People Watching

I see a 6-foot tall male with dirty blonde dreadlocks in a rainbow bandana. He was wearing a tie-dye t-shirt, brown shorts, and some sort of brown bag. I assumed the bag was made out of hemp. Based on his dress I would assume that he is very ecologically friendly. He probably likes charities and is pretty liberal in his political views. I would also probably assume that he’s pretty chill and laid back. I make all of these assumptions based solely on dress. Although these aren’t necessarily negative characteristics or values I’m still making assumptions that limit my understanding of him as a person. These assumptions probably mean that I judge people a little much although he is wearing a lot of indicators of a “hippie” to call him that term without knowing if that’s how he views himself.

I see an average height girl with long blonde hair in a ponytail. She’s reasonably tan and wearing yoga pants and a blue long sleeve shirt. She is holding a Starbucks coffee in one hand and her cell-phone in the other. She has a small black bag with a light blue yoga mat protruding from it. Based on appearances I think she’s a bit of a Yuppie (young urban professional). What she is wearing seems like it is more for fashion than it is for usefulness. The Starbucks coffee is often used as a status symbol and when paired with yoga attire she seems like someone who’s affluent or at least trying to look affluent. I could be completely wrong and she might be drinking Starbucks because it’s her favorite coffee and the yoga stuff because she practices it everyday. It shows that I am sensitive to outward displays of wealth (or perceived wealth) and I jump to conclusions reasonably fast.

I see an older gentlemen, probably late sixties early seventies. He is wearing a yellow Oregon hat over his white-haired balding head. He is also wearing a yellow Oregon jersey and Oregon beads. It is a Wednesday with no real Oregon sports games on so I assume he’s a diehard fan. I think of his age based on his wrinkled face and white hair. He is obviously inebriated and having a great time. I assume he is either a local Eugene resident or he went to the University back in the day. I think it is the first one because he doesn’t seem the college type. I make that assumption based on his drunkenness at his age and that he is still going to local bars. I feel like most college grads leave Eugene upon graduation and if not wouldn’t be out at the bars on a Wednesday night. Whichever the case I assume he’s retired since he is out drinking on a weekday. These assumptions tell me that I have designated expectations for educated people and perhaps my own future. I assume that educated people would dress a little nicer and not stay around at their Alma Mater for 50+ years afterward. From these inferences I know that I want to leave Eugene after I graduate and I sometimes judge based on appearances

Is Food Actually Art?

In “A Matter of Taste”, William Deresiewicz discusses our society’s new obsession with food. Deresiewicz believes that food has replaced art as an area of focus in our current day civilization. Deresiewicz states that: “what has happened is not that food has led to art, but that it has replaced it. Foodism has taken on the sociological characteristics of what used to be known — in the days of the rising postwar middle class, when Mortimer Adler was peddling the Great Books and Leonard Bernstein was on television — as culture” (Deresiewicz). Deresiewicz brings up aestheticism and ends the article with a solid argument that food is not art, which is why I thought it would be a good source to compare with Telfer’s ideas of aesthetics and artistry.

Telfer believes that food should be considered an art. Telfer argues that food should be considered a minor art; for food can still cause emotion, it can be inspirational, and it can please us in more ways than simple nutrition. Telfer feels: “that good food can elate us, invigorate us, startle us, excite us, cheer us with a kind of warmth and joy, but cannot shake us fundamentally in that way of which the symptoms are tears or a sensation almost of fear” (26). For these reasons Telfer argues that food should be considered art. However, these are all feelings of joy. To be so single-faceted across a whole genre (food) seems to me to be less “arty”. Food for this reason can be seen to have one emotion-striking node (joy) and to me art should be able to affect you on many levels. Paintings can make you smile or frown; music can make you cry or dance; sculptures can make you ponder and daydream. These classic forms of art all can do more than just cause joy they can be used to convey any number of emotions. Even a swing set can make you feel exhilarated or pain (if you jump off and hurt yourself). Does that make a swing set art? A puppy can make you delighted, fuming, loving, but is it art? Food can make you happy and it serves the purpose of nourishment but that doesn’t mean it is art; this is Deresiewicz argument.

