  Don't you dare ask your family for help, go out and get another job...two jobs if that's what it takes.  Similarly, if you have a radical idea that could improve the lives of billions, climb that mountain alone so no one can taint your vision.  Of course, doing anything alone takes at least twice as long as it would with help, (not trolling, but...) what's the rush?  It always feels like we are racing toward some final achievement, but none of us know what it is.  As Seth Priebatsch suggests, maybe this race has become a game for all of us, one that we don't know how to stop playing.  We keep trying to level up, but the ground we stand on raises along with us, so it never really feels like we get anywhere.  So we try harder, invent faster, socialize more, as if the final achievement is one complete unified consciousness; we catch glimpses of it and think that's it! that's the ticket! Then we go to class and we all talk about concepts that already came out of someone else's mouth in order to try and come up with a better concept that will be the future conversational fuel for classes to come.  We all try to laugh at the same memes and videos, join the same online games so we can curse similarly, mimic sarcastic vocal inflections so we sound cool, and say things like "obvi" instead of obviously to identify where we stand linguistically in our generation.  Some days I look at all this and think, "Wow, we really do all cultivate each other!" and other days I think, "Have we forgotten how to cultivate ourselves?"

Woah, Thompson.

Thompson's book is pretty much composing my questions for me for the Critical Photo Essay.  Since my focus has shifted to elderly perspectives on technology, and whether or not this technology is beneficial or detrimental to our progress as a society, I've become interested in the question of are we getting dumber?  This question evokes another area of inquiry, which is do we value memory in an age where it isn't a necessity?  Thompson has some quotes that pertain to these question pretty well.
(Also, apologies for not having page numbers, my kindle version only has locations)




"If we remembered every single detail of everything, we wouldn't be able to make sense of anything." (Thompson)

How can this be? I'm reading this as "if we have all the information possible, we wouldn't know how to use it."  This seems absurd, because I think that with more information, the more sense you can make.  Perhaps this quote is assuming that you have a normal brain until you're 25, and one morning you wake up with every memory from the womb to the present moment.  Sure, that would be pretty overwhelming.  But if our brains functioned like machines from the very beginning, never forgetting a single piece of data, I think we could make sense of everything.  So...I don't buy this.

"The real power of digital memories will be to trigger our human ones." (Thompson)

This is a pretty important statement, mostly because this is already in effect.  Using machines as triggers instead of 'actors' for lack of a better term seems like a possible way to maintain a balance between machines NOT taking over, and humans remaining in control.  I realize this comes off as a little paranoid, because I don't have a lot of trust in technology, or privacy, so in an effort to combat this fear I've tried to see the collective consciousness system (the internet) as a harmonious balance between humans, instead of man vs. machine.  For example, the biggest fear in using machines as memory triggers is that it might not be the machine at all, but some government agency using the machine as a catalyst for some form of mind control.  Holy shit I can't believe I typed such a batshit crazy sentence.  Anyways, the important thing to remember with this specific kind of paranoia is that most networks tend to correct these types of discrepancies.  For each Big Brother-ish nefarious government movement, there is an equal and opposite reaction where the hackers/geo loggers/bloggers/twits derail the government plan.  So, it's a cool thing to have internet vigilantes.

Lastly, I'd like to touch on the concept of ambient awareness.  This was really cool to see fleshed out, because it's a phenomenon that we all experience.  It made me realize that I am less ambiently aware than all of my classmates, because I don't social network.  However, I still experience some amount of this awareness through things like email and texting (sorry Alex, gotta use you as an example).  For the first month of the semester, Alex was a static character in my classroom fixture.  We'd discuss readings when prompted by Doug and participate in large group discussions, but once class was over, the character(s) disappear, at least for me.  One day Alex and I decided to exchange numbers, in an effort to kick each other's ass when motivation levels got low and one of us contemplated not going to class.  As soon as she was entered into my phone, she became a fixture in my mind instead of just the classroom.  Each Tuesday and Thursday morning, there's some minor degree of acknowledgement that both Alex and I might be toying with the idea of not coming to class, and this awareness prompts a motivational text message.  Another example is with Ian, who I've known in previous classes, but never interacted with as a human, only as a student (you guys all know they aren't the same thing.  Nobody says shit like "it struck me as particularly interesting that bleh bleh bleh and the implications are fairly extensive in terms of theoretical perspectives" in conversation, and if you do, nobody enjoys talking to you.)  Ian and I exchanged numbers this semester also, and through our occasional texts an image of his life started to emerge for me.  Whether this image is accurate or not is irrelevant, it's the fact that the technological action of inserting a number into a phone suddenly makes a person more tangible.  Personally, I find this equal parts spooky and cool, and I can't help but wonder what other awarenesses I experience.  Overall, Thompson gave me a ton to think about, and helped me start my CPE, so right the fuck on.   

