This blog serves the two courses I currently lead at SOF in Senior Institute Social Studies/Humanities - "The American Way of Life is Not Negotiable" and "Life Doesn't Have to be Meaningless".
1. Make Up Work & Improved Drafts - Please post these as new drafts. This will make it easier for me and others to know what's new. Hopefully each of you have the update from me of what you are missing and remember that the deadline for late & revised work is January 3 at 11pm. One of the major assignments that few people have adequately prepared is a synthesis - the "Big Paper" with an intro paragraph, material from various assignments, and weaving together of the big ideas of the course. This "Exhibition Style Paper" is an important part of the course and you should have a decent (still evolving) draft by the end of the break.
2. New Assignment - Please post one to two paragraphs describing your Winter Holidays and then a 1-2 paragraph analysis connecting your experience of these cultural rituals to the American way of life (AWOL) or dominant & marginal messages (Corporate &/or Folk) on the Good & Meaningful Life (LDH2BM).
1. Find an item (as cheap as this one or as expensive as this one) that you'd like to buy that you have the money to pay for.
2. The item should be an auction item rather than the "Buy It Now" type. Check to make sure you will be able to pay for it - don't bid on "PayPal Only" items unless you have legal and ethical access to a credit card. Most items also allow "Money Orders" which you can get at the post office in trade for cash. Don't bid on something you don't want or can't afford. You may also have to create an Ebay account if you don't already have one.
3. Consider your strategy. Decide to make an early big bid, an early low bid, or a late or very late big or low bid, or repeated bids. Consider JBidWatcher.
4. Take notes on your feelings and actions while you wait for the auction to end.
5. Write a 1-2 paragraph description of your experience and a 1-2 paragraph analysis that connects your experience of capitalism, through this assignment, to the AWOL. Please post this to your blog as a separate item by December 19, 9pm.
Some more stuff about the assignment: Ebay is a great example of how capitalism has permeated the American Way of Life. Everything in the world seems to be for sale and regular people are doing most of the buying and selling.
For our purposes of gaining insight into the forces shaping our lives we can analyze the strategies used by buyers and sellers and the mindset, habits, and effects on our lives that are engendered by participation in this particular free market. Since Ebay is a particularly free market that is hugely popular in the US we can gain a sense of how capitalism, in a relatively pure form, affects us.
I urge you to actually bid on and win an item on Ebay so you have the full effect of participation. I also hope that many of you will bid and lose so you get that experience as well. Of course I am unable to monitor your actions through Ebay and have little desire to be an omniscient tracker of your online activities. So if you track items ("watch this item") and record bids and starting and ending prices, etc., then you will be able to successfully approximate (fake) the assignment. This activity is yet another "real world simulation" like the auction we did this past Friday.
Be warned that some people get addicted to Ebay and that in general looking at a computer screen (even if it saves you money and gets you cool stuff) is not a really adequate substitute for living.
The main idea is to add to your big paper. We've been working on two frameworks that dominate the American Way of Life - capitalism and government.
For capitalism you can add to the big paper insights into how it affects what we do, what we think about, what we hope for, how our lives are shaped that draw from the auction and your early work on the Ebay assignment.
For government you can cut and paste and edit material from your A, B, C, and D assignments about the constitution. Especially D asks you to draw connections between the documented structure of US government and how we live.
In 101 today you can work on several different projects.
The main reason we're down here is so that you can add to your big paper. The main thing we've been working on the past week that you can add includes this set of concepts:
1. The "marginal messages of commodified culture" are those messages sold to us by advertisements, movies, tv, music videos, books, magazines, etc that define the good and meaningful life in a way which is unusual. These "marginal messages" expand the range of visions of a good and meaningful life both by offering new visions and also by (to some degree) contradicting the dominant corporate messages on the good and meaningful life.
2. Some examples and sources of marginal corporate messages on the good and meaningful life.
3. Some weaving and analysis of these messages to show their significance - to demonstrate their kinship (or successful divorce) with dominant corporate messages - to claim them as personally powerful in your own understanding or relegate them as insignificant compared to the tsunami of dominant messages - to theorize why the corporations put them out - to consider the argument that corporations manage (with our complicity) to "commodify our dissent".
You can also make up late work - here's what was due as of last week.
thought i should put this online too - same one i gave you in september.
General Rubric for Assignments
10 – Among the best work done in the class. It fulfills all criteria from the assignment, is strong with thought-provoking ideas, has flavor and beauty, and has been revised and polished. This work is deep, colorful, and clean and would be welcomed by college professors.
9 – Good work, impressive. Reveals some strong ideas and areas of beauty or has been highly revised and polished –doesn’t quite manage to combine polish with strength.
8 – Solid job. Shows ideas and flashes of aesthetics but requires work to build those into a more powerful project.
7 – Decent work. The assignment has been completed without just “going through the motions”. Alternatively the work might have some strengths but have missed part of the assignment.
6 – Getting there. The work seems somewhat perfunctory – as though it were done last second or without intention. Doesn’t seem to have benefited from thinking time or from revision.
5 – Halfway – Most of the assigned work is minimally done with one or two decent parts.
4 – Partway – Most of the assigned work is minimally done.
3 – Something – Some of the assigned work is minimally done.
2 – A gesture – A bit of the assigned work is minimally done.
What's already been assigned in the 2nd quarter and what should be posted on your blogs?
Draft of Big Paper (intro paragraph connecting what we've been learning to a general theory of the American Way of Life - especially including "defining aspects" (freedom, opportunity, etc) and "dominant frameworks" (political and economic systems). sections on "dominant frameworks" - connecting what you've learned in basic economics to the AWOL and connecting what you've learned
Big Paper (intro paragraph linking various assignments to the question of how to live a good and meaningful life - sections on your perspective, other peoples' perspectives, dominant corporate perspective, etc)
Thanksgiving post (how was your thanksgiving? did genocide come up as a topic? what does this cultural ritual reveal about efforts to live a good and meaningful life?)
Black Friday/BND post (did you shop or not-shop? what is your analysis of the connection between these contradictory cultural rituals and efforts to live well and meaningfully? connect your personal experience to your theories of larger patterns.)
Trampled Wal-Mart worker post (what does this show about how people live? about people's priorities? about our culture? if anything? use specific evidence.)
Part A: You've done - mostly in class - a longer assignment regarding the first chunk of the Constitution (listed below). Please post the following parts.
Paraphrase preamble and list powers and responsibilities of the 3 branches of the federal government.
Please describe your feelings while reading and taking notes on the Constitution - awe, excitement, boredom, frustration?
Pick 5 of your best insights and questions from the 10 you constructed about the Preamble and first 3 articles.
Part B (Post separately from A):
Select 2 of your responses to the questions regarding Articles 4-7. Develop each to become a brief but sharp and interesting 2 paragraph essay.
Select 2 of your responses to the Bill of Rights. Develop each to become a brief but sharp and interesting 2-3 paragraph essay.
