HW # 37 - Cool Paper Final

"Stay Cool "


“Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is hear no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
Macbeth act V scene V

“This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.”
Hamlet act I scene iii

When it comes to describing “cool,” Shakespeare has something to say worth hearing from a once cool guy, Macbeth, who makes terrible decisions and becomes extremely “uncool” and from an uncool guy, Polonius, who is manipulative and full of himself but comes up with advice about how to be cool that still sounds right after 400 years. In his quote Macbeth, a great war hero, sums up the meaninglessness of his life when he is about to be revealed as a murderer of his king and friends due to his lust for power and pressure from his ambitious wife, who has just committed suicide out of guilt. Polonius on the other hand has this “cool” moment when he tells his son Laertes, who is about to go out into the world on his own, to always to be honest with yourself so that you will always be honest with others because if you are not honest with others, then you would be being dishonest with yourself. Shakespeare’s plays have lasted because he wrote about human nature and he understood people’s weaknesses, that is their desire to elevate themselves in their own minds and everyone else’s. If having an awareness of a need to be cool is a part of our human nature and our competitive social environment, and there are serious dangers involved with trying to be cool, then our society needs to help us appreciate our own individuality and responsibility as a member of something bigger than our own social environment, and that thing is humanity. Three of the biggest dangers of trying to be cool are living a life that is short-term cool, having an identity that depends on what other people think of you, and having an identity that is completely selfish. When we give in to these dangers, we give up having meaning in our lives and any chance of looking back on our life and considering that we were actually “cool” people.

When Gwendolyn Brooks talks about her poem that begins “We real cool. We left school,” she says that she was trying to get inside the heads of some local boys in her community who were playing pool when they should have been in school. She said they were “thumbing their noses at the establishment.” It’s almost always cool to go against the establishment. It’s what many heroes do if the establishment is bad, and it’s what makes certain outlaws very cool like pirates and other outlaws who don’t fit into the establishment. It is also protective armor. Langston Hughes said, “Stay cool and dig all jive, that’s the reason I stay alive.” If school doesn’t seem like a place where you can be cool (get self-esteem), why make the effort? For black kids in poor inner city communities I think their special kind of coolness is something they can feel proud of because they own it. These kids have been trend setters for America and the world with songs, dances, language, clothing styles and gestures and body moves (pounds and chest bumps). And they should get credit for holding onto it. As Orlando Patterson says, there is also a lot of respect coming from white society and white corporations for this inner city culture. When establishment white people start talking about “in the house” or “in the hizzle”or learn the crip walk and corporations put the language and the moves in commercials, then the black kids often from the Bronx or L.A. come up with new expressions and new dances like “the jerk.” They stay ahead of the corporations who make fortunes making cool stuff mainstream and shortening its cool life. Unfortunately, except for successful athletes and hip hop artists, who are able to bypass college and make lots of money, for a lot of inner city kids no matter how talented their coolness is short-term because of a lack of good education. Unlike middle class kids who go to college because they are expected to go and go to schools and get the help to enable them to go, inner city minority kids don’t plan on going to college because they don’t go to good schools and they don’t get expensive tutors and help from well educated parents. These cool jive kids can often only stay cool by taking huge risks as they get older living in communities where drugs and guns make their culture a really dangerous one. In huge numbers they go to prison or get shot. Very uncool.

Another danger of coolness is trying too hard to be cool and it is illustrated by the character Ivan Ilych from Leo Tolstoy's The Death of Ivan Ilyich, who suffers from an extreme fear of death which leads him to be critical of the way he has lived his life as he looks back at an earlier, happier time in his life before coming to the realization that he has cared too much about money and social status. The way Ivan lives his life Ivan is contrasted with other characters in the story who are more open and honest about the way they live their lives, the peasant Gerasim for example, who truly cares for Ivan. Ivan, a judge who does not live for himself but for the purpose of social climbing blindly adopts values of an aristocratic society. He believes that if he emulates the materialistic life of high society he will find meaning in his own life. He marries not because of love but because he has found a woman who socially acceptable and decorates his house with fancy material objects to try to cement his upper class status. The Death of Ivan Ilych is a sophisticated psychological story about a man who is having what seems to me like an existential experience trying to figure out his own nature. Tolstoy is using Ivan Ilych to illustrate the moral that to have a good life people have to care about their fellow human beings and not be focused on trying to be "cool" in other people's eyes in a way that makes their world revolve only around them.

