Wednesday, December 10, 2008

Reactions to elections

the day of the presidential election i was at work. It was a late night, and i ended up leaving at like 11. The trains weren't working for some reason so i took the bus home. Heading into my building i heard gunshots. These shots i soon found out were shots of joy. When i got up stairs i called my mom to ask her who had won the election, expecting to not receive an answer because im used to elections going on all night, with recounts and all that. To my surprise i found out that obama had one the election with a landslide victory. Instantly i got goosbumps, and was really happy. I thought in my head finally we have a president in which i feel comfortable in placing americas future in. In andys class we talked about the election the day after, and some classmates brought up the whole idea that this can be very scary, and bad things can happen. This is because even though racism isnt common in our neiborhoods, and where we live there still is racism in america, and that also sent chills down my spine because i really think thats a horrible thing to imagine. Even andy was proud to have Obama as our president but he said that this can take a very bad turn.

While watching the news, i beleive 2 days after the election, i saw a story of 3 white men who were caught while trying to plan a way to assassinate obama. This instantly got me a little dissapointed in america all around, because if people still beleive this in the end of 2008, i think thats crazy. Whenever im put in a situation where i dont like a group of people because of what they beleive in, i like to put my self in there position. When trying to do this i instantly thought its probably what they are being raised around. If my mother had brought me up to be a racist i beleive i would have honestly grown up to be a racist until i had an event or something change my perceptions. i beleive this happens all the time. An example is how now a days i see kids hating homosexuals, and i beleive that is because there family member dissaprove. I myself was told by my family and friends, being a homo is bad. Thus in my life i still to this day associate someone being bad or being wack as being a homo. I dont hate gay people, and i beleive i would be able to have a gay friend but since this was planted in my brain while i was young i had beleived this was bad, but now i understand i dont think its bad anymore.

In conclusion i have no idea what to expect from this election. With a black president i beleive a lot of good things can come. I honestly cant wait. Everyone expects the change to be instant, but i understand that its going to take a while, and we as "americans" need to work together to get this change to happen. Honestly all i can do is hope for the best, and i expect great things to happen.

Tuesday, May 27, 2008

My revelation expirience

For a paper Andy wanted us to write about, and describe a time in which we had received a message, or was a prophet figure. When encountered with this question I thought of the obvious situations. These are the times in which Andy taught us something or we realized something in a movie. I honestly don’t want to write about that though because Id rather write of something more meaningful. Over the summer I spent a lot of time with my uncle. He spoke to me about a lot of things, and he would always be real with me. He offered me plenty of opportunities to enlighten myself but I never truly took full advantage. One day we were talking and he gave me a revelation on the real world. He spoke to me about getting a job and becoming a man. He spoke to me about me needing to start making money for myself and not being as dependent on others. When I heard this I actually took this to heart. All the time I thought I’m too young I won’t ever get hired by any job. I made so many excuses of how I can’t make it in the world but I never actually attempted. At first I didn’t even listen to this revelation. I thought to myself how I always hear this there’s no reason to pay attention to it now. After passing by my ignorance I noticed how it is true. Why sit there and complain about something that won’t happen when I haven’t even attempted to make it happen. While taking in this revelation I then attempted to make it happen. I went the next day with him and picked up a few applications for jobs. A lot of places told me I was too young so of course I was upset. I wanted to work at game stop, and I was old enough to work there. Sadly they weren’t hiring at the time. I still gave in a resume and application. Eventually I thought I had failed, but still attempted to make this revelation work. About a month later I had received a phone call from game stop. I was avid and really happy. They called me in for an interview and I was proud of myself. Eventually I ended up getting the job. With this story I thought it was a great example of me receiving a revelation that directly impacted my life and my future. With this job I now have experience and can continue my life with experience with work. If not for this revelation being shown to me I would still be the same old lazy person. I feel as if I have matured with this revelation and also feel more responsible.

My dad?

Part 1:
"Hey pass right here." I yelled across the hardwood basketball court. The buzzer was beating down to one. The crowed was silent. All I heard was my heart beating I knew I had to do this. The score was 81 to 79. We were losing to Bush high school. I looked up at the clock 10 seconds left. It’s not the easiest shot in the world but I know I could do it. I jab with my right foot. The defenders shaky. He doesn’t know what to do; he’s as scared as I am. 7 seconds left. I’m not scared, ill make the shot and I know I will. I got this. I’m ranked 1st in the state for a reason. 4 seconds. I pump up, the defender jumped! Perfect chance to shoot. I pull up...."SWISH" I made it. I drop down to the ground, still not believing what I had just done. I hear some screaming and a whistle but I'm still consumed with hat just happened. I hear the crowd yelling but all of a sudden I hear silence, and the ref yells "No Basket!" What? I get up angry. There was an off ball foul; our freshman center Paul rice pushed someone on the ground before I made the shot. What?! I scream angrily at the ref. We lost. I’m fucking mad. Words can’t even explain how disgusted I am. Nothing can make this night worse. We lost our first game of the season to our division rivals. Well still make the playoffs but who cares. I wanted to head in perfect. I sat in the locker for an hour. While I was heading outside there were people patting me on the back trying to make me feel better, but I was still depressed. I waited at the bus stop to catch a ride home. Some guy in his 40s stood next to me. He kept looking at me. Honestly I was getting ready just in case he were to try and jump me. He finally turned to me and said; "your Kobe right?" I replied with a simple nod to with the head. He looked at me and put his hand out for me to shake it. I stared at it not knowing what to do, and he sensed that I was uncomfortable so he put it down. I asked him who he was. He replied in a monotone voice "Kobe I don’t know what you have heard about me, but I am your father." "My father?" I replied in anger and uncertainty. He can’t be my father my mother had told me my father had died when I was born. "I was just released out of prison. I was doing 17 years for attempted murder." he spoke with the same tone every time. I was consumed with all these ideas, that I had no idea what to do. I saw the resemblance but chose not to believe what I saw. He reached out to hug me. Not knowing what to do, I swung. Full force punch to the face, knocked him right down onto the ground. He was hurt emotionally more than I hurt him physically. Not knowing what to do I run.

Part 2:
I sat in an empty room. Waiting for my mother to come home. The second she walked in I asked he the question that had been on my mind all night. "Is my father or dead, or was he just in prison?" Not knowing what to do she started crying. She cried because she found out that I had finally figured out the truth. Not knowing what to do she opened up a wine bottle and poured herself a cup. When ever she was uncertain about something she would drink. I hated it. We stood up until about 2 in the morning just talking about the truth. She explained everything to me and I don’t think I was really ready to hear any of it. When I heard it all I don’t think I was ready. I still didn’t want to believe it. Over the next few weeks I kept thinking about it but, I didn’t see my convict father again. Our team was progressing throughout the high school playoffs and we were doing great. We ended up going to the championship. We play bush high school, again. The same team that ruined our perfect season. Only god knew how much I wanted to win that game. The night before the game I went to the park just to practice my jumpshot. While shooting around a bit, I heard that same monotone voice. "Play me kid, show me what you got." There he was coming out of nowhere again. "Fine." I threw the ball at his chest pretty hard. He threw it back even harder. I started out softly, but went real fast to my right. Layed it up with ease. "I gave you that one" He said while walking back to the line. I then went again dribbled up and pulled back, "swish". "Your pretty good" he told me with a smile on his face. If I’m gonna play I better practice all my moves. I dribbled down about 7 feet from the basket. I back him down, when I was about 3 feet away from the basket I turned of the post and shot with my right hand. "Bom" His hand slapped against the ball. He blocked my shot. I still got my rebound. I attempted it again. "Bom" he blocked me again. "Fuck" I yelled in anger. "Your games great you just need to work on your post moves, I can help you if you allow me." He offered. "What do I need you for, I didn’t need you for the first 17 years of my life, and I really don’t need you now." I know I said it very meanly, but he was still a stranger, and a convict to me. "Listen man, I’m not asking you to call me dad. I’m not asking you for anything. I’m offering you knowledge, and trying to help you out. I don’t want to take over your life, and be your parent, because I have made my mistakes, I know I’m not an angel, I just want to get to know you a little. You are my son, and you are honestly all I have, all I ask is for a little respect just as you’d respect any other person. Now you wanna' learn the best way to post up?" When I heard this it truly went to my heart, I understood him now. Why was I such an ass, he never was asking me for something, he was only offering stuff for me to gain. "Teach me" I said while passing him the ball. He posted up on me and explained that before I take that shot its a good idea to jab the opposite way I’m choosing to shoot, to give me some more space to make the shot, then turn around and make the shot the other way. He did on me over and over all-night. With practice I almost mastered it, and felt comfortable now using these new moves he taught me. When leaving to get on the bus I gave him a hug, and under my breath said "thanks.....dad" He heard me but didn’t acknowledge it because he knew I still was uncomfortable, he just smiled. I got home and slept, anticipating the game tomorrow.

