The case for Bad Books

Let’s talk about “bad” books. Books that are deemed bad because they are somehow less literary or less sophisticated than other books. Many popular fiction books or bestsellers fall into this category. (I’m not saying that there can’t be crossover, but there are distinctions between popular, or mainstream, fiction and literary fiction). The second kind of bad book is the banned book. The book that is bad because it somehow turns the reader evil. If you read too many of these you’ll know because you’ll grow horns and have the inexplicable desire to skip in line at Starbucks. But that is a discussion for another time.

Every reader has their guilty pleasure books. Those books that aren’t literary, or classic, or Important, or a book we’d like to be seen reading on the train to work in the morning. But that doesn’t mean that those books are necessarily bad.

“Popular” often connotes shallowness and something of lower quality. It’s easy to get and not worth a whole lot. But it doesn’t have to. I mean, lots of people seem to enjoy this thing that we are all supposed to be above. I’m here to make the case for enjoyment and fun.

Why does everything have to be so serious? If you like reading thrillers or romances go for it. You’re still reading. In the last few weeks I’ve been in a position which requires my reports on works of fiction including their potential. The first thing looked for isn’t the Big Metaphors or Important Symbolism. The number one question is: did you want to keep reading? Was the book enjoyable to read? A good story can be polished up. An intriguing world with characters I care about is worth a lot more than a perfectly polished and Literary sleeping pill.

Our “guilty pleasure” reads are enjoyable for a reason and there is no shame in enjoying something. When did the high school mentality of being cool by staying above it all take over? Ugh, liking things is so overrated. The effort of pretending not to like things or not to be excited by things is useless. If you like a book read it. If you REALLY like it get someone else to read it. Get excited about things. Guilty pleasures only make us feel guilty when other people judge us for liking something.

I don’t know if you’re aware, but there are worse things you can do than liking something (especially if that something is a book). I’m not saying you should only read your favorites. There is something to be said for variety and trying new things. Also, those Important and Clever and Literary books aren’t just called that for the fun of it. It would be amazing to read all the books – Or even just my ever expanding to-be-read list. But even with all the unread possibilities there are days when I reach for the comfort read.

So go ahead. Read the vampire romance. Devour the YA section of your library even if you aren’t aged 13-18. I won’t snitch on you.

A book that you find worth in – and yes, pure enjoyment or escapism is valuable – is important. So stop worrying about reading the “right” books and go for whatever you like.

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The Wall

The wall is the point at which you feel like you can’t do it anymore. The point at which you’re sitting in the hallway crying. Spinning wheels and no progress. The wall is a dangerous place, because it is very inviting to stop at it; especially since you feel as though everyone is doing so much better than you are. They say that everyone hits the wall. The wall, though, is a lie. There isn’t a wall, but rather a series of them for you to make your way over, around, or through. And even though getting past the wall it totally in your power. It’s a little daunting to know that this is going to happen to you again.

Some people describe themselves sitting on top of the wall not sure where to go. Others describe a series of shorter walls, almost like hurdles that you try to jump but still bang your shins on every. single. time. Maybe its the bricks in your wall that add up to monumental setbacks. The wall can happen to anyone.

For me at least, the wall metaphor is really unhelpful. It gives this image of stopping, climbing over the wall, and then returning to the place you were before. I prefer the plateau metaphor. Stuff gets hard and scary and stressful and you keep going. You talk to someone. You write, dance, sleep, work it out. But you keep moving. You don’t give up. And eventually, even though it seems like you’ve been stuck, you start to move upward again. You don’t go back to where you were before because you have learned and experienced enough that will forever change how you respond to the world and your work in it. You will never again run into that particular wall (and even if you do you know how to beat it). You start climbing again.

This also works really well with the cheesiest of journey metaphors.

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Six Seasons and a Movie

The Study Group

Television Appreciation 401

Greendale Community College

Six Seasons and a Movie

Community is a sitcom that lasted six seasons in various formats and was created by Dan Harmon. The show, while owing several of its seasons to the dedicated fans, is once again on hiatus. But not to worry. After the ban on dioramas after the incident that we all know as “changnado” and its sequel “changnado 2” the Greendale Study Group has discovered the best way to run a show and it is with six seasons and a movie. Community will be our case study.

