It took me a little while to understand what you
wanted in terms of analyzing space. Looking back at some of my earliest blog
posts, I tended to summarize a lot more than I needed to and my analysis sort
of got lost in the jumble. I also focused on analyzing the story rather than
the actual space.
In my blog pot about Johnny Cash’s “Beyond Here
Lies Nothing” video, I summarized every single thing that happened and talked
about the significance of each one of those things rather than concisely
discussing the elements we talked about in class and going over them with a few
strong points form the video. Going into Inquiry 1 I was still unsure about
what you wanted in terms of analysis, summary and time spent going over space
and meaning. The conference helped a little bit, but having not received a
grade on anything from you at that point, I was unsure of what to expect, so I
just did what I knew how to do and hoped for the best. The comments you
provided on my Inquiry were helpful and provided a good insight into how you
graded.
From there, things started to get clearer,
ironically this was around the time we read Foucalt which was an ordeal to say
the least. The main thing I took away from Foucalt was his concept of mirror
spaces, which are perceived but are not actually real in this plane of
existence. I was able to apply that concept to a variety of things, like when
we talked about the Stubenville rape case and the big data blog post. I said
that the Internet acted as a mirror space for real events and in some cases had
an enormous impact on the real spaces that we inhabit.
We then had a blog post about Starbucks, which
was probably my favorite blog post not only because it talked about the
processes in which companies create customer loyalty, but I was also able to
apply concepts from a book I had read earlier to it. The book discussed the
formation of a habit loop in our daily lives and how each day is made up of
many different cycles of this loop, everything from brushing our teeth, to
driving places and eating. I’m sure you’re probably tired of hearing about the
habit loop from me, but I find it fascinating and it was amazing to me how many
different places I could apply it in my own life.
Inquiry 2a suffered from procrastination and
lack of motivation, so I had to make up for it in 2b. A lot of the things I
talked about in 2b weren’t originally in my prezi including, believe it or not,
the habit loop. Inquiry 2 didn’t do a lot for me in terms of introducing me to
new information, but it was a great outlet for me to apply the things I had
learned so far in the class and in other classes I have had before this one,
especially my social psychology class.
Inquiry 3 seemed to pass by quickly since it was
a group project and we all kind of worked on it separately aside from a few
short meetings so it really felt more like pooled individual efforts rather
than a group project. Because of the apparent disconnect in our group, I don’t
think our presentation and subsequent paper flowed very well. This is not to say
that the information in our presentation was sub par, our information was all
rock solid, each individual contribution was interesting and well thought out,
the main problem was that there was little or no segway between ideas.
Seemingly interspersed with Inquiry 3 was our
box town project; which I thought would have fit better had it been closer to
the map reading seeing as they both deal with urban and suburban layout. I
remember from both discussions the topic of roads changing depending on the setting
they’re in. If they’re in rural countryside, they’re spread out and most of the
time they connect two larger cities or towns. Once roads get into a
metropolitan area they become straight and divide the city into square blocks
so that space can be fully utilized (Boston being the only exception…). In
suburban areas, the layout of the roads is less about efficiency and more about
things like making sure houses have enough land, and including bends in the
roads to discourage speeding.
Despite a bit of a slow start and apathetic
ending, this course has engrained a couple things in my head. I’ll always look
at the Internet as a mirror space; I’ll never face the door in an elevator
again; and I’ll never know how to use a semicolon; because you said you would
teach us; but you never did;
