An example of diagetic sound is the first scene of the show where she is in a college classroom learning. It is an example of diagetic sound because they only sounds you hear are coming from the scene. The teacher lecture, the clock ticking, and nothing else; no music. This is still the case in the next scene when she is walking in the hallway talking to a guy. This is being used because it is a scene showing just another ordinary day with nothing special happening. It is contributed to horror by putting a baseline on normal things. If the normal things have only diagetic sounds, then when you place more than just diagetic sounds in scary scenes it seems more dramatic. The mise-en-scene again in this scene was just showing a normal college classroom and hallway. It was relatively light showing that again, the scene was normal.  I chose this example because it seemed to be purely diagetic sound with no added sound. It helped to form a contrast between normal scenes and horror scenes in the show.

A good example of non-diagetic sound was when the smoke or supernatural thing was going into the box, there were whispers, and there was also music in the background. This is non-diagetic because these were sounds that weren’t being made by anything in the scene, but they were added to the scene. These were put into the scene in order to make it seem more spooky and dramatic. If the whispers weren’t in the scene, it wouldn’t seem very scary at all. The music just intensifies the horror and makes it more dramatic. The mise-en-scene of this scene had dark lighting, if you call smoke a prop, it worked really well at showing that something supernatural was happening and again, adding to the horror. There wasn’t a lot of diagetic sound in this scene that was contributing to anything because the whisper sounds and the music were much louder than the faint sounds in the scene. I chose this scene because it was a very obvious change from the college classroom scene with very different mise-en-scene and it mostly had non-diagetic sound.

Another scene that has a good example of mise-en-scene is when the girl is running from the floating evil people in the dorm hall. The lighting is very dark and dim, the framing and angle are as if the audience is watching it happen as if they were standing right there but can’t do anything and are helpless which adds to the horror I think. The actor is frantically running and banging on the door for help, you can see in her movements that she’s terrified. And the diegetic sound is there but at a relatively low volume compared to the diagetic sound which makes the scene more dramatic.

Person One:

1. This person I assumed was a homeless person in the streets of downtown person. They were wearing worn, dirty clothes with rips and holes. His face was wrinkled and cheeks were sunken in with a gray beard growing. He was wearing a hat, but no shoes. He was holding a sign that said “Anything helps. God Bless” and holding a paper cup with crumpled bills and change in it.
2. It is hard to judge the values and beliefs of a person like this because I was so distracted by their dirty clothing and my empathy for them. I will never know if they are a good person, if they were once successful, or what their political beliefs are. When I did community service at a downtown chapel in Portland, we held a community coffee and bagel event which gave students the opportunity to socialize with some of the local homeless members. Many of these people were not weird. They had just had some very unfortunate circumstantial things happen to them that they were not able to support themselves. Many of them had interesting lives before they became homeless. Now, some of them had mental disorders which prevented them from working and earning a living for themselves. My point is, it is hard to judge people like this for their values and beliefs because they are not dressing themselves to show their style, they are dressing themselves to stay warm, protected, and alive.
3. I made the assumption that the man was old, white, male, bad health, and not very good emotional condition.
4. These assumptions say that I believe that all homeless people probably have bad health and are not in very good emotional condition. I guess it’s possible they might have surprisingly good emotional conditions given the circumstances, but their health is probably very bad because of lack of resources for good hygiene.

Person Two:

1. I saw a middle aged woman with bleach blonde hair, wearing a Luis Vuitton hand bag, designer brand denim jeans, and big sunglasses. She was carrying a small fluffy dog inside another bag and walking into the department store Nordstrom.
2. I thought that this woman’s values and beliefs were most likely very superficial. She seemed to be one of those people who have a lot of money and choose to flaunt it and show off their worth. She seemed to be doing this with wearing very expensive clothing and pet. She didn’t have any tattoos or piercings from what I noticed and she didn’t seem like the kind of person who would have any or support other people who had them. She seemed very proper.
3. I assumed that she was around 50 years old, female, white, raised in a wealthy family, good health, and probably not a very good emotional condition. I think that usually people with a lot of money have enough resources to stay relatively healthy but they don’t have very good emotional condition. I think that people who choose to flaunt their money in their clothes or what they own tend to be compensating for some kind of unhappiness.
4. I think that these assumptions say that I can be very judgmental, but going to a private high school with a lot of wealthy people has shaped how I view other wealthy people. I also value people who are humble and I don’t believe it is good to flaunt your money. I think it makes people look superficial.

