From winding and elaborate Celtic knots, to the bold and unique scarifications of African tribes, tattoos appear in almost every civilization throughout history, making it an essential part of their cultures and an art of its own.
Tattooing was very dangerous, crude, and took months to complete in many cultures, but was seen as a sacred art and was taken incredibly seriously. With no specific tools to carve into the skin, ordinary blades and wood carving tools were used and natural pigments were used for colors. Ancient peoples took pride in their brands and marked the pain of carving the skin as a test of adulthood. These marks also showed ancestry and expressed a person’s social status across languages and borders where words could not.

Katherine L. Krcmarik. “The Art of Tattoo”. Michigan State University. April 2003. Web. March 21 2010.

“Skin Stories: The Art and Culture of Polynesian Tattoo”. PBS. 2003. Web. March 22 2010

Chris Rainier. “Tattoos”. National Geographic. 2001. Web. March 22 2010

“Tattoos: The Ancient and Mysterious History”. Jan 1 2007. Web. March 21 2010

Jim Douglas Burgess. Celtic Tattoos. Maui Celtic. 2003. Web. March 25 2010 http://www.mauiceltic.com/celtic-art.htm

Celtic, Polynesian, African, Asian

bibliography

Katherine L. Krcmarik. The Art of Tattoo. Michigan State University. April 2003. Web. March 21 2010.

Skin Stories: The Art and Culture of Polynesian Tattoo. PBS. 2003. Web. March 22 2010

Chris Rainier. Tattoos. National Geographic. 2001. Web. March 22 2010

Tattoos: The Ancient and Mysterious History. Jan 1 2007. Web. March 21 2010

Gordon Powles. The History of Yakuza Tattoos. Ezinarticles. July 2008. Web. March 22 2010

3 topics

Maybe I could write on some sort of animal like a gorilla, parrots, or an eel. I've always liked biology and would enjoy writing a paper on zoology.

I just saw the movie Seven, a thriller about a man who murders 7 people based on their deadly sin, it made me curious about researching Dante's Inferno.

Maybe i'll write on tattoos, why, I don't know.

Plot holes and mediocre storylines rule the box offices; flat characters that don’t act human hide behind special effects, and a general lack of meaning behind movies are polluting our theaters. With the rise of green screen and CGI technology in the past few decades, many movies have come to rely too much on high budget special effects. However, there are gems that come out on top occasionally. But, what makes a movie a classic? Plot, characters, style, and meaning are what make a legend.
The Plot is the movie. Without a good plot, a movie is worthless. The characters and settings can keep the audience’s attention, but the plot is what drives the movie. Movie Legends such as The Godfather, The Shawshank Redemption, and Chinatown have interesting characters, but without the well written plot, it would fall apart.
Memento, plot-wise, is a masterpiece. Memento is a modern murder mystery released in the year 2000, with an ingenious presentation and pace. At first it follows the formula of a standard murder mystery, but twists into a unique and “”” guessing game to figure out who is the murderer.
Characters are the strongest supporters of the plot and can make or break a movie. All good movies have memorable characters such as Forrest Gump and Indiana Jones. Many writers fall back on stock characters that follow a stereotype and bring down the movie, or flat characters that have no depth such as Charlie from Tim Burton’s remake of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Charlie seemed to be a saint descended from Heaven that could do wrong. He was completely selfless and sought to bring out the best in everyone. He shared his only birthday present with his family and loved them more than anything in the world. He spouted morals and gave heartwarming speeches; He showed no greed or gluttony in a world of chocolate. He seemed unbelievably flawless, the point being unbelievably. Charlie does not act like a child would, and is overall a very boring character.
Jack Nicholson’s character in One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Mcmurphy, had flaws to his actions, showed anger and greed, wanted personal gain, and acted like an average person. He had personality and multiple sides to his character, from expressing resentment to nurse Mcmurphy, to being a father figure to Billy. Mcmurphy was a very round character that made the audience wonder if he was insane or just trying to breeze through and easy life at a mental home.
One of the biggest offenders in the downfall of good movies is the CGI technology that can get in the way of the plot, sometimes even becoming the focus of the movie. James Cameron’s Avatar, the king of the box office, has mind-blowing special effects and houses almost photorealistic computer generated people and environments. However, the story was given less attention and litters the movie with predictable plot turns and stock characters, such as the oh so familiar evil military general.
Pan’s Labyrinth features amazing creature and a world as beautiful as Avatar’s, but uses the fantasy elements to support the plot. A young girl struggling through her mother’s marriage to a military official during World War Two escapes into a wonderfully crafted fantasy world. The effects are not the focus of the film though, and are only used to add to the films dark and mysterious setting.
The element almost every movie fails at achieving is to have a meaning to behind the plot. A good story will entertain an audience, but relating to a real life situation or having a hidden philosophy behind the plot will leave people thinking. Movies like District Nine and Taxi Driver portray real world events and situations such as the brutal racism in South Africa and the affects of violence on the mind, but hide them behind the story. Other movies like Fight Club, Pulp Fiction, and The Matrix lace the action and violence with a subtle philosophy that some won’t pick up.
Fight Club on the surface looks like a grimy and vulgar movie with a shock factor, but has an anti-capitalist and anti-society message buried under the violence. The two main characters open an underground fight club and spread anarchy throughout the city, but the main point of the movie is the philosophy they carry. Released during the prime years of credit cards and debt, Fight Club tells the philosophy of “Self improvement is masturbation.”[i] That self improvement pleases only the person trying to achieve it; that people spend their lives at jobs they don’t like, to buy things they don’t need.
Intelligent movies are hard to find in recent years, but films like Quinten Tarintino’s Inglorious Basterds, proved me wrong that good movies are gone, and hopefully more great movies will come soon to take back the box offices from the disasters in theaters now.
[i]Fight Club, Chuck Palahiuick. 1996