Part C (Post separately from A & B)
Select 2 of your responses to the questions regarding the 12-15th amendments. Develop each into a brief but sharp and interesting 2-3 paragraph essay.
Describe the amendment from the rest of the list (16-27) that you find most significant and make an argument for why we should consider it especially important.
Part D (Post separately from A, B, and C)
Post your further-developed thoughts on question 1 in a 2-4 paragraph mini-essay.
Post your further developed thoughts on question 4 in a 2-5 paragraph essay.
Post your further developed thoughts on question 5 in a 3-7 paragraph essay.
Consider the habits of mind to start your thinking and writing process. What is the main point? What are other ways of seeing this - where might there be controversy? Why does this matter? What does this connect to? Then make a brainstorm list of topics or a concept map. Then write a rough draft. Print it out and add and change. Make a new draft. Share with someone smart and get them to make comments. Post the 3rd draft.
Post online the above. Do not post the below, which is just here to make a record of the original class assignments. Deeper In the Constitution A: Part 1: Preamble:
Memorize Preamble – use chunking and sequencing techniques. Chunking - “we the people” – “in order to FORM a more perfect union” “ESTABLISH justice” – Sequencing - FEIPPSoe
Paraphrase Preamble Effectively – look up words you don’t know. Read the blue ink. Write it down.
Be able to explain various goals listed in Preamble to each other and instructor.
Critical thinking about preamble – what isn’t listed? What is a lie or a distortion or spin? Think it through and write down a few ideas, a few skeptical questions.
Part 2: Articles 1-3 of the Constitution:
Read through each article and take notes on each.
List powers and responsibilities and facts about each branch in your notes
Read explanations by textbook editors (blue ink) for each section
Read crossed out (amended) parts.
Create 10 questions or interesting analyses/ideas about the 1st 3 sections and the Preamble.
B: Part 3: Articles 4-7
Read and paraphrase the “Full Faith & Credit” provision in Article 4. What does that mean for gay marriage? Explain.
Read through the rest of Article 4 – Paraphrase the amended portion that begins, “No person held to … may be due.” Why does this matter?
Article 5 – Please make a flow chart of the two processes for amending the Constitution. What is the one rule which can’t be amended? What would the Convention route look like today?
Article 6: What is the Supreme Law of the Land? What is the significance, in your opinion, of the “No religious test” clause.
Article 7: What was necessary for the ratification of the Constitution? Why “Conventions” not “State Legislatures?” Why 9? Does this seem like a fair process to you? Why or why not?
Part 4: The Bill of Rights
Read and paraphrase in writing the first 10 amendments.
Please draw all the things that the government can’t block, because of the 1st amendment – one image for each of the 6 clauses.
Does the 2nd Amendment seem to you to allow “well-organized militias” to have guns, or to allow all people to have guns? Make an argument
Is the 4th Amendment contradicted by MTA, library, and/or airport searches?
What do the 6th & 7th Amendments show about US fears of a bad government which would use its powers to unfairly arrest and convict innocent people?
Do “lethal injection” and/or the “electric chair” contradict the 8th amendment? Why/why not?
What do the 9th remind us about where rights ultimately come from? Are they given by government? What are some of the “others retained by the people” in your opinion? Is abortion one of them?
What does the 10th Amendment say about the national government’s powers? Can the federal government take over the public school system? Can the Congress pass a law allowing gay marriage or denying it?
C: Part 5
What does Amendment 11 indicate about the relative power of the federal government versus state governments (a question which 65 years later led to the US Civil War)?
Amendments 12, 13, 14, & 15 are often referred to as a major turning point in US government policy. Explain the importance of these amendments.
Why do you suppose these amendments were passed when they were - given how popular white supremacy has been in the US?
Does the 14th combine with the earlier "no religious test" clause to guarantee a vision of a diverse and equitable society with no government discrimination?
Why do you suppose the US government betrayed these ideals so frequently and so deeply from 1868 to 2008? Provide 3 of these betrayals or, if you prefer, of times when the US government realized these promises during difficult times.
Does the 14th amendment seem to you to require the US government to overrule state government laws against gay marriage? Should the US government also step in to protect fetuses - as "persons" - from states that allow abortions? What about stepping in to guarantee women's right to the liberty of control of their own body and reproductive choices? What do your answers to the gay marriage, fetus-as-person, and reproductive rights questions suggest to you about the potential and problems in enforcing the 14th amendment? Specifically consider the following section - "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
Part 6: The rest of the Constitution
Please read the rest of the amendments and write a sentence or two summarizing the meaning of each. If you get stuck check out some help from the textbook or wikipedia.
Evaluate Amendments 11-27 - which are the most powerful? Which are the most important?
D: Part 7: Thinking Further
Given the distinction between a constitutional amendment and a law - if you had the influence how would you amend the constitution?
Is the Constitution a possibly divinely inspired document that provides a nearly perfect structure of freedom and responsibility to the US government? Describe 2-3 aspects of the Constitution and Amendments that could support this argument.
Is the Constitution an elaborate sham - a fake-out - a big founding fathers PSYYYCH!? Identify 2-3 aspects of the Constitution and Amendments that could support this argument.
What is the general tendency of the Constitution and Amendments in your view - general and steady expansion of human freedom and decency? Reverses and contradictions in no particular direction? Ever increasing betrayal of democratic ideals by corrupt officials? A record of an eternal battle between the evil and good sides of humanity? Explain your fundamental perspective regarding the Constitution and provide a few arguments (including some citations of the Constitution itself) that support your position.
How does the Constitution, as amended, create/constrain/shape the American Way of Life?
As negotiated I created grades based 50% on class work and 50% on assignments. The assignments I graded are below and were graded according to the “General Rubric” that emphasizes insight and also careful revision. The class work was graded (unscientifically) based on the rubric I provided, which emphasizes having notebook out for review, nurturing your own questions and interests related to the class, being present and on time, and participating constructively in groups and whole class efforts.
Assignments – Both Courses: Video & Writing Project 1 (x2) Responses to VWP1 Other Peoples’ Perspectives
Additional AWOL Assignments: I Pencil Summary, Quotes, Analysis
Additional LDH2NBMeaningless Assignments: Music Video Analysis Music Video Analysis Responses (1/2)
I was able to accurately construct high grades for some students (top was 98%) – with a handful of As. A second hands and toes batch of students had done all the work but not necessarily always consistently excellent and ended up with something between 75%-89%. Some students managed to pass without having done all the assignments (65%-74%). And some students were pretty close to passing based on having done well on a couple assignments or done poorly on a number. And some students published no work and failed by a large margin (36% was the low). In all more than 40% of students failed the course, pretty even by gender and I’ve not analyzed race and class – and this is roughly true of Jeremy Copeland’s class too.
