for homework 31 i asked a family member of mine why it is that on their business card there is her first name then her maiden name then her sur name by marriage. She said that she didn't really think that it had much importance. She told me that she felt like it just sort of keep the name however minor a part of her life it is. It really had nothing to do with going against normal conviction. She also keeps it on her business card because her business has that name on it, which is where she worked before she was married.
I then asked her if it gives her any special feeling to know that it is still a legal part of her life. she said: that it helps her feel more connected to her family. "when your proud of something you like to hold it and since it was such a big part of my life before it didn't want to just throw it away"
Also she doesn't have her children use both names, and isn't called by both names at once which shows that she isn't really that serious about it.
My thoughts: This use of maiden names is something that has become increasingly popular, and most people do as a way to not feel confined. I think that is a small example of an immunity project, not her giving something to someone like her children but her taking something from her family. It is a way to keep things like names and cultures that would otherwise be forgotten stay a part of the family. And I don't see anything wrong with immunity projects like that, practically everyone does it in one sense. This type of add-on to the name is more of a tribute than anything else, some people do it to stand out, and be more open but I don't think every case is like that. The times when it is done to become more noticeable is a sub-conscious way of aggrandizing yourself. And in an increasingly more liberal and open society it is no surprise how often it happens.
Part B:
One of the methods of masking that I do in my every day life is make jokes. I often joke around with my friends and family. I am not really thinking that much about it as i do it, its sort of just an impulse I make the joke and it lightens the mood. It feels good when people laugh at a joke, it makes you stand out and feel like the center so it is obvious why so many people value comedy and comical people, that is why the joker is such a major archetype.. I think that a lot of people make jokes as a way to be accepted. I think that most people make jokes as a way to be accepted and many people try to be the funniest because it is a job and it gives them a sense of purpose. So maybe not every time but some people tell jokes as a way to feel like they have a purpose in their groups cool.
Another one of the methods that i have realized my self doing is posture. I usually don't sit very straight and often in a slouch. and people who sit in a slouch lazily often give off the impression that they don't care. What is interesting for me is that I'm not trying to act like i don't care, me not having good posture and the impression that people who don't sit straight don't care is merely a coincidence. My thinking of how posture can give off the impression of not caring leads me to believe the three sections Behavior and Body especially all work together to give off the cool personal the individual is attempting to show. Some are more connected than others but overall they all the three sections can work off of each other. also as i think of how we try these different behaviors so often that sometimes they go below our normal, conscious awareness because they is so significant in our culture. I think that everyone does some of these things even if it is not obvious to them why it is such a big part of their life since to many people their actions to be considered cool and accepted are below normal recognition.
How does cool relate to our attempt to live in relation to this emptiness?
To all of us either in our conscious minds or sub-conscious we realize that our lives and actions in the grand scheme of things and in the relation to the rest of the universe we are relatively meaningless. Our lives as the physiologist Victor Frankl discovered are immersed into an empty void. And we desperately and often failingly try to fill it with meaning. This is what he called the existential vacuum. A website (http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/frankl.html) devoted to explaining the life and theories of Frankl by a college professor states: “People today seem more than ever to be experiencing their lives as empty, meaningless, purposeless, aimless, adrift, and so on, and seem to be responding to these experiences with unusual behaviors that hurt themselves, others, society, or all three.” Basically we discover the emptiness and meaningless of our lives especially when we have nothing to preoccupy ourselves with.(Frankl defined it as Sunday neurosis, which Wikipedia defines as a form of depression resulting from awareness in some people of the emptiness of their lives once the working week is over.) and try and fill it with our perception of cool as a way to seem meaningful. I think that coolness is most immediate and popular responses to feeling empty and that is why it is so popular. As a result of obsessing over feeling meaningful we try desperately to be noticed and seem important. It happens in small ways: when you are in the elevator with another person so you instinctively take out your cell phone to act like you have something better to do and in big ways: philanthropists helping those less fortunate immensely to feel like they are making a difference in the world. However I do not believe that because we see our lives as meaningless is the only reason we are obsessed but also because we fail to accept the understanding that we are not the center of our universe. In real life unlike in space there is no sun to which all others orbit, we are all dependent and reliant on each other.
As Frankl explained we fill our misconception that we are center of the world with things that have often denoted success, like money and looks. We keep finding new things to cover these emptiness with, thus we have the action of cool. In my experience only a select few discover Sunday Neurosis consciously (becoming aware of the emptiness) and even fewer act on it. This leads me to think that people really do want to be ignorant. The majority of us rather not know the underlying human physiological chemistry and I think that is why cool and following others in its many archetypes have become so phenomenally popular. Everyone tries to take on the role of hero, some with devoting their success to helping others (philanthropists) and others by risking their lives to be needed, meaningful, and reliable (firemen.) Acting heroic helps us feel a purpose like we are working towards a greater society. We cover our insecurities of being empty by trying to be cool.
Schopenhauer, another physiologist and social theorist said that the three things that distinguish us as mortals is our broadcast sense (health beauty education), our possessions or financial ability, and our presentation to others. These work hand in hand, our financial situation allows us to take better care of our selves or buy anything from plastic surgery to clothes, and allows us to get a good education. And when these things come alive it changes other people’s perception of us we adapt to look a certain way based on our looks, and possessions. Therefore by Schopenhauer's definition of mortal, mortality in coolness is ever changeable and ever adapting to the circumstances of the mortals themselves. We strive to accomplish these tasks because they are what denote us as good and cool. Letting us feel just a little more purpose. The attempt to fall into all these categories is what pushes us to attention and the false validation of being purposeful. The emptiness sits beside us always and everyone tries to run away from it by filling his or her lives with the false validation obtained from acting heroic and important.
Is it evil to help the corporations to manipulate the minds of young people for the sake of profit?
