Satire Batire. Chicken.

              

EXCELLENT

Mausy.

Wow so finding an article was not as easy as he made it sound yes? But luckily I found one, finally. If anyone else already has it, cheers. The review I discovered was written by Ty Burr. Ty Burr...do you think his mother was too cold to finish writing his first name? Like she could have written "Tyler" on the birth certificate, but her hand froze before she could finish? How short are all of the other Burr's names? Makes you wonder. Any who, Ty starts off his article by re clarifying the reason for the author's choice of a comic-strip version of the holocaust; to "give the artist and his readers the distance necessary to absorb horrors almost beyond imagining". Another interesting thing he points out about this particular holocaust survivor story that makes it stand out against all others is the fact that, in a sense, the main character doesn't really survive; at least not as the person he was at the start of the series. The author, Art Spiegelman, does not portray his father(the survivor the story centers around) as a heroic and valiant character, but rather "a neurotic hoarder who may have driven his wife, Art's mother, to suicide". This unflattering and utterly truthful light that Art chooses to shed is characters in is one of many tools he uses to try and shatter any illusions the reader might have of a Hollywoodised Holocaust. Burr goes on to explain that Maus is "not about rounding off the edges of the past", but rather it is "an attempt to understand a man and his place in history through small, evocative drawings". He does not draw the cartoons as cutesy little Disney characters, but rather simple blunt abstractions meant to put off pathos until we are ready to finally take in the details of what happened. BAM.

I see the cat AND the cradle. Fear me.

Who doesn’t want to write this blog post? Olivia doesn’t, Olivia doesn’t! But I will, because I love you all, and I know how much you love reading my enthralling posts, and links. You should definitely check out my links, right now. Don’t even read my post, just start clicking. You’re welcome. Okay back to why I’m here;

By definition, we are told that postmodernism is a style in architecture, art, literature, and criticism developed after and often in reaction to modernism, characterized by reference to other periods or styles in a self-conscious way and a rejection of the notion of high art. I think it’s apparent throughout Cat’s Cradle that the author is trying to reflect this idea in his work by use of characters and situations that reject and almost satirize the idea of absolute truth.

The narrarator of the novel follows a religion called Bokonism, which so happens to be all founded on “shameless lies”. By having a religion that is founded on lies, the author is clearly satirizing the idea of religion that is normally founded upon its own “absolute truth”. This fictitious religion in the story also serves as the foundation for the entire novel which clearly shows how the entire book is oozing with postmodern ideals and themes.

Another example of postmodernism in the story can be found in Newt’s painting.  It’s described as “small and black and warty” with “scratches made in black, gummy impasto”. Clearly this abstract painting does not follow the strict guidelines of modernism; neither does the fact that each character was able to freely critique and derive his/her own meaning from the piece. By refusing to follow any rules when creating the painting and see one clear dominate meaning in it, the characters are defying all ideals of modernism and embracing those of postmodernism.

Who's done writing their blog post? Olivia is, Olivia is! That's right suckers.

Get the "factory" out of our schools.

          

           

         Well, Brave New World is over, and with it comes another essay. Yayyyy. I actually really enjoyed this book, and it brings to light a very interesting point that I happen to be very passionate about. The books theme, in my opinion, pushes the argument that there is no such thing as a perfect world or social structure by showing the numerous imperfections that lie in an assembly line oriented society. I think this theme can easily be applied to today’s educational system. In my essay I would like to discuss how although we cannot teach students without structure, schooling them through giant industrialized factories is not only stunting their creative thinking, but it is depriving them of any preparation for a world outside of standardized testing. Neil Postman has many interesting views on the growth of technology that I plan on exploring and analyzing in my essay.

The internet has supplied students with endless information that can be accessed with a click of a button, and because of this, employers are shying farther and farther away from people with lofty educations and moving towards creative thinkers who will build up their companies with new ideas.   As Sir Ken Robinson explains in his video, schools continue to group students by age, completely ignoring the fact that not everyone at one age learns or thinks the same. They stuff them with individual standardized testing not realizing that by alienating children they are inhibiting their ability to learn and grow as much as they could if they were in a group.  It is my opinion that if schools wish to be successful in educating students and preparing them for the real world, they need to realize that due to the advances in technology, stuffing students with endless amounts of information is both unnecessary and disabling. We need to stop standardizing and uniforming students and start encouraging them into new and innovated ways of thinking.