Part 3:
I went through the same daily routine, I went to school and all that. After school I chilled in the gym until the game. In the locker room everyone was hyped up ready to play, I unlike myself sat there, and thought. I thought about what this game meant to me, and I thought about my dad. When encountered with this idea of him being my dad I was so resistant, but now I understand. I was such an ass. I accept him now. For the game coming up I want to play for him. I hope he'll be there, but anyway I dedicate it to him. In the shoot around before the game I practiced what he was teaching me last night. I was comfortable with it. I kept looking around for him but he wasn’t there. Right before tip-off I looked around but he still wasn’t there. Within the first minute of the game I heard he doors swing open. I knew it was him before I even looked. I saw it was him and all of a sudden felt a surge of energy. "Give me the ball" I screamed. I got it and ran hard to the basket and dunked it down as hard as I could. The crowd went nuts, I was screaming at the top of my lungs. While walking to the other side of the court I pointed at my father and smiled, he pointed back just as happy as I was. Then I knew I was ready to bring it all out. In the end the game came down to the same situation. "Give me the ball" I called out. There were 10 seconds left. Score was 91 to 90. We were losing by one. I went down about 5 feet from the basket. I thought of the post moves I learned, and instinctively backed down my defender. 8 seconds left. I jabbed right with my right foot. The defender shifted right, quickly I went left and layed it up with 1 second left on the clock. I went nuts with the whole crowd. The building was shaking. I pointed at my dad as happy as I ever had been. We had won the game. Immediately after receiving my trophy I went to my dad, and hugged him. I gave him my trophy and told him to hold on to it for me. We had won the championship. We were the best team. I knew it was because of him. If not for him I don’t think I would have won that game. I accept him in my life now. He is my dad I knew it all along even though I had problems accepting it. I thank him for coming into my life.

Friday, May 23, 2008

Big Essay Due saturday

What is a trope? When encountered with this question in class one day I had no idea what the answer could be. At first I thought it was some type of item, but when it was explained to me I understood. A trope is a common reoccurring image that can be seen anywhere. An example of a trope is the way that a lot of rich people buy huge gold Jesus crosses to show how religious they are. (Even though Jesus would probably not approve of it.) Tropes are seen everywhere at every time people just don’t notice it but we know what it is. In the movie Firefox staring Angelina Jolie there is a common trope which is used in many movies. The trope would be the man teacher asserting his power over students to get them to do what he wants, and then the students must overpower the authority to create an environment that is better for everyone else. That is a trope seen in many films and books, but it’s an only a smaller trope inside of a bigger trope. The main trope that we looked at this semester was the revelation trope. This trope is seen almost everywhere and once understood is easily recognizable. Throughout the semester we were looking at films and books trying to recognize this trope and learn as much about the world around us by looking at it through this trope.

When looking at this trope throughout different movies we noticed things that kept repeating. the trope in the movies always start with an issue seen by the viewer but not seen but other characters in the actual film. Then there is always a character which fills the role of a revealer. This character is known to be smarter and wiser than everyone else but isn’t always the main character. This character tries to reveal his knowledge of whatever the subject of the film is. When trying to reveal this message the receiver of the revelation often resists the revelation at first until the receiver sees or experiences the revelation for him. Then through acts and learning the receiver ends up taking the revelation and doing something about it, with help from his/her "supporting cast".

The first and main movie we paid attention to was the matrix. This movie is the best example of a revelation movie that you can get. It follows almost every rule that occurs with this trope. I had previously seen this movie and enjoyed it, but I never saw it the way that I saw it while paying attention to this trope and to other tropes also. This movie was not only a revelation movie, but also had many religious aspects in it which gets the viewer thinking, and searching for a deeper message while watching the movie. It starts by having the viewer enter this futuristic science fiction world, by entering through what may be perceived as a birth canal, leading to the idea that you are being born into this computer world. It starts out with an unknown character named trinity in a room, where she is about to be arrested but then does some fighting moves and acrobatics thought which are normally thought to be impossible. Having this occur in the beginning of the film it shows the viewer the rules of this world, which are that there are none. It then starts with the story of neo. Neo is the main character of the movie. He is a hacker who knows there’s something else to the world but has no idea what it is. He assumes the role as the receiver of the revelation. He has heard of a hacker/ internet terrorist named Morpheus. In search for this man named Morpheus he comes up with a question which is “what is the matrix?” Then approximately 23 minutes into the film neo finds Morpheus and is encountered with what would be the biggest and most life changing choice of his life. Morpheus asks neo if he would like to take a blue pill, which would bring back to his life as it is, or would he take a red pill which will lead him to the truth that he seeks. Of course neo chooses the red pill and is led to the first part of his revelation. He learns that the world was taken over by man made robots which learned that they could use human’s brainpower as a battery. Neo also learns that he is predicted to fulfill a prophecy and become “the one”.

While continuing on his journey he learns martial arts, and learns how to bend the rules of what he thought was reality. While learning his new role on earth he constantly resists. Everything that happens to him he resists. There is a scene in which Morpheus try’s to teach neo to bend the laws of gravity, and jump from one building to another building about 30 feet away. Morpheus jumps the building no problem but neo still doesn’t accept this revelation of a world where anything is possible so he fails and falls off the building. To make this faster in the end Neo has to accept the revelation taught to him by neo in order to survive and save the human race.

One of the main things to pay attention to while looking at this trope is the different pieces of the trope so that when you notice these pieces while looking at literature you can easily find the revelation trope. One basic thing with the revelation trope is that it starts with an unacceptable situation. This situation can be whatever you want it to be, but mostly appeals to the viewer as something they would dislike. An example of an unacceptable situation is in the movie the Matrix, like I had mentioned earlier. The situation in that movie is the whole idea of humans being used as batteries for robots. The viewer sees this and knows that this has to change and has to be fixed but sees the receiver of this revelation learning and eventually changing this situation to be fixed. Following the unacceptable situation being presented there has to be a solution to it. The solution is often created and known by the prophet. An example of this part of the revelation trope can be seen in star wars. Obi Wan knows almost everything about Luke Skywalker's past and knows the only way to overthrow the Empire is to train and give Luke the confidence to become a great Jedi. Obi Wan carries the revelation of Luke being the one to change everything, but doesn’t reveal everything to him at once. Obi Wan is definantly the prophet in that revelation story.

The next step in portraying the revelation trope is for the prophet to offer a new definition of reality, or to pretty much come up with the master plan and share with everyone the way they will change this unacceptable situation. It also consists of them doing and showing these actions, and new “reality” to everyone else. An example of this is in the film Firefox. In that movie the strong willed character played by Angelina Jolie, comes up with a plan to catch there pedophile teacher in the act of being a pervert, and end up physically abusing him. When the prophet fights the opposition and passes on their message there is often misinterpreted or just has a problem getting people to follow and believe his message. It is pretty much just more opposition to the revelation. An example that I think is good for this part of the revelation trope is from the matrix. In the matrix a character name cipher knows the revelation, has heard it over and over again, but still believes that it is bullshit. He totally disregards the idea that neo can be the one and thinks its ridiculous. Cipher ends up being the “Judas” of the film and giving up Morpheus to agents. A part I found interesting about his opposition of the revelation is a part when he was about to kill neo by unplugging him from the computer world. He was talking about if he was really the one then there would have to be some sort of miracle to stop him from killing neo, and all of a sudden a guy in which he thought was dead, came back and killed cipher, and saved Neo's life.

The next part of the revelation trope is that the prophet gets in trouble with the authorities or the masses for challenging the existing structure. An excellent film that showed this part of the revelation trope is the film they live. The main character that goes through the film with no name learns the revelation that all the rich and high class people are not actually human, but some zombie alien creatures. He challenges the existing structure by going on a shooting spree, killing most of the zombies he sees. Then he gets in huge trouble and is trying to be tracked down by them. Also in the same film the first people who challenge the structure are the people from the church, and they also become pursued by the zombies, and get in trouble with the authority figures of this structure. Also in the matrix neo had gotten in trouble for trying o override the structure of the matrix and save mankind from the robots. By doing this he got in trouble with the authority figures of the matrix, and had to have a fight with agent smith. The way the director of the films chooses to portray this part of the revelation trope is often different but pretty much consists of a lot of drama and action. In the matrix leading up to this final battle with agent neo there was plenty of drama, which in all showed the part of the revelation trope.

After learning the basics of the rope and comparing the trope through films, we analyzed the trope through the different messages every movie had a certain revelation but in that they all had to do with a different situation. The different situations influenced the viewer to enjoy the revelation in a different way. Though each film had a different revelation message I felt as if most of them were saying the same thing. One revelation message I thought I saw the most is the wake up message. In this message it pretty much means to stop thinking every thing you see is true, and real, and wake up from your delusional world. When exploring this message we heard a small example of this. It’s a situation in which people were strapped down to a chair where they could not move in a cave. About 2 feet above there heads is a stage with fire on it. People would always walk along this stage and interact, but the people strapped to the chairs can only see there shadows. If that’s all they saw their whole life then they would believe that people look like shadows, and that’s what they would think was real and normal. If these people who were strapped into the chairs were to get up (wake up) and see everything for what it really is they would learn and the truth would be revealed. That is just only one example of this reoccurring wake up message. Another film I saw this in was the movie they live. In this movie the "average American man" was constantly trying to live the "American dream" but this never happens for them because they are always being kept down by the rich people in the society. This is easily comparable to the real American life, but in the movie to make it more dreamful and entertaining they decided to make these rich greedy people into zombies. The only way you can see the truth about everything is if you where some special sunglasses. Throughout the movie you see people who aren’t even these power hungry zombies protecting what they think is right, when it’s truly wrong. The whole movie the main character is trying to wake everybody up and show the world the truth behind what they think is real. In the end what I'm really trying to show is that there are different ways to convey the revelation messages, and the messages are all different. There are always re occurring messages being sent, like the wake up message, but that’s not the only message in every revelation story. The reason I only discussed the wake type of message is because I feel as if it’s the most easy to recognize, and it is also a very deep message easily connectable to American culture. Any other message can be whatever you want but it just has to reveal something, or have someone become enlightened on a certain situation or conflict.