I have mixed feelings on this issue, i wouldn't say that the corporations that manipulate the minds of young people are exactly moral but to call them evil is a bit of a stretch. Corporations that try to sell cool simply use the most direct and effective way in the market, Television and it happens so often and in such volume that we have become wise to the manipulation. I don't consider the corporations evil just immoral so naturally i don't see those who help the corporations as evil. Athletes and musicians who sponsor the company are just trying to become known and heard. In the commercial with Grant Hill he wasn't attempting to brainwash the youth he was just making a commercial for sprite for his own personal attention. As was said in the lecture with matt ever since we were babies we have been trying to get attention and love. It is one of the pitfalls of our physiological chemistry. So is really evil for Grant Hill to want attention, it is one thing to call a corporation evil but it is another thing to accuse others of manipulating the youth when all they are doing is getting attention. I doubt that is what Grant hill had in min when he agreed to do the commercial.
Like the stars, and athletes who sponsor the product or phenomenon another way corporations get to what is cool is from the teens themselves. In the frontline video "merchants of cool" they interview the members of a company called look-look. Look-look is considered a cool hunter they go around and find what is cool now and take pictures of it for the corporations. So whether they realize it or not the teens are helping the corporations manipulate the rest of the youth. So the teens that are hunted by Look-look and given to corporations are in turn manipulating their own kind. Which begs the question how can teens be evil for sub-consciously manipulating themselves? Its immoral for the corporations to exploit the teens but its not evil for being a trend setter.
Whether or not those who help the corporations manipulate the minds of the youth know what they are doing makes a big difference. To me if you know that by staring in a commercial or singing with the company logo over your head you would be essentially controlling what the youth sees and likes then there might be some justification to call you evil, but if you are just utilizing a corporation to make a name for yourself and are unaware of the repercussions of your actions its incorrect accusation to call you evil. Those who help the corporations are they themselves being manipulated by the long arm of companies marketing strategy.
Should advertising to young people be banned? Up to what age? Or all ages?
The banning of advertisements to the youth seem to me a little extreme. To completely ban any an all advertisements is claim that will end up having a profound effect on our lives, and not all in a good way. there is no dening that some adds are blatantly wrong, racy, or manipulative like adds that tell kids to smoke, or subliminal advertisements and they should be put on a shorter leash but not all. And now more than ever advertisements and marketing play a big effect in the global economy.
Subliminal messages are really just plain wrong, they are deceiving and what some consider mind control. they lead you in and before you realize it, it has implanted something in your mind. It implants information below or near the normal threshold. so without realizing it you have been subjected to another add. According to merchants of cool teens process around 3000 adds a day (not all of the 3000 are subliminal.) Yes that's a ton of messages and information and maybe it should cut back a little but who is to say what gets cut what doesn't.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXcSWTb9zz8
This youtube video is a Australian news report on the use of subliminal messages during an awards ceremony. According to them it technically is illegal. one quote from the video from a teacher at the university of Sydney states that "Subliminal advertising is banded because it is a form a mind-control: it aims to influence us in ways that we are unaware of, and consequently that we could not choose to resist even if we wanted to." This type of advertising should be banned, marketing the sub-conscious is really just wrong. This I think should be banned to all ages teens, children, and adults.
In conclusion the banning of all advertising to young people is a bit too extreme because in reality adds are what helps to drive competition. If we were to ban all adds it might have a disastrous effect on the sales of companies and in turn hurting our economy. However there must be a limit, adds that affect mental health need to be banned for regard to the health of the population.
Anonymous,, . "wikihow." how to be cool in 7th grade. wikihow.com, Web. 7 Dec 2009. .
This article is a basic how to article compiled by a few different authors. What drew me to it was that it is specific to 7th grade. It gives various tips on how to be cool, some of which are broad and unsurprising like be confident, and practice good hygiene. It even gives links on how to be smart, the more surprising step was to be smart and keep grades up but not so much so, almost as if grades are for appearances.
This article is pretty simple and gives a well rounded group of practices to be cool. The steps are not all related, so it gives ideas and suggestions to be liked by a wide variety of people, thus making you even cooler. Together the eight steps for being cool reflect the overall consensus for being cool, nice, smart, funny, and confident. This Source is good for understanding that there are some basic principles for being cool that in most instances can be followed.
"Cool." Urbandictionary.com. Urbandictionary , Web. 7 Dec 2009. .
This article is less of a how to and more of a what is. It gives the various definitions of cool (disregard the ones defining weather.) The most interesting part was at the top of the page, in which there were different words for cool. There are some contradictions, smart and stupid, which proves that cool varies based on values and life style.
This article is worth looking at because it gives the different situations in which cool is used, it brings up the point that cool is someone superior and is also something used as a filler word (definition 2) the abundant definitions show the underlying principles of cool... popular and what other people want to be. This source helps me deepen my understanding of how different people have different interpretations of cool.
Fenichel, Dr. Michael. "What is "Cool"? (What's Hot? What's Not?)." 2008. Web. 7 Dec 2009.
this article is an informational article about teens and why coolness is so important. The author mentions how teens look to other teens to see what is cool. The author talks briefly on what types of things dictate whether or not you are considered cool. He also mentions self-esteem but i'm not sure how relevant that is to this assignment. At the bottom of the page the author shows the responses from the question what is cool? he asked boys and girls ages 12-18.
I think that if i were to use this article I would probably use the interviews at the bottom. Although i have my interviews which I also plan on using these show how the definition if cool changes with a span of just a year. In addition the article has a lot of information, much of which is in the interviews on what makes up cool.
"Cool (aesthetic)." Wikipedia. Wikipedia, Dec 8 2009. Web. .
This is a wikipedia page that will probably be used by a lot of people but it is quite substantive. It is a basic overview of the word cool. it goes through the idea of cool in the sense that where are studying, like behavior and culture, but it also mentions the religious types of cool, and cool during the renaissance and the cold war. I decided to focus mostly on the sections U.S. pop culture cool and cool as a social distinction.
This page is good for finding evidence of cool it gives a ton of different references for further research, which will be very helpful in my paper. In addition if i decide to talk about the way coolness has been utilized by the media there is a really good quote by Kalle Lasn "[Cool is] a heavily manipulative corporate ethos."
