Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Created January 6, 2020
Community? Engagements? Arts? Well, for starters this is a class taught at Transylvania University in Lexington, KY by professors Kremena Todorova and Kurt Gohde. The goal of this class is to form a relationship with the community by engaging in artistic projects with the community. The outcome of this will manifest itself in many ways, some recognizable and others not so much.
CETA 2020: Our first 2 emojis (of hundreds)
Created January 6, 2020
Individual Tasks
Collect addresses, make & write thank-you cards, design pronoun buttons--Anna Davis
Blog Manager--Paige Wessling
Recorder/archivist for This I Believe essays--Sarah Metcalfe
Social Media--Lydia Baggett & Garrett LeVan
Photographic Inventory (3 people)--Yousef Alsdudi, Sarah Bennett, & Faith Boles
Space, raw material, & tool inventory manager AND order enforcer--Emily Neat
Quality Control & Class Ethicist--Alex Toney
Software Design Team (3 people)--Shelby Barker, Emily Cecil, & Abby Pearson
Fabrication Team (3 people)--Brooklyn Greer, Will Hemingway, & Marissa Price
Finishing Team (4 people)--Nannie Baze, Emon Daneshmand, Ally Frederick, & Madison Phillips
Additional photographic documentation--Kremena and Kurt
Working with production design at Kre8Now Makerspace--Kurt and Kremena
Publicity for the class--Kremena and Kurt
Securing materials needed--Kurt and Kremena
Articles of Interest (optional)
Blog Archive
-
▼
2019
(27)
-
▼
February
(8)
- Class Notes 2/19/19- Meeting with Jim Zilliak at t...
- Class Notes 2/13/19- Meeting with Merlene Davis at...
- This I Believe #7
- This I Believe #6
- Class Notes 2/11/19- Meeting with Rich Schein at t...
- Questions & Comments for our conversation with Mer...
- This I Believe #5
- Questions for our conversation with Rich Schein on...
-
▼
February
(8)
Hours upon hours upon hours spent learning something. Class three days a week. Homework the following nights. Papers and reflections done routinely. Long nights studying. Cramming all the information in. Pages on pages of studying guide material. Trying to squeeze every bit in before the exams. Waking up early to try and memorize it all. Reading the studying guide countless times. Being able to directly quote the study guide questions and answers.
ReplyDeleteThinking “okay I got this”.
Then seeing the first question and then thinking “oh shit I don’t got this”.
Panic sets in and the rest of the exam is doomed.
I start to second guess everything that I learned. I lose every piece of information I spent learning in class and prepping for. My mind goes blank, it is like it’s the first day of the course and I haven’t been taught anything.
I go to question 2 and I read it. I think “alright I remember this”, but then the answer that I thought I knew isn’t an option on the multiple choice. It isn’t worded exactly as I memorized it. Shit.
I find the answer that is the closest to what I learned in hopes that it is right. That question isn’t worth that much alone so it’ll be okay if I miss it.
Nope. Wrong.
Those questions worth only a few points do count and add up. Especially when I get to the five short answer questions that are worth ten points each and I only partially remember the answers to those.
Well shit, that’s like half my grade.
The last question is worth twenty points and if I thought I blanked at the beginning of the exam boy was I wrong because I had no clue what I was doing. It was as if I was on a new planet surrounded by completely unknown things, running around like a chicken with its head cut off. In reality, the question was something I studied hard and knew but at that time I lost it all. I butcher the question. Not good at all.
How can I study and prep so much then get to the exam and fail so miserably?
I can blame it on test anxiety or the idea that has been ingrained in my head since 5th grade “If it isn’t an A+ it isn’t good enough”. Thanks, Mom and Dad, your high standards fucked me up.
I believe in failing and failing to meet the astronomically high expectations.
Paige, this sounds painful (I kept thinking, are the exams I create *this* difficult?!!)
DeleteI too have to believe in failing.
100% experience test anxiety, now I just think I’m going to fail every exam.
DeleteI try--not always successfully--to embrace a larger range of options in terms of how to think of something as successful. This is easier now that I am not receiving grades on so many things as everyone in college does (something to look forward to).
DeleteFinding benefits within failure is something, I am certain, everyone could learn from.
In elementary school, I was in an advanced program that allowed me to work ahead of my class because that work was too easy. I enjoyed reading and they had me reading far above my grade level. I always took classes a grade ahead of me which led to me being skipped a grade- almost two. That came with “thinking I was too good” and people telling me I was “acting white”. I had always been in orchestra but when I’d been introduced to the cello in third grade, I was voluntarily. In the black community, it’s rare to find a black student playing an instrument, especially a string. I played well and I had been called white again, everyone felt I shouldn’t have held the spot I did.
