Final Reflection

So this past Monday we got our assignment for our final reflection paper... I definately don't think I will have a complete draft ready by this coming Monday! I am STUCK right now. I don't know what to write about, there are so many things, I've tried outlining specific ideas, but the topic of authorship is still so broad that I can't narrow it down. This is the first time all year that I have been this clueless as to what I'm going to write about, which is bad, because it's already Friday and a complete draft is due in about 3 days. I've honestly sat down for about an hour and a half everyday since we got the assignment and tried to think of what to write. I got as far as the first sentence and that's it. I guess some people call this "writer's block", but I'm not even sure if that's what this is. It usually doesn't take me this long to get into my "author" mode. After discussing authorship all semester, I thought I knew what I considered an author to be, but now I'm not so sure because I can't even get it out in writing. Is anyone else having the same problem with this paper?

Mix Tape Reflection

For the mix tape project, I decided to make a cd with songs for my boyfriend. After thinking about it for a while, I decided that I wanted to make it about the "twists and turns" that our relationship has been through. The cd starts out with a love song that is kind of slow. Gradually, it "slopes down" into more sad/angry songs but the pace gradually speeds up. This section is supposed to symbolize our rough times. A couple examples of these songs are "I Should've Cheated"by Keyshia Cole and "Crazy Over You"by Eminem. Then finally, the songs on the cd increase back up with "make up"songs like "Sorry 2004"by Ruben Studdard.

I very much enjoyed this project and never thought that I would ever have been able to do it for a class. I love music, so anything that has to do with it doesn't seem like work to me, it's fun. The only thing that I didn't like about the project were some of the "rules" that we read. For example, the rule that said that we shouldn't use 2 songs by the same artist back-to-back. I understand that in a way, but the way that I used 2 songs back-to back seemed to work. I used 2 songs by 50 Cent, but both of them were duets. So I think that because there are other artists on the songs with him, it's okay to bend the rules.

Cut-Up

In class last Wednesday, we made "cut-ups", which are basically pieces of text that are chopped up and rearranged. I've never really heard of doing this before this class, so it seemed pretty weird to me to be doing this. There are different ways you can "cut-up" a piece of text, I tried a couple. The first time, I folded a paper I wrote up into quarters and cut along the folds and then rearranged the quarters. No matter how I arranged the pieces, the new text made absolutely no sense, so I tried this same technique with a different piece of text (a page from the book Parrot in the Oven). This made even less sense than the first attempt. So finally, I decided to try cutting up a page from the book in a different way, I cut each paragraph out and just rearranged them, that way seemed to flow much better and wasn't completely crazy sounding.

Here's an example of the use of the "quartering method" (a page from Parrot in the Oven):

"Magda and Pedi wen see anything so won-site sides of the couch, lying on the
couch. And of the blanket against ut the whole room: the was fanned
out on a pily cherub angels on the her as she lay there, hehe glass-top coffee
table, line of black mascara leaming in the sunlight one eye. I went over
any mother spent so much fled and turned her faceping together, and what then I
sat down och energy tearing apart. And watched them. I like a place
I was meant there's no way of explain that I had come back to or wanted to, but
I knew being away. My home. and the bright walls of as closing in
around me, re lying asleep, on oppo-me, that I'd never again each crunching
their enddrous as my two sisters their chest. Magda's hair it wasn't just
them, below, unteased. I watched squiggly TV, the lump mouth half open, a
thin frame of the painting, taking from the corner of my mother's animals, wiped
it, and she snuf-This room was what me away. energy cleaning and keen
Dad's cushioned chair my father spent so much won't say why, because and it was
wondrous, I why, even if I could to be. A place, I felt as my eyes got
drowsy after a long journey of the room glowed around the light in the room"