For the street interviews I mostly interviewed people near madison square park and around the flat iron building. I got a few different types of people, a guy in his twenties, a husband and wife from scotland, and a business man.
the man in his twenties didn't have much time to talk but i was able to get some decent answers. i asked him if he thought we would be better off if there was no real definition of cool and if everyone is respected for their personal attributes. his response was not that lengthy but still got to the point. He simply said that yeah it might be better but that's never going to happen, only in a perfect world. He also didn't himself to be "cool" regardless of what other people thought of him he never really judged himself in that respect. Which sort of coincides with his idea of what a cool person is, to him the sole definition of cool is someone who is comfortable with themselves. This answer was expected but not a lone i didn't think it would be his only definition.
The second person I interviewed was a business man. surprisingly he thought that a cool person just meant a calm person. When i asked him if thought it would benefit us if we didn't rank ourselves he said no. From there he started to discuss how who looks cooler is based on the eye of the beholder. Person A may look cooler than person B to me, but to someone else Person B might be the cooler one. He brought up the point that Coolness is subjective in multiple ways. in one sense it is subjective because of the eye of the beholder, and in another it is subjective because is based on ranking.
I also interviewed a couple from Scotland. The First thing they said was a list of what they define as cool and in their personal experience is cool. It was not at all surprising, clothes, cars, sense of humor, and successful. I don't think it could have gotten much more standard. I guess this sense of cool is pretty universal. However when I asked them if they thought it would be better not to let coolness play a part in our lives they responded no because it excludes individualism. it keeps us from being ourselves and unique.
interview with someone not in Personal/political.
i asked someone i knew who not taking person/political or learning about being cool how they felt on the cool factor of our culture. The first thing i asked was what do you think is the difference between acceptability and coolness. To which he responded acceptability is fitting in where as cool is standing out. In some high schools you can be accepted but not really respected and the truly cool kids are treated like idols. I then asked him how important he thought the cool factor was to our culture. His answer was that for high school students and teenagers it is unequivocally one of the most important things to think about but as we get older it seems to change however he didn't have a point of reference being that he is still in high school.
Interview with family member
My first question was the same acceptance vs coolness question I asked someone not in personal/political I asked it twice because I wanted to see how the answer might change when asked to someone from another generation. Her response was unexpected, something that never even crossed my mind. Acceptance is what you actually are, you are accepted by your peers and neighbors, and family for who you are and what you are. Unlike coolness which is what you give off. Being cool is an appearance, state,or a vibe but it doesn't mean you actually are. You make an effort to be cool acceptance is more natural. cool is what you think you should be, whether or not it is accurate is irrelevant.
do you consider yourself cool compared to your friends and colleagues?
Not ex
cessively. somewhat but not really, enough to be seen as cool but not too much to seem like your trying too hard. Try not to stand out but at the same time try not to blend in. "I don't really like to stand out but i also don't like to blend in."
it is good to be in the middle of the spectrum.
on a given day about how much effort do you put into looking cool? how hard do you try to look cool?
it doesn't take long- maybe 15 to 20 min. Doesn't try too hard to look acceptably cool.
the only extra effort for appearance excluding, the essentials (i.e. shirt, jeans, shoes.) is a hat. so he doesn't add much of the unnecessary crap that can make it seem like one is trying to be something they are not.
do you think that not putting much effort into being cool makes you even cooler?
not really. It doesn't change much, knows people who put in more effort yet they don't have a much different result
how do people categorize you just my looking at you in terms of your exterior. in other words judging the book by its cover?
"i get art scene a lot like hipster stereotype, occasionally jock"
its not really accurate. and he doesn't try to look like a hipster or artist, its not really up to him.
who is your idol?
"i don't really have an idol. i guess i would say Jimi Hendrix."
"why, you think he was cool"(me)
"yes, he was very cool, is music was good and was a change from what was seen a
nd heard."
2. interview with will
compared to people your know and converse with do you consider yourself cool?
"i dont think so, not necesary, its a case-by-case basis." after a going over it in his head "yes i am cool" "i wouldn't say that I'm cooler, or better than anyone, but i like to think that everyone can be on a level playing field. some people just end up leading"(will)
the others just follow the leader around, looking up to him. (me)
how much effort do you put into being cool?
i don't know not much like I don't try an insane amount
do you think if you put more effort it would make you cooler, less cool?
It depends on what you want if you want t
o stand out and be extravagant than you end up trying hard, but if you just want to blend in and simply be accepted than too much isn't necessary.
do you try and stand out?
"i think everyone tries to stand out. but not everyone succeeds", "i am fairly unique"
how do people stereotype you based on your exterior looks, at first sight what comes first to thought in some instances?
sometimes a prep. and in some ways i am preppy and its correct.
is it cooler that you look somewhat preppy in a school that doesn't have many preppy kids?
"i don't know if it makes me cooler, it makes me stand out"
who is your idol
John Wayne because he comes a forgotten era. in many ofhis movies he was astray from the status quo. he was tough and had a cool accent
3. Interview with matt
based on your definition of cool are you cool when compared to your friends?
i really don't think of myself as cooler than anyone else i really just try and be me, more than anything. i think what can make a person likable is if they can understand people on a deeper level than most.
Do you put a lot of effort into looking cool?
i don't really know image is an important factor in acceptability so part of me puts a fair amount of effort but also a part of me does care. some people really care and others don't really care. still some people just end up trying to be something they are not.
what do people assume about you based solely on your external attributes?
well i don't really know how accurate it is but I wouldn't be surprised with preppy, or hipster. but i really just try and be normal, not specific to one group because everyone is an individual, separate and different.
who do you admire/who is your idol?
my mom because she is pretty cool, i have a ton of respect for her. she works hard and raises me, my brother and sister and i think thats cool.
COMMENT ON OMARS STORY Hey Omar i figured i might read your short story for homework 25.
