CRIT-PHOTO ESSAY 2.0 Teacher Version

Writ Photo Essay   Sorry the last slide is not supposed to be where it is at, but without messing up the entire format by trying to move it (I tried at least 10 different times), so I apologize for that. At this point, after having struggled for nearly 2 hours trying to embed this bastard, I am just going to go with what I have now...

Makes you take a second look- Check them out

Wiki-leaks at it again

So I just came across this article detailing a multi-national trade agreement between nations that represent over 40% of the worlds gross domestic product. Wiki-leaks procured a 95 page tidbit from the trade agreement and published it for the entire world to see. It is amazing that something like Wiki-leaks  can bring previously unknown secrets to the light of those in the world. I have often thought about the vast scope of ignorance that citizens are kept in within this country, the secrets this government has from us… I know that sounds a bit like "Who really shot JFK" but at the same time, the pure genius gathered by our government and utilized into differing protracted uses certainly turns our country into the tip of the iceberg…what secrets are buried beneath tons of concrete and dirt? My Aunt who works for the government told me of weather programs developed by our government that can essentially control weather patterns and storms… I, like any skeptical person, was like "whatever, sure sure sure" but then she showed me some documents and reports and I did a little 180 to be more like "holy shit thats scary insane!"
Ignorance is best left to bliss, but what bliss can last with the fragile shell of ignorance futilely attempting to protect it…?    here is that article on the TPP 

Dancing on the Shoulders of Giants

Expressly delivered via the world wide web, I find the factualisms connected with human integration towards more interconnectedness within society's cliques, groups, and communities, have been developing for hundreds of years--if not thousands--towards a more effective and streamlined system that brings millions together with little hassle at all. That is one thing that stand out distinctly to me in this week's topics of the web and videos on the web, along with gaming, is that the amount of effort and planning that goes into sharing discourse to a certain selected or desired community has decreased by maximum levels. No more does it take three weeks to be prepared for a lesson you want to share with a sold out crowd at some venue (don't ask me what crowd sells out for lessons) you can prepare and share a video online in half the time, even quicker if you are tech savvy and prepared. Not only does the internet connect discourses globally, but it makes it so much easier for anyone to share what they have, or think they have, of importance for the world.
Something that seems to be of similar merit is the recent story of the fifteen year old boy that has made break through efforts in the cure for cancer. He needed resources to complete his experiment so he went to a renowned scientist through the internet to ask to use his resources and lab...now millions of people have the possibility to be saved. The interconnected communities found among the internet can largely change the world for the better, of course this is not black and white, the grey area contains both positive and negative side-effects within discourse communities. For instance you have communities like BBC but reversely you then have communities like Al Jazeera which largely contain discourse related towards global terrorism. Like any innovation there are the positive and negatives that will rear their heads in different ways.
Much like Dash's idea that those that see further than others are standing on the shoulders of giants, our giant is the collective modal data that incorporates our discourse communities and our golden egg is the revolutionary ideas that continue to evolve and develop further the idea of a more connected world that morphs and evolves off of the ideas and sundry techniques that captivate, motivate, and invigorate the world we live in today.


light
crowd
desire
interconnected systems
standing on the shoulders of giants
schools connected by internet not geographical location

Cause it takes a real man to write….right?

