All posts by ksg304@nyu.edu

Reflections

“The…” Digital Literacy Narrative- Kas Ghobad

3 Comments

http://www.tiki-toki.com/timeline/entry/336108/The/

The story of my digital literacy dates back to preschool as far as I can recall. It all began with pencil and paper, as I became quite influenced by one of my teachers. She believed I was some sort of artistic genius just from looking at what I would draw and was my inspiration to begin painting (but that interest didn’t last long at all). It didn’t seem to matter much at the time, but drawing and painting were my first forms of expression and I feel that it makes them somewhat important for orienting the context of this timeline.

As I entered elementary school, I had already been acquainted with a computer at home and started playing videogames almost constantly in my free time, while at Wolftrap I learned how to read and write the alphabet. The importance of videogames and this area of technology was mostly magnified by my dad and his side of the family, who were really into a game called Diablo 2. It was odd actually, the entire family would gather together to play the game cooperatively at times and I think what I began to crave most was finding more games like this. Perhaps it was because I had some of my best memories during my early childhood just playing that game with my relatives and I realized it was more than just a game but a way to connect with people.

Throughout the later years of elementary school, I still spent plenty of time on the computer, but meanwhile I became a fanatic of fantasy and fiction novels and would read straight through an entire series as fast as I could. Simultaneously, I was drawn to movies like the Lord of the Rings trilogy and Harry Potter of course (though I refrained from reading them until much later and I have no idea why).

In middle school and early high school, social media played a much bigger role in my life than I’m willing to admit. It was mostly Facebook that I wasted my time with (and still do) though I was never a fan of actually making posts. When I got my first smart phone in 9th grade, the amount of time I spent communicating digitally drastically increased and ever since I’ve felt less human for constantly retreating to the cyber domain to talk to people.

In my last two years of high school, I became much more aware of the intellectual importance of almost every art form, including literature, film, music, and even videogames. It began when I started listening to a much wider range of music and ended with the discovery that gaming has always been an art form in it’s own right, I just never took the time to realize why I played and what games meant to me.

Reflections, Uncategorized

Final Thoughts on The Machine Stops

Leave a comment

There’s a lot to think about after reading such a short story, but what comes to the forefront after going through The Machine Stops again is this blaring emphasis on the necessity of a direct, firsthand human experience. Of course there were many other themes I could explore, such as those regarding the strength of faith as it consistently survives along with the human race, but I keep coming back to the prior point. With the loss of physical space and resultant loss of physical experience and prowess, the human society grew quite idle in Vashti’s world. Convenience in living area transferred to convenience in thought with the creation and ubiquity of the Machine, something already happening in our modern day world. The horrifying reality is that without self-discovery (whether it’s truly original or not), everything in the world loses meaning, including language and ideas that come with an alarming lack of emotional response because the people legitimately don’t know what to feel. My best example is when Kuno first predicts that “the Machine stops”, Vashti simply cannot comprehend what this could mean. As we later find out, she begins to slowly be consumed by fear when his prophecy rings true and their world collapses. It’s incredibly depressing to me that the only thing Vashti really experienced was the apocalypse, but it’s also a wake up call. Our worlds are almost frighteningly similar. I live in a very small space (my dorm), I am constantly trusting technological sources to retain all the non-essential knowledge, and I sometimes lack the primary experiences I wish to understand. It’s surely not the dreary and disgustingly immobile world we observe in Forster’s story, but the themes still apply.

Uncategorized

Intro to Carly Valentine

Leave a comment

Meet Carly. Though she has a somewhat generic name and Google seems to only recognize a quite different Carly Valentine Photographer, the REAL Carly is of course a unique individual like any and every other NYU student.

boat ice cream 1 ice cream 2

Originating from Canada, Carly remained there over the summer until it was time to move to New York City. She spent this most recent summer before college enjoying a lake area called Lake Manitouwabing and endless ice creams with her friends according to recent pictures posted to Facebook.  A woman with great taste and ice cream choices in my opinion, she is also a connoisseur of music, listening to a huge variety of artists such as Kanye West, and pretty much only Kanye West.

music

 

Seriously, he appears to be the ONLY artist she likes and therefore she’s a big Yeezus fan because that’s his only decent album and everyone knows he was completely responsible for it’s thoroughly original production. Her interests in TV shows actually portray a similar story over Facebook as the only ‘like’ listed is Saturday Night Live. It’s a good thing Carly moved to NYC when she did, she’ll get plenty of opportunities to see her favorite show!

carly fries

 

Finally, I don’t see how anyone could introduce Carly without pointing out the close-knit linguistic relationship between her name and curly fries that exists beyond the written realm and even transcends all forms of logical reality. Good on you Carly, you continue to do you and be those fries. She’s having a wonderful time in her Gallatin Writing Seminar and meeting amazing new people like Kas Ghobadi, White Male Student #3, and other cool dudes.