    

Selling Perspectives

As I was reading the Kohl et al article, I realized that I was reading a collaborative essay about collaboration.  I think that this was an appropriate choice on the authors' part, and it caused me to think 'behind the scenes' of this article as I kept reading.  I had to ask myself if my understanding of writing shifted at all with the knowledge that "collaborative processes of writing dissolve the central intention of the author" (174).  In short, my answer is no.  While collaboration can be useful during the 'bouncing ideas around' stage of writing, I think that writing goals are ultimately solitary, and therefore benefit from solitary pursuit.  However, I'm speaking purely about one stage of composition here, which is the actual writing of the draft.  I think collaboration is useful again when it comes to editing so that a more objective perspective is available.  With this in mind, I had to wonder what the writing process looked like for Kohl et al, since there were three authors.  The essay flows surprisingly well, which brings up another quote from page 174: "the authors only work on passages and never on the entire text."  Of course, this quote was in reference to Wikipedia, but I think that it's generally true for writing collaborations.  Obviously we read through our co-authors' sections, but in my experience it's often with far less scrutiny than we would read our own sections with.  Why is this?

 This goes back to my 'writing goals are solitary' statement.  When we complete our area of responsibility, we look at our co-authors' responsibilities as secondary because we already have a sense of accomplishment.  This is a dangerous attitude, because the finished product will have everyone's name attached to it, without indication of who wrote the 'better' sections.  Writing is work, and part of that work is understanding that different writing styles often clash, and knowing how to smooth the transitions between styles.  How does Wikipedia do this?  Well, the wiki pages ridicule each textual input for sources to ensure that all information is accurate and properly cited, but that doesn't smooth stylistic differences.  From what I've seen, 'correct' Wikipedia entries are concise sentences that are only concerned with the facts, and less concerned with cultural perspectives.  So how collaborative is it really, if all textual input is derived from a database of reliable sources instead of opinions?

This leads right into Johnson-Eilola's main question, which is "where does writing come from?"  Although I've stated that writing goals are often solitary, I agree with the point made here that "all texts are interdependent" (200).  Writers are not in isolated bubbles (except the filter bubble), generating completely original ideas out of thin air.  We can only generate content that draws from other sources, which means that solitary writing goals must draw from the societal collaborative experience.  In other words, we need to be aware of outside perspectives in order to form our own inside perspectives.

I'm finishing up this blog in class as we discuss these readings, and I came to an important question.  Doug summarized the concepts by saying that we have reached an age where we no longer build things, we build ideas, and sell them as goods or commodities.  I agree with this, but it begs the question...does this mean we are selling perspectives?

College Stress Infographic

Process Reflection

This infographic was not at all my first idea.  Originally I wanted to display the crazy depths of the ocean by comparing it to common landmarks that we're all familiar with, but after a quick search I found hundreds of those.  My next idea focused on mental health statistics among college students, but that quickly got out of hand and many of the pictures I planned on using were...let's say insensitive.  That failed idea brought me to the stress infographic you see here, which I think most of us can relate to.  These statistics were incredibly easy to pull up, but the time consuming part was finding the right clip art and spacing everything in an aesthetically pleasing way.  I used a template in Piktochart, but ultimately made it my own by adding slides and making it more complex.  All of the available backgrounds were either wood textures or busy patterns, but I discovered that by making wood textures more opaque, it resembled lined paper which gave me the appropriate space to build on.

I felt that it wasn't enough to just display how many students are affected by stress, so I made my infographic somewhat useful by offering suggestions to counteract stress.  I thought it was interesting that my statistics revolve around making excuses, and ultimately buying more time in order to feel more relaxed.  I'm not sure whether or not this points to our generation being lazy, our society making unrealistic demands, or a combination of both, but I don't think this system is working out too well.  This is getting pretty off topic, but I read that Sweden just switched to a 6 hour workday, and productivity shot through the roof.  Perhaps a comparison between Swedish/American workers would make an interesting infographic...Anyways, this project was not difficult, just time consuming.  If I had to do this again, I would spend a little more time finding an engaging topic instead of looking for pictures.  

CPE Proposal: Senioritis

In the interest of many of us in this class, I’ve decided to utilize a common affliction that we’ve all experienced (or are currently experiencing) and understand the cause and effects of ‘senioritis.’  Dwindling motivation is something that I’m plagued by this semester, so instead of letting it get the best of me I thought that it would be productive to analyze why this happens to so many of us, as well as shed some light on possible remedies.  The rhetorical approach I aim to take with this topic concerns the element of persuasion, since persuasion is a necessary counterpart for motivation.  I’d like to analyze the persuasive weight that accompanies both positive and negative reinforcement when it comes to completing a long-term task. 