Having an identity that is completely selfish and shuts out other people is a third kind of dangerous way of trying to be cool is completely un-cool. Bullies, for example, make themselves feel good at the expense of others. In The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian Junior, a Native American freshman who upon entering an all-white high school was told by as a senior named Roger “You know Indians are living proof that niggers fuck buffalo.” Roger, the bully had claimed the spotlight for that ten second span and the laughter that would follow was enough to satisfy his ego for some time. His reward was Junior’s pain. In the novel, A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens Ebenezer Scrooge starts to reflect on a life he has not lived well because of a supernatural experience when the ghost of Christmas Yet To Come shows him his own grave thanks to a visit from his dead partner Jacob Marley, who does not want Scrooge to suffer his fate of spending eternity in chains because of the greedy life he led. He has been shown by the Ghosts of Christmas Past and Christmas Present and of Christmas Yet to Come what a selfish miserable life he has had. Ivan has to reflects on his selfish life all on his own after an accident begins to cause him great pain and slowly kills him. He is searching for meaning in his life because he knows it is going to end and, as he says "... I did everything properly." He means that he did everything he thought the society he wanted to be in expected him to do. After shutting out society for so long Scrooge finally becomes a member of humanity.

Shakespeare’s advice, “To thine own self be true,” seems to me to be a lot like what the existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre said, “Man is nothing else but what he makes of himself.” Making something of ourselves gives meaning to our lives. Whether there is a god or not, we are all part of humanity, and our actions should be humane to be cool. Being arrogant or dishonest or cruel is not cool and neither is an unfair world where some are not given the advantages to make something of themselves.

HW 36 - Triangle Partner Help (Aja H.)

Thesis - Trying to be cool in other people's eyes makes us feel like somebody and gives our lives meaning.


Main Idea - Why is it that we humans desperately need other people's approval and commit so many uncool acts to get attention? Take the bully for example. In a twisted way he gives meaning to his life by inflicting misery upon other people. He finds a weakness in his prey like shyness, for example, and then exploits it by trying to put the person in the spotlight in some uncomfortable situation. Or take the braggart. She has always had a better experience doing anything than anybody else.

Ideas for next draft

item # 1 - Try to answer the good question that you ask about what we humans are missing that causes us to need to be cool in other people's eyes so badly.

item # 2 - You make great points about Ivan Ilych and about tattoos. I think you could be even clearer about what can be cool and uncool about getting tattoos.


item # 3 - I think you should talk about another character in a book or another way people try to be cool and give their lives meaning.

HW 36 - Triangle Partner Help (Julie A.)

Suggested thesis: For most teens their idea of being cool is a reflection of how their social group of peers act out their idea of being cool.

My brother has a friend whose older brother is a rapper. That is to say the older brother is nocturnal animal who hangs out in nightclubs. My brother's friend thinks it's cool to be around his brother. This means that he is constanly surrounded by a group of jeans falling, thug looking, cash on hand "homies" chilling at the bar and getting high on anything they can. They watch other people dance because they're too cool to dance. Even though they're not rich they buy the most expensive drinks. For my brother's friend trying to fit in with his brother is completely uncool for him. He isn't doing much homework and is missing a lot of school. Unlike his older brother, he is not developing a talent or earning money. He is just adopting habits that could take a lifetime or at least a long time to undo.

Ideas for your next draft

Item # 1 - Affect(meaning to have an effect on) is the verb and effect(meaning a change that is a result of an action) is the noun. If effect is used as a verb it means to cause, to happen or to bring about.

Item # 2 - Discuss paradox you bring up about parents. Teens rebel against parents to try to be cool, but what if parents drink too much or even do drugs. Shouldn't the teens not drink and smoke to be different from their parents? It seems this isn't usually the case.

Item # 3 - Why do you think girls are more party animals than guys?