11/16/2010

The Winter Olympics have never really captured my attention, and pale in comparison to the summer Olympics that feature better sports and in general more interesting events. It seems overhyped and can be repetitive, focuses too little on the sports themselves, and can be downright boring during some of the slower events. Not that I don't like winter sports as I watch the Winter X-Games annually.    

Homework Assignment

What is the common topic that both Asher and Quindlen discuss in their essays?Homelessness
Ascher's focus deals largely with How people deal and react to homelessness. What IS her generalization? Everyone has compassion and empathy.

How many examples does she use to support her generalization? Why does each example work as evidence or support for her generalization? Both examples provide someone showing compassion or pity to someone in need.

Quindlen begins her essay with an example. What is it? Why does it work as part of her introduction? What is her generalization? How does she support her generalization in her essay? Is it effective? WHY?Which of these essays do you find more appealing? Ascher’s. Is it because of the examples or evidence? The wording? The focus that is carried throughout the paper from beginning to end? WHAT? Do not simply say, "Yeah, it was the wording. I liked what she said." Bully for you -- what were the words that make the essay effective? Liked the examples? Great! What examples? In my opinion Aschers’s essay is better written, is a more interesting read, and provides better examples to back up the focus of the essay. Quindlen seemed to ramble onto irrelevant tangents and uses an odd ordering in her essay.

2/04/2010

I get most of my daily news from the "News Jog" and "News Sprint" sections on the radio station I listen to while driving. Of course it's not reliable, the slogan even says its the most slanted and biased newscast on radio, but I listen to it for the comedy. Not only is it biased but it focuses on the odd and funny news more than important stories, so its purely entertainment. 

2/02/2010

I've never believed in superstition or luck in any way. Urban myths and stories of seven years bad luck never appealed to me, and I just don't believe that "luck" has any effect over our lives and that things just happen, for a reason or not. So, i'll continue to walk under ladders and have no fear of breaking glass, and breath easy ignoring these odd and nonsense "rules". 

1/28/2010

My first essay was a breeze. The only thing that slowed me down was choosing a topic, but I was able to quickly narrow it down to my obsession with music. The writing and revising was quick and painless when doing a topic you enjoy. 

Each of the essays I was assigned had an essay and I commented on each one, but only received one comment myself. The comment was positive and mentioned that the transition between my thesis and paper was odd. 

I think my first essay went well. The only part could possibly confuse an audience is the switches between past and present tense throughout the paper. Description was everywhere in this essay, but maybe I went overboard describing too much of a person or place. I feel the conclusion connected to the essay and left the audience satisfied with the theme. 

1/26/2010

Movie scripts, magazine ads, or just the best selling novel on the shelves. Writing in the modern world is used to make cold, hard cash. Sure, some people write just for fun or not by choice, but most Americans want to make something out of it, and it works. These writers are smart, and draw in readers with odd pictures or bold fonts, hooking them into their schemes and stories to make them want more. 

