Originally Published 10.03
Revised 11.26
Orwell's How I Write really is a fascinating essay--in it, he explains how the historical context of his youth and adolescence forced him to become a writer, how war politics and the rise/fall/failure of socialism made him into the writer he eventually became-and, most importantly, how a writer uses language.
(Well, not the last one, per se, although it's hinted at; for further writers-writing-about-writing-y goodness, check out Stephen King's On Writing. Truly, truly marvelous. Okay, continuing)
Fascinating, right? Or it would have been, had it been discussed; my contribution to our group presentation was, alas, mostly reliant on a journal article that, due to some confusion, was largely ignored.
Still, I managed a few things, to be detailed thusly; let us set my contributions to history correct!
Most importantly, I actually read the book and watched the film. That was a big day for me. From this, I found, read, enjoyed, and appreciated the Orwell essay I meant to discuss and tie into our journal article; this did not happen. Still, and most fortunately, I managed to talk a bit about the implications of Newspeak during the actual presentation, linking the concepts to Wittgenstein and the basic linguistic philosophy of Todorov.
It was neat, and a good presentation (I, for one, was beyond nervous, and am sure it showed); still, I wish I'd been able to discuss my part in a manner that would have made sense (i.e., in relation to the article). The background we'd acquired, in class and as a group, allowed for a more spontaneous contribution--but, having been so well prepared, I was ever-so-slightly disappointed by this slight.
Still, we were prepared, articulate, and knew what we were talking about, an unlikely (for me, at least) combination that made out presentation terrific.
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Boulle and Plato
From WEB-CT
Author: Elizabeth Christiansen
Date: Monday, October 6, 2008 1:46pm
Boulle, it seems to me, has based the social construct of the Planet of the Apes, at least
in part, on Plato's Republic. There's a way to put this more eloquently than I will be able
to do, but bear with me:
Plato details three "classes" of humans, analogous to the human body: the head, the
heart, and the appetites. I forget the exact structure (it's been a long time since tenth
grade philosophy), but, basically, the heads rule the state, the hearts protect the state,
and the appetites basically eat, sleep, and procreate to continue the state.
I think I'm going to look into this before I post anything else; just wanted to get the idea
out there.
Author: Elizabeth Christiansen
Date: Monday, October 6, 2008 1:46pm
Boulle, it seems to me, has based the social construct of the Planet of the Apes, at least
in part, on Plato's Republic. There's a way to put this more eloquently than I will be able
to do, but bear with me:
Plato details three "classes" of humans, analogous to the human body: the head, the
heart, and the appetites. I forget the exact structure (it's been a long time since tenth
grade philosophy), but, basically, the heads rule the state, the hearts protect the state,
and the appetites basically eat, sleep, and procreate to continue the state.
I think I'm going to look into this before I post anything else; just wanted to get the idea
out there.
Ethnography: English 313
YET TO BE REVISED
I'm doing a sort of experimental bit on this thing, taking one observation (mostly objective, at the beach) and analyzing it in two different ways, on each of my blogs, in order to illustrate how the lens through which one chooses to view any individual act skews the construction/meaning of the act itself.
(Yes, that was a great sentence, full of insight and, errm, sense-making. Digs it and big ups.)
So.
Earlier today, my wonderful, delightful boyfriend and I went to Venice Beach, a veritable shithole--and, in essence, the perfect place to view humanity in its natural state (you know, you know, no, you don't, you don't know what I mean).
Halfway between the pier and the vendors that litter most of the stretch between Santa Monica and Venice, on the actual beach (surf, sand, salt 'n all), we found ourselves amidst mostly young couples, sparse and evenly spaced across the sands, few in number, largely similar: bikini tops, ironic beach t-shirts, California Rainbow (R) flip-flops, sunglasses, pullovers. Smiles.
Very young, very heterosexual. Very Southern California on a Wednesday afternoon.
The topography of the beach is similarly generic: a huge and mostly empty parking lot watched over by an attendant, a lonely lifeguard station sitting abandoned, vaguely rusted trash cans, omnipresent signs warning the reader that there shall be "NO SWIMMING/NO NADAR" (which really ought to read "NO NADANDO." Just saying). Sand. Mid-afternoon low tide, a few boats scattered in the distance in an area zoned safe for boating, not much else.
