animalinside2013

[animalinside2013]

“The Star-Gazer’s Log of Summer Time Crime" post

“The Star-Gazer’s Log of Summer Time Crime” kind of reminds of the tragedies of these past few weeks. I don’t know, it might be that everything for a while will remind me of the Boston tragedy. In case many of you didn’t know, according to many sources the brothers, especially the youngest that is now in custody, were nice, normal kids with many friends. In fact, according to this news show I was watching the other day, many of their high school friends are convinced the brothers were set up in the crime. His father called him a “true angel.” On reddit yesterday, I saw a photo of the younger brother with his high school prom date. Why am I bringing all this up? Because Ollie reminds me of him. According to the short story, he was good, smart, innocent boy who minded his own business. His father absolutely loved him and what he was studying by himself. At the same time, his father was so blinded by love (and alcohol) to see the transformation that was actually happening within Ollie and his actions. He started hanging out with a twisted Raffy, just as Dzhokhar with a twisted Tamerlan (at least these are the current assumptions), and both boys got sucked into the criminal activity for their own reasons. One can only guess at Dzhokhar reasons, but Ollie felt he needed to prove himself. Eventually, though Ollie knew what he was doing was wrong each step of the way, he got so caught up in it that he could not get himself to stop. I like to think that something like this, but on a much more massive and dire scale, happened with the younger brother.

-Sina

[animalinside2013]

Afton wanted me to post this after our tutorial about our creative project.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujfykqcpO-o

[animalinside2013]

Review

I really enjoyed the Maus books. I had read first-hand stories about the Holocaust, but the fact that this book was concise and somewhat detached (due to the animal figures), made it that much more impactful. It also gave us the unique insight into the lasting, trans-generational effects of the Holocaust. The story of Art was almost as fascinating as the story of Vladek. Overall, it gave a full, 360 degree view into the world of a German Jew.

  The book I did not like was by far Zoo City. I really thought I would like it, because of the whole fantasy element. I had really liked The Golden Compass and thought it would be similar. However, I thought this book was terrible. I didn’t like the fact that it consistently left me unsatisfied. For example, the world is based on our own, with the same history, but had one key difference that happened within the past half-century. I wanted to know what the world looked like. Was the whole world like South Africa? In our own world, South Africa is not a very good place to live, and is not like the rest of the world. How would America have changed? How would China have changed? The ending was also equally unsatisfying. Things just happened without explanation. It just left me confused. In addition, I really disliked her style of writing, though most people liked it (I think). For example, the movie review chapter. I guess I am just a stickler for the traditional ways.

  Thanks for a great semester Sam!

[animalinside2013]

Creative Assignment - Sina

Here is my creative assignment. You can either download the files, or use the links I provided in the word document.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/20axw4u7nhr85pw/KC64u6xU5y

[animalinside2013]

Best/Worst of 112

I can can without fail say that the different novels we read in this class were a 180 degree shift from the classics and Shakespeare we read earlier this year in my 102 class. I was hesitant at first at the new literature, most of which I’d never heard of before. With the exception of Alice in Wonderland and Maus, all the titles were completely foreign to me. This was also the first time I’ve had an assigned reading that was a series of short stories rather than a long boring novel. Although I did enjoy Zoo City, The Bloody Chamber and Maus, my favorite reading this semester was St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves and my least favorite text was Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. As I mentioned before, one of the reasons I enjoyed St. Lucy’s so much was that even though the stories were very outlandish and surreal, the characters were still grounded in the same teenage problems we all encounter. Some of the conflicts had fantastical aspects to it, but in the end, the stories come down to the teenagers and their struggles with family, fitting in, etc. Furthermore, the style of writing Russel employs is simple and direct but still manages to convey enough description for us to picture these new lands in our minds. 

I disliked Alice in Wonderland for the same reasons I liked St. Lucy’s. While I could relate to the characters in the previously mentioned book, I could not connect to Alice at all. I felt frustrated as we viewed the world through the eyes of a small girl who was confused about so much. While I understand this leads to the “coming of age” and “loss of innocence” ideas, I thought it was just frustrating. Furthermore, the descriptions of the different places were overdone and got boring to read after a while. Overall, however, I greatly enjoyed the survey of books we read this semester and will definitely miss this class. 

