The Journal, Part 3
January 7th 2007 11:45
Category: No Category
2:34pm Sunday May 6, 2001
Looking at the outcomes for the Ext 2 syllabus, I realised I’ve been shying away from documenting my processes in as much depth as I have earlier (which surprised me!), so I thought I owe it to my Ext 2 experience to elaborate further:
I didn’t explain in entirety the way I came to start writing what I think will be my final idea…
The idea of the self-conscious writer weaving in and out of texts in an attempt to capture something ‘perfect’ or ‘ideal’ originated out of the idea for my play. The play, with its powerful symbols of isolation and disconnection was a starting point powerful enough to introduce the themes I wanted to. However, as I developed the idea of the self-conscious writer dealing exclusively with the play and its development throughout the work, I faced a few problems. I felt somewhat confined in not being able to bring in any other modes of writing, and being limited in the exploration of textual forms in this way.
Then one day in April I was walking home in the night and noticed the moon above me… this led me to write a passage inspired by Italo Calvino’s postmodern techniques, creating an effect that I liked (this passage is included in my ‘inspiration and process’ folder), which I though I could incorporate into my work, providing another text other than the play to work with. This led me to reconsider how the major work would turn out. I realised there were several elements that needed to find their place into it somehow:
-?- The play
-?- Prose fiction pieces… I wanted to include prose because it’s a very effective way of exploring the creation of a story, and a format I feel comfortable in experimenting with. I could also use beautiful, stirring, provocative language and imagery in a way that is hard to present within a play, yet would add depth and interest into the Work. I also longed for the opportunity to do my own Calvino-inspired comments on the creation of a story.
-?- At least one poem. I wanted to include poetry
* the diary/journal format appealed to me on many different levels:
-?- it allows one to explore the self in a very personal and natural way, allowing for touching on many issues, especially in the writer exercising various degrees of self-consciousness. This format is an appropriate one for experimentation on behalf of the writer, and suits probing the psyche in a casual yet intense manner, which would be harder to achieve if the self-reflexive quality was officially a part of the text. The journal format allows for the writer to be as intimate with themselves and their subject matter as is possible while being natural.
-?- It allows me to use all the textual forms I wanted, yet also brought the focus away from the pieces themselves and to the writer’s psychological state, which is exactly the effect I wanted to produce and was wondering how.
-?- Having been an enthusiastic journal writer for many years, this style is one I can relate to and feel at ease with, and I can develop my interest in skills in this area for my Work.
-?- The use of a journal allows for another level of meaning to be read into my work: it can appear to be a parody or satirise the experience of a Ext 2 English student herself! This is a subtle but very powerful layer of meaning, because it examines the psychological effects the Ext 2 syllabus might bring to a student undertaking the course. And I like doing that sort of thing because it’s oh-so-postmodern
)
I have observed that while the purpose of the proposal and the process journal is very sound, and a brilliant method of encouraging the student to investigate his/her own processes in theory, in practice often these aspects of the syllabus can be a difficulty for the students involved.
Often the pleasure that students derive from writing is the fact that their source of inspiration seems mysterious and unexplainable. Many authors adopt this approach of ‘writing from the heart’, and actually see the documentation of their process as detrimental to the progress of their idea. Other students may not be as opposed to writing on their source of motivation but may be puzzled over what it actually is. As 17 or 18yr-olds, our understanding of our identity, individuality and deep psychological processes is still tenuous, yet to achieve the highest we can in this course we need to draw from a deep understanding of our personal context, how we have been influenced and how our minds and emotions work.
This experience could affect a student undertaking this course in many different ways. The writer in my story is in a way a reflection of myself- her problem is not reluctance to explore her mental and emotional processes, but rather to come out with a complete a piece of writing. She is constantly aware of how constructed everything she writes is, and seems unable to escape the cynicism that any piece of writing she creates is cliched, uninventive and unoriginal. She interrupts her process of writing to air her insecurities over the direction her pieces are going, and through this experimentation over writing she undertakes a personal journey, exploring her insecurities and fears over writing.
The effect the course had on me is that I thought so carefully and hard about what I wanted to do in theory, before I attempted to do it, that I felt I couldn’t live up to my standards in practice. This created the feeling that whatever I wrote would be contrived, flawed, etc. Once I started writing more and getting more comfortable with both writing and myself, this fear faded, and I feel like my block has lifted, and I finally feel comfortable with this idea, and am not trying to plan it all out but letting it shape itself as it will, while having a perfectly good indication of what the outcome will be.
