I love memoirs

So I love memoirs and decided that our assignment was a good enough excuse for me to go out and buy a memoir to read. I found Her Last Death by Susanna Sonnenberg. It was such a good book, but the ending was a little disappointing. I guess you can't make up a more interesting ending to your own life...lol. Anyway if anyone is looking for something to read to maybe become more inspired let me know.

Emily

It's that day..

Happy Thanksgiving gang!

bush memoirs

http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5gM9nkeVBCaUYRkZpsFsn757hqs4Q

do u agree?

If anyone is a fan of David Sedaris or likes the memoir Me Talk Pretty One Day you should definitely read Chelsea Handlers Hey Vodka its Me Chelsea! it so funny if anyone wants to borrow it i have it! 

Harvard Coop Bookstore Reading

So, believe it or not, I am actually a published memoirist. I have an essay published in Red: The Next Generation of American Writers - Teenage Girls, a collection of short memoirs written by teenage girls on themes ranging from divorce, to vacation homes, to Jimmy Fallon. We have a reading on Tuesday, December 9th at 7:00 pm at the Harvard Coop Bookstore celebrating the books paperback release, and I just wanted to give you guys a heads up if you're interested in hearing some more memoirs or in attending a reading. Come talk to me if you'd like more information.

Music Memoir

Songs have an incredible ability to automatically bring me back to a certain time or make me think of a certain person or place. I found this website, Cassette From My Ex, that chronicles the stories people have about receiving mixed tapes and they even provide you with the actual tracks the tapes included. I thought I'd share that with you guys after Kat mentioned the essay "Thanks for the Memorex" by Sarah Vowell, and after a few people in class brought in items related to music.

Now I'm considering somehow connecting my memoir to music, maybe telling a story about how I will forever associate the song "Sweet Home Alabama" with the time I was on a roadtrip to Canada and we got pulled over for going 100 mph due to our overexcitement about the song. I have a lot of other crazy stories that I can connect with certain songs, but I'm not sure if I want to take my memoir in such a nostalgic direction? I find myself worrying about the tone of my memoir more then what I even write my memoir about...

TURN THE PAGE!

Come to our new blog! As part of our literacy campaign, we (Rachel Thompson, Jessice Bonet, and David Tafoya) have created a blog that will host hard copies of all our posters as well as facts about literacy. The purpose of our campaign is to try and econrouagra the average person to read a book instead of read a gossip magazine, watch a television show or go on Facebook. We hope we can persuade people that reading is one of life's simplest and most enjoyable pursuits, worthy of every bit of attention you can spare!

Come to www.turnthepageliteracy.blogspot.com and encourage everyone you know to read!

The "Truth"?

Remember James Frey...

Genre Differences

We've been using the terms memoir, personal essay, and creative nonfiction/literary nonfiction fairly loosely in class. However, there are some big differences between these genres, as well as many similarities. What do you think are the differences? What are the conventions of a personal essay versus the conventions of a memoir? Something to think about...

Writers on Writing

For this project, don't forget that you need to find two sources (text or visual, like an audio clip or a movie) that can help you shed light and analyze your own memoir. Here are the names of some interesting writers that have written about memoir that you might want to check out:

-Richard Hoffman
-Douglas Whynott
-Philip Lopate (The Art of the Personal Essay is a great collection of academic essays. He edited it. I think we have it at the Iwasaki)
-Philip Gerald
-Nancy J. Miller
-Vivian Gornick
-William Zissner

These are just a few. Also check out your favorite nonfiction writers to see if they have any essays about the craft and databases.

i'm going about this assignment as I would write a college personal essay (similiar to the one us transfer students had to write for the application). Sometimes the smallest detail is the answer to writing a memoir. I haven't really written a "memoir" but defintely a lot of personal essays. You can take one "scene" of your life, something that your mom had said, a conversation with a friend, some decision you made in life- a lot of these things go un-noticed adn we don't even think of the impact they actually, do in fact, have on our life.
i still don't know what I would like to write about- I do, but I almost don't want to write about it. But I guess sometimes the things you don't want to write about, you'll have a lot more to say and it'll all have more meaning.

