Thursday, 30 August 2012

[Quotidian] FLCL, a review

First, I feel like I have to justify the inclusion of an anime review in this blog.  There are two main reasons behind FLCL's inclusion: the first is that anime has subtitles (and, therefore, requires reading) and the second is that I've been meaning to keep track of the endless hours that I waste in a slightly productive way.

Anyway, here we go.

{Other people love reviewing FLCL}


FLCL is notorious for being deliberately obtuse and being a little bit hard to handle.  The animation style jumps around depending upon what affective content is being dealt with, and the perspective constantly fluctuates to imitate the sort of shots that are more akin to experimental films produced by emotionally-ladened high schoolers.

So, what specifically makes this anime so difficult to deal with?  I'm sure a huge list could be written, but one major aspect is that it is constantly referencing past anime and making puns that I'm sure are clever if you were fluent in Japanese.  As an ardent lover of puns (both good and bad), I sincerely wish that I had a good enough grasp on the language to appreciate them.  As it stands, most versions can be paused every 10 seconds or so to read what the puns are referencing.  Obviously, there is much lost in both translation and pausing every 10 seconds, and most people (including myself) would rather watch an episode in its entirety without catching every single reference.

{Seriously, guys, "never knows best"}
Besides the barrier that exists due to the transition from Japanese to English, FLCL also draws on English in a way that only foreign features can.  English is used sporadically throughout to give FLCL a little bit more street cred; to make it seem deeper.  As a fluent English speaker, you may find (as I did) that English is used rather liberally and without any consultation made to an English-speaking authority.  For example, one character, Mamimi, smokes a cigarette down by the river.  On the cigarette is written "never knows best."

There are evidently some pretensions that exist within this series (though it is not nearly as bad as Ergo Proxy).  I alluded to issues of perspective before, and believe me when I say that they are both a boon and a bane for the viewer.  If you are either really patient or really impatient, then you may enjoy the animation style.  It shifts continuously to allow for different effects; at one part, for example, it shifts between a traditional animation style to a presentation of a number of frames from a manga. 

I actually enjoy the visual experimentation that constitutes FLCL.  The voice-overs and narration, however, are a little bit harder to swallow.  They remind me of the sort of monologue that is drawn directly from the aforementioned emotionally-ladened high schooler's journal.  On the up side, the narration is authentic to the sort of angst that many teenagers experience; on the down side, it gets pretty annoying.

{Please tell me why this is happening}

So, why would anyone want to watch FLCL?  And why on Earth is it so popular?!  Let me outline 5 reasons why.

1.  It is only 6 episodes long.  22 minute episodes, that is.  This was a deliberate move by the producers, according to the ever-reliable Wikipedia, to make FLCL styled "more after 'a Japanese TV commercial or promotional video', creating a work that is 'short, but dense-packed' [sic]."  So, even if you find it difficult to watch an episode, you can remind yourself that it is only 132 minutes (approximately) of your life, and that you've probably spent the same amount of time watching something worse.  Whenever I recommend this series, I like to tell people that it is hard to get through the first half, and that they should just power through the second half.

2.  It has all of the prerequisites of an anime.  There are cats, robots, guns, adolescents, and girls with short skirts.  All of these elements are combined in a way that is self-aware without being trite.

{Honourable mention is a tie between samurai and ninjas}

{Naota touches himself}

3.  Robots come out of Naota's forehead/FLCL is unique.  As mentioned above, FLCL manages to use the tropes of anime without being hackneyed.  FLCL, for example, is the only anime that I know of that has robots sprouting out of a character's forehead during periods of sexual frustration (I imagine that there may be some spin-offs with robots sprouting elsewhere).  Furthermore, FLCL is a visual journey that leaves you spinning.  Each episode not only offers you something different, but it also provides more fodder to use for your PSYCH 101 anlysis.  Not to mention, familiarity with FLCL is required to be considered hip with the Otaku crowd -- because one should always be concerned with how their nerdy peers perceive them.



4.  The soundtrack doesn't suck.  I don't know how many times I've committed hours of my life to a series just to have the annoying intro song stuck in my head on repeat.  Luckily for you, The Pillows are neither a high-pitched girl band nor are they a similarly high-pitched boy band.



5.  FLCL is a fantastic coming-of-age story.  The whole reason why FLCL is one of my favourite anime (if not my favourite) is because it is a giant metaphor for growing up and becoming comfortable with oneself (and ones sexuality).  A lot has already been said by others about why the robots springing out of Naota's head are a representation of his maturation process, and I have even made reference to this in an essay where I parallelled Japanese acceptance of robotic sexuality with their acceptance of post-humanism in general (LAWLZ, English degree).  Basically, the content of the show is worthwhile, even if it is difficult to sit through.

With all of the above being said, I'll just leave you with just one more note: if you've watched anime before and you haven't seen FLCL, you should watch it; if you haven't watched anime before and you want to see FLCL, you should watch it with the help of some fun-inducers.

