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Journal 6

This week’s discussion on eugenics is pretty interesting because my sister had actually considered about taking out the “bad” genes before she got pregnant. To her it wasn’t a big deal and she said it was very possible. But this week’s discussion made me realize the danger of such technology and how the future people would be stratified if extensive eugenics are conducted. Well my nephew Felix didn’t go through any genetic modification, but I still thought it was worth bringing up. I really enjoyed the episode Men Against Fire from Black Mirror because it shows how much the government/media manipulates us and alters the truth. I wish people will stop believing in everything they see online and face the truth. People also tend to make up excuses so they don’t feel bad about their actions, kind of like Stripe chooses to keep using Mass instead of remembering himself killing people. Anyway, this is the last journal, really enjoyed this class. Thank you Jackie.

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Blog 6 Favorite

My favorite screening in this class is definitely The Stepford Wives movie, I also really enjoyed the Black Mirror’s episode Men Against Fire. I find myself enjoying movies than reading article because, well, movies are fun. I wouldn’t claim movies carry more rhetorical power, but they are for me. Most of the times I am more immersed in the visual works than words on paper. Even though many people argue that, visual adaptations of a work takes away the possibility of reading. The director’s vision and interpretation of a work is set in stone when a movie is made, and many people feel like it contradicts from what they have imagines from reading. My argument against that is we can still interpret the movie differently from the director’s intention, and movies definitely help to spread the original message to a wider audience.

The aesthetics of The Stepford Wives is definitely what caught my attention. From the area setting to the wardrobe of the wives, the movie tells the story of a village of higher-class white people where the men form a man-only elite group that plots against their wives. The wives’ carefully curled hair and flower patterned dresses place them into the stereotypical housewives images, and in the end it turns out that they are actually robots. When the protagonist Joanna’s best friend Bobby is replaced by the robot, the first thing Joanna notices is her dressing style and makeup, to which she desperately cries out “You never wear dresses and make up!” I believe the wardrobe and makeup play a very important role in this movie because they represent restraints on the female characters. The men disable them from freely expressing their nature and emotions by dressing them as barbie dolls.

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Journal 5

This week I really enjoyed watching “Love me, Love my dolls”, it was definitely eye-opening and a wild ride. For some of the guys you can really tell that they invested emotions into their dolls; they talk to them, have sex with them, and sleep with them. The fact that these dolls are, just dolls, and the guys are still enjoying them, could you imagine how people would react if in the future we have human-like robots who have actual emotions? I am a firm believer that robots will take over in the future but all my friends just laugh at the idea and say “we will just unplug them.” Well, first of all, I doubt robots will have electric plugs, secondly, people will go crazy for these robots once they are attached to them, how do you expect these people to see their “loved ones” get “killed”? It really is a complicated issue but we will see.

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Blog 5 Connectdome

Dr. Kasthuri uses Logos to make his argument strong because he backs up his claim with scientific facts such as neurons in the brain, connectivity, and electricity transferring, etc. Ethos also seem to be used because of the setting in the video. Even though he doesn’t explicitly says that he is a Doctor, the audience still get a sense that he is an expert on the subject.

A premise he is basing his argument on is definitely that “all human information is stored in the brain,” which we have actually discussed in Friday’s Discord class. How do we know only brains store information? What about our bodies, organs, and heart? Another premise he is basing on is that “souls don’t exist,” otherwise he wouldn’t argue a brain contains complete human information because no one can prove where the soul is located.

As Dr. Kasthuri’s audience changes, his diction or terminology also changes. For the youngest kid, the Dr. describes the brain function like a fairytale that involves star and space. For the expert, they jump right into the point and start discussing deeper topics that is very difficult for viewers to follow along.

After viewing the video, I have huge faith in connectdome. I believe though we are still far away from creating a real human, having a neural map brain would make huge progress. I don’t think I am in the place to judge consciousness because it is still a vague concept to me. We as humans only know what we are thinking about, if a new specie is really created, can we judge whether it has consciousness? I don’t think so.