Rhythm Science

Well....Rhythm Science.... After reading the book by Paul Miller, aka DJ Spooky That Subliminal Kid, I'm pretty sure I'm more confused on the whole DJ-ing thing than I was to begin with. I never considered myself to be especially savvy when it comes to technology, but I felt like I knew a good amount about music technology and how it works. However, now, I feel like I have no idea what thoughts and technology are needed for DJ-ing. I never considered it as complicated as Rhythm Science portrays it. This book was especially difficult for me to read, even though I am a huge music/hip-hop fan, because I'm not the best at visualizing things that aren't there, or don't exist yet. For example, in his book DJ Spooky says, "Sampling is like sending a fax to yourself from the sonic debris of a possible future" (p.77) WHAT?!?!? I know we talked about it in class, so I understand this quote a little better, but on my own, I would've never been able to come up with the conclusion that we did. I guess this book was intentionally written in this way by DJ Spooky, so that the reader would have to work and analyze in order to understand what he was trying to say (which, for the record, I'm still not sure what it was).

Sampling Project Remixes

Here's a "remix" I created from Casey's sampling project. I didn't change much about it, just added a few more pictures and some colorful text to express how the RIAA is in the middle of music production and listening.

Here is another "remix" I created of one of my classmate's (Mandy) sampling projects. I tried to create a visual argument about how copyright has changed from her original image about authorship.

Sampling Experience Reflection

The most recent assignment for our class was a sampling experience. We needed to use images from either the Internet, or actual pictures, to create an argument about copyright. Our challenge was to create the same argument twice, only using different sources. For the first sample, we were free to use any images we could find, copyrighted or not (protected by "fair use" I believe because it was for a school project). The second sample, however, could only contain images that were in the public domain (either the copyright on the image expired, it was licensed under creative commons, or the images were our own property).

As I'm sure most of my fellow classmates did, I found the second sample more difficult to create than the first. Having the freedom to use any image I wanted for the first sample, really allowed my argument to come through and speak for itself. I must admit, the second sample was not as difficult as I imagined it to be, however, only because of creative commons. If it were not for creative commons, I'm pretty sure I would still be working on it and would've ended up using images from clip art, or simply drawing the whole thing. Creating a visual argument without having access to the proper images, because of copyright law, is either impossible, or extremely time-consuming and unsatisfying.

My visual argument was supposed to convey a community of new technological creativity that is being held captive (hence the prison bars) by copyright law. I believe that much of the new technology that is/has been created is our generations form of creativity (including computers, communications, music, and entertainment). With all of the extensions of copyright and lawsuits led by monopoly companies, creativity is hindered. People are afraid of being punished for being creative, and some of these people are just not willing to take that risk. It brings about an ethical question: How much regulation can be enforced before we are no longer willing to be creative at the expense of freedom?

Sampling Projects

This sampling project so far has been less difficult than I expected it to be. However, I have only got through the first one where we can use copyrighted material (due to being extremely sick for the past week). I feel a little bit behind on everything in class, but am trying to catch up on all of the readings and on my project. I'm afriad that the second part of the project where we can only use "public domain" materials will be much more difficult. I mean, how am I going to search for these images online? I'll probably just end up using some of my own digital photos. Anyway, like I mentioned, I'm a little bit behind on the readings for this week, so I don't have much to blog about them right now. Hopefully soon though!

More on Plagiarism...

After class today, I have a newfound respect for teachers/professors. After going through what many professors go through with every assignment the give (checking for plagiarism), I have come to the conclusion that I don't have the patience necessary to do this. It's probably a good thing that I have no intentions of ever being an educator, because I would probably be the one with which students knew they could get away with this sort of thing. It could be pure laziness, however, it could also be that I wasn't very familiar with the topics I was reading. Checking for plagiarism in a paper that, to me, sounds like it's in another language, is extremely difficult. I didn't know what the language used in specific topics was like, and didn't know how to go about finding the sources that my fellow plagiarizers stole from. I have to say that unlike mine, the 2 papers I read (by Emily and Patrick), were very well thought out, as far as sources go. I couldn't find ANY passages in Patrick's paper that were plagiarized (although he said about 65% of the paper was unoriginal), and could only find a couple passages in Emily's paper (I got lucky with those). However, with my paper, my sources were discovered within minutes of searching. It just goes to show, it can be possible to get away with plagiarism even with all the new technology and resources available, it just takes a lot of hard work, more than it would just to write an original paper.