To start off I really enjoyed your story. I thought it was interesting and original. I thought it was great how your stories true cool guy was the Jim, the one who kept the peace and just wanted to have a good time with his friends. I was not surprised to see the cool and main character guy be Jim, the likable.
COMMENT ON ALICIAS STORY hi Alicia. let me just start by saying this is one of the best stories i have read. I really enjoyed reading it. i really liked how you were able to show a contrast between what you saw as cool, nate a nice person who appreciated art and culture. and what is typically shown as cool, veronica, an arrogant, and mean girl who does the same thing all the time. not really experiencing life. I think it was a good way to depict the "real" cool and the "fake" cool.
COMMENT ON BRITTANI'S STORY
Hi brittani this is a good story with an interesting plot. I really enjoyed how you demonstrated the idea that cool people in our world, are cute, and wear new clothes. Your quote at the end where you said that dayshawn is cool yet not stuck up was a good way to introduce some of your own ideas about cool. Many people are seen as cool if they look down on others, and act arrogant but your story showed that is not necessarily the case.
COMMENT ON MAX'S STORY
hi max i thought i would comment on your post. for one this story is unique. it takes on a perspective unlike the others i have seen. your character faces an emotional conflict different from the other conflicts that are physical, tangible, and about high school. another thing i found interesting about this story was that it was that the cool guy, Pascal, was seen on both sides of the spectrum. in one aspect he was extremely intelligent and did wonderfully in school not your average cool, and on the other hand he went to parties and drinks. the contrast was very interesting.
COMMENT ON ARDEN'S STORY
Arden this is a really good story.
to start off your reliance on description and lack of dialogue in the first paragraph greatly helped me see who dakota is. i was able to picture him as he walked by and the people saying hello. secondly one thing you did in your story that i have not seen in any others is how "cool" changed. at first it was Dakota, a nice guy who treated others with respect. then it changed to hawk, an arrogant, smug, hot shot. the idea of involving two different defintions of cool is something i have been noticing in some other stories. it was like this high school was in its own world, hawk was societies definition of cool , and he got the high school to conform
PART 2
One thing that i saw in almost all of the stories i read was the involvement of the writers definition of cool, and societies definition of cool. Arden's, max's, and alicia's stories all incorporated an idea or message of what should be cool and what is cool. This added to a general feeling, and theme i got from reading and hearing different stories of what is wrong with our definition of cool.
the stories, max's and alicia's especially showed a recurring theme of independence. Not quite a rebel, or artist. more of a mix between the mystic and sage. they were sage's because they were wise and had these ideas and opinions about others that were largely oblivious to the other characters.
Popularity played a role in every single story i read, which was no surprise to me especially because they were based on high school. In all the stories there was this idea or topic of likability. whether it was the character losing it, it ardens story, the character being worried about gaining it in brittani's story, or Pascal not really caring what his classmates thought in max's story. popularity or lack there of was seen constantly. proving that popularity is a central part of being seen as cool. Some social circles see cool as not having popularity by the general population. while others require popularity to be cool. regardless of having or wanting it or not popularity plays a pivotal role in our interpretation of cool.
Another recurring theme i noticed while reading the stories was the constant bring up of approval. for instance in Brittani's story the main character was worried about getting approval from his new classmates. In the beginning of Arden's story people were always saying hello to him or at least nodding there heads because they wanted the cool guys approval. even the rebel gets approval. Not from the authoritative figures but from the regular people who want to be like them.
Mike slowly opened his eyes to see that it was 7:00am. With the small amount of energy he had so early in the morning he slammed his hand down on the snooze for an extra 5 minutes.
“Mike wake-up for school,” called out his mother but he ignored her.
In retrospect those five minutes probably were not worth it. Now he might miss his train but it didn’t make much of a difference to Mike. The way he saw it was maybe for once I wont be the first one there.
Finally he moseyed out of bed, took a shower, got dressed in the average clothes he owned, not too flashy as to attract too much attention but enough to blend in, arriving at school a few minutes late.
“Today you will have a pop-quiz on algebra!!!” yelled his math teacher above the students who were talking so that the students who cared could hear.
Joining in with all the pathetic moans and groans of the other students Mike took his seat.
His friend Ron who sat in front of Mike turned around and gave him a pile of quizzes. Mike took one and passed it to the person behind him. Mike’s eyes surveyed the quiz quickly. He thought to himself A, B, B, D, C. Mike smiled to himself knowing that they wee correct. Secretly he liked math. He enjoyed finding the one possible answer to a problem. He would always remember what he said when his 5th grade math teacher asked him what he liked best about math: “I like knowing that there is always one answer out there for a problem. And once it is solved it is like the truth.” Unfortunately for Mike getting good grades in high school wasn’t as cool as it was in fifth grade.
He circled A for question one, Bubbled letter B for two and three. Checking his answer one more time circled D for number four. And then looked at five:
3x-15=0
a. 6
b. 4
c. 5
d. 3
Ok C he thought and brought his pencil to the paper. Then he stopped. Mike looked over to the kid in front of him, Ron. Ron gave the teacher his quiz and said
“I didn’t get it, oh well how much can a little quiz mean?”
The Teacher stared blindly at him, finally after a long pause and a deep breath:
“You know Ron maybe if you didn’t spend so much time talking and joking around you would do a little better in my class.”
Ron looked over to Mike, his friend since middle school, and shrugged. Mike laughed “I’m glad I am in the class as him,” Thought Mike. However Mike also knew that the educational gap hurt their friendship.
Mikes eyes drifted back over to his own paper. He stared at C as if it was the most captivating thing in the room.
“I want to write C, its right I know its right, I know all the others I picked were right. C means 100, But if I get a 100 ill look like a nerd. Ron will think we are too different. Maybe I should circle A, get an 80 and be done with it. I will look better. It’s just a silly quiz. Nothing I can’t make up.” Mike thought to himself
Mike circled half of letter A. his pencil stopped without him realizing it. Mike knew he shouldn’t.
“What do I Do? It is worth it? This is so minuscule compared to the rest of my life.It is the decision of the day. I hate decisions and I hate prioritizing”.