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Journal 3

For this week, I enjoyed Friday’s class the most because we were talking about memes, which was surprising to me because I never thought that memes could carry so much value. Before today’s class, I have thought a lot about how social media and the quick accessibility to entertainment numbs our minds and senses, which is why I don’t use Tiktok because I know I won’t be able to stop once I start watching it. I felt like the discussion on memes kind of tied with my belief on the impact of social media. However, my opinion on mass media was more on the negative side: I think it kills the value of original arts, it provides too much entertainment, and it is oversaturated with stuff that waste time. But today’s lesson changed my mindset a little bit. Instead of blaming social media, I gotta see how technology improvement deemed the fast pace of media. Information comes and goes, but memes stand out because they are catchy, funny, and easy to remember. 

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Blog 3 comedy/parody/satire

I believe the comedy genres, even in the form of parody and satire, could have great rhetorical and argumentative powers. The funny aspect of comedy helps the audience to better take in the message. Take The Young Frankenstein for example, the movie starts off very light-hearted and it has smart funny scripts that are easy to watch. But it still reflects back to the original film in many core scenes, such the creation of monster, and its black and white setting. 

Parody and satire are powerful because they are often political and ironic. In our lecture, Linda Hutcheon argues that "through a double process of installing and ironizing, parody signals how present representations come from past ones and what ideological consequences derive from both continuity and difference.” Parody in my opinion, could strengthen the original art but often adds a contemporary ideological twist to it; it breaks the subjective belief that arts have an authentic aura and that any imitation is bad. I see parody as a result of inspiration, humor, and engagement. Especially after we discussed how everything is a remix, that solidified my belief more.

At first I was confused about the difference between parody and satire but Jaquelin explained to me during class. Parody is an imitation of a previous product, it often uses humor whereas satire doesn’t have to. Satire is mostly ironic, often used to criticize/expose someone’s stupidity, and low-key political. Famous movies that are satirical include Jordan Peele’s Get Out on the issue of racism and stereotypes. For Frankenstein, I believe Frankenstein could be seen as a satire on appearances, science, and family.

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Journal 2

For this week, I found two things that were extra interesting. When we first read Charles E. Robinson and Anne K. Mellor’s articles on the editing of Frankenstein, I was like why do I care? Especially with Robinson, he was pinpointing little words and sentences that Percy fixed and I thought it was a bit too much. Mellor’s analysis, however, made more sense to me because I really appreciate her feminist approach to the situation. From our class discussion I also learned a lot about how society views women writers  back to that time period. Percy’s excessive alterations to Shelly’s manuscripts could be argued as manipulative, or out of love because he worried about the incoming criticism. Which I thought was crazy to think about.

Second thing is I REALLY enjoyed the video on “remix.” I was fascinated when the narrator says inventions are inevitable because I have watched a lot of videos recently on similar topic. I believe the possibility that human evolution is guided by a mystical force and human’s future path is already determined. That’s why the same inventions happen in different places around the same time, craaaaaazy.

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Blog 2

(Detective) Today is June 6, 2010. I am currently at the death scene of Mark Smith, which took place in Madison parking garage. At 11:15 pm we received a phone call from the garage’s security guard James Lopez, and we arrived at 11:30 pm. Mark Smith is a 35 year old Caucasian male, 6ft tall, athletic build, and has ginger color hair. We found him next to his car, which is an olive color Subaru Forester, tag number H91N3. He is laying on the ground with his face down….His wallet is emptied, but his Rolex watch is still intact, so robbery is unlikely the motive.

(Coroner) Victim Mark Smith, ginger color hair, 6ft tall, 35 year old white male. Upon first observation he has six stab wounds, which are all non-fatal in the first strike. I then found a round dent on the back of his head with minor bleeding, which could mean that he was knocked out of consciousness before he gets stabbed. If that is the case, then the cause of death could be the loss of blood over the course of 30 minutes.

(Eulogy) My father Mark Smith, as most of you know, was a great father, a loving husband, and a responsible teacher. He always believed in the best of people, and taught me the same growing up; so it is so difficult for me to process everything that has happened, and how could anyone hurt such a beautiful soul. The memory I have with my father will be forever kept in my heart; I will continue to live bravely in this world knowing that he would also want the best for me.

