Novel Experience & Expression » experience

Resonance Assemblage

Gary Hink — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 00:15:51 +0000

M 07-Dec Due: Final Project — “Resonance Assemblage” (checkpoint)

Workshop / “Studio” class

“Stage 1″ Checkpoint instructions here.

W 09-Dec (no class)

Due: Final Project — (9pm finalized / online)

Overall guidelines here

[See post to watch Flash video]

“Stage 1″ Project Checkpoint due M 07-Dec (class time) — required

Note: must be online, “in progress,” by class time to avoid penalty
(late / point deduction from final project).

Content: 6-8 entries (”posts”) minimum (of 16-20 total).
— reminder: entries are fragments (100-200 words); see below for more.

“Research” is complete; definite/revised topic/issue; sources and “materials” selected.

List sources on “Materials” page:

Literary: 2 from Part II novels; (4 req’d total)*
Scholarly: 1 min. from research; (2 required total)
Culture: 2 min. (distinct from “Literary” sources; 4 min. total)
Multimedia: 2 min. (10 total, including 1 non-image e.g. video, audio, animation, etc.)

— * Note: any material from a novel is sufficient: quote, phrase, description, figure/image, character, setting, references/allusions, style/”voice” (?), narration technique (?)….

— Prospective materials: list any sources not used yet but anticipate including in entries; also might list any items seeking but not found thus far.

——–

Layout : Blog reformatted (see instructions below — click here).

Static home page created.

“Entries” page created.

Required Pages created (see below; content incomplete)

New title (creative / applicable, re: “critical expressionism” of your project)

New “theme” (blog template)

Categories and Tags (create, relative to topic)

All old entries categorized (and tagged? optional);
e.g. “research,” “response,” “reading journal”

Widgets: “Categories” and “Tag Cloud” (minimum / req’d)

——–

Required Pages:

Home
About
Entries (or “Posts”)
Materials
Poetics
Reflection

——–

Multimedia

— Be sure to embed at least one image and/or audio/video clip (even if you change/delete them later).
— Use from Web or your own (upload to Wordpress)

Instructions:
Embedding Images
Video Instructions (for YouTube; cf. Google, Vimeo, etc. on page)
Adding Audio Instructions
Google Maps

Note: We’ll want to troubleshoot practical issues about this during Monday’s workshop; please attend/arrive with specific technical questions/issues.

——–

Content

6-8 entries (”posts”) minimum.

— reminder: entries are fragments (100-200 words).

Flexible / hybrid poetics: might be single topic/vignette (for emphasis); or, juxtaposition of diverse elements, e.g. text and image from different paradigm levels.

Note: strongly discourage using images for “representation” (illustration, depiction, etc), as this is not expressive (but logical). Instead, use expressive images guided by intuition (associative and affective logic), without “obvious” (explicit, rational) connection…

Paradigm (one example from each dimension, for Monday):

Personal
Disciplinary (historical / scientific)
Cultural
Original Narrative

Interface: one example (from any of three paradigm dimensions)

Expressive Figure: one example (from any of three paradigm dimensions)

Manipulated image : one example

“Ready-made” or “Bricolage” Method of using images: “re-fashion” / “re-purpose” visually, by using any image program like Photoshop; including free software online:

Pixlr
Phoenix
Picnik
Wordle (?)

——–

Blog Format / Layout Instructions

Creating Pages

1) Dashboard -> Pages -> Add New
2) “Add New Page” -> Title / compose -> Publish

*3) Create a new page that will become your home/front page.
*4) Create a new page titled “Entries” or “Posts”

A) Convert blog to static home page.

1) Dashboard -> Settings -> Reading.
2) Front page displays -> choose “A static page.”
3) Select Front page (from drop-down menu).
4) Select Posts page (from drop-down menu).

B) New Theme & Title

Change Theme to one expressive of experience/affect.

1) Dashboard –> Appearance –> Themes

Change title: re-name your blog with an apt title for your project.

1) Dashboard -> Settings -> Blog Title & Tagline

C) Enable “Tag cloud” & “Categories” widget

1) Dashboard –> Appearance–> Widgets

* To tag and categorize entries

1) Dashboard -> Posts -> Edit Posts
2) Select post to Edit -> Add/type tags (right column) -> Click “Add” Button.
3) “Categories” -> Choose/create (right column)
*4) Click “Update” (right column) to save (not updated, otherwise).