HW # 35 - Cool Paper Rough Draft

Cool Paper Draft (To Be Edited Tonight)


“Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing”
Macbeth act V scene V

“This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.”
Hamlet act I scene iii

When it comes to describing “cool,” Shakespeare has something to say worth hearing from a once cool guy, Macbeth, who makes terrible decisions and becomes extremely “uncool” and from a truly cool guy, Polonius. Macbeth’s quote sums up the meaninglessness of his life when this former war hero is about to be revealed as a murderer of his king and others due to his lust for power and pressure from his wife, who has just committed suicide out of guilt. Polonius on the other hand can be thought of as a “cool” guy for sharing his wisdom with his son Laertes, who is about to go out into the world on his own. Polonius’s most important advice is always to be honest with yourself so that you will show yourself as honest to others and be honest with them. Shakespeare’s plays have lasted because he wrote about human nature and he understood people’s weaknesses, that is their desire to elevate themselves in their own minds and everyone else’s. If having an awareness of what it is to be cool is a part of our human nature as well as a product of our own social environment, and there are serious dangers involved with trying to be cool, then our society needs to help us appreciate our own individuality and responsibility as a member of something bigger than our own social environment, and that thing is humanity. Three of the biggest dangers of trying to
be cool are too much consumption of “cool” products, having an identity that depends on what other people think, and having an identity that is completely selfish. When we give in to these dangers, we give up having meaning in our lives and any chance of looking back on our life and considering that we were actually “cool” people.

Today, for too many kids the use of cool digital products like Ipods, Iphones, Facebook, and video games takes up too much after school and weekend time. For younger kids their addiction to video games is dangerous because they are not developing their coordination through team sports, individual sports, dance, or even just recreational activities like throwing a football, swimming, or playing ping pong. They are not developing the habit of exercise which is necessary for a healthy life. Having physical activity everyday is also important because it helps refresh the brain. For older kids violent video games involve them in dangerous action that is probably more apt to lead to aggressive behavior than listening to some violent rap songs and watching violent movies. Another problem for older kids with this emphasis on being cool is that the use of texting, Facebook, and Twitter get our minds in the habit of writing in an abbreviated way. The aim is for speed so the thinking is off the top of our heads. Being asked to write a five-page paper with thought-out analysis is torture by comparison. If I were texting a friend to say “It was nice to see you,” I would write “It wz (smiley face) to c u.” The goal is to shorten words and sentences as much as possible to get a message out as fast as possible and get one back. The article, “British Researcher Says Facebook A Brain Drain” by Robert Mitchum, says that an Oxford neuroscientist thinks that online social networking could be dangerous for our brains and behavior. She predicts that "the mid-21st century mind might almost be infantilized, characterized by short attention spans, sensationalism, inability to empathize and a shaky sense of identity." M. T. Anderson’s book, Feed

A second danger of trying too hard to be cool is illustrated by the character Ivan Ilych from Leo Tolstoy's The Death of Ivan Ilyich, who suffers from an extreme fear of death which leads him to be critical of the way he has lived his life as he looks back at an earlier, happier time in his life before coming to the realization that he has cared too much about money and social status. The way Ivan lives his life Ivan is contrasted with other characters in the story who are more open and honest about the way they live their lives, the peasant Gerasim for example, who truly cares for Ivan. Ivan, a judge who does not live for himself but for the purpose of social climbing blindly adopts values of an aristocratic society. He believes that if he emulates the materialistic life of high society he will find meaning in his own life. He marries not because of love but because he has found a woman who socially acceptable and decorates his house with fancy material objects to try to cement his upper class status. The Death of Ivan Ilych is a sophisticated psychological story about a man who is having what seems to me like an existential experience trying to figure out his own nature. Tolstoy is using Ivan Ilych to illustrate the moral that to have a good life people have to care about their fellow human beings and not be focused on trying to be "cool" in other people's eyes in a way that makes their world revolve only around them.


Having an identity that is completely selfish and shuts out other people is a third kind of dangerous way of trying to be cool is completely un-cool. Bullies, for example, make themselves feel good at the expense of others. In The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian Junior, a Native American freshman who upon entering an all-white high school was told by as a senior named Roger“ You know Indians are living proof that niggers fuck buffalo.” Roger, the bully had claimed the spotlight for that ten second span and the laughter that would follow was enough to satisfy his ego for some time. His reward was Junior’s pain. In the novel, A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens Ebenezer Scrooge starts to reflect on a life he has not lived well because of a supernatural experience when the ghost of Christmas Yet To Come shows him his own grave thanks to a visit from his dead partner Jacob Marley, who does not want Scrooge to suffer his fate of spending eternity in chains because of the greedy life he led. He has been shown by the Ghosts of Christmas Past and Christmas Present and of Christmas Yet to Come what a selfish miserable life he has had. Ivan has to reflects on his selfish life all on his own after an accident begins to cause him great pain and slowly kills him. He is searching for meaning in his life because he knows it is going to end and, as he says "... I did everything properly." He means that he did everything he thought the society he wanted to be in expected him to do. After shutting out society for so long Scrooge finally becomes a member of humanity.

