While the majority of people in the sections will make videos which are probably really good, I don't think it makes sense to have a video assignment for this "cool" unit. The time frame is small, allowing us minimal time to properly edit, script and produce these short films. As far as my personal reason's are concerned, I have a certain insecurity about acting. When it comes down to it, I think that once you assigned this project, I put to the test everything I thought I had figured out after this unit, anddddd..... I failed!
In a similar way to the production directed by Augusto Boal In Sao Paulo, I had a lot of opinions and idea's about what should happen, and what I would like to see happen, but when it came time to actually carry my words out, I couldn't. My very refusal to act, is evidence of the fact that I have not been able to escape my "box", or change my character. My goal for this unit had been to leave my "box", and I think I partly achieved that. To a certain extent, I believe that I grew as a person after our exploration of cool, as I can now recognize certain social cues that people are trying to send in order to mask something from others. Being able to process and understand more about how and why people say and do what they do is a very important part of being able to create realistic solutions to large problems. This is the very essence of what Boal's Theater of the Oppressed was intended to accomplish through the platform of Forum Theater.
I wanted to test this method in a real scenario, to see if it could actually be effective in problem solving outside of a theater setting. I decided it would work best in my home, the next time I found my brother arguing with one of my parents. I ended up getting an opportunity a few hours later when I heard my dad arguing with my brother about taking the trash out, while my brother wanted to go out, insisting that he would "do it later". With a little effort, I got them both to be quiet and listen to me as I explained the idea behind and the concept of Boal's Forum Theater. I asked if they would do me a favor and try to work this problem out using this method, so I could discuss it for my history project. They agreed. In the spur of the moment, I asked my brother Max to try and say something different to my dad rather than "I'll do it later". When this didn't work, I decided to use the real approach of replacing Max with myself, trying to solve the problem by instead saying I would take out the trash now (acting as Max).
While I was able to successfully present Max with a solution, I failed to actually solve the problem, my brother ended up taking out the trash, but only after getting my father increasingly angry at him before doing so. I would urge anyone to try and think about alternatives in their life, weighing all options and not limiting yourself to something you feel doesn't fit you. Being concealed to a box may be easy, but it's predictable, and leads people to become autonomous drones who don't think, but act and don't question their lives at all. This is how people become submissive, allowing the upper class and corporations to condition the minds of the masses, without very much resistance.
I have found, that the largest and most common arguments are based off of people's different perspectives on reality, with arguments over memory, who-did-what, and so on. If we can become aware of how other people think, we can be more understanding, and put ourselves into someone else's shoes. become open to think about our world at a deeper level than what we have been conditioned to think, is where we can find the real solutions to our problems.
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Comparison of my paper to "Of Glory" by Michel de Montaigne
In the essay "Of Glory" by Montaigne, he writes of the futility in man's pursuit of g-d- like qualities. The pursuit of Glory, is used to describe what we seek in dreams of fame, fortune, and importance. We deify certain qualities, and are surprised when we never can attain them. In a way, this could be compared to a person who intentionally dropped a gold necklace in the sahara dessert and became frustrated when they couldn't find it. By placing these qualities on an echelon above ourselves, we lower ourselves, and try to convince ourselves we are as important as g-d.
In my essay, I focused on the topic of cool, attempting to write openly and without restraint as to get to the very core of what I feel and think about this idea of "cool" after completing this unit. I found that what I wanted to get at, was that the idea of cool is just that, an idea. We have the reality we live in, and the reality that we want to create. We pay celebrities and athletes crazy amounts of money to do things we wish we could do, and try to emulate our peers to capture a certain look and complete the persona of a character we want to pretend we are. My essay was written in a way that differed from Montaigne's as it was written to reveal my own thoughts to myself, not so much to present my thoughts to the world. At the same time, I concluded my essay with a sentence encouraging people to question the world around them, giving my essay a very "advice column" like feel to it. I would say that in comparison to Montaigne's essay, I would consider mine to be a rearranged version of "Of Glory" (about cool, not glory).
"Thus is it that t0 God alone glory and honor appertain; and there is nothing so remote from reason as that we should go in quest of it for ourselves."
- Michel de Montaigne; Essays; XI. Of Glory
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