And then:
The Maverick: The Breaker.
Alex (mi novio) saw him first, walking his sand-filled Seven-Up bottle across the sand, a "break" from the monotony of the yuppies surrounding us, looking like he might "break" any who crossed his path in two, surprisingly reminiscent of Anthony Hopkins playing Breaker Ted Brautigan in Hearts in Atlantis, if Anthony Hopkins had long, grizzled white hair and a green speedo and an anklet and sunglasses and carried around a Seven-Up bottle. We watched him stalk across the beach, toward the lifeguard's stand, where he performed, to our unending amusement, a series of stretches and near-yoga poses.
The antithesis of monotony! The antithesis of yuppies!
And he was fuckin' crazy!
It's funny; It's culture.
(I'm assuming that everyone in this class will have a similar sentence somewhere in his/her post, and certainly don't want to be the only person without one. Also, I like semicolons.)
Apart from our Breaker, everyone has to wear occasion-approprate clothes; heterosexualty is overwhelming. Youth is important; employment, ergo capitalism, even moreso (Venice is never empty, except on weekdays, when humans are at work--the absence of culture here reveals more than its presence ever could). The parking attendant's booth, existing only to collect the $7.00 toll to park, has a human watching over it; the lifeguard station, which exsts, in theory, to save people, is empty (because, I suppose, you probably can't charge $7.00 prior to saving a life; it's bad for business.)
The yuppies (a nickname I just appropriated at Alex's suggestion; he's standing over my shoulder, reading this as I type it, and suggested that, as I have already shared our nickname for The Breaker, it might be appropriate to come up with a nickname for everyone who is not him--e.g., everyone else, including us, e.g., the yuppies. Te amo, Alejandro! Y besitos!) are a mark of contemporary Wednesday afternoon beach culture: mostly young, overwhelmingly heterosexual, appropriately clothed, smiling; the maverick is a mark of...well, everything else, Outsiders and Others and Other 'O' words I can't being to think of now that might describe someone living on the fringe of culture, who is marked as fuckin' crazy (sorry) because he isn't, well, young and smile-y and yuppified, as the culture of the beach tells us he should be.
I do want to say, though, that, had this not been a weekday, or had I been farther north or south, the yuppie culture predominant here would have been an anomaly; both the pier and Venice vendors look more like the Breaker than Alex or I (for now, at least, until we get all tatted up and pierced, and shave mohawks and wear leather clothes and BDSM collars and other shit that will make us unique, just like everyone else.)
I'm doing a sort of experimental bit on this thing, taking one observation (mostly objective, at the beach) and analyzing it in two different ways, on each of my blogs, in order to illustrate how the lens through which one chooses to view any individual act skews the construction/meaning of the act itself.
(Yes, that was a great sentence, full of insight and, errm, sense-making. Digs it and big ups.)
So.
Earlier today, my wonderful, delightful boyfriend and I went to Venice Beach, a veritable shithole--and, in essence, the perfect place to view humanity in its natural state (you know, you know, no, you don't, you don't know what I mean).
Halfway between the pier and the vendors that litter most of the stretch between Santa Monica and Venice, on the actual beach (surf, sand, salt 'n all), we found ourselves amidst mostly young couples, sparse and evenly spaced across the sands, few in number, largely similar: bikini tops, ironic beach t-shirts, California Rainbow (R) flip-flops, sunglasses, pullovers. Smiles.
Very young, very heterosexual. Very Southern California on a Wednesday afternoon.
The topography of the beach is similarly generic: a huge and mostly empty parking lot watched over by an attendant, a lonely lifeguard station sitting abandoned, vaguely rusted trash cans, omnipresent signs warning the reader that there shall be "NO SWIMMING/NO NADAR" (which really ought to read "NO NADANDO." Just saying). Sand. Mid-afternoon low tide, a few boats scattered in the distance in an area zoned safe for boating, not much else.