After analyzing different messages shown in different revelations we then began analyzing the different prophets in the films we saw. When trying to figure out how to analyze these different characters I stumbled and didn’t know what to exactly write to compare them. Once I noticed I had no idea to write I turned to one of my fellow classmates pieces of work. I went to Bonnie’s blog to see how she compared the different character in the books and films we saw. She uses the main character named Legs from the movie Foxfire, and compares her to the main character in the book Enemy of the People. She said:
" In both the movie Foxfire and the play Enemy of The People, the revealer wants to help people join together and rise up against those in power. However, Legs is the only one that succeeds, while the Doctor becomes rejected by the society. Through these revelations, it becomes clear that people are more willing to accept a message or revelation that will empower them along with others, rather than one that requires them to change the comfortable lavish life they are used to. Legs offered a message of empowerment and sisterhood, while the Doctor offered a message that required the town to give up their tourist appeal, which meant a loss of money, and money needed in order to save the water. Those that were offered the message of empowerment that would help them rise against those in power chose to act on the revelation, while those who were offered the message that required a change in their lavish economic lifestyle, resisted the message."
I thought while reading this part it was an excellent example of how I can analyze 2 characters from 2 totally different stories and still find some thing in common. As she had mentioned, the movie is about people rising up to overthrow a teacher, while in enemy of the people its a doctor trying to get a whole society to raise up and over throw their government. Both pieces have different messages, but still the 2 main characters need to do the same thing to have there message become a reality. Just because these 2 characters compare doesn’t mean that all of the prophets need to be the same. The only thing that may compare is what they need to overcome in order to share their revelation. In the end I learned and understood how different characters from different revelation messages can all compare based on what they need to overcome, and sometimes even how they convey there message to the masses.

The last that we had compared and analyzed in our class was the settings, and drama that occurs in each revelation story. To talk about this I decided to compare and analyze the two films the matrix and they live. The matrix took place in a world based on our world. They live were also based on a government just like Americas, capitalist systems. With these settings in place both movies had a lot of drama, because with a government like Americas and with a society like Americas, there is always constant wrong, being done, and always something bad and entertaining that would happen. Also I think that this setting based of America was chosen because of the way that the viewer can instantly connect what happens in the films to themselves in real life. Also these movies both have very deep messages, which I believe the director also wants the viewer to take home with them, and actually use the revelations in real life. While comparing these settings of these two films, and also to other films I have come to a conclusion that most films are set in a world based on ours so that the films revelation can be learned easily and also can connect to the viewer. If the movies were set in some magical world, where everything we know is wrong, and ants can talk I dought the viewer would take the movie as serious and take in as much of the insight that they receive when watching a movie that they can relate to.

After analyzing the setting of the films now I want to look at the drama that ensues while the revelation is being revealed. In the both movies I found that there was a “Judas” figure. A Judas figure is pretty much a traitor. It gets its name from the bible because Judas was the guy who betrayed Jesus and gave him up. In the matrix the Judas figure was cipher as I had mentioned earlier. He betrayed everyone and tried to get Morpheus and neo killed. In They live the Judas figure was the blonde girl that the main character kidnapped. (I don’t remember her name, I believe it was Polly, but I’m not sure.) She ended killing the supporting main character and trying to kill the main character at the end of the film. In both films I noticed that the Judas figure was not successful in killing the prophets, and also they are the ones trying to stop the revelation from being shown to everybody. Also I notice that when these drama full parts occur in the movie it is usually during a very important part, where the prophet does something life changing or makes a very important decision. If it doesn’t occur during that part it influences it. In the end this piece of a betrayal scene influences the story. In they live it happened at the end of the film when the main character was doing the most important thing of his life. In the matrix this betrayal trope occurred and influenced neo to make his most important decision, which was to go in and save Morpheus, and accept his role in the revelation.

After we discovered and explored the revelation trope in whole, our teacher Andy helped us learn the art of deconstruction. Deconstruction is something very hard to understand, and equally hard to explain. It’s also especially hard to master. I don’t think that I can explain it greatly but I can try my best. Deconstruction is pretty much taking a sentence, or any combination of words, and finding other meanings then what it directly means. When we hear something as humans we automatically have in our head an opposition to what we hear. For example when we hear black, we see the opposition and know it’s not that meaning. We sat in class and thought of as many binary oppositions as we could. Just a few of the ones we came up with were:
Black-white
Good-bad
Wrong-right
Normal-weird
Interesting-Boring
Cooked-Raw
With all of these binary oppositions we looked at, we tried to deconstruct them. For example a really easy binary opposition to deconstruct is normal and weird. When asked the question what’s normal, everybody has there own answers. When you think of the idea of normality there are all these oppositions to what’s normal to each person. All of these oppositions can go under the idea of being different. So If I were deconstructing that binary opposition I would ask what is normal, and what us different. Also what is the definition of being normal, and who gets to come up with this idea of being normal. Are there rules behind normality? All of these questions deconstruct the idea of being normal and different. With these questions asked then it takes away these oppositions and shows that there really is not one meaning to anything.

In class one day Andy had asked us to deconstruct the old jack and Jill nursery rhyme. If you don’t know how it goes, it sounds like this:
Jack and Jill,
Went up the hill,
to fetch a pail of water,
Jack fell down,
and broke his crown,
Then Jill came tumbling after.
Throughout my whole life I had heard this nursery rhyme and had no problem with it. When asked to deconstruct I found that this rhyme can have a lot more than just one meaning. At first I took line in which they went to fetch a pail of water. When I hear that then I see that maybe at the time period this is in water was not easy to obtain. I then ponder if jack and Jill were poor, and had problems affording running water. I also question jack and Jill’s relationship, I don’t know if they are brother and sister, husband and wife, cousins, or maybe even just friends. Then it says that jack fell down and broke his crown. If he had a crown to break then he may have been royalty. He also may have been a powerful person in society. After that they say Jill came tumbling after, there fore implying that the female has to follow the male throughout everything no matter what the problem may be. In that this nursery rhyme can easily be considered a sexist story that shows how the man has the power and the women just follow. This may not be true, but instead of the rhyme saying that Jill chassed after, or Jill came after, instead it said tumbling. When the word tumbling is used it may imply that she fell and felt the same pain as he would have felt. In the end we had learned what deconstruction was and we tried our best to apply this art to our world.

In conclusion we had a very productive revelations class this year. I feel that I learned a lot through films that I have viewed prior to this class. I learned what a trope was and learned one of the most common tropes ever. Now I even find myself joking about revelations. Once these ideas of a trope and of the revelation trope are learned, they can barely ever be forgotten because they are everywhere. I can predict that in over 90 % of films in the world have some sort of revelation in it, and some aspect of the revelation trope in it. Once understood it’s much easier to observe. Also with the idea of deconstruction now, we take common things we see every day and open them up and explore so many more aspects than what we see on the outside when we first see it. The best connection to that idea is something we were shown in class. When you see a guitar, you see it, and know in your head what’s around it and how it looks three dimensionally, but you don’t really see the whole guitar. You only see your perception of the guitar. That’s why this idea of deconstruction is a way to explore the guitar, and see things from every different aspect. So in the end this class rocked.

Thursday, May 22, 2008

I STOOD UP LATE FINISHING IT, AND IT FEELS GREAT...i still need to proofread it, ill do that in the morning then my draft will be complete for saturda

what is a trope? when encountered with this question in class one day i had no idea what the answer could be. At first i thought it was some type of item, but when it was explained to me i understood. A trope is a common reoccuring image that can be seen anywhere. An example of a trope is the way that alot of rich people buy huge gold jesus crosses to show how religious they are. (Even though jesus would probably not approve of it.) Tropes are seen everywhere at everytime people just dont notice it but we know what it is. In the movie firefox staring angelina jolie there is a common trope which is used in many movies. The trope would be the man teacher asserting his power over students to get them to do what he wants, and then the students must overpower the authority to create an environment that is better for everyone else. That is a trope seen in many films and books, but it’s a only a smaller trope inside of a bigger trope. The main trope that we looked at this semester was the revelation trope. This trope is seen almost everywhere and once understood is easily recognizable. throuought the semester we were looking at films and books trying to recognize this trope and learn as much abnout the world around us by looking at it through this trope.

when looking at this trope throught different movies we noticed things that kept repeating. the trope in the movies allways start with an issue seen by the viewer but not seenm but other characters in the actual film. Then there is allways a character which fills the role of a revealer. This character is known to be smarter and wiser than everyone else but isnt allways the main character. this character tries to reveal his knowledge of whatever the subject of the film is. When trying to reveal this message the receiver of the revelation often resists the revelation at first until the receiver sees or experiences the revelation for himself. Then through acts and learning the receiver ends up taking the revelation and doing something about it, with help from his/her "supporting cast".