ReplyDeleteIn middle school, the first sport I tried out was soccer and my family told me black people don’t play that. So I tried volleyball and apparently black people don’t play that either. Track was the only other option.
My sophomore year of high school, I took my first art class. At first it was just an elective but I was good at it. None of my black friends then or growing up, did art.
People called me weird, called me a nerd, told me I wouldn’t fit in. All because I was breaking stereotypes for African Americans. Quickly after every talent I had picked up, people found out and I tried to hide it. I stopped doing some things in order to fit in- or at least appeared to do so. I wish I hadn’t, I wish I would’ve pushed myself even harder.
I believe we need more black people to do so. To go forth with their gifts rather than hiding them. There are younger people that need the inspiration, I know I did.
Jada, yes yes yes
DeleteI love that you are willing to break through social conventions and deliver inspiration to others.
The good news in your narrative is that at least you know you opted to not do things you were good at. It is truly unfortunate why you made these choices but it is better than at least one alternative where someone is made to feel they are not good at things just because participating in them goes against whatever stereotype our world is working to maintain.
DeleteThank you for pushing yourself in the ways that you have and do. I agree, we need more of that.
I did badly on the first art history paper I ever wrote. (Admittedly, my paper was terrible.)
ReplyDeleteI remember that the prompt we were given for that first paper made very little sense to me and I, an inexperienced first-year, felt too embarrassed or didn’t know how to admit how much I didn’t understand it. I thought I could figure it out on my own with some textbook reading, Google, and a few texts to classmates.
I was wrong.
Though I stayed up until almost 4 a.m. writing and googling in a frenzy the night before it was due, no amount of work on my own could have fixed the problem. The reality of the situation was that I should have asked for clarification.
Later down the line, I worried the second paper would also go badly, even going so far as to write that paper in its entirety over spring break and turn it in early for feedback. As I continued taking art history classes, I thought back to that paper almost every time I had to write a new one, always trying to be sure that I understood the prompt.
Now I'm a junior and I’ve taken all the classes required for a minor in art history, and I think it’s interesting to look back on that first class. I never anticipated picking up a minor in art history until I realized I was one class away from finishing the requirements. And now, honestly, I would literally just keep taking those classes if I had more time. There are a lot of things I feel that way about.
I believe doing badly at something in the beginning shouldn’t necessarily cue us to dislike it or avoid it. And I believe in asking questions, even when it’s intimidating.
Yes! I too believe in asking questions! Always on with the questions!! (I, too, once wrote a reflection about believing in asking questions!)
DeleteI feel this.
Delete(this is a letter)
ReplyDeletewhen i was in elementary school i found a snail and kept it as a pet for a while. my mom made me let it go one day, and i think Junior was a lot happier free to roam in the wet grass and see the whole wide world.
my mom didn’t tell me this time, but i had to let you go too. but that doesn't mean i've let you go. it just means you're happier roaming your whole wide world but this time your world is her instead of grass. you get to roam her and i get to sit back and watch you be happy. it's like a movie where you fall in love with the main character and watch their love story unfold, and as real as my hurt is, now you are just a million little pixels and we are just a scene no one will remember by the end of the movie.
and someday i'll stop watching our scene, i think. but it really is my favorite one. it sounds like the songs you wrote about me and it feels like the wind when we sat on the picnic table on that perfect day in May and it tastes like bourbon and your mouth and it looks like the way you used to look at me.
the funny thing is, though, i wouldn't undo us if i had the chance. i wouldn't un-kiss you or un-touch you. i am endlessly thankful for whatever it was we had because i’ve never loved anyone like the way i love you and you’d never loved anyone like the way you love me but somehow we did it anyway.
i know energy can be neither created nor destroyed but i believe in breaking the laws of physics because you and i created something so special, there’s no way it was anything less than pure energy.
What a beautiful letter, Emily...it is pure light (and energy).
DeleteI love your wording in about every essay (letter in this case). It’s so pure and poetic.
DeleteKremena
ReplyDeleteFebruary 10, 2019
On this birthday, what I want to do is think about the people I’ve recently lost. I want to focus on each of them, holding them in my memories. I want to remind myself what I owe to them.
On this birthday, I want to remember Joe Buttigieg, an old man with hands of a laborer. When I met him, Joe was a famous scholar. Two years into my dissertation, he invited me to his house for dinner. He cooked pasta with salmon and capers for a small group of guests. The capers, bigger than any I had seen, had been picked and then preserved in salt by his Maltese mother. The meal was a visible sign of the respect Joe showed me, something I was rarely granted as a graduate student. After his son announced he would seek the Democratic nomination for US President, I found out Joe treated his son, too, with love and respect at a time when others were challenged by the son’s sexuality.