 

Deresiewicz does believe that food can induce some emotional response and that it is more than shear sustenance. However, he seems to agree with Ursom that food cannot be art. Food tends to draw an aesthetic appreciation but nothing more than that. As Deresiewicz says: “Meals can evoke emotions, but only very roughly and generally, and only within a very limited range — comfort, delight, perhaps nostalgia, but not anger, say, or sorrow, or a thousand other things. Food is highly developed as a system of sensations, extremely crude as a system of symbols. Proust on the madeleine is art; the madeleine itself is not art.” Deresiewicz believes that food lacks the emotional depth to be considered art. While food can be delicious and its presentation can be resounding, cause satisfaction, but not the full array of emotions that art can make you feel. Food can only really cause disgust when it has gone past its sell by date. Food can only cause anger when you don’t get what you ordered or it takes much longer than its supposed to arrive. These emotions aren’t really generated by the food itself but have been caused by some exterior force upon the food. Food adds to the aesthetic reaction but it is the other stimuli that garner true responses. I never really thought to judge food against the full possibilities of art in the way Deresiewicz does. It is easy to say that something can be art but now after reviewing Deresiewicz’s argument to judge food against art it doesn’t completely hold up. Food cannot truly cause a reaction in an encompassing manner the way art can.

Food may have come to mean similar things as art and be as important in our culture but that doesn’t mean it is the same thing. In reference to food, Deresiewicz says: “It has developed, of late, an elaborate cultural apparatus that parallels the one that exists for art, a whole literature of criticism, journalism, appreciation, memoir and theoretical debate. It has its awards, its maestros, its televised performances” (Deresiewicz). Food may have worked its way into pop culture through vast popularity but just because it’s popular doesn’t mean its art, as “A good risotto is a fine thing, but it isn’t going to give you insight into other people, allow you to see the world in a new way, or force you to take an inventory of your soul” (Deresiewicz). I appreciate food and there are many people who find it artistic in its own sense but that doesn’t mean food (in general) should be considered art. There are exceptions, like the industry of molecular gastronomy and pop art featuring Campbell’s soup.

 

Deresiewicz, William (October, 2012). A Matter of Taste [On-Line Newspaper]. Retrieved 27 Oct 2013. <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/28/opinion/sunday/how-food-replaced-art-as-high-culture.html?_r=0>.

Food as Art

In Food as Art, Tefler believes that food can be viewed as an aesthetically pleasing art. She first defines a work of art and applies that definition as support for her argument. “The classifying sense of the term ‘work of art’, in the way Ursom uses it, takes the maker’s or exhibitor’s intentions as the criterion for deciding whether something is a work of art or not” (Tefler 12). So Tefler is stipulating that not all food may be considered pieces of art because not all food is intended to be art. The average burger at a fast food restaurant is made primarily for sustenance and retail purposes. However, there are some places that value food as art. For instance a meal at a five star restaurant a lot of the enjoyment from the meal is derived from the experience and presentation of the food; that can be considered art. I agree with Tefler. A fancy restaurant may have fine cuisine but your bill isn’t just paying for your meal it’s paying for the atmosphere and the artistry of the food itself.

Tefler gives examples of a cook who is making food into art, this cook: “desires to design dishes, courses and whole meals which present patterns of harmonious or contrasting flavours and textures. This is the approach of the cook who is designing a work of art” (Tefler 15). Tefler’s argument makes it simple in my eyes whether food can be art or not. I agree with Tefler that food should be considered art in its own right if that is the intention of the cook. Her whole piece makes me think of the term gastronomy. According to Webster: gastronomy is defined as “the art or activity of cooking and eating fine food” (Merriam-Webster). I believe this is the type of food that Tefler is talking about. If you take a look at Alinea a molecular gastronomy restaurant in Chicago you can see right away that food is being turned into an art form. The food is still meant for consumption but it also is portrayed in the aesthetically pleasing artform that Telfer talks about in her article. Here is a gallery of the types of cuisine that Alinea serves. You can also watch this quick video on the creation of one of their dishes.

This video showcases the preparation for one of Alinea’s dishes, called Lamb 86, that incorporates 86 distinct flavors/ingredients to pair with the lamb. If you continue watching the playlist they show further proof of food as art. After looking further into gastronomy I hope you feel as much as I do that food can be art just as Tefler argues. I do not believe it is simply gastronomy that is applicable to this but it is definitely a fine example as food created to be esthetically pleasing art.

What is Art For?