Aghhh…..ughhhh…..ohhh yeahhhh… see that!? Uhh just pumped those words up on to the screen, like a manly man man man. So I would be a little untrustworthy if I said that I was completely enveloped by those articles and video. Wysocki's Sticky Embrace of Beauty was interesting in context, but felt like more of a continued expounding of previous articles that we have read that deal with "the original" writer, yet focuses more inherently on the question of discourse viewed with an aspect of beauty that transcends analogous discourse, warping it closer to a digital canvas of limitless possibilities.
OH but Jamieson's article was a touch more in sync to help add a new element to the role of discourse that we have covered over the semester. The tin stereotypes that are labeled upon gender roles are current and hold some semblance of sway nearly every where in the world, yet as far as writing and the community of discourse is concerned should women have a more diverse and nonlinear approach to completing a piece of discourse? Well of course, and they do, and they write some freaking amazing things… the rationalization that women are "delicate, emotional, noncompetitive, and nurturing," at least to me, seems completely true--minus the "noncompetitive" haha thats just funny. But women are delicate…in semblance to men mind you, they are emotional and nurturing… and hell thats part of the reason we (men) love them. Now wait.. I am not being sexist. I argue that these attributes lend to women creating a more complex pieces of discourse, not the opposite. Now when it does come to tone and speech deliverance of a written discourse, men perhaps hold an edge with deeper and heavier speech delivery...yet as ying and yang, men and women hold a varied set of rhetorical weapons. Each have socially assigned roles that permit, encapsulate, and deny certain wants and expected deliverances.
Jamieson talks of the evolving discourse of women and how it is more acceptable for a woman to show her true intelligence, of course if I was a woman reading his article, whew, I would be pissed at the examples of male ignorance and engorged egos. Great writers come in all shapes and sizes, some are kids, some are old people, some are men, and some are women....neat but real stuff. It's the human nature of jealousy to degrade and disavow that which we fear will upset a "normal" balance of social conformation.


Difference between:
Stopping and holding the sight- I believe what Wysocki was getting at in her essay, the difference between stopping and holding the sight, has to do with her idea of "naturalized text" holding it's true identity. When what is contained within the text, the pure raw form of what is trying to be expressed through discourse will stop the reader in their tracks and hold them with a distinctly relevant or "beautiful" piece of text, yet while they understand the use of, or theory of use of, eye pleasing aesthetics, arrangements, the reason that it has stopped them is because it is deemed to be "disembodied" from the text, providing a jarring halt for the reader. As for holding the reader, it is close to opposite of stopping the reader, it shows visually beautiful aesthetics that embody the text's voice and hold the reader to true form of the "naturalized text".....and never mind I totally missed the jist of these differences.... reciprocal text allows the reader to employ and inject their own form of beauty into the form of the text. "Just another step into the bullshit theory of textual analysis" (Aaron Plowman) which I hold dear to my heart.

Wiki Wacky Kohl et al

"You're such a Kohl et al!" Ha sorry I just couldn't resist...dumb dumb dumb I know.
The articles by Johnson-Eilola and Kohl et al were a great pairing; one dealing with where text comes from and how it is received, perceived, and integrated, while the other deals with "a freely expandable collection of interlinked 'Web' pages" (Kohl et al 2). But in accordance to Johnson-Eilola, "we live in a time of contradiction and contingency" so we delight in this delicious parable of articles. It's funny to think about the history of certain discourses, certain words, and certain influences; what reserved collection of thoughts did I have to phrase that, and this, (and these) words? Much like one of the first articles we read for this class dealing with the originality of text, and how there really is no original text, the Johnson-Eilola article delves and then expounds on that issue. Writing an "original" piece seems to be an insurmountable task to writers living in the world we do today, moreover, academic writing is in such a rubric that the chance for a truly "original piece is nearly non-existent. For me, music seems to be in the same category of being hard-pressed to create a piece that is truly original. You hear so many people saying that with five or ten chords you can play nearly any song on the guitar; unearthing the question if music and writing can be more closely linked than they all ready are? Is there five or ten steps that each writer can use to write almost any piece of discourse? Can altering those steps bring the ability to the writer to create vastly different sounding discourses? I pose that question to all of you: What steps in writing would take the place of chords to a guitar to music? Here is a video of singer/songwriter David Gray talking about his writing process for his acclaimed music.

Infographic

The website where I created my Infographic would not embed on here, no matter what paths I explored. Just some tidbits from the last FIFA World Cup in South Africa so you can all be savvy for when the next World Cup comes this summer!

Click on the hypertext above to view my Infographic

Critical Photo-Essay Proposal

Critical Photo-Essay Proposal

The Instable Hierarchy of Writing

            For my photo-essay I want to look/research the sometimes long, and short, life of the written word. The clear that up a bit, I want to look into how writing is a powerful tool yet so often it has a fleeting life. Yet that power lies only in the human influence and interest directed towards it, however wildly different the influence is. I want to explore why some writing holds its power through the ages and why some do not; exploring not only world-wide pieces of writing, but other writing in my own town that has faded through the years.

