style. numero dos.

Obviously, what I’m asking you to do for this last assignment is to reflect a bit on what we did during the class. My hope is that you’ll take a chance with this last entry to take stock of the course as a whole.

Originally, on Spetember 10th I posted this

Well, to avoid quoting the Webster definition, style is a personal preference, an attitude, a way of appearing and appealing to individuals. At least my definition of style is. Style is everything from the attitude you present to the articles of clothing you pair together, that is personal style. Styles of writing and speaking are just as unique. From word choice, diction, syntax, point of view and tense choice you could find an infinite number of different writing styles. Some prefer short, sweet sentences. Other prefer to ramble on and on, speaking of many ideas, just hoping to use conjunctions, commas and semi-colons [Does anyone know how to use them properly?]It all comes down to what is comfortable, what sounds right, to both the writer and the critic, and what can concisely iterate the point.

I still believe that style is all of that but it is also more than that. It is what you consider original. It is based on knowledge, previous experience and the ability to experiment and try new things. We learned how to create a new writing technology and no ones was identical. We created comic strips, none of which were remotely similar and we managed to create a movie that was unlike anything that had been done before. Style is being able to develop your own sense of what you have learned and implement in a way that your ideas are clear and concise and that you are speaking your mind. It’s fascinating.

The best was not last.

The last peer review was a pain. Posting on wordpress and waiting for comments seemed to be the least effectual for me. There was no way i could help with marking up in any way nor could my classmates specifically point out certain things.

The most useful part of the peer review was having as many pairs of eyes reading over my essays and finding what I had missed. The least useful part was bland or vague comments that we all end up giving because we barely have time to write our own essays, let alone read someone each others.

This semester has been some of the worst peer review I have experienced in both myself and others. There was no real comments or analysis of the essays. It was rushed and unimpressive.

Holy Obsession, Batman!

Bamboozle Left is headlining SOMETHING CORPORATE. Gahhhhh, I can’t wait!!

Now If only I could find the money & friends to go to California with!

Rough Draft.

“The links between motivation, new media, multiliteracies, agency, and civic participation can be readily traced. Less clear, however, are the connections between these items and changes in education.” (Anderson) Many are unaware of the connections that writing and film media have in common. They are also unaware of the co-dependency that each literacy has with the other. Film media relies on a strong script or literary concept to create a story or plot line, while the script and plot depend on the film and images to depict the meaning and message as accurately as possible. Using writing as a basis for film making literacies are layered to create a multifunctional educational tool. According to Anderson “The ultimate value of transforming literacies is to help students discover the ineffable possibilities of the creative process.” In taking an online class myself and my classmates were exposed to film media as educational material as well as literary journals and books written by professionals. In making a collaborative video we were exposed not only to scholarly material but to the process of writing and creating film media that mirrored the intent of what we had written. In this process we were able to dissect the similarities and differences in writing and film-making. While writing and film making serve an identical purpose their functionality and accessibility offer different results for the audience and those involved in the creation.
The creation of both a script and a film based on information that the class had already covered seemed easy enough. We decided to base the script off The Elements of Style  by Strunk and White, and more specifically the Commonly Misused Words section. Arriving at that conclusion required the input of a majority of the class. Through our online discussion we discussed possibilities for topics and what we wanted to focus on. After a number of suggestions and agreement on a singular subject from a majority of my classmates we began to plan further. Collaborating on the project was easier than expected, each person was accommodating and tried the best they could to contribute.  My classmates were quick to volunteer times they were available and roles they would like to take and what each of us were to contribute. The planning went smoothly and like any class we expected the best of the situation.  The hardest part of collaborating is actually following through. As a majority the class decided to meet and in person lay out plans for the filming and script. While not everyone could attend one member, Jennifer, and another, Jon, made sure to send an email and post the progress of what was accomplished at the first meeting. My role in the process was to help write the script, which was accomplished at the first meeting, without my help. One issue with collaboration is that we often find that doing it all on our own or finishing the task without the help of others is more timely than to work together, especially in the case of this class. The class met again to film and edit the video. Although I was unable to attend the second meeting the class expressed the success of the collaboration in the film made and in gratitude for making the experience worthwhile through emails sent out in thanks. Even after the bulk of the work was done class members continued to put in time and effort to help and extend help. The collaboration was successful because it resulted in a well written video that clearly articulated the information the class had wanted to convey to it’s audience.
English 328 is an upper level writing course, aimed at strengthening our writing skills, and more importantly, making sure we can adapt our writing skills to the changing world around us. To those reading about the process for making a video about writing, you make ask why? Why did you spend the time making the video instead of just writing about what you had learned? According to Anderson, “The ultimate value of transforming
literacies is to help students discover the ineffable possibilities of the creative process.” The creative process is not limited to the art of film making, nor is it limited painting, music or writing.  Creating a short film in which the main focus is writing and the writing process allows both myself and my classmates to hone our skills and create something new, something that will allows us to effortlessly translate the thin line between film scripts and writing a traditional essay. We created the film to seam together two sides of a creative process. In our quest to make a video we were required to use the skills we had practiced from writing a traditional essay and modify them to produce a short film incorporating what we had written about. The differences in the two processes are what this class has been about, combining different technologies to examines the differences and how that changes the way we write.
Both the making of a short film and the writing of an essay require planning and an idea of what is to be conveyed and accomplished by the finished product. An essay requires citations as well as evidence to supports any claims made, as with videos. In regards to English 328 and the video we made evidence from Strunk and White had to be used in order to convince the audience that the video had worth. What is unique about video and film media is that in addition to proving a claim with evidence you must correlate the images on the screen to further back the point being conveyed. Anderson states;