There are two major alternatives for dealing with these grades to address the large numbers of students who failed. The first is that the teachers could lower expectations, and just pass everyone who shows up and doesn’t mess up the discussions, and so on. A person who used to teach at SOF called this “a gentlemen’s 65”. The other alternative is that the 40% of failing students lift their effort and get work done and try to learn as much as they can. I’ve chosen, for my courses, the second option. SOF is aiming to be one of the best schools in the city along with Bard & Beacon & Baruch, for each of the students who is here roughly 9 students applied for their seat. We prepare all students for college and for completing intellectually challenging exhibitions. If you’re not willing or able to do work you should at least consider transferring to a school where you can be more successful.
Specific Questions: What if I think my grade is unfair? You’re entitled to appeal any specific assignment grade that you feel is off by 2 or more points. In other words if you got a 7 but believe you deserve a 10 you can appeal. But you can’t appeal if you think the score is off by 1-2 points. In general if you think a score is too low its probably a sign you should re-read the assignment and the rubric. There are no appeals of the class work scores.
How will these quarter grades affect my semester grade? I will average the two quarter grades, perhaps with an extra “mid-term” final grade, to compute your semester grade. That will be an average of your exact score – and if you failed the quarter it will be with your actual 63% or actual 36%. I will make one exception to the strict averaging – I plan to allow students who earn above a 90% (and only those students) in the second quarter to do an extra credit project to offset the potentially lower first quarter grade.
But this isn’t fair, is it? No, I don’t think grades tend to be fair or particularly helpful. We’ve talked about that. But what grades you are given will be at least accurate to the best of my ability.
But I had technological problems, that’s not fair! There was class time, computer lab time, and plenty of help available. Computers and the internet are available at every public library and in many other locations as well. It is your job to solve problems that hinder your learning, not to use them as excuses for not learning.
If I want to talk to you about my grades what should I do? You should write a polite and detailed email that states what you see as the problem, include your scores as of the mid-October grades, and seek to propose a clear and fair and just solution. My email address is at the bottom of the UTFL.net page.
1. Compare this election to Bush v Gore – In 2000 Bush/Cheney (not strong candidates) almost beat the Democrats that were able to claim responsibility for a strong economy, no wars, budget surpluses, etc. Obama as the best candidate in U.S. history with huge financial support and a skilled grassroots organizing and vote-getting machine was campaigning against an unskilled and ludicrous Republican ticket that was allied to the super-unpopular President Bush II who was responsible for a disastrous financial crisis, a recession, two losing wars, record gas prices, Katrina, WTC, housing market collapse, etc. And Obama only wins 52% to 46% - 55,500,000 still voted for the Republican. This is not a massive swing to enlightenment among the American people that folks in NYC & Europe want to see.
2. my favorite comment on the election, from ranprieur.com - "November 5. I might be the only Obama voter who is disappointed. He did not beat the polls, despite his massive ground game and all the cell phone voters, and he had short coattails, with Democrats doing a bit worse than expected in House and Senate races. In my own state, which Obama won by 16 points, two brilliant Democrats, Darcy Burner and Peter Goldmark, might yet lose to mediocre Republicans. California, which Obama won by 24 points, voted to ban gay marriage. I don't see a progressive surge -- I see the most exceptional presidential candidate in decades doing everything right and still needing luck to win. If McCain had picked Tom Ridge as VP, and the financial collapse had happened two months later, the pundits would now be saying that America is not ready for a black president, that the 50 state strategy was a blunder, that a massive volunteer network is a waste of time, that rural white voters are real Americans and college students are out of touch.
This is not the dawning of a new era. We put out a fire, and there are more coming. It's going to be interesting to see what the Republican party does now. The smart move is to rebuke the wingnuts, move back to center-right, and be patient. If they do that, they'll be the dominant party again before 2020. The bold move is to go old-fashioned populist, culturally conservative and economically socialist. That would change everything, but I don't think they have the balls. And the stupid move is to go even farther to the right. That's also the most dangerous move for the country, because they might just get some lucky breaks and win."
3. Obama is going to be HATED by the lunatic-right-wing (already is - they shout "kill him" and "arab" when his name comes up) - maybe 15% of the population? he will be jesus to the 20% of liberals (occasionally a disappointing jesus, but if you read the gospels you can see that is also part of the role). and the rest of the people will believe a mixture of the right wing and the liberals, hope and fear in a bad tasting combination. i think his ability to carry out his idealistic but pragmatic reform policies such as universal health care through a federal program that is set up to move us towards single-payer like in canada, taxing the rich more, more diplomacy, some slow-down on greenhouse gases, some alternative energy, etc will be limited by the recession and financial crisis and by the ravings of the rightwing. but he might slow down the movement of the u.s. towards chaos and idiocy.
4. Compare Obama’s upcoming Presidency to Clinton’s – In 1992 Clinton won office over Bush I in the middle of a mild recession – raised taxes on rich people and created Family & Medical Leave policy but failed to pass his biggest promise – universal health care legislation and had to compromise on gays in the military. By 1994 the rightwing surged & won 54 additional seats and control of the House with the “Contract with America”.
5. There has been a lot of talk about the powerful effects on the culture of having a “Black President.” It is probably true that some people (ethnic minorities especially) who have been told not to dream too big will feel encouraged to dream bigger. But it is also likely that the election of this mixed-race President will be taken as an opportunity for people to say that Blacks and others should “stop whining” and “shut up and act like everything is fair”. But everything is not fair – African-Americans are far more likely to deal with the problems of poverty and discrimination than European-Americans – and that is a result of the historical legacy of slavery and white supremacist policy in the U.S. And that legacy doesn’t go “poof” just because we have another outstanding Black celebrity – just as Tiger Woods, Oprah Winfrey, and Michael Jackson didn’t guarantee equal opportunities and basic dignity for all ethnic minorities. Bottom line – Black and Hispanic and Asian children still face an unfair burden of poverty and discrimination and Obama would have to be a miracle worker, not just President, to change that.
6. Obama and many of his supporters have pointed to the crucial role of engaged volunteers and activists in getting him elected and that his election is “not the change, just the chance to make the change.” But what are we all supposed to do? Its pretty clear how to organize volunteers to win an election – phone calls, door knocking, working at the campaign office, etc. How do we organize the millions of enthusiastic and principled supporters of the Obama campaign to end the war in Iraq? Create non-profit universal health care? Guarantee a decent childhood to poor Black and Hispanic and all other children? Transfer the economy from an Earth-plundering model to a sustainable ecological economy?