            For this project I want to research the reasons, however apparent or unapparent, of why certain writing (ex: canonical writings, propaganda writing from different eras, ancient writings, and even old, local signs with writing) either fades or does not; and why those reasons are.

            I feel that researching critical texts through the library archives, along with other Internet research and some articles that we have read this year, will provide me with enough research to write a thorough essay. For the photo part of this I plan to insert photos alongside the text in a black and white format (I feel it provides an edge and stark flavor to text). I am not too sure how I will format this, but I am leaning towards an old-fashioned photo-essay, but I will look into seeing if I can spice it up a bit with some modern technological savvy.

            I feel that I might be biting off more than I can chew with this essay, depending how in-depth you would like it, but let me know if it is too broad and what would be the best vein to move toward. I apologize for this being a bit late, last semester of college shenanigans at work for this guy. Anyway here it is and I hope it fits into what you are looking for.

Power Punctuation, YEAH!!!!

I really liked the examples they provided in this article, it was nice to see almost every example that Solomon offered. For us literary scholars, who are chained and shackled to the restraints of academia, we (I use the term loosely) have a fear of slipping loose of those chains. I grant you, that fear is rightly founded because how many of us have seen the accursed red ink adorning the sad pages of a slighted essay? Well I have, it sucks. Of course we are better off for it. I make no sad excuses to say that the mean n' scary teachers were in the wrong, but did they have to use so many exclamations points behind a furiously underlined 'PUNCT.'!?
However, I feel that Solomon missed an important point in his article, one that exploits the power of punctuation, and that is poetry. Not all poets use punctuation to express their words, but when it is used it changes the poem entirely. Here are a few clever poems by Raj Arumugam
1 ‘
Punctuation

one must wonder
if the word “Punctuation”
is a relative of “Punctured’; 
for, as you must have noticed, 
a prose passage
with no punctuation
is as good as punctured…
poetry is cunning; 
she uses punctuation as she wishes
and still remains pregnant
with meaning, if you know what I mean
2..
the definitive full stop
Say 'Hello'
to the Full Stop
before it shuts you down

Say 'Hello'
to
the American period
the definitive full stop that says: 'That’s it, folks! '
in other words
it says: 'Enough! ' 'That’s it! '
' I’m done! ' ' I’m finished! '
But some people never get that, do they? 
they just keep going on; 
but now I’ll take my cue
and say no more.
FULL STOP.
PERIOD.
3! ! ! 
exciting poem with exclamation marks! ! ! 

Oh noble exclamation mark! 
I expel! I exclaim! 
Oh most excitable exclamation mark! 


Oh, to see you
sends blood racing
in my veins! 
Oh, I love you
once! 
twice! ! 
and I love you thrice! ! ! ! 
- oh, was that four times? ? ? ? 
Oh, be not jealous
I brought in your
distant relative
the crooked and deformed question mark
for I not only love you
! 
! ! 
! ! ! 
! ! ! ! –
but I love you forever, most excitable exclamation mark! ! ! ! 
! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! .......and forever! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ..............

Oh noble exclamation mark! 
I expel! I exclaim! 
Oh most excitable exclamation mark! 

These are fun little poems that point out some of what Solomon talked of in his article but here I will show you a poem by William Carlos Williams, first without punctuation, and then the original with:

Libertad Igualdad Fraternidad 

You sullen pig of a man
you force me into the mud
with your stinking ashcart

Brother
if we were rich
we'd stick our chests out
and hold our heads high

It is dreams that have destroyed us

There is no more pride
in horses or in rein holding
We sit hunched together brooding
our fate

Well
all things turn bitter in the end
whether you choose the right or
the left way
and
dreams are not a bad thing 

William Carlos Williams

And now with the normal punctuation, mind you it helps to read the poem out loud, first try it with the first amended version, and now with the second original version:

"Libertad! Igualdad! Fraternidad!"

You sullen pig of a man
you force me into the mud
with your stinking ash-cart!