Mike looked up and saw that even the dumbest kids in the class were handing in their quizzes. The teacher walked over to Mike’s table and asked for the quiz. Mike looked calm and collected on the outside, but in his head was quite the contrary.
“A no C no A no C no A. Do you want to be cool and happy now or smart and have it pay off later? AHHH I cant believe how much I am freaking out about a five question quiz!!!!!”
“NOW” exclaimed the teacher
Mike stared at him, then looked at Ron, then at the quiz. Took a breath, and circled C.
What about being cool can make or break a persons social status in humanity? Cool in our society is the pursuit that pretty much everyone is following. What is the down side of cool? I don't know if there is. i mean what's not to like about being cool. I can remember when i was young still learning basic rules of society I was trying to figure out why is it called cool. The word cool is in no way related to its definition in this sense.
To me the average cool can be summed up in a few ideas. For one cool people are popular and trendy, but what makes them so popular, they are beautiful and are new, they seem different from others but really they are just the same. and the coolest people can never be followers, they are the leaders they set the trends and the cool people below them follow them. its interesting to think about the levels of cool. if you really look at it and analyze it, it disturbingly seems a lot like a food pyramid.
Another aspect of cool that there are inconsistencies. the stereotypical cool person is pretty, trendy, doesn't care about school, and is all around laid back. however in many instances being the opposite of cool is seen as cool. Take popular politicians for example, like the president. He is a very smart man who went to a great school. He was a good student in school and was very studious, this is much different than the average cool. Yet all the entertainment shows talk about him, and are obsessed with where he is, or what clothes his daughters are wearing. Not focusing on his politics at all because he is cool and hip.
Another thing i have noticed over our few days of talking about the definition of cool in our society is that what is cool seems to move gradually across generations. At first cool especially the "new cool" is different and a change. It starts with a few people, almost always the youth, and eventually gets copied and followed by an older demographic. It seems like what is cool keeps moving down the line and i am not sure why maybe it is because of our societies obsession with staying young, maybe it is a collection of things. The thing itself that was cool moves down until it is used up even for the oldest generation but there will always be something cool, something that if obtained and boost a person's social status, and it is almost always the made cool by the teenage and young demographic.
This is my art project. i decided to draw a picture. i took a picture of it and uploaded it too my computer.
the picture shows a computer flying above an eagle, it is showed as better and more exciting. There are people below talking to each other. I know it may be hard to see what they are saying so i will also write it here:
person 1:Hey what's up there in the Sky!!!!
person 2: What the Eagle??
person 3:No forget the Eagle the computer is better
person 4:Yeah forget the Eagle, the computer!!!
QUESTIONS:
Is your art a hammer or a mirror? Why?
I believe that my drawing is a mirror, it reflects much of population. i felt like depicting the computer as better, faster, cooler, and more exciting than the eagle was a good way to showing how we as populous get more excited over electronics than anything else. I wasn't really making a big or shocking statement i just tried to depict an aspect of society.
Does your art make you fink and theel? What are some of your own reactions to your art?
When i see my art, it doesn't give me a good feeling because it isn't depicting the most positive thing. The painting makes me wonder if things will ever go back to when we appreciated environment or if will we just keep moving farther and farther away. It in some ways makes we want to treat the things with no chip in them with more respect. I think i did a good job showing what i feel, that we have become more interested in the mass-produced electronics than things we hardly ever see.
What was the most interesting aspect of your making of the art?
I think that the most interesting part of the making of the art was the drawing the picture. i could have left them out and just have drew the computer and Eagle and let the explanation tell the whole story. By deciding to add them I showed what we look like. It gave the audience the ability to look in through a different perspective. Since i was trying to show what our society looks like i thought it might be a good idea to have a sort of birds eye view of the situation. Art tends to have a bigger effect when it is looked at from an outside prospective looking in. The addition of the people also gave the audience an opportunity to think for themselves instead of relying solely on the explanation.
How has the digital obsession altered our ability to interact causing out sense of individuality to decline?
INTRODUCTION:
All types of information seem to be thrown at us constantly. The new digital age started when the radio was mass-produced. The radio was the first electronic medium that brought people together. As with television the radio was somewhat addictive but nothing like today’s television or some of the other digital mediums in our culture. So many more people listened to the news in the radios hay-day then they do now. The Internet and television are used primarily as a form of entertainment where as the telephone and radio were primarily used as form of communication. At first the television was used mostly as a means of obtaining information such as the news and current events and gradually turned to a method of entertainment (I Love Lucy in the 60’s and American Idol in the new millennium.) There are now so many digital mediums they have caused us to re-think interaction between one-another and what it means to think impartially. The digital age has created a new form of screen-based communication, which has reduced face-to-face embodied communication and replaced it with electronic mediums; this is changing our ability to lead an individual life of free thought.
ARGUMENT ONE:
The Internet is arguably the biggest change in our way of life as a result of the digital revolution. Its many aspects play multiple roles in obtaining information. One of the biggest portions of the Internet is the self – publishing side. Blogs, movie reviews, and personal thoughts (aka comments) blanket the web like no other type of entertainment could. Why send a letter to the editor when you can comment on the website. In the book Everything Good is Bad For You the author Steven Johnson states: “The wonderful blog-tracking service technorati reports that roughly 275,000 blog entries are published in the average day - a tiny fraction of them authored by professional writers.” (Johnson 119) This statistic shows how frequent blogs are posted, and read, and thought about, and replied, and forwarded. If you were to look at any random post there is a high probability that it will be based on the person who wrote it, whether its what they are feeling about work, what they think about sports, or politics, or movies. The underlying principle of the post is self-involvement. The blogs are providing new channels for social interaction. At first glance this seems like a positive and in many ways it is, but there is an overwhelming negative side. The constant blogging, followed by the comments, then the replies all happens so fast that within minutes your ideas, thoughts and opinions are seen by tons of people. Your original thoughts about life are now the thoughts of others and your ability to keep your thoughts and be an individual are wiped away with the click of a mouse. The blog is the online diary, except on the blog there is no hiding place. The connection is so strong that it begs the question can you be too connected? And what does that mean; does it mean you’re tied together with the rest of the populous to the point of losing your individuality?
