Q&A Final Presentation

My Argument

Technology can provide the body with many pleasures and be a convenience in everyday life.  Technology can also be a key part of enhancing the capabilities of the body.  Technology is not however immune to human error and has the potential to be dangerous if misused, abused, taken to a point beyond moderation, or misunderstood.

Prompt 12

I believe that violence is used in movies just like any other topic that fascinates viewers.  Most movies contain the same elements.  These elements are bad language, sex, and violence.  Just about every rated R video contains all three of these.  People watch movies because things like sex and violence are fascinating.  Average people don't get to experience raw violence on a day to day basis.  When people are involved in or get to witness a fight or murder or something they experience a feeling that is unmatched by other emotions.  On the same theme, people don't get to casually watch other people have sex on a day to day basis.  Movies allow viewers to watch these two things easily and experience something they don't usually have access to.

As uncommon as viewing sex or violence on a day to day basis is, viewing the two simultaneously is even more uncommon.  Mixing the two seems to hold a level of intrigue that nothing else can touch.  This isn't a common theme of movies.  When a movie contains these two it must do so in a way that consists of studying these actions.  In other words it's not acceptable for a movie to just show violence and sex without viewing it from a distance.  A movie must contain another movie within it to show these types of things.  It's not socially acceptable to really do so in any other manner.  

I believe it's this aspect of being socially unacceptable that makes Croenberg use it as a portal for videodrome penetration.  The concept of a video being able to take over someone's mind is very strange.  It's only appropriate for an equally bizarre event like sex and violence to be the essential event for this phenomenon to occur.  I don't think this idea complicates the argument of the body and technology at all.  I believe it just brings more logic to the crazy idea of technology having such an influence on the body by giving a reason why.  Since we can't really fathom some of the ideas of technology and its powers because they sound illogical, it's easy for movies to support this concept with an answer they we equally don't understand.

Prompt 11

The Lawnmower Man explores the relationship between the body and technology in many different ways by using many different characters.  The main characters in this movie are a scientist and a gardener.  The scientist has just recently suffered a blow to his business career because of the death of a chimp that he is experimenting on.  The scientist decides to try his experiments on a gardener who is not very smart.  The scientist hopes to make the gardener more intelligent with these experiments.  Throughout the movie the scientist's personal life begins to deteriorate because of his obsession with his job and technology advances.  The scientist uses technology in a way that he hopes will enhance the mind of the gardener.  This presents a completely different argument than the gardener does.

The gardener undergoes these experiments by the scientist and becomes smarter and smarter.  By the end of the movie the gardener is extremely talented and is capable of things like mind-reading and telekinesis.  Once the gardener becomes intelligent and capable of powerful things he also becomes increasingly angry due to effects of the experiments.  The experiments conducted rely heavily on virtual reality.  The gardener and the scientist both use this virtual reality world to escape the real world.  The scientist does it for fun and exploration and searches it for ways to seek benefits for the human mind.  The gardener becomes more and more into the virtual reality world and feels he is limited by the physical world.  He begins conducting experiments on himself so that he may make the total transformation into the virtual reality world and leave his humanly body behind.  This contrasts the scientist tremendously.  The scientist wishes to use the virtual reality as a means of helping the body and the gardener sees it as a means of leaving the body and its limits behind.  

The gardener becomes too powerful and angry towards the end of the movie and begins killing people.  This breakdown and the overall deterioration of the people's lives involved with this technology gives an overall argument about how harmful technology can be to humans too concerned with it.

Prompt 10

There were many topics within Neuromancer that I found interesting. By interesting I mean confusing of course. The one I found most interesting was probably death. Death is viewed in Neuromancer much differently than it is in anything I've ever seen, read, or heard.

Dixie Flatline is the most obvious example of death in the novel. Dixie is a ROM is some kind of disc with a recording on it. Once someone jacks into this recording, Dixie is present as a dead person or some sort of ghost. Dixie was a human at one time who was recorded onto this ROM and now is stuck in there. When the ROM is not being used Dixie does not exist. Dixie has characteristics like his laugh that are disturbing to humans. This adds an extra scary factor to death itself. Dixie is dead but has desires which I find strange. Dixie longs for nothing more than to be erased so he doesn't have to exist in this state anymore. I'm confused by this because if he is erased I wonder if he goes into a different state of death or just doesn't exist as a dead person anymore. If he's dead but wants to be erased to a different state of dead does the next or other stage of dead present better circumstances?