The first and main movie we payed attention to was the matrix. This movie is the best example of a revelation movie that you can get. It follows almost every rule that occurs with this trope. I had previously seen this movie and enjoyed it, but I never saw it the way that I saw it while paying attention to this trope, and to other tropes also. This movie was not only a revelation movie, but also had many religious aspects in it which gets the viewer thinking, and searching for a deeper message while watching the movie. It starts by having the viewer enter this futuristic science fiction world, by entering through what may be perceived as a birth canal, leading to the idea that you are being born into this computer world. It starts out with an unknown character named trinity in a room, where she is about about to be arrested but then does some fighting moves and acrobatics thought which are normally thought to be impossible. Having this occur in the beginning of the film it shows the viewer the rules of this world, which are that there are none. It then starts with the story of neo. Neo is the main character of the movie. He is a hacker who knows theres something else to the world but has no idea what it is. He assumes the role as the receiver of the revelation. He has heard of a hacker/ internet terrorist named morpheus. In search for this man named morpheus he comes up with a question which is “what is the matrix?” Then aproxamately 23 mionutes into the film neo finds morpheus and is encounted with what would be the biggest and most life changing choice of his life. Morpheus asks neo if he would like to take a blue pill, which would bring back to his life as it is, or would he take a red pill which will lead him to the truth that he seeks. Of course neo chooses the red pill and and is led to the first part of his revelation. He learns that the world was taken over by man made robots which learned that they could use humans brainpower as a battery. Neo also learns that he is predicted to fulfill a prophecy and become “the one”.

While continuing on his journey he learns martial arts, and learns how to bend the rules of what he thought was reality. While learning his new role on earth he constantly resists. Everything that happens to him he resists. There is a scene in which morpheus trys to teach neo to bend the laws of gravity, and jump from one building to another building about 30 feet away. Morpheus jumps the building no problem but neo still doesn’t accept this reve;ation of a world where anything is possible so he fails and falls off the building. To make this faster in the end Neo has to accept the revelation taught to him by neo in order to survive and save the human race.

One of the main things to pay attention to while looking at this trope is the different pieces of the trope so that when you notice these pieces while looking at literature you can easily find the revelation trope. One basic thing with the revelation trope Is that it starts with an unacceptable situation. This situation can be whatever you want it to be, but mostly appeals to the viewer as something they would dislike. An example of an unacceptable situation is in the movie the Matrix, like I had mentioned earlier. The situation in that movie is the whole idea of humans being used as batteries for robots. The viewer sees tthis and knows that this has to change and has to be fixed but sees the receiver of this revelation learning and eventually changing this situation to be fixed. Following the unacceptable situation being presented there has to be a solution to it. The solution is often created and known by the prophet. An example of this part of the revelation trope can be seen in star wars. Obi Wan knows almost everything about Luke skywalkers past and knows the only way to overthrow the Empire is to train and give luke the confidence to become a great jedi. Obi Wan carries the revelation of luke being the one to change everything, but doesn’t reveal everything to him at once. Obi Wan is definantly the prophet in that revelation story.

The next step in portraying the revelation trope is for the prophet to offer a new definition of reality, or to pretty much come up with the master plan and share with everyone the way they will change this unacceptable situation. It also consists of them doing and showing these actions, and new “reality” to everyone else. An example of this is in the film firefox. In that movie the strong willed character played by Angelina jolie, comes up with a plan to catch there pedofile teacher in the act of being a pervert, and end up physically abusing him. When the prophet fights the opposition and passes on theire message there is often misinterpreted or just has a problem getting people to follow and believe his message. It is pretty much just more opposition to the revelation. An example that I think is good for this part of the revelation trope is from the matrix. In the matrix a character name sypher knows the revelation, has heard it over and over again, but still believes that it is bullshit. He tottaly disregards the idea that neo can be the one and thinks its ridiculous. Sypher ends up being the “judas” of the film and giving up morpheus to agents. A part I found interesting aabout his opposition of the revelation is a part when he was about to kill neo by unplugging him from the computer world. He was talking about if he was really the one then there would have to be some sort of miracle to stop him from killing neo, and all of a sudden a guy in which he thought was dead, came back and killed sypher, and saved neos life.

The next part of the revelation trope is that the prophet gets in trouble with the authorities or the masses for challenging the existing structure. An excellent film that showed this part of the revelation trope is the the film they live. The main character who goes through the film with no name, learns the revelation that all the rich and high class people are not actually human, but some zombie alien creatures. He challenges the existing structure by going on a shooting spree, killing most of the zombies he sees. Then he gets in huge trouble and is trying to be tracked down by them. Also in the same film the first people who challenge the structure are the people from the church, and they also become pursued by the zombies, and get in trouble with the authority figures of this structure. Also in the matrix neo had gotten in trouble for trying o override the structure of the matrix and save mankind from the robots. By doing this he got in trouble with the authority figures of the matrix, and had to have a fight with agent smith. The way the director of the films chooses to portray this part of the revelation trope is often different but pretty much consists of a lot of drama and action. In the matrix leading up to this final battle with agent neo there was plenty of drama, which in all showed the part of the revelation trope.

After learning the basics of the rope and comparing the trope through films, we analyzed the trope through the different messages every movie had a certain revlation but in that they all had to do with a different situation. the different situations influenced the viewer to enjoy the revelation in a different way. Though each film had a different revelation message i felt as if most of them were say ing the same thing. One revelation messag i thought i saw the most is the wake up message. In this message it pretty much means to stop thinking every thing you see is true, and real, and wake up from your delusional world. When exploring this message we heard a small example of this. Its a situation in which people were strapped down to a chair where they could not move in a cave. About 2 feet above there heads is a stage with fire on it. People would allways walk along this stage and interact, but the people strapped to the chairs can only see there shadows. If thats all they saw there whole life then they woulod beleive that people look like shadows and thats what they would think was real and normal. If these people who were strapped into the chairs were to get up (wake up) and see everything for what it really is they would learn and the truth would be revealed. That is just only one example of this reoccuring wake up message. Another film i saw this in was the movie they live. In this movie the "average american man" was constantly trying to live the "american dream" but this never happens for them because they aare allways being kept down by the rich people in the society. This is easilly comparable to the real american life, but in the movie to make it more dramfull and entertaining they decided to make these rich greedy people into zombies. The only way you can see the truth about everything is if you where some special sunglasses.throughout the movie you see people who arent even these power hungry zombies protecting what they think is right, when its truely wrong. The whole movie the main character is trying to wake everybody up and show the world the truth behind what they think is real. In the end what im really trying to show is that there are different ways to convey the revelation messages, and the messages are all different. There are allways re occuring messages being sent, like the wake up message, but thats not the only message in every revelation story. The reason i only discussed the wake type of message is becaus i feel as if its the most easy to recognize, and it is also a very deep message easilly conectable to american culture. Any other message can be whatever you want but it just has to reveal something, or have someone become enlightened on a certain situation or conflict.

After analyzing different messages shown in different revelations we then began analyzing the different prophets in the films we saw. When trying to figure out how to analyze these different characters i stumbled and didnt know what to exactly write to compare them. Once i noticed i had no idea to write i turned to one of my fellow classmates peices of work. I went to bonnies blog to see how she compared the dofferent character in the books and films we saw. she uses the main character named Legs from the movie Foxfire, and compares her to the main character in the book Enemy of the People. she said:
" In both the movie Foxfire and the play Enemy of The People, the revealer wants to help people join together and rise up against those in power. However, Legs is the only one that succeeds, while the Doctor becomes rejected by the society. Through these revelations, it becomes clear that people are more willing to accept a message or revelation that will empower them along with others, rather than one that requires them to change the comfortable lavvish life they are used to. Legs offered a message of empowerment and sisterhood, while the Doctor offered a message that required the town to give up their tourist appeal, which meant a loss of money, and money needed in order to save the water. Those that were offered the message of empowerment that would help them rise against those in power, chose to act on the revelation, while those who were offered the message that required a change in their lavish economic lifestyle, resisted the message."
I thoguht while reading this part it was an excelent example of how i can analyze 2 characters from 2 tottally diferent stories and still find some thing in common. As she had mentioned, the movie is about people rising up to overthrow a teacher, while in enemy of the people its a doctor trying to get a whole society to raise up and over throw theire government. Both peices have different messages, but still the 2 main characters need to do the same tyhing to have there message become a reality. Just because these 2 characters compare doesnt mean that all of the prophets need to be the same. The only thing that may compare is what they need to overcome in order to share theire revelation. In the end i learned and understood how different characters from different revelation messages can all compare based on what they need to overcome, and sometimes even how they convey there message to the masses.