The blog isn’t the only way the Internet has changed our interaction habits. Search engines have also tarnished our thought process. Many, most of whom are teenagers, have all the information in the world at their finger tips and see no need to learn more the minimum necessary or have intelligent conversations instead they use the easy way, the method that requires less work, they rely on Wikipedia, and Google to gain knowledge only when necessary. “Google is our culture’s principle way of knowing about itself.” (Johnson 121) For today’s youth the digital age, primarily the Internet has given them an excuse to never educate themselves unless necessary. This change from intelligent and purposeful conversation to the opposite has been partly caused by the television and the Internet together. The T.V. distracted and caused people to zone out while the Internet gave them a place to get anything they needed 24/7. In this sense the Internet and television have made people dumber and less cognitive. As a result there is less interaction about what really matters, and the conversations that do exist are based on Youtube videos and reality shows.
Social networking sites are another way the Internet has changed the way we interact. They help shape the new interaction style different from all else. According to the facebook website there are about 300,000,000 active users. ("Facebook.com") This is only around 4 million less than the population of the entire United States! Social networking has helped form the new method of interaction. It helps connect friends and family like nothing in the past could. Social networking has gone as far as redefining the word friend. Being a facebook friend doesn’t meet the same requirements of a real life friend, to change the definition of the word friend is quite a feat. Similar to the blog, Facebook has opened a new pathway of interaction. Social networking is seen as the change from having a conversation with a friend on the phone or in a restaurant to looking at the pictures of someone you hardly know in the safety of your home. And with more than 2 billion photos uploaded every month ("Facebook.com") the change isn’t difficult to miss. Social networking sites have worked to appease the demand of having information immediately. This is further making it harder to think about something objectively with no background information or individual opinion.
ARGUMENT TWO:
Nearly all the digital mediums in this age have an aspect of constant contact but nothing has matched the cell phone’s ability to connect people from every corner of the world. “Nothing has matched the seismic cultural shift created by the cell phone” (Kim.) The cell phone has revolutionized the human idea of connection. It has given us the opportunity to talk to anyone anytime. The cell phone has given people the opportunity to interact and connect while being hundreds of miles away. One example of the obsession of constant contact is a table adapted from the Neilson group telecom by “fuor digital”. It shows that 88% of wireless subscribers in Russia have used text messaging within the last 30 days of the survey. ("fuor digital, digital media specialists ") This statistic does a good job of illuminating how many people use texts and cell phones to connect and interact with friends, family, and co-workers. The constant use of cell phones and texting has altered what is normal talk. What used to be a human connection is replaced with a piece of technology. We have become so immersed in our digital lives, the text, calls, and screen that we stop thinking about what is around us, what we should be focusing on is brushed to the side by the digital mediums.
Cell phones obviously connect people through their personal lives but they also connect business. Thousands of people rely on cell phones to work. This is both advantageous and disadvantageous, in one sense industries have thrived because of the availability to send information at any moment, but at the same time people lose their ability to disconnect, to be alone. When I was interviewing people on their thoughts of digitalization one man made the point that we are always reachable: “Everyone expects that your available 24/7, which means you have an urgency in responding, people aren’t thinking, they are not acting appropriately in many respects.” This is an excellent point cell phones have allowed work to never cease. How many people claim they can’t live without their phones? The explosion of digital media has changed proper interaction, people now use technology to work even when they are away. Everyone is reachable all the time thus preventing people from leading a solely individual life, having one life based on work, and the other on personal life. The constant connection is preventing people from being truly alone.
ARGUMENT THREE:
Another negative implication of the digital age is that we use the connection set by the Internet and cell phones even when it is not necessary, to often we Google something because it is easier. We get the raw information using the fastest way we know how. We use the technology because we are addicted and it’s appealing. An example of using the technology when not necessary is in the book Feed by M.T. Anderson: “we were to angry to speak out loud our jaws were like grrrrrvvvvv. So we started to chat” (Anderson 167). Even though they were sitting right next to each other with no one else around them they used the technology. They didn’t need to use it, they could have just spoken and gotten the same outcome but they didn’t because the feed was more attractive, it was marketed better. The addiction to digital representation devices has altered our sense of interaction as shown in Feed instead of speaking as individuals to each other, they used the Feed as a third party.
Another example of using digital representational devices when not necessary is from the film “Wall-E” in the film two men are using a screen to interact even though they are right next to each other. (Wall-e) This is another example of how the digital mediums have changed our ideas of interaction so much that we don’t even think about not using them, it has become second nature. They have become the central point of interaction. They are so prevalent in our society that our thoughts are no longer just thoughts; they are represented by digital devices.
SIGNIFICANCE:
This idea that we are losing our ability to think freely is extremely important. What kind of world is it if one can’t be an individual and you have to rely on everything and everyone else? People spend so much time on the Internet and watching television that they are constantly being shaped and formed by the ideas of those who write it. We see so much, because we spend so much time in a trance by the digital devices. We attempt to mirror what we see and hear from them, thus losing our individuality. We as humans are all different but the digital age it conforming us, reducing individuality
CONNECTIONS:
These changes are seen just about everywhere. Pretty much all of the modern world, especially the western world, is having the same affect as a result to the digital obsession. The lack of face-to-face embodied communication is gradually lowering the need for individuality all over the world. I see it occasionally in my life, for example I can recall last year instead of reading notes from the text book I wrote down the question and decided to Google it later. However this is just the human way of thinking, to find something new, adapt to the change environment it has caused, obsess, and eventually move on.
Still some remain unaffected by the digital age. The Amish for example use no modern electronic technology or digital devices. Yes they interact but only with one another so their conversations do not expand, they remain stagnant in there own culture. The difference in lifestyle is an example to prove how we are different because of the digital age.