The term paleoanthropsychobiological was coined by Ellen Dissanayake in her piece entitled “What is art for”. When trying to understand what paleoanthropsychobiological means we can break the word down into its roots. “Paleo” can be assumed to be short for the term paleontology, which is the study of prehistoric life. “Anthro” is short for anthropology, which is the study of humankind. “Psycho” is short for psychology, which is the study of mental functions and behaviors. “Biological” relates to the study of life and living organisms. So if we throw it all together the term paleoanthropsychobiological means the study of prehistoric human mental and physical lifestyle. Dissanayake relates this study to the origin of art and its relationship to human survival.

When Dissanayake refers to the term “making special” she is referring to the innate need to derive meaning from an event such as a ritual ceremony. By making the ceremony or occasion special our ancestors were able to easily recall what happened in the ceremony and why it was important. These ceremonies were key to human survival because they taught life lessons or key insights to survival that could be passed down through the generations. If the rituals weren’t memorable or even existent they wouldn’t pass on key information or bring together people as a group. This all relates to art because it made art a detrimental necessity. It was “art for life itself” as she says multiple times in the reading.

Dissanayake talks about art in the medieval times as an engine for religion, to be more specific Christianity. Renaissance artists changed the focus from the Divine to humankind however they still kept grounded within a recognizable reality and culturally accepted standards of magnificence and excellence. Dissanayake talks about the 18th century bringing about 5 cultural changes with art. These five included: 1. a gradual secularization of society 2. The rise of science 3. The social changes to a monetarily focused society. 4. An emphasis on reason. 5. Political revolutions in America and France. Dissanayake attributes these changes to causing the “Romantic Rebellion” (17). Artists no longer had to please authority (whether church or state) but instead had to please the masses. As art grew within this new realm and modernism emerged. With the thoughts of modernism came and so did a cultural disinterest. One in which the “ ‘disinterest’ implied that viewers could appreciate any art, even the artwork of eras or cultures far removed from their own, whether or not they understood the meaning the works had for the people who and made and used them” (18). This caused art to become a universal language because everybody could appreciate it even people who didn’t understand the cultural relevance. This made good art versus bad art harder to explain since viewers didn’t necessarily know the significance of each individual piece of art. Art in modern times has come to mean so many different things and I believe in the old saying that art is “in the eye of the beholder”.

What Is Art For?

Reading “What is Art For” by Dissanayake in conjunction with the Ted Talk by Dennis Dutton give an encompassing view of art in early humanity and the necessity of art for survival. Dissanayake and Dutton both view art as part of evolution but see its importance in different ways.

Dissanayake sees rituals as the first steps to what we see as “art” in modern day. Rituals were a process of “unification, passing on cultural knowledge – individuals in human societies where ceremonies were performed would survive better and leave more offspring than those who did not. And being crucial and intrinsic to ritual ceremonies, the arts were crucial and intrinsic to human survival – art for life’s sake” (Dissanayake 10). Dissanayake brings home the point that art was a way of passing down valuable knowledge as well as a way to bring people together. She believes that art was developed as a cultural necessity. The use of rituals and ceremonies allowed for groups to create and maintain meaning. These events were special and brought together humanity as a group. Rituals built a sense of camaraderie and companionship.

Dutton also sees art “for lifes sake” (as Dissanayake would say). However, Dutton believes art held more meaning for the individual versus the group. Dutton discusses the use of art in the creation of hand axes. These hand axes were used as primitive markers of optimal mates. The men who could create the best hand axe demonstrated intelligence, a steady hand, and skills in being able to plan ahead. Just as a peahen chooses a peacock with the fullest plume human females would choose the men with the best hand axes and so the less artistic men wouldn’t survive.

I believe that Dutton and Dissanayake both have valid points. Dissanayake believes that art arose from the necessity to bring people together. Art as seen through ritual acted as a catalyst to build relationships and pass knowledge. Dutton sees art as a way to pass genetics. The better the art the more chance for genetic survival (natural selection).

In the modern age the necessity for survival has shifted. We no longer need to pass down our knowledge through dance and we don’t have to craft our own rocks to attract women. However, art still exists everywhere we look and I feel it still has a lot of the same purposes. People are naturally attracted to someone who can play an instrument beautifully, paint a masterpiece, or be highly knowledgeable in a field. Art will always be important to us. It is engrained in who we are and a lot of that can be attributed to its importance in our evolution.