Writing an interesting memoir

I'm not sure if anyone else is worried about this, it may just be me, but does anyone else feel like they don't have anything interesting to write about? My life has been quite uninteresting in my opinion, probably many other people's opinions as well. I know that I could find something moderately interesting to write about and write in such a way as to make it enjoyable to read, but then there's still translating that to the graphic format which is a whole other worry. I can describe something in a way that is funny or interesting, but coming up with something from my life that would look good in pictures? That sounds like a stretch. I realize that there's writing to accompany the graphics, but I'd rather not have to rely solely upon the writing to make an interesting graphic memoir. It would be nice if I had some memory that lent itself to images. Sadly, it seems that eighteen years hasn't been quite enough for me to have accumulated any graphic worthy experiences.

THE Kings of Leon

Did anyone go to the Kings of Leon show at the Orpheum on Thursday night?

If you did, then you know it was a great show! I went with my roommate who is a huge fan. I wasn't really that into them but knew some of their songs. The show was absolutely refreshing, in a way, to see a real true rock band. I love being at a show where sometimes the sound of the band is taken over by the crowd singing along. The played a really long set and an on-core, too. It was the best show I went to all week!

If you're intreseted in Kings of Leon here is there myspace page so you can check out some of their songs: http://www.myspace.com/kingsofleon

Arthur Russell

I don't know if anyone is a fan of Arthur Russell, but they just released a 21 track collection of his rarest material, dating back as far as 1973.

Arthur Russell was an American musician who became famous in the late 70's for his 'odd' disco music. He began his career as a cellist, backing Allen Ginsberg at his poetry readings in 1973. Unfortunately he contracted HIV in the 80's and died in 1992.

Most of his material has been released in posthumous collections such as the album Calling out of Context and The World of Arthur Russell

The new collection was just released on Rough Trade titled Love is Overtaking Me. Unlike his other material, which is mostly early electronic music, the new album consists of classic style rock and contemporary folk ala Cat Stevens and The Band.

For me, it is THE album of 2008. Arthur Russell is often credited for his production innovations, or for being ahead of his time (see groups such as Dirty Projectors or Of Montreal), but this collection shows that Russell had immense versatility (and the good kind, not the obscure Jazz side-project kind).

Another example of a great artist lost before he gained true recognition.

buy the album here

I like tv but...

Hey guys i need to blog so...

As you may or may not know I work at a local restaurant. And this weekend I saw something that makes me kind of jealous but mostly just shocked. This weekend alone I have seen 3 families who bring some sort of video player to the restaurant with them for their kids. Now, the kids arent that young, and on one occasion it was only the kid and his mother.  When I grew up I never had tv anywhere near a meal or a tv in my room until college, and I was just wondering if this is normal now. Why cant adults talk to their kids? What do you all think?

Quantum of Solace

Okay so who is going to the midnight show of 007 on Thursday night/Friday morning? I already printed out my tickets. It looks fantastic to me. I love the direction that they have taken Bond in. Some people say that they are abandoning tradition and ruining the series, but I feel that Bond needed an update desperately and that people were losing interest. I love the way Daniel Craig has revolutionized the character and brought so much new to the table. Bond can't be stuck in the 50's, his new portrayal is brilliant in my opinion. Thoughts?

Poll

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=fP3Bl7BeTuYuxFmKO3gPNg_3d_3d

If you have time, please cut and paste this link into your browser. It is a survey for Ben, Alex, and Cady's group project about music literacy.

Thanks!

Kat

Obama won and now no one has anything to talk about...

Is it just me or have news organization, especially cable news, run out of things to talk about since Obama was elected. I was watching CNN the other day and they spent almost an hour talking about Obama's visit to the White House. I'm just curious, aren't there other things going on in the world?

Emily

Open Letter...

Dear Brother Obama,

You have no idea, really, of how profound this moment is for us. Us
being the black people of the Southern United States. You think you
know, because you are thoughtful, and you have studied our history.
But seeing you deliver the torch so many others before you carried,
year after year, decade after decade, century after century, only to
be struck down before igniting the flame of justice and of law, is
almost more than the heart can bear. And yet, this observation is not
intended to burden you, for you are of a different time, and, indeed,
because of all the relay runners before you, North America is a
different place. It is really only to say: Well done. We knew, through
all the generations, that you were with us, in us, the best of the
spirit of Africa and of the Americas. Knowing this, that you would
actually appear, someday, was part of our strength. Seeing you take
your rightful place, based solely on your wisdom, stamina and
character, is a balm for the weary warriors of hope, previously only
sung about.

