(at least in high school.)
We’ve all done it before—sometimes an elusive word is on the tip of the tongue, but we can’t seem to come up with it. So, we type in a similar word, right-click, and hope the synonym list jogs our memory. The right correct appropriate word pops up, the writer’s-block crisis is averted, and we’re on our way. Good times. Sometimes, though, the synonym doesn’t quite fit, or is the wrong word altogether.
How’s summer going? I had planned on updating throughout, but things have been busy. If any of you are still checking, drop me a comment below. Might give me motivation to share the coolness I come across.
So, I’ve been working on the syllabus for the Great Stories class I’ll be teaching in the fall, and thought I’d ask for your input. What stories from religious texts, fairy tales, myths, fables, and such should we read? What were the stories you loved as a child, or only recently discovered? Basically, what stories should every person know?
This will be a chance for us to increase our cultural capital, and better understand Western life.
My list:
- Job
- Icarus and Daedalus
- Prometheus
- The Greek Pantheon
- Cinderella (in many forms)
- Creation stories
- …more to come.
Which, if you know where “pandemonium†comes from, sounds an awful lot like the outcome of this game sent all these people into eternal torment.
To be fair, in the complete article the phrase is “sent 20,000 people into a burst of joyful, ear-splitting pandemonium.†While possibly more strange, at least that makes sense in the modern usage of the word.
Article on the fashion industry I mentioned yesterday.
Great (if short) discussion today. If you didn’t catch it the first time around, check out pages 81-3 for a great explanation of how to write a paper:
A good remix is defined by its signature original elements. . . . You may decide the originality is already there; an original process or take on sampled material counts. Or you may end up with one tiny piece of the original mixed with an entirely new score of your own. Either way, your originality should outshine the borrowed elements, or at the very least, present them in a new light.
Marc Ecko Tagging Air Force One
You should also check out Ecko’s explanation. He’s a great apologist for the DIY ethos and free speech. He also makes money from this ethos (his products represent rebellion and free speech, therefore those wearing them are as well). Think back to our discussions on cliques and the high school hierarchy and see where this leads you.
The Wooster Collective is a fantastic blog that showcases street art from around the world. Worth taking a look. And another. And another. And an article on TAKI 183.
It’s worth noting that graffiti is illegal; it wouldn’t be a message of change and rebellion if it wasn’t. Gladwell mentions the other side of the argument in his book The Tipping Point, and his point is summed up well here, in an article where gangs and graffiti always go hand-in-hand.
In sync with Marc Ecko’s use of graffiti in advertising, the opposite:
The authorities raised the stakes once again with harsher vandalism laws and sentences, so artists . . . worked faster and smarter, using techniques borrowed from the advertising industry and the high art galleries that had adopted graffiti. (Mason 119)
Mark Jenkins’s website. With pictures!
Have fun, see you tomorrow.
Student hoaxes world’s media on Wikipedia
Is this interesting, or simply sad?
The original Guardian obit can be found here (with correction notice at the bottom). There is no mention of the mistake on The Guardian’s Wiki page.
