Ace Venture 8/27

While discussing Post Modernism in class on Thursday, I was most surprised and intrigued by the concept of "system failure" within our generation. System failure is the idea that systems can not make changes, it is people that make changes. Dr. Rog said that my generation is much more likely to volunteer and to want to incite change. This came as a surprise to me because I've always seen my generation as somewhat lazy because of all the luxuries we have like the internet and new technologies coming to us every day. I see previous generations as harder working and because they seem to be the ones that have gotten us to where we are today. While I'm glad to hear that people my age are willing to volunteer and help for change, our lack of trust in the government and systems is disappointing. Perhaps all these negative events that we discussed when attempting to define post modernism like 9/11 and the Columbia protest are part of the reason that we've lost faith in systems to make effective changes. What is confusing for me is that our systems and government are made up of people, so why can't we trust them to make change? Why when we are asked to vote on a policy or sign a petition we are less likely to do that, but when asked to volunteer and give our time to create change we are willing to do that? It may go back to the "aesthetic of speed" idea that was discussed in class. When we volunteer our time and are actively participating in making a change, we can almost get that instant gratification of seeing the change that we have made. But signing a petition or casting a vote doesn't really give us that gratification. We have to wait until a vote is passed and then wait for a system to process this and then continue to wait to see a change that may not even come. It is not only technology that we want to be faster, we want changes made in the world and in our society to be faster as well.

Teets, 8/30

When exactly did the Postmodern era start? Or has it even started? Most times an era is categorized years later, so I guess for now we will have to answer those two questions with an "I don't know." What we all doknow, though, is that our society is becoming more and more obsessed with speed and efficiency. The invention of the internet has led to many new and exciting inventions, which allow individuals to perform tasks quicker. Networking sites, IPhones, online shopping, emails; all of these things have made it much easier to communicate and also perform simple tasks from your computer chair! The internet, in my opinion, opened doors for the technology boom. Our society has become faster and faster in recent years, and only time will tell just how much faster we can potentially get.

Nowadays if you don't have time to talk on the phone, you send a text message. If you don't have time to sit down and eat at a restaurant, you go through a Drive-Thru for a quicker meal. We make "speed based" decisions each day without even realizing it. If I don't have time to prepare lunch, I open the freezer, unwrap a hot pocket and put it in the microwave for a minute and 16 seconds. As I'm walking to class, I don't have time for a full conversation with my friend, so I send a text message instead. I don't park in the first available parking spot because I can find a closer spot that will allow me to get where I'm going faster.

The mini timeline we reviewed in class only covered events that took place in the past 60 or so years. As college students, we can assume that some of us will be around in another 60 years. It blows my mind to think of what our world will be like 60 years from now. It seems moronic to pose the question, "What next?", but I find myself asking it anyway. What will be the next great invention of our time? Will it really be a video based twitter site? Will it be navigation chips inside of everyone? Sometimes we have to put our individual arrogance aside, and reply with "I don't know."

Graham

I thought that class on Wednesday was extremely interesting. I felt like it connected a lot with our generation, as we spoke a lot about the way that our generation is effected by the media and new technology.
I never really stopped and realized how much the media tries to intimidate us by constantly informing us of new things that could make our lives miserable, or possibly even kill us. This weekend I watched the news and heard about how the majority of the individuals in the United States will be infected with the Swine Flu, and other terrible diseases. They give lists of precautions and things that you must do in order to make sure that these things do not happen to you, and many people get so nervous about this media that they live their lives by these rules. They carry hand sanitizer everywhere, don’t shale hands or have contact with other individuals, or even wear masks in public places. The media has made us so fearful of death and sickness that we will ultimately do anything that CNN tells us to do. This has become a part of our daily lives. We are always learning about some new terrible thing that we need to fear, and we often make it a lot worse than it truly is.
I also thought it was interesting how we talked about the way that technology has taken over the world, and just when we think that things can not get more advanced, they do. I used to think that the little brick Nokia phone was the coolest invention, and just years later we have advanced to touch screen, camera and video phones that can hold all of your music and documents. Ten years ago we never thought that this would be possible, but they are always coming out with the next big thing to make money, and what they have created is incredible. It is weird to think that in 10 years we will probably look at the Iphone and discuss how technologically inferior it is to what we will have in the year 2020.
I can not wait to see what other interesting things we will discuss this year. If what is to come is just as interesting as the first day of class, then I am extremely excited.

DoubleBubble:8/30

Our society is slowly becoming more and more technological and is depending more on technology for our everyday needs. For instance with the growth of facebook,it has now become a website that alumni are communicating through. The other day someone said to me how they find out about engagements and weddings through the facebook status' of their friends. I also have realized recently with the tragic deaths of celebrities that I am finding out through other people's facebook status' and since facebook started, it has shifted from college students to mothers, fathers and the older generations. What about the idea of how far cell phone's have come since their earliest days. I remember when car phones were the most technological device. It brings up the question of what is going to come next? From the Nokia black and white phones to the iPhone our society is starting to depend on these technological things in order to communicate. Now on Twitter you can update your status to exactly what you are doing and slowly our society is "updating" themselves with their friends through their 'twits' and through their facebook status'. Now a days kids in our generation rarely will call friends to catch up and instead use text messages to find out what they are up to. What i think is kind of funny is the idea that when you see a 20 year old typing a text message, most of the times they do not have to look at the phone and can type 60 words per minute. When you see our parents typing out text messages most of the times it takes them a minute to type out one word. Our society is so technologically advanced that we are slowly beginning to depend on these things for our everyday needs. In a second you can google on an iPhone or Blackberry an address or phone number, whereas some parents are still depending on the yellow pages. When a 20 year old loses their cell phone, it is the end of their life, because we depend on cell phones so much to do the everyday things faster and quicker. It kind of seems as though our generation in a way is lazy, doesn't it?