The last that we had compared and analyzed in our class was the settiings, and drama that occurs in each revelation story. To talk about this i decided to compare and analyze the two films the matrix and they live. The matrix took place in a world based on our world. They live was also based on a government just like Americas, capitalist systems. With these sttings in place both movies had a lot of drama, because with a government like Americas and with a society like Americas, there is always constant wrong, being done, and always something bad and entertaining that would happen. Also I think that this setting based of of America was chosen because of the way that the viewer can instantly connect what ghappens in the films to themselves in real life. Also these movies both have very deep messages, which I believe the director also wants the viewer to take home with them, and actually use the revelations in real life. While comparing these settings of these two films, and also to other films I have come to a conclusion that most films are set in a world based on ours so that the films revelation can be learned easily and also can connect to the viewer. If the movies were set in some magical world, where everything we know is wrong, and ants can talk I dought the viwer would take the movie as serious and take in as much of the insight that they receive when watching a movie that they can relate to.

After analyzing the setting of the films now I want to look at the drama that ensues while the revelation is being revealed. In the both movies I found that there was a “judas” figure. A judas figure is pretty much a traitor. It gets its name from the bible because Judas was the guy who betrayed jesus and gave him up. In the matrix the judas figure was sypher as I had mentioned earlier. He betrayed everyone and tried to get morpheus and neo killed. In They live the judas figure was the blonde girl that the main character kidnapped. (I don’t remember her name, I believe it was polly, but im not sure.) She ended killing the supporting main character and trying to kill the main character at the end of the film. In both films I noticed that the Judas figure was not successful in killing the prophets, and also they are the ones trying to stop the revelation from being shown to everybody. Also I notice that when these dramafull parts occur in the movie it is usually during a very important part, where the prophet does something life changing or makes a very important decision. IFf it doesn’t occur during that part it influences it. In the end this piece of a betrayal scene influences the story. In they live it happened at the end of the film when the main character was doing the most important thing of his life. In the matrix this betrayal trope occurred and influenced neo to make his most important decision, which was to go in and save morpheus, and accept his role in the revelation.

After we discovered and explored the revelation trope in whole, our teacher andy helped us learn the art of deconstruction. Deconstruction is something very hard to understand, and equally hard to explain. Its also especially hard to master. I don’t think that I can explain it greatly but I can try my best. Deconstruction is pretty much taking a sentence, or any combination of words, and finding other meanings then what it directly means. When we hear something as humans we automatically have in our head an opposition to what we hear. For example when we hear black, we see the opposition and know its not that meaning. We sat in class and thought of as many binary oppositions as we could. Just a few of the ones we came up with were:
Black-white
Good-bad
Wrong-right
Normal-weird
Interesting-Boring
Cooked-Raw
With all of these binary oppositions we looked at, we tried to deconstruct them. For example a really easy binary opposition to deconstruct is normal and weird. When asked the question whats normal, everybody has there own answers. When you think of the idea of normality theres all these oppositions to whats normal to each person. All of these oppositions can go under the idea of being different. So If I were deconstruct that binary opposition I would ask what is normal, and what uis different. Also what is the definition of being normal, and who gets to come up with this idea of being normal. Are there rules behind normality? All of these questions deconstruct the idea of being normal and different. With these questions asked then it takes away these oppositions and shows that there really is not one meaning to anything.

In class one day andy had asked us to deconstruct the old jack and jill nursery rhyme. If you don’t know how it goes, it sounds like this:
Jack and jill,
Went up the hill,
To fetch a pail of water,
Jack fell down,
And broke his crown,
Then jill came tumbling after.
Throughout my wjhole life I had heard this nursery rhyme and had no problem with it. When asked to deconstruct I found that this rhyme can have a lot more than just one meaning. At first I took line in which they went to fetch a pail of water. When I hear that then I see that maby at the time period this is in water was not easy to obtain. I then ponder if jack and jill were poor, and had problems affording running water. I also question jack and jills relartionship, I don’t knoqw if they are brother and sister, hasband and wife, cousins, or maby even just friends. Then it says that jack fell down and broke his crown. If he had a crown to break then he may have been royalty. He also may have been a powerfull person in society. After that they say jill came tumbling after, there fore implying that the female has to follow the male throughout everything no matter what the problem may be. In that this nurcery rhyme can easily be considered a sexist story that shows how the man has the power and the woman just follow. This may not be true, but instead of the rhyme saying that jill chassed after, or jill came after, instead it said tumbling. When the word tumbling is used it may imply that she fell and felt the same pain as he would have felt. In the end we had learned what deconstruction was and we tried our best to aply this art to our world.

In conclusion we had a very productive revelations class this year. I feel that I learned a lot through films that I have viewed prior to this class. I learned what a trope was and learned one of the most common tropes ever. Now I even find myself joking about revelations. Once these ideas of a trope, and of the revelation trope are learned, they can barely ever be forgotton because they are everywhere. I can predict that in over 90 % of films in the world have some sort of revelation in it, and some aspect of the revelation trope in it. Once understood its much easyer to observe. Also with the idea of deconstruction now, we take common things we see every day and open them up and explore so many more aspects than what we see on the outside when we first see it. The best connection to that idea is something we were shown in class. When you see a guitar, you see it, and know in your head whats around it and how it looks three dimensionally, but you don’t really see the whole guitar. You only see your perception of the guitar. That’s why this idea of deoncstruction is a way to explore the guitar, and see things from every different aspect. So in the end this class rocked.

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

another draft of big essay, need to compare drama/setting of rev trope, and need to add decomposition if neccisary, and music revelations.

what is a trope? when encountered with this question in class one day i had no idea what the answer could be. At first i thought it was some type of item, but when it was explained to me i understood. A trope is a common reoccuring image that can be seen anywhere. An example of a trope is the way that alot of rich people buy huge gold jesus crosses to show how religious they are. (Even though jesus would probably not approve of it.) Tropes are seen everywhere at everytime people just dont notice it but we know what it is. In the movie firefox staring angelina jolie there is a common trope which is used in many movies. The trope would be the man teacher asserting his power over students to get them to do what he wants, and then the students must overpower the authority to create an environment that is better for everyone else. That is a trope seen in many films and books, but it’s a only a smaller trope inside of a bigger trope. The main trope that we looked at this semester was the revelation trope. This trope is seen almost everywhere and once understood is easily recognizable. throuought the semester we were looking at films and books trying to recognize this trope and learn as much abnout the world around us by looking at it through this trope.

when looking at this trope throught different movies we noticed things that kept repeating. the trope in the movies allways start with an issue seen by the viewer but not seenm but other characters in the actual film. Then there is allways a character which fills the role of a revealer. This character is known to be smarter and wiser than everyone else but isnt allways the main character. this character tries to reveal his knowledge of whatever the subject of the film is. When trying to reveal this message the receiver of the revelation often resists the revelation at first until the receiver sees or experiences the revelation for himself. Then through acts and learning the receiver ends up taking the revelation and doing something about it, with help from his/her "supporting cast".

The first and main movie we payed attention to was the matrix. This movie is the best example of a revelation movie that you can get. It follows almost every rule that occurs with this trope. I had previously seen this movie and enjoyed it, but I never saw it the way that I saw it while paying attention to this trope, and to other tropes also. This movie was not only a revelation movie, but also had many religious aspects in it which gets the viewer thinking, and searching for a deeper message while watching the movie. It starts by having the viewer enter this futuristic science fiction world, by entering through what may be perceived as a birth canal, leading to the idea that you are being born into this computer world. It starts out with an unknown character named trinity in a room, where she is about about to be arrested but then does some fighting moves and acrobatics thought which are normally thought to be impossible. Having this occur in the beginning of the film it shows the viewer the rules of this world, which are that there are none. It then starts with the story of neo. Neo is the main character of the movie. He is a hacker who knows theres something else to the world but has no idea what it is. He assumes the role as the receiver of the revelation. He has heard of a hacker/ internet terrorist named morpheus. In search for this man named morpheus he comes up with a question which is “what is the matrix?” Then aproxamately 23 mionutes into the film neo finds morpheus and is encounted with what would be the biggest and most life changing choice of his life. Morpheus asks neo if he would like to take a blue pill, which would bring back to his life as it is, or would he take a red pill which will lead him to the truth that he seeks. Of course neo chooses the red pill and and is led to the first part of his revelation. He learns that the world was taken over by man made robots which learned that they could use humans brainpower as a battery. Neo also learns that he is predicted to fulfill a prophecy and become “the one”.

While continuing on his journey he learns martial arts, and learns how to bend the rules of what he thought was reality. While learning his new role on earth he constantly resists. Everything that happens to him he resists. There is a scene in which morpheus trys to teach neo to bend the laws of gravity, and jump from one building to another building about 30 feet away. Morpheus jumps the building no problem but neo still doesn’t accept this reve;ation of a world where anything is possible so he fails and falls off the building. To make this faster in the end Neo has to accept the revelation taught to him by neo in order to survive and save the human race.

