A Synthesis on the Value of Punctuation and Its Impact on Technology

Communication, including punctuation, evolves as a result of societal and technological progression, and although society is examining its value in everyday usage, social media needs punctuation in order for messages to not lose their clarity and coherence.  
Punctuation is vital when using technology to express thoughts and to create conciseness.  According to Henry Hitchings, "Digital communication and social media have produced new opportunities" (Source A) to do these.  This ranges from memes to Twitter.  In memes, it is important to convey a funny and/or purposeful message in a few words, and a helpful way to assert a message is to apply punctuation.  

Meme

As the above meme demonstrates, different uses of punctuation create different meanings to a sentence.  The commas in the first sentence define a woman without a man, while the semicolon in the second sentence - the semicolon is portrayed as "a particularly intelligent ... friend" (Source E) that can be depended on "for easing ... through a complex thought" (Source E) - defines a man without a woman.  This illustrates the importance of establishing clarity while writing because, without it, the message can be confusing or not necessarily convey the meaning wanted.  In addition, without punctuation, language itself becomes chaotic.  In Twitter, "Tight character limits force users to ... 'Omit needless words'" (Source A).  "tweets must be 140 characters or less" (Source F), so there is "very little room for adjectives" (Source F).  As a result, people change their writing style to become "obscure" (Source F) while tweeting:  they do not use punctuation and diction becomes unspecific.  Eventually, this negatively impacts a person's writing by also making it unclear and not concise.  

How do Modern African American Artists Convey Their Thoughts on Racism?

After analyzing the painting Officer of the Hussars, by Kehinde Wiley, I was interested in finding out his artistic purpose.  I learned that he "engages the ... visual rhetoric of the heroic, powerful, majestic and the sublime in his representation of urban, black and brown men found throughout the world" (Kehinde Wiley).  Kehinde's enthralling paintings made me wonder how other modern African American artists convey their thoughts on racism.  After some research, I found out that Glenn Ligon, a conceptual artist, explores the impact of language and gender on racism.  
Glenn Ligon has created many famous works, such as We're Black and We're Strong.  

We're Black and We're Strong by Glenn Ligon

Ligon has had many art exhibitions.  One of his more momentous exhibitions was "America", at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York.  "America" explores "American history, literature, and society across a body of work that builds critically on the legacies of modern painting and more recent conceptual art" (Whitney).  An interesting piece there is Sun (Version 2) #1.  

Sun (Version 2) #1 by Glenn Ligon

In this, Ligon uses multiple colors, predominantly black, in order to scorn the racism that was taught to children.  The school that is colored black signifies the segregation of schools, where white children were taught in white schools and colored children were taught in colored schools.  The people in the lower left corner are scribbled over with black, indicating that children were taught that colored people were not accepted by society.  The word "shades" in the upper left corner is blackened to suggest that all colored races were treated like how blacks were.  Also, by adding (Version 2) to the title, Ligon conveys that there were "two suns", one for whites and one for colored people. 

How Can Eye Color Be Changed Both Temporarily and Permanently?

In The Bluest Eye, Pecola dreamed and "prayed for blue eyes" (Morrison 46), believing that "if her eyes ... were different, that is to say, beautiful, she herself would be different" (Morrison 46) and "maybe Cholly would be different, and Mrs. Breedlove too ... say ... 'We mustn't do bad things'" (Morrison 46).  Although it is impossible to genetically change eye color, people are able to modify their eye color both temporarily and (soon) permanently through advances in technology. 
A common method of temporarily adjusting eye color is with colored contacts.  Colored contacts have a diverse set of hues to choose from, ranging from blue and green to purple and gold.  They are convenient to use, since they are becoming cheaper and can come in prescription.  Also, they last for a long time, as long as they are taken care of properly.  

Colored contacts

A technique that is being developed to permanently change eye color is called the Strōma procedure.  The Strōma procedure is a process that, with a gentle, low-energy laser, alters eye color from brown to blue.  Researchers assert that everyone has blue eyes, but brown eyes are a result of a thin brown pigment layer on the surface of the iris.  The Strōma procedure removes this brown pigment, exposing a person's natural blue eyes.  Eyes that have gone through this procedure are indistinguishable from genetically natural blue eyes, and it is so effective that, afterwards, the brown pigment cells do not regenerate.  There is no set date of release for the procedure since it is still being tested, but it is expected that the general public will be allowed to use it in fall 2015. 

How are Feminist Ideas Simulated in Art?

According to Emily Prager in "Our Barbies, Ourselves", Barbie dolls were created by Jack Ryan as an indirect tool used by men to combat feminism in the 1960s.  However, I feel that it would be very extreme to combat feminism through children's toys.  Nevertheless, I wanted to research how feminist ideas are portrayed through art.  