So I am drawing from my own experience, and satirising… myself, as a 4u student who ‘overindulged’ in the investigation of her mental processes to the extent that she got stuck within them and felt uncomfortable creating a product. (The line between process and product is also an important exploration in my Work.) But this could apply to anyone who finds themselves in a similar situation.
I’ve included a ‘Inspiration and Process’ Folder to include pictures, diagrams and other useful material relevant to my investigation and inspiration… so far I have The album cover of No Doubt’s ‘Return of Saturn’ album, which includes Gwen Stefani’s lyrics, which have been an inspiration to me- she writes very intimately about her life and her emotions, and her use of language is superb. I also included another album cover, that of Alanis Morrissette’s ‘Jagged Little Pill’, which explores similar issues, but is less introspective than Sefani’s wistfully brooding verses. Both texts are very insightful, explore psychological states and issues, and have elements of postmodern style in them.
5:25pm Tuesday May 8, 2001
Also included in the folder is a Disney motion picture flip book. These are sold by Disney to offer fun and education about the illusion of movement of animated pictures to children, but I it is still relevant to anyone who is interested by the creation of an illusion. If the book is used as instructed, to just flip through without stopping, then the appearance of fluency is achieved in the gradual changes to the picture. However, pause on a page, and slowly continue turning them, and it is fascinating to explore how slight the changes are from one page to another. The change is often barely noticable, yet when all combined together every little bit contributes to the seamless overall effect.
This is similar to writing in that the mood, tone or atmosphere created by each word is relatively slight in terms of the big picture (assuming the text is over 500 or so words), yet altogether each of those individual words compose the story, and they possess literal as well as symbolic meaning while appealing to both the conscious and the unconscious mind.
And so, somebody so alert to how wording shapes the direction of a tale would be hyper-conscious of the development of their story through language.
4:59pm May 13, 2001
The following is based on Derrida’s investigation into structuralism:
The STRUCTURALIST model argues
1) that the structure of language itself produces "reality"--that we can think only through language, and therefore our perceptions of reality are all framed by and determined by the structure of language.
2) That language speaks us; that the source of meaning is not an individual's experience or being, but the sets of oppositions and operations, the signs and grammars that govern language. Meaning doesn't come from individuals, but from the system that governs what any individual can do within it.
3) Rather than seeing the individual as the center of meaning, structuralism places THE STRUCTURE at the center--it's the structure that originates or produces meaning, not the individual self. Language in particular is the center of self and meaning; I can only say "I" because I inhabit a system of language in which the position of subject is marked by the first personal pronoun, hence my identity is the product of the linguistic system I occupy.
The HUMANIST model presupposed:
1) That there is a real world out there that we can understand with our rational minds.
2) That language is capable of (more or less) accurately depicting that real world..
3) That language is a product of the individual writer's mind or free will, meaning that we determine what we say, and what we mean when we say it; that language thus expresses the essence of our individual beings (and that there is such a thing as an essential unique individual "self").
4) the SELF--also known as the "subject," since that's how we represent the idea of a self in language, by saying I, which is the subject of a sentence--or the individual (or the mind or the free will) is the center of all meaning and truth; words mean what I say they mean, and truth is what I perceive as truth. I create my own sentences out of my own individual experiences and need for individual expression.
Language is a construct. Your meaning can only be conveyed if the reader shares the world of words you have created. Meaning is extracted by the reader and their personal sets of values, including how they interpret language. Freedom of self-expression exists within the composer, because they decide how to manipulate their words and language formations with which they work with. But their text has no guarantee that it will be interpreted the way intentioned. Structuralist ideas permeate my attitude to writing.
-How intellectual theories manifest themselves in the experience of individuals
7:00pm Monday 14th May- experiment
Now im going to tell you why I’m not doing 4u anymore. I guess im just not cut out to be a writer.
This journal is the most fluent piece of work I’ll probably ever complete. I just can’t seem to write.
I wish this journal could be my major work. Make a point, by reversing the process as a product.
I’d probably give my poor tortured 4u teacher a heart attack. Gee, I wonder how they’d market that sorta thing!
Actually, now that I think about it… it doesn’t sound like a bad idea.
THE END – and there’s a 4u work for you!
Prologue:
The proposal
Epilogue: creative writing, or
“how do you know when to end something?”
5:05pm Wednesday 16th May 2001
Over the last few days I’ve had an idea that I’ve really taken to- using my journal as my Major Work. But I decided the difficulties in having both a satisfactory journal and a satisfactory work were too much to handle, so I’ve modified this idea to simply adapt or appropriate my journal into my major work, using segments of it directly, and modifying others as needed to aid my story.