I would advise you to remember that you did not create the disaster
that the world is experiencing, and you alone are not responsible for
bringing the world back to balance. A primary responsibility that you
do have, however, is to cultivate happiness in your own life. To make
a schedule that permits sufficient time of rest and play with your
gorgeous wife and lovely daughters. And so on. One gathers that your
family is large. We are used to seeing men in the White House soon
become juiceless and as white-haired as the building; we notice their
wives and children looking strained and stressed. They soon have
smiles so lacking in joy that they remind us of scissors. This is no
way to lead. Nor does your family deserve this fate. One way of
thinking about all this is: It is so bad now that there is no excuse
not to relax. From your happy, relaxed state, you can model real
success, which is all that so many people in the world really want.
They may buy endless cars and houses and furs and gobble up all the
attention and space they can manage, or barely manage, but this is
because it is not yet clear to them that success is truly an inside
job. That it is within the reach of almost everyone.

I would further advise you not to take on other people's enemies. Most
damage that others do to us is out of fear, humiliation and pain.
Those feelings occur in all of us, not just in those of us who profess
a certain religious or racial devotion. We must learn actually not to
have enemies, but only confused adversaries who are ourselves in
disguise. It is understood by all that you are commander in chief of
the United States and are sworn to protect our beloved country; this
we understand, completely. However, as my mother used to say, quoting
a Bible with which I often fought, "hate the sin, but love the
sinner." There must be no more crushing of whole communities, no more
torture, no more dehumanizing as a means of ruling a people's spirit.
This has already happened to people of color, poor people, women,
children. We see where this leads, where it has led.

A good model of how to "work with the enemy" internally is presented
by the Dalai Lama, in his endless caretaking of his soul as he
confronts the Chinese government that invaded Tibet. Because, finally,
it is the soul that must be preserved, if one is to remain a credible
leader. All else might be lost; but when the soul dies, the connection
to earth, to peoples, to animals, to rivers, to mountain ranges,
purple and majestic, also dies. And your smile, with which we watch
you do gracious battle with unjust characterizations, distortions and
lies, is that expression of healthy self-worth, spirit and soul, that,
kept happy and free and relaxed, can find an answering smile in all of
us, lighting our way, and brightening the world.

We are the ones we have been waiting for.

In Peace and Joy,
Alice Walker

Lit Rock

Lit Rock is the phenomenon by which Bands or musicians will base a good deal of their music around themes, situations, and characters found in their favorite books. Today's reigning champion is undisputedly the Decemberists, who have based entire albums on books they've read. The Crane Wife, their fourth album released in 2006 was based on a Japanese fable frontman Colin Meloy found in a children's storybook. He and his other bandmates have at times worked in bookstores and so they understand the importance of the book in music and other arts. Meloy's lyrics read like a reworked Dickens or Orwell novel or possibly some lugubrious Irish play written while famine was at every door. He sings about love lost in tragic storms, giant whales, soldiers, priories, revenge at sea, jolly boats, wanton sailors, women of ill-repute haunting cobble stone streets, and cannibals. Indeed his work is all the more exciting for his picaresque (the name of the bands third album) tales of cowardice, love, and loss and his bandmates are able to spin utterly convincing sonic renderings of these scenes for him.

During concerts to support Picaresque, the band covered Wuthering Heights, a song by Kate Bush whom Meloy routinely described as the mother of 'lit rock' as they know it. Bush certainly was the master of reinterpreting classic novels to timeless pop songs, but she has one predecessor who doesn't regularly get his due. Aside from the countless singers who referenced that classic that never goes out of print, The Bible, there is one singer who routinely name checked his favorite authors in his sublime pop songs. John Cale, one-time bass and viola player for The Velvet Underground, embarked on his solo career in 1970 and two albums in let the world know the joy of reading. Paris 1919, his sophomore record, is filled with layered literary references and splendidly written tributes to the great works that inspired him to put pen to paper. In the grooves of Paris, you'll find an homage to Dylan Thomas' great and ageless poem A Child's Christmas in Wales, a song named for that great spinner of intriguing yarns Graham Greene, and a rocker named for Shakespeare's Danish prince.

