Tree poem (1/12)

       The point of the tree poem is that the author could not find the right words to describe the movement of the tree. He tried dance  but that failed because he later said "Dance with me, dancer. Oh, I will" and that failed to compare to the tree. Next he used the word capitalized which doesn't make sense whatsoever. The author visualized an aspen tree in the wind but could not express it to his satisfaction. This shows that the argument is that there are times that visuals take the place of words and are needed for certain times. Poetry failed the poet and I am sure that he would rather be a photographer right now.
       The lines stated above are located third line from the bottom in italics. They are put into this format to adequately describe the exact reason that the word dance for trees was not compatible. In the last line he refuses to name exactly what the tree is doing. "The aspen doing something in the wind."
       

Walk Paper

Walk

1.         The visual production I will be examining is my own, my word is walk, and it is located on my blog. My first picture is a standard crosswalk and then a single person walking. What follows are many individuals walking in very many ways: for exercise, while in sleep, underwater and so on. All of these pictures are accompanied by the song Walk Like A Man by the Four Seasons. Next are different types of pairs until another crossing sign appears but this time it is of many people crossing; a song switch occurs to Hello Goodbye by the Beatles. And as the first notes of the song are recognized, the Beatles walking across the street picture comes up and is followed by an onslaught of famous people. A few negative pictures of walking people are scattered based on the music and also many “walks for change” inspirational images are displayed. The theme is that walking is a basic action but it can mean so much more.

2.         This video creation is definitely an argument. The first images of what walking closely resembles an introduction paragraph. Then the switch that is the transition statement was presented through music and style of images. Celebrities and also groups of people were displayed in the images instead of the primarily singles and doubles originally portrayed. These facts are easy to notice and the connection between the two presents the argument to the viewer. And it does so much more than just plain writing. With the argument comes all of the feelings that one cannot begin to feel if someone just wrote: walking is symbolism. The images of Martin Luther King, Gandhi, Harriet Tubman, Michael Jackson, and the Beatles makes the audience smile and remember through just seeing them. Then the audience perceives the connection between the images and the knowledge makes much more of an impact. J. Anthony Blair believes that arguments must be able to confirm or reject and my argument can. One can argue that walking is banal and cannot mean anything extra.

3.         The reasons of this argument are that walking can create change, bring hope, cause fear, cause death, and inspire the world. A cliché of walking is that “It all begins with the first step.” These claims are represented in this visual production through the inspirational music and the popular, easily recognizable people in the images. I believe that this is successfully expressed because giving examples through history, ties together the point about change and proves the argument. I think they would not have been more effective if expressed another way because if pictures of only random people walking would have bored the audience and lost the meaning.

4.         This visual production is predictable in the fact that all of the pictures, except for two pictures of signs, are of people walking. For a topic of the word walk, it is obvious that one puts in different types of walking. To be more discreet, I could have shown people walking away from opportunities, life, or a job which entails images of different actions than just the word walk. The walkers in the picture keeps the visual argument from becoming abstract or hidden and so supports the expressiveness of the production, but it can be too easy an argument to make therefore lessening its impact.

5. The order of visual images in a visual production is very important to get the argument across. Gunther Kress correctly connects time and space in videos of this nature. For my project, the images are timed so that the important pictures are longer and yet everything is timed to adequately match the music. The combination of audio and visual strengthens my argument increasingly. For example in the first half of my video, around every three to four seconds, a note is louder and stronger than the previous and so at that moment I changed to a new picture. Also, during the second half of the slide the good images of walking and the bad are placed so that when the Beatles sing goodbye, they say goodbye to the bad pictures enabling them to understand the difference and the meaning behind it. This makes the video flow better, keeps the audience’s attention, and makes them aware of the importance of each picture to connect to the whole.