[animalinside2013]

woah.

[animalinside2013]

Hey guys! Here's the website for my game! Hope you have fun! Sorry about the USC message on the bottom; I couldn't figure out how to get rid of that.

[animalinside2013]

Creative Project

Here is the link to my interview project: https://plus.google.com/photos/110951009681913968952/albums/5872339904306072897/5872339904425667346

[animalinside2013]

Just saw this. so vogue. 

Sir Eduardo Paolozzi 18. Vogue Gorilla w Miss Harper 1972 screenprint and lithograph on paper

[animalinside2013]

the chocolate and the brussels sprouts

All in all my favorite and least favorite readings from this class can be summed up as the chocolate and the brussels sprouts. 

While brussels sprouts are one of my favorite foods now, I couldn't stand them as a kid. I don't even know if I ever tried them, but simply the idea of a brussels sprout was offensive to me. This is sort of how I felt about Foucault and Mbembe weeks ago when we were reading them for the first time. I started by reading them out of order which led to severe confusion, and after reading one in depth I really just sort of skimmed the other out of frustration (similar to sniffing the brussels sprouts from across the table and refusing to go near them). I even managed to write a whole paper that mixed up the two theorists. But the concepts of necropolitics and biopower have grown on me immensely-- since I finally tasted them for the first time a couple weeks ago in dealing with ideas surrounding my seminar paper. Foucault and Mbembe have proved extraordinarily useful in sorting out my seminar paper ideas, and they have become very applicable to my other TO class on revolution. Like my experience with brussels sprouts, I was able to learn in this case the usefulness and healthfulness of eating up the theories. 

And then there's chocolate. Dark chocolate more specifically. While brussels sprouts are healthy and mysteriously delicious and vibrant with life, chocolate is chocolate. And Zoo City is chocolate. For a work with so many imaginative concepts to work in and explain, this book tactfully introduced each new plot point and character with mystery and simplicity. Beukes always left us wanting to flip the page and craving more, but she never overwhelmed us. Not to over-praise dark chocolate (is that possible??), but dark chocolate is exactly the same. When I was reading Zoo City, I was inclined to think and take the information in in small increments, layered with analysis and lots of thought into what it meant. Beukes story left me mulling it over long after I had finished reading. Not to mention that it was just incredible. 

Of course, if you ask me, you need both brussels sprouts and chocolate to have a healthy and happy life. I loved that this class seamlessly blended together theory and fiction in both the reading assignments and the prompts for our papers. I feel that this blending allowed for a fuller understanding of the insights and benefits into each work and made us more insightful readers and writers. I'm sad it's over!

[animalinside2013]

Here is my creative assignment. I thought Kayla F.'s was really cool and mine is kind of similar. 

[animalinside2013]

Final Post

I really enjoyed grappling with the major questions this course posed and I found almost all the works stimulating and engaging. I would definitely recommend this course to future TO students!

My favorite work was probably Maus I and II. I thought the graphic novel was a really interesting medium to examine something as dark as the Holocaust. You get to see what the author is doing visually as well as verbally to communicate the ideas, such as the use of masks and various animal representations. I also really enjoyed The Bloody Chamber and St. Lucy’s, they were both a very enjoyable collection of vignettes that each person could find something different to identify with, my personal favorites were Wolf Alice and St. Lucy’s. The supplementary texts by Foucault, Mbembe and Creed were also excellent auxiliary texts that effectively complemented the primary works.

My least favorite works were probably Zoo City and Alice in Wonderland. In Zoo City, I really felt that the introduction of magic into the world Beukes’ created detracted from the power of the message the book was trying to convey. The result was a piece of somewhat interesting fiction, but it didn’t engage me in the way some of the other texts did. The ending was particularly unsatisfying and I was left questioning what the overall point of the novel, which felt like a jumbled collection of different plot points, was. Alice in Wonderland was a fun read, but it was confusing and I felt that we might have been extrapolating too much from a children’s text when discussing some of the things Carroll did in the novel.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this class, the texts, and most importantly, the discussions we had about them, it will definitely be a class I remember throughout my career at USC. 

