My e-portfolio.

My idea for my advocacy project is electronics recycling.  Electronics contain a significant amount of precious metals, some of which produce huge amounts of pollution to mine.  Also, other elements of electronics contain harmful materials like mercury and lead that can leach out of landfills and contaminate the environment after they have been thrown away.  To make matters worse, consumer electronics have come to be viewed as very disposable – you get a new phone or a new iPod every year or two, and a new computer only slightly less frequently.  This is really wasteful and aggravates the pollution problem.

To deal with this issue, a recycling centers across the country have adopted programs to recycle electronics – everything from cell phones to microwaves.  Here in Center County you can recycle electronics by taking them to the Recycling and Refuse Authority in Bellefonte.  They deal with your electronics free of charge, recycle the precious metals and other components, and keep a lot of waste out of landfills.

However, to recycle your electronics you have to get them there.  College kids have a lot of electronics.  And usually don’t have the cars or the time to truck all that stuff to Bellefonte. Therefore, it would be nice to have a permanent place here on campus to collect electronic waste and have it sent over to the recycling center.   My audience would probably be Mobius, the sustainability and recycling group here on campus.  I’d try to get them to set up a permanent electronics recycling station somewhere on campus.  My medium would be a letter or petition sort of thing.

My idea for the topic of my persuasive policy essay is illegal ivory trade in the US.  Despite all the conservation efforts that have been in place for decades, elephant and rhino poaching is on the rise again, and the US is the second largest consumer of illegal ivory in the world, after China.  For a country that prides itself on being among the first to implement all sorts of wildlife protection policies, this is unacceptable.  The problem largely arises from the lack of regulation on internal ivory trade that makes it reletively easy for poachers and their affiliated syndicates to sell illegal wildlife products once they pass the initial barrier of getting into the country.

The policy I would be advocating would be the National Strategy for Combating Wildlife Trafficking, which was unveiled by the White House in February.  This policy proposes to shut down nearly all domestic ivory trade, putting strict limitations on interstate trade and even trade within states, as well as virtually eliminating the import and export of all ivory goods.  The only exceptions, for the most part, are items that can be proven to be “antiques” (more than 100 years old) and items brought into the US before the Endangered Species Act prohibited their importation.  As I do more research, of course, I may advocate for a change to the Strategy or an alternative policy.

Some of my research so far has included the possible consequences of this policy.  Among the groups concerned are: museums, who fear legal trouble when loaning exhibits that include ivory, musicians, whose high-end instruments often contain ivory but do not have the required documentation to prove they are legal, the NRA, which disapproves of the restrictions on the sale of ivory-inlaid firearms that, again, may not have proper paperwork, and dealers in antiques whose collections will lose nearly all value if they cannot be legally sold.

I think this is a good topic for my persuasive policy essay because, since the government has just proposed a policy, it gives me a chance to evaluate this policy and see if there are any changes I would make to it.  The US is trying to show that we’re a leader in wildlife protection, but it will be interesting to see where exactly this balances with the potential economic impact of such a policy.

I Believe in Darkness

I believe in darkness.  Darkness has gotten such a bad wrap over the years: the Dark Ages, the Dark Lord, “come to the dark side” — all of these have a seriously negative connotation.  But sometimes, the darkness is what brings out the best in people.

When the lights go down in a theatre, right after intermission, it’s pretty dark.  I was huddled over my music stand, squinting in the light of a dim bub, trying to scratch out the entr’acte to The Sound of Music on my violin.  My stand partner was doing the same thing.  He was a senior, and had not liked being delegated to the second violin part with me, that scrawny high school freshman.  He absolutely dripped with apathy. In fact, he scared me a bit.  My best friend had been in the marching band with him, and when she found out he was my stand partner, she had told me all sorts of stories about how nasty he was to everyone.

So far, he had been living up to his reputation — complaining about being moved down from the first violin part, poking fun at the other kids in the pit, and putting very little effort into putting bow to strings.  I tried to stay out of his way.