Brother!
--if we were rich
we'd stick our chests out
and hold our heads high!

It is dreams that have destroyed us.

There is no more pride
in horses or in rein holding.
We sit hunched together brooding
our fate.

Well--
all things turn bitter in the end
whether you choose the right or
the left way
and--
dreams are not a bad thing. 

William Carlos Williams

I hope this a relatable parable for you guys, it was the first thing that popped into my mind when reading this article and I felt compelled to share. Thanks for reading!

I'll be handling Mr. Losett's discourse for the rest of this post

Well hello there, you might have clicked on this blog post under the assumption that you would be reading what Mr. Losett had to say about the readings for your class. I do hate to catch you off-guard but I will be handling the discourse for the rest of this post. Now I am sure you are thinking to yourself, "who exactly is writing this then? Cavin must be cheating, letting someone else post on his blog." But alas no, Mr. Losett unassumingly became disposed to the required functions critical in responding suavely for your delight.
I should jump to the chase huh? Who would have ever thought an innocent twelve pack of pure patriotic American Pabst Blue Ribbon beer would have the opportunity to share it's... thoughts and feelings to the entire world wide web.... of course judging from the glassy-eyed stare, much akin to a rather dumb dog or cow, that Mr. Losett is directing towards the computer screen; I will safely assume that perhaps a max of four or five brave souls will have the innate courage to stumble in to the horror chamber of rhetoric that Mr. Losett brazenly calls his blog.
Of course in the interim of Mr. Losett's despondent deluge towards the required and strict structure of academia, why don't I give it a shot. In these lines to follow, I sincerely ask you to humor me and follow along... it seems Mr. Losett has fallen off...his chair that is.
                                                                                                                         It might seem funny that a combined total of 144 oz of sweetly, delicious beer such as us could hold so much enlightening and thought provoking....hey! HEY!
                HEY!!! We're writing here!
"Candy canes and sugar cones make a happy gnome! a;sdlka; b ;asdf;ga gsda  adsg"

         Sorry, Mr. Losett believed he was capable of continuing on with his assuredly failed attempt at doing his homework 

 

Maybe we will write from over here to really confuse him...ahh look at him stare

blankly, the small stream of drool creeping from the

corner of his mouth, reminiscent of a gurgling two year old

discovering a dust-coated jellybean

from under the couch cushions.

Usually by now, Mr. Losett would have wittingly wrote about relevant tangents about blah, blah, blah...who cares..

I want set something straight, so listen up fuckers. If you EVER see a hipster drinking our classy contents you are to do the following:

 1. Call him a limp-dick toad sucker(interchangeable swear words are quite ok)

 2. Call upon your offended honor and engage in fisticuffs

 

I do already see a problem with this though....it would be much to offensive. So make sure you ask them to set us down first, so we don't spill or, god forbid, dent our can.

 

And can I say something else in the spirit of not caring because this isn't my blog and you will all likely be judging Mr. Losett for what I have written. Come to think about it, Mr. Losett is at my complete and utter mercy; but in case you didn't know, mercy is not in my ingredients...seriously read a can or look it up or something. Ahh shit, never mind folks. I hate to be rude to you, yes you, you cherub reader you ol' dog you. It seems Mr. Losett is losing complete motor control and has taken it upon himself to strip his shirt and go on a...jog? Seriously who goes on jogs? That is just completely ludicrous. However I feel it my obligation to ensure that he trips multiple times, screams profanities, and .............oops gotta jog~!

 

But My iPad Said Different...

So Mishra....oh that Mishra made me fall asleep on my computer Mishra. There were some profoundly inspiring things said sarcasm noted but in truth the first part under Misconceptions or Alternative Conceptions the passages: "Current research in science education has generated a growing body of evidence showing that students come to science classes with theories about how the natural world works..." and continuing on with "these cognitive structures that students have prior to instruction have been variously called misconceptions, alternative frameworks, alternative conceptions or naive theories" (Mishra). It goes on to state what most of us (myself included) figured as common sense; I mean children live in this world and experience in their own way, and unless they are completely sheltered or quite literally live under a rock, they ask questions and develop their own childish theories about how the world around them functions. Like when God hit a strike in bowling when there was thunder, or... ( I am literally at a blank for another example, if you guys have any you should put them in the comments).  But I pose what is to come in education, in fact what is already here.
The development of technology is assuredly changing the discourse of education and in fact it is changing how children see the world before they get to these "science" classes. Here is a chunk from an article on macstories.net:

For the past years, Apple has been showcasing the educational advantages of devices like Macs, iPhones and iPods on its Apple in Education website. Since the introduction of the iPad in 2010, however, the company has been making an effort to position the device as the best tool now available to teachers and students to improve the quality of education and level of engagement. The dedicated iPad in Education webpage showcases recent moves by Apple such as iBooks Textbooks and the iTunes U iOS app.

While we have covered schools and educational institutions adopting iPads in the past, the latest profile posted by Apple today on their UK website is quite possibly the best example of iPad in education to date. Those of you who have been following the progress of iPad deployment in schools may remember Fraser Speirs’ iPad Project, which made headlines throughout 2011 as it was the first one-to-one iPad deployment to every people in a school. Speirs documented the process of giving an iPad to every teacher and student at Cedars School of Excellence (Scotland)on his personal website, and today Apple has posted a video profile showing how “Cedars students boost learning with iPad”.

These links all have great and interesting articles on how iPad's are being innovated into the school systems. Even on a personal level, my Mom has an iPad in her classroom (where she works with disabled children) and she tells me almost every time I see her how much easier it is, not only to ease the stress and struggles of a teacher, but also for to enhance the children's learning potential. It doesn't stop there though, the amount of Apps. made for small children that incorporate learning in the forms of science and math through games and activities, will these "naive theories" still be relevant in 15 years?

The Duck and the Golden Egg-- AV

Within Your Eyes This Post Shall Live

First I found this little gem of a post from actor John Cleese on the terrorism alert levels in the world. And before you get to reading it, keep in mind McCloud's imparted wisdom that when you read a text you make it alive... can the following descriptions evoke images for you (and it's not the most image invoking piece) but still, are sentences just strung out icons for pictures, moving images rambling almost like a movie through our head as we read? Anyway here it is (more from me after).

 

The English are feeling the pinch in relation to recent events in Libya and have therefore raised their security level from "Miffed" to "Peeved." Soon, though, security levels may be raised yet again to "Irritated" or even "A Bit Cross." The English have not been "A Bit Cross" since the blitz in 1940 when tea supplies nearly ran out. Terrorists have been re-categorized from "Tiresome" to "A Bloody Nuisance." The last time the British issued a "Bloody Nuisance" warning level was in 1588, when threatened by the Spanish Armada. 

The Scots have raised their threat level from "Pissed Off" to "Let's get the Bastards." They don't have any other levels. This is the reason they have been used on the front line of the British army for the last 300 years. 

The French government announced yesterday that it has raised its terror alert level from "Run" to "Hide." The only two higher levels in France are "Collaborate" and "Surrender." The rise was precipitated by a recent fire that destroyed France 's white flag factory, effectively paralyzing the country's military capability. 

Italy has increased the alert level from "Shout Loudly and Excitedly" to "Elaborate Military Posturing." Two more levels remain: "Ineffective Combat Operations" and "Change Sides." 

The Germans have increased their alert state from "Disdainful Arrogance" to "Dress in Uniform and Sing Marching Songs." They also have two higher levels: "Invade a Neighbor" and "Lose." 

Belgians, on the other hand, are all on holiday as usual; the only threat they are worried about is NATO pulling out of Brussels . 

The Spanish are all excited to see their new submarines ready to deploy. These beautifully designed subs have glass bottoms so the new Spanish navy can get a really good look at the old Spanish navy. 

Australia , meanwhile, has raised its security level from "No worries" to "She'll be alright, Mate." Two more escalation levels remain: "Crikey! I think we'll need to cancel the barbie this weekend!" and "The barbie is canceled." So far no situation has ever warranted use of the final escalation level. 