Kerri, the literacy narwhal's, rating of FLCL:

{4.5 unicorns out of 5 think you should watch FLCL}

Sunday, 5 August 2012

[Quotidian] Narwhal [Literacy]

Here follows the journey of Kerri from PDP student to literacy narwhal.  (This can also be considered the introduction to my portfolio for EDUC 341.)


[Literacy] Sponsors

Here's a picture that I drew to represent Kerri, the literacy narwhal's, literacy sponsors:


What are literacy sponsors, you ask?  Well, they are the "people, organizations, institutions, and tools that support (or withhold support for) literacy learning in people's lives" (Smythe, 2012, par. 3).  Because space is limited, I will just say that my literacy experiences have always been positive, despite my early challenges and weird speech impediment.  The people in my life, furthermore, have always been positive and supportive, and they have always encouraged me by working under the belief that I am smarter than I probably am.

Top 3 literacy sponsors: family (specifically grandparents and sister), friends (by supporting my love of literacy and challenging me by presenting new facts and things to look at), and school (by slowly whittling away at my grammar mistakes and introducing me to new content).

{Did you know that beluga whales and narwhals are related?}

Smythe, Suzanne. (2012). Unit 3 study questions. In EDUC 341-C100, Literacy, education and culture. Burnaby: Simon Fraser University. Retrieved Aug 5, 2012, from https://webct.sfu.ca/webct/cobaltMainFrame.dowebct?appforward=/webct/viewMyWebCT.dowebct

Saturday, 4 August 2012

[Literacy] Amorphous + Digital

I previously alluded to the fact that literacy is in part difficult to define because of its amorphous nature.  Literacy shifts with the needs and resources available to the society in which it exists.  It can happen, and has happened (refer to the printing press revolution), that literacy skills become more accessible to a large portion of the population.  Simultaneously, however, there are higher demands and requirements placed on individuals to be considered literate when such proliferation occurs.

Because I value visuals, I have created an image to explain the links between writing systems, society, economics, resources, and value systems.

{Images lifted from all over the Internet: school of fish, crown, pyramid, tools, narwhal, apple logo, Sir Ken Robinson, fish}
The above model is applicable to writing systems across time and place.  The connections that are presented in this model are integral to understanding how a writing system develops, and how one makes sense of literacy.

Our current technological revolution, for example, can also be analyzed through this narwhal network.  The first three requirements -- urbanization, differentiated social and economic roles, and social hierarchy -- are inseparable from our common experience (at least in capitalistic society).  The other two factors -- the nature of the tools available and the values held within the culture -- do a little more to help to explain the proliferation of digital literacies.

Put simply, we, as a society, have gained new literacies (i.e. digital) because of the advances that have been made in computer technology.  Our tools and resources have expanded with new technological innovations, and our society has embraced these changes because they align with our value system.  Digital literacies, in short, are a quintessential part of life because they benefit our social structure (Smythe, 2012).

Now, the above idea would require an entire posting in itself to justify and elaborate upon, so, instead, I will briefly touch on the consequences of these new digital literacies.

Adapting to this digital culture has presented educators with the enormous challenge of keeping schools, and the education that is provided in schools, relevant.  A fantastic video from GOOD's website presents this issue and offers a number of solutions:

 

The above video follows the same rationale that is presented by Sir Ken Robinson in any of his talks: educators and the education system need to adapt to modern demands.  Luckily, this video suggests three main prerequisites for successful adaption: reading comprehension, information search and retrieval skills, and an armour against doctrine.

While I completely agree with all of these requirements -- though I re-interpret the aforementioned 'armour' to mean the development of critical thinking skills -- I would like to add a fourth prerequisite: adaptability.  Without adaptability (in both educators and students), we will be unable to keep pace with technological advancement in the future.  We need, in sum, to inculcate adaptability into our curriculum so that our students remain flexible to future needs.

{This rainbow narwhal is adaptable}
Smythe, Suzanne. (2012). Unit 3 overview. In EDUC 341-C100, Literacy, education and culture. Burnaby: Simon Fraser University. Retrieved Aug 5, 2012, from https://webct.sfu.ca/webct/cobaltMainFrame.dowebct?appforward=/webct/viewMyWebCT.dowebct

[Quotidian] Freedom Writers, a review

{Hilary Swank educates}

Freedom Writers (2007) follows the exploits of a new teacher in a tumultuous, urban high school.  Through Erin Gruwell's (Swank) efforts, we are able to explore the messy relationship between self, community, and education.

This film looks at literacy through a social history view, which examines the social background of the literate (or illiterate) individual in an effort to make sense of their literacy experience.  A socio-cultural perspective, furthermore, posits that literacy is "a social and cultural practice that individuals enact in relationship to their context and their communities" (Johanson, 2009, p. 410).

