Jodie Mack: A Review

Jodie Mack was as vibrant as the short films she showed, and I was loving it. Not only did she draw in the biggest crowd out of all the lecturers but she did nothing but make good on her promise of wowing us with her art work. On a more serious note I'll start out with saying that the fine arts has always been a soft spot for me being that a vast majority of the people in my family are involved with the field in someway or another. Out of the two films that she showed us I have to say that I fell in love with "The Saddest Song" at first sight, I mean even though I don't believe that people can fall in love at first sight doesn't mean that a person can't fall in love with something at first sight right? I guess she caught me off guard by making her films kind of a one woman show, sure we went into it expecting nice art work and good creative vision but on top of that she did her own vocal performance and had fantastic themes throughout her works. The vocal performance (one of my favorite parts) was adorably well tuned, it fit the overall quirky, half-baked theme of things that came across in both pieces and kind of made me feel like I was at an open mic night at some off beat yet popular in the unpopular way independent coffee shop. While Ms.Mack's work spoke on the greater themes of love I felt more touched by her initial disclosure that her films speak of her inner desire to be loved in that silly sweet way. If only there were more disclosures like that in this world, after all it gave great insight to why she would pick the silly happy feel good themes that she did, and for that I am ever grateful. We haven't had many opportunities in this class to see the ultra positive side of love with just a touch of that saccharine sweetness that we all crave so this was much needed to say the least. Ms. Mack was able to convey some more serious themes about modern relationships such as confronting strain of money issues and being single but ultimately what I thought was going to be a more depressing film turned about to be adorably sweet. Going back to the artist herself during the Q&A session after the films Ms. Mack was asked about her film making process to which she responded that the division of work was hard to outline because her pieces are constantly existing in all states of pre-production, post-production, and production. I found this to be quite profound because her pieces exist in those states and revolve around some romantic themes while love itself always exists in those forms all at once. We are either looking for the next person, being caught up on the current one, and reminiscing about the past ones making love less of a cycle and more of conglomeration of parallel states none of which are tangible but all of which exist.

Thoughts on Garren Small

It's OK Mr.Small, I don't resent you for trying to call on me as I absent mindedly scratched my cheek after you read of one of your poems, and I certainly don't mind that you called me out on my apparent dismay at being noticed. Seriously though, that is something I am guilty of doing to my own audience members every time I have to give presentation and such. All kidding aside Garren Small was one of our most engaging and participation enthusiastic speakers that we have had the pleasure of hosting in this class to date. Having overheard some coffee talk before the lecture I was surprised that Mr. Small identified himself as having majored in political science, after all its not too often that we see a future politician turned successful poet.  Mr. Small was charmingly engaged with his audience, not seeing this as an opportunity to stand up on his soapbox in the limelight instead he actively tried to engage the audience in critique, open repertoire, and interpretations of his work and the works of his favorite poets. In short egocentric is the last thing that I would use to describe Mr. Small, after all it is incredibly refreshing to see such an established individual try so hard to interact with his audience, and on top of that be so amazed with the different off the cuff interpretations that his readings received. Mr. Small's work spoke volumes on the overall themes of our class, the title of his lecture "Fires Dared to Ignite" was something that he touched upon briefly yet deeply. According to Mr. Small the fires that are dared to ignite is the love worth pursuing, this imagery is not unheard of in any of the works that we've been exposed to. Its something about the unbridled force of nature, a burning flame, that inspires, scares, excites, and helps us relate to our own helpless emotions. A fire once ignited is not controlled, it can only be corralled to a point before it gets out of hand, much like the passion of one individual for another. You fall in love, you fall deeper in love, and then you get hurt, and you get over it, this cycle is like lighting a match and holding it between your finger tips, the flame first flickers to life, then grows to the point where it not longer is in danger of fizzling out, but then things get out of control and the larger the flame grows out of your control the closer it is to burning your finger tips. Eventually this cycle ends with the flame being forcefully smothered by the person holding the match or by itself if the person cant let go for some reason, either way it ends but it can begin again. However the cycle can never end or begin if it is the fire that wasn't dared to ignite, the love not pursued, the fall not taken, the chance not seized. According to Mr. Small being in love, falling in love, and opening yourself up to another person takes some courage,and that's why its a dare and not just a step or something spontaneous out of the blue.