Simple Solution, Impossible Problem

Gary Hink — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 04:11:17 +0000

“Truth depends on an encounter with something
that forces us to think and to seek the truth.” (14)

“if the resonance has both objective and subjective conditions,
what it produces is of an altogether different nature:
the Essence, the spiritual Equivalent….that breaks with the subjective chain.” (154)

— Deleuze, Proust and Signs (1972)

M 30-Nov     Foer: Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (through p. 173)
                       (Laura Hampson & Tahara Franklin)

W 02-Dec     Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (pp. 174-259)
                       (Krystal Sardinas & Paige Miller)

Due: Project Proposal Update (revised/finalized; 7pm, on blog)
(counts as blog entry; add Foer to your “poetics inventory”)

→ Notes from class discussion (plus reminders and clarifications)

F 04-Dec Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (pp. 267-326) (Sarah Zimmerman)

plus: (required): “Mystory” excerpts by Ulmer (PDF)

M 07-Dec Due: Final Project — “Resonance Assemblage” (checkpoint / partial)

Mining Experience

Gary Hink — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 21:16:30 +0000

Note: The following prompt is in addition to updating your “inventory” (required) with specific lessons and techniques from the novels, which is part of the project proposal; we’ll update one last time next week with Foer’s poetics.

For this week’s blog entry (due Friday),
exercise practicing a generative method and mode of thinking crucial for the final project,
following Monday’s creative writing entry: intuitive, inventive, and reflexive (personal).

“We should not be satisfied with either biography or bibliography;
we must reach a secret point where the anecdote of life and the aphorism of thought
amount to one and the same thing” (The Logic of Sense 128).

— Deleuze (via Ulmer; citing Nietzsche’s method for invention).

two prompts and examples below…

A) “Emblem” (examples)

B) “Signature Theory” (example)

For this week’s blog entry:

Personal Research Experiment
(choose A, B, or both…)

— toward “discovering” an interface

A) “Emblem” (from Greg Ulmer)

Consider your current major and career choice (or intended/prospective).

Within this context, recall your childhood (pre-adolescent) experience; what memory emerges?
This could be in the form of an anecdote or a figure (image); it might be “arbitrary” or limited/particular — not asking “origin” of desire/ambition for career/major choice.

Secondly, recall one cultural narrative within this context, ideally similar time-period of your life
(in addition to literature, stories from film/TV, and even pop forms like advertising, sports, consumer culture, etc.). What resonance do you notice? Insights about yourself, from this association?

note:
This is the opposite of fabricating a “brand” identity and logo, inventing an “image” for the marketplace and advertising. Rather, “mining” your experience database to notice unexpected connection(s) of resonance between past and present.

Examples here.

B) “Signature theory” (Derrida & Ulmer)

Research the various meanings and etymologies of your given and family name.

Through wordplay and intuitive combinations, generate and develop your signature into a link between your life experience and your major/career/artistic endeavors.

The “signature” of a musical composition appears at the beginning of the piece, providing the key and time for the performance of the music. (More here.)

What resonance do you intuitively notice about your present experience/identity and your signature: in what key and time signature is your life “played” (performed)?
More concretely, we can use our signature not to explain but to better understand our own idiosyncratic (”signature”) mode of working — our “fingerprints” or “trace” on our work.

remember: Resonance is Deleuze’s term for the non-totalizing and non-homogenizing consistency that appears across the assemblage of heterogeneous elements, for example within an author’s work or within a concept.
For him, Proust’s distinct signature (”style”) resonates throughout all seven discrete volumes of In Search of Lost Time.

What insights do you gain through your signature theory about your “style” — especially a style of working across different disciplines (college courses)?

Example here

“Emblem” examples:

Detailed accounts by Greg Ulmer:

* Frank Gehry: “fish”
Albert Einstein: “compass”
Antony Gormley: “rectangle“

ghink

Cochlea: spiral-shaped part of ear; converts vibrations to neuro-sensory (audible) information;
i.e. literal interface between physical (”frequency”) and neurological sensory data.

Anecdote: (childhood memory)

In 4th grade, my class was assigned to paint something in art class to be considered for inclusion in the forthcoming playground, which our community (including my family) was building.
As I lacked fine art skills — unlike my younger brother Brian, the visual artist — I simply spent the period painting abstract shapes, deliberately not attempting to paint “a picture” like my classmates (following the instructions).
Not intending mine to be considered in the contest, I carelessly splattered some paint over it — which I found I quite liked, incidentally. A few more ’splatter” motions drew the attention of the teacher, who unexpectedly praised my work; (in retrospect, shapes of geometrical abstraction and methods of abstract expressionism!) I’d mainly used the colors that I consistently loved during pre-teen years: black, purple, and teal (as well as some complements of red, if I recall) — not any referential scheme.