On this birthday, I want to think about Margaret from the first block of my street. A few years ago, a neighbor planted a moonflower in front of Margaret’s house. Margaret tended to it and encouraged passers-by to watch the yellow petals dance while the sun went down. Recently, Margaret’s thin body seemed swaddled in a wool sweater, no matter the temperature. Still, we didn’t expect her to pass so soon. I want to think of her in a place filled with moonflowers: forever dancing in a slow-fading sunset.
On this birthday, I want to recall Bette. Years ago, she was recovering from chemo as I was recovering from pneumonia. I felt weak and alone. I felt the healthy people around me could not offer me comfort. Bette nodded in understanding before asking everyone about jobs, children, and life partners. The last time I saw her, she was tied to an oxygen tank. My lungs felt stronger than ever. We talked about compression socks, flying across continents, and using airports as makeshift gyms: good for walking long distance while feeling safe in foreign environments.
On this birthday, I am instead consumed by chores. I do laundry so my son has a clean school uniform. I shop for crackers in Kroger and for volleyball socks on Amazon. In the morning, I decline offers of a special out-of-the-house birthday meal. Instead, I ask for a big home-made salad for dinner. I end up eating under pressure as my family waits for me to finish before departing to a Super Bowl party.
On this birthday, I believe in getting on with life, as if it’s an ordinary kind of thing.
Happy birthday, Kremena. Your conclusion is going to haunt me this week (in a good way :) ). The people we meet and the death we are always approaching are so, so far from ordinary.
DeleteThough I was once a celebrated 12-year-old computer whiz shipped to coding camp, that was before computers could display imagery. It was before the internet or email. For everyone with a mother who changed her last name to her husband’s, it was when mothers were still known by the names they had in middle school.
ReplyDeleteWhat is your mother’s maiden name? This is a common online security question. Other security questions about your mother include her middle name, what town she was born in, and the animal you identify her with. Okay, one of these examples is not a common security question. If it were, how long would it take a computer to guess through all the common animals and find your answer?
Our answers to security questions are relatively simple for a person to figure out. Your mother’s maiden name and the hospital she was born in are the details genealogical search engines are built to find immediately.
What was the name of your first pet? What was the name of the first street you lived on? These, too, are security questions. They are also questions you answer on a website to generate your own drag name.
What was the last name of your first boss? Where did you spend your childhood summers? People answer these questions with abandon as they click through a quiz to find out which character from Game of Thrones they are most like.
I have a growing collection of rubber ducks in my bathroom. The collection happened just like the transition from the previous paragraph—it came out of nowhere. I believe computers know how often I clip my nails, how many coffees I have had in my entire life, and where I will be at the very minute you are reading these words. We are predictable by code even middle schoolers could write and my first pet was a duck.
This is such an interesting story. I love that you have a collection of rubber ducks, I think ducks are neat!
DeleteIt’s at that point in the semester where I think about my future. I like to think about alternate paths my life will be on if I changed my major or transferred schools. I am comfortable with my school and major, but I like to play fun ideas.
ReplyDeleteMy current fun idea is working with seals. The animal seals, not wax seals(Those are pretty cool though.) I love marine mammals and would love to work with them some day. Art isn’t really an optimal degree for working with animals, but biology is. The problem is I’m not interested in having a degree in biology.
Graduating college with a degree in art is the plan I am currently on. I wonder if alternate universe Emily is having fun memorizing a Biology textbook. Meanwhile this universe Emily is drawing pictures of seals. There is a possibility I will never work with seals, but who knows maybe seals like to do art.
I believe in keeping your future flexible.
I love this! I also often think about what I'd be doing if I couldn't major in art or art history. Lately I think another version of me might be a psych major, but I've also considered that another version of me is on a path to teach English to high school students
DeleteSeveral years ago, a Studio Art alum from Transy named Caitlin started working at a zoo (I believe it was actually with seals). She is a vet in Maryland now. I don't know if there are still seals in her life.
DeleteSuch a fun reflection! (And now I must try to imagine an alternative-universe Kremena...)
DeleteThe first time I saw a punk show, I wore high-waisted shorts with a sunflower print. They were decidedly not punk rock, but I had just turned 21 and was barely familiar with the music scene. I was afraid to go alone, an anxiety many women feel at the prospect of going out solo, so I invited my friend Jenna to go along with me. The bright red dress she wore was also very much not punk rock. We drank enough liquor to forget about our brightly colored outfits.