6.   The visual productions I reviewed were largely successful. Most videos conveyed the message and also added emotional impact. Images definitely do what writing does and more. A visual production can be set up like a paper with an introductory image or two, followed by images that once connected, can make an argument. The main difference is that arguments made by images usually need more images or text to be understood. If you only saw a woman walking in my project, you would not understand my argument. But if you saw a woman walking alone and then later with a group, the message would become clearer but even more images would help. The fact that too many images confuse the audience does not harm the visual verses written argument because it is also valid that too many sentences in a paper can lose the reader. Writing does not convey meaning as quickly and effectively as images. Images do not have to be translated and usually one glance at a picture provides exceedingly more information than glancing at a page does. Also one has to concentrate more while reading to receive the full impact of the meaning and a mental image while one can generally watch a TV show and understand what is happening even if one zones out for a few minutes.

4-letter project

Taylor Mali

Performance or writing space plays a large role in the making of meaning. For example, if Mali's speech was handed to me on a piece of printed paper, I would think it cute but not funny or I might not have even understood the humor in it at all. This is why I saw this performance on you tube. A student made a Prezzi about it and tried to format Mali's facial expressions through the text in the Prezzi and he added the audio of the performance. The spoken word holds so many implications and hidden meanings in it that without the audio, the Prezzi would have fallen flat. Another example of hidden meanings in the spoken word is sarcasm. Sarcasm can never truly be obvious in text without writing the actual word, sarcastic, down. Therefore, writing space does play a large role in what it all means.

Bolter Proj. 2 Draft

Technology

Writing changes over time. It relies on technology that is remediated constantly through invention and public preferences.

Technology replaces technology. We often find that society is repudiated by the new technology until they quickly find out that they can’t live without it. This was apparent with the horseless carriage and printing machines. Handwriting was prevalent in the time before the Renaissance and was often used to copy books. This slow, odious, and meticulous work was replaced by printing machines that raised the distribution of books and drastically increased book learning. From a scribe having to copy each letter of a book into another book, to someone pulling  copying a page at a time, was large improvement. One feature of the new technology that was replicated from the old technology that deemed important is the style of the handwritten books. “Printing had the additional virtue that it could produce books that were nearly identical to the best manuscripts: the press rivaled handwriting in quality while far surpassing it in quantity” (Bolter, 14). “[t]he absence of any apparent change in product was combined with a complete change in methods of production, giving rise to the paradoxical combination of seeming continuity with radical change” (Bolter, 14).This was done to pacify the public but over time, the letters became thinner, easier to read, and cleaner.

Contrary to thought, public derision helps technological progress instead of hinders it. In Megan Allen’s group’s Prezi on chapter 1, they write, “Without people rejecting advancement such as the movement to electronic writing, there would be no reason to continue reinventing the writing process.” For example, when electronic books started coming out, the public was outraged. They refused to accept it, and they denounced it by pointing out its flaws. People complained about how with the new book one cannot read in the sunlight, there are no page numbers, the pictures are not in color, and so on. In response, the electronic book companies took the complaints and responded by adding these features and more until the product was so greatly improved that the people’s misgivings were overcome. Now everyone has a Kindle, iPad, eBook, or Nook.

However, the jump from the paper and pen to a computer did not go through this slow process of improvement. Instead, the technological change occurred so suddenly which is why digital technology is such a big adjustment from print. Previously, technologies went through remediation.

Boy and Girl words

Boy: gentleman, tool, douche, guy, dude, mack, man, boy, homie, bro, broski, broseph,broha, honey, macho,


Girl: lady, whore, slut, princess, angel, queen, cutie, cutie-pie, ginger, fairy, honey, sweetie, hoe, baby, harlot, concubine, bitch, trollop, tall drink of water

Images and Words

Images can do what words do. They do not have to be translated or explained or redefined for different peoples. But arguments are associated with speech. Speech is either written or oral becasue of propositions and sentences. Words, one can say, are only used for arguments; to get us to respond to them in a specific way, or twist our way of thinking for the author's purposes. Therefore images can communicate but can't do everything.