You gotta have some awesome stuff in a show to make it to six seasons: Paintball, zombies, monkeys, chicken fingers, an awesome best friend, and anything else you dream up in your dreamatorium. Community has all this and more. It’s probably the best show since Inspector Spacetime. What’s the point of watching something lame? While some of the networks Britta’d up the show was cool enough that fans brought it back. After season five, a lot of the main characters left to do other things like sail around the world with TV’s Levar Burton or to wait in vapor form for something really cool at the end of the world. But I agree with the hosts of the popular morning show, Troy and Abed in the Morning, that six seasons and a movie would be the perfect run for any show.

You could say Community came back from the dead and taught us valuable, wholesome lessons about life. Community taught us about accepting one another and loving one another. Even if they are heathens. The show approached a wide variety of issued with sensitivity and with realism that you don’t often see in sitcoms. I don’t know why those television people couldn’t see that they had a perfectly good show right in front of them; it doesn’t matter if there was a little more drama in it than the normal sitcom.

The group likes doing things without me so much; I’ll just let them do this by themselves.

Community was a show committed to quality. Its characters underwent significant growth while still retaining their essence. Audiences were allowed to find comfort in the show’s familiarity while never become bored with repetitive or formulaic jokes that relied on the social mistakes of the vaguely autistic character. The show also refused to conform to the traditional sitcom formula and included several ambitious and well executed homages (sometimes misidentified as parodies) to popular genres and films. These homages relied heavily on action and science fiction films, but also included mobster, crime, and heist formats. While the show changed over the years the first three, or golden, years came to establish the show. After a gas leak as the story arc for season four season five attempted to return to this golden age, but that was impossible. Season six was picked up and changed once again for online audiences. The sixth season saw many of the characters leave the community to seek out new adventures. However, enough plot-lines were left unresolved to warrant a final movie to wrap things up.

Television may have its dumb moments this show included. Nobody is perfect, but the fans came together to save the stupid thing so I say we respect what they fought for. Community ran six seasons and ended on a high note. We came through hardship and every change the studio threw at us. We lived through a gas leak for god’s sake. There were rewards, yes. Those fans deserve more than a crappy essay or even a diorama. They deserve a film to say goodbye to the most attractive character ever to grace the screen. They deserve to see him one more time and remember him always as the coolest guy ever. Six seasons and a movie! Say it with me. Six Seasons And A Movie! AND A MOVIE!

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Community was created by Dan Harmon. None of the characters are mine.

#andamovie

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#StayInSchool

“Don’t Stay in School” is a video with — as of August 2015 — about 3,400,000 views on YouTube. It was published in February of this year by Boyinaband. It is a music video expressing the artist’s dissatisfaction with his education.

My initial reaction to the video was to be angry at him. This is a terrible message. I love school and I would encourage as many people to stay in school as possible.After my knee jerk reaction, however, this video does make some good points. I need to recognize that I come from a privileged background. I went to private schools and was encouraged to work hard by my parents and teachers. I went on to college and am about to complete an MA. Not everyone has access to the best education. Many schools are overcrowded. Many students need to work to help support their families. Life happens.

I agree that more life skills are necessary in schools. Things such as taxes and budgeting, basic first aid, how to cook and take care of yourself, laws, and other “real world” knowledge isn’t always the focus in school.

But I think this video is being a little dramatic. My high school offered a personal finance class which introduced students to taxes and budgeting — from what I’ve heard this class wasn’t out of the norm. Home Economy classes are being cut from many schools for budget reasons, but they were once there. First aid could easily be added to existing health or physical education classes. As for laws, talking about human rights and international law is important, however, does everyone need to memorize the laws of a specific place in such a mobile world? laws should be learned, however, don’t loose sight of the forest for all the trees. I would say giving people the tools to understand and seek out legal information is more important than memorizing lists.

Without history and literature how are students to understand current events, laws, or even human rights? What about empathy? Are those laws more relevant when taught as facts or as a part of a long history of human civilization that is constantly growing and changing?

Without mathematics how are you to learn about budgeting and taxes, regardless of the calculator in your pocket? Besides, math teaches different ways of looking at and solving problems — more than long division and when two trains will collide. Math teaches logic, reasoning and problem solving. Not to mention it is something you use on a daily basis (whether you realize it or not).

Health and first aid are important, but should be part of an education that not only teaches how to treat and recognize but also prevent illness and injury. First aid could be added to a full Health and Physical Education curriculum.

So please, don’t take things away from students. Rather, add to the curriculum, modify the current system. But I don’t care if you thought Shakespeare was boring, taxes are too (and even if they might seem more useful in “real life”). There will always be the kids who resent having that knowledge forced on them.