I discovered that the messages on feminism are portrayed the most successfully through installations.  Judy Chicago shows this in The Dinner Party.  It is a part of the Center for Feminist Art in the Brooklyn Museum.  

The Dinner Party by Judy Chicago

The Dinner Party is composed of a banquet table in the shape of a triangle - triangles symbolize equality - with thirty-nine place settings.  Each place setting is for a notable woman from history and mythology, such as Sophia, Saint Bridget, Sojourner Truth, and Virginia Woolf.  In addition, the names of 999 prominent women are painted on the tiles below the table, such as Abigail Adams, Eudoxia, Enheduanna, and Mary Shelley.  With this installation, Judy aimed to participate in the "feminist revision of history", an undertaking where feminists strived to rediscover women icons forgotten due to the conspicuity of male icons throughout history. 

How is a Building's Significance Expressed to Different Groups?

Earlier this week, we talked about the article "So What?  Who Cares?", which examines the importance of addressing the questions "Who is the target audience in this essay?" and "Why is this essay important?".  During the discussion, I realized that these questions apply to more specialties than writing, such as architecture.  There are many architectural feats around the world that answer both of these questions, in particular the Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto. 

Bata Shoe Museum, Toronto

The Bata Shoe Museum is both visually appealing and answers both of the questions, "Who Cares?" and "So What?".  Architect Raymond Moriyama uniquely designed the building to represent the museum's purpose of showcasing shoes from history and different cultures - the museum is constructed to look like a shoebox.  Because of its purpose, the museum has a huge audience that includes tourists, shoe fanatics, and architects, and its importance and impact ranges for different sectors of its audience.  Tourists come to the museum for its unique exhibits and its stature as a distinguished attraction in Toronto.  They leave the museum with new and uncommon knowledge about shoes.  Going to the Bata Shoe Museum is probably on a shoe fanatic's bucket list because it contains a diversity of shoes.  They are impacted the same way as tourists:  they receive remarkable information about a distinctive field.  Although the information that can be acquired at the Bata Shoe Museum is important, architects value the building's outward appearance and functionality more because they are important factors to the museum's success.  Architects are also impacted differently since they are primarily searching for inspiration for their own designs. 

How Does Setting Affect Artwork?

Early in the week, during the class seminar of The Scarlet Letter, a question came up concerning the effects of the settings, the forest, in chapters 17 to 19, and the meeting house, in chapters 20 to 22.  I believe that the forest helped represent the dark and secretive situation that Hester and Dimmesdale were in.  Also, I regard the meeting house as a gathering place for strict, law-abiding residents.  Moreover, I think that setting has a profound effect on artwork because it helps create mood.
Different art periods throughout history have different ways of expressing itself, therefore composing different moods.  For instance, artwork from the Romanticist period aesthetically glorified abstract concepts, such as survival, hope, and despair, and was based on strong emotions rather than exact truth.  An example of a Romantic artwork is The Fighting Temeraire, by Joseph Mallord William Turner.  This painting creates a tranquil mood by having a peaceful setting. 

The Fighting Temeraire by Joseph Mallord William Turner 

In addition, the Expressionist period expresses the emotional responses from an object or event by using color aesthetics.  A well-known example is The Scream, by Edvard Munch.  By using intense colors in the setting, the painting establishes moods of chaos, disorder, and alarm. 

The Scream by Edvard Munch

How Has the Portrayal of Women Changed Throughout Art History?

After reading "There Is No Unmarked Woman", by Deborah Tannen, I connected Tannen's purpose, that all women are "marked" in an unfortunate way, to how women have been portrayed, or "marked", as aesthetically pleasing (or not) in art.  Women were looked down upon for much of history, and this has been reflected in art history. 
The negative portrayal of women in art began in the early modern period, also known as the Renaissance; portraits emerged during the early modern period.  It would seem that portraits made it easier to depict this deprecation, but, during this period, women and men were portrayed similarly, and the deprecation was composed through the details.  These details, which are excellently portrayed in Portrait of a Lady, by Rogier van der Weyden, include:  stiff posture, downcast eyes, head coverings, arms' positions, no showing teeth, bound hair, and uncrossed legs.  Because Portrait of a Lady has most of these details, the lady was considered to be very virtuous.  However, not all artists back then wanted women rendered as obedient or virtuous, as shown in Self Portrait, by Judith Leyster.

Portrait of a Lady by Rogier van der Weyden

Self Portrait by Judith Leyster

Women continued to be belittled until the Feminist Movement in the 1960s.  The Feminist Movement changed the perspective of women from submissive subsistence to independent individuals that are in control of their own lives and are able to act however they want; this change has affected all forms of art since the Feminist Movement began, such as the photograph Untitled, by Cindy Sherman, and the acrylic painting Hotline for Troubled Teens, by Joe DeMers. 

Untitled by Cindy Sherman

Hotline for Troubled Teens by Joe DeMers