Samantha Plate's blog

I plan to narrow my lens of existentialism to just that ideology the Kierkegarrd presents about the fullness of a moment and how it immulinates Kiesha's need for a dramatic event. I will examine this by only looking at a few moments in Kiesha's life that this is present and examining them more deeply.

Samantha Plate

Play In The City

10/27/2013

The Sole Author: Keisha's Identity through Existentialism

            Have you ever wondered who you are? Have you ever thought “Why am I here? What is my purpose?” Have you ever thought everyone knows themselves except for you?  If so, you are not alone. You are questioning your existence just like Keisha Blake does all throughout NW. In Zadie Smith’s novel NW, Keisha Blake questions her identity in an attempt to understand herself while struggling with the concepts of existentialism.

            Existentialism is extremely prevalent throughout NW. It is always there in the background, breaking through every now and then to make obvious appearances, other times passing by in the background. Leah introduces Natalie to the ideas of Kierkegaard during chapter 55 and it is shortly after this that Keisha becomes Natalie. Much later in chapter 138, Keisha tries to understand this philosopher better by doing a Google search. It is shortly after this that she begins to visit the listings site. The ideas of Kierkegaard and Existentialism can be seen in Keisha’s thoughts and actions and can be used to understand her better.

The separated parts of NW create the sense of separate stories that only come together at the end. They share some similar characters and settings, and even sometimes the same story, but yet they each have their own distinctive nature, made more evident by the structure. This makes it difficult to consider the novel as a whole, one way to examine the novel as a whole would be to look at the reoccurring themes and symbols throughout the novel. By examining the themes of identity, the need to the "good guy", and growing up we can see the similarities between the characters and their stories. The symbols of 37, the apple tree, Leah's dog, and many others, help to add more insight into the development of the characters. I hope to gain more understanding of NW and Zadie Smith.

Samantha Plate

Play In The City

10/17/2013

Playing in the City and in the Classroom

I can’t quite remember what I expected this course would be like. It seems like so long ago that I was scrolling through the Emily Balch Seminar choices and the one entitled Play in the City caught my eye. Whatever it was that I did expect I know I was nowhere close to imagining the amazing experiences I have had this first quarter.

While I came in knowing that we would be playing in the city, I did not realize that we would also be playing in the classroom. From the first day, when we spent time exploring the physical classroom, I knew this Emily Balch Seminar was going to be a different experience than the other seminars that had been options. This thought has only been enforced over the past few weeks. Our unconventional assignments have really encouraged the idea of playing in the classroom and I have enjoyed every minute of it. One of my favorite assignments was when we created a mosaic out of the reading. Not only was this a nice break from writing responses and other dull assignments I had in my other classes, but I also really connected with the reading and this assignment helped me to view it in a different way. These assignments have helped me to read in different ways and view readings from different angles.

Samantha Plate

Play In The City

10/06/2013

What Is Art?

            In Mary Flanagan’s book Critical Play, she tries to define play through art. She associates play with art because they both “manifest critical thinking” (Flanagan 3). She believes artists use play in their work, often in subversive ways. While in Philadelphia this weekend I experienced a lot of art. This made me think of Flanagan and how art is connected to play. Last week I examined one of Flanagan’s definitions of play and how it fit with what I saw. This week I viewed my experience of Philadelphia through her view of art. Flanagan makes a few statements about art and its playful and subversive qualities to help define it. Flanagan first quotes Marcel Duchamp saying "in art there is no such thing as perfection" (Flanagan 3). She believes there is a "call for innovation" in the art world and subsequently in play. When it comes to defining what an artist is, she uses "’making’ for ‘making's sake’" (rather than for some arbitrary reason like money) as a qualification (Flanagan 4). Flanagan also discusses the subversive nature of art. It made me question if art has to be subversive to be playful or vice versa? Flanagan looks at Antonio Negri and determines that subversion is “a creative act rather than a destructive act” (Flanagan 11). Subversion is all about breaking rules and so naturally both play and art are conducive to subversion, but must they be subversive?

1. I started by reading the article "Too Bean Or Not To Bean" in The Inquirer about local coffee shops trying to thrive amongst big buisnesses in an overflowing market.

2. A quick internet search led me to this article about Town Hall Coffee.

3. From that article I clicked a link to an article about the Night Market in Chinatown (which closes tomorrow)

4.I then went to Chinatown's website and under attractions was listed the Kimmel Center

5. After exploring the Kimmel Center's website for a few minutes I went to maps.goggle.com and searched the Kimmel Center to look for places around it.

Samantha Plate

Play In The City

09/29/2013

What Is Play?

            What is play? This is the question that Mary Flanagan tries to answer. She is unable to come up with one specific definition. When asked to describe the reading in class I said “refreshingly indecisive”. The fact that Flanagan admits there are many definitions of play is truly refreshing. Theorists, psychologists, are scientists are always trying to pin “play” down and give it a strict definition. But play in itself defies definition- it is playful. Play sets all the rules and breaks them too. There are so many ways to describe this essential part of life, but no way to define it.

            I truly felt this idea that play cannot be defined on my last trip to Philadelphia. After visiting the mosaic garden my group and I decided to wander around the area, hoping to stumble upon more mosaics. We found ourselves walking in the “wrong” direction, but now I realize it was the right one. We ended up at a playground.

While looking through Chapter 5 of Critical Play by Mary Flanagan I became interesed in an artist who was mentioned only briefly. His name is Allan Kaprow and it is his work that coined the term Happening, something we all experienced a few weeks ago.

A Happening is a work that is shaped through audience participation. It creates a narrative through interactions of the participatnts and the Environment. The Environment is the space where the work occurs that encompasses everything that is needed for the work- people need only enter for it to begin. 

Kaprow's most famous work is "18 Happenings in 6 Parts". Reading about this work reminded me of "The Quiet Volume". It involves participants moving through a series of three rooms while following the direcctions written on three cards and the sound of bells to indicate when to move on.

I decided to make my mosaic by taking video clips of the mosaics and compiling them together.

The video should be embedded in this post but if it doesn't work the link to view it is: http://youtu.be/rYO7_hYaJxE