OPPOSING VIEW POINTS:
On the contrary what’s good about the boom of digital representational devices and the idea that the digital age is destroying our ability to think and interact is that digital devices are just the latest version of human interaction. Did people say the telegram was destroying interaction, or the smoke stack? No, they just made life easier, they were just the examples of human ingenuity. History is merely repeating itself, just in a different version. As people develop so do the inventions created for them. Technology is simply adapting to the wants and needs of the population. Digital mediums are helping people get what they need and want faster, easier, and more efficiently. It is a valid argument, one that many overlook. It is just change, and change is always somewhat scary. The digital age is more worrisome because it was immediate, not gradual like other innovations before it.
Digitalization has played a big part in modern globalization. The Internet assisted in moving cultures together. People of various lifestyles and cultures have been brought together. “The internet breaks down cultural boundaries across the world by enabling easy, near-instantaneous communication between people anywhere in a variety of digital forms and media. The Internet is associated with the process of cultural globalization because it allows interaction and communication between people with very different lifestyles and from very different cultures.” ("Globalization".) This, from the globalization page from Wikipedia shows how digitalization has brought people together in positive ways. It has connected us as a world, and created international integration.
CONCLUSION:
The new form of digital interaction has relied too heavily on electronic methods instead of a human communication reducing our ability to lead an individual life.
WORKS CITED
·johnson, steven. Everything Bad Is Good For You. New York: Riverhead books, 2005. 119. Print.
·Johnson, Steven. Everything Bad Is Good For You. New York: Riverhead books, 2005. 121. Print.
·"press room, statistics, general growth." Facebook.com. facebook, Web. 3 Nov 2009. .
·Kim, Ryan. " The world's a cell-phone stage The device is upending social rules and creating a new culture." San Francisco Chronicle 27 Feb. 2006: n. pag. Web. 5 Nov 2009. .
i thought I would post a comment on your paper because my partners are having minor problems posting theirs.
To start, I think this a really good rough draft. It is well written and I think you have all your ideas in a good order. One thing you may want to change is in your introduction. It might benefit the reader if you added what it was you were talking about in the first sentence. The “it” your talking about is obviously an aspect of digitalization but I wasn’t sure if you were referring to something more specific.
Your second paragraph connects to your thesis well but where is that quote coming from. Just something small to add would be a quick sentence on where it came from.
Your paper definitely had some well fitting evidence, which help to support your thesis.
One piece of evidence that is really good for the argument where you talk about how language has changed is Feed. In feed people no longer write, at all. This may help strengthen your point.
All in all this was a very good paper and I think you did an excellent job Evan.
i posted the previous comment before i knew about the grading so im doing it now.
pov4 ev4 efforg4 conandsig3 opv2 com3 total20
COMMENT ON SAMS PAPER
hey sam i figured i would comment on your paper because my partners are having trouble posting theirs.
for one your analysis in most of your arguments are very well written and do a good job connecting to your thesis. in your third paragraph your connection and similarities to how it can be mirrored in our lives was great and i think you should try and do that in more of your arguments
in your paragraph on Brave New World was really insightful. I too am reading that book, thats a really interesting connection that i never really analyzed. but to add to it something you might want to add how it is similar to our society technology aside.
i will finish this later to be continued.
to continue your connection to how big a part of our lives it is (Y2K) was very good may be if you want you could expand on it
How has the digital obsession altered our ability to interact causing out sense of individuality to decline?
The digital age although new and fairly recent has quickly changed the way we live like nothing else in recent memory. So many aspects of our life have been influenced by electronics. All types of information seem to be thrown at us constantly. The new digital age, which we identify with the most, started when the television was mass-produced. Although that was the beginning, the digital mediums of the 40’s are nothing like the digital mediums of today. The television was used mostly as a means of obtaining information such as the news and current events and gradually turned to a method of entertainment (I Love Lucy in the 60’s and texting and American Idol in the new millennium.) To put it simply there are so many digital mediums they have caused us to re-think interaction between one-another and what it means to think impartially. The digital age has created a new form of communication, which has reduced face-to-face embodied communication and replaced it with electronic mediums; this is changing our ability to lead an individual life of free thought.
The Internet is arguably the biggest change in our way of life as a result of the digital revolution. Its many aspects play multiple roles in obtaining information. One of the biggest portions of the Internet is the self – publishing side. Blogs, movie reviews, and personal thoughts (aka comments) blanket the web like no other type of entertainment could. Why send a letter to the editor when you can comment on the website. In the book Everything good is Bad For You the author Steven Johnson states: “The wonderful blog-tracking service technorati reports that roughly 275,000 blog entries are published in the average day - a tiny fraction of them authored by professional writers.” (Johnson 119) This statistic shows how frequent blogs are posted, and read, and thought about, and replied, and forwarded. If you were to look at any random post there is a high probability that it will be based on the person who wrote it, whether its what they are feeling about work, what they think about sports, or politics, or movies. The underlying principle of the post is self-involvement. The blogs are providing new channels for social interaction. At first glance this seems like a positive and in many ways it is but there is also a negative side. The constant blogging, followed by the comments, then the replies all happens so fast that within minutes your idea thoughts and opinions are seen by tons of people and your original thought about life is now the thoughts of others and your ability to keep your thoughts and be an individual are wiped away with the click of a mouse. The blog is the online diary, except on the blog there is no hiding place.
The blog isn’t the only way the Internet has changed or interaction habits. Search engines have also tarnished our thought process. Many, most of whom are teenagers, have all the information in the world at their finger tips and see no need to learn more the minimum necessary or have intelligent conversations instead they use the easy way, the method that requires less work, they rely on Wikipedia, and Google to gain knowledge only when necessary. “Google is our culture’s principle way of knowing about itself.” (Johnson 121) For today’s youth the digital age primarily the internet has given them an excuse to never educate themselves unless necessary. This change from intelligent and purposeful conversation to the opposite has been partly caused by the television and Internet together. The T.V. distracted and caused people to zone out and the Internet gave them a place to get anything they needed 24/7. This has stopped people from having interactions about what really matters, and moved it to conversations based on sitcoms and reality shows.