Babies and Magazines

Meddy uses text to direct and fill in the reader on what we should be taking away from the baby's struggles. The baby touches a magazine and is disappointed to find that it doesn't move, turn to a new page, or interact with her. She tests a different page and rationalizes that it must be her, she is the problem in this situation. Therefore she tests her pointer finger...no, that's not it. When given a ipad however, the picture moves and responds with every touch of her chubby, inexperienced, baby hands. This is relevant to writing because it is a clear example of technology replacing the printed page and how children are growing up with this switch in culture.

Fear of Writing Commentary

Catherine M's blog on the fear of writing was very inspirational and meaningful. She encourages readers to write instead of writing on her traumatic experience. This reveals that she pulls her words from deep inside her and finds solace in her abilities. On the other side of the spectrum, Mike B. challenges the reader to do and be better. He asks why anyone should be scared of writing and reflects that it results from being scared of oneself. Both blogs are meaningful and very well written.

Punctuation

Punctuation matters. It matters because if authors did not use punctuation, the readers' job's difficulty will increase tenfold. This is especially true for periods. I mean how hard will it be if I continued this sentence indefinitely because I did not feel like putting a dot at the end nor a comma or semicolon in the middle I think that as you continue reading this terrible run-on you will get the picture  not only can you not be able to tell which sentence is which you cannot fully comprehend my meaning because you will not be able to distinguish the pauses that separate parts of the sentences. How was that for an argument? And aren't you glad that I put a question mark at the end of that sentence? But Dennis Baron argues that punctuation is temporary but I argue that they still matter.

Frederick Starr

Starr uses many rhetorical moves in his "Rediscovering Asia" essay in Best American Essays but his most influencial one is his use of the passive voice. Instead of directly naming his subject in his assertions of Asia and the ones who need to rediscover it, he stands back from the issue. He knows that if he says who needs to change, he will offend many people; especially if the ones he is offending is us, the "stupid" Americans. Starr is writing to us after all and many great authors know that offending the reader is not the best strategy to being praised for his work.

Disneyland-Proj. 3

Disneyland

Laughter. Disney music. Cobblestone and the clip-clop of horse hooves. The smiles of the kids as they know that something wonderful and magical is about to happen. These are the first moments one experiences when first entering Walt Disney’s magical world of Adventure and Fantasy, Tomorrows and Frontiers. Meeting princess and screaming as one shoots through the stars, licking Mickey Ice Creams and singing with pirates soon follows. Disneyland is a theme park based on the imagination of Walt Disney and his animated characters. There are 7 sections in general: Fantasyland, Tomorrowland, Adventureland, Fronteirland, Mickey’s Toontown, Critter Country, and New Orlean’s Square. As a whole, I absolutely love Disneyland. I have a lot of the merchandise and I start to itch to return to the park after about two months away. However,

My favorite part of Disneyland is the atmosphere. When you walk in, happy music is playing, everyone is smiling, and every cast member is out on Mainstreet trying to hi-five you. As you walk down the cobblestone and jump over the horse and carriage track, you wave to the Disney characters and ogle at the moving windows. The friendly beep-beep of the old motor-cars drifts over the crowds who practically skip down the street, excitedly concentrating on their goal: rides. Before the crowd disperses, one and all witnesses the marveling sight of Walt Disney himself in bronze welcoming his guests and holding the hand of an abnormally sized Mouse in front of the sparkling and bright castle. First one is drawn to the shiny flashes of the metallic space ships circling some planets. Next the rustic log cabin look of Adventureland, its wooden bridge and fence leading to every type of attraction from fast rides like Indiana Jones and slow like the Jungle Cruise.  All the way to the left, at the end of the visual scan around the center of Disneyland is Frontierland in which you can see lazy, dusty, tan porches and hear gunshots and “yeehaws” in the distance.

Rhetorical Moves

I keep thinking about my project 3 and I'm pretty sure my next move will be to use more active verbs. I will try to engage the audience and to make my paper more interesting at the same time. Right now my paper is in passive voice to refrain from offending the audience. Instead of offending, though, my paper is boring them and so turning them away. In just changing around my sentences and naming my focus, I will enliven my essay and make reading my oppposing views fun.