Plagiarism Experience Reflection

For this assignment, we had to plagiarize a paper (75% someone else's work, 25% our own). At first, like I think most of my classmates, I thought, "This is going to be the easiest assignment of the semester." We could write about anything that we wanted. Again, at first, I thought that would be super easy. However, it seemed to complicate things. I couldn't decide what to write about. I finally decided on a biography of Abraham Lincoln. It's something that I've wrote about before, and something that everyone has at least heard a little about throughout the course of their education. I wanted to plagiarize a biography because I figured that it would be hard to distinguish which parts were plagiarized. Because so many biographies use the same language and include many facts, I thought it was the best bet.

I found that plagiarizing a biography was more difficult than I had expected. At first, I thought it was just because I chose to write a biography, however, after discussion in class on Monday, it sounded like this assignment was just as difficult for my fellow classmates. The hardest part about this assignment was trying to decide how different parts of the sources I was using and my voice could fit together and sound like a well-flowing paper. Like the ghostwriting assignment, the plagiarism experience also helped me learn a lot about about my writing style. Just by understanding that my writing style was different and by actually having to make the paper flow, I was able to, in a way, analyze my own writing. I also believe that because it was so difficult to take different works from different authors with completely different writing styles and make them flow together as one, plagiarism can be considered an "art" (however, whether this is ethical or not is left for the individual to decide). Again, I'm referring back to Deborah Brandt's statement in class when she said that sooner or later, authorship will be in the form of plagiarism, i.e. cutting and pasting. After completing this assignment, I can see how this could be possible.

Ghostwriting Reflection

The ghostwriting project was an interesting one. Who knew I could write something for someone else and actually make it sound similar to their voice? I learned a lot about my own writing style, and also about my friend's style. I've never considered myself especially creative, or having a unique writing style, however this project changed my mind. While evaluating my friend's writing style, I was also able to evaluate my own and see how it is unique.

There were a few parts of this project that were easy for me. Because the person I chose to write for has been my friend for over 10 years, I have become accustom to both the way she talks and writes. Since grade school, we have taken the same grammer classes and writing classes, so our writing styles are pretty similar. Because our writing styles are similar, it was easier for me to pick out the differences and work with them in the writing process. I was able to put in a few sentences that you could say were my "voice", and because our "voices" are similar, when combined with her stylistic devices, it sounded like her.

However, I did run into a few problems in my ghostwriting experience... My choice to write for a close friend had positives (as I mentioned above) and a few negatives. My friend wanted her own ideas in the paper and wasn't even willing to hear any of my suggestions for an addition to the paper in order to lengthen it. Also, after I showed her the first draft and asked for her to write in any corrections she would make, she returned it to me with no revisions. She said that she wouldn't change anything and it was perfect the way it was. I'm not sure her reasoning for this, but I think it was either one of two reasons: 1. She didn't want to offend me because we're friends, or 2. She simply didn't have enough time to look over the draft. Either way, this was a frustrating moment for me because I don't feel like the paper was my best work. However, it was what she wanted, and after all, the paper would have been signed with her name (if I were a real ghostwriter).

Although this may sound a bit selfish, I think that all the difficulties I encountered during my ghostwriting experience would've been less troubling if I were getting paid for it. But, I do wonder how long I could ghostwrite (and be paid for it), before no amount of money could lessen the frustration.