-- John Cleese - British writer, actor and tall person

I mean I chuckle after every time I read this. The ability to put "voice" within a text, not someone just rambling on, but actual voice. Where you can envision someone saying it to you... 

McCloud had a wonderful perspective on cartoons, icons, and how the human mind can do truly remarkable things when it comes to assigning subjective animations to seemingly inanimate object 

;) <---- a semi-colon and a parenthe...is that the singular half of parentheses? is the universal symbol for a sly, sneaky, suggestive face used daily in millions of texts. 

Our ability to assign relatable values and similar experiences to symbols, icons, images, ect... is super cool in and of its self; but how about when two people from different sides of the globe, from different worlds, are able to communicate through drawn symbols representing universal things such as a tree, or a flower, or a jar of peanut butter...?  I mean we have to give ourselves a little more credit than that I suppose, the fact that humans can represent through symbolsiconscartoons--images-- that they create (as long as not completely abstract) is a feat all by itself... 

Another interesting point McCloud brings up is the separation of great art and great literature and how the two are viewed apart in the serious world of art or literature. This brings me to a tangent, this is much like how our school's grades are split apart in this country. We determine that a child should be in a grade based off how old they are, not based on any other critical factors? I feel the best way to explain my point is to show you where I got my point from and it's use of a variety of different tools that we have discussed in class and it's completely eye-opening arguments that it makes: Enjoy-

Skimming in Cybertext's Oasis

It was interesting starting to read Sonoski's article, he talked so much for his love of reading off of a screen, yet there he was creating an essay to be printed and yet here we are reading it off the screen, like some skewed circle. It also dawned on me that while he was talking about the inevitability of skimming while reading hypertext, that gasp I was skimming it. I was skimming the whole text. And he does provide such a great point that skimming is viewed with such a (perhaps aptly assigned) taboo of loosely gazing at the text with daydreams skyrocketing behind your eyes. I will admit it though, I skim when I read, but rather I consider myself a fast reader not to fawn over myself but I gather words and sentences together in a way that I wont even try to to explain, but it works rest assured Professor Downs.
Another interesting point in this article was Sonoski's thoughts on people "keeping up in their fields" and how, especially in the scope of this class, it seems an insurmountable task. The endless cyber desert contains so many relevant and irrelevant items that you can be stuck for hours on tangent stacked on tangent tabbed on tangent new windowed on tangent...you get my gist. However, we focus, within this desert, oasis's that contain the sweet vitality of sought information, yet it is a "discrete hypertext" that only I have the map to get too (and all of you of course) and of course the stray soul who happens by and either stays and shares the oasis's wealth of stock or moves on to other, perhaps better, oasis's. Is there a complete mastery to this field? I would say that Professor Sexson would be a strong claim to this, yet how can any one person or even a group of people decide what defines and encompasses mastery over the written English language.
 In Jakob's article I was fascinated (if not not a little exasperated) with his brief, yet great, description of Memex. Of having a camera strapped to your forehead that recorded everything you saw or heard and arranged it in to a semi-cohesive pattern? Ok having a camera strapped to your forehead would be a little annoying, but with today's advances in technology could the use of a microchip formed to tap into your five senses and then record and assimilate what is important to you and all the other stuff. How many times have you had a mind blowing realization slip through your fingers, or could not quite remember how reading a certain passage made you feel in relation to relatable subject. It's funny, most of you (including me) thinks this an improbable possibility that will happen when there are flying cars and all that jazz. Put this into perspective though, Ted Nelson came up with his universal knowledge-managment and information-production system called XANDU. It was, if I skimmed read correctly, wikipedia. And that was in 1965... 