Freedom Writers, for example, examines the nature of violence within the community, and suggests that attitudes towards literacy are reflected in the expectations and experiences of those around the learner.  The students in this film, for example, often came from families where gang affiliation, not high school graduation, was the rule, not the exception.

There are devastating effects to this sort of mindset.  School is seen as some sort of prison that has no relevance to the learner's life, and teachers begin to believe that they can only manage behaviour, not educate students.

Basically, this concept suggests that students have become indoctrinated with the belief that education is unavailable, and therefore undesirable; and, as a result, teachers begin to believe that students are incapable of performing academically.

This obviously leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy which is reflected in the diagram below.  Figure 'A' can easily be replaced with any sort of identifiable group -- like boys, the financially disenfranchised, or certain ethnic identities -- and still hold relevance.


{This is Indexed = hilarious}

Moayeri and Smith (2010) warn against falling into this trap of pedagogical disenfranchisement, by stating that "predetermining students' intelligence and ability, especially based on the basis of culture, limits students' potential success" (p. 415).

Gruwell also speaks of this inequity:
"Why should [students] waste their time showing up when they know we're wasting our time teaching them?  We tell them, 'go to school; get an education,' and then we say, 'well, they can't learn, so let's not waste resources'" (Freedom Writers).
Her solution was to give these students resources, like new books, access to guest speakers, and the opportunity to go on field trips, and to make their learning experiences more authentic and relevant.  But, most importantly, she believed that her students were capable of literacy, and she acted under the expectation that they had both the desire and the ability to learn.

This is a great message for any educator approaching any student.  Students should not be judged (either positively or negatively) based upon their social or economic background; but, at the same time, being aware of an individual learner's socio-economic history can help direct the teacher in providing authentic learning experiences.  Gruwell, for example, focused on the Holocaust in order to engage her students.

Overall, this film presents a number of very important pedagogical issues that apply to education, literacy, and to life in general.  Despite my fervor for addressing issues of inequity within education, I can only give this film 3 out of 5.  My main issue with Freedom Writers is that it models itself after a true story when it is only based on a book.  This makes it seem like the extraordinarily fast advancements made in Gruwell's class actually happened, and that the transition that the teacher made from adversary to confidante -- with all of her students, no less -- is plausible.  I'm not suggesting that the merit of the pedagogical discourse in this film is lessened, just that it will take more than just the two movie-length hours to make such an important change.

Kerri, the literacy narwhal's, rating of Freedom Writers:

{Unicorn of the sea}

Johnson, A. A. (2009). Orlonia’s “literacy-in-persons”: Expanding notions of literacy through biography and history. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 52(5), 410–420. Retrieved from http://www.reading.org/publications/journals/ 
Moayeri, M., & Smith, J. (2010). The Unfinished Stories of Two First Nations Mothers. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 53(5), 408–417. Retrieved from http://www.reading.org/publications/journals/ 

Friday, 3 August 2012

[Literacy] Self > Quotes


Literacy is very difficult to define.  For example, literacy can mean reading, writing, representing, and, quite often, it simply means that one is educated.  Just to confuse the issue even further, we can look at literacy through different 'views' -- skills-based, social, or critical.  Part of the reason why literacy is so difficult to define is due to the ever-evolving nature of our literacy needs and the mediums that we develop to fill these needs.

Before delving into the developmental (read: currently technological) nature of literacy, it is important to look at what literacy means to the self.  At the essential core of literacy is the desire to record and communicate.  Even with the human capacity for language, I often find myself unable to express what I really mean.  My experience is not unique.  In fact, many other, more important people have expressed this issue more fluently:

“For in spite of language, in spite of intelligence and intuition and sympathy, one can never really communicate anything to anybody.” (Aldous Huxley, "Sermons in Cats")

“Human speech is like a cracked kettle on which we tap crude rhythms for bears to dance to, while we long to make music that will melt the stars.” (Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary)

The truth of this last quote struck some deeper part of my psyche to such a degree that I decided to draw a representation of it.  The less literal symbols (i.e. not the bear or the star) in the background are meant to represent this discord between intention and actualization.  The inspiration came from the 'play' symbol (the triangles) and the download bar that one often sees in a torrent downloading program.

{Gustave Flaubear - AKA hipster street cred}


So, even if we have a really good idea of what literacy means, we may not be able to express it very clearly at all.  There is hope, however:

“Using words to talk of words is like using a pencil to draw a picture of itself, on itself. Impossible. Confusing. Frustrating ... but there are other ways to understanding.” (Patrick Rothfuss, The Name of the Wind)

Rothfuss, despite confirming our earlier woes, suggests that we may be able to tackle the meaning of literacy in more ways than by just using words, which is a task that I wish to pursue in further postings.

To start, however, I would like to make a very silly analogy and suggest that literacy is like a narwhal -- magnificent, but slightly ungainly (especially when attempting to describe it).

{Smiling narwhal thinks you're neat}