That’s exactly what I was doing during the entr’acte of The Sound of Music when I suddenly heard a ba-gaaaooooooouuuuu — the sound of a G string slipping impossibly out of tune.  My eyes panic-scanned the score dimly illuminated in front of me, hoping to find some alternate fingering that could get me around the loss of my lowest string, but I quickly discovered that there was no way.

Cursing internally, I whipped my instrument from under my chin and held its wood close to my ear.  Franticly, I twisted the tuning peg with all the feeble strength my skinny wrist could muster.  But I’m no strong man, and my old violin was particularly stubborn, and the peg would not stop slipping.  Even if I had managed to wedge it back in place I never would have found my note amid the cacophony of “The Lonely Goatherd” that was being yodeled out by the rest of the orchestra.

I was about to give up when my AWOL instrument was pulled out of my fingers.

“Play mine,” a voice came out of the darkness as another violin was pressed into my hands.  I didn’t have time to think, but started to churn out “The Lonely Goatherd” along with everyone else.

My violin was swapped back — now perfectly in tune — after the last chord of the exit music had died and the lights came back up.  I tried to thank my stand partner for saving me, but he ignored me and slouched his way out of the pit.  With the lights back up, I guess he was afraid of getting caught being nice.

Truth is, even the worst people have a little bit of good in them if you just look at them in a different light, so I believe in darkness.

Here are a lot of ideas for various projects we’ll be doing this semester:

For my “This I Believe” essay I am considering either “I believe all people are fundamentally good” or “I believe in spontaneity.”  The first is a bit cliched, but it’s something I learned from experience and something that a lot of people don’t really believe in (although they might want to).  The second is more unique and has an interesting backstory, but I think it’s also not as strong.

As for the CI blog, I’m definitely interested in issues of the environment, but in a messy sort of way.  Thing might by wrong in colloquial context, but I define “environment” as any physical aspect of the universe that isn’t human.  How we interact with our environment and how we use it and shape it is always an evolving issue; one much bigger than just “global warming.”  Even more interesting is how our environment interacts with us, and how we deal with it when a hurricane or new disease or meteor hits.  Of course, this is probably well outside the topic of “environment,” and spills untidily across all kinds of disciplines, but I think such a broad, unconventional view would inspire some good conversation.

For my passion blog I might continue my “photo safari,” but one of my friends has suggested I start a “dream blog” since I am plagued with really weird and occasionally entertaining dreams that usually manage to evade interpretation.  I’m not sure if anyone would enjoy reading such craziness, though.

I think I could improve my blogging by being a little less “random and creative” and stick to more conventional topics because they are easier for people to respond to with comments.  Also, especially in my passion blog, I found my style to be really choppy.  This was probably at least partially due to the format of my “photo safari” and the fact that I was trying to stick to a reasonable word count, but I’ll try to smooth it out in the future.

For our group’s video on the controversy over Titanic’s artifacts, we made several video and audio choices that were reflected in the homework video tutorials.  First of all, we used specific transitions between shots to make the whole thing flow more smoothly and divide the video into sections of related content.  For similar video segments, we use a transition that blurs images together.  It establishes continuity between shots.  Between segments that belong to different ideas we fade to a few frames of black.  This is very good for keeping our video organized, as well as signaling to the viewer when we’re moving on to a new point.

Our video also has an emphasis on audio.  Titanic is a very visual topic that relies mostly on iconic images (the ship sinking, the rusting wreak on the ocean floor, the “king of the world” scene from the movie).  While these images are fascinating, the public’s fascination with Titanic artifacts is a leading cause of the controversy that surrounds them.  Therefore, we decided to leave portions of the video black with just a voiceover.  This will force the viewer to focus on what is being said and also give him time to digest the images.  The black itself is reminiscent of the ocean’s depths and also calls to mind the memory of the tragedy’s victims.