Lit Rock today is a slightly different species than it once was. It, for example, now knows no genre. Bands like White Rabbits wear their bookshelves on their sleeves and their music is fittingly sensitive and listenable, yet on the other end of the spectrum lies something equally as pleasing. Metal band Mastodon based their second record Leviathan on Moby Dick at the suggestion of drummer Brann Dailor. It's now not uncommon to find screamo bands with names like Gatsby's American Dream. There are other bands that take a subtler approach, but the literary influence is there - its nearly impossible to picture Tokyo Police Club without the writings of William Burroughs and Philip K. Dick to place it next to; ditto Cold War Kids with Robert Louis Stevenson and Allen Ginsburg. Canadian dream-pop band Stars took their love of the written word to a whole new level when they asked Daniel Handler (alias Lemony Snickett, the writer of Children's fiction) to write a short story to correspond with the lyrical themes of their album In Our Bedroom After The War so that they could include it in the liner notes. In Our Bedroom is itself a cohesive story with arc and recurring themes. And on the converse of this is the Gothic Archies, a band who composed a soundtrack to be read along with each of the books Handler wrote under his Snickett moniker.

Books are a gift that will never stop giving and continue to reach audiences well beyond the literary world. The greatest compliment I've ever received with regard to my music came when a singer I'd never met told me that my music struck him like a classic novel. In the words of my friend and fellow song-writer John Howell "always read to your children, because it makes all the difference".

i don't really have much to talk about at the moment, but i felt obligated to write in the blog, because it's been on my list to do for the past few weeks and i had yet to include some opinion or statement.
however, i want to say, those it's almost been a week since the election. i am SO happy that Obama won. he really can bring our country to change. and yes, it's been said, but for once I feel like i am proud to be an American. Especially being in Boston on Election night, I felt like I was a part of something much bigger than i thought before. I felt unity. and that's an extraordinary feeling.

we have a winner...

hey, so...

OBAMA!  History was made tonight, guys. This is incredible. What did you guys think of his speech? I personally was expecting the same caliber of his others, which I loved, but this one seemed to be of a whole new level. It was...well, it was presidential, with the elegance and humility that a president's image should conjure, I believe. Delivered with a new wisdom, serenity, and sense of grounding (if that's a legit term...), it really inspired my faith in him as this country's new leader. Agree? Disagree?

Also, thought it was interesting to note the reaction of the two audiences in arizona and chicago when one candidate mentioned the other's name. Both McCain and Obama showed the utmost respect for the other in their speeches after the announcement, but McCain's audience continued to boo and hiss at Obama's name when McCain mentioned him as a worthy opponent and a good man, while Grant Park applauded McCain's mention when Barack mirrored the respect McCain had shown him moments before. Just a thought.

Oh, and look at us go! Its a video of a crap load of college kids parading the streets tonight, lots of emerson faces too!

http://www.thebostonchannel.com/video/17895673/index.html

Vote

You have no excuse not to

Democracy?

As we are learning about literacy campaigns, we are being exposed simultaneously to another type of campaign: voting campaigns. However, I recently discovered that whatever fervor I had for voting would be wasted on this election, for despite being a registered voter in the state of Tennessee, I cannot vote. I mailed in my absentee ballot request form a week or two ago and just received a letter from the voting commission stating that I am unable to vote via an absentee ballot because this will be the first election in which I vote, and in the state of Tennessee, you have to appear in person, not as an absentee voter, when it's your first time to vote. Has anyone else fallen victim to this rule? I hadn't heard of this policy before, or I would have registered in the state of Massachusetts so I could vote in this presidential election. To me, this seems undemocratic, for it inhibits people's ability to vote. I hope everyone else's attempts to vote were/are more successful than mine was.

election

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/issues/

this is a site on cnn which shows what the candidates believe on each issue. I know at Emerson almost all of you will vote for Obama, but I think its important to know what each of them believe in. Have fun haha

Put Down the Remote and Pick Up a Book

Aly, Emily, Caitlin, and Jenell wrote a really solid A-level proposal. I am posting it on here for those of you that have yet to complete your proposal. It is a good example because they clearly outline their rhetorical situation (42% of college graduates don't read a book after they graduate), pick an appropriate medium (series of ads for public transportation) and why. They take it a step further by rewriting the Dentyne gum ads.