(Prosecutor) Ladies and gentlemen of the grand jury, I thank you for your time being here and exercising your civic rights. Sitting right there is John Travis, the murderer of Mark Smith, who was a loving father, husband, and teacher. On June 6 this year, Smith was found dead in Madison parking garage. He was attacked on the head and stabbed six times on the body by Travis. It was an act of hate and brutality…I am here to ask you to make a decision of justice! Travis not only stabbed Smith, but his action was also a stab to our legal system. Please make it right by finding him guilty! Thank you!

Without a surprise, the eulogy was the easiest one among the prompts. I could find many examples online even if I never wrote a eulogy myself. I also didn’t need to consider any of the given facts because I came from the perspective of his daughter instead of anyone from the legal aspect. I just showed my grief in the situation and it looks like a plausible eulogy,

At first I thought detective and coroner would be the hardest because I didn’t know any legal terminology, but it turns out the prosecutor’s role was the hardest to grasp. For detective and coroner, even though I didn’t have the jargon to speak like them, I could still add my own details to make the observations sound credible. For the prosecutor, however, it made me realize that I am not great at combining rhetorical methods. Shifting my emotion from presenting facts to appealing the jury presented a great difficulty, and I was very disappointed with my paragraph.

I believe the rhetorical situation of academic writing demands professionalism because our instructors and peers are our main audience. An objective and factual tone are appropriate most of the time, but sometimes we also need to put our emotions in there to support our arguments. The jargon used in academic writing mostly comes from the reading we have done in a class.

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Journal week 1

I really enjoyed watching the lectures on Gothic, particularly the part on movie because I was a huge fan of Twilight, and Edward is really hot. Jaquelin is hilarious when she explains stuff, it makes the lectures fun and easy to watch.   

Working on Frankenstein now for the first time after high school made me think of this topic with a completely new mindset. Back then I concerned mostly with beauty/ugly, racism, etc, on the story. Now that I am more interested in AI and law I believe Frankenstein’s story is also very applicable to our near future. What are we going to do when robots take over? Do we treat them like humans and grant them legal rights? In our Zoom call Jaquelin mentioned the possibility of AI slaves, which is shocking to think about considering we are not even that far away from abolishing slavery. 

Antlitz’s article that we read on Monday came in very handy to alleviate my stress on writing papers because I haven’t write an argumentative paper for a long time. His approach to creative writing provides me a new perspective on connecting my inner-self with writing. I am planning to give his methods a try and hopefully I will do better this semester. 

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Blog 1 Frankenstein

My first encounter with Frankenstein goes back to my high school’s English class. I remember reading the novel as well as watching the movie. I recall the movie to be colorized but I can’t find it anywhere online, so maybe it was a different adaptation to the book.

I didn’t grow up in America so I have not seen Frankenstein references in any shows or cartoons. I have heard of the word Frankenfood, though, which means genetically modified foods. When something is associated with Franken-, it seems to carry a negative connotation. I don’t believe GMO foods should be criticized very harshly because they are modified to meet the high demand from consumers. If everything is grown naturally without using any kind of modern technology to boost the production, we might not have enough foods to eat.

I did not view Frankenstein as a horror story when I  first watched it, rather I was very sad to see what the creation has to go through. If I remember correctly, there is a scene where the “monster” gives a flower and makes friend with a girl in a farm house, but the old man in the house kicks him out after seeing his horrendous face. 

The society has always judged people based on their appearances. As an Asian-American myself, I am well-aware of the stereotypes associated with Asian. I kind of viewed Frankenstein’s difference as a racial issue because his face is the main reason why people ostracize him. The treatment of him is just a result of racism and fear of the unknown. 

Lately I have been very into the topic of AI, and I believe AI robots will be so well-developed in the future that they will look just like humans. People fear Frankenstein because of his face, but how would people react to him if his face is no different from the others? Would people approve his existence, would he be considered a human, and what rights would he have? 

These are difficult questions to answer because there are so many legal, moral, and scientific factors to consider; I really hope to see more discussions on this topic as the course goes on.