One of the main things to pay attention to while looking at this trope is the different pieces of the trope so that when you notice these pieces while looking at literature you can easily find the revelation trope. One basic thing with the revelation trope Is that it starts with an unacceptable situation. This situation can be whatever you want it to be, but mostly appeals to the viewer as something they would dislike. An example of an unacceptable situation is in the movie the Matrix, like I had mentioned earlier. The situation in that movie is the whole idea of humans being used as batteries for robots. The viewer sees tthis and knows that this has to change and has to be fixed but sees the receiver of this revelation learning and eventually changing this situation to be fixed. Following the unacceptable situation being presented there has to be a solution to it. The solution is often created and known by the prophet. An example of this part of the revelation trope can be seen in star wars. Obi Wan knows almost everything about Luke skywalkers past and knows the only way to overthrow the Empire is to train and give luke the confidence to become a great jedi. Obi Wan carries the revelation of luke being the one to change everything, but doesn’t reveal everything to him at once. Obi Wan is definantly the prophet in that revelation story.

The next step in portraying the revelation trope is for the prophet to offer a new definition of reality, or to pretty much come up with the master plan and share with everyone the way they will change this unacceptable situation. It also consists of them doing and showing these actions, and new “reality” to everyone else. An example of this is in the film firefox. In that movie the strong willed character played by Angelina jolie, comes up with a plan to catch there pedofile teacher in the act of being a pervert, and end up physically abusing him. When the prophet fights the opposition and passes on theire message there is often misinterpreted or just has a problem getting people to follow and believe his message. It is pretty much just more opposition to the revelation. An example that I think is good for this part of the revelation trope is from the matrix. In the matrix a character name sypher knows the revelation, has heard it over and over again, but still believes that it is bullshit. He tottaly disregards the idea that neo can be the one and thinks its ridiculous. Sypher ends up being the “judas” of the film and giving up morpheus to agents. A part I found interesting aabout his opposition of the revelation is a part when he was about to kill neo by unplugging him from the computer world. He was talking about if he was really the one then there would have to be some sort of miracle to stop him from killing neo, and all of a sudden a guy in which he thought was dead, came back and killed sypher, and saved neos life.

The next part of the revelation trope is that the prophet gets in trouble with the authorities or the masses for challenging the existing structure. An excellent film that showed this part of the revelation trope is the the film they live. The main character who goes through the film with no name, learns the revelation that all the rich and high class people are not actually human, but some zombie alien creatures. He challenges the existing structure by going on a shooting spree, killing most of the zombies he sees. Then he gets in huge trouble and is trying to be tracked down by them. Also in the same film the first people who challenge the structure are the people from the church, and they also become pursued by the zombies, and get in trouble with the authority figures of this structure. Also in the matrix neo had gotten in trouble for trying o override the structure of the matrix and save mankind from the robots. By doing this he got in trouble with the authority figures of the matrix, and had to have a fight with agent smith. The way the director of the films chooses to portray this part of the revelation trope is often different but pretty much consists of a lot of drama and action. In the matrix leading up to this final battle with agent neo there was plenty of drama, which in all showed the part of the revelation trope.

After learning the basics of the rope and comparing the trope through films, we analyzed the trope through the different messages every movie had a certain revlation but in that they all had to do with a different situation. the different situations influenced the viewer to enjoy the revelation in a different way. Though each film had a different revelation message i felt as if most of them were say ing the same thing. One revelation messag i thought i saw the most is the wake up message. In this message it pretty much means to stop thinking every thing you see is true, and real, and wake up from your delusional world. When exploring this message we heard a small example of this. Its a situation in which people were strapped down to a chair where they could not move in a cave. About 2 feet above there heads is a stage with fire on it. People would allways walk along this stage and interact, but the people strapped to the chairs can only see there shadows. If thats all they saw there whole life then they woulod beleive that people look like shadows and thats what they would think was real and normal. If these people who were strapped into the chairs were to get up (wake up) and see everything for what it really is they would learn and the truth would be revealed. That is just only one example of this reoccuring wake up message. Another film i saw this in was the movie they live. In this movie the "average american man" was constantly trying to live the "american dream" but this never happens for them because they aare allways being kept down by the rich people in the society. This is easilly comparable to the real american life, but in the movie to make it more dramfull and entertaining they decided to make these rich greedy people into zombies. The only way you can see the truth about everything is if you where some special sunglasses.throughout the movie you see people who arent even these power hungry zombies protecting what they think is right, when its truely wrong. The whole movie the main character is trying to wake everybody up and show the world the truth behind what they think is real. In the end what im really trying to show is that there are different ways to convey the revelation messages, and the messages are all different. There are allways re occuring messages being sent, like the wake up message, but thats not the only message in every revelation story. The reason i only discussed the wake type of message is becaus i feel as if its the most easy to recognize, and it is also a very deep message easilly conectable to american culture. Any other message can be whatever you want but it just has to reveal something, or have someone become enlightened on a certain situation or conflict.

After analyzing different messages shown in different revelations we then began analyzing the different prophets in the films we saw. When trying to figure out how to analyze these different characters i stumbled and didnt know what to exactly write to compare them. Once i noticed i had no idea to write i turned to one of my fellow classmates peices of work. I went to bonnies blog to see how she compared the dofferent character in the books and films we saw. she uses the main character named Legs from the movie Foxfire, and compares her to the main character in the book Enemy of the People. she said:
" In both the movie Foxfire and the play Enemy of The People, the revealer wants to help people join together and rise up against those in power. However, Legs is the only one that succeeds, while the Doctor becomes rejected by the society. Through these revelations, it becomes clear that people are more willing to accept a message or revelation that will empower them along with others, rather than one that requires them to change the comfortable lavvish life they are used to. Legs offered a message of empowerment and sisterhood, while the Doctor offered a message that required the town to give up their tourist appeal, which meant a loss of money, and money needed in order to save the water. Those that were offered the message of empowerment that would help them rise against those in power, chose to act on the revelation, while those who were offered the message that required a change in their lavish economic lifestyle, resisted the message."
I thoguht while reading this part it was an excelent example of how i can analyze 2 characters from 2 tottally diferent stories and still find some thing in common. As she had mentioned, the movie is about people rising up to overthrow a teacher, while in enemy of the people its a doctor trying to get a whole society to raise up and over throw theire government. Both peices have different messages, but still the 2 main characters need to do the same tyhing to have there message become a reality. Just because these 2 characters compare doesnt mean that all of the prophets need to be the same. The only thing that may compare is what they need to overcome in order to share theire revelation. In the end i learned and understood how different characters from different revelation messages can all compare based on what they need to overcome, and sometimes even how they convey there message to the masses.

The last that we had compared and analyzed in our class was the settiings, and drama that occurs in each revelation story. To talk about this i decided to compare and analyze the two films the matrix and they live. The matrix took place in a world based on our world. They live was also

another draft of big essay, need to compare drama/setting of rev trope, and need to add decomposition if neccisary, and music revelations.

what is a trope? when encountered with this question in class one day i had no idea what the answer could be. At first i thought it was some type of item, but when it was explained to me i understood. A trope is a common reoccuring image that can be seen anywhere. An example of a trope is the way that alot of rich people buy huge gold jesus crosses to show how religious they are. (Even though jesus would probably not approve of it.) Tropes are seen everywhere at everytime people just dont notice it but we know what it is. In the movie firefox staring angelina jolie there is a common trope which is used in many movies. The trope would be the man teacher asserting his power over students to get them to do what he wants, and then the students must overpower the authority to create an environment that is better for everyone else. That is a trope seen in many films and books, but it’s a only a smaller trope inside of a bigger trope. The main trope that we looked at this semester was the revelation trope. This trope is seen almost everywhere and once understood is easily recognizable. throuought the semester we were looking at films and books trying to recognize this trope and learn as much abnout the world around us by looking at it through this trope.

when looking at this trope throught different movies we noticed things that kept repeating. the trope in the movies allways start with an issue seen by the viewer but not seenm but other characters in the actual film. Then there is allways a character which fills the role of a revealer. This character is known to be smarter and wiser than everyone else but isnt allways the main character. this character tries to reveal his knowledge of whatever the subject of the film is. When trying to reveal this message the receiver of the revelation often resists the revelation at first until the receiver sees or experiences the revelation for himself. Then through acts and learning the receiver ends up taking the revelation and doing something about it, with help from his/her "supporting cast".

The first and main movie we payed attention to was the matrix. This movie is the best example of a revelation movie that you can get. It follows almost every rule that occurs with this trope. I had previously seen this movie and enjoyed it, but I never saw it the way that I saw it while paying attention to this trope, and to other tropes also. This movie was not only a revelation movie, but also had many religious aspects in it which gets the viewer thinking, and searching for a deeper message while watching the movie. It starts by having the viewer enter this futuristic science fiction world, by entering through what may be perceived as a birth canal, leading to the idea that you are being born into this computer world. It starts out with an unknown character named trinity in a room, where she is about about to be arrested but then does some fighting moves and acrobatics thought which are normally thought to be impossible. Having this occur in the beginning of the film it shows the viewer the rules of this world, which are that there are none. It then starts with the story of neo. Neo is the main character of the movie. He is a hacker who knows theres something else to the world but has no idea what it is. He assumes the role as the receiver of the revelation. He has heard of a hacker/ internet terrorist named morpheus. In search for this man named morpheus he comes up with a question which is “what is the matrix?” Then aproxamately 23 mionutes into the film neo finds morpheus and is encounted with what would be the biggest and most life changing choice of his life. Morpheus asks neo if he would like to take a blue pill, which would bring back to his life as it is, or would he take a red pill which will lead him to the truth that he seeks. Of course neo chooses the red pill and and is led to the first part of his revelation. He learns that the world was taken over by man made robots which learned that they could use humans brainpower as a battery. Neo also learns that he is predicted to fulfill a prophecy and become “the one”.