Another choice we made in the video was to start with the words “RMS Titanic” and no audio except ocean sound effects and some stock footage of waves.  People have a lot of preconceived ideas and prior knowledge about Titanic, and this simple beginning gives them a chance to recall what they already know.  Then, when the voiceover starts, the viewer is already focused.  We revisit this motif at the very end of the video, where a photograph of the ship sailing away dissolves to black and the same words appear on the screen.  This ties the video up nicely, recalling the beginning, but also is symbolic in the way the video begins with waves and ends with black, the same way the ship began afloat and ended up at the bottom of the ocean.

One of the best ways to be civicly involved since the beginning of time was to be in a parade.  Everyone from Julius Caesar to Queen Elizabeth II has participated in one of these public functions.  For rulers like Caesar and the Queen, parades are a great way to stay in touch with the people – for beloved rulers, it gives the populace a chance to see their respected leader up close; for more tyrannical leaders, it reminds the populace who’s boss.  Parades are also a great campaign strategy in that a visiting candidate can “reach” a larger percentage of the population in person than if they were merely giving a speech somewhere.

Another great function of a parade is to make something national personal.  For example, after the successful moon landing in 1969 all three astronauts were literally paraded around New York City.  This brought what could be viewed as a very “distant” topic (both literally and in the sense of “big science vs. the everyday”) home to a lot of people.  Veteran’s Day parades do much the same thing – shutting down a street for columns of uniformed men and women is a better reminder of what Veteran’s Day stands for than a sign in a window or a flag in someone’s yard.

Of course, everyday citizens can show their civic involvement through parades, too.  Marching in a parade in support of a particular group is a great way to tell people you believe in a certain cause.  This is especially important for groups that are sort of “under the headlines” – not controversial or particularly groundbreaking, but important nonetheless.

Even just going to watch a parade can be civic.  Physically going to a place with a bunch of other people is civic in itself, and cheering for particular groups you identify with is even more civic.

Personally, I’m really excited for next week’s Thanksgiving parades.  I love it all – the floats, the balloons, the marching bands … I know the whole thing can come across as a bit outrageous, but instead of judging the people dressed up as turkeys and nutcrackers, admire just how civicly involved they are.  They put a lot of work into bring you holiday cheer, so don’t rain on their parade!

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(The above link does eventually get you to the video, you just have to keep clicking it.)

My preparation for this TED talk was very stressful.  I had an awful time coming up with a topic, but once I did, I found it to be one I was really interested in.  One of my problems was the time limit.  I did a lot of research since I didn’t know much about psychology or fear responses.  I found a lot of interesting sub-topics within my topic, and originally wanted to base my talk on the different factors that influence a person’s fear response.  However, a number of the influences I was planning to cover involved a lot of background information.  In fact, I could have done a 10 minute talk easily.  I ended up having to pare the presentation down, changing the subject at basically the last minute.  The influence of gender stereotypes on fear responses was the best-supported sub-topic I had, and touched on some of the others, so after bolstering it a bit I found it fit the time parameter.  I feel like I would have been more well-prepared if I had limited my material sooner.

Finding a final version of my topic was probably the weakest point of my preparation.  My supporting information was interesting and easy to understand, I think, and the presentation was pretty cohesive.  Making the powerpoint was a wonderful way to memorize my presentation.  Physically putting the thing together was better for helping my memory than all the practice I did afterwards.  The main function of my practicing was getting the timing right.  Every time I practiced I realized I was going too long and decided to drop something.  Then I would practice again end up dropping something else.  This was not a very effective strategy, since after maybe ten run-throughs I had only done one or two with my “real” presentation.

One thing from the reading I really tired to fuse into my talk was the idea of ethos.  I felt like the point of a TED talk is to share a fraction of the knowledge you have on a subject in which you are an expert, and I was far from an expert in my topic.  That’s why I included a little anecdote of my experience in the haunted house, to add some credibility to what I was saying so it wouldn’t sound like I was spouting facts I didn’t really understand.  I also tried for really clear links and transitions between the different parts of my presentation so the whole thing would make sense and flow cleanly.