Social networking sites are another way the Internet has changed the way we interact. They help shape the new interaction style different from all else. According to the facebook website there are about 300,000,000 active users. ("Facebook.com") This is only around 4 million less than the population of the entire United States. Social networking has helped form the new method of interaction. It helps connect friends and family like nothing in the past could. Social networking has gone as far as redefining the word friend. Being a facebook friend doesn’t meet the same requirements of a real life friend, to change the definition of the word friend is quite a feat. Face Book like the blog has opened a new pathway of interaction. Social networking is seen as the change from having a conversation with a friend on the phone or in a restaurant to looking at the pictures of someone you hardly know. And with more than 2 billion photos uploaded every month ("Facebook.com") the change isn’t difficult to miss. Social networking sites have worked to appease the demand of haveing information immediately. This is Further making it harder to think about something objectively with no background information or individual opinion.
Nearly all the digital mediums in this age have an aspect of constant contact but nothing has matched the cell phone’s ability to connect people from every corner of the world. “Nothing has matched the seismic cultural shift created by the cell phone” (Kim.) The cell phone has revolutionized the human idea of connection. It has given us the opportunity to talk to anyone anytime. The cell phone has given people the opportunity to interact and connect and be hundreds of miles away. One example of the obsession of constant contact is a table adapted from the neilson group telecom by “fuor digital”. It shows that 88% of wireless subscribers in Russia have used text messaging within the last 30 days of the survey. ("fuor digital, digital media specialists ") This statistic does a good job of illuminating how many people use texts and cell phones to connect and interact with friends, family, and co-workers. The constant use of cell phones and texting has altered what is normal talk. What used to be a human connection is replaced with a piece of technology. We have become so immersed in our digital lives, the text, and calls, and screen that we stop thinking about what is around us, what we should be focusing on is brushed to the side by the digital mediums.
Cell phones obviously connect people through their personal lives but they also connect business. Thousands of people rely on cell phones to work. This is both advantageous and disadvantageous, in one sense industries have thrived because of the availability to send information at any moment, but at the same time people lose their ability to disconnect, to be alone. When I was interviewing people on their thoughts of digitalization one man made the point that we are always reachable: “Everyone expects that your available 24/7, which means you have an urgency in responding, people aren’t thinking, they are not acting appropriately in many respects.” This is an excellent point cell phones have allowed work to never cease. How many people claim they cant live without their phones? The explosion of digital media has changed proper interaction, people now use technology to work even when they are away. Everyone is reachable all the time thus preventing people from leading a solely individual life, having one life based on work, and the other on personal life. The constant connection is preventing people from being truly alone.
Another one of the negative implications of the digital age is that we use the connection set by the Internet and cell phones even when it is not necessary, to often we Google something because it is easier. We get the raw information using the fastest way we know how. We use the technology because we are addicted and it’s appealing. An example of using the technology when not necessary is in the book Feed by M.T. Anderson: “we were to angry to speak out loud our jaws were like grrrrrvvvvv. So we started to chat” (Anderson 167). Even though they were sitting right next to each other with no one else around them they used the technology. They didn’t need to use it, they could have just spoken and gotten the same outcome but they didn’t because the feed was more attractive, it was marketed better. The addiction to digital representation devices has altered our sense of interaction as shown in Feed instead of speaking as individuals to each other, they used the Feed as a third party.
Another example of using digital representational devices when not necessary is from the film “Wall-E” in the film two men are using a screen to interact even though they are right next to each other. This is another example of how the digital mediums have changed our ideas of interaction so much that we don’t even think about not using them, it has become second nature. They have become the central point of interaction. They are so prevalent in our society that our thoughts are no longer just thoughts; they are represented by digital devices.
This idea that we are losing our ability to think freely is extremely important. What kind of world is it if one cant be an individual and you have to rely to everything and everyone else? People spend so much time on the Internet and watching television they are constantly being shaped and formed by the ideas of those who write it. There are so many instances where the digital age is immensely good for society but sometimes you can have too much of a good thing. This also has an effect on a jury, how can you get a fair and impartial jury of your peers if all the information and opinions of others are already plastered on the Internet. Yes it is giving us information but too much of it is useless.
On the contrary what’s good about the boom of digital representational devices and the idea that the digital age is destroying our ability to think and interact is that digital devices are just the latest version of human interaction. Did people say the telegram was destroying interaction, or the smoke stack? No they just made life easier, they were just the examples of human ingenuity. History is merely repeating itself, just in a different version. As people develop so do the inventions created for them. Technology is simply adapting to the wants and needs of the population. Digital mediums are helping people get what they need and want faster, easier, and more efficiently. It is a valid argument, one that many overlook. It is just change, and change is always somewhat scary. The digital age is more worrisome because it was immediate, not gradual like other innovations before it.
These changes are seen just about everywhere. Pretty much all of the modern world, especially the western world, is having the same affect as a result to the digital obsession. The lack of face-to-face embodied communication is gradually lowering the need for individuality all over the world. I see it occasionally in my life, for example I can recall last year instead of reading notes from the text book I wrote down the question and decided to Google it later. However this is just the human way of thinking, to find something new, adapt to the change environment it has caused, obsess, and eventually it will change.
The new form of digital interaction has relied too heavily on electronic methods instead of a human communication lowering our ability to lead an individual life.
WORKS CITED
·johnson, steven. Everything Bad Is Good For You. New York: Riverhead books, 2005. 119. Print.
·Johnson, Steven. Everything Bad Is Good For You. New York: Riverhead books, 2005. 121. Print.
·"press room, statistics, general growth." Facebook.com. facebook, Web. 3 Nov 2009. .
·Kim, Ryan. " The world's a cell-phone stage The device is upending social rules and creating a new culture." San Francisco Chronicle 27 Feb. 2006: n. pag. Web. 5 Nov 2009. .