Person Three:

1. I saw a young man waiting for the max train in downtown Portland. He had a buzz haircut, and he was wearing a fitted solid color t-shirt, jeans, and tennis shoes. He had a tattoo sleeves covering both of his arms, and part of a tattoo on the back his neck showing above his shirt. He didn’t appear to have any piercings. He was dressed as an “average guy.”
2. I thought the man’s values and beliefs were hard to read and place. Clearly he had no problem with tattoos so he probably believed in body art as a form of expression. He seemed very fit, so he probably takes his personal health seriously. Other than that, I couldn’t place anything else.
3. I assumed that the man was about 27, white, male, probably a middle-class cultural background probably grew up in America. He seemed fit, so I assumed he was healthy. I also assumed that he had no out of the ordinary emotional issues and relatively happy by his facial expression.
4. These assumptions say that I believe that a person can have a lot of tattoos and be normal, even though there is a part of me that was surprised and I expected a person with that many tattoos to be wearing all black and black lipstick or something. But I don’t believe there’s anything wrong with tattoos. I think it is a person’s choice whatever they want to put on their body. I may not want to have a lot of piercings and tattoos myself but I wouldn’t not hire someone because their tattoos if I was an employer.

I would like to say that I do think food is art, and I have always thought it was art but I never even tried to think about the reasons why I thought this until this assignment. The writer makes this elaborate case of arguments about why they think food is art, but I think my reasoning is a little more simple although I do agree with most of what the author has to say. I think most food is art because it is created by people for the sake of pleasure, each and every person and culture has their own style of cooking, and they can be appreciated with almost all the senses of the body. The first part of my reasoning about food having the purpose of pleasure actually goes along with when the author says, “It is generally agreed that there can be aesthetic reactions to tastes and smells. There can also, of course, be visual aesthetic experiences connected with foodstuffs, as when one admires a rosy apple” (Tefler, 11). So food causes aesthetic experiences that the chef or cook wants people to experience when they are creating the meal. The author also goes into talking about how chefs could be an artist or a craftsman who are following technique and instructions to cook, but as “technique is a mark of craft, but the creative artist requires technique” (Tefler, 15). Although when people cook most of the time they use recipes, there is always room for improvising or interpretation which will in the end give the meal the cook’s own flare or style. The one thing I did disagree with the author on was that “the art of food is minor because it is not only simple but also limited in three important ways: food is necessarily transient, it cannot have meaning and it cannot move us” (24). They may have thought art was minor for these reasons, but I think it should not be called simple by any means. If food is art, then it should be noticed for its remarkable ability to appeal to almost all bodily senses: taste, smell, texture, and visual. I think that my view of food and art are more like Post-modernism view of art from Dissanayake’s essay because it doesn’t fall under the modernism view. I don’t think you should have to experience food in a “disinterested” fashion, you actually need to be interested in it with your own personal likes and dislikes in order to appreciate it. It is post-modernism view because accepting food as art is the same as accepting “that any ‘truth’ or ‘reality’ is only a point of view” (Dissanayake, 5). Some people believe it as a reality that food isn’t art, but that is their point of view and others view food as art which is another point of view. I don’t think all food is necessarily art such as fast food which is described in the video as a sort of homogenized taste which is well illustrated in McDonald’s slogan of “One taste Worldwide” (“Fast Food”). Sadly, I can’t think of a good argument for my opinion, but I think a lot of people might agree with me.

1. Paleoanthropsychobiological refers to a perspective or view of art that is is historical, societal, psychological/emotional, and a genetic inherited trait of the human species. Art can be all of these things together. This term was created by the author of the assigned text, Ellen Dissanayake.
2. Dissanayake means by the phrase “making special” that every human has a genetic evolutionary personality trait to want to make things that they care about and have “strong personal significance” special. What she means by special is something extraordinary and not usual or every day. I think the fact that diamonds are valued is similar to this concept. Diamonds are shiny and pretty and they were made special because they are rare. Things can be more special when they are rare and unusual.
3. One theory of art is that is for religious purposes: “In medieval times, the arts were in the service of religion…but were not regarded ‘aesthetically,’ if this means separately from their revelation of the Divine. Another theory she brings up is modernism in the 18th century where “a startling and influential idea took hold that, like the concept of ‘art,’ was unprecedented. This was that there is a special frame of mind for appreciating works of art — a ‘disinterested’ attitude that is separate from one’s own personal interest in the object, its utility, or its social or religious ramifications” (Dissanayake, 3). Another theory is postmodernism which is what we think of today is “rather than assuming that art reflects a unique and privelaged kind of knowledge, postmodernists point out that any ‘truth’ or ‘reality’ is only a point of view — a ‘representation’ that comes to us mediated and conditioned by our language, our social institutions, the assumptions that characterize individuals as members of a nation, a race, a gender, a class, a profession, a religious body, a particular historical period” (Dissanayake, 5).

1. 