And then:
The Maverick: The Breaker.
Alex (mi novio) saw him first, walking his sand-filled Seven-Up bottle across the sand, a "break" from the monotony of the yuppies surrounding us, looking like he might "break" any who crossed his path in two, surprisingly reminiscent of Anthony Hopkins playing Breaker Ted Brautigan in Hearts in Atlantis, if Anthony Hopkins had long, grizzled white hair and a green speedo and an anklet and sunglasses and carried around a Seven-Up bottle. We watched him stalk across the beach, toward the lifeguard's stand, where he performed, to our unending amusement, a series of stretches and near-yoga poses.
The antithesis of monotony! The antithesis of yuppies!
And he was fuckin' crazy!
It's funny; It's culture.
(I'm assuming that everyone in this class will have a similar sentence somewhere in his/her post, and certainly don't want to be the only person without one. Also, I like semicolons.)
Apart from our Breaker, everyone has to wear occasion-approprate clothes; heterosexualty is overwhelming. Youth is important; employment, ergo capitalism, even moreso (Venice is never empty, except on weekdays, when humans are at work--the absence of culture here reveals more than its presence ever could). The parking attendant's booth, existing only to collect the $7.00 toll to park, has a human watching over it; the lifeguard station, which exsts, in theory, to save people, is empty (because, I suppose, you probably can't charge $7.00 prior to saving a life; it's bad for business.)
The yuppies (a nickname I just appropriated at Alex's suggestion; he's standing over my shoulder, reading this as I type it, and suggested that, as I have already shared our nickname for The Breaker, it might be appropriate to come up with a nickname for everyone who is not him--e.g., everyone else, including us, e.g., the yuppies. Te amo, Alejandro! Y besitos!) are a mark of contemporary Wednesday afternoon beach culture: mostly young, overwhelmingly heterosexual, appropriately clothed, smiling; the maverick is a mark of...well, everything else, Outsiders and Others and Other 'O' words I can't being to think of now that might describe someone living on the fringe of culture, who is marked as fuckin' crazy (sorry) because he isn't, well, young and smile-y and yuppified, as the culture of the beach tells us he should be.
I do want to say, though, that, had this not been a weekday, or had I been farther north or south, the yuppie culture predominant here would have been an anomaly; both the pier and Venice vendors look more like the Breaker than Alex or I (for now, at least, until we get all tatted up and pierced, and shave mohawks and wear leather clothes and BDSM collars and other shit that will make us unique, just like everyone else.)
The _____ Five Minutes of Film Ever
Originally Published 11.20
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZI9OYMRwN1Q
"The thing about my baby," Michael Jackson explains,"it don't matter if you're black or white." In what must be the most inspiring five minutes of film ever recorded, the 1991 music video to his platinum hit "Black or White," Jackson dances across the globe, examining intolerance and race relations. From the southern plains of Africa to the snowy steppes of Russia to his own backyard, the racial dichotomies of "black" and "white" are essentially capitalistic, and as suggested by Jackson's imagery and clever storytelling, ultimately solvable only by the open minds of future generations.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZI9OYMRwN1Q
"The thing about my baby," Michael Jackson explains,"it don't matter if you're black or white." In what must be the most inspiring five minutes of film ever recorded, the 1991 music video to his platinum hit "Black or White," Jackson dances across the globe, examining intolerance and race relations. From the southern plains of Africa to the snowy steppes of Russia to his own backyard, the racial dichotomies of "black" and "white" are essentially capitalistic, and as suggested by Jackson's imagery and clever storytelling, ultimately solvable only by the open minds of future generations.
Wittgenstein
From WEB-CT
Author: Elizabeth Christiansen
Date: Thursday, September 11, 2008 9:17am
I've been particularly interested in the use/power of language in 1984--particularly
Orwell's use of seemingly contradictory language in the slogans presented by Big Brother
("Freedom is Slavery," et al); the messages these, well, messages perpetuate seem to
rule each other out.