The reasons for my idea are:
-?- On treating my journal as a text in its own right, I saw that I had here something very much of the essence of what I wanted to write. I wanted to document the indecision, queries, hesitations and the erratic process of inspiration, and how it motivates a writer to redo and undo writing due to ongoing shifts in personal perspective and opinion, level of awareness and understanding. And here is a document where I have attempted to show all of this within myself, through writing extensively on my personal journey with my work. This is more or less what I set out to do in my major work.
-?- It gives me something solid, meaningful and complete in its own fragmented way to work with. This journal skips from one place to another very quickly, leaving the reader to fill in the gaps. I have tried to maintain a fluency and sense of development throughout my entries, but for the reader to have a sense of this they must be willing to see the erratic developments as fluent in their own right.
-?- I am extending and enriching the role of the journal in my major work and also raising questions about its role in the new eng ext 2 course.
Here is an extract for the 2001 Eng Ext 2 Syllabus (Sample Marking Guidelines section)
The Major Work Journal
During the development of the work, students are required to keep a process journal.
The MW Journal must provide the following information:
-?- A written statement containing a clear statement of intention agreed to by the student and the teacher/school
-?- Reflections pertaining to the development of the MW composition
The MW Journal is a documentation of the investigative process and the process of composition. The recording of research, analysis, critical, imaginative and speculative reflections and development of process will assist students in achieving course objectives and outcomes and in preparing for external and internal assessment tasks. (The journal also has a role in establishing the authenticity of the MW.)
The journal may also include:
-?- Method of approach
-?- Evidence of research and questioning
-?- Redrafts for reasons for any changes in direction
-?- Examples or indications of stimulus material and reflections upon them in relation to the development of the major work composition
-?- Reflection on the extent to which intentions were achieved
-?- Reflections upon the finished product
-?- An annotated bibliography.
The Major Work journal must be submitted with the Major Work. The journal should be clearly labelled with the candidate’s number and centre number, and the name of the Major Work and its medium of production.
As seen in the syllabus, clearly the major work journal is intended to play a significant role in the development of the major work, however nothing is mentioned on it being wholly or partially reproduced in the major work. Under the majority of circumstances this concern wouldn’t be applicable, but in my circumstances it is, and it appealed to me as an innovative concept, since I was questioning the 4u experience. I think of it as a subversion of the implied convention that the journal is for the process, and is separate from the product. It’s also a postmodernism-inspired technique which increases my own sense of fun and adventure in a search for a ‘finished product’. I obviously like giving my work an interesting twist.
Looking at the outcomes for the Ext 2 syllabus, I realised I’ve been shying away from documenting my processes in as much depth as I have earlier (which surprised me!), so I thought I owe it to my Ext 2 experience to elaborate further:
I didn’t explain in entirety the way I came to start writing what I think will be my final idea…
The idea of the self-conscious writer weaving in and out of texts in an attempt to capture something ‘perfect’ or ‘ideal’ originated out of the idea for my play. The play, with its powerful symbols of isolation and disconnection was a starting point powerful enough to introduce the themes I wanted to. However, as I developed the idea of the self-conscious writer dealing exclusively with the play and its development throughout the work, I faced a few problems. I felt somewhat confined in not being able to bring in any other modes of writing, and being limited in the exploration of textual forms in this way.
Then one day in April I was walking home in the night and noticed the moon above me… this led me to write a passage inspired by Italo Calvino’s postmodern techniques, creating an effect that I liked (this passage is included in my ‘inspiration and process’ folder), which I though I could incorporate into my work, providing another text other than the play to work with. This led me to reconsider how the major work would turn out. I realised there were several elements that needed to find their place into it somehow:
-?- The play
-?- Prose fiction pieces… I wanted to include prose because it’s a very effective way of exploring the creation of a story, and a format I feel comfortable in experimenting with. I could also use beautiful, stirring, provocative language and imagery in a way that is hard to present within a play, yet would add depth and interest into the Work. I also longed for the opportunity to do my own Calvino-inspired comments on the creation of a story.
* the diary/journal format appealed to me on many different levels:
-?- it allows one to explore the self in a very personal and natural way, allowing for touching on many issues, especially in the writer exercising various degrees of self-consciousness. This format is an appropriate one for experimentation on behalf of the writer, and suits probing the psyche in a casual yet intense manner, which would be harder to achieve if the self-reflexive quality was officially a part of the text. The journal format allows for the writer to be as intimate with themselves and their subject matter as is possible while being natural.
-?- It allows me to use all the textual forms I wanted, yet also brought the focus away from the pieces themselves and to the writer’s psychological state, which is exactly the effect I wanted to produce and was wondering how.
-?- Having been an enthusiastic journal writer for many years, this style is one I can relate to and feel at ease with, and I can develop my interest in skills in this area for my Work.