ReplyDeleteClose to midnight, GRLwood took the stage. I had read online that they played what they called “scream pop,” but there was no way to prepare for the torrent of sound they produced. I didn’t even know two people, let alone two women, could make such a furious racket. I didn’t know that two women my age could raise that kind of hell. I have never felt so alive. I was possessed that night, whether by screaming lesbians or a little too much alcohol or the exhilarating energy of thrashing bodies in a dim bar, I’m not quite certain. My body moved in ways it never had before, as if my body had become a doll and was shaken about. I woke up extremely sore the next day, but feeling like an entirely new person.
Most people don’t peg me as someone who is into punk music, let alone a genre called scream pop. I definitely don’t look the part, with my petite frame, blonde hair, and bright, floral-patterned clothing, the results of a childhood lived in fear of exploring unconventional identities, lived in fear of conflict and anger. That night was the first time I felt safe enough to rage without hurting anyone.
I believe in scream pop.
I think it is so weird how we categorize people for their taste in music and don't expect someone to listen a certain thing.
DeleteThough I have not heard the phrase "scream pop" before I can imagine it and wonder if there is indeed an expected "look" for a scream pop fan? Like Paige, I am interested in how we mentally type people for things like musical preference. I imagine all ways of typing someone are potentially offensive and can be wildly inaccurate...what within us creates a need to type people within categories we understand?
DeleteI believe my niece and nephew when they say they’re sad. I know they are, because I am too, sometimes. When I care for them on the occasional weekend I make the most of our time together. I spent an entire year living with them. I miss them every day and coming home to a silent apartment can be hard.
ReplyDeleteIn one year, I helped my niece learn to read and adjust to kindergarten. I taught them to play cards and hustle the other kids at school. I had tea parties with my niece. I loaded my nephew’s motorcycle into the tailgate of my Jeep so he could ride to his heart’s content on a strip mine road. I read them a couple of the Little House books at bedtime, all cuddled up in my bed before tucking them into their own. I watched countless unboxing videos. I had to tell my 6-year-old niece it wasn’t nice when I overheard her tell her brother he that he hit her with ‘that fucking ball.’ I had to leave the room quickly to laugh so the lesson stuck. I encouraged my nephew to ride his first roller coaster, and laughed so hard at his fearful yelling that I lost my voice. I spent birthdays with them. I spent my 28th birthday with them. My nephew asked to spend his tenth birthday here in Lexington—3.5 hours from home—because he didn’t want to spend it without me. I cried when my niece cried because she lost her favorite stuffed cat because I felt hopeless knowing we’d never find it. I made a full year of memories that both their parents didn’t.
When they tell me that they’re sad, I believe them. When they tell me that they miss their parents, I believe them. When they tell me that they don’t understand why my sister and their father can’t live with them or be good parents, I believe them. I believe them because I don’t understand, either. I believe they’re sad because sometimes I’m sad, too. Sometimes I wonder what happened to the sister I grew up with, then I remember that she has been replaced by the addiction-riddled body snatcher I had to pick up in the fall of 2017 after a domestic disturbance call, and snuck into our parents house under cover of dark—then out again after driving them to school. I believe I am a better parent than my own sister, and I believe I encourage things in my niece and nephew that I hope will help them grow and bloom. I believe I do a great job of not letting my negative feelings toward their parents be expressed when they ask about them.
So, when my kids tell me they’re sad, I believe them.
This is beautiful, Heath.
DeleteThey will grow and hold memories of magic time with you and they will hopefully one day meet the sister that you remember. And if your nephew comes to Lexington for his birthday, there are so many great places to take a 10 year old!
I love that you have tea parties with your niece. And that you are confident in saying you are a better parent to your niece and nephew than their biological parents. So often biology is expected to produce things like care, love, closeness. Thank you for listening to and believing (your) children.
DeleteThe memories you have made with them are going to be cherished. You are a great role model for those kids to look up to.
DeleteI believe that all people no matter where they land on the political spectrum have the right to choose.
ReplyDelete“You are going to hell.” “You are a murderer.” “God will judge you for this.” These are the words that have stuck with me since that day senior year of high school.
It all started when a close friend of mine asked me to run to the grocery store for a pregnancy test. We waited and held hands in a bathroom stall at school when her world blew up. She had decisions to make and it was not my place to judge her for them. I sat with her while she cried, while she prayed, and I was with her the moment she chose not to continue her pregnancy.