The most prominent shape in the painting was an imperfect spiral, which I’d been constantly practicing in those days (before perfecting the circular pencil technique).

It looked something like this:

Two notable elements that frame this anecdote, prior and subsequently:

1) I most definitely was (and am) not skilled in visual arts, and never drew/draw
(except for tracing comic book characters in an attempt to match my brother’s skilled renderings! but that is a separate anecdote)
My brothers and I all grew up playing music, first through involuntary piano and vocal lessons for me, followed by saxophone and trumpet choices by me and Brian respectively (once we reached fourth grade) — then eventually our “real” instruments of choice (passion) by high school, guitar.
Andrew (youngest) is without exaggeration a musical prodigy, having begun playing piano at age four voluntarily (with a piano in the house, after all); he quickly superseded my skills at first piano and then saxophone(s) (but not guitar, a mandatory instrument for him in college!).
Indeed, Brian has become the visual artist (photography, painting, mixed-media) he has always been (after years of guitar/bass); Andrew has been / will always be a musician (composer and performer) — for them, there is little differentiation of their “life” and “career” (key lesson for all of us, as my parents have supported for 26 years and counting).
In this context, I consider myself not “involuntarily” but incidentally and notably situated in relation to them: artistic sensibility (way of understanding and expressing), yet in a scholarly context; thus, the priority of the aesthetic mode for my career and scholarly method, originating from the “life” dimension (passion for music).

2) The painting from class with the spiral and paint-splatter apparently was only a “draft,” which is unusual for art but not writing (as I’d later endure and then require dozens of composition students to practice).
Unfortunately at the time, I could not quite replicate the original composition for the playground, having a much different attitude toward the desired reproduction.
However, this was fortunate, as I have the framed original (”draft”), which hung in my room where I practiced saxophone and guitar in the subsequent years, until we tore my childhood home down.
Similarly, the playground was torn down last year, perhaps “fated” with its name on our barrier-island town: “Sandcastle Park,” (two blocks from the beach).
The spiral image ended up being just like the cochlea of the ear after all, only receiving vibrations (”hearing”) in the present tense — like the splatter-technique impulse, or live musical performances,
or the conversations between the “architects” (me and my dad) and the “engineers” (Brian and Andrew) of sandcastles during an ephemeral construction at the beach — where of course one might find a spiral-shaped seashell.
(This present time always belonging to Lêthê.)

Whereas the spiral once signaled the movement toward “immortality,” — selected for one of the playground’s (castle) towers in the context — there eventually became a point in time when the movement shifted, progressing toward destruction. Rather than linear narrative, we could say that both of these motions were always-already encompassed in the spiral shape.

Career Resonance

// Spiral in chaos theory

summary: dynamical systems are sensitive to changes in initial conditions (not deterministic); ordered systems include movement toward chaos, while chaotic systems include movement toward order. In other words, “undecidable” with binary logic, not “either/or.” Consider: is spiral moving “inward” or “outward”? Unknown, undecidable; both.

At SUNY Buffalo, my thesis supervisor was Joseph M. Conte — who uses chaos and complexity theory in his work with postmodern literature.

Spiral’s in/direct appearance or function
in (French) poststructuralist theory
(my primary area of research):

— Roland Barthes: “third meaning” of expression is neither denotation or connotation, but signifiance. The “third sense” is hearing.
(Image-Music-Text)

— Hélène Cixous: task is to hear the unsaid, with attunement.

— Jacques Derrida:
“middle voice” is between active and passive, self-address. (i.e. speaking-hearing oneself)
Also, Différance is neither word nor concept, but active moving forces: undecidable, as différer means both “to differ” and “to defer.” Between speech and writing; becoming-space of time and becoming-time of space; new logic of impossibility.

— Gilles Deleuze:
Greek myth of Ariadne (from Nietzsche’s understanding); labyrinth is both spiral shaped and sonorous in Deleuze’s reading. For him, Ariadne’s song becomes one of affirmation of Life, as lover of Dionysus — rather than slave to ressentiment that results from judgment.
Thus, way of living that affirms Life.