Validating Cyber Text

Baron raises an interesting point in his article, where he tells of the changes to writing to preserve its validity. I thought it was rather funny that the monks in England who controlled the development of writing, used to create forgeries to seize possession of private land. Have any of you been witness/victim to forgeries? Anyhow, Baron then goes on to reiterate that in order to validate cyber text, we are going to have to develop a whole new system to serve such needs.
What would the new system look like? What range would would it extend over? And finally what texts in the future will be available when E-reserves have been outdated? Or will they ever be outdated?
I'll now transgress into a completely different tangent, and discuss what we were talking about in class on Tuesday about Society's role in the content of discourse and if there is certain conformity for comfort. (Side-note....I see snow on the peaks of the Bridgers!) Anyway, who decides what is appropriate or not? In the Greek era, there were public bathhouses and displays of public sexual intercouse, now we see a woman with too much cleavage on the sidewalk and we say tsk, tsk...Even now as wrote down about cleavage in my blog for class, I inwardly cringed at the perceived reaction of what people would think. Will girls be offended and think I used a sexist analogy? Will guys be completely distracted thinking about cleavage now? In all regards I shouldn't care the slightest of what peoples reactions should be, I didn't slander anyones name after all... Yet we are all still bound by an invisible shackle that puts a buffer on what is on our mind and what we share with others. Honestly now, how many of you would openly share the top 5 things going through your mind, no silly gimmicks, just straight honest truth....especially if I told you to think about Brad Pitt washing your car...interesting.
Also another interesting tidbit from Baron was his idea of the telephone's introduction intruding upon the privacy of our homes and now how our emails are filled with "spam." Even how there were debates of wether or not we should say "hello" and "good-bye" when beginning and ending a conversation. Now we have anonymous chat rooms hy bb whts goin on, personal dating sights Lisa matches 95% with you!, and even craigslist  -wanted- Used toilet 0$, its amazing how the internet has seemingly broken some barriers of interacting with people outside of your town, outside of your state, and even outside of your country. I myself have a PenPal from England that I started writing too when I was in the 7th grade and we still keep in touch to this day. People talk about how technology is creating a barrier between people, raising digital walls that you can hide behind in the comfort and safety of your underwear and couch. But I will argue that point and say that while there are people affected by the sudden bouts of reclusion and isolation when interacting with the internet; there are also those who take advantage and find groups of people into similar interests, it allows easier opportunities to find out local events going on in the area and sign up for them, you can easily plan a trip with access to the internet. I believe the real problem is that most people get overwhelmed with the internet, even those who consider themselves computer savvy. It is ridiculously easy to be sucked into the cyberpool of information available at your fingerprints, but as humans have and always will do, they will adapt and speed processes up. We are a society of constant stimulus, our coffee line can never move fast enough, the person in front of you wont speed up, the professor is making you stay two minutes after class gets out....all daily excuses that I bet 100% of us have used more than once in a week. We want things now.

Absence of Logos and Ethos in our media today

So who doesn't love to watch Fox News? I mean if you are down, in a shitty mood, lacking the humor of life, turn on good 'ol Fox and laugh along to their attempt to report logical, unbiased news. If ever a media outlet lacked correct and logical euthymeme's, it would have to be Fox. In the link here you can find some examples of this (scroll down a ways). Anyway thought I would share my thoughts, hopefully no one in class actually watches Fox news with any seriousness.

Haha talk about biased rhetoric....on my part. I would rather like to think of it as factual in nature, and true in discourse.

I will always remember one instance of this, two years ago when Obama addressed the nation on the assassination of Osama bin Laden, Fox news had rolling across the bottom of the screen "Obama bin Laden assassinated".... I mean really? Just a small typo to air on national, live news? Like that would have ever been "looked" over by other news stations (most likely).

Iterability, Iterability, Iterability...