-?- The use of a journal allows for another level of meaning to be read into my work: it can appear to be a parody or satirise the experience of a Ext 2 English student herself! This is a subtle but very powerful layer of meaning, because it examines the psychological effects the Ext 2 syllabus might bring to a student undertaking the course. And I like doing that sort of thing because it’s oh-so-postmodern
)I have observed that while the purpose of the proposal and the process journal is very sound, and a brilliant method of encouraging the student to investigate his/her own processes in theory, in practice often these aspects of the syllabus can be a difficulty for the students involved.
Often the pleasure that students derive from writing is the fact that their source of inspiration seems mysterious and unexplainable. Many authors adopt this approach of ‘writing from the heart’, and actually see the documentation of their process as detrimental to the progress of their idea. Other students may not be as opposed to writing on their source of motivation but may be puzzled over what it actually is. As 17 or 18yr-olds, our understanding of our identity, individuality and deep psychological processes is still tenuous, yet to achieve the highest we can in this course we need to draw from a deep understanding of our personal context, how we have been influenced and how our minds and emotions work.
This experience could affect a student undertaking this course in many different ways. The writer in my story is in a way a reflection of myself- her problem is not reluctance to explore her mental and emotional processes, but rather to come out with a complete a piece of writing. She is constantly aware of how constructed everything she writes is, and seems unable to escape the cynicism that any piece of writing she creates is cliched, uninventive and unoriginal. She interrupts her process of writing to air her insecurities over the direction her pieces are going, and through this experimentation over writing she undertakes a personal journey, exploring her insecurities and fears over writing.
The effect the course had on me is that I thought so carefully and hard about what I wanted to do in theory, before I attempted to do it, that I felt I couldn’t live up to my standards in practice. This created the feeling that whatever I wrote would be contrived, flawed, etc. Once I started writing more and getting more comfortable with both writing and myself, this fear faded, and I feel like my block has lifted, and I finally feel comfortable with this idea, and am not trying to plan it all out but letting it shape itself as it will, while having a perfectly good indication of what the outcome will be.
So I am drawing from my own experience, and satirising… myself, as a 4u student who ‘overindulged’ in the investigation of her mental processes to the extent that she got stuck within them and felt uncomfortable creating a product. (The line between process and product is also an important exploration in my Work.) But this could apply to anyone who finds themselves in a similar situation.
I’ve included a ‘Inspiration and Process’ Folder to include pictures, diagrams and other useful material relevant to my investigation and inspiration… so far I have The album cover of No Doubt’s ‘Return of Saturn’ album, which includes Gwen Stefani’s lyrics, which have been an inspiration to me- she writes very intimately about her life and her emotions, and her use of language is superb. I also included another album cover, that of Alanis Morrissette’s ‘Jagged Little Pill’, which explores similar issues, but is less introspective than Sefani’s wistfully brooding verses. Both texts are very insightful, explore psychological states and issues, and have elements of postmodern style in them.
5:25pm Tuesday May 8, 2001
Also included in the folder is a Disney motion picture flip book. These are sold by Disney to offer fun and education about the illusion of movement of animated pictures to children, but I it is still relevant to anyone who is interested by the creation of an illusion. If the book is used as instructed, to just flip through without stopping, then the appearance of fluency is achieved in the gradual changes to the picture. However, pause on a page, and slowly continue turning them, and it is fascinating to explore how slight the changes are from one page to another. The change is often barely noticable, yet when all combined together every little bit contributes to the seamless overall effect.
This is similar to writing in that the mood, tone or atmosphere created by each word is relatively slight in terms of the big picture (assuming the text is over 500 or so words), yet altogether each of those individual words compose the story, and they possess literal as well as symbolic meaning while appealing to both the conscious and the unconscious mind.
And so, somebody so alert to how wording shapes the direction of a tale would be hyper-conscious of the development of their story through language.
4:59pm May 13, 2001
The following is based on Derrida’s investigation into structuralism:
The STRUCTURALIST model argues
1) that the structure of language itself produces "reality"--that we can think only through language, and therefore our perceptions of reality are all framed by and determined by the structure of language.
2) That language speaks us; that the source of meaning is not an individual's experience or being, but the sets of oppositions and operations, the signs and grammars that govern language. Meaning doesn't come from individuals, but from the system that governs what any individual can do within it.
3) Rather than seeing the individual as the center of meaning, structuralism places THE STRUCTURE at the center--it's the structure that originates or produces meaning, not the individual self. Language in particular is the center of self and meaning; I can only say "I" because I inhabit a system of language in which the position of subject is marked by the first personal pronoun, hence my identity is the product of the linguistic system I occupy.