“Low-bridge media activities offer many opportunities for personal transformations based on engagement, transformations that result in newliteracies. But we can also link these multimedia modes of reading and writing to another level of literacy: critical, civic  participation and agency. Surveying a range of research, Selber (2004) repeated the call for “an educational system that prepares students to be social critics rather than indoctrinated consumers of material culture” (p.95). Selber marked this engagement with the term “critical literacies,” outlining opportunities for students to develop critiques as they look at design cultures, use contexts, institutional forces, and popular representations of technology. This ability to critique through engagement with technology provides access to (often hidden) cultural discourses (p. 107). But this ability to critique must be more than purely analytical.”

While essay writing requires us to be mindful of ourselves and how we represent our ideas in writing, videos require us to best represent our ideas, words, images and the actors we use to portray our meanings. While an essay and a film may have the same point, more effort goes into making a video simply because there are more details that need to fit together in order to make the same point as the essay.
Writing a traditional essay is simple, in theory. Thoughts and ideas are backed up with textual references and placed in logical order to create a solid argument, making the writer’s point. A video requires thoughts and ideas to be represented in the images and actors visible. The difficulty in each is choosing the words, images and actors that will convey meaning in a clear enough way to translate to an audience. When writing an essay I can see the words in my head, type them into a Microsoft Word document and they are identical. Film does not allow the same precision. Actors could forget or change lines, the scene could change in an instant. I prefer the predictability of an essay as well as the ability to edit an essay as I go along. Deleting whole sections and starting over. Although the same is possible with film, it requires more time editing after the actual filming is completed. Juhasz states “Outside the paltry offerings of the site for real-time interaction, there is something in the lived shared exchange that creates an atmosphere for education that is not possible on this site. The body seems a pre-requisite for community (at least as far as the classroom is concerned): a better vessel for cementing obligation, trust, and concern between people than is the computer.” in regards to teaching a class completely on YouTube. I have a similar sentiment when it comes to writing a traditional essay versus completing an assignment through a digital medium such as film or photography. I have more control and a better understanding of how to complete the project when dealing with the physical representation of my thoughts in front of me rather than a live action representation that can be mistaken.
While the collaborative video assignment was educational and I did realize the parallels between film making and writing traditional essays, I still prefer to write a traditional essay and supplement that essay with the facts and evidence from the readings to support my claims.

uuuutooob.

While I understand the connections we’re making between writing and creating the video I feel that at times the idea of the video detracts from writing itself. We are concerned with parts, scripts, equipment and locations rather than just on the script. In a movie each piece is important, and each deserves the proper time while with writing we are only required  to place thoughts in a logical order and provide evidence to substantiate our claims. Writing, like film media, can be informal and formal and can be just as varied, but require an entirely different approach to the final product. I understand Anderson’s advocacy for “low-bridge” media. It allows instantaneous access to inspiration. One video or song that is posted on you tube could inspire a paper or video or another song. We educate ourselves through the experience of experiencing. Although it seems like circle logic, it’s not really. We learn more about ourselves and the world through what we experience, so you could say that through experiencing the varied media on you tube and other low bridge technologies we are becoming more experienced in culture and in being able to make our own creations. Anderson uses you tube to explain a cultural phenomenon, the idea that any one can be a an artist and that art has no definition. We create and post and get strangers to comment, good and bad on what has been posted. We have created an anonymous community of critics that are ruthless and honest.

preemptive strike.

Looking back at the class and what activities we’ve done the writing technology project sticks out most in my mind for being somewhat useful in making a video because we are technically combining a technology with writing to create a video about writing technologies.

Ong’s article on writing technologies that alter thought relates to the making of a video by just reading into the title. We are using the video as a way to alter the way we think about writing and how we can use writing in many aspects of creativity to exemplify our points in creative ways [leading back to the question, what is style?]
Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics is another source that jumped at me when thinking through the video project. McCloud talks about the different ways to symbolize and represent concepts and ideas, the same way we will try to enunciate our point by using a different symbol or or concept in the video to explain what we have in words.

strike 3, you’re out.

In line with my previous recaps as well as with many of my classmates I find the peer review in this class sorely lacking. I suppose that much of my frustration with the peer review process is the lack of dedication that myself and many of my classmates feel to this class. In addition to having to constantly check the discussions and read and complete work for this class many of us are so busy that we put off posting which makes others wait and by that point we are all missing out because we’ve run out of time.

I am a huge advocate of peer review. I believe that the more people who truly read your paper and comment the better. I have found with this class because it is online [at least for me] that I am not giving my classmates nor are they giving me the same level of scrutiny that I usually find in a face to face classroom. I only had one person edit my essay and while she was helpful I again wished for more feedback.  I also feel that in writing I have a much easier time when I have the actually essay in my hands and I am able to physically write words down. I also prefer to give feedback in person, explaining my thoughts about the essay with the person next to me so we can discuss. I prefer for instant response, the delayed reaction time as well as the varied response time from classmates makes it hard to do much of anything in a timely manner, which  deters me from sitting around hoping someone posts before I have to go to work, make dinner, pick up my brothers or work on any number of other classroom assignments.