HW # 34 - The Cool Pose and Various Approaches to Life Rooted in Class, Race, Gender, Age, etc.

When Gwendolyn Brooks talks about her poem that begins “We real cool. We left school,” she says that she was trying to get inside the heads of some local boys in her community who were playing pool when they should have been in school. She said they were “thumbing their noses at the establishment.” When you think about it, it’s almost
always cool to go against the establishment. It’s what many heroes do if the establishment is bad, and it’s what makes certain outlaws very cool like pirates and
other outlaws who don’t fit into the establishment. If school doesn’t seem like a place where you can be cool (get self-esteem) because you don’t have the role models to inspire you to work hard or you don’t have the help you need to do well or, like the working class boys in the “Learning to Labour” article, you think society isn’t going to let you get rewarded for your hard work the way higher class people get rewarded, then why make the effort?

Regarding black kids in poor inner city communities I think Orlando Patterson is right
about the importance of cultural explanations for behaviors that hold a lot of them back from being successful in this American society. Obviously, when it comes to feeling a
part of a middle or upper middle class family where there is support for you and money
for you and career expectations for you, they don’t. I don’t think there is a big difference
between the kids themselves. The majority of us do what we are expected to do in our
communities. Most middle and upper middle class kids plan on going to college because that is what is expected of them. Most poor black kids don’t plan on going to college because they are not expected to go. And their communities have created a culture that
is highly successful for some like athletes and hip hop artists who bypass college and make tons of money. As Patterson says, there is also a lot of respect coming from white society and white corporations for this inner city culture especially for music and sports stars, but that is not all. These kids have been trend setters for America and the world with songs, dances, language, clothing styles and gestures and body moves ( pounds and chest bumps). And they should get credit for holding onto it. When establishment white people start talking about “in the house” or “in the hizzle”or learn the crip walk and corporations put the language and the moves in commercials, then the black kids often from the Bronx or L.A. come up with new expressions and new dances like “the jerk.”

Unfortunately, the downside of this culture is very down often resulting in prison and
early death. The fact that selling drugs is so profitable and guns are so available makes the culture a really dangerous one. The cool aspect, that is the tryingto be cool aspect of cool, is really strong because it is so hard to get self esteem inpositive ways if there aren’t good role models around. The assignment asks about who to blame or what to do. I blame racism for the good and bad in black culture. Slavery produced the blues and racism helped produce jazz and hip hop. I think there have to be more organizations that give kids good role models and opportunities to develop talents and do well in school on a daily basis. Some of my brother’s friends who have done well in school say that if it hadn’t been for Boys Clubs, they would never have even gone to high school.

HW # 33 Cool Paper Outline

Thesis

If having an awareness of what it is to be cool is a part of our human nature, and there are
serious dangers involved with trying to be cool, then our society needs to change the way
most people go about trying to be cool.

Dangers:

Too much consumption of "cool" products
- wasted time
- zoning out/short attention span
- not developing talents/skills
Talk about Feed


Having your identity too dependent on what other people think of you
- Trying too hard to fit in/giving into peer pressure
- Wanting respect from the wrong people
- not thinking independently
Talk about The Death of Ivan Ilych and A Poverty of the Mind


Having an identity that shuts out other people
- Being a bully
- Being a prisoner of yourself
- Not developing sense of humanity
Talk about The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian, A Christmas Carol,
"Cool Guy" (HW24) assignment, and existentialism (Manley's class)

HW 32 - Tattoos & The Presentation of the Self

What does tattooing signify to me? Hmmmm… I have to admit that I haven’t given a lot of thought to tattoos. The first thing that comes to my mind is sitting captive in a subway car observing someone with a tattoo and wondering how long it takes before the tattooed person becomes bored with the tattoo. I think that I would get bored seeing the same tattoo on a person. This reaction makes me think that I have to get a larger perspective on the subject. I googled the history of tattooing and looked at a Smithsonian site. I read that tattoos have been found on female Egyptian mummies and on Chinese mummies, especially on the bodies of criminals. Tthe modern name “tattoo” came about after the British explorer James Cook’s expedition in 1769 to Tahiti where the islanders had tattoos “featuring highly elaborate geometic designs.” Following this trip this website says tattooing became popular in Europe especially among sailors and coal-miners. Because the common tattoos for sailors were anchors and the common tattoos for coal miners were miner’s lamps, it seems obvious that these tattoos were like amulets for good luck. This idea for a tattoo makes sense to me. Also, I can understand that if you are stuck a ship for a long time or in a coal mining area getting a tattoo might be something to do to pass the time.