[animalinside2013]

Final Post

This is the reason I joined TO, to be able to work with wonderful, amazing materials in class and have lively discussions about them. When I see what my friends are reading for their writing classes, I feel so lucky that I'm in TO instead. I can honestly say that I enjoyed everything that we read/watched in this class. But anyways. Maus was a big favorite of mine because it presented such a familiar topic in a different way with a really compelling take on the children of Holocaust survivors that made me think. Usually, when I encounter material about the Holocaust, I'm only half paying attention because I feel like I've read it all before. With Maus, however, I was absorbed from page one and prompted to revisit the issue of the Holocaust with a new appreciation for the survivors and their experiences. Maus really moved me and changed how I view Holocaust survivors and the impact that their experiences can have on those close to them. If I had to pick one that I did not absolutely love, it would have to be True Blood. I blame this on the fact that I had no prior experience with the series and being thrown into the middle of the action made it hard to follow. (Plus I just can't get over how incredibly Southern they are...I'm sorry, it makes me giggle.) I also really enjoyed the supplementary articles that we were given (Agamben, Freud, Creed, etc.). Taking a highlighter and pencil to those articles was so much fun for me. I found them all engaging and insightful (though I must admit that some were a little harder to get through than others) and I felt that they added another dimension to the themes that we learned about and discussed in class. And oh, the discussions. I've had classes where the material was great, the professor was great, but the discussions were just...lacking. I got so much more out of this class because the members of our class were so engaged and ready to talk about the texts. So thank you Sam for picking out such great material for us to study and for doing a fabulous job leading the class...and a huge thank you to my classmates for making the class and its discussions so enjoyable and rewarding for me.

[animalinside2013]

St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves (II)

(Thought I had posted this and realized it didn't get posted. Whoops) I cannot even begin to describe how much I enjoyed "Children's Reminiscences of the Westward Migration". Figures from Greek mythology? Check. Tales about the move out west that remind me of Little House on the Prairie, which were some of my favorite books as a child? Yes please. It was heartbreaking reading this story and seeing the once happy family and love between the Minotaur and his wife break down because of the stress and tension that the move West brought upon them. The story also illustrates wonderfully how quick humans are to judge and turn on an easy target when the going gets tough. In this case, the target just so happens to be animal, but the same mentality applies across the board to anything that is strange or even slightly undesirable. We see the other traveling families deciding to quickly abandon the old woman Olive and becoming hostile towards the Minotaur.  Unlike in "Children's Reminiscences" the child looks up to his father, the children in the following story "Lady Yeti and the Palace of Artificial Snows" are suspicious of their fathers (although for good reason). The two boys are driven to camp out in hiding in order to attend the Blizzard mostly to catch Badger's father "in the act", but also in large part to witness a forbidding, adult event. Like many of the other stories in St. Lucy's, the two boys are rushing to mature and become adults. 

[animalinside2013]

Final Post!!

I really wasn't sure what to expect going through this semester with this particular theme in mind. Really. There was so many ways that it could have gone, that it was really unsure. But having gone through it, I find that it was interesting and worthwhile the way it proceeded. The readings were interesting, although some of them were more interesting than others. 

St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves was my favorite reading. It is easy to read and retain because each story is merely a touch. It isn't something that drags you in and pushes you to an end. It merely opened many doors and allowed you to come and go as you pleased. Each story was complete in its incompleteness--I know that the incompleteness grated on some people's nerves, but that's what allowed the story to retain their novelty. They finished without being conclusive, and that allowed for individuals to fill in the rest as they pleased, or to put down the story and not complete it if they so wished. That freedom to choose is what really made this story interesting to me. It also reminds me partially of Barnum Museum, which was also similar in its ambiguous, inconclusive collection of vignettes.