The day we went there were several protesters outside including men, women, and children. They hurled insults our way but we kept our heads down and tried to ignore them. However, a woman decided that this was not enough and shoved my friend to the ground and screamed at her until a security guard came to stop them. Things went smoothly after then and life moved forward, however, my friend will forever carry around what happened that day. There is a sadness behind her eyes. It was never and easy decision for her.
I wish that’s what people knew. Never once did she take it lightly. I wish those people who condemned her and told her that god would judge her could take a look in the mirror and say that they wouldn’t make a similar decision under similar circumstances. I believe that she made the best decision for herself. I believe that she, and every woman, has the right to choose.
Your friend has probably suffered many times over all of this (at many times throughout the process). That she had to suffer at the hands of others who believed it was their place to cause additional pain to another person--this is a tremendous shame.
DeleteThank you for being someone who understood your friend needed support and caring through all of this.
Ally, yes, I, too, believe with you.
Delete
ReplyDeleteGrowing up, I was always conflicted about my identity. This was especially hard for me in middle school because I had just moved back to the states, after spending 4 years in a country with completely different norms, traditions, and culture. I tried so hard to blend in with the majority. The name Hannah helped me in doing so, but my looks and skin complexion did not. This was before I wore hijab so people had no idea what my origins were. Some assumed I was either Hispanic or Indian, but never an Arab Muslim. At the time, I thought of this as a blessing because of the stigma muslims carried. This all began to change in the 7th grade.
Three days after the Boston Marathon Bombing, I sat in class listening to my teacher speak about everything that happened and the brothers who did it. She said, “the bombers were not from this country but did have permission to enter.” Not hearing what she said, I asked, “They did or didn’t have permission?” Her response was, “They had permission, the same way your parents were given permission to come.”
I was so embarrassed and shocked she would say something like that in front of all my classmates. She just made a false comparison between two men who killed several and injured hundreds, and the two people who raised and loved me my whole life. She made me want to hide my true identity even more. I felt like I had to make it clear to everyone I encountered that my mom was born in Florida, I was born in Illinois, and my family is like most “Americans”. I never mentioned, nor was proud of the fact that my father is an immigrant.
Seeing what I was going through and feeling the need to protect me, my mom enrolled me in an Islamic private school for my 8th grade year. She wanted me to build better sense of my identity. It was this transition that allowed me to become who I am today. The religious aspect of it was important, but knowing there were other people who were conflicted between two identities just like me helped me build one strong Identity.
I believe EVERYTHING happens for a reason. Although I was angry at my teacher for her inappropriate and ignorant comment, it is the reason I am who I am today
The trials we put one another through with micro (and major) aggression sometimes feel endless. That you are able to find yourself on the other side of this and to find gratitude for someone who spoke to you with so little care says much about who you are.
DeleteI wonder how many times in a day you find yourself looking for 70 excuses for other people as a way to move past this kind of situation.
This is what my fiancee says: "Do what brings you joy, or what's worth delaying joy for." She's right, of course.
ReplyDeleteI took my stepdaughter on a college visit, to EKU. She wants to be a social worker. She wants to help people and knows that her time in what our family calls Deep Poverty (poverty is when you struggle to keep the lights on; Deep Poverty is when you live in a decaying trailer filled with rats and roaches, and struggle to keep the lights on) will give her special insight into the lives of the children and adults she wants to help. I helped her prepare questions for the Social Work department head, then listened as she set aside the script and her feelings of intimidation; she spoke with grace and wisdom.
I played Skyrim. I killed dragons and giants. I imagined my wood elf was lawful evil, snuck around and murdered Stormcloaks. I liked being someone who was good with a bow, but was killing dragons joyous?
I went to a meeting to plan to change Kentucky law so that former felons can vote again. I sat behind someone who wanted to abolish prisons. They have a five-year plan to change the law statewide, and a nine-month plan for people in Kentucky jails to be able to vote. It's a good plan, so I signed up to be their loyal footsoldier. I want to help.
I read medieval Christian metaphysics and wrote about them. I smiled a little when I wrote that sentence. Is it cool to read metaphysics? Does it make me fun and tall and pretty? I like being a person who reads metaphysics and talking about being a person who reads metaphysics. This is goofy.
I believe in trying to see what really brings me joy. And also in just chilling.
There is really only one answer to your question: Of course reading metaphysics makes you fun, tall, and pretty. Surely that is the purpose of metaphysics.
DeleteAdditionally, I really dislike that read (past tense) and read (present tense) are the same word. I dislike it in your essay especially because until you ask the reader a question (is it cool to read metaphysics?), everything is in the past tense. That makes the switch to present tense align with the moment of switching to asking the reader a question. I like that. But the darn English language and having read and read spelled the same way sort of undoes that small structural joy.