1. Yo-Yo Ma wrote the essay titled, “Necessary Edges: Arts, Empathy, and Education” and was first posted on the “World Post”.  I noticed that he is a very educated man. He attended both Julliard and Harvard University as well as a very experienced musician and writing starting at a very young age. I find him to be impressive considering his knowledge.
2. Ma’s imposed context is that art is a value in the world and could benefit everyone when used more. Through my personal reading experience, this article reaffirmed my opinion that art is necessary in the world. To me personally, I gathered from this essay that it is important to find an equilibrium in life. To be balanced in all aspects of life and to consider other aspects. The purpose of this essay was for Yo-Yo Ma to inform the audience of his thoughts on art and music’s impact on the world and creating an equilibrium between art and the math and sciences.
3. The rhetorical situation was the “necessary edges”. The essay exemplifies that you need the necessary edges to have a core equilibrium.  The scope is the entire world. Everyone can benefit from evolving and changing the traditions taken by other cultures. The equilibrium is the evolution of a certain song or dance taken from a prior culture.

Three Unfamiliar Words:

1. Compartments: a separate section of a structure or container in which certain items can be kept separate from others. Ma uses this to describe the word separating into separate sections.
2. Weary: feeling or showing tiredness, especially as a result of excessive exertion or lack of sleep. Ma uses this to describe our civilization as run down in the text.
3. Innovate: make changes in something established, especially by introducing new methods, ideas, or products. Ma describes art as a factor inspiring to us to innovate or make new changes.

Before:

1. According to Zander, art can “make people do things, change things, and build things.”
2. They compare any time not spend helping, “is like having a leisurely nap beside a lake where thousands of children are screaming for our help.”

After:

1. Zander himself states that art can “make people do things, change things, and build things.”
2. In Peter Singer’s view, any time not spent helping, “is like having a leisurely nap beside a lake where thousands of children are screaming for our help.”

ORIGINAL:

What would this world be like without art? I imagine a boring, uneventful, dreary, colorless, and unjoyful society. I envision people walking around looking grey and glum and not having the energy to get through life. How could we have life without it? Art is interpreted in different ways based on the mindset and experiences of different people. Southan explains the interpretations of the effective altruism group which differ from the interpretations that the composer, Zander, expresses in his Ted Talk. The EA group says that, “Artists paint the beautiful landscapes in front of them while the world burns around them”. Effective Altruists’ view artists as selfish whereas Artists see their work as transformational. After reading Southan’s ,”Is Art a Waste of Time?”, as well as a Ted Talk featuring Benjamin Zander, I consider art an indulgence that the world should not take for granted.

As Peter Singer expressed in his essay titled, “Famine, Affluence, and Morality”, the world is analogous to a pond. He proposed the thought of if people were to see a child drowning in a pond, would they jump in to save her? Would they ruin their own clothes to save her life? He compared it to our world when stating that there are many people who are in poverty or are struggling to stay afloat, but the world for some reason is neglecting to help.

REVISED:

A boring, uneventful, dreary, colorless, and unjoyful society is what I imagine the world would be without the presence of art. I envision people walking around looking grey and glum and not having the energy to get through life. How could we have life without it? Art is interpreted in different ways based on the mindset and experiences of different people. Southan explains the interpretations of the effective altruism group which differ from the interpretations that the composer, Benjamin Zander, expresses in his Ted Talk. The Effective Altruists’ view artists as selfish whereas artists see their work as transformational. Masterpieces are made to have viewers in awe. Even the slightest appearance of the craftsmanship put together by an extraordinary human being can transform the viewer. The quietest tune of a listeners’ favorite anthem can change the whole attitude and outlook a person has on life. After considering the hard-work, creativity, connections, and sense of community that art brings to the world, I consider art an indulgence that the world should not take for granted.

As Peter Singer expressed in his essay titled, “Famine, Affluence, and Morality”, the world is analogous to a pond. He proposed the thought that if people were to see a child drowning in a pond, would they jump in to save her? Would they ruin their own clothes to save her life? He compared it to our world when stating that there are many people who are in poverty or are struggling to stay afloat, but the world for some reason is neglecting to help. Personally, I would jump in to save the girl in need. As her life was in danger and I had the capabilities to help, I would ruin my clothes for her. Even though I didn’t particularly drown her, I would still save the child to my capabilities. For some, it may take every cent they earn to pay the bills. Other workers may have the ability to help at a higher extent, but not everyone can.

STRATEGIES:

In the first revised paragraph, I changed my hook to be more descriptive as opposed to opening with a question. I then changed my flow of paragraphs by taking out the repetition of the words art and music. I changed them to words such as masterpieces, craftsmanship, tune, and anthem. I also updated my thesis to state the implications of the argument of my essay to become a more narrow scope as opposed to being so broad.

In the second paragraph, I edited it to integrate my opinion more into the paragraph instead of just stating the opinions of others. I also added my own opinion by narrating what I would do in the situation described. Overall it benefitted my essay to be more detailed and a stronger, more concise argument.

The short essay, “Shitty First Drafts” was very relatable to me. I understood the process described very well. I agree with her process of multiple drafts. I think it is important to have your first draft be your “