Basics of the US System of Government According to the Dominant Perspective
1. Constitution: The US system of government is based on a written constitution which is “the highest law of the land”. In other words, the U.S. is “a nation of laws” where everyone has to follow the published rules. This contrasts with the “bad old days” of a King who could just change the rules to suit his own situation and desire for unlimited power. 2. Federalism: The US system divides power between the national, state, and local governments who all make policy choices. This contrasts with France or China – in which stronger centralized governments make policy which “lower” governments 3. Checks & Balances: The US constitution set up a system in which 3 Branches of government limit each others powers. This was intended to prevent the situation of “power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely”. 4. Separation of Powers – Each of the 3 branches has separate powers. 5. Legislative Branch –Article 1 of the Constitution - The Congress – Is bicameral – the Senate (100 people 2 from each state even Nebraska) and the House of Representatives (435 voting members – depends on state population according to Census). Powers include making laws, taxing, approving treaties, approving appointments to Supreme Court. 6. Executive Branch – Article 2 of the Constitution – The President – Now limited to 2 4 year terms (amendment). Powers include negotiating treaties, signing legislation, vetoing legislation, appointing applicants to the Supreme Court. 7. Judicial Branch – Article 3 of the Constitution – 9 members – Powers include (since Marbury vs Madison) the claim as the highest interpreter of the Constitution (decides what laws are legal and what laws are illegal). 8. Checks & Balances include: a. The President can check the Congress by vetoing legislation (but the Congress can override the veto with a 2/3rds majority). b. The President can influence the Supreme Court by appointing its new members. c. The Supreme Court can check the Congress and the President by declaring actions and legislation unconstitutional and by interpreting the existing laws how it wants. d. The Congress can check the President by refusing to approve appointments, by overriding vetoes, by negating treaties, by refusing to declare war, by refusing to raise more money, by refusing to spend money. e. The Congress can check the Supreme Court by creating Constitutional Amendments. 9. Limited Government - The Constitution (esp the Bill of Rights) limits government and protects the rights of the people from government interference and oppression. Actually a major goal of the Constitution is to limit government to limit democracy - the Constitution was set up in such a way as to limit the power of ordinary people to use government to create a more equal society. For instance, if the House of Representatives (the part of government most controlled by the people) voted to divide rich peoples estates the Senate could negate that. Or if the Senate passed it, the President could veto it. Or if the President signed it the Supreme Court could declare it unconstitutional. 10. Electoral College – A way of making sure that a President has broad support across the country, not just in a single region. (Actually a screwed up attempt to ensure that the regular people didn’t get to pick the President). 11. Republic not a democracy.
We are born and we all die. What should we do with the time in between?
I have ideas of what makes a good and meaningful life. The people I interviewed, friends and strangers, also have various perspectives of what makes a life meaningful and good. Where did we get these ideas? Are these ideas helpful or misleading? Most of our most deeply held beliefs about the good and meaningful life are received from the larger culture. The larger culture can be considered a combination of three major sources - corporate/commodified culture, folk culture, and big subcultures.
My ideas about a good & meaningful life 1 My ideas about a good and meaningful life 2 Other peoples ideas about a good and meaningful life 1 Other peoples ideas about a good and meaningful life 2 Defining corporate/commodified culture and raising the question of messages it sends (dominant, marginal, prohibited) Corporate messages 1 - Music video 1 Corporate messages 2 - Music video 2 Corporate messages 3 - Film 1
The American Way of Life is fundamentally organized around several dominant frameworks, including mixed capitalism and a representative government. In order to understand the choices individuals make in our culture - how we are able to live - we have to be able to understand these dominant frameworks.
The framework of capitalism is extremely important for both the actual physical structures of our society, what we do all day, and for our ideology - what we think, what we desire, what we fear, what we believe. What is the dominant understanding of capitalism - the kind you'd get from someone who took an economics class in high school or as a freshperson at college? Introductory courses to capitalism describe it as an economic system based on private ownership of wealth, free enterprise in a market system devoted to profit, and the ...
I've already asked you to post a one page synopsis of the dominant understanding of capitalist economics. Free markets, supply and demand, the circular flow, profit motive, the invisible hand, upward mobility, the factors of production, etc are concepts that should be included in your work. Note, I'm not asking whether you agree or disagree with this view of capitalism - I'm asking you to show that you can articulate and understand it. If you still don't understand it, please use google and wikipedia.
In addition I would like you to read 2 (or all) of the following pro-capitalist essays and include citations, paraphrases, and reactions to the essays in a revised draft (separately posted) of your synopsis of the dominant perspective on capitalist economics. We are headed toward a long paper on how capitalism affects the AWOL - this is the component by advocates of capitalism, and should increase your synopsis to 1.5-3 pages.
Capitalism Saves - An essay arguing capitalism is responsible for longer and better lives.
Milton Friedman - The most famous economist with a radical pro-capitalism, pro-free markets perspective. Recently died and this is a collection of excerpts from texts and interviews. Wikipedia Article - This is the dominant perspective in "neutral" text.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
My Lip Gloss:
1. What is the song basically saying about how to live a good life? Paraphrase the main idea. The "good life" that the protagonist pursues in the "My Lip Gloss" video is to be cool. Being cool is associated with a number of specific items - using expensive products, getting a lot of sexual attention from the other sex, being resented by people of the same sex, the authorities praising you and wanting to imitate you. The video also shows a couple other themes - being famous (on the computers), using your powers to invigorate your chosen followers with amazing powers, running for class president, sparking a unified dance scene from the masses, commanding everyone's attention.
2. What lyrics particularly speak to that perspective? Use quotes as evidence. "I just want to be a part of the cool crowd." That's Lil Mama's sole spoken ambition to set up the video and it is shared by everyone we see in the video. The skinny boy wearing blue is being pushed around by the mean kids in the hall but Lil Mama blows her magic lip gloss breath at him and he flips the script and drops his glasses and starts dancing the dance. He is now cool. Towards the end of the song ("8th period") the dean calls her to the office and asks Lil Mama to write down "where you get yours [lip gloss] from." Even the dean wants to be cool - dramatized in the video by letting her hair go free.
3. How do the video images support, re-orient, or challenge the dominant theme of the lyrics? Analyze. The video extends the song in several ways. Each "becoming cool" moment is symbolized by a physical transformation - dropping the glasses, freeing the hair, dunking, being on the computers. But it is still all about being cool - being extraordinary - being the center of attention. Nothing particularly good or important is done (no ending of poverty or recognition of human solidarity or struggle against oppression) - other than a kind of carnival-like interruption of the normal school day. But hey - carnivalesque interruption of the school day (with those in power approving us but in their offices) is actually, as Lil Mama states later, "like wow".
4. What else do you notice that's interesting? Look for internal contradictions, aspects of the message that resonate with other messages from the pop culture, points that connect to your own perspective, etc. Analyze squared. The dumb little ending "It wasn't the lip gloss it was you all along." Like Dumbo's feather and 10 other little revelation tropes (the ending scene in the film version of "the Natural") we are taught that the fetish we identify with isn't the real source of our power. This is the opposite of, for instance, the story of Samson.
In the context of "becoming cool" the message here is that the expensive product allows you to access the real power inside of you - the product is just a necessary "prop" but you are really the star. But that still leaves a big role for the expensive product - Lil Mama can "upgrade you" - but remember that L'Oreal isn't the real deal, its you that matters.