While continuing on his journey he learns martial arts, and learns how to bend the rules of what he thought was reality. While learning his new role on earth he constantly resists. Everything that happens to him he resists. There is a scene in which morpheus trys to teach neo to bend the laws of gravity, and jump from one building to another building about 30 feet away. Morpheus jumps the building no problem but neo still doesn’t accept this reve;ation of a world where anything is possible so he fails and falls off the building. To make this faster in the end Neo has to accept the revelation taught to him by neo in order to survive and save the human race.

One of the main things to pay attention to while looking at this trope is the different pieces of the trope so that when you notice these pieces while looking at literature you can easily find the revelation trope. One basic thing with the revelation trope Is that it starts with an unacceptable situation. This situation can be whatever you want it to be, but mostly appeals to the viewer as something they would dislike. An example of an unacceptable situation is in the movie the Matrix, like I had mentioned earlier. The situation in that movie is the whole idea of humans being used as batteries for robots. The viewer sees tthis and knows that this has to change and has to be fixed but sees the receiver of this revelation learning and eventually changing this situation to be fixed. Following the unacceptable situation being presented there has to be a solution to it. The solution is often created and known by the prophet. An example of this part of the revelation trope can be seen in star wars. Obi Wan knows almost everything about Luke skywalkers past and knows the only way to overthrow the Empire is to train and give luke the confidence to become a great jedi. Obi Wan carries the revelation of luke being the one to change everything, but doesn’t reveal everything to him at once. Obi Wan is definantly the prophet in that revelation story.

The next step in portraying the revelation trope is for the prophet to offer a new definition of reality, or to pretty much come up with the master plan and share with everyone the way they will change this unacceptable situation. It also consists of them doing and showing these actions, and new “reality” to everyone else. An example of this is in the film firefox. In that movie the strong willed character played by Angelina jolie, comes up with a plan to catch there pedofile teacher in the act of being a pervert, and end up physically abusing him. When the prophet fights the opposition and passes on theire message there is often misinterpreted or just has a problem getting people to follow and believe his message. It is pretty much just more opposition to the revelation. An example that I think is good for this part of the revelation trope is from the matrix. In the matrix a character name sypher knows the revelation, has heard it over and over again, but still believes that it is bullshit. He tottaly disregards the idea that neo can be the one and thinks its ridiculous. Sypher ends up being the “judas” of the film and giving up morpheus to agents. A part I found interesting aabout his opposition of the revelation is a part when he was about to kill neo by unplugging him from the computer world. He was talking about if he was really the one then there would have to be some sort of miracle to stop him from killing neo, and all of a sudden a guy in which he thought was dead, came back and killed sypher, and saved neos life.

The next part of the revelation trope is that the prophet gets in trouble with the authorities or the masses for challenging the existing structure. An excellent film that showed this part of the revelation trope is the the film they live. The main character who goes through the film with no name, learns the revelation that all the rich and high class people are not actually human, but some zombie alien creatures. He challenges the existing structure by going on a shooting spree, killing most of the zombies he sees. Then he gets in huge trouble and is trying to be tracked down by them. Also in the same film the first people who challenge the structure are the people from the church, and they also become pursued by the zombies, and get in trouble with the authority figures of this structure. Also in the matrix neo had gotten in trouble for trying o override the structure of the matrix and save mankind from the robots. By doing this he got in trouble with the authority figures of the matrix, and had to have a fight with agent smith. The way the director of the films chooses to portray this part of the revelation trope is often different but pretty much consists of a lot of drama and action. In the matrix leading up to this final battle with agent neo there was plenty of drama, which in all showed the part of the revelation trope.

After learning the basics of the rope and comparing the trope through films, we analyzed the trope through the different messages every movie had a certain revlation but in that they all had to do with a different situation. the different situations influenced the viewer to enjoy the revelation in a different way. Though each film had a different revelation message i felt as if most of them were say ing the same thing. One revelation messag i thought i saw the most is the wake up message. In this message it pretty much means to stop thinking every thing you see is true, and real, and wake up from your delusional world. When exploring this message we heard a small example of this. Its a situation in which people were strapped down to a chair where they could not move in a cave. About 2 feet above there heads is a stage with fire on it. People would allways walk along this stage and interact, but the people strapped to the chairs can only see there shadows. If thats all they saw there whole life then they woulod beleive that people look like shadows and thats what they would think was real and normal. If these people who were strapped into the chairs were to get up (wake up) and see everything for what it really is they would learn and the truth would be revealed. That is just only one example of this reoccuring wake up message. Another film i saw this in was the movie they live. In this movie the "average american man" was constantly trying to live the "american dream" but this never happens for them because they aare allways being kept down by the rich people in the society. This is easilly comparable to the real american life, but in the movie to make it more dramfull and entertaining they decided to make these rich greedy people into zombies. The only way you can see the truth about everything is if you where some special sunglasses.throughout the movie you see people who arent even these power hungry zombies protecting what they think is right, when its truely wrong. The whole movie the main character is trying to wake everybody up and show the world the truth behind what they think is real. In the end what im really trying to show is that there are different ways to convey the revelation messages, and the messages are all different. There are allways re occuring messages being sent, like the wake up message, but thats not the only message in every revelation story. The reason i only discussed the wake type of message is becaus i feel as if its the most easy to recognize, and it is also a very deep message easilly conectable to american culture. Any other message can be whatever you want but it just has to reveal something, or have someone become enlightened on a certain situation or conflict.

After analyzing different messages shown in different revelations we then began analyzing the different prophets in the films we saw. When trying to figure out how to analyze these different characters i stumbled and didnt know what to exactly write to compare them. Once i noticed i had no idea to write i turned to one of my fellow classmates peices of work. I went to bonnies blog to see how she compared the dofferent character in the books and films we saw. she uses the main character named Legs from the movie Foxfire, and compares her to the main character in the book Enemy of the People. she said:
" In both the movie Foxfire and the play Enemy of The People, the revealer wants to help people join together and rise up against those in power. However, Legs is the only one that succeeds, while the Doctor becomes rejected by the society. Through these revelations, it becomes clear that people are more willing to accept a message or revelation that will empower them along with others, rather than one that requires them to change the comfortable lavvish life they are used to. Legs offered a message of empowerment and sisterhood, while the Doctor offered a message that required the town to give up their tourist appeal, which meant a loss of money, and money needed in order to save the water. Those that were offered the message of empowerment that would help them rise against those in power, chose to act on the revelation, while those who were offered the message that required a change in their lavish economic lifestyle, resisted the message."
I thoguht while reading this part it was an excelent example of how i can analyze 2 characters from 2 tottally diferent stories and still find some thing in common. As she had mentioned, the movie is about people rising up to overthrow a teacher, while in enemy of the people its a doctor trying to get a whole society to raise up and over throw theire government. Both peices have different messages, but still the 2 main characters need to do the same tyhing to have there message become a reality. Just because these 2 characters compare doesnt mean that all of the prophets need to be the same. The only thing that may compare is what they need to overcome in order to share theire revelation. In the end i learned and understood how different characters from different revelation messages can all compare based on what they need to overcome, and sometimes even how they convey there message to the masses.

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

still working on big paper

what is a trope? when encountered with this question in class one day i had no idea what the answer could be. At first i thought it was some type of item, but when it was explained to me i understood. A trope is a common reoccuring image that can be seen anywhere. An example of a trope is the way that alot of rich people buy huge gold jesus crosses to show how religious they are. (Even though jesus would probably not approve of it.) Tropes are seen everywhere at everytime people just dont notice it but we know what it is. In the movie firefox staring angelina jolie there is a common trope which is used in many movies. The trope would be the man teacher asserting his power over students to get them to do what he wants, and then the students must overpower the authority to create an environment that is better for everyone else. That is a trope seen in many films and books, but it’s a only a smaller trope inside of a bigger trope. The main trope that we looked at this semester was the revelation trope. This trope is seen almost everywhere and once understood is easily recognizable. throuought the semester we were looking at films and books trying to recognize this trope and learn as much abnout the world around us by looking at it through this trope.

when looking at this trope throught different movies we noticed things that kept repeating. the trope in the movies allways start with an issue seen by the viewer but not seenm but other characters in the actual film. Then there is allways a character which fills the role of a revealer. This character is known to be smarter and wiser than everyone else but isnt allways the main character. this character tries to reveal his knowledge of whatever the subject of the film is. When trying to reveal this message the receiver of the revelation often resists the revelation at first until the receiver sees or experiences the revelation for himself. Then through acts and learning the receiver ends up taking the revelation and doing something about it, with help from his/her "supporting cast".

