I'm at a coffee bar near my apartment. Free wi-fi. Out of my apartment. Really good iced teas so I'm not drinking coffee but I get a little caffeine. Hallelujah. I actually came here with the hope that a different environment would encourage me to actually finish my application essay. I find the essay question very interesting, but I'm not sure what direction or stance to take. Here, I will post the question for your viewing pleasure:
Improvements in consumer-grade technology and its relative affordability have provided opportunities for students to create and distribute their art, their films, their writings, and their music in ways previously unavailable. Though it was once far too expensive for an individual outside of the professional world to make a "film", for example, many young people now engage in scripting, shooting, and editing their own works. Aspiring journalists write and publish their own e-zines, blogs, and on-line journals. Self-managed musicians create and distribute their own CDs and promote themselves. And we all know about podcasts...…Big heavy question. Do I go with the honest but incredibly arrogant answer that I simply think I'm smarter and a better writer than 99% of humanity? Do I talk about having a sense of what the market actually desires? Get into a whole thing about reality tv and creative non-fiction? I started writing about that last bit. I stated that the current national obsession with reality is our collective desire to understand and explain ourselves, falling into three categories: "That's just like me," "I wish that was me," and "At least I'm not like that!"
With so much ready access to the technology tools that help produce and distribute these creative works, and with so much work being produced and distributed "out there" (some of it not very good, by the way), how will you make your work stand out? For the moment, forget the technology and what it has done for you and your art form. Tell us, instead, about your ideas. What themes or concepts do you want to explore through your work? What do you want to make your "audience" think or feel? What do you want to make them aware of? Why are you interested in your ideas? Why should anyone else be interested in them? Have you already begun to explore your concepts through your work? What do you hope or expect Nameless College to contribute to the development of your ideas? What is the first thing you want to do at Nameless to explore your ideas?
It's an interesting point to make, but I don't actually think anything is that simple. And I'm pretty sure that's not the best way to treat an application essay. I need to find a way to say "I have ideas but I need to learn more and I think you could teach me." Make my ideas sobrilliantd and briliant enough without letting the egotism creep through. Which is much harder when I try to answer the part of the question about "What themes or concepts do you want to explore through your work?" and "What do you want to make your "audience" think or feel?"
I want to be understood. To have someone understand and appreciate the shit inside my head. For them to externally validate my internal experience. But then there's that great furry paradox of wanting to be special. To be somehow more interesting and complicated and brilliant than everyone else, at least in some particular area. I want to make a dent in people's lives, but not because I think I actually have something so important and dent-worthy to say. Rather because I want to rationalize and define my silly little existence and somehow go beyond myself in a more permanent way. Like Shakespeare or the crazy guy who took a hammer to the Liberty Bell. I don't remember his name, but from then on there were dings in the Liberty Bell. That's fantastic and really fucking funny. I'd rather do something a bit more productive. Like write something that effects people. I don't mind if they don't know my name, but if they know the name of my work, that would be good. Quote passages to express things they themselves are incapable of expressing so well.Oh, tangent. Semi-tangent, because it does answer the question, but I can't really say that shit, can I? And still expect them to want me as a student? Urg. Help.
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5 comments:
i think you may be thinking too hard about this. Yes, Nameless College wants you to ponder these points and everything but they also want something that stands out. Why don't you talk about the project you've been working on? i'm sure that would stand out. Then again I kind of see the entire thing from all these sociological angles which I don't know if that's where you're coming from. But it reminds be a little of Nickel and Dimed by Ehrenreich, like an expose. Also, look on the bright side, Naneless College has a reputation of being very generous in their acceptances.
P.S-thanks for the mention yesterday
Don't get me started on Ehrenreich...that book goes on the long list of books by people who think they're going to saved all the poor little opressed people. If you're going to really do an expose on the lives of the "less fortunate," you can't spend your whole time thinking of yourself as half-tourist, half-savior.
Ooh, maybe I can use that...
i didn't say i liked the book. i thinks shes full of herself and didn't really do it like an ethnographer or something. i think its rather poorly written and you could do better. but the broad concept intrigues me and it the basic structure, the whole going in and bringing to light a distinct subculture with its own norms that reminded me of what you are doing. and now that i write that, i realize there were better examples of that...
Didn't mean the Nickel and Dimed criticism as an E criticism. Actually, what you said was a fairly helpful jumping-off point. Which is good, because I've been sitting here for 3 hours now and I'm about ready to jump off something.
always glad to give you ideas. i know you didnt mean it towards me. no worries. its just hard to fully convey ideas by typing little snippets. and i feel your pain with the essay. my grad school ones were huge ugly labors always with the "am i sounding like a condescending ass?" question over your head. i'll leave you to work now
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