I find the story of when Case dies to be much more interesting however. Case dies and goes to a sight on the beach that involves Linda Lee and Neuromancer. Linda Lee seems to be content and happy in this weird state of death. She doesn't seem to be bothered by it like Case is. In all the relations to death the state of cold is present. This seems to bother Case the most. The ever present cold bothers him. Linda Lee is content in the place but Case wishes to leave it. This makes me wonder if the state of death creates a different mindset for everyone. The other things about death that bother Case are that he is on a beach with wind and dirt. I find this interesting because these are things that a lot of people enjoy. In this futuristic world of technology these are cast as bad things. I would be in a happy state if I were on a secluded beach with my lady friend and no school or work to worry about. I'm just saying.

Prompt 7

The trend of body modification for a more desireable look is as evident today as it ever has been in American society. The desired look has become harder to achieve than ever but is still highly sought after. The normative body modifications applied to achieve this look include everything from exercise to plastic surgery. People wish to achieve a better looking body by doing anything from eating differently to taking diet pills. At first these acts would seem very different from the more radical forms of body modification that try to speak out against society's norms but they are not entirely. The difference is easily spotted and lies with the goals of each group. The normative body modification group wishes to fit into society's standards. The radical body modification group on the other hand wishes to act in defiance of these standards. The people within these groups can view their actions in different ways. Someone can see their action as being part of a group or as being an individual. They can see it as something that exists within a society or as something removed from society and belonging only to the person. However any view point held or any body modification received for whatever reason only further adds to the political viewing of bodies in general. Those who receive mainstream body modifications are viewed by others as if they support the ideas behind mainstream body modifications. For instance is someone took diet pills to become smaller they will be viewed as someone who believes people should be thin. On the other hand if someone receives a radical form of body modification they are viewed as supporting the ideas behind radical body modification. For instance is someone got a tattoo on their face they they are viewed as someone wishing to stress a point or speak out against the ways of society in disagreement.

prompt 5

The two links to National Geographic and Marketplace were very different in their approach to body modifications especially tattoos. National Geographic took a cultural approach to these things. The link I looked at consisted of several photographs of different people in different cultures with tattoos and various other body modifications. The body modifications themselves were the main focal point of the photographs for the most part. National Geographic then tied these modifications into a cultural context. The different people pictured were from all sorts of different cultures from Brazil to Samoa. National Geographic then explained the meanings the people in the picture and the culture or country they were located in gave to these modifications. These different meanings varied from senses of pride to modern primitivism to mafia involvement. The process by which the people had been tattooed was different in these pictures as well. National Geographic made available pictures of body modifications in different cultures and tied the meanings of those tattoos into the cultural context.

The Marketplace approach was much different towards body modificaitons taht National Geographic. National Geographic pictured these people in a manner that suggested they were outside of the norm that Americans such as myself are accustomed to. It was attempting to show and describe things unfamiliar to people such as myself. Marketplace on the other hand attempts to describe how these modifications are becoming a normal part of everyday American life. Marketplace interviews a mortgage broker who is by his own means successful today in the business world. He also has many tattoos all over his body that people are aware of. The argument that Marketplace attempts to make with this is that most people believe that tattoos are becoming more and more common in the business place and eventually will not be such a factor in the inability to acquire jobs or make business deals. The belief here is that the people who are becoming less and less judged by their body modifications today will eventually hold some of the positions that place the judgement. Basically, it's becoming more and more normal to see body modifications on people every day and with that the norms of moderation are shifting.

I don't believe that body modifications are still something exotic. Living in Austin I see a new type of body modification once a week it seems like. I have a tattoo and I view myself as quite normal. I don't see anything about myself as exotic. I agree completely with the view of the guy interviewed in the Marketplace about how body modifications are becoming less strange. I believe this pattern will continue to occur until tattoos aren't involved in considering something exotic.

Post 4

For this post I'll be looking at the "Onslaught" video and the "oversized or outstanding" print advertisements that Dove ran.  Dove ran these videos in a campaign called "Real Beauty."  

In the print advertisement, Dove features a woman who is built thicker than the typical magazine model.  She is standing in a sassy pose with her hair blowing back out of her face.  Beside her face on either side is the word oversized or outstanding.  Beside each word is a question mark and a check box.  In this advertisement Dove is asking the viewer to select whether they feel the model is one of the two word choices or the other.  Dove is trying to create a good feeling for the brand by putting an oversized model in an ad and giving the viewer the choice to select that the model is not overweight but is outstanding in her own way.  They show the model in a happy confident manner that makes the viewer believe that she is proud of the way she looks.  Dove expects the viewer to chose that the model is outstanding and with doing so attains the perception that the company is promoting a viewing of women for their positive aspects as opposed to the negative ones.  If the viewer picks that the model is oversized then it is a reflection of the viewer and not of Dove.  If the viewer plays into Dove's strategy then Dove gets the good credit, but if the viewer does not then the negative light is cast on the viewer.  To create this contrast of viewpoints the viewer has to be aware that the model is indeed overweight.  Dove doesn't want to directly point out that the model is overweight so they do it in a sly manner.  By showing an overweight model next to the word oversized they achieve this.  By presenting the other option of outstanding, they get credited as this being their opinion and don't have to take credit for achieving the other opinion for it to be contrasted with.