B) “Signature Theory” example: ghink

(g)ary

ary:
Main Entry: “-ary”
Function: noun suffix
Etymology: Middle English -arie, from Anglo-French & Latin; Anglo-French -aire, -arie,
from Latin -arius, -aria, -arium, from -arius, adjective suffix

1 : thing belonging to or connected with; especially : place of <ovary>
2 : person belonging to, connected with, or engaged in <functionary>

French: -aire = “surface”

— also, River Aire in England (?)

Suffix -aire
1. -er; suffix used to form agent nouns.

e.g. legionnaire

* Latin: “ARIA” = expressive melody

noun
an air or melody in an opera, cantata, or oratorio, esp. for solo voice with instrumental accompaniment

— thus, expressive melody (solo) + connected with (orch/accomp.)

* voice/song as gesture (expressive quality of voice; unique)

(g)ary
= connection (”ary”) gesture (”aria”) agent (-aire)

(h)-ink

ink, = writing, literature, signed signature

“ghink” as gest + (h)ink = gesthink

gest aria (expressive)
gest of the “agent” (actor-participant)

→ gesthink ?

“gesthink” as “gest” + “think” + “ink/signature”

cf. Barthes: understands text as “pure gesture of inscription” (”Death of the Author”)

thus, my “signature”:

gary: connection agent song surface

hink: think writing

Novel Experience(s) Week

Gary Hink — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 19:15:54 +0000

M 09-Nov read:

Gregory Ulmer, “The Learning Screen.” 4 pages. Networked. 2009.
and Franz Kafka’s parable, “Before the Law”

Orson Welles’ version: Watch/Listen (2:50)

W 11-Nov No classes—Veterans Day
Due: Response 5 — Prompt (deadline 11:59pm)

F 13-Nov EGO Conference: see schedule below.
Due: Blog Entry, “Inventory” about lessons thus far; see more below.

M 09-Nov *read: Ulmer, “The Learning Screen.” Networked*. 2009.

T 10-Nov ~~(guest lecture, optional)~~ Rescheduled Noah Wardrip-Fruin (Asst Professor, UC-Santa Cruz). “Process-Oriented Fictions: Narrative in the Age of Media Machines.” ~~5pm, 285 Reitz~~. More Info

W 11-Nov No classes—Veterans Day Due: Response 5	Blog Entry due Friday

R 12-Nov English Graduate Organization	9th Annual Conference
F 13-Nov Class meets in 150 Pugh Hall; choose 2pm or 3:30 session (attendance required; normal policy applies) EGO Conference Schedule Keynote Speaker: Dominick LaCapra (Cornell University). “Sebald, Coetzee, and the Narrative of Trauma” Ustler Atrium, 13-Nov 7pm
additional UF events:
F 13-Nov Good Bye DDR: Memory and Material Culture Dauer Hall (10am-5pm). Schedule –see especially: “Memory and Visual Culture” Facebook

F 13-Nov UF School of Art + Art History “ArtBash” 2009 6-9pm, Fine Arts Complex (Fine Arts Buildings A/B/C/D) Website

13-14 Nov 2009 Florida Writers Festival. Schedule

Lêthê Dis-aster

Gary Hink — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 21:36:46 +0000

(Audio) CBC | BBC (original broadcasts, 16 Feb 1945)

Notes and Context for Wed 07-Oct

When all is said, what remains to be said is the disaster. Ruin of words, demise, writing, faintness faintly murmuring: what remains without remains (the fragmentary). — Blanchot (33)

“And what do the birds say? All there is to say about a massacre, things like Poo-tee-weet?” — Vonnegut (24)

Notes and Context for Wed 07-Oct

Context:

Paradox of “writing experience” (writing the disaster)

Greek etymologies:

word for “truth” is “alētheia” : unconcealment, disclosedness (Heidegger) // (classical intro.)

Q. what of a truth (of experience) that is not disclosed?

“catastrophe” = katastrephein {kata “to overturn” + strephein “turn”; or strophe “a turning”}
= “reversal of what is expected” (originally in drama)

Q. in what does a “turn” occur? (hint: EXP)

Blanchot: The Writing of the Disaster

“disaster” as “dis-aster”

– literally, separated from the stars (astronomy/astrology = fate)

“The disaster: break with the star, break with every form of totality…;
the disaster: prophecy which announces nothing but the refusal of the prophetic as simply an event to come, but which nonetheless opens, nonetheless discovers the patience of vigilant language.