For The Love of Brain Systems

Ok, so this was the lecture we've all been waiting for and may I say that it did not disappoint. Dr. Brown was a very enigmatic and clever lecturer, she presented her information with such a refreshing excitement that I couldn't help but to feel more engaged in the further she got along. I suppose its a strange way to look at things but like with Dr. Freund the more excited that she got about her own research the more excited I got for her after all its very rare that in the field of neuroscience that someone can get away with building a body of research on brain phenomena related to love and desire, its actually relatively unheard of.  What makes Dr. Browns research so interesting is the premise that its based on, it basically says love and desire are real things and they are important to the overall quality of human life, unlike many areas of science which like to water it down to a simple mating mechanism. So now that shes spent a majority of her professional career solidifying the science behind what makes us tick, what have we learned from it? From her studies in early stage intense romantic love or the honeymoon and courting period as I like to call it, I couldn't help but to wonder if there were better implications for this kind of research except dealing with late stage fading romantic love. For example the kind of stimulus and brain scans tests that she performed could be used to differentiate the traditionally different forms of love that we have all been taught about  (Philia, eros, stroge, and agape) and therefore might be used to better tailor marriage counseling techniques towards shifting the subconscious views of ones mate from a friend/enemy complex and back over to the passionate romantic love that we all want in our lives. Dr. Brown noted that there was an interesting overlap in some individuals in her studies of sexual arousal and romantic  love, but that it was a few isolated cases. I cant help but to wonder if that is the byproduct of negative conditioning around what is deemed the acceptable nature of love, a personality survey could help clear up some of that confusion, if the individuals stated views of love deeply involve sexual feeling then naturally they're brain scans will indicate both arousal and romantic love firing off at the same time. That area of her research could also be explored further to delve into the different kinds of sexualities, such as asexual individuals. If an individual is truly and naturally asexual (meaning not caused by some altering incident) then they should be capable of romantic responses but not arousal stimuli, and in a person with an aversion to sex for negative reasons their scans should indicate both mild arousal and disgust. Dr. Brown also stated that her findings indicate that the core system of romance is related to vital need and the reward and drive area of the brain, so my question comes to mind "could a stalker be created?" On a general research level there have been plenty of studies in which the hypothalamus of some poor lab animal is assaulted to simulate a condition called hyperphagia, or insatiable hunger, and this is done with relative ease in a lab setting. If a condition like hyperphagia can be recreated multiple times over then you could easily alter other areas of the brain that keep lovers scoring at the top of the passionate love scale from toppling down the dark side of affection. Therefore if the reward and drive area of the brain associated with romantic love and inhibition of social actions was altered then a stalkerish like behavior could be simulated and perhaps lead to the discovery of abnormal neural morphology in certain categories of sex offenders. So who said love research isn't valuable?

Thoughts on Slaverys Interior

Out of all the guest lecturers that we have had the pleasure of learning from and engaging with Dr. Reed certainly took the memo of think out side the box to heart. Yes, I will fully admit I was a skeptic when I saw the title of his lecture "Slavery's Interior- Cinema and the Performative Traumas of History" I mean how on earth was this supposed to relate to our love and desire class? Well he accepted the challenge and made it work. Dr. Reed presented a very original view on the subject of desire and how it applies to our world, in the case of his work desire was something people wanted to be in control of and still do. The way he put it was that the act of enslaving another individual was the act of keeping alive someone who would rather die. In essence this describes the enslaver as one who wishes to control the desire of others (his slaves) but ultimately is the victim of his own desires to control others, somewhat of a means of compensation for the lack of self control. In multiple ways the overall idea and theme of slavery can be applied in many ways, such as the traditional sense of slavery which Dr. Reed has analyzed through film for the purposes of his lecture and in the metaphorical sense which is what these films wish to appeal to. In these films on slavery the longing for freedom (the overarching theme of his talk) is the key representative of unfulfilled desire, film makers have been using slavery as a successful medium to capture the audiences longing for their own personal freedoms from self invented slaveries so to speak .To put it plainly after seeing a film like Amistad a mid level cubicle worker may feel justified enough to break free of the bonds of his deadend employment and pursue the finer things in life, however on the other hand you may have the exact same office worker return to his work the next day with renewed fervor for his previously undesirable employment. This train of thought follows suit with what Dr. Reed summed up near the end of the lecture that we see slavery where we want to see it and we also craft freedom where we want it. Just like love and hate can coexist in the same object simply based on the perspective of who is judging it (refer to the text Celestina where the differing views of Calisto and Sempronio on Melibea are examined in detail if you catch my drift) slavery and freedom can also represent a similarly skewed image dichotomy. What is a miserable trapped existence to one person is freedom and joy to another, it all depends upon the perspective, consider the role of Stephen (Samuel L. Jackson) in Django Unchained. By modern standards being a house slave to the same family for your entire life and being put in the position of having to discipline other people in a similarly unfair plight would be hell for most, but for Stephen he wanted nothing of any other life but his life long servitude. Perspective plays a larger role in desire then we think it does, although desire persists as something that we all experience it bears a new face in every setting, it can be wanting something badly or loathing something to an extent that you want to be rid of it.