In the video Dove shows young girls going to school in the midst of many shots of horrific images associated with models, size, surgery, and the harshness of maintaining a beautiful image.  These images of the thin models is what Dove is saying is the "beautiful" body by the world's definition.  Dove shows the little girl to relate that they believe the little girl is already beautiful to them and doesn't need all the harshness involved in trying to look like the models they see everyday.  Dove has to show that the little girl is not the beautiful that people consider these models to be.  Dove does not, however, want to say that the little girl is not beautiful.  To do this they create the video in a way that makes it look as if the little girl is the one seeing these models as beautiful instead of herself that way.  Dove gets credit as seeing the little girl as beautiful and trying to help her realize this.

With this campaign, I do not feel that Dove has too much consideration in helping little girls throughout the world feel more beautiful for who they are.  I also do not believe that Dove did much to radically change many people's image of beauty.  All I feel that is accomplished through this campaign is that Dove was able to sell products to people who felt down about their looks or something dealing with the harshness of society in general by giving them a warm and fuzzy feeling inside by buying the product.  At the moment the items were purchased some purchases felt good about themselves for just a short amount of time or like they were making a difference.

Post 4

Short Writing 2 Apache Nalin

I am writing about the Edward Curtis portrait Apache Nalin.  In this picture I feel that Edward Curtis is trying to convey an image of unresolved confusion.  I don't feel that Curtis is trying to express one particular thing but a blur of several thoughts.  Curtis is not trying to prove a point but is providing an image that provokes several chains of thoughts that represent the native american situation on the whole.  This is an image that stirs up many mixed emotions.

The first thought I had when I looked at this picture was as simple as "is this a boy or a girl?"  From the picture I cannot come to a conclusion.  The native american is not very old.  The result of this young age is no definite facial features that express one gender or another firmly.  On top of this the figure is heavily clad in clothing so no other evidence can be found to support either argument.  The fact that the person has long hair doesn't offer any help in the issue because it wasn't uncommon for native american males to have long hair.  I feel that most people would have the same reaction to this photograph.  This makes the viewer of the portrait both frustrated with the inability to figure out the answer and a bit ashamed for not having a stronger understanding of the native americans to be able to deduce that same answer.  It's easy for the reader to pay the photo no more attention at the result of not even being able to figure out the simplest detail of the image.  However, I can also see some readers being stirred with curiosity and becoming absorbed with the photograph and exploring the other mysteries it contains.

The layout of this photograph is one of these many mysteries.  Native americans as far as I'm aware are usually captured in a natural environment in some sort of action.  Native americans are usually hunting or riding a horse or placed in some sort of natural environment related within most white peoples minds of that typical to the people.  In this photograph however the figure is just standing or sitting still looking at the camera.  The background consists of nothing more than a dark wall or some kind of screen the photographer sets up when taking pictures.  It makes the viewer feel as if the person is out of context.  This could very easily symbolize how the white man has removed the native americans from their environment and is forcing them to relocate to places to which they don't belong.  At the same time the dark wall in the background could be one of the dark mud in which some native americans used to build their houses.  If this is the case, then the person in the photograph is in a natural setting. 

The person in this photograph is wearing all sorts of decoration on their body.  The person has something that appears to be pierced into his forehead that hangs down almost to their eyebrows.  The figure is wearing a top that has frill or some sort of intricate decoration on the shoulder area.  Around the neck hangs an excessive amount of jewelry that appears to be uncomfortable.  Also the person's hair is parted in a way that is not necessarily neat but is definitely not messy. All this body decoration creates a weird mood for the viewer.  It puts the reader in a questioning state of mind.  One question that come to mind consists of whether this person naturally dresses like this or if it was done just because the photograph was about to be taken.  The hair being parted could be something that Edward Curtis did to the person to make them appear more pleasing for the photograph or it could be an attempt by the person to clean up and look respectable or even similar to the white men for the picture.  The jewelry itself could be a sign of wealth or attainment or a sign of culture and sentimental meanings to the person wearing them.

The most puzzling thing about this picture is the person's face.  It's not clear what kind of expression the figure is making.  The eyes portray both a deep sadness and a wide open unafraid look.  The face is not forming a distinct smile or frown.  In a way the face looks solemn but in another way it looks very proud.  In my mind I picture native americans representing all of these emotions.

I do not believe Edward Curtis tried to make this portrait relate anything in particular.  Instead I feel that he wanted to convey an image that stirred all sorts of emotion and on a whole provoked deeper thought and curiosity to the people that this person came from.