The disaster, touch of the powerless infinite: it does not come to pass under a sidereal sky, but here—a here in excess of all presence.” (75)

→ thus, not accounting for experience of disaster by fate/destiny/fortune

Problem: Neither Belief (faith) nor Knowledge (reason/science) addresses or includes the “human element” of EXP…

“Target” (object/area of concern): experience of disaster → writing of experience?

i.e. how to write the experience of the disaster?

“The disaster, unexperienced. It is what escapes the very possibility of experience—it is the limit of writing.
This must be repeated: the disaster de-scribes.
Which does not mean that the disaster, as the force of writing, is excluded from it, is beyond the pale of writing or extratextual.” (7)

* Note Vonnegut’s foregrounding his writing of the novel, in the metafictional frame (and emphasized through other textual elements.

→ hypothesis: experience is (in/of) writing

Q. What lesson(s) to take from Vonnegut, from reading the novel?

Q. (more immediately) Vonnegut’s using disaster as figure:

if the event is the vehicle, what is the tenor (expressed element)?

Literary Definitions: Simple || Extended

Note: I am not using “Figure” to mean metaphor; if anything, closer to metonymy… I can further explain rationale and distinction later; logic simply stated: contiguity favored over substitution.

Q. hypothesis / premise:
if memory concerns truth that “manifests” (as Alèthéia),
then what of the absence or absent-truth?

note: Lêthê (Greek) = “forgetfulness” or “concealment.”
         (thus, a-lêthê = Alèthéia = unconcealed Truth.)
        Also: in Hades (mythology),
        the River and spirit/goddess “Oblivion”—opposite to Mnemosyne (Memory).

Blanchot: “Forgetfulness” — “refers us to nonhistorical forms of time, to the other of all tenses, to their eternal or eternally provisional indecision, bereft of destiny, without presence.” (85) → i.e. oblivion

Q. What is the (forgotten) experience of oblivion?
Or perhaps an oblivion-experience (the disaster). How to express this?

Additionally, note the different conceptions of time in Slaughterhouse Five…?

Simultaneity of past – present – future (at/as one moment) = Eternal Moment

Ethical implications? (beyond “illusion of free will” vs. “determinism/fatalism”)

cf.

Eternal Recurrence

ewige Wiederkunft

not literal, but “thought of perpetual recurrence” as if, not as such

Looking further ahead:

Potential discussion in next week’s blog entry:
reflection upon the “catastrophe” (turn) of experience — writing (of) experience.
(premise / hypothesis: the “turn” happens through writing experience…)

So It Goes

Gary Hink — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 17:18:15 +0000

M 05-Oct Slaughterhouse Five     (through Chp 5; Caroline & Erin)

W 07-Oct Slaughterhouse Five     (Chp. 6-8; Laura Navia)

F 09-Oct Slaughterhouse Five    (Chp. 9-10; Audrey)

F 09-Oct Due: Response 3 — Prompt

Extra Credit for Resp 3. (due 12-Oct)

extra credit — part of Resp. 3
200 words (separate entry/post); due M 12-Oct

Read and respond to a classmate’s entry.
Describe the affect expressed (that you intuit from the fragments).
Evaluate the effect of (or the extent to which) the entry’s expressing experience through “unconventional discourse.”
From this, (important) discuss “lessons” to take from Vonnegut, for understanding experience and expression—particularly for expressing experience.
(note: feel free to email me with questions or for further instructions about this reading-reply)

Response 3: Creative Writing Assignment (Responding to Slaughterhouse Five)
500-600 words; 10 points
Due: Fri 09-Oct (11:59pm)

Vonnegut provides the impetus for this imaginative assignment in several ways: the full title(s) of the novel; Billy Pilgrim’s profession (optometry); the Tralfamadorians’ perception (“four dimensional”); the formal (textual) breaks in the narrative, which compel us to “fill in the blanks.”

Tip: Review notes on writing of the disaster and “concealed” or “hidden” (secret) truth of experience: Wed 07-Oct.

Option 1

Task: Express a particular affect {subjective dimension of “experience”: feeling, mood, disposition, attitude, stance} that Vonnegut conveys through Slaughterhouse Five. Use the aesthetic logic of expression, rather than explicitly stating or describing this affect (in “rational” discourse).

So, first step: decide upon a specific affect that you have intuited from the novel. This can be about Dresden or Vietnam, but likely more general, involving a feeling/stance toward both — I have presented Dresden as Vonnegut’s vehicle for addressing Vietnam, after all.

