#editorials/essays

[basicallyanotherwitchesthing]

Jorge Carrión - Mito y Magia del Mexicano - Editorial Nuestro Tiempo - 1971

[roobylavender]

i recognize that with the way comics work it's easy to take what is publication fact as canon fact. and while at times this may give way to very useful, innovative readings of characters, at other times it's not much of that at all and instead amounts to a revisionism wherein either a gap in content or a lack of its development is subsequently used to punish the character. i see this happen esp with jason, in that his short-lived term as robin is subsequently used to diminish the life that he led, to deplete it of friends, happiness, joy, interests. and i would really advise against it bc.. sure it's easy to imagine jason had no long-lasting, consistent friends bc editorial never had the time to explore him having any. it's easy to imagine that jason's life as robin was squarely plagued with his anger and grief and emotional instability. it's easy to imagine bruce loved him less bc of how he was deterred from killing the joker or bc of how he othered his grief in the aftermath (personally i severely disagree with this statement but i am making it merely for the sake of argument). the lack of content (and this coupled with the fact that jason's character was rebooted two years prior to his death) makes it very "easy" to envision that jason never actually possessed any personhood in comparison to his contemporaries. but i don't see what it does for jason as a character. why isn't he entitled to the same fully realized life, to the same friendships (mark w. barr and his silly school-centered issues, how i adore you to no end), to the same scope of closeness and endearment and happiness to bruce that anyone else called robin would be? i don't want to take what we lacked in publication as immediate fact of whatever failed to exist in canon. i want to imagine and embrace the trivial details, the nooks and crannies, the meaningless extrapolations of jason's life. i refuse to allow editorial's ignorance, disgrace, and condemnation of his grievances to rob him of a life. he doesn't deserve that, and we should never pander to it

[disniq]

Yknow if the speculation actually turns out to be true, I think Vigil is a pretty fitting codename for Jason

because what is this man if not the personification of mourning, a walking reminder that terrible things happen, the embodiment of "Look At Me And Remember"

[wordtowords]

Losing on "Jeopardy"?

jeopardy - noun - exposure to or imminence of loss or injury

Looking to find a basic definition, I googled "jeopardy," and guess what I came up with? The television game show, of course! Jeopardy has been on the box for forty seasons, boasting over nine thousand shows. Which says a lot. It says that enough people out there in TV Land (network TV Land) are interested in seeing just how much they learned in all of their years of schooling. Ergo, for decades, they have played along with the three contestants chosen from a deep pool of erudite individuals. But as we all know, when it comes to Hollywood, nothing is as it seems to be, especially in a town that invents fantasies and perpetuates them.

Today, my daughter and I drove onto the Sony Pictures' lot in Culver City (definitely one of my favorite L.A. sub-cities) unprepared for what the morning and a portion of the afternoon would bring us as members of Jeopardy's studio audience. Personally, I thought the experience would be more like being in the house at Jimmy Fallon's show where one observed an even taping and only had to applaud when the flashing light labeled APPLAUSE warranted it. It was more of a live broadcast. Being in the stands at Jeopardy was quite different, like being an extra on a movie set sans the omnipresent catered cuisine and eventual paycheck. We volunteers had to do a lot of cueing up and waiting in corralled herds (common on movie sets), listen to and follow through with multiple directives, and maintain patience while the production crew corrected misspellings on the board and overdubbed some of Ken Jennings's and the contestants' words. We, about a hundred naive tourists, were put in jeopardy as human flaws were being perfected in real time. Of course, no one in the audience realized that the studio system was taking advantage of them since both the parking and ticket to the show were free and so few things in life are free. On the other hand, as P.T. Barnum once said, "There's a sucker born every minute." And Hollywood makes no exceptions. 

On the totally positive side, while we were lined up single file outside against the wall of the soundstage, polished Ryan Seacrest, Dick Clark's successor and new host of Wheel of Fortune, drove up in his new muted-gray Austin Martin (yes, I know how much they cost), parked parallel to our firing line, stepped out three feet in front of me and gave me, my daughter and a few other stunned onlookers one beaming Hollywood smile. He was, to be honest, a sparkler, perhaps better looking in real life than on TV. Being able to drool over him for a New York minute was worth the complimentary ticket to Jeopardy and what it yielded.

Needless to say, as many of you bonafide fans already know, the contestants don't lose even if they lose. The second and third place gamers walk away with 2K and 1K even if they wind up with nothing earned. One could say that the audience is at a loss, but it really depends on how you look at it. We did walk away with a thorough knowledge of the recording process and the recognition that it isn't easy. 

My recommendation? Even if you are a huge fan, don't buy a plane ticket to L.A. just to see a taping. Watch the show at home where you can call out the answers–whether they be right or wrong–and throw popcorn at the tube if you feel the answer to the inevitable question was too vague or misleading. We in the audience didn't have those luxuries. I actually missed them. One thing is for certain. If you at home continue watching the show, you'll never be in jeopardy of losing it. 

[saphosticated]

The discursive essay.

I announce it to the class like some foul beast that lurks in the peeling paint on our classroom rafters. Feet shuffle. Eyes avert. But I still start my usual spiel.

The discursive essay is the best type of writing that I will be allowed to teach you during the entire HSC. But, I won’t give you a scaffold. I won’t give you letters like PEEL or PETAL or TEEL to clutch like a life-raft. Instead I will give you freedom.

Sure, you’ll have a prompt. But you can interpret it any way that you want. You can use any techniques. You can discuss anything that interests you. You can have an entire paragraph made up of rhetorical questions and still get a band 6. (Trust me, I’ve seen it)

You can write imaginatively, add in some poetry. Experiment with spacing. Use your punctuation for effect. If you want to write about anxiety (or maybe you’re just overthinking it. Again) you certainly can.