Plagiarism

Well, Wednesday in class we had some pretty interesting stories about plagiarism... Stories like that are always fun to hear for some reason. I'm looking forward to doing the Plagiarism assignment because I think it's sometimes easier to plagiarize than to be original. It depends on the topic, but with all the new technology that we've seen in our lives so far, it's hard to actually be original. How do we know that what we come up with and think is our own mind's work, isn't already out there, expressed by someone else. There are only so many words, and only so many ways to put things. Sooner or later, like Deborah Brandt mentioned, we will be essentially cutting and pasting our compositions rather than actually creating them.

As far as ghostwriting goes...that's a difficult subject to interpret. I'm glad that we're studying ghostwriting and plagiarism back-to-back, because to me, they don't seem all that different, and it makes me think, "If plagiarism is so bad, then why is it happening so often in the form of ghostwriting?" I read the University's policy (short one online) on plagiarism, and while reading, I kept thinking to myself, "It sounds just like they are defining ghostwriting." I guess it's okay to plagiarize as long as the real author is being paid for it. I wonder what the University's policy on ghostwriting is...

First Assignment Reflection

The assignment that we've just completed was the essay about authorship in pop culture. I actually had fun researching for and writing this paper. It's been a very long time since I have been able to say that I had fun writing a paper for school. For some reason, this assignment didn't seem like work. I was very interested in relating what we have been learning in class to something more familiar to me. My paper focused on Barthes' idea of authorship from his article "The Death of the Author" in comparison to the movie 8 Mile. When I first thought of the two, I didn't see any connection, and thought, "This should be an interesting challenge..." But when I started watching the movie again, with Barthes in the back of my mind, so many similarities/oppositions stood out to me, that I began to see the movie in a whole new light. In addition to seeing the movie differently, I also understand Barthes' article much more than I did at first. I think this is an awesome way to increase interest in these philosophical texts--by relating them to what we know and are interested in.

While watching 8 Mile, I noticed many things that opposed what Barthes said in his article. The one that kept appearing in the movie was the idea that there is a relationship of "life" between the author and reader. Barthes' main idea was that when an author writes, s/he "dies" and essentially the reader is "born". However, in 8 Mile, it's more like the author (played by Eminem) is still "alive" when he raps and the audience is "born". He raps so much about himself (where he came from, his race, his life story etc.) that the audience has no choice but to hear him along with the language.

I couldn't get the video to upload on this blog for some reason, but if you have a few mins (~2), and you want to see this example of authorship from 8 Mile, check out this video of Jimmy (Eminem) rapping about himself in a battle.

Authors in Pop Culture

For our Authors in Pop Culture assignment we are supposed to use an example where an author is portrayed in the narrative to argue a point from one of our readings so far this semester. I have decided on using the movie 8 Mile (one choice on Scot's list) because I am very interested in the Hip-Hop culture. Although I have seen this movie many times, it should be very interesting to watch the movie with a critical eye. It'll probably be a little weird thinking of Eminem as an "author", because I have never really looked at him as that. But after defining the term "author" in class, I now see how broad it can be. I am very excited to re-watch 8 Mile with the knowledge and questions I've aquired from the readings discussed in class. Analyzing something I am actually interested in should make this assignment pretty easy, if not fun.

"Language" Barriers

So these past 2 articles we've read seemed very complicated at first...but after discussing them a little, the idea seems much simpler. Barthe's article describes the author-reader relationship as one of birth and death, however, where does one begin and the other end? In a way, an author creates a segway for analysis by readers. There are endless possibilities to analyzing simply one work. However, is this what the author wanted? Or did he/she only mean the text to be interpreted one way? Although many of us see writing as a form of creativity and expressing ideas, it also creates "language" barriers, where the author's intentions could totally be dismissed and replaced with new interpretations from the reader.

My First Blog

This is the first time I've ever posted a blog and it's for Intermediate Composition-an English class. I'm not sure if I'm going to end up loving or hating them... Maybe they'll become completely addicting like Facebook has become for so many students. Since this is my 3rd year at UW-Madison and I have never blogged, I am a little excited about learning something new. I guess we'll see what happens as the semester goes on...