This is not interesting. This is the main line of advertising which both flatters our specialness and attacks our insecurity - the main message of advertising is that "our product can help you access your innate wonderfulness". So "My Lip Gloss" is simply a commercial hip hop fantasy that replicates corporate make-up commercials. The lack of any critical "edge" is made even more clear by the fact that in "My Lip Gloss" the mother is sympathetic and wise and the Dean is full of praise and wants to imitate the protagonist. So even the authority figures are conspiring to support the extraordinariness of the teen. This extraordinariness, then, can't be a rebellion against the established authority figures, but it can be a party in the lunch room. Which probably won't pose much danger to capitalism.
One other quick interesting point was that the video showed the protagnist and all her teen friends faces on the (macintosh) computer screens. That's today - facebook, myspace, etc. But then they say, "No music" and the scene abruptly breaks to the "real" images of the teen and her circle and she's spitting rhymes to just hand claps. This distinction between the "virtual" and "real" in a video which is actually itself faked and virtual, is kind of weird. The distinction "fake" and "real" is of course what the "Lip Gloss" thing is about - and maybe the confusion between the two is what "cool" is about.
Finally there is something weird going on with the emphases in "I be rubbing it" but I'll leave that to others to analyze.
Messages on the Good & Meaningful Life from Popular Culture - Part 1
Please watch the following three videos. If you see something objectionable to your family's sense of what you should be seeing - please stop watching and talk to me about it.
After you watch all three videos please select one to analyze. You should address the following questions: 1. What is the song basically saying about how to live a good life? Paraphrase the main idea. 2. What lyrics particularly speak to that perspective? Use quotes as evidence. 3. How do the video images support, re-orient, or challenge the dominant theme of the lyrics? Analyze. 4. What else do you notice that's interesting? Look for internal contradictions, aspects of the message that resonate with other messages from the pop culture, points that connect to your own perspective, etc. Analyze squared.
Please type up your response, read it over, revise it, and post it by Monday, Oct. 20 at 8:50am. Please devote 50 minutes to 2 hours of concentrated attention to this effort.
What makes a life meaningful? What are the most meaningful aspects of our lives? Do we find our own lives meaningful? I posed these and other questions, all related to the big question, "How should we live?", to numerous people I know, people in the street, and during classes. To make sense of all the different answers I constructed categories for them. The distinction I found most thought-provoking was the one between individualist & collectivist responses. Collectivist responses centered on relationships, structures, and groups. Individualist answers focused more on a single person’s achievements, hopes, and processes.
The most popular collectivist answer was that the family is the most meaningful aspect of our lives. This was probably the majority answer in the people I spoke with. Is this as self-evident as it seems to most people? What is it about families that makes them such centers of meaning in our lives? When I asked a black middle-school student to elaborate on his immediate answer of “family” he said that, “They are there for you when you need them and take care of you” and “They love me.” I asked him if the important aspect was that they loved him, or that he loved them and he said, “Both.”
This sense that a life's meaning emanates from loving bidirectional relationships - from relationships characterized by trust and mutual support - was dominant. But support for what? Love based on what grounds? It seems that most of the people I spoke to are living in a role based game - a kind of Dickens world - where all the actions we take outside the family have their ultimate purpose in just kind of hanging out at home together. You are supposed to love the people you hang out at home with and support them through various struggles and expect the same from them. Love doesn't have to be earned and mutual support is assumed. Family is a kind of warm & cuddly nest and a refuge from the cold and pokey world outside.
But is this really the most meaningful aspects of our lives? When I asked a gringo middle-school student to describe why family mattered most to him he also spoke of love and support. But when I asked if, after high school, he would be leaving the family nest and moving away to go to college he unhesitatingly said, "Yes." I tried to sharpen the contradiction, "If your family is the most meaningful aspect of your life why would you ever leave it?" But he didn't seem to see one - in our culture these days we center our emotional lives around our birth family as children and then abandon the birth family for career and individual "success" and then create a new family as adults. We try (often unsuccessfully) to merge the childhood families and adult families rarely - at Thanksgiving Day dinners or Christmas gatherings.
The people of the United States take the American Way of Life pretty seriously, even if they have a hard time articulating exactly what it is. Many people I spoke to were unsure of how to define the American Way of Life, or spoke in vague generalities, or said they didn't know. The ones who did have a strong sense of the concept also often had a strong opinion on the topic. I think this contrast between those who had ideas to share and those who didn't is a sign of the split between people who think about the culture and people who just live in it (like, "Fish in the water who don't know they're wet."). Now thinking about something doesn't guarantee insight - but at least insight is made possible.
Several of the people on the street said, "No idea" and my friend Heather said, "No comment". A young Hispanic woman just said she thought it was good here but the prices were too high and there weren't enough jobs.
On the other hand some felt strongly about the topic. One gentleman (middle-classed gay gringo) said that freedom was the defining aspect of the American Way of Life and that freedom was rooted in the Bill of Rights - a guarantee against government oppression. An older gringo woman spoke of freedom and flags and how people who are critical of the country should move overseas.
What do the people around you think of the “American Way of Life?
Please answer the question in 1000 words or less.
You could consider multiple aspects of the question – definitions of the AWOL, pros and cons, how much people seems to have thought about it, etc.
Do not just list “Tina said this and Diego said that.” Figure out a pattern or two so that you can weave quotes and paraphrases together.
Patterns:
For two patterns you can name your first pattern and then the other one could be the answers that didn’t fit the first - “While 2/3rds of the people I spoke to indicated ____, the other third had various other points of view.”
Once you’ve got your essay please add three illustrations to embed in the text. These illustrations could be your own photographs or drawings – scanned or uploaded. They could be illustrations or photos from the internet. They should add an additional flavor, an interesting juxtaposition, or a demonstration of your argument.
Please complete the rough draft by Thursday October 9, 9pm and post it asking your assigned partner for specific feedback. Then revise and post the finished copy by Sunday October 12 at noon.
YLDH2BM Assignment 3: Short Essay with Illustrations
What do the people around you say about living meaningfully?
Please answer the question in 1000 words or less.
You could consider multiple aspects of the question – whether meaningfulness is objective or subjective, what parts of their lives they find most meaningful, how they know what matters to them most, etc.
Do not just list “Tina said this and Diego said that.” Figure out a pattern or two so that you can weave quotes and paraphrases together.
Patterns:
For two patterns you can name your first pattern and then the other one could be the answers that didn’t fit the first - “While 2/3rds of the people I spoke to indicated ____, the other third had various other points of view.”
Once you’ve got your essay please add three illustrations to embed in the text. These illustrations could be your own photographs or drawings – scanned or uploaded. They could be illustrations or photos from the internet. They should add an additional flavor, an interesting juxtaposition, or a demonstration of your argument.
Please complete the rough draft by Thursday October 9, 9pm and post it asking your assigned partner for specific feedback. Then revise and post the finished copy by Sunday October 12 at noon.