I am asking myself why I really haven’t been tempted to get a tattoo. I’ve never walked by a tattoo parlour and been at all tempted to go in. Today I think I got a little insight about why I might not feel as strongly about them from Mr.Fanning and from a friend of our family I interviewed on the subject earlier today. First, Mr.Fanning. He said he grew up in a small conservative town in Maine which I’m guessing did not have a very diverse population. He said that he got his first tattoo at age 17 to be an anti-conformist. His tattoos were part of his rebel identity, and when he joined a punk rock band they were probably almost like part of his costume. He said that one tattoo he had was a tiger to represent strength and courage. When he said tattooing for him was a rite of passage, it made me think that his tattoos were in the tradition of African or Asian boys getting special markings when they became warriors.

The friend of our family I interviewed told me that she got her first tattoo when she was 18 and was about to go to college. Like Mr.Fanning, she also grew up in a small conservative town, and she wanted to be different. She also said she was a nerd in high school, and this made her different but not in a “cool” way. When she arrived at her all girls’ college, Barnard, she was the only ones to have a tattoo, and she felt good about that. She said that getting that tattoo was definitely an act of rebellion that her mother made her promise never to get another one. Now that she is over 30, she says that she regrets having gotten them. The main reason is that she is tired of them and that because she has gained weight they have stretched.

My feeling right now is that maybe because I have a black father with dark skin and a white mother, I already look different from a lot of people. Altough I have to admit when I went to Brazil to play soccer, everyone said I looked just like their cousin. As far as my identity goes, I guess I have used sports to give me a sense of who I am. I was going to say that I didn’t think I would have the patience to sit still to have a tattoo, but then I rembered that I have sat still several times for multiple hours to get my hair braided. I think I prefer hair braiding to the idea of getting a tattoo because after two weeks the braids come out without pain and without cost—not the case with tattoos. There are obviously many ways people like to adorn their bodies, I guess I prefer the non permanent ones.

Extra Credit Assignment

The character Ivan Ilych from Leo Tolstoy's The Death of Ivan Ilyich and the character Ebenezer from Chales Dicken's A Cristmas Carol both suffer from an extreme fear of death which leads them to be critical of the way they have lived their lives. Both characters look back at an earlier, happier time in their lives before coming to the realization that they have cared too much about money in the case of Scrooge and money and social status in the case of Ivan. Another way in which these characters are similar is the contrast they come to notice between themselves and characters who are more open and honest about the way they live their lives, the peasant Gerasim who truly cares for Ivan and Bob Crachit, who is treated so badly by Scrooge and yet never criticizes him.

Ivan, a judge who does not live for himself but for the purpose of social climbing blindly adopts values of an aristocratic society. He believes that if he emulates the materialistic life of high society he will find meaning in his own life. He marries not because of love but because he has found a woman who socially acceptable and decorates his house with fancy material objects to try to cement his upper class status. Ebenezer Scrooge is a very rich and miserly old man. The two characters are different because Scrooge, unlike Ivan, does not care what society thinks about him. Also, Scrooge starts to reflect on a life he has not lived well because of a supernatural experience when the ghost of Christmas Yet To Come shows him his own grave thanks to a visit from his dead partner Jacob Marley, who does not want Scrooge to suffer his fate of spending eternity in chains because of the greedy life he led. He has been shown by the Ghosts of Christmas Past and Christmas Present and of Christmas Yet to Come what a selfish miserable life he has had. Ivan has to reflects on his selfish life all on his own after an accident begins to cause him great pain and slowly kills him. He is searching for meaning in his life because he knows it is going to end and, as he says "... I did everything properly." He means thatb he did everything he thought the society he wanted to be in expected him to do.

Even though A Christmas Carol is almost like a children's story because the symbolism of the ghosts is very obvious and in contrast The Death of Ivan Ilych is a more sophisticated psychological story about a man who is having what seems to me like an existential experience trying to figure out his own nature, both Scrooge and Ivan Ilych are used to illustrate the same moral. That moral is that to have a good life people have to care about their fellow human beings and not be focused on trying to be "cool" in other people's eyes in a way that makes their world revolve only around them.