Billy's English 125 Blog

Presentations

Mon, 14 Apr 2008 22:38:34 -0500

I am really enjoying the presentations thus far, it seems everyone was able to come up with a topic that really related to something that is interesting to them, I know I did. This has made the presentations very interesting, because it is obvious that the presenter cares about their topic. On that note, however, I can't believe that our time as a class has wound down so quickly! It seems like just the other day that we got the syllabus and Paper 4 seemed so far away, and now it's just about all over. Freshman year sure did fly by, and I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not. I welcome the break during summer, but it just means that I'm one-quarter away towards real life, and I am certainly not ready for that. It seems like I'm gonna need at least another ten before I leave school and become an old person (no offense Laura!). Well, seeing as this will be the last blog post I ever write, I hope everyone has a great summer and is successful in whatever life brings you!

Paper 4

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 00:18:24 -0500

I can't believe the year has wound down so quickly and that i'm practically almost a sophomore in college at this point. It's scary to think that in just a few short years i'm actually going to go into the real world doing real things.

My paper 4 is coming along very smoothly. It is actually almost done. (I don't know how, i'm never on the ball with these sorts of things) but I am very happy with this, as it is giving me a lot of time to go over and make sure it is done well. The research process went very smoothly for me, I think my topic was just narrow enough, because i was able to find just the number of articles i needed, granted with some difficulty, but that means that there hasn't been too much research done on my topic which i s what i'm going for.

It's good to feel that my presentation is out of the way, and went fairly smoothly. I wish I could have focused more on my proposal at the end, but I was really feeling pressed for time at that point, as the five minutes snuck up on me so quickly. With my presentation being done and paper four being basically finished, I can't believe that i'm more or less done with English 125! I hope everyone had a good year!

-Billy

Momma Mia!

Mon, 31 Mar 2008 21:33:18 -0500

All this talk that we have been doing about the digital divide has really been quite relevant to my life right now. My mother recently made the switch from PC to Mac (with a little persuasion from me), and the phone calls have been nonstop. The transition for me was relatively easy, though I am still finding a couple neat new tricks I can do with mine, but she is not having quite the same experience. Her being the "technology immigrant" while I am a "technology native" really has made a huge difference. She is having tons of trouble just handling the basics of her new operating system and computer. I feel like she would like it more if I could show her all her computer was capable of, but i'm afraid it would blow her mind trying to learn everything too fast. As a "technology native" myself, it's very difficult for me to imagine why she is having so much trouble with the change. When I first got my Mac, I explored the computer, pressing different buttons and seeing what I could do with everything, so I could more effectively use it. Even when I needed to do something that I wasn't quite sure how to do, I just followed what seemed like the logical order of things to do, and I was able to figure it out fairly quickly. My mom doesn't seem to have this intuitive sense that I do, which is interesting, because we've both been using computers and technology for the same amount of time. The closest thing I can relate this to is how people say that it is easier to learn a new language when young, than when you are older. It's interesting how things work out that way. Any other takes on why this might be are welcome. I'll accept any advice that might help me figure out why my mom is so hopeless, haha.

Global Communication

Mon, 17 Mar 2008 20:48:50 -0500

Networking websites such as Facebook and Myspace have really revolutionized how the youth of today interact and communicate. I can't even remember what I did with my time when I couldn't see what all 400 of my closest friends were doing every minute. When put this way, it does seem like Facebook is an insane concept, everyone putting there whole life out on the internet in order to see the life of everyone else. This sort of networking really does have many advantages though, first of their is the entertainment of it, as noted by the fact that I am on my facebook 24 hours a day. It allows for the easy sharing of pictures, the daily posting of notes to keep people up to date on life, and all sorts of things that i'm not gonna tell you about because i'm sure you guys already know. I just find the whole thing incredible on a macro scale though. Now that everyone in our generation is connected with everyone else, the possibilities seem limitless. People from every corner of the globe joining together in a group for a common cause is very incredible. People are creating new holidays at random. There seems to be a new hug an (insert personal characteristic here) day every week. It's just incredible what we can do with it, and it seems like new uses for this global connection are coming out every day. It will be interesting to see what the nature of Facebook is 20 years from now

Writing Essays

Mon, 03 Mar 2008 23:43:16 -0500

For the first time ever, I tried writing an essay out of order. In my paper 2, I wrote the body paragraphs first, and then wrote the introduction. This had an interesting affect on my paper. After analyzing my advertisements in the body paragraphs, I was able to come up with a very original thesis. It helped me gain a new perspective on my advertisements that I may not have been able to think of before.

The downside of this method was that it seemed like it took forever to get the paper written. It took me a while to find a thesis to fit with my body paragraphs. Once I did find my thesis, I then had to go back and alter my body paragraphs. A very lengthy process.