The idea that our everyday lives are being made easier and easier because of technology is something that interests me a lot. It seems like society is looking at the things we need to survive the everyday life and basically finding ways to make it easier simply by updating our society. For instance, i think it is very interesting that now you can have your groceries delivered to you because it is a hassle to go to the store and you can just do it online. The cell phone companies are beginning to have an "app" for everything and basically trying to fix every struggle just with the click of a button. As the iPhone commercials say, "there's an app for that". Our generation is lazy and the technology is beginning to come so advance that we are beginning to let go of the old and depend simply on the internet and cell phones for everything.

-DoubleBubble

Serendipity, 8/27/09

Part of Post-Modernity is the invention of something that is not real in order to explain the unexplained, and to give the community a feeling of understanding. In class, these examples included TV shows such as “The X Files, Fringe, and Lost”. These shows explain periods in our lives where we feel like we have no control, so there must be people out there with magical powers and monsters. The unknown is no longer completely unknown, now there is a solution in the community’s minds, even though they realistically know it is probably not true. However, this practice of creating something to replace fear is not new. It dates back in time to several other occasions. One example of this is the creation of “magic”. In civilizations that could understand aspects of nature, they created “magic” or forces that use magic as a form of power. When people fell ill, they felt it was the god’s punishing them for something that was wrong in society, which was a much easier concept to understand than it happening for no reason, to both good and bad people. Also, the Salem Witch hunts are a good example as well. Using binary opposition ( describing ones identity in opposition to a common “enemy”, if you aren’t like us, you are a witch), many innocent people were killed as a means to control how the population acted. If the community feels at risk, they will create a reality that may not actually be real, in order to explain and control the fear from growing. A personal example during my childhood is “Sabrina the Teenage Witch”. It was a show about an awkward teenage girl in high school that happened to possess magical powers. I loved this show because it comforted me that even if my high school years ended up being troublesome, at the back of my mind I might be a witch to make my life easier. Even though I realistically knew this was not true, I still consumed all the media related to the show, including reading all the books and buying the “Sabrina The Teenage Witch” Barbie dolls. Most people in American culture will do anything to escape and numb reality. This tactic may be as harmless as a TV show about Vampires, or be as serious and dangerous as the Witch Hunts.

-Serendipity

Mongoose, 8/27

One of the ideas that stuck out to me on the topic of postmodernism was how arbitrary an idea it really is. Many different time periods have been considered to be “postmodern”, but when exactly does the “modern” era begin and end? The reason that I interpreted as to why society is always changing and thus moving deeper and deeper into a postmodern era is the cultural obsession with speed. We are always looking for ways to speed things up; we find out news and other information as soon as it happens, have to get wherever we are going as fast as possible, sacrifice quality of food in order to get it quicker, and send text messages, rather than picking up the phone and calling someone, in order to deliver a quick message. Everywhere one chooses to look in our society “speed” is all around us. One of the main aspects of speed that stuck out to me was the way that it continues to “modernize” our culture in the aspect of communication. Nowadays it is possible to perform every aspect of business on a cell phone that used to require a desktop computer; this makes it possible to accomplish things a much higher rate because you can answer emails or balance bank accounts on the go while running errands necessary to run your business. The obsession with speed has also lead to technological advances making it possible to keep up with people and let your friends know what you are doing all at one time with the click of a button. These things are made possible through the developments of social networking pages such as Facebook and Twitter. Many people chose such networks as their outlet to news information, weather, sports as well as conversations with friends, again stressing the aspect of speed by getting all of this information from one easy to access page. Although these things have seemingly come about at an alarming rate, they will undoubtedly be outdated in our near future because of our unsatisfied desire for speed and advancement.

Elmo, 8/30

The “fear du jour” discussed in class is a term which I found very interesting and very applicable to our lives. It seems that whenever we turn on the news, pick up a magazine, or browse an online newspaper the headlines are always filled with fear. I personally feel that all I hear about these days is the “failing economy”, the “threat of swine flu”, or that I have a “75% chance of developing skin cancer in my lifetime”. The media has a way of instilling fear in the American people; it essentially dictates our daily lives. Hollywood also plays into this fear by producing scary movies by the dozen per year. People enjoy seeing these films because subconsciously we actually do enjoy being scared. Some days even the news seems to be its own mini scary movie. Because living in fear has become a part of our daily lives, there have become many ways in which to cope. There is more sunscreen being advertised than ever, talking about condoms and birth control are no longer a taboo, and terrorism has become a part of our everyday vocabulary. Even here on Rollins campus there is hand sanitizer around every corner in order to try and beat the swine flu outbreak. Our society has also become a very medicated society in which there seems to be a drug for everything so that it is easier for people to cope with their everyday lives. Society tells us we don’t have to feel the stress or pain of day to day life because there’s a drug for that. Being scared has become a normal feeling and when we turn to the media there is always the underlying curiosity of what the latest frightful issue may be. During and after class this week I thought a lot about this issue of fear and the “fear du jour”; I realized that fear really IS presented to us on a daily basis and it truly is all around us.