It’s your opportunity to throw away the rules and use your voice. Make allusions to the things you know. The things you care about. Link them to your studies. Make me want to keep reading.

Were Machiavelli’s observations of Florentine society and politics decidedly Lady Whistledown’ish. Maybe you want to see if your reader can decipher the difference between a Taylor Swift lyric and a Shakespeare quote.

Make links between your texts and current events. Maybe it is stupid that you sit in a classroom while the person next to you complains that we have no air conditioning so they won’t do their work, but children are being bombed in Gaza and their schools are now empty mouths in the ground and empty mouths not being fed because of the blockade.

Maybe we taught you too well to follow the rules.

To use your scaffolds.

To tie together your five paragraph essays with overly crafted thesis statements.

To use connectives for your ideas

To analyse the techniques.

To repeat what you’ve been taught.

So much that freedom feels overwhelming. It feels dangerous. This unknown text-type that lurks in the shadows and does not get the love it deserves.

But,

Once you start looking. It’s everywhere. It’s the opinion editorial, it’s the recent personal essay written by Lizzo and published on Tumblr (Go read it, it’s fantastic), it’s blog posts, and travel guides and anywhere that someone is sharing their ideas and their story however they want without trying to persuade you.

It’s the antithesis to AI. It’s the combinations and connections and personal style and voice that only you have. It’s uniquely human, and like the dragon in Shrek. You do not need to be afraid of it.

[steelycunt]

is this political editorial ive written for my unit a masterpiece or a disastrous piece of shit. i dont like the fact that i cant tell

[rubiatinctorum]

i've read three GPT-ass essays in a row for this assignment and I can't even do anything about it except ask students rhetorical questions in the feedback of regarding examples for their points so they realise when they get it back I know they don't really demonstrate knowledge of the text we're writing on

[waugh-bao]

Congratulations!! You must be really wow-ing your professors to get this opportunity. They see that you’re more than capable and up to the challenge even as a baby phD. Way to go!!

Aww, thanks so much! <3

[supercantaloupe]

revising my baroque gender and opera research paper from last spring and. damn i really do think this was some of my best work

[antonia-necochea]

“¿Y hoy? ¿Sigue existiendo lo extraño? En la actualidad se piensa complacientemente que todos son de algún modo iguales. Así vuelve a desaparecer lo extraño en el interior de lo propio. (…) Es saludable dejar un espacio libre en uno para lo extraño. Sería una expresión de amabilidad que también haría posible volverse distinto.” - Byung-Chul Han Editorial @cajanegraeditora . . #philosophy #essay #han #culture #editorial #graphicdesign https://www.instagram.com/p/CmUMet0ufBB/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[jerxiong]

first post as a bookblr & introduction

hi!

i'm a hmong american writer & editor. i'm joining tumblr as we enter 2023 as a way to keep myself accountable on reading while also supporting books by writers of color. my main focus in creative nonfiction books by asian writers, but i'll occasionally venture to other works in other genres too.

anyway, if you're curious, i'm still experimenting with what i'll post & what will be fun to do, but i think it'll generally be these things:

creative nonfiction / essays / memoirs / graphic memoirs / unconventional genre-bending works

writers of color, specifically asian writers and indigenous writers

BIPOC writers in diaspora

book reviews / maps / boards

book love / recs

book reading liveblogs

reflections / insights on editing

reflections / advice on the mfa creative writing experience

hmong stuff

thanks for reading! looking forward to the community.

[platformsforyou]

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[pynkhues]

Julianne Moore was TERRIFYING (and mesmerizing) in May December.

Yes! She is incredible in that! I watched that movie around the same time I read The Real Lolita by Sarah Weinman and had so many Thoughts about both that I actually wrote an essay which got picked up by a publication outlet initially but later dropped for space / the fact that they didn't think it would be evergreen. It's evergreen in my head though. haha.

[canpandaspvp]

lord have mercy before i show up at this man's house and attack him

[wordtowords]

Throw Back to 9/3/1986

FORUM                                                                                                        September 3, 1986

Educational revaluation

DEAR EDITOR:

As an educator, I feel compelled to comment on your recent editorial reflective of the deterioration of American education. "First Step on a Long Road." Realistically, it would not have been inappropriate to have headed your piece, "First Step on an Interminable Interstate Highway." The current problems of the American system of education are deeply rooted within our society. The ubiquitous unsatisfactory test scores are but superficial indicators of societal maladies, which may take decades to correct. However, the road to knowledge may not be so overwhelming if we contemplate two essential points.

Initially, perhaps we as Americans need to reevaluate our distorted values and focus on the importance of education although this task may be neighboring on inane considering our contemporary priorities. For starters, why is it that we overly compensate our professional athletes and starve our teachers? Under the prevailing circumstances, some teachers are worthy of receiving five million dollars over five years. Just think of the number of minds they reach and shape over that period.

After revamping our priorities, we must then proceed to reinforce the absolute necessity of education in our children. Abstain from spoiling youngsters with an overabundance of material amenities! Invent a stimulating, creative, educational environment utilizing primitive tools...As they grow older, provide youths with books to read, rather than isolating them in front of the television set. After all, teachers cannot teach if students are not receptive to learning. Educators cannot perform the impossible by unlocking a door when students alone hold the key to it. The brightest of children have always been those who are motivated to learn.

It is conceivable that the "long road" may be abbreviated immensely if we as a nation take time to ponder our values and reorder our priorities. 

-Gwyn English Nielsen, age 27, a teacher at Mother Seton Regional High School, Clark, N.J. 

Enough said. 

Sadly, even after 38 years, the aforementioned is still relevant today. 

[straykats]

gonna be sick trying to decide if i should take the day easy or if i should start my essays