Month: September 2018

I agree with Lamott’s descriptions as my first drafts always seem to be quite messy. Starting a paper is always the hardest thing for me, and I always feel stuck and don’t know what to write. From there I know I just have to get something down on the paper and just start to write whatever comes to my mind. After that I give it a day or two and then go back to try to fix it.

I somewhat related to this description and found it enjoyable to read. What I found surprising was that its common for writers to just write a bunch of nonsense in a first draft and then  go back and find a completely different think they want to write about and start over for the second draft. I feel like that would frustrate me completely starting over after having initially written so much or had different idea.

Revision Plan Strategy:

I’m going to give my paper another look and highlight the major themes and support them with evidence from the text. In my peer review comments, I was told I needed to put more of my own opinion into the paper to support my argument better, so I’m going to explain more of the key quotes.

I’ve always found it difficult for myself to peer review others work since I always felt my own pieces needed a lot of work. But after going over things in class, I tried to focus on the writers thesis and overall claim. This helped me look for supporting evidence throughout the paper and give better help. This also made me learn about how to organize my paper properly and to use the text to my advantage to support my ideas.

(Sorry its sideways I don’t know how to fix it)

A little breakdown of my somewhat organized someone confusing brainstorm: Before I even started my brainstorm, I read through the essay prompt and picked out pieces I need to focus on before I went searching through the articles. That guided my brainstorm, as I split everything up by the main points. After going through all of that I tried to make connections between all of the focus points. (hence the color coded underlining) These are idea and connections that I will expand and elaborate on.

My thoughts on art: After the brainstorm, I feel that Art isn’t a waste of time. EA’s do have a strong argument and at times are correct. They are trying to do the most good, which is great, but I still am a strong believer in pursuing something that makes YOU happy. The EA’s idea of replaceability is true in terms of what Dre Urhahn is doing. Anyone could paint murals and anyone could help with the projects and make a difference. I also agreed with Southan’s ideas that “there are plenty of people drawn to media and the arts who care about making the world better”. This relates to “How painting ca transform communities” and how they changed peoples perspectives of Favelas by creating something beautiful. Overall I fond many connections in Southan’s views and Dre Utahan’s TED talk and that EA’s have a good point to an extent.

The TED Talk I chose was about these two men that went to Rio to ultimately make a documentary of a poor neighborhood and ended up completely switching courses and instead, transformed buildings into art. These neighborhoods they were working in were called “Favelas”, which were basically very poor neighborhoods with crime and broken down houses. They had the idea to completely transform the area and started by painting one building bright blue and eventually painted a boy flying a kite over it. This beautiful mural went viral, bringing positive attention to the neighborhood and changed how people looked at it. The two continued to make art around Rio and were asked to do a Project in Philly in one of the poorest communities. They ended up getting to know everybody in the neighborhood and made a strong connection with them. They also employed a lot of those people as they simplified the murals and had them help. They wanted to keep expanding and brighting their ideas to different places but money was somewhat an issue. They needed sponsors and funding for projects but in order for that to happen they needed to have strict plan of what was going to happen. They never really had strict plan as they would just show up in the area, get to know everyone and then “let the project grow organically”. Eventually, they got the funding needed and continued to transform areas all around the world.

Ultimately, they changed the perspectives of those looking in at these poor neighborhoods and turned them into something beautiful and inviting. It kind of makes you think about how you sometimes judge too soon or just look on the surface. In order to fully understand something you need to take the time and look deeper. This also show how in some ways art can bring us together in ways we wouldn’t expect. To some extend it brought communities closer together and made them feel proud of where they came from.

Rereading “Is it OK to Make Art?”  a second time, has definitely been a different experience from the first time I read it. The first time I tried to attack it I was confused throughout the reading and my annotations didn’t do much good either. Going into class the next day, I didn’t really have a good grasp of what the reading was about. But after discussing some different things in class and defining some words I was able to get a new perspective of the reading the second time around. I visited the Effective Altruism site right before as well and also got a better understanding of their movement.

Having all of these things in the back of my mind, when I looked at it again, made the reading not only easier to understand but also more enjoyable. I felt myself more engaged in the text and making more thoughtful annotations. I found myself becoming more skeptical of the Effective Altruism movement as well. I understand that they want more people to help the needy but they believe the only real way to fix that is to throw money at it. This I don’t fully feel is right.

I also noticed that EA’s believed that if you don’t have a high paying job that “doesn’t really make an impact” then there is no reason to pursue it. This I found wrong, since I grew up also being told to pursue what makes me happy and I don’t think you can really help others without being happy in your own life. I understand that what they are trying to do, and see that it is a great thing to help those in need

Just starting off this article was quite dense and made me think and rethink many different actions in my life. It even made me even wonder if my major is something thats OK to pursue. The Effective Altruism movement is quite intense and the members of it have very strict close minded views.

First Thread

The first thread I’m going off of was when Hilton and Southan went on a walk around the cottage. Hilton (a member of the EA movement) asked Southan if the script she is writing going to be one of the best scripts ever written. Southan found this question as a trap and didn’t really know how to respond without disappointing Hilton. Ultimately he proceeds to answer with “no” and gets a weird feeling around Hilton.  After that interaction, he then begins to explain the views of EA’s and if you’re writing a script,  you’re using resources that could ultimately save lives. But if you are writing the best movie of all time then it might be OK to write that script. This idea made me really wonder why would  telling yourself you are writing the best movie of all time suddenly make it OK in the eyes of the EA’s? I guess the views of the EA’s really confuse me and I don’t fully understand what they are trying to achieve besides helping those in need to the fullest potential. If thats the case then how does “writing the best movie of all time” help people?

Second Thread

The second thread that I found interesting was when they were explaining “Net Positive”.  A UK-based programmer, Ozzie Gooen, made up a fake superhero to  spoof creative rich people who think they’re helping but in reality they are doing the bare minimum. These people cared more about the making of cool art then helping those really in need but in the end they still think they’re good people for doing something. So, Gooen joked about “Net Positive Man”, which is basically saying they’ll help but not really. The example they gave was someone drowning in a well and Net Positive man saying “Heres a Youtube Video! It’s Net positive!”. I found this somewhat funny but also realized that it is very relevant. People think they are helping when in reality they aren’t doing much. People try to help ultimately to feel good about themselves they aren’t really thinking about the people in need. Which I believe is very true in some cases and quite sad. I still don’t believe you have to have the same views as EA’s but you could always do a little more to make a difference.