Option 2

Similar task, but complementary perspective: use the novel’s elements—characters, settings, (respective) narratives, etc.—to express (an) experience of your choice/invention. This need not be inherently “related,” but probably “parallel” with Vonnegut’s topics. As we do not seek to “reveal” or “unveil” the “truth” of this experience (scientific / rational mode), your composition should not “tell the testimony” of the situation but present an expressive figure that conveys the affect of experience.

Composition Method
(parameters, expectations, suggestions)

1) Form/composition: Non-linear vignettes; fragments of narrative moments at respective times and places. (Suggested: 3-4 vignettes, minimum.) So, this can not be a linear narrative within one setting!

2) Using Vonnegut’s characters, compose brief scenes that occur “within the gaps” of the novel’s narratives. In other words, invent by imagining likely anecdotes or events, based upon the information and characterization that Vonnegut provides. These will be original scenes, within the parameters of both history and the novel. tip: “multiple worlds” (cf. Abbott Chp. 12)

3) Hybrid discourse: creative or inventive (e.g. science fiction) and historical (accounts/facts). Permissible but not required to include “metafictional elements” (e.g. the authorial voice of Vonnegut or Burroughs writing the novel).

4) Style: concrete and vivid imagery, using figures, (i.e. not abstract/general); descriptive language and dialogue (explicit, realistic, evocative, “expressive”). i.e. “write like Vonnegut” in terms of diction and tone, to express your implied affect (of experience). Use this formal approach to convey not “what it is like” but what it is to undergo this experience…

5) Use “minor characters” (particular individuals) from the novel.

– rationale: to whom is Slaughterhouse Five dedicated, after all? (Consider effect)
– rationale: following Vonnegut, we are not writing in the “autobiographical” mode.

Examples:

Bernhard and Mary O’Hare
Valencia Merble
Lionel Merble
Barbara Pilgrim
Robert Pilgrim
Roland Weary
Edgar Derby
Werner Gluck
“The Blue Fairy Godmother”
Howard W. Campbell, Jr.
Bertram Rumfoord
Eliot Rosewater
Kilgore Trout
Montana Wildhack

Overall, feel free to use any/all of the unconventional techniques that Burroughs and Vonnegut employ, especially to present non-linear narratives. In any case, your composition should necessarily reflect an effort to try at least one experimental method of writing, as learned from reading Naked Lunch and Slaughterhouse Five.

For example, consult and/or try the Cut-up machine or a similar writing prompt / exercise, in addition to the parameters above (note “proceed with caution”…? Remember, still a few parameters for this assignment, to experiment within.)

Beautiful Shadow

Gary Hink — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 16:09:26 +0000

“By the roots of my hair some god got hold of me.
I sizzled in his blue volts like a desert prophet.”

– Plath, “The Hanging Man” (1960)

At work in novels is “a new logic, definitely a logic, but one that grasps the innermost depths of life and death without leading us back to reason. The novelist has the eye of a prophet, not the gaze of a psychologist” (82).

– Deleuze, “Bartleby, or the Formula” (1989)

M 21-Sep Plath: The Bell Jar (through Chp. 9) (Sarah Zimmerman)

”Plath’s Life and Career” (Illinois)

W 23-Sep The Bell Jar (Chp. 10-14) (Krystal Sardinas)

plus poems (optional / select) — see below. cf. List: all poems (Stanford)

F 25-Sep The Bell Jar (Chp. 15-20) (Jessica Brousseau)

plus (required):
“Ariel” (1962); “Daddy” (1962); & “Lady Lazarus” (1962)

Due: Response 2 — Prompt

Response 2: Bell Jar and Experience

500 words (min.); 10 points.
Due: F 25-Sept. Post to your blog, by ~~class time~~ midnight.

Given that this is not an autobiography, and yet highly “experiential,”
what can we learn from The Bell Jar about experience, from Plath’s literary expression?

Start by considering and/or (re-)defining “Experience”
(as a noun or verb? as a narrative or event? a combination?).

Another point of departure (contrast) is the “referential function” (153) that Abbott discusses, in that we are not evaluating this in terms of “factual, false, and fictional” (157). Rather, this novel illustrates the uncertain or undecidable status between literature and life (cf. Derrida and Miller, Cambridge 210).

In this view, consider experience as narrative: Plath presents multiple narratives throughout, concerning the past, present, and future within the time of the plot-events, specifically in the
memories (past) and aspirations (future) that she notes in parallel. This non-linear sequence gives us a thematic starting point, both in the overall structure and in the vivid image of the fig tree.