The HUMANIST model presupposed:
1) That there is a real world out there that we can understand with our rational minds.
2) That language is capable of (more or less) accurately depicting that real world..
3) That language is a product of the individual writer's mind or free will, meaning that we determine what we say, and what we mean when we say it; that language thus expresses the essence of our individual beings (and that there is such a thing as an essential unique individual "self").
4) the SELF--also known as the "subject," since that's how we represent the idea of a self in language, by saying I, which is the subject of a sentence--or the individual (or the mind or the free will) is the center of all meaning and truth; words mean what I say they mean, and truth is what I perceive as truth. I create my own sentences out of my own individual experiences and need for individual expression.
Language is a construct. Your meaning can only be conveyed if the reader shares the world of words you have created. Meaning is extracted by the reader and their personal sets of values, including how they interpret language. Freedom of self-expression exists within the composer, because they decide how to manipulate their words and language formations with which they work with. But their text has no guarantee that it will be interpreted the way intentioned. Structuralist ideas permeate my attitude to writing.
-How intellectual theories manifest themselves in the experience of individuals
7:00pm Monday 14th May- experiment
Now im going to tell you why I’m not doing 4u anymore. I guess im just not cut out to be a writer.
This journal is the most fluent piece of work I’ll probably ever complete. I just can’t seem to write.
I wish this journal could be my major work. Make a point, by reversing the process as a product.
I’d probably give my poor tortured 4u teacher a heart attack. Gee, I wonder how they’d market that sorta thing!
Actually, now that I think about it… it doesn’t sound like a bad idea.
THE END – and there’s a 4u work for you!
Prologue:
The proposal
Epilogue: creative writing, or
“how do you know when to end something?”
5:05pm Wednesday 16th May 2001
Over the last few days I’ve had an idea that I’ve really taken to- using my journal as my Major Work. But I decided the difficulties in having both a satisfactory journal and a satisfactory work were too much to handle, so I’ve modified this idea to simply adapt or appropriate my journal into my major work, using segments of it directly, and modifying others as needed to aid my story.
The reasons for my idea are:
-?- On treating my journal as a text in its own right, I saw that I had here something very much of the essence of what I wanted to write. I wanted to document the indecision, queries, hesitations and the erratic process of inspiration, and how it motivates a writer to redo and undo writing due to ongoing shifts in personal perspective and opinion, level of awareness and understanding. And here is a document where I have attempted to show all of this within myself, through writing extensively on my personal journey with my work. This is more or less what I set out to do in my major work.
-?- It gives me something solid, meaningful and complete in its own fragmented way to work with. This journal skips from one place to another very quickly, leaving the reader to fill in the gaps. I have tried to maintain a fluency and sense of development throughout my entries, but for the reader to have a sense of this they must be willing to see the erratic developments as fluent in their own right.
-?- I am extending and enriching the role of the journal in my major work and also raising questions about its role in the new eng ext 2 course.
Here is an extract for the 2001 Eng Ext 2 Syllabus (Sample Marking Guidelines section)
The Major Work Journal
During the development of the work, students are required to keep a process journal.
The MW Journal must provide the following information:
-?- A written statement containing a clear statement of intention agreed to by the student and the teacher/school
-?- Reflections pertaining to the development of the MW composition
The MW Journal is a documentation of the investigative process and the process of composition. The recording of research, analysis, critical, imaginative and speculative reflections and development of process will assist students in achieving course objectives and outcomes and in preparing for external and internal assessment tasks. (The journal also has a role in establishing the authenticity of the MW.)
The journal may also include:
-?- Method of approach
-?- Evidence of research and questioning
-?- Redrafts for reasons for any changes in direction
-?- Examples or indications of stimulus material and reflections upon them in relation to the development of the major work composition
-?- Reflection on the extent to which intentions were achieved
-?- Reflections upon the finished product
-?- An annotated bibliography.
The Major Work journal must be submitted with the Major Work. The journal should be clearly labelled with the candidate’s number and centre number, and the name of the Major Work and its medium of production.
As seen in the syllabus, clearly the major work journal is intended to play a significant role in the development of the major work, however nothing is mentioned on it being wholly or partially reproduced in the major work. Under the majority of circumstances this concern wouldn’t be applicable, but in my circumstances it is, and it appealed to me as an innovative concept, since I was questioning the 4u experience. I think of it as a subversion of the implied convention that the journal is for the process, and is separate from the product. It’s also a postmodernism-inspired technique which increases my own sense of fun and adventure in a search for a ‘finished product’. I obviously like giving my work an interesting twist.
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