Life Values Assessment

This is the order of my values from my important to least important.
  1. Family
  2. Loyalty
  3. Friendship
  4. Enjoyment
  5. Integrity
  6. Wealth
  7. Prestige
  8. Power
  9. Health
  10. Independence
  11. Personal Accomplishment
  12. Security
  13. Personal Development
  14. Expertness
  15. Creativity
  16. Community
  17. Wisdom
  18. Leadership
  19. Location
  20.  Service

When reviewing the activities I did today against the twenty values I found that today I mainly did activities that involve friendship and enjoyment. In fact, out of all the activities I did today they all fell under my top 5 values (with the exception of brushing my teeth which would fall under the health category). I watched football (enjoyment), threw a ball around (enjoyment/friendship), called my brother (family/friendship), and hung out with my friends (friendship/enjoyment). As you can see the activities I did today played off of each other. To me my top values aren’t all different categories; they all mix together and intertwine. I find enjoyment from my friends and family. I am also loyal to them and find being honest to them is the best policy.

I think the largest belief pattern I inherited from my parents was that of loyalty and integrity. They brought me up to do the right thing and tell the truth always. I think that those are good beliefs and they still have authority over me and are relatively valid. I wouldn’t say honesty is always the best policy. Lying is better in some cases like: “does this dress make me look fat?” or “how was dinner?” but honesty is still an integral part of my belief system. You just have to know the right time where it’s better to lie to save someone’s feelings.

Values and Beliefs

Americans take pride in the Democratic practice of choice.  We choose to think individually and believe in different things. This leads to a very muddled, confusing outlook on values. People could believe in x, y, z, or 27. So with the evident lack of regularity it is difficult to break down our beliefs to create a uniform set of values. Take the ongoing discussion on gay marriage. Some people strongly oppose gay marriage, some people think it’s an indisputable right, and some don’t care. I personally don’t think it is anyone’s business what goes on behind closed doors and if gay marriage bothers people so much they could simply not go to a church that allows it, but I digress. It is obvious in this situation people have different beliefs but if we break it down to the core value must people would align. If everyone is fighting over marriage then this means that people view marriage as something that is important. We can go even further and say that most people view marriage as a bond between two people that demonstrates their commitment and love for each other. Who is marrying who ends up being minor details. We all see the importance of marriage in a similar light even if we cannot ultimately decide who should marry whom; that is up to our own judgment. According to Lewis, we judge and create our own beliefs in four main ways: sense experience, deductive logic, emotion, and intuition. Sense experience means you learn directly through one (or more) of your five senses. Deductive logic means testing your beliefs to make sure that they consistently lead to the same answer. You judge based on emotion when you feel something is right or wrong. You make decisions through your intuition unknowingly (unconsciously); your brain comes to a judgment while you aren’t thinking about it. The latter four ways of “knowing” help shape our beliefs and values. If we return to the gay marriage example people could use any of these four to make their decision. They may also rely on two other modes of knowing that combine the four basic ones. The two new modes are authority and science. So one person may look to an authority figure like the church in their opinion on gay marriage (the bible); while another person relies on science (i.e the presence of gay animals in nature). We can determine our beliefs and values using any of these modes. We could be reliant on any one of these modes to make our judgments. One person may rely more on emotions while another relies on science. This is why I believe our values may come off as confusing and muddled. We have the ability to come to the same reasoning through different modes or different reasoning through the same mode.

Lewis, H. (1990). A Question of Values: Six Ways We Make the Personal Choices That Shape Our Lives. Axios Press.

 

RE: “How Will Oregon Respond The 1st TIme It’s Really Challenged?”.

This blog post is a response to the article: “How Will Oregon Respond The 1st TIme It’s Really Challenged?”. Here is the link to the article I read: How Will Oregon Football Respond the 1st Time It’s Really Challenged?. I appreciate the analysis of the Oregon offense. The statistics and numbers referenced are hard to beat. The Oregon Ducks have held its opponents to a total of 24 points in the first quarter (cumulative results for Virginia, Tennessee, and Colorado) and just 16 in the remaining three quarters. Furthermore, the Oregon Ducks are 1 of 5 teams in history to 50+ points in 5 straight games. These opponents weren’t the best teams but the results would suggest that Oregon could achieve a similar outcome against a better team. The first real competitors Oregon will face are the University of Washington and UCLA. However, I agree with the article that the Ducks will thrive under the uptempo offenses of both UCLA and Washington. In my opinion Stanford will be the first real challenge for the Ducks; that game will establish Oregon (or Stanford) as a BCS National Championship team.