Use two to four specific descriptions from the novel as support examples for your definition, being careful not to summarize; remember to work from (and “with”) the textual instances toward an overall conclusion for your response.

Notes / suggestions:

Likewise, be careful not to generalize (e.g. “society’s view of women…”); rather, discuss the unique circumstances and ordeals that Esther undergoes or that Plath describes, as your examples.

You might find it easier and/or more effective to narrow your scope to a particular aspect or element (”sub-category”) of experience, using one of the contexts or circumstances from the plot (e.g. gender relations/roles, institutions, mental illness). This is a fine approach, but still try to pose an overall conclusion about experience from your specific example.

Finally, the references from Abbott in the prompt come from Chapters 11 and 14, which might be helpful to review (especially pp. 153-7 & pp.209-10; as well as autobio. and performance on pp. 138-43).

Sidenote: like the fig tree vision, another of Plath’s percepts to consider in your definition is the shadow that she mentions, beautiful or otherwise, there or not…

Sylvia Plath: all poems (Stanford)

Suggested

“Ariel” (1962)
“Daddy” (1962)
“Lady Lazarus” (1962)

“The Hanging Man” (1960)
“Love Letter” (1960)
“The Moon and Yew Tree” (1961)
“Berck-Plage“(1962)
* “Death & Co.” (1962)
* “Elm” (1962)
* “Event” (1962)
“Fever 103″ (1962)
“Little Fugue” (1962)
“Poppies in July” (1962)
“Poppies in October” (1962)
* “Stings” (1962)
* “The Bee Meeting” (1962)

Blog Setup

Gary Hink — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 21:20:51 +0000

Over the weekend, please create your blog; then, post your link in a comment below.

In your first entry, please briefly introduce yourself (as we’ve not during class time): flexible expectations for this, but please include
major/grade and “technical experience level” (with tech./social media); rationale for taking course, (seeking what from this experience?); your “working definition” for “experience”; and any interesting information you’d like to share, perhaps an “experience narrative” (after Friday’s class)…

Note: See prior post for suggestions / elaboration on “blogging” in weekly entries.

Register @ Wordpress

WP Support site

Technical Instructions for Blog Setup:

Blog Setup:

Wordpress Register
Complete registration, using UF email account. Note: username will become URL (address) by default. e.g. http://janedoe.wordpress.com.
However, you can rename domain on next page:
e.g. Username: GHink. Domain: “experience.wordpress.com” And then (re-)title blog — Blog Title: “Experience Expression”
(Then click “signup”).
Next, choose Theme. Many to browse/select; choose a theme you like! (one expressive of your personality, aesthetically pleasing, relevant widgets, etc) Browse or search; preview or activate — you can always choose new themes without any permanent changes to your blog. I suggest two- (or three-) column layout.

So, once you’ve created your account/blog:

– your username is your URL (e.g. ghink.wordpress.com)

– login in order to post/edit: Wordpress.com

The “Dashboard” is the page to create content and edit appearance. This page presents full control of your blog — including appearance, entries/pages/content, and all administrative functions. Look around — the navigation is fairly intuitive.

Next, you’ll probably want to change a few Settings (Dashboard, left sidebar):

“General Settings“: Blog Title (if you’ve not already)
“Users” — “Your Profile”: Name, avatar, etc
* “Appearance” — “Themes“: (if you’ve not already)
* “Appearance” — “Widgets“:
– All optional, yet strongly suggest:
“Search,” “Pages,” “Categories,” “Tag Cloud,” “Links” (add classmates to your Blogroll).
Note: “Meta” is a key widget, in order to login directly on your page; (much faster than WP.com).

Now you’re ready to add content.

“Pages” (Dashboard, left sidebar :
First, edit the “About” page (required); at minimum, suggest Name, Course, Semester (like my current About page). Use privacy logic; do not post your email address, to avoid receiving spam.

Any additional pages are up to you. I will be able to distinguish your “official” class entries (weekly, for credit) by the tags and categories that you add to Posts.
“Posts“
First, edit the initial / default entry.
Here, briefly describe your blog; additionally, I would like everyone specifically to introduce themselves in their first entry (as we did not do so during class time).

– Once you edit the text-field, add Tags and the Category (right sidebar). Then click “Update” (for new entries, “Publish” button).

span style=”font-family:times,georgia,garamond;”>In the future, click “Add New” under “Posts” (left sidebar) — this is how you’ll add weekly entries and your response assignments.