Well I'm off to work, I mean school, I mean, ugh, give me my pills.

Education today is a joke. Students all around the country are being shoved into these giant industrialized melting pots that completely deprive them of any self expression or individuality. Creative thinking is stunted at a very young age by teachers that train students to think that there is only one answer to everything. Instead of expressing themselves, students are stuffed with pills and told to focus; blaming their attention span on a disease rather than the actual cause, modern technology. With so many outlets of entertainment in today’s technological world, of course students are going to barely be able to pay attention when listening to a boring monotonous lecture. They group students by age, completely ignoring the fact that not everyone at one age learns or thinks the same, and stuff them with individual standardized testing not realizing that by alienating children they are inhibiting their ability to learn and grow as much as they could as when they are in a group. Schools have quickly turned into educational factories, educating children by batches down a long assembly line of knowledge in an attempt to standardize and uniform the population.

There are many parallels that can be drawn from this to Brave New World. Individuality and creativity is also stunted at a young age by scientists who genetically engineer people in jars before they are born so that they can be taught and produce in whatever group or batch was preordained. Also similar to our education system, their society is set up in the form of an assembly line, operating under the slogan "Community, Identity, Stability" and stuffing everyone  with pills and medication to keep them stable and useful. The whole society has been thrown in a giant melting pot that completely deprives them of any self expression.

Mmmm...yeah yuck.

"Wheels must turn steadily, but cannot turn untended. There must be men to tend them, men as sturdy as the wheels upon their axles, sane men, obedient men, stable in contentment." This quote spoken by Mustapha Mond in “Brave New World” elucidates the mechanic society that exists due to debauched morals that are ensiled into the population to drive it towards complete and utter stability.  Stability is achieved by organizing society into a giant assembly line of jobs and responsibilities, replacing God with Henry Ford. The population is dehumanized through engineering that predetermines each individual’s biology so that they can serve their preordained purposes efficiently and contently.  The whole structure thrives on pleasure which allows men and women of every profession, whether prominent or low-end, to behold total satisfaction with their lives, and the government to maintain efficiency.

To obtain and retain this pleasure, the government completely transforms Christian morals, making them a taboo subject of the past. The whole family structure is completely torn down thanks to modern technology that allows people to be conceived, grown, and manipulated in test tubes and rooms that are kept and monitored in large buildings. There is no longer such thing as a “mother” or “father”, in fact the words themselves are extinct. By erasing the family structure, the government is keeping people both dependant and devoted to them and to society as a whole. Because of this, sex is no longer looked upon as a binding act between a man and woman, but rather a leisurely pastime for everyone to partake in. Sexual feelings and impulses are encouraged while marriage and sanctity are abhorred things of the past. In this world, "Every one belongs to everyone else". In fact, it is highly looked down upon to only have one partner. If one wishes to be refined, he or she will “have” as many people as possible; so the more promiscuous the better. By keeping sexual relations light, the government is preventing anyone from getting emotionally attached, again keeping them 100% percent devoted and satisfied to them.

I see your point....but you're still wrong. Sorry.

 

 

There is a question on The Tempest that directly delves into the core of education; should we critique a piece of literature solely by face value, or should we dig deeper and take the history and context of the piece into consideration? There have been many discussions on the subject, particularly surrounding The Tempest, and there are numerous opinions.  Stephen Greenblatt agrees with the later. He finds it extremely necessary for the reader to search into the text and derive for themselves any and all possible meanings from the words that lie between the lines; especially in the case of The Tempest.  To him, researching and interpreting can only heighten the reader’s experience and is the reason why we read in the first place. On the other hand, George Will finds this method of reading to be highly counter-productive and insulting to the author’s original intent. He thinks that by reading too far into a text, we can completely destroy the author’s meaning and replace it with our own. He argues that this is what political powers often do to strengthen their arguments, and that we should just enjoy the work for its face value and nothing more. In the case of The Tempest, enjoy the beauty of the words that Shakespeare artfully designed unto the page and leave it at that. To help keep it at this, he suggests that we establish one concrete interpretation of every literary work. My own argument lies somewhere between the two. I think Shakespeare's views on colonialism can be found without having to dig unnecessarily deep into the text and it is my plan to make and support my own argument on the interpretation of The Tempest by pulling evidence and ideas from both Greenblatt and Wilson. Mmhmm. I do. It’s a fact.