Updated Research question

topic- education and the economy

How does the shift from an education system that promotes hard work to one that focuses on a student’s self esteem affect the rest of the student’s life in terms of employment and general success? Furthermore, how does this new type of education system perpetuate itself and as a result create different social stratifications in society? What is the effect of our modern educational culture on our society in a time of rapid technological change?

NHR Research Assignment

Ovid`s "Pramus and Thisbe" is a story overheard by Lucius in The Metamorphosis, about two ill-fated lovers who kill themselves over the other`s death (Pyramus thinks Thisbe dead and commits suicide, Thisbe finds Pyramus dead and kills herself). The story`s main ideas were stolen by Shakespeare to make Romeo and Juliet, although the characters are in different situations (Romeo and Juliet`s families have a blood feud, while it is never stated why Pyramus and Thisbe cannot marry, only that their fathers refused to allow it, and they could only talk to each other through a hole in the wall separating their houses) which was, in turn, very closely copied by Lenard Bernstein to make West Side Story, with the biggest difference between the two plays being the time period they are set in, and that West Side Story is a musical. Its written in the same style to Ovid`s other works, in a poem with very sutle jokes, jabs and anomalies to make the reader think throughout the poem. The poem is very sad, being about two separated lovers who kill themselves out of despair.

Link: http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/Classics/OvidPyramusThisbe.htm

NHR Research Assignment

The source that I chose to examine was "God's Little Toys," written by William Gibson for Wired. This article is one of the many that Lethem chooses to 'plagiarize' in his essay "The Ecstasy of Influence." In this article, the author talks about his own experience of using snippets of other works in his own writing, even unconsciously. He also talks about this idea of "recombination," or deconstructing a work and improving on it, providing examples in various industries of how improving on previous works benefits everyone. Additionally, the need to legislate new innovations after is important so that we don't stifle progress in our society. Stylistically, the author uses a personal example to introduce the idea before providing evidence for his claims. Personally, I really enjoyed reading his perspective on our changing landscape. With the Internet creating new forums for people to innovate together, creating something entirely new out of something old. His examples of how people have done this for certain movies that they like was also relatable to me, as I've seen such collaboration and recombination on social media platforms such as Tumblr. I do think, however, that it is important that as we continue to shift to more of an "active" audience, we strike a balance between constant innovation and credit where its due.

Gibson, William. "God's Little Toys." Wired, 1 Jul. 2005, https://www.wired.com/2005/07/gibson-3/.       Accessed 20 Oct. 2016.

NHR Research

In "The Ecstasy of Influence: A Plagiarism," Jonathan Lethem cites the essay "E Unibus Pluram: Television and Fiction" as one of his sources. The essay discusses America's relationship with television and fiction writing, and how the two are interrelated themselves. The tone of the essay, while sarcastic and humorous, is also very informative and enlightening regarding how fiction once influenced digital media, but a shift has taken place. Today, television influences today's fiction literature, which, from the author's perspective. is causing it to dilute to an extent. The piece invokes the audience by using relatable language and relevant examples to that time (i.e. Pepsi commercials and The Cosby Show...the article is from 1997). Overall, the essay made some really interesting points that I have never truly considered or thought about, in a way that was enjoyable and easy to read.

Wallace, David Foster. “E Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction.” A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again: Essays and Arguments, Boston [u.a.], Little, Brown, 1997, jsomers.net/DFW_TV.pdf.

NHR Reasearch

Echolalias: On The Forgetting of Language is about how people can forget words, phrases, and even entire languages. Roazen relates this to how infants forget their infant babble as they learn the language of those around them. He talks about the child not only looses the babble, but also the ease and flexibility to learn any language. He wonders about if adults had any of the infant speech left in their final tongues and that if it did, then that would be the echolalia of the forgotten infant speech. He uses a logic extending system called “Logic in Reality” to explain how things like this language problem could be worked out reasonably and logically.

This work invokes an audience by questioning the edges of human consciousness and how people can forget things that they once knew. The book does not really try to answer every question that it brings up, but it should rather be considered an exploratory work, where he is trying to find a better understanding of the human mind and explain to the audience what he has come up with. While the ideas itself are speculative, the tone is not as it is based on reason and building on previous ideas. The tone stays rational to provide a base work for the book itself.