If I had one suggestion for anyone attempting to write a paper through this method, it would be to have a clearly defined thesis in mind and write it out before writing the body paragraph.

advertising in beer

Mon, 18 Feb 2008 22:36:47 -0500

I never really realized it until i started researching for paper 2, but beer companies really employ some of the most interesting techniques in order to get consumers to purchase their product. This is most likely from an attempt to combat all the negative attention they get, but it is really incredible how good their advertising departments are. Budweiser in particular has had some very memorable advertisements in the past, including the old Super Bowl commercial with the frogs. I'm sure everyone remembers that one. Many of the magazine ads for alcohol i looked at were very interesting as well. In fact in the sports illustrated swim suit issue, Budweiser unleashed a whole series of advertisements showing how they are sponsoring the US Olympic team, by placing attractive Olympic athletes in provocative attire and positions around their beer. This was especially interesting to me, because i always looked more closely at these ads to read who the athlete was and all that kind of thing. I just thought it was interesting how alcohol advertisements tend to stand out so much.

Visual Rhetoric

Mon, 11 Feb 2008 21:48:56 -0500

Visual Rhetoric is an interesting concept to me. I probably watch more TV than anyone in class. If I had to estimate, I would say on average, I probably watch between 4 and 5 hours per day. I am constantly being bombarded with it. In Romaine's article "Advertising Gender," she argues very intensely about how these advertisements are objectifying women. This may be true that they are exploiting women's bodies in order to sell products, but I personally don't think that seeing women represented in this way makes me think of them as less human. This could just be me, but I doubt it. I just feel that people make much to big a deal about something that is not really an issue. I mean, sure, a company can go too far with it so that it could be really offensive, but usually these types of ads are only in places where mature adult males would see them. Oh well, that's just my opinion.

A is for American

Mon, 04 Feb 2008 22:56:31 -0500

I found this to be an especially interesting piece of literature. I love learning about quirky pieces of history like that. In fact, when i'm not doing work, i can often be found watching the history channel, so to find out about the interesting relationship between Morse and Webster fascinated me. There was so much I didn't know about them, including the interesting fact that both made their innovations because of their patriotism. There was just so much about both of them that I never new, for instance that Webster wrote the whole dictionary himself and that Morse was a painter, and seemingly created Morse code on a whim! It is interesting to look in retrospect, and see all the unintentional impacts these innovations have made on our lives. Morse code, originally intended for day to day communications between families and to potentially unify the world, is now mostly used by the government to send messages, often during wartime. However, it did lay the foundation for other inventions such as the telephone. The Webster dictionary was also originally intended to help unify the nation by giving it it's own "American language." And perhaps he did accomplish this, but how many of these spellings which he designated for our language actually stuck? Now it is mostly just used to find definitions for words, and spelling is often simply handled by a word processor placing a squiggly red line under the misspelled word. It makes one wonder which of today's technologies may someday achieve different purposes.

Comics

Mon, 28 Jan 2008 15:21:20 -0500

I really enjoyed reading Scott McCloud's "Writing and Art." It really gave me a new perspective on comics. I always read the comics in the Sunday news growing up, but never really gave much thought to the fact that comics could ever really be something more besides little colorful panels in the newspaper. I never really thought that they could be made into novels, or even have much of a point to them besides to make a quick joke. I never really thought about how ancient cave art, art on tapestries, and other such historical pieces could be considered comics, but if you think about it, they really fit all the criteria necessary for a comic. This makes comics really an integral part of the history of civilization, which I find to be very interesting. I also found the fact that McCloud chose to write an entire essay in comic form. I found it much easier to read essays in this form, because the pictures helped to illustrate the point he was trying to make, and the fact that it was broken up into panels helped to hold my attention more affectively. Overall, I found this essay to be very thought-provoking as to where comics came from and where they are going in the future.

Short Paper 2 reflection

Sun, 20 Jan 2008 19:36:18 -0500

Through writing our first two short papers, I really got a chance to take in how much technology has changed my life. I never realized how much technology has evolved through just the short period of my lifetime. I can remember being very young and having a bulky computer with a small green screen, and the only thing it could really be used for was word processing. Now, with the internet revolution computers are capable of doing things that sounded incredibly far fetched just 15 years ago. Most changes are very favorable, however, in my opinion, since we now have so much information at our fingertips, more work is expected of us. Not to pick on this assignment, but in previous years, there never could have been work due on weekends, and now I consistently have at least two assignments due every weekend. This is not necessarily a bad thing, I mean, we have this technology to do so much more in a short period of time so we might as well use it and not waste it.