As for the actual presentation, I found that I rushed through it when I really didn’t need to.  This is obviously a direct result of the fact that my presentation was originally way too long and I had to cut it down.  I was still under the impression that my presentation might be too long, so I rushed and talked a lot faster than was strictly necessary.  I did stumble over a couple of words, as a result, and forgot a couple of transitions between ideas, so it was also a bit choppier than I intended.  I know my movements were very harsh and jerky, which I didn’t like when I watched the recording.  I’m also less comfortable presenting in front of a small audience than a large one, so I found my eyes unfocusing and jumping between the spaces between people’s heads in an attempt to not make eye contact.  I kind of distracted myself.  I think I also repeated myself a couple of times, which was not planned, and did a little bit of wild improvisation when I couldn’t quite remember what I was going to say next.

However, I think I was able to cover most of this fairly well.  I think my flow was good and I was more or less engaging and entertaining.  I appreciated when people reacted to my slides so I could remember there was actually an audience out there.  I also think I was able to mesh my narration and the powerpoint fairly well.  I was rather impressed that I was able to always be on the right slide at the right time.  Mostly, I think I was clear and concise, so I think the audience was able to get a lot out of my presentation.

Ok – I am terrible at coming up with ideas whenever I really need them, but I think I’ve finally come up with something.  I plan to do my TED talk on superstitions.  That’s about as far as I’ve gotten.  My thesis will probably be something along the lines of  how while superstitions are ignorant beliefs not founded on scientific fact, they serve the purpose of keeping people safe, moral, or otherwise in line.  They’re like a bastion against chaos.  Of course, I will need to do a pretty decent amount of research to get this idea off the ground, but it’s a good start.

As for rhetorical choices, I think the topic itself is a pretty good rhetorical choice.  My paradigm shift paper was about the changing connotation we place on nursing homes.  To be honest, nursing homes are not really a relevant or particularly interesting topic for an audience of college kids.  Elderly people or the adult children of elderly people considering going into nursing homes might find it interesting, but people my age can’t connect with it as well.

Superstitions are much more interesting, because they cover a wide range of interests and almost everyone has a superstition of some sort or has come in contact with people who have superstitions.

Other rhetorical choices I am considering making include balancing the pathos and logos in my talk, just like superstitions are a balance of of the emotional and logical sides of people.  There’s kind of a continuum, here, of how people view this topic, and I need to be careful to appeal to both ends of that continuum.  If I balance this right, it should develop my ethos, too, since I will come across both as someone who has looked at these superstitions logically and objectively while still giving the superstitions the level of credibility they deserve.

I have found that one of the best ways to be civicly engaged in my community is by having a job.  True, most of the time you’re working just for the money, and sometimes the hours are really long and your duties are really boring, but there are some positive aspects, believe it or not.

Before I go any farther, let me clarify a little.  By “job” I’m talking about the summer jobs most of us have to pay for our pizza during school.  If you work in a cubicle typing numbers all day you are obviously not civicly engaged.  Of course, if you’re sitting in your basement shooting computer-animated zombies all day, you’re not exactly being very civic either.

What I am talking about is the average, everyday, highly-stereotyped, college-kid-flipping-burgers, cashier-at-Walmart kind of job.  Yes, they’re boring and very low-paying, but they also flatten your nose against the window of reality.

I think a lot of people today, especially teenagers, are not very in touch with the people in their communities simply because they are not in daily contact with the people who live around them.  Frankly, they spend most of their time in school, with their friends, or holed up in their houses.  Even the “community events” and fundraisers they do participate in are done almost remotely – organizers go to their school, or they raise money themselves and then pass it on to organizers who then go out into the community.

If you’re a cashier at Starbucks, however, you interact with every sort of person: friends and total strangers, people your age, older, and younger, but mostly people from your own city, town, or community.  This kind of constant interaction with new people definitely builds people-skills, but it also gives you a glimpse into the dynamics of your community.  So next time you find yourself stuck behind a cash register, trying to keep your eyes open and grumbling about how annoying your customers are, try thinking instead about who these people are, where they could be from, and how they fit into your community.  In the end, you’ll have a better understanding of your community and how it works.