In the simplest terms, though, they make a lot of sense; denying any sort of metaphor in
them (difficult, yes, but work with me), the word presented ("Freedom"), through the
word "is," becomes its opposite ("Slavery")--that is, the term itself takes on a new
meaning, in direct opposition to what the reader understands it to mean (we are,
remember, denying metaphor and looking only at the literal), and, thusly, the binary
presented by the word[s] (Freedom/Slavery) disappears: the two words now mean one
and the same.
Wittgenstein, in I forget which writing (sorry) suggests that, in order for a concept to
exist, it must have some sort of word that means it (italics on the "mean," I wish Icould
format this)--there can be no freedom is the word freedom does not exist, because,
without the word to define it, the concept itself can mean nothing; by changing the very
concept of the word "freedom," (here, to mean "slavery"--to the residents of Oceania,
Freedom IS Slavery) freedom itself cannot exist--indeed, it has taken, through language
rules/tactics as theororized by Wittgenstein, a contradictory meaning that, eventually,
will be the only meaning--Freedom, through the power of language, will itself eventually
come to be Slavery.
Just an observation.
Author: Elizabeth Christiansen
Date: Thursday, September 11, 2008 9:17am
I've been particularly interested in the use/power of language in 1984--particularly
Orwell's use of seemingly contradictory language in the slogans presented by Big Brother
("Freedom is Slavery," et al); the messages these, well, messages perpetuate seem to
rule each other out.
In the simplest terms, though, they make a lot of sense; denying any sort of metaphor in
them (difficult, yes, but work with me), the word presented ("Freedom"), through the
word "is," becomes its opposite ("Slavery")--that is, the term itself takes on a new
meaning, in direct opposition to what the reader understands it to mean (we are,
remember, denying metaphor and looking only at the literal), and, thusly, the binary
presented by the word[s] (Freedom/Slavery) disappears: the two words now mean one
and the same.
Wittgenstein, in I forget which writing (sorry) suggests that, in order for a concept to
exist, it must have some sort of word that means it (italics on the "mean," I wish Icould
format this)--there can be no freedom is the word freedom does not exist, because,
without the word to define it, the concept itself can mean nothing; by changing the very
concept of the word "freedom," (here, to mean "slavery"--to the residents of Oceania,
Freedom IS Slavery) freedom itself cannot exist--indeed, it has taken, through language
rules/tactics as theororized by Wittgenstein, a contradictory meaning that, eventually,
will be the only meaning--Freedom, through the power of language, will itself eventually
come to be Slavery.
Just an observation.
Ethnography
Originally Published 10.16
Substantial Revision 11.20
On Wednesday, my boyfriend and I ended up at Venice Beach--I was recovering from a cold, hadn't been outside in four days, and had decided that, during the delusional period spent between coughing and hallucinating, the beach would be a nice place to look at people up close, but still manage to stay far enough away so as not to become Typhoid Elizabeth, infecting half of Southern California with my evil viral infection; a real anthropologist oughtn't disrupt the cultures she studies, and certainly shouldn't spread the germ cultures she harbors amongst them.
Venice Beach is beautiful, and strange; we were far enough away from the market part, but still close enough to see, distantly, both the vendors and the Ferris wheel at Santa Monica pier--that is, on the actual beach at the beach, complete with tide (too close to my feet), sun (too bright, too hot), breeze (too breezy) and lots and lots of sand. My particular vantage point was perfect for people watching: close enough to the tide so as not to be bothered by remote beachgoers, but far away enough from it to avoid drowning, close enough to the lifeguard station and frankly awful public restrooms to examine humans in their natural habitat without being close enough for anyone to realize that I was watching and judging everyone who passed (in my slight daze, I decided to narrate the goings-on in the manner of a wildlife documentary on public television, complete with Australian accent.)