I have made the following changes to my proposal in light of student feedback. I will make 50% of the number grade (quarters and semesters) from participation – which includes some aspects of observable effort. There is a rubric below. I have also clarified, below, the general rubric for assignments and work policy.
So here’s the basic idea – your work will be judged ONLY on excellence/achievement.
These scores will be put in a place where you can see them (probably online) and are non-negotiable, except in case of grave injustice involving more than 2 points (i.e. I score a 7 but you are convinced it is a 10). In case of grave injustices we will ask Josh Marks to serve as the Appeals Judge and he will be allowed to either change your score to the one you’ve claimed or to keep it as I originally scored it – but not to compromise. Work is eligible for this appeal process only when posted on time. You are limited to 2 unsuccessful appeals per year - successful appeals are not limited.
Each assignment will be weighted based on the relative work involved in the assignments – projects that require more work will be “worth” more. These weighted scores will be calculated into a “work score” and this will be 50% of your grade but also revealed separately from the total score.
The other 50% will be “participation” strictly using the rubric below. This will not be an “automatic” score nor will it be one where the teacher will say, “What does she need for the 65?” This score will be part of the total score but also revealed separately. These "soft skills" are also an important part of your learning - as several of you argued Monday.
General Rubric for Assignments 10 – Among the best work done in the class. It fulfills all criteria from the assignment, is strong with thought-provoking ideas, has flavor and beauty, and has been revised and polished. This work is deep, colorful, and clean and would be welcomed by college professors. 9 – Good work, impressive. Reveals some strong ideas and areas of beauty or has been highly revised and polished –doesn’t quite manage to combine polish with strength. 8 – Solid job. Shows ideas and flashes of aesthetics but requires work to build those into a more powerful project. 7 – Decent work. The assignment has been completed without just “going through the motions”. Alternatively the work might have some strengths but have missed part of the assignment. 6 – Getting there. The work seems somewhat perfunctory – as though it were done last second or without intention. Doesn’t seem to have benefited from thinking time or from revision. 5 – Halfway – Most of the assigned work is minimally done with one or two decent parts. 4 – Partway – Most of the assigned work is minimally done. 3 – Something – Some of the assigned work is minimally done. 2 – Better than nothing – A bit of the assigned work is minimally done. 1 – Mas que nada – A tiny bit is posted. 0 – Nothing.
Work Policy Work should be done over a period of weeks and days, not hours and minutes. By working steadily (or at least intermittently) you give yourself the chance to have ideas, to have second thoughts, to explore in different directions, to exchange notions with others (including the teacher), and to revise significantly and repeatedly.
Work done at the last second is just generally not as good - less ideas, less flavor, less revision.
Work needs to be posted on time as our class relies on the opportunity to learn from others’ work – and if yours isn’t posted when we’re looking, no one will learn from it. Work that is more than a day late may be discounted a point and work that is a week or more late may be discounted 2 points. The “late” discount will not drop a score below 6.
Participation Rubric 50 - (12.5 each)
Sharp, succinct, and thoughtful contributions to class or group discussion at least 3x a week that contribute to the depth of our collective understandings
Consistently present, on time, and focused (95%)
Lead and focus and support others in group work and learning activities
Prepared with all assigned work but with additional aspects and questions to explore actively
45 - (11.25 each)
Strong and thoughtful contributions to class or group discussion at least 3x a week that contribute to our collective understandings
Consistently present, on time, and focused (95%)
A strong member in keeping groups and learning activities focused and worthwhile
Well prepared for class – did the reading, finished the work, notebook out to consult yesterday’s notes before today’s course begins
40 - (10 each)
Thoughtful contributions to class or group weekly
Usually present, on time, and focused (85%)
An active member in groups
Ready to make the most of class – writing down ideas and paying attention so that you can learn more from the assignments
35 - (8.75 each)
Occasional contributions to class or group
Often present and on time and usually focused (75%)
Doesn’t mess up the group
Goes through the motions usually but sometimes gets interested
30 - (7.5 or less each)
Rarely or never contributes to class or group
Often absent or late or distracted
Distracts the group
Sometimes secretly texts, flirts, disappears during class, generally avoids having to learn anything from the class
Tentative Grading Plan – September 29, 2008 – Andy
We have explored the functions of grading – such as helping colleges sort which students to take, families to have a sense of their student’s progress, a student to have some feedback on her achievement., and extrinsic motivation (carrot and stick) for students to do assigned work.
We also discussed the problems associated with grading – such as deforming the learning process, antagonizing the relationship between learner and teacher, the distraction of “whatdja get” instead of “what did you learn”, the indignity of being stamped.
We have talked about the various aspects of schooling that could be usefully quantified – such as learning, effort, achievement, time spent, contributions, etc. We can’t just create an “ideal” plan without paying attention to our particular situation. Virtually all students are trying to play the college admissions game and so want grades. Most students are used to prioritizing graded work over non-graded work, so again grades are useful. I have almost 100 students so many measurements of each student aren’t possible.
Given that most of the functions of grading (family, student, and college feedback) have to do with achievement I plan to focus my grading on the quality of the work. Here’s what I propose – I assign a number grade (1-10) to each important assignment – with 10 being the best reachable grade by two or more people. I weight the assignments in terms of their importance/time-commitment. At the end of the quarter (or even before) I share those assigned scores with you. But also at the end of the quarter you prepare a brief analysis of your own effort and learning. I write a quick note agreeing, disagreeing, nuancing, contextualizing, or stating my ignorance. This method allows your family to gain insight into this important aspect of your experience.
Potential Concerns: 1. What if the assigned 1-10 scores seem wrong/unfair/too-rigourous? Can I negotiate my grades with you? The scores will suffer from human imperfection. I will always state the major aspects to consider as an informal or formal rubric and I will often provide a model of what I’m hoping you’ll make. And I’ll start with the strongest actual work and then grade from there so that I don’t hold you to graduate school standards. But I will not have time to debate whether a work deserved a 9 instead of an 8.
2. Won’t you be wasting your time looking at my work like a judge looks at beauty contestants discussing poverty? I do worry that it will be a waste of time judging that I could have spent planning curriculum, giving thoughtful feedback, or working with a particular student. It seems factory-like and artificial to me. But it also seems necessary in our particular situation. I do plan to limit the time I devote to grading to enable me to do a good job on the work I value more - actually teaching.
3. How exactly will this “effort and learning” thing work? At the end of the quarter you will spend time going back over your notebook and your blog. You will identify times you worked at maximum capacity and otherwise. You will assess whether your skills and understanding have increased dramatically, substantially, marginally, or not at all. You will record your results on a single typed sheet of paper (two headings – Effort and Learning) and I will stamp or scrawl a quick note with any thoughts I have on the topics. You will share this with your family at the same time you give them your official progress report.