Additionally, this group has a clear outline of how they are going to work together. Each member has a role.

It is also clear that they have done some preliminary research, which is nice to see. I love the title of the campaign as well, "Put Down the Remote and Pick Up a Book."


Proposal for Group Put Down the Remote and Pick Up a Book
Aly, Emily, Caitlin, Jenell

Our Group wants to promote traditional literacy. We see the importance in people in their 20s reading books for fun. According to research done by the Jenkins Group, 42% of college graduates don’t read a book after graduation. Our group wants to help change that by starting reading patterns in college age people. We want to promote that reading can be fun and relaxing. Our subway ads will highlight just that.
We want to do a series of advertisements that could be place in the subway or on a bus. Our inspiration came from the Dentyne Ads on the subway, that highlight making face time and getting off of your computer. Attached are four of these ads to give some idea of the direction we’re going in with the project. Our vision would be to take the cute innocence of these ads and incorporate our campaign of literacy. We would do a set of four advertisements.
The first advertisement would highlight the importance of reading the book as opposed to watching the movie. It would have someone with the book next to a particularly sad movie adaptation more interested in the book than the flashy movie ad next to her. The caption would read “The Obvious Choice.” Along the bottom a list of books that have been turned into movies would be listed, giving the person looking at the ad a choice to make the obvious choice.
The second advertisement would highlight the warmth and comfort of a book. It would have a person or a group of people cuddled up inside reading a book with a cup of hot chocolate in each person’s hand. The caption would read “Hot Chocolate’s Favorite Accessory” and along the bottom would be a list of classic books like The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Little Women; classic children’s books that are comforting and fun to read.
The third advertisement would highlight something that almost every 20 something in Boston spends time doing, sitting on the T and commuting to work. It will have someone sitting on a T reading a book. The caption will read “Avoid Awkward Eye Contact.” Along the bottom will be a list of short exciting top seller books.
The fourth and final advertisment would highlight spending time in a bookstore. In a world where we waste time surfing the net and chatting online, we want to remark on the importance of spending time in a bookstore. This ad will have the caption “Excellent Waste of Time.” It will have a person in one of the old bookstores in Boston scanning the shelves and looking for the perfect book. At the bottom would be some little known favorites that the group picks out at the bookstore.
In order to make this project happen, we will need to research the Dentyne ads very closely. We will have to research book titles that we can place under each ad. We will have to have four photo shoots and enough models to make them all look professional and designed well enough for the subway. It is then going to take time on everyone’s part to put these ads together on the computer and have them printed up for the presentation. After the presentation our group will make it our job to somehow get our advertisement out in the public sphere. That is going to take a lot of research and phone calls on the part of everyone in the group.
This project is going to demand participation from all of the members of the group. Research is being done by Caitlin and Aly. They are going to be researching our target and looking into how to rewrite an ad. Jenell is going to be doing a lot with the creative side of the project. She’ll be looking into ads and figuring out how we want to place our ads and the people in the ads. Emily will be working on organizing and gathering all of the information together. Everyone will be in one of the ads. For the ads with groups we will each be responsible for finding people who we feel will look best in the ads, remain serious, and understand our mission and purpose. During the actual producing of the ads our whole group will be responsible to be present and helpful in any way needed.
Our group is very excited about this project and hopes to create an ad campaign that we can be proud of. Because this is a class where we are expected to go a step beyond, we hope to find a way to take our ads out into the public sphere, whether it be through the library system or through local reading advocacy groups. We want our ads to really reach students, promoting reading and learning outside of the school setting.

Webcomic

Check this out:

http://www.qwantz.com/

It is a webcomic about dinosaurs and society. Each day the layout and typography are the same, but the content is different.

Kat