Essay #1

Andrew Johnson
Mrs. Aiken
English 1101
Jan 28, 2010
The Low End a.k.a Coral Blue
His jet black cowboy hat made his aged hair appear to be thinned white waves flowing from under the wide brim of his hat to his hunched shoulders. He waved us in with a calm smile, hiding the rest of his face behind a pair of seventies style aviator sunglasses and a short, but thick beard as snowy white as his mane of hair. He clenched the purpose of our visit, and a later fascination of my life, in his long, spidery hands. It was a vintage five- string electric bass guitar that looked as old as the owner, sporting dents, dulled chrome plates, and a wooden body that must been carved decades ago. A faded coral blue paint covered chunks of the wood and cracked over the neck of the guitar. It was at least four and a half feet from one end to the other and was carved in the classic shape that any musician would recognize as a Fender. “Let’s get started” he chuckled, turning on a nearby amp and cranking the volume up to 11.
With the rise of a new music program that would teach anyone an instrument for free being started at my church, I decided why the hell not. Teens around the neighborhood drove up the first day in their near-broken first cars that exhaled thick fogs of smoke and squealed deafening scrapings of worn brakes. Some brought their own beat-up pawn shop guitars and drums, but most, including me, were looking forward to trying out the brand new church bought instruments up for grabs. We hoarded down the winding, carpeted stairs and shuffled into different rooms each bigger than the last, housing walls of acoustic guitars and shelves littered with drum parts and golden symbols. Naturally, the electric guitar, vocals, and drums drew in the crowds that looked on as the adults wailed and pounded on their road worn instruments with the spirit of an eighties hair metal band. With so many choices I wandered the rooms tossing ideas around in my head of which one to choose, when I saw that one of the teachers only had one student.
Having no idea what a bass guitar was, I assumed he had just another electric guitar in his long fingers. After a brief moment of studying each other, he waved me in and pointed to the empty folding chair next to a kid that was the very definition of a redneck. He had on a wrinkled NASCAR shirt, a mesh trucker’s cap, which he removed to reveal a very closely shaven head that looked of homemade quality, and black boots caked in red clay.
After spinning the knobs all the way up and slamming on the ultra bass button, the old man slapped the strings with the hardened flesh of his thumb and popped them with his index finger, flooding the room in a deep, yet refined ocean of sound when he slapped, and splitting that ocean with an earsplitting pop when he plucked them with his index finger. It was like nothing I’d ever heard before, and it was then I knew I had been drawn into the right room.
Of course the bass guitar I was given to practice with was nowhere near the prestige of my teachers axe, but I was too excited to care. It was heavier than a standard guitar and much bigger, bearing thicker and more painful metal strings that rip and tear the flesh off of unsuspecting beginners’ finger tips. I would spend hours sealed away in my room, under a fluorescent glow, sloppily repeating lines, and rush to church on weekends to try and impress them with muddy and struggled songs that would slow to almost a halt when I had to reach into the deepest parts of my mind to remember how a certain melody would go.
Nevertheless I have spent the last two years heading deeper and deeper into the music, letting my mind swim in the ocean of sound, pleasing my ears with the mellow thumps of the speakers and giving myself the freedom of flowing with the beat.

I've been out with eye problems lately. I woke up monday with a dull pain in my left eye to find it red and irritated  with a dark and discolored pupil in the mirror. I never did figure out was wrong wrong with it exactly, but daily eye drops took care of the problem fairly well in only 2 days. 

Anyways, I read today that its unhealthy to sit or lay down for more than 4 hours straight. That even with exercise it can make heart attacks and obesity more likely among any age. As an artist I have been known to sit at a desk for long periods of time, but I doubt i've spent that long on my work, it still worries me that it could be dangerous. I plan to start doing outside studies, painting landscapes and waterscapes, moving around to capture different moments in time like an italian impressionst of old.

The last book I read was 'The Godfather' by Mario Puzo. I had already read the book my freshman year of high school as part of a project, and was re-reading it after watching the film trilogy. I personally thought the books were superior in almost every way; and while the actors, especially the actor who played Don Corleone, played their parts to the  T, they couldn't compare to the characters and settings that are created by the mind's eye when reading the book.

My Expectations of English 1101

I hope to be able to learn to write essays more fluently and organized without sacrificing my writing speed, and to improve my sentence structure and vocabulary.