My least favorite reading, I think, was Alice in Wonderland. Personally, it made the least amount of sense to me, and was not as enjoyable as the other books. Certainly, it is an interesting read on its own... Unfortunately, when compared to the other texts in the class, I can't say that it holds up in comparison. It isn't that I find it too childish; Dr. Seuss' books are "childish" but are symbolic of so many things that you learn about as adults. It's just that to me, it was the least useful in understanding the general themes of the class, and really was more confusing to read.

At the end of the day though, the class was worth it. The readings were good, and I doubt anybody's going to forget having watched Princess Monoke. There's nothing left except to finish strong. Second semester is over, and it passed by waaaay too quickly for comfort. I'm so glad this class is done though, writing papers were a nightmare. It is difficult to say what will happen from here on out. Hopefully, everything will be good.

[animalinside2013]

And so we end the semester.

Heading into this semester, I expected we would learn a lot about animals and human-animal hybrids in this class. However, I did not expect the amount we learned about purely being human. I really liked the first collection of short stories we read, The Bloody Chamber. I liked how the traditional fairy tales took an uncanny and untraditional turns. The stories were really readable, and brought the characters of  familiar fairy tales and myths into a whole new light. I especially liked "The Courtship of Mr. Lyon" and "The Tiger's Bride" because these two really forced me to reevaluate whether humans are the desired lifeforms or animals are the desired lifeforms. I also really enjoyed Zoo City because it seemed like a novel I would pick up and read for pleasure on my own. The storyline was extremely compelling and I fell in love with Zinzi and her sloth. Even though it was graphic and hard to read at times, it really made me consider who I viewed as "animalled" in my own life.

I did not care as much for Maus. I think reducing the Holocaust to cats versus mice simply did not work. It reduces all Jews persecuted in the Holocaust to mice, and does not let any of them identify with any other cultural ties they might feel more connected to. Also Art Spiegelman really annoyed me as the story went on because it seemed like he just did not care for his elderly father. I mean, this guy raised him! You should just help him! The metaphor just broke down when they were still mice in America. Earlier they showed Americans liberating concentration camps as dogs. Whose to say none of those Americans were of Jewish heritage, because I bet you some were. 

Anyway, it has been a great semester, and I am looking forward to how everyone creatively portrayed their semester tomorrow. 

[animalinside2013]

omghhkp hashtag last discussion

I can't believe the semester (and year) is over! Looking back on all the memories and times we shared together awww. I guess I'll jump right into what I liked and didn't like. I LOVE EVERYTHING. well, not really. I didn't *hate* anything though. 

I guess I'll start with the stuff I wasn't a huge fan of. Mainly The Bloody Chamber/St. Lucy's. It wasn't that I thought they were poorly written or uninteresting. I guess I'm just not really in love with looking at an entire collection of short stories in an academic setting. I love the genre when I'm just reading for fun (e.g. David Sederis), but when there's an overarching theme to the class, I feel like it's harder to get an in-depth discussion about how the pieces fit together. The Bloody Chamber was better in that respect, though. 

Probably liked Zoo City the least out of most of the works. It was entertaining, but I personally never really cared about the characters themselves, and thought some of the stuff was over-the-top cheesy. 

True Blood was pretty solid entertainment, and led to some interesting discussion.

LOVED Princess Mononoke. Such a well done film. Would liked to have watched it a bit earlier in the semester though. 

The Agambe and some of the other selected readings like Freud were a bit more tedious to get through, but the Prezi presentations were really helpful in that respect. 

Alice was a really weird book and the lack of solid structure was kind of annoying, but I thought that also made it really interesting to discuss and let people focus on a lot of different themes.

Maus led to a lot of great discussion and was interesting for its style in general. Definitely a keeper. 

Overall I give this class TWO THUMBS UP! Everything we read was at least somewhat interesting, and always at least led to some awesome discussion. Easily my favorite class I've taken so far. Yayyy. 

Thanks Sam! :DDD