The first and main movie we payed attention to was the matrix. This movie is the best example of a revelation movie that you can get. It follows almost every rule that occurs with this trope. I had previously seen this movie and enjoyed it, but I never saw it the way that I saw it while paying attention to this trope, and to other tropes also. This movie was not only a revelation movie, but also had many religious aspects in it which gets the viewer thinking, and searching for a deeper message while watching the movie. It starts by having the viewer enter this futuristic science fiction world, by entering through what may be perceived as a birth canal, leading to the idea that you are being born into this computer world. It starts out with an unknown character named trinity in a room, where she is about about to be arrested but then does some fighting moves and acrobatics thought which are normally thought to be impossible. Having this occur in the beginning of the film it shows the viewer the rules of this world, which are that there are none. It then starts with the story of neo. Neo is the main character of the movie. He is a hacker who knows theres something else to the world but has no idea what it is. He assumes the role as the receiver of the revelation. He has heard of a hacker/ internet terrorist named morpheus. In search for this man named morpheus he comes up with a question which is “what is the matrix?” Then aproxamately 23 mionutes into the film neo finds morpheus and is encounted with what would be the biggest and most life changing choice of his life. Morpheus asks neo if he would like to take a blue pill, which would bring back to his life as it is, or would he take a red pill which will lead him to the truth that he seeks. Of course neo chooses the red pill and and is led to the first part of his revelation. He learns that the world was taken over by man made robots which learned that they could use humans brainpower as a battery. Neo also learns that he is predicted to fulfill a prophecy and become “the one”.

While continuing on his journey he learns martial arts, and learns how to bend the rules of what he thought was reality. While learning his new role on earth he constantly resists. Everything that happens to him he resists. There is a scene in which morpheus trys to teach neo to bend the laws of gravity, and jump from one building to another building about 30 feet away. Morpheus jumps the building no problem but neo still doesn’t accept this reve;ation of a world where anything is possible so he fails and falls off the building. To make this faster in the end Neo has to accept the revelation taught to him by neo in order to survive and save the human race.

One of the main things to pay attention to while looking at this trope is the different pieces of the trope so that when you notice these pieces while looking at literature you can easily find the revelation trope. One basic thing with the revelation trope Is that it starts with an unacceptable situation. This situation can be whatever you want it to be, but mostly appeals to the viewer as something they would dislike. An example of an unacceptable situation is in the movie the Matrix, like I had mentioned earlier. The situation in that movie is the whole idea of humans being used as batteries for robots. The viewer sees tthis and knows that this has to change and has to be fixed but sees the receiver of this revelation learning and eventually changing this situation to be fixed. Following the unacceptable situation being presented there has to be a solution to it. The solution is often created and known by the prophet. An example of this part of the revelation trope can be seen in star wars. Obi Wan knows almost everything about Luke skywalkers past and knows the only way to overthrow the Empire is to train and give luke the confidence to become a great jedi. Obi Wan carries the revelation of luke being the one to change everything, but doesn’t reveal everything to him at once. Obi Wan is definantly the prophet in that revelation story.

The next step in portraying the revelation trope is for the prophet to offer a new definition of reality, or to pretty much come up with the master plan and share with everyone the way they will change this unacceptable situation. It also consists of them doing and showing these actions, and new “reality” to everyone else. An example of this is in the film firefox. In that movie the strong willed character played by Angelina jolie, comes up with a plan to catch there pedofile teacher in the act of being a pervert, and end up physically abusing him. When the prophet fights the opposition and passes on theire message there is often misinterpreted or just has a problem getting people to follow and believe his message. It is pretty much just more opposition to the revelation. An example that I think is good for this part of the revelation trope is from the matrix. In the matrix a character name sypher knows the revelation, has heard it over and over again, but still believes that it is bullshit. He tottaly disregards the idea that neo can be the one and thinks its ridiculous. Sypher ends up being the “judas” of the film and giving up morpheus to agents. A part I found interesting aabout his opposition of the revelation is a part when he was about to kill neo by unplugging him from the computer world. He was talking about if he was really the one then there would have to be some sort of miracle to stop him from killing neo, and all of a sudden a guy in which he thought was dead, came back and killed sypher, and saved neos life.

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

day 2 big paper work

what is a trope? when encountered with this question in class one day i had no idea what the answer could be. At first i thought it was some type of item, but when it was explained to me i understood. A trope is a common reoccuring image that can be seen anywhere. An example of a trope is the way that alot of rich people buy huge gold jesus crosses to show how religious they are. (Even though jesus would probably not approve of it.) Tropes are seen everywhere at everytime people just dont notice it but we know what it is. In the movie firefox staring angelina jolie there is a common trope which is used in many movies. The trope would be the man teacher asserting his power over students to get them to do what he wants, and then the students must overpower the authority to create an environment that is better for everyone else. That is a trope seen in many films and books, but it’s a only a smaller trope inside of a bigger trope. The main trope that we looked at this semester was the revelation trope. This trope is seen almost everywhere and once understood is easily recognizable. throuought the semester we were looking at films and books trying to recognize this trope and learn as much abnout the world around us by looking at it through this trope.

when looking at this trope throught different movies we noticed things that kept repeating. the trope in the movies allways start with an issue seen by the viewer but not seenm but other characters in the actual film. Then there is allways a character which fills the role of a revealer. This character is known to be smarter and wiser than everyone else but isnt allways the main character. this character tries to reveal his knowledge of whatever the subject of the film is. When trying to reveal this message the receiver of the revelation often resists the revelation at first until the receiver sees or experiences the revelation for himself. Then through acts and learning the receiver ends up taking the revelation and doing something about it, with help from his/her "supporting cast".

The first and main movie we payed attention to was the matrix. This movie is the best example of a revelation movie that you can get. It follows almost every rule that occurs with this trope. I had previously seen this movie and enjoyed it, but I never saw it the way that I saw it while paying attention to this trope, and to other tropes also. This movie was not only a revelation movie, but also had many religious aspects in it which gets the viewer thinking, and searching for a deeper message while watching the movie. It starts by having the viewer enter this futuristic science fiction world, by entering through what may be perceived as a birth canal, leading to the idea that you are being born into this computer world. It starts out with an unknown character named trinity in a room, where she is about about to be arrested but then does some fighting moves and acrobatics thought which are normally thought to be impossible. Having this occur in the beginning of the film it shows the viewer the rules of this world, which are that there are none. It then starts with the story of neo. Neo is the main character of the movie. He is a hacker who knows theres something else to the world but has no idea what it is. He assumes the role as the receiver of the revelation. He has heard of a hacker/ internet terrorist named morpheus. In search for this man named morpheus he comes up with a question which is “what is the matrix?” Then aproxamately 23 mionutes into the film neo finds morpheus and is encounted with what would be the biggest and most life changing choice of his life. Morpheus asks neo if he would like to take a blue pill, which would bring back to his life as it is, or would he take a red pill which will lead him to the truth that he seeks. Of course neo chooses the red pill and and is led to the first part of his revelation. He learns that the world was taken over by man made robots which learned that they could use humans brainpower as a battery. Neo also learns that he is predicted to fulfill a prophecy and become “the one”.

While continuing on his journey he learns martial arts, and learns how to bend the rules of what he thought was reality. While learning his new role on earth he constantly resists. Everything that happens to him he resists. There is a scene in which morpheus trys to teach neo to bend the laws of gravity, and jump from one building to another building about 30 feet away. Morpheus jumps the building no problem but neo still doesn’t accept this reve;ation of a world where anything is possible so he fails and falls off the building. To make this faster in the end Neo has to accept the revelation taught to him by neo in order to survive and save the human race.

One of the main things to pay attention to while looking at this trope is the different pieces of the trope so that when you notice these pieces while looking at literature you can easily find the revelation trope. One basic thing with the revelation trope Is that it starts with an unacceptable situation. This situation can be whatever you want it to be, but mostly appeals to the viewer as something they would dislike. An example of an unacceptable situation is in the movie the Matrix, like I had mentioned earlier. The situation in that movie is the whole idea of humans being used as batteries for robots. The viewer sees tthis and knows that this has to change and has to be fixed but sees the receiver of this revelation learning and eventually changing this situation to be fixed. Following the unacceptable situation being presented there has to be a solution to it. The solution is often created and known by the prophet. An example of this part of the revelation trope can be seen in star wars. Obi Wan knows almost everything about Luke skywalkers past and knows the only way to overthrow the Empire is to train and give luke the confidence to become a great jedi. Obi Wan carries the revelation of luke being the one to change everything, but doesn’t reveal everything to him at once. Obi Wan is definantly the prophet in that revelation story.

The next step in portraying the revelation trope is for the prophet to offer a new definition of reality, or to pretty much come up with the master plan and share with everyone the way they will change this unacceptable situation. An example of this is in the film firefox. In that movie the strong willed character played by Angelina jolie, comes up with a plan to catch there pedofile teacher in the act of being a pervert, and end up physically abusing him.