     I’ve read a fair amount of peer reviewed articles concerning senioritis, all of which have varied opinions about the delineating factors that contribute to a lack of motivation.  What most studies fail to acknowledge is the fact that there are several instances of being a senior throughout life aside from the obvious college/high school titles.  5^th graders are the seniors of middle school, 8^th graders are the seniors of Jr. high school, and 64 year olds are seniors in the sense that they are about to graduate on to retirement.  From personal observation, I’ve noticed that each of these groups experience some form of senioritis.  One theory I have is that there is some decline in motivation once we near the end of a major life task because most of us get a premature sense of accomplishment before the task is actually finished.  Conversely, I think it’s possible that by the time we reach seniority, we have become so comfortable with our surroundings and routines that it seems impossible for our current situation to change whether we are motivated or not.  By this I mean that we take our positions in life/school for granted, and assume that we are fixed into an arbitrary system that will remain unaffected by our actions. 

I’d like this project to take the form of multiple camera interviews, ideally with one person from each section of seniors.  In my head, I imagine my video to be somewhat of a Barbara Walters spoof, so that it isn’t so stiff and dry.  I’ll come up with a specific set of questions for each age group, and try to make connections between them all in order to get the bigger picture into view.  Through conducting this research, I hope to better understand my own rhetorical situation in reference to education, and through this understanding, I hope to be able to condition myself to control my motivation a little better.    

Punctuation is Music

I wish I had read Solomon before conducting my A/V short.  The concepts laid out here are exactly what I knew to be true, but didn’t have the knowledge to articulate.  “Punctuation directs tempo, pitch, volume, and the separation of words” (Solomon, 282).  I think most of us are aware of this fact, however we tend to keep these literary tonalities in our heads, because we are too self-conscious to portray them out loud.  If we had to read the sentence, “Are you fuckin’ kidding me?!” in our heads, most of us would agree that the voice would be some combination of strained/shrill/disbelief, possibly yelling or whispering harshly.  However, if asked to read this aloud in front of the entire class, I bet more than 75% of us would read it fairly monotone, with only a slight vocal inflection at the end to identify it as a question.  If we are to become “Creative Composers” as Bernhardt puts it, shouldn’t we shed our vocal insecurities and embrace the tempo/pitch/volume that the page implies?  My band teacher always used to preach (mostly to the woodwinds, because they are modest folks) to PLAY IT AS IT’S WRITTEN.  You can’t play every note piano just because you’re afraid of honking every note that’s forte.  Similarly, reading blatant punctuation in monotone is…well…monotonous.   It completely bastardizes the composition that the composer intended.  I would even go so far as to say that those who lack the ability to properly vocalize texts shouldn’t be reading aloud at all.  None of us want to listen to “Bueller…Bueller…Bueller…”

I thought it was fascinating—albeit arbitrary—that Solomon designated certain punctuations to Major ? ! [ ], Intermediate : ; “ “ ( ) / and Minor - ‘ *.  I think these distinctions mean different things to each writer/reader, but I like where he’s going with this.  I agree with all the intermediate symbols, because they make you pause and ponder.  Minor and Major are something I struggle with in all areas, because often times (musically speaking) you can slip a Major into a dominantly Minor context, and it feels very much like a Minor.  Similarly, ?! feels abrupt/intrusive, so I can see that as Minor in some cases.  I really like the attempt at categorization though.  Maybe this can inform whatever question I develop for the Critical Photo Essay.

“The truth of actions is reached via the mode of writing, and the truth of how the world looks is reached via the mode of image” (Kress, 48). 

There is something about this quote that I can’t quite pick apart, but I think that it’s important (easy area for my group to comment on to help me out here).  The truth of actions…what the hell is that?  Are we not able to speak the truth of actions?  I may be too literal here, but I think that the truth of actions can be seen in their reactions, which doesn’t always involve writing.  If you watch me drop potassium into water, the reaction speaks for itself doesn’t it?  In fact, I think I could mime the results to someone and get the truth of action across, without speech or writing.  Perhaps this is what Kress means by saying that the truth of how the world looks is reached via the mode of image, that you have to observe something in order to see its truth.  This is completely “DUH.”  I think that Kress just wanted a powerful sentence to end this essay, but this one is pretty meh.  I’m guilty of doing this too, especially after being burnt out at the end of a paper, but seriously…am I missing something in this quote?  I don’t know.  Here’s a *true* butterfly.