4. Some people aren’t as good at reading or writing or thinking – is it fair to grade them lower? This is a valid concern – to some extent achievement grades will simply recognize the people who had existing skills and understandings and also “punish” students who are already at a disadvantage. It is possible that having clean feedback on your achievement might help you learn to make your work better by thinking more before you start it, getting feedback from friends and an adult before revising it, and doing the best you can.
The major benefit of putting your work on blogs is to enable you to exchange your work easily with other students. You can learn from them and they can learn from you.
On this blog there is a set of links to each section's blog addresses. Use those links to find four students blogs' in your section, and one student's blog from the other section in the same course (2 & 4, 1 & 3).
Watch their videos and read their description and analysis. For each one you watch, please leave a brief AND SPECIFIC comment. For instance you could write, "I really liked the colors in your video" or "I really enjoyed the scene with your little brother" or "Great point about how your family is the most meaningful aspect in your way of life." After you leave those comments for the other students copy and paste them into a single post on your own blog (don't forget to note who they were for). Now on the same post please write down three insights or analyses you've gained from looking at those other peoples' work.
The insights could be ones that you read in someone else's analytical writing or they could be ones you had as a result of patterns you noticed in the films. For instance you might write, "One insight I had was how common it was for people to make videos of themselves hanging out with their friends - there was scenes like that in 4/5 of the other videos. Obviously that is an aspect of our way of life that people find very meaningful."
Please check out the other blogs, post your comments, and make your comment/insight post by noon Sunday.
DESCRIPTION: 1. What have you included in this video? This video has footage of four aspects of my life. You see me in my sun and jellyfish protective swimming gear at Brighton Beach. There is video of my friend Heather and her mom Carole and I talking at my apartment. There is the kind of strange looking footage of me reading student work on the computer in my classroom. And finally there is a brief excerpt of a lesson on revelation that I offered to some of my favorite students in last year’s Revelation course.
2. Explain how different parts of the video relate to your way of life.
All four parts of the video related to meaningful aspects of my life.
Swimming has been a big part of my life for the past year. I’ve been learning to swim well using an approach called “Total Immersion”. And for me swimming in the ocean is particularly meaningful. The ocean has been big for me my whole life – growing up in SW Florida and now living in NYC. It makes me smile when a seagull flies over me when I’m swimming backstroke.
I have lived together with Heather for more than 10 years. My chance to be friends with her and enjoy her is one of the most meaningful aspects of my life. Her mom Carole, who I also care a lot about, has recently moved to the apartment downstairs of us in Brooklyn so we have been able to share more family experiences here.
The internet is both a blessing and a curse for my life. The video shows me reading student work – this has made it possible for me to evolve a new kind of teaching in which work continues to belong to the student rather than be “handed in” to the teacher and for students to learn from each other more easily. And in general I’ve learned a lot from the internet. But the internet also represents one of the biggest pits of relative meaninglessness in my life – thousands of hours wasted on endless games of chess & go, stupid staring at the New York Times, reading forums about folding bikes, etc. I’ve tried repeatedly to reorient myself back away from the virtual and to the real, but success has been limited and intermittent.
My teaching has been one of the aspects of my life that I’ve devoted the most time, thought, and energy towards. I feel a sense of pleasure and meaningfulness in helping students to reach deeper insights about the world and themselves and the relationship between the world and themselves. I feel that I’ve been given some important gifts that teaching helps me to share. On the other hand sometimes it feels like my energy is being wasted in a factory system in which most people are just pretending, just going through the motions.
3. What’s seems good about your way of life? What’s bad? What’s neutral?
My way of life is centered around trying to create meaningful situations. Right now the main meaningful situations I’ve been able to create are my life at home, my work at SOF, and my enjoyment of nature and physicality. That’s all good. What seems bad about my way of life is how our destructive culture has paved and pounded the world and poured delusions into people. So I have to live my life surrounded by pavement and by people who yell at each other or get caught up in stupid fads and identities. I don’t get to be connected with birds and bears and dolphins.
What’s neutral – on the one hand I really appreciate that I don’t have to drive a car in NYC but on the other hand I don’t really enjoy riding the subway. I look forward to the few years between when the cars stop because of oil prices and the streets haven’t yet become unbicyclable. My relationship with food is also good & bad. I’m glad to be a member of the food coop and to be growing tomatos and peppers and arugula at the community garden. But I would prefer to be growing more of my food and knowing more of the people who grew the rest and drinking really clean water from clean rivers and streams.
4. What would you have liked to have included, that is important to your way of life, but weren’t able to? I would have liked to include footage of our plots in the Brooklyn College Community Garden since that would highlight another aspect of what I find meaningful – working with the Earth, learning how to feed ourselves, understanding our physical reality more deeply.
ANALYSIS & INSIGHT 5. What’s going on with your way of life? What seems to be the general pattern or direction or point or situation? A general pattern in my way of life is someone who is trying to experience meaningful situations. Someone who is able to focus on teaching and someone else will feed him and give him health care and housing. Someone who has time to enjoy loved ones.
6. How do the good, bad, and neutral in your way of life fit together? The good aspects of teaching and living in NYC – flavorful and generous city-dwellers, interesting students, being able to teach a self-made and meaningful curriculum, no car, access to meaningful culture are also related to the bad parts of living and teaching in NYC – mass media, pavement, too many people.
7. Does your way of life seem like a “typical American Way of Life”? Why or why not? My way of life seems in some ways typical. I have a job in “the City” and an apartment in Brooklyn so I have to commute everyday. I spend recreational time in typical places (Brighton Beach, the Botanic Garden, Prospect Park), spend a lot of time on the internet, and “exercise” regularly and eat food other people grew, often at restaurants. You don’t see me doing physical work to bring food or mine metals or fix roads.
But in some ways my life seems pretty different than most peoples’ lives in this culture. You don’t see me watching TV, driving a car, or buying fast food – three of the activities that I associate most with the AWOL. We don’t have an air-conditioner, we don’t try to distract ourselves with celebrity magazines, we don’t get stoned or drunk. We don’t go listen to preachers tell us Official Stories of Politics and Life. We aren’t struggling to get as rich as possible. We try to garden and enjoy reality as much as possible.
8. What aspects of your way of life seem really interesting to you – you’d like to think about them more deeply, figure out how this sort of thing developed historically, what’s going to happen to this aspect of your way of life within your lifetime? What questions do you have about these really interesting aspects of your way of life? How did it happen that I can not do any “real” work and still live so easily? Who is doing the real work for me? In what ways is my life now reliant on complicated and ultimately fragile social arrangements?
Guiding Questions for Analytical Writing Around Video Project 1
Meaningless: Under the heading “DESCRIPTIVE” please write 300-600 words on the following 3 descriptive questions. Under the heading “ANALYSIS & INSIGHT” please write another 300-1000 words addressing the following 5 analysis questions.