Prompt 3

These two paintings by Hicks and West seem very similar upon first glance.  After analyzing both pictures I've developed a better understanding of how these paintings are alike and different and what the artists were trying to achieve with these likenesses and differences.  

Although Hicks and West differed in the side of the portrait that they placed the white men and native americans on, they painted the two groups in a similar relation to each other.  In both pictures the native americans are backed up against one side of the painting.  I think this shows symbolism in that the white men have backed the native americans into a corner.  It suggests that the native americans have exhausted all escape options from signing this treaty but at last are left with no other choice.  In both portraits there is a white man with his arms out to create a boundary for the other white men in the picture to keep them from getting to close to the treaty that is at hand.  However the native americans are very much crowded around what's going on in the center of attention.  This could show that the white men have more respect and are acting more proper whereas the indians are curious and have no understanding of etiquette.  More importantly I feel that this shows that the white men understand that they are going to gain many advantages through cheating the native americans in this agreement and don't want to do anything to mess it up by getting involved during decision time.  Also the indians have little say in this decision so they are acting curious because they don't have a clue what their fate will be as result.

One difference in these two paintings is the degree of intensity of the statements the artists are attempting to make.  By this I mean that West painted less of a visual statement of his beliefs that Hicks.  Hicks shows the native americans backed up against a tree to further stress his belief that they had their backs against a wall(tree) and were forced into signing the treaty.  Hicks also casts the native americans in a shadow and the white men in the light.  This shows strongly how the native americans had little say or importance in the situation and the white men were in charge.  Also, Hicks paints the agreement happening up on a hill near the woods with the town and ocean down below in the background.  I think Hicks was trying to show through this that the white men were doing this almost in secret because they knew how shameful of an act they were committing.  West on the other hand paints the agreement happening in the middle of town away from the woods in equal amounts of light for both parties.  I believe West was making the same statement as Hicks but also trying to convey a more natural image with less stressing of his beliefs.  He wanted the same thoughts to occur by the viewer, he just did not want to do it so obviously.

Post 2

The New World body was quite a shock for those seeing it for the first time.  In many ways, the New World body was everything that was the complete opposite of the european body.  This new body reflected the differences of the cultures and lifestyles.  Emphasis within the new world was not placed on the body like it was in the European cultures.  Europeans placed a lot of meaning on the way they presented their bodies to others while the people of this New World were far less concerned.  The natives may have had views on size, structure, or deformities but did not go to the extent that the Europeans did on fixing their body up to present it to people.  The people of Europe viewed things such as the way women dressed and covered themselves as a sign of class and beauty while the native women were pretty much unclad.  The Europeans judged the people of the New World by these things.  Women were seen as presenting themselves in a trashy way because of their lack of clothing.  Europeans thought the natives viewed their own bodies with a lack of respect and care.  When descriptions of these natives reached the people back home in Europe I'm sure the people back home viewed the natives in the same way.  Not only that, but I'm sure a lot was lost and added in the descriptions that reached people by word.  This is probably similar to the way in which people today view aliens from outer space.  Although I can't speak for sure, I doubt anybody has actually seen an alien.  Yet we have an image in our mind of what they look like if they exist.  All the factors added together resulted in the natives being viewed with a lack of respect and as an inferior species to Europeans.  The natives viewed these new foreigners is manners different and similar.  "All the people in the neighborhood flocked to John Heath's to behold such rarities as they fancied us to be." (William Byrd 342) Described here is how the natives fancied the Europeans as a treat or a spectacle.  When two cultures that are so different view one another for the first time, these reactions are to be expected.

Post 1

Bodies function within my environment in a multitude of ways and are dependent upon the classification of my environment.  Classifying my environment as Austin Texas or even just the University of Texas is too broad of a scope to analyze the plethora of body types.  For this topic I'll discuss the bodies within my closest group of 15 or so friends I've met in college.  No two people within my group of friends have bodies that serve as a similar function or have many similarities at all.  Several of my friends are in bands.  They dress their bodies in ways that display a particular image that is tied into the attitudes and beliefs of the bands as well as the ideals the bands believe important and a part of those bands.  They do this through piercings, tattoos, and the types of clothing that they wear.  Other friends of mine are not as concerned with what accompanies their bodies as much as they are how their bodies look.  These friends do physical activities that shape their bodies in a way that they feel is more desirable.  There are friends of mine as well who wish to convey an image that they do not care what is desirable by society norms or "attractive."  My friends also belong to different bodies within society.  A majority of my friends belong to fraternities.  They decorate their bodies in ways that help them fit into norms of their respective fraternities.  Some of my friends are members of the University of Texas a Camp Texas counselors.  These friends tend to have higher morals and be more principl- oriented than the rest of my friends.  This is due in one of two ways to being a counselor.  They were either chosen as a counselor because of this fact or have taken this stance as a direct result to belonging to this body.