2. I think that since today was a Sunday, I pursued these values very well today. Today, I spent time with my family and friends, while I feel that I pursue the other 3 of my top 5 values each and every day as well. I chose family first because my family gave me everything I have, love and support me unconditionally and are the most important people in my life. I put personal development second because my family helped my personal development the most, and you need to develop your self and your personality and values before in order to be a good friend. I put friendship next because everyone needs and love their friends. Friends are another huge part of what made me who I am today and I don’t know what I would do without them. Loyalty is also important for all the relationships in my life to thrive because loyalty creates trust and trust makes healthy relationships which helps people thrive and survive because we are very social beings. Integrity is also extremely important because I strive to always try to stand up for my beliefs and do the right thing. I make mistakes, but I always strive for integrity.

The belief patterns I inherited from my family are that for one, family always comes first because you can’t find unconditional love anywhere else in most cases. They also stressed personal development and integrity because they would always push me to become more independent at a young age and make my own decisions and taught me to have good integrity. The only beliefs that I can think of that are different than what my parents taught me have to do with how society has changed their views generation to generation. For example, my parents think tattoos are wrong, and you should go to church every Sunday. I don’t think tattoos are wrong, I actually want to get one and I don’t think people who have them are “ruining their body”. But I think this because tattoos are now a more normal and accepted thing in society. I don’t go to church on Sundays like my parents taught me to because I believe that being spiritual is just as, if not more powerful than attending religious services that are very easy to tune out from anyways.

I still have yet to pursue independence, expertness, and security. I guess I am doing a good job working towards it by attending college and pursuing my career goals. I still rely on my parents for financial aid so I am not quite very independent, and when I finish graduate school pursue my career path I will have gained expertness and hopefully security. I don’t think anything stands in the way of me being able to pursue these goals because I believe that I can do whatever I want if I set my mind up to it.

What makes art valuable, good, or beautiful? Is it based on the message it portrays or based on a set of standards that society put in place that says if art is good or bad? The reading states that in the nineteenth century, “aspiring artists…learned what standards were acceptable from newly-established national academies and collections in national museums…Professional critics who wrote for newspapers and newly-established magazines of art contributed to the new milieu” (Dissanayake, 3). By this time, how good artwork was became whether or not the piece contained certain techniques and standards that were put into place by these national art academies. I feel that a lot of people would agree with me that not everyone would agree with this. Many people would say that how “good” artwork is depends on an individual’s tastes, likes and dislikes. A piece of artwork can be very valuable because it has all of the proper techniques that the art institute requires, but it may not necessarily be considered good by a lot of people because “never in question was the ‘high’ art assumption that works of art – no matter how strange they looked or unskilled they seemed to be – were conduits of transcendent meaning” (Dissanayake, 4). Although the value of art may depend on a person’s taste, it is important for everyone to appreciate artwork. The reading says that, “’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 made and used them. In this sense, art was ‘univeral’ (Dissanayake, 4). I do agree that it is important to appreciate artwork, but looking at it with disinterest may not be the right approach because in order to appreciate artwork one would need to understand the context, eras, cultures, and meaning that the artist was trying to portray.

I chose something I agree with from the article. I do believe that there are values that humans do freely choose, but I also believe that there are values that are inherited by genetics as well as they way each individual was raised. The article states, “there is a good deal of evidence that human beings are not primarily driven by genetically determined instincts but are rather free to make their own choices” (Lewis, 7).  They bring up things like self-preservation and sexual drives as being genetic, which I absolutely agree with because they scientific physiology backs this op. But are these things necessarily values? I almost believe that in most societies, the way we live is to suppress our natural human instincts, and suppressing the “undesirable” part of human nature is where human values comes in. People suppress their sexual drives which creates the value of abstinence, people suppress their aggression and anger which creates the value of peace, people suppress their fear of change which creates the values of courage and improvement. Given this, I believe that values lie more on an individual’s upbringing. I was taught that you should wait to have sex until you love someone, and that I should suppress my anger and keep the peace. These have become some of my own values and things I believe in, but they do go against human nature.  Another example that values come from upbringing is that I can compare my values to the values of generations before me. I believe in equality and gay rights, gay marriage, and that racism is wrong. However, white Americans a few generations back would have most likely have thought it was normal to say that non-white and gay citizens are not equal and just taken it as a normal thing that they did not have the same rights. Now, there are exceptions because there were people who felt this was wrong, but some people would not have thought twice. This is very sad, but it’s the way society works. And over time, our societal values have changed and so have most individual’s values.

The blog, Why is green tea good for you? Here are 7 reasons, was interesting to me because one of my interests is nutrition. I find it fascinating how certain foods can affect the body, give it the nutrients it needs, or cause negative effects. I felt that this article was very well written and it had links to the appropriate cited journal articles where they got their information. It made what they were saying about green tea much more believable because they backed it up with the research articles. I wish they had added reasons for why green tea was so good like how it reduced the risk for diabetes: maybe something like because it suppresses sugar cravings or something like that.