I encourage you to add in other thoughts that seem relevant as well as answering the questions – and also if you’ve thought about a question 3x and it still seems boring or repetitive, skip it or twist it..I suggest that you write a first draft in word, print it out, revise it, give it to a friend to make suggestions, revise it again, and then post it up. This writing should be in the same post as your video – the video should be embedded in the writing. GUIDING QUESTIONS - DESCRIPTION: 1. What have you included in this video? 2. Which parts of the video related to relatively meaningful aspects of your life? Which parts related to relatively meaningless aspects of your life? 3. What would you have liked to have included but weren’t able to?
GUIDING QUESTIONS - ANALYSIS & INSIGHT: 4. What seem to be some of the main criteria you use (emotionally +/or mentally) to assess how meaningful an aspect of your life is? 5. Is there a pattern in what you find meaningful or meaningless? What are some of the elements in that pattern? 6. Looking at the video as a whole – is it a fairly honest/accurate depiction of your life? Does it make you seem interesting/special/exciting? 7. Does your life seem meaningful from an outside perspective? Is it from an inside perspective? Why? 8. What questions do you have about living a meaningful life at this point?
AWOL: Under the heading “DESCRIPTIVE” please write 300-600 words on the following 4 descriptive questions. Under the heading “ANALYSIS & INSIGHT” please write another 300-1000 words addressing the following 4 analysis questions. I encourage you to add in other thoughts that seem relevant as well as answering the questions – and also if you’ve thought about a question 3x and it still seems boring or repetitive, skip it or twist it. I suggest that you write a first draft in word, print it out, revise it, give it to a friend to make suggestions, revise it again, and then post it up. This writing should be in the same post as your video – the video should be embedded in the writing. GUIDING QUESTIONS - DESCRIPTION: 1. What have you included in this video? 2. Explain how different parts of the video relate to your way of life. 3. What’s seems good about your way of life? What’s bad? What’s neutral? 4. What would you have liked to have included, that is important to your way of life, but weren’t able to?
GUIDING QUESTIONS – ANALYSIS & INSIGHT 5. What’s going on with your way of life? What seems to be the general pattern or direction or point or situation? 6. How do the good, bad, and neutral in your way of life fit together? 7. Does your way of life seem like a “typical American Way of Life”? Why or why not? 8. What aspects of your way of life seem really interesting to you – you’d like to think about them more deeply, figure out how this sort of thing developed historically, what’s going to happen to this aspect of your way of life within your lifetime? What questions do you have about these really interesting aspects of your way of life?
1. What have you included in this video? This video has footage of four aspects of my life. You see me in my sun and jellyfish protective swimming gear at Brighton Beach. There is video of my friend Heather and her mom Carole and I talking at my apartment. There is the kind of strange looking footage of me reading student work on the computer in my classroom. And finally there is a brief excerpt of a lesson on revelation that I offered to some of my favorite students in last year’s Revelation course.
2. Which parts of the video related to relatively meaningful aspects of your life? Which parts related to relatively meaningless aspects of your life? All four parts of the video related to meaningful aspects of my life.
Swimming has been a big part of my life for the past year. I’ve been learning to swim well using an approach called “Total Immersion”. And for me swimming in the ocean is particularly meaningful. The ocean has been big for me my whole life – growing up in SW Florida and now living in NYC. It makes me smile when a seagull flies over me when I’m swimming backstroke.
I have lived together with Heather for more than 10 years. My chance to be friends with her and enjoy her is one of the most meaningful aspects of my life. Her mom Carole, who I also care a lot about, has recently moved to the apartment downstairs of us in Brooklyn so we have been able to share more family experiences here.
The internet is both a blessing and a curse for my life. The video shows me reading student work – this has made it possible for me to evolve a new kind of teaching in which work continues to belong to the student rather than be “handed in” to the teacher and for students to learn from each other more easily. And in general I’ve learned a lot from the internet. But the internet also represents one of the biggest pits of relative meaninglessness in my life – thousands of hours wasted on endless games of chess & go, stupid staring at the New York Times, reading forums about folding bikes, etc. I’ve tried repeatedly to reorient myself back away from the virtual and to the real, but success has been limited and intermittent.
My teaching has been one of the aspects of my life that I’ve devoted the most time, thought, and energy towards. I feel a sense of pleasure and meaningfulness in helping students to reach deeper insights about the world and themselves and the relationship between the world and themselves. I feel that I’ve been given some important gifts that teaching helps me to share. On the other hand sometimes it feels like my energy is being wasted in a factory system in which most people are just pretending, just going through the motions.
3. What would you have liked to have included but weren’t able to? I would have liked to include footage of our plots in the Brooklyn College Community Garden since that would highlight another aspect of what I find meaningful – working with the Earth, learning how to feed ourselves, understanding our physical reality more deeply.
Analytical: 4. What seem to be some of the main criteria you use (emotionally +/or mentally) to assess how meaningful an aspect of your life is? If something feels meaningful I usually think of it as meaningful. But what makes it feel meaningful? Situations that relate to love and beauty seem meaningful to me. Love can be in the masks of solidarity, passion, belonging, or responsibility. Beauty can be in the masks of excellence, coherence, truth, and virtue.
5. Is there a pattern in what you find meaningful or meaningless? What are some of the elements in that pattern? I find situations meaningful that engage my senses of beauty and love. These tend to be situations that are exceptions to the mass mediocrity I feel myself to be surrounded with. Situations in which people are honestly and thoughtfully relating to each other or when people are honestly and feelingly relating to the larger world around us – the air we breath, the plants we eat, the water we swim in. Those are the sorts of situations I try to create in my life – either when swimming or living with my friend or doing my Right Livelihood of helping people gain insight.
So it seems the elements in the pattern of what I find meaningful are connection and resistance to mediocrity and both of those elements require the element of truth.
6. Looking at the video as a whole – is it a fairly honest/accurate depiction of your life? Does it make you seem interesting/special/exciting? This video doesn’t show me irritated or impatient or in many of the other moods that tend to blow across my emotional sky. But other than that, it does seem fairly accurate and honest.
I do think the video depicts me as someone special but more as a counter-cultural type than someone “cool”. To me the feeling that comes from the video is one of relative peacefulness, of someone who makes a point to swim at the beach and doesn’t mind wearing tights to protect against the jellyfish, of someone who makes time for loved ones, and who tries hard to contribute intelligently to the well-being of people I am responsible for. I don’t think I’m very “dashing” in the video – more “thoughtful and a little goofy”.
7. Does your life seem meaningful from an outside perspective? Is it from an inside perspective? Why? The video does make my life seem meaningful to an outsider – if the outsider has my standards of meaning. I would look at this video, if it were of someone else (and to some extent it is), as showing a person aware of beauty, experiencing nature, practicing excellence, contributing his talents to others, and doing what he finds worthwhile.
And from the inside it feels the same way.
8. What questions do you have about living a meaningful life at this point? Why don’t we make our whole lives meaningful? Why do we spend more time than we want on situations we find relatively meaningless? Is conscious/loving engagement with nature necessary for a meaningful life?