I wholeheartedly agree that school should include more life skills. Without the full array of sciences, history, and the arts – including literature – how will this knowledge have any context? The video asks for more health classes but complains about biology. It asks to know about human rights but complains about learning the history of those rights.

Typically the minutia of different sciences, literary traditions, and histories (please, though, could we have more non-western history lessons?) are left to later years of school when students do have more choice.

Education shouldn’t be a set of skills for survival like some dystopian YA novel. It should be skills for life – interconnected and ever expanding understanding. Education is, or should be, as much about learning how to learn as it is about acquiring skills.

Yes, I think there’s plenty of work to be done in the educational system I’m familiar with. But please don’t take the beauty of science or the wonder of art out of schools; without them do you think anyone would want to continue, even if they are “exposed” to these things?

The logic of #DontStayInSchool is flawed. It shouldn’t be about taking things away and only giving out small tastes. To fix this problem all these things need to Stay in School, but be augmented, added, and connected. Cross curriculum learning and understanding should be endorsed over test scores and memorizing facts and skills.

Despite the myth, school isn’t just about preparing you to be an adult who survives. At its best education should provide the skills and tools to learn how to learn. Curiosity should be piqued and a journey started, rather than a process that ends with a walk across a stage and a piece of paper.  Citizens of this world should know about art, literature, and empathy as much as they know about first aid. People should be fascinated by the beauty of the sciences rather than repulsed. History can shed light of current events.

Picking and choosing what you think is necessary strips the meaning from the necessities.

I say change the educational system not to leave out, but to add, to connect, and to prepare students – whatever their age.

#StayInSchool

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Now that I’ve given you my opinion and bias here’s the original video.

A Short Essay on Essays

INTRODUCTION: I was brought up on a diet full of five-paragraph-essays. They always had that same introduction, body paragraph- body paragraph- body paragraph, conclusion structure. Which is fine, I guess. It taught me how to effectively write. But at some point it went from training wheels, to crutch, to just plain laziness. I understand that it’s how most people are taught; it’s what most high school teachers expect. College professors don’t stray too far from it. I’m here with important news: essays can be fun. Essays, in my definition, are short, informational pieces of writing which convey information effectively and stylishly. Interpret this as you will. Now that I have told you what I’m going to tell you, I shall write it.

BODY PARAGRAPH 1: Essays are for the writer as much as they are for the reader. In my experience, essays always require a bit of research, a lot of thinking about the chosen topic (including any counterpoints), and in the best cases some enthusiasm. Now, there’s nothing wrong, exactly, with the 5-paragraph form, but it’s a bit tired. Get crazy. Try Something new. Some of the essays I post on this site will be insane-bonkers-crazy person in form. I’m saying essays with SIX paragraphs. Calm down, calm down, some will be more traditional. Maybe written in the style of fanfiction or IKEA instructions or free form nature poetry. Actually, probably not the poetry thing.

BODY PARAGRAPH 2: Each essay on this blog will be fewer than 1000 words. It’s long enough to write something interesting and fun, but short enough to get to the point quickly. No rambling fangirling or tangents about Willow’s sweaters (regardless of their unquestionable beauty). Also, despite what an enthusiasm for essays might indicate about me, I do have other things to do and 1K is easy enough to commit to. (She says on post one).

Body Paragraph 3: The word “essay” often invokes those required subjects you had at school. “5 pages on the industrial revolution due Monday morning”. Fun. Now, I’m not knocking the industrial revolution or anything. The essays I intend to write, though, are going to be a bit more varied than that though. There will be Buffy the Vampire Slayer and The Epic of Gilgamesh, Harry Potter and the Green Bay Packers, literary theory and science – basically anything I think merits some time and 1,000 words. Some of the essays will just be a long question or end up in a place which is much more fuzzy and confused than the starting line.

CONCLUSION: I have now told you things. I shall tell you in this paragraph what I have told you. Essays should be fun and should be written about interesting things. Don’t forget that learning stuff is actually really exciting. As the inaugural post, I thought a few words on essays would be appropriate. ThousandWordEssays is a blog devoted to taking a deeper look at interesting things. A simple, yet vague, concept. The results will be recorded and posted in the form of an essay. The essays in question may take any form.

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Hello world!

Hello Internets!

Thousand word essays is just what it sounds like: essays in 1000 words or fewer about things I find interesting.

You should know that I use the term “essay” rather loosely. Be ready or anything and everything on here. This is where I plan on geeking out about the things that I love, interest me, make me question the world, or otherwise inspire me to do a bit of research and write about.