Note on Tags and Categories: these are important for readers (me, primarily), especially as the semester progresses (and you accumulate 20 entries). This is how I’ll distinguish your “class entries” (for credit) from any personal entries that you might post (optional).

More on “Posts” at Wordpress Support
“Links” (left sidebar):
– “Edit” (delete default links)
– “Add New” (at minimum, the course blog; plus any others you’d like to add, such as your classmates’ blogs and relevant web sites).

For further technical help, you can find answers/instructions to most issues in the
Wordpress Support section as well as the
Support Forum

(both of which you can search with keywords).

Suggestion: “play around” with the interface controls, and you’ll likely intuit the functions fairly quickly (more quickly, I’d add). Specifically, when creating an entry, you’ll see two rows of formatting commands at the top of the text field, when in “Visual” view — these cover most functions, (basic and otherwise!). The “visual” view is the actual design/formatting (”what you see is what you get”) — this is how your “post” will look.
More about this later and/or by request, (and as always, email me with Qs/problems).

Blogging (as) Experience

Gary Hink — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 19:47:59 +0000

(from syllabus)
Blog Entries
1 minimum per week, beginning week 2; (100-200 words. Credit/no credit assigned).
Every student will create and maintain a blog throughout the semester, preferably using Wordpress
Blog entries due Wednesday each week, starting week 2, unless otherwise noted (e.g. weeks 8 & 14).

Elaborating upon today’s class, specific suggestions for blogging below.
Note: more technical instructions for blogging coming soon (i.e. setup / “tech. support”) — need not create your blog until next week (over weekend?)

Also, optional / additional ideas:
as part of blogging, use Twitter, Facebook, or other social media (?).
More on this below — could be very interesting and unique approach!

Weekly entries are informal (ungraded); consider as “Reading Journal”: e.g. post associative links/images, pose questions, note observations, describe insights – particularly connections between texts within and those outside of class. An enjoyable and productive way of engaging our “objects of study,” this on-going work serves as “research” and material for the final project.

Specific suggestions for blogging:

On a general level of the course, blogging itself is precisely (an) experience and (your) expression. The benefit to our method (experiment) is both to practice and develop our engaging with literature, as well as generate ideas through the process — consider as analogy the creative moments that occur during “band practice,” (not just refining old songs but generating a creative impulse!). For progress in our experiment (semester), this practice involves “warming-up”: not just “tuning,” but ourselves becoming in tune or “attuned” to different frequencies.

One perspective is our scholarly examination of our “objects of study” (literature); at minimum, your “reading journal” entries might note a specific literary topic/issue, such as one we discuss that particular week. This strategy helps generate ideas specifically for assignments.

We are also interested in additional “frequencies”: observations and connections from your unique perspective, involving any relevant personal/experiential knowledge. Specifically, explore insights through associations or connections between our texts and any content/material “outside” of class–this very much includes your experience from the past and at present (e.g. other courses, activities, media). We’ll try to develop a “three-dimensional” or “360°” perspective on “experience and expression.”

In both cases, also very interesting and productive to present new questions that our reading generates (i.e. how /what you are considering, newly or differently, as a result of reading).

Finally, your blog is the “experience narrative” of this particular semester, with all of the unique events and culture contextualized during “fall 2009.” The “incidental” associations that occur might likely provide fruitful avenues to explore for our project. We’ll want to be especially attuned to any “surprising” (accidental?) connections, especially any triggered by “involuntary memory” (more on this last concept later).

Optional / additional ideas, for blogging:

I have considered the potential use of Twitter, as part of blogging, and it might be interesting/productive in two ways. First, because we don’t know when an insight will occur, it is often useful to review our own experience as a narrative — a stream of “tweets” (entries) creates this narrative, showing us our process of engaging material (all courses, media, etc.). Alternatively, there is a new trend of users “tweeting” in character, taking up a role from literature/culture and writing in this voice. This is of great interest for us as a strategy of imagining and expressing others’ experience, which we will attempt to do at the end of the term.

The opposite of Tweeting “in character,” and yet very much the “three-dimensional” perspective of the course, would be using Facebook as part of the process. Both our novels and our class are “social networks” themselves; a new perspective would be testing what occurs when you conduct our experiment (method/process) within your established social network, especially regarding feedback.

Anyone interested in either of these options should contact me, perhaps for additional prompts/suggestions and certainly for technical advice (and to discuss how to integrate into your weekly requirement of 200-word blog entries).