NHR Research Assignment

In Let Them Eat Prozac: The Unhealthy Relationship Between the Pharmaceutical Industry and Depression, author Dr. David Healy analyzes the history and development of SSRIs, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. He looks at the marketing campaigns publicizing these drugs and all the controversies around them, questioning how beneficial they actually are to patients struggling with depression. These drugs initially seemed like miracles, but upon further investigation, there a dark side. Some patients taking theses medications ended up with side effects worse than the disease, and, in some cases, drove people to suicide. This text invokes an audience because the subject is something that hits close to home for many people. Almost everyone knows someone who has struggled with a mental illness or has maybe even struggled with one themselves, so a topic like this can easily draw a lot of attention. It has an informative tone. It is not a biased work, and Dr. Healy is not trying to stigmatize all medications or move to ban them, in fact, it is mentioned that Dr. Healy himself prescribed these drugs for many of his patients. Dr. Healy is simply stating the facts and informing the public about the side of the pharmaceutical industry that is often kept from the public.

Healy, D. (2004a). Let Them Eat Prozac: The Unhealthy Relationship Between the Pharmaceutical Industry and Depression. New York University Press.

NHR Research Assignment

In Lethem’s essay, he refers to “undiscovered public knowledge” as a problem with research efforts today. I found the source of this idea in an essay titled “Undiscovered Public Knowledge: A Ten-Year Update” in which Don Swanson lists examples of how the association of two unrelated topics resulted in many biomedical discoveries, one of which that Lethem highlights is the cure of Raynaud’s Syndrome being fish oil. Swanson discovered these relationships by simply matching up keywords in the titles of journal articles and synthesizing information found in articles with similar names. Swanson hopes that this method would produce “literature-based scientific discovery.”  Swanson is very friendly yet serious with the topic; he does not completely debunk the process of scientific research. He instead seems to offer a different way to approach research and respects the classical method of research. The facts are expressed and interpreted in ways that an audience that does not know much about the topic can understand them and their significance. One area where I can see that the audience can get interested in is how the examples presented are applicable to most people’s daily lives, relating to medical applications such as Alzheimer’s, migraines, and sleep. Furthermore, Swanson still keeps the professionalism required of a scholarly paper by including few, if any opinionated or subjective thoughts, and basing all of his claims in fact.

Swanson, Don R., and Neil R. Smalheiser. "Undiscovered Public Knowledge: A Ten-Year

Update." Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence. Web.

<https://www.aaai.org/Papers/KDD/1996/KDD96-051.pdf.>.

NHR Research Assignment

The source I researched was Silent Theft by David Bollier. The reading came from “The Ecstasy of Influence: A Plagiarism,” most notably, from the section “You Can’t Steal a Gift.” The introduction opens up with a case study on the West Publishing Company, a company which monopolized the pagination of certain legal documents, and therefore held control over the majority of legal cases in the US. Bollier writes this section with all the markings of an early 20th century muckraker, intent on digging up all the travesties of the company while still giving detailed facts on the case. Bollier then begins to discuss the general topic of property and the “commons,” however, he begins to twist the West Publishing Co. story differently. He asserts that “business … is no more a villain than a lion whose metabolism needs gazelles” (Bollier, 4). His tone then becomes an advisory tone, pointing out not to generalize everything, and that protecting the commons calls for a balance of property and free use. He maintains this tone, providing information to the reader when applicable, arguing his case along the way. He treats his audience as someone new to the topic, with little knowledge of the subject, but at the same time, does not belittle their intelligence by over-explaining or over-simplifying his arguments. Bollier eases the reader into his perspective, giving ample support for each point and doesn’t jump from conclusion to conclusion. His conclusions tend to occur after he guides the reader through his thought process and add to his overall argument.

Bollier, David. Silent Theft: The Private Plunder of Our Common Wealth. New York: Routledge, 2002. Community-Wealth.org. Web. 19 Oct. 2016.

Link: http://community-wealth.org/content/silent-theft-private-plunder-our-common-wealth

NHR Research

I chose to look at Lawrence Lessig's book Free Culture, which was cited in Lethem's essay, "The Ecstasy of Influence: A Plagiarism." Lessig claims that he is worried that today's society will ruin free culture, and the purpose of his book is to prevent extremist views from ruining it. He first presents his readers with a review of his first book called Code: And Other Laws of Cyberspace, and he acknowledges everything that he did incorrectly. He then explains how he is going to go about describing his new issue, extremism affecting free culture, and what needs to be done to prevent it. His tone is that of a parent trying to help his child find the light, or learn how to walk. All of his claims are laid out confidently and plainly. Throughout the whole preface he displays that he is planning on sharing all the necessary facts for his readers to better understand the issue. Also there are certain factors of free culture that Lessig plans to focus in on. He seems to want to focus on how power is used through the scope of law and is planning on being as analytical as a lawyer in his study. At the end of the preface he finally defines free culture for the reader. Essentially he is going to describe how to have a good balance between anarchy and control.


https://books.google.com/books/about/Free_Culture.html?id=qm7ODAAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button#v=onepage&q&f=falsehttps://