In Porter's paper he discusses a very interesting point on that all forms of discourse are "composed of "traces," pieces of other text that help constitute it's meaning" (Porter, 3). That is to say that even the very words that I type right now are  have been influenced, shaped, and molded from other pieces of discourse that I have encountered and that have influenced me consciously (or unconsciously). In his example of the Pepsi commercial, his breakdown of the different representational images and phrases that are used to connect the audience and the commercial, are easily transferrable to other product commercials. For instance... I heard if you buy Axe Body Spray, you will be nearly molested by beautiful women (why isn't every guy getting fresh with this stuff?!?!). Or how about if you use Dove soap, you will lose all your wrinkles, excessive weight, and feel like a shining golden god... thanks commercials, thanks.
But it doesn't stop there, Porter goes on to point out the emphasis and applause for the "original" writer that is shared by many but yet there is no such thing as an "original" writer. Many of us seemingly creative types sputter and fuss at such a bold accusation, why else did we spend infinite hours under the duress of a term paper than to develop a new and creative view on what we wrote about...damn. I guess we can be proud that we offered a new discourse pertaining to (said) subject. I suppose you could consider the blogs that we are all writing for this class, they are all on both or either of the two articles assigned to us....we will surely use these articles to discuss in our blogs (since I assume we all want a decent grade in class), yet no blog will be the same. And it would be mightily weird if two were the same...cheaters? parallel universes? telekinesis? Yet we, the voice of the future, all savvy literary students with similar course backgrounds will find different shades of discourse on the aforementioned articles.
And where do we even get started on Fisher's simple and un-verbose discussion of the narrative paradigm and how it breaks down to the argumentative, persuasive theme and the literary, aesthetic theme which does "not deny reason and rationality; it reconstitutes them and makes them amenable to all forms of human communication" (Fisher, 376). In short, what I garnered from Fisher's article is that every form of communication is a narrative of sorts, and the narrative paradigm is designed to function within the pedagogy of narrative influence, with Fisher describing narrative as a "theory of symbolic actions and/or deeds-- that have sequence and meaning for those who live, create, and interpret them"(Fisher, 375). Translated I believe that to mean that every event recorded in history is then relived in the recorders own words, say for instance the bible...?

Searching For The Storyteller: A Tale

And finally movie critics and viewers sigh, as one, in relief to learn that the long anticipated feature film Searching For The Storyteller: A Tale has released a trailer. Youtube has been almost overloaded with video viewers cyboriously clamoring over each other to sneak a peek at the trailer. Comments are already in and viewers and critics rave their opinions:

Alex Sun of the Moonlight Times
"Honestly I don't know what he was trying to accomplish, if the film is anything like the trailer we are in for a ride of gut-wrenching film making and disastrous aftershocks in the cinema world."

Bridget conOndrum of the Out of Print Press
"I was ghastly offended and now I have to schedule even more meetings with my therapist..."

Bill Wolf of the RunningRabit Chronicle
" This is crap."

Click on the movie tab to view Searching For The Storyteller: A Tale 

If it's me...I go with IT

While I am sitting here reading Geisler et al and his views of IT's capability, and evolution and it's role in shaping the current society of today, I feel as though I am part of this evolution, that every person who picks up a device and searches on the internet layers yet another digital coating on the continuing metamorphoses of IT advancement.

How an intended audience (or unintended) responds to a specifically designed piece of rhetoric interlaced into a text used found in "information technologies (that) provide an opportunity to explore fundamental theoretical issues of text in new ways" (Geisler et al, 3) -- be it a uploaded youtube video, a google doc talking on the importance of information technology, or a future presidents inspiring speech to a Democratic Convention. 

Whereas living biological organisms continue to evolve over centuries due to natural selection and adaptation, informational technology evolves over minutes, seconds, even nano bytes due to society's rapidly enhanced understanding of it. "ITexts--in their newly emerging genres, publishing and circulation patterns, and occasions and situations of use--will develop according to the situations, relationships, and activities within which they will be accessed and comprehended" (Geiser et al, 13). So not only do ITexts conform to different societies, religions, and all accessible forms of information technology but conformation is shared by both, with both being equally shaped and influenced by the other. 

The ability of humans to relay a desired combination of rhetoric into a recognized and (though not always) accepted way of learning and communication has evolved into information technology that can be accessed nearly anywhere in, or out, of this world. You realize yourself part of something larger, something more interconnected than most would imagine, part of a changing, writhing digital world. A place where one and all feel some semblance of power because of the information so readily available at their finger prints.

* Could you consider Obama's speech here at the Democratic National Convention in 2004 a form of IT rhetoric? 

About me

Hey my name is Cavin and I like lamp...whoops I mean I like to enjoy Montana in all it's shades, I have a passion for procrastination, and I'll be damned if I don't love football (european version!). I enjoy taking photographs of different Montana landscapes. I am looking forward to this class and the different structure it has from most english classes.

Cheers!