Summary/Reading Response 1: The Cult You're In

Kalle Lasn in his article The Cult You’re In (Common Culture, 49-53) presents a startling assertion that the members of society are members of a cult that has been around for many generations. It is not a religious fanaticism, or even being a zealot of some sect. It is the cult of everyday life, the cult of everyone “dreaming the same dream.” Lasn argues that when we were very young, we joined whether willingly or unknowingly, a cult that would define our lives. Lasn says it started when we were young, begging our moms to bye us the cool little gadget at the store and progresses until all we can think about when we get older is “wealth, power, fame, plenty of sex and exciting recreational opportunities.” We see this in the poorest area of town to the richest from the uneducated to the educated. It is the eight year old that feels powerful after receiving an allowance being able to buy whatever he wants. The majority of society runs down a path, the path of a cult in one direction, the direction of materialism.  

Lasn starts the article by illustrating man’s desire for wealth writing as if he was the man experiencing and being apart of this cult, a man that couldn’t even pay his bills, a man that lives in a self created society, dreaming of BMWs, trips to New York with his girlfriend, and luxury. He then progresses and talks about those that don’t contribute to society, referring to them as the “slacker camp.” These, to Lasn, contribute to the cult stating, “The cult members aren’t really even citizens because they are merely consumers.” All of these categories help contribute to the general drive and similar dream of everyone, the dream to possess. This, to Lasn, is the cult we are in.

Collaborative Writing: "Breaking Down Borders"

Set at Borders cafe in Westwood, CA, Robert Samuels observes how technology has taken down the borders between the public and the private sectors and between work and play. Samuels argues that these "commercial public squares," such as the cafe, have become neither public nor private but more of a blurred domain of our social and personal lives. In conclusion, Samuels states that the way technology has transformed our culture is not necessarily a bad thing but allows us to shift and switch between the boundaries in society. 


Reflection: Collaborative Writing

For the Collaborative writing assignment, I teamed up with Sirui, Ruiman, and Jian. After reading the selected article together in class, we broke it down into four sections – a beginning thesis and three supporting points. Each person took a section. We then wrote summaries for each section on our own. In class on Friday, we combined these summaries into one succinct paragraph that summarized the article.

We chose to divide the labor as stated above because it would give everyone an equal opportunity to reflect on the material, have practice writing a summary, and give everyone a chance to communicate what they thought about the article. Since we had discussed it some in class, our opinions were quite similar. Thus, the succinct final paragraph that we submitted was much easier to write.

Despite working on this summary, I still have a lot to work on. For me, the writing of a summary is not easy. I am either two lengthy in my summary and pay way too much attention to the details or I miss the main point entirely. Therefore, I am thankful for the practice this assignment provided, but I am also looking forward to the upcoming assignments where I can build my skills in the area of writing summaries.

 

Reflection: Portfolio Design

This was a very enjoyable project. I tried things I have never done and learned some things about the Blogger interface. From what I have read, it appears that Blogger is a little more complex to use. It required some basic knowledge of code to be able to customize the Blog. For example, the drop down menus you see on the right are because I used template codes and changed them for my purposes. This didn't necessarily require basic knowledge of computer code; however, it did help.

I would like to go step by step through each function of the site:

- The home page is a chronological list of all the posts I put up; however, the tabs in the drop down menu will take you to the specific page of each assignment. This will prove to be more useful as I have more content.

- I chose the different tabs based on the several assignments that we will have to complete during this course. They are labeled in such a way as to communicate exactly what they are for.

- The drop down menus to the right will link each individual assignment as I complete them. Instead of having to scroll through pages and pages of content, you will be able to go directly to each assignment, read it, and comment on it without any trouble.

- In addition to the drop down menus, I have provided a way to search the site. I will be labeling each post with searchable tags. This will also allow you to find what you are looking for specifically without having to look through content.

Note: Each of the widgets is for ease of use. The easier the content is to find, the happier the reader.

- The picture in the background was chosen because of this being a communication course as well as a writing course. I found the notebook background to be quite fitting. 

I have never coded a drop down menu before; so, I now have a basic knowledge of changing code to fit my needs. I will not say getting everything the way I wanted it was easy, but I greatly enjoyed designing my webpage.

The following is a list of goals I need to work on in the area of portfolio design:

1. Appearance: The design could be better. In the drop down menu, the words don't all line up with the menu background.

2. Navigation: While I feel the website is easy to navigate, it may not be to my viewer. I would like all ages to be able to navigate the website. The tabs are not easy to understand. They don't necessarily communicate what they need to.

I am happy with what progress I have made in this project, but I look forward to improving the site as I get suggestions and comments on how to make it a better blog.