My findings: unadulterated beauty, nature, the wild, the beach, is all government run and regulated. Immediately upon parking ($7.00, pay at the booth, the arm of the block goes up, park in a designated spot), one sees a series of signs bearing the red-lettered legend NO SWIMMING/NO NADAR, with a picture of a small red figure amidst small red waves, with a thick red X running through his middle--bilingual or not, literate or not, there is no way to mistake that there is to be NO SWIMMING/NO NADAR here--in what is, essentially, a vast public swimming pool, there is to be NO SWIMMING! The same signs litter the beach wherever there is something to post on: a bathroom stall, the leg of a lifeguard's chair, a trash can
Settling into what we came to call, in our thick and terrible accents, The Vantage Point, we immediately recognized an obvious code of conduct concerning the humans surrounding us: the unspoken rule seems to be that one can only run away to the beach on a weekday afternoon in order to engage in some romantic rendezvous, or, you know, homework assignment, whatever; everyone, save The Breaker (to be detailed later) had a partner of the opposite sex with them; most were fairly young, in their early to mid-twenties, wearing beach gear covered by beach gear--a bikini top covered by a pullover, board shorts covered by short-sleeved tees bearing advertisements for fictional surf shops and seafood restaurants; straw hats and baseball caps abounded, along with the omnipresent California Rainbow (R) flip-flop: in the uniform of the young and beach bound, no one stands out; no one disrupts the notion that this is what one wears, this is what one does because...well, there is no reason not to, right? To not listen to the signs and dress like a particularly happy yuppie couple from an L.L. Bean catalogue from last season.
The panopticon allows no room for originality because, well, what happens when you break free from absolute conformity? Bad things happen, right?
You become different; you become a threat
Until we saw THE BREAKER
Truly a man amongst men, The Breaker appeared to us, speedo-ed in lime green, grizzled and sunglass-ed, wearing an anklet and carrying a sand-filled two-liter Seven-Up Bottle, marching across the sand, bottle in hand, to the lifeguard station, where he proceeded to perform a series of stretches and awful-awkward not-quite-yoga poses, using his bottle as a weight, completely oblivious to the world around him (or, on the flipside, all too aware of it, and enjoying the attention); against the grain, he was the only human I paid attention to--alone, awkwardly dressed, old, spectacular--that was not entirely consumed by the Wednesday afternoon beachgoer prototype Even though he did pay attention to the
It's strange to consider it, but even the beach--the beach!--has been specified and regulated to the point that one cannot use/abuse it as nature intended; stranger still is the fact that, until this exact second, I, and no one I've spoken to, has ever noticed it! We're so entirely conditioned to listen to signs, to follow social cues and trends, that anything unusual, even if it is not at all unordinary (The Breaker: wearing a swimsuit, sunglasses, doing a beach workout at the beach; nothing especially strange, though the anklet was a bit weird), strikes us ("me") as weird and hilarious and wonderful; the maverick--I bet The Breaker would like to hear me call him a maverick--amongst us is gone due to regulations, formal and informal, that cause us to become like them--and consider it our idea! We listen because we are conditioned to listen, considering what we hear to be some sort of, you know, inborn idea instead of an ingrained ideology, tabula rasa to...what? Them? Through an unassuming indoctrination that just...teaches...us...to listen.
Right?
Indeed. The general public (me included) tends to obey signs because of the threat posed when one does not obey signs; the constant fear of being watched stops most people from “mis-behaving.” Rorty, of course, understood this; the panopticon works because it preys on the fears of the general public (or, more pointedly, prisoners) regarding what, exactly, happens when one does not follow the rules.
Substantial Revision 11.20
On Wednesday, my boyfriend and I ended up at Venice Beach--I was recovering from a cold, hadn't been outside in four days, and had decided that, during the delusional period spent between coughing and hallucinating, the beach would be a nice place to look at people up close, but still manage to stay far enough away so as not to become Typhoid Elizabeth, infecting half of Southern California with my evil viral infection; a real anthropologist oughtn't disrupt the cultures she studies, and certainly shouldn't spread the germ cultures she harbors amongst them.
Venice Beach is beautiful, and strange; we were far enough away from the market part, but still close enough to see, distantly, both the vendors and the Ferris wheel at Santa Monica pier--that is, on the actual beach at the beach, complete with tide (too close to my feet), sun (too bright, too hot), breeze (too breezy) and lots and lots of sand. My particular vantage point was perfect for people watching: close enough to the tide so as not to be bothered by remote beachgoers, but far away enough from it to avoid drowning, close enough to the lifeguard station and frankly awful public restrooms to examine humans in their natural habitat without being close enough for anyone to realize that I was watching and judging everyone who passed (in my slight daze, I decided to narrate the goings-on in the manner of a wildlife documentary on public television, complete with Australian accent.)
My findings: unadulterated beauty, nature, the wild, the beach, is all government run and regulated. Immediately upon parking ($7.00, pay at the booth, the arm of the block goes up, park in a designated spot), one sees a series of signs bearing the red-lettered legend NO SWIMMING/NO NADAR, with a picture of a small red figure amidst small red waves, with a thick red X running through his middle--bilingual or not, literate or not, there is no way to mistake that there is to be NO SWIMMING/NO NADAR here--in what is, essentially, a vast public swimming pool, there is to be NO SWIMMING! The same signs litter the beach wherever there is something to post on: a bathroom stall, the leg of a lifeguard's chair, a trash can
Settling into what we came to call, in our thick and terrible accents, The Vantage Point, we immediately recognized an obvious code of conduct concerning the humans surrounding us: the unspoken rule seems to be that one can only run away to the beach on a weekday afternoon in order to engage in some romantic rendezvous, or, you know, homework assignment, whatever; everyone, save The Breaker (to be detailed later) had a partner of the opposite sex with them; most were fairly young, in their early to mid-twenties, wearing beach gear covered by beach gear--a bikini top covered by a pullover, board shorts covered by short-sleeved tees bearing advertisements for fictional surf shops and seafood restaurants; straw hats and baseball caps abounded, along with the omnipresent California Rainbow (R) flip-flop: in the uniform of the young and beach bound, no one stands out; no one disrupts the notion that this is what one wears, this is what one does because...well, there is no reason not to, right? To not listen to the signs and dress like a particularly happy yuppie couple from an L.L. Bean catalogue from last season.
The panopticon allows no room for originality because, well, what happens when you break free from absolute conformity? Bad things happen, right?
You become different; you become a threat
Until we saw THE BREAKER
Truly a man amongst men, The Breaker appeared to us, speedo-ed in lime green, grizzled and sunglass-ed, wearing an anklet and carrying a sand-filled two-liter Seven-Up Bottle, marching across the sand, bottle in hand, to the lifeguard station, where he proceeded to perform a series of stretches and awful-awkward not-quite-yoga poses, using his bottle as a weight, completely oblivious to the world around him (or, on the flipside, all too aware of it, and enjoying the attention); against the grain, he was the only human I paid attention to--alone, awkwardly dressed, old, spectacular--that was not entirely consumed by the Wednesday afternoon beachgoer prototype Even though he did pay attention to the
It's strange to consider it, but even the beach--the beach!--has been specified and regulated to the point that one cannot use/abuse it as nature intended; stranger still is the fact that, until this exact second, I, and no one I've spoken to, has ever noticed it! We're so entirely conditioned to listen to signs, to follow social cues and trends, that anything unusual, even if it is not at all unordinary (The Breaker: wearing a swimsuit, sunglasses, doing a beach workout at the beach; nothing especially strange, though the anklet was a bit weird), strikes us ("me") as weird and hilarious and wonderful; the maverick--I bet The Breaker would like to hear me call him a maverick--amongst us is gone due to regulations, formal and informal, that cause us to become like them--and consider it our idea! We listen because we are conditioned to listen, considering what we hear to be some sort of, you know, inborn idea instead of an ingrained ideology, tabula rasa to...what? Them? Through an unassuming indoctrination that just...teaches...us...to listen.
Right?
Indeed. The general public (me included) tends to obey signs because of the threat posed when one does not obey signs; the constant fear of being watched stops most people from “mis-behaving.” Rorty, of course, understood this; the panopticon works because it preys on the fears of the general public (or, more pointedly, prisoners) regarding what, exactly, happens when one does not follow the rules.
Redirections
This blog re-directs from an earlier blog. Herein are posts revised from the first blog, as well as topical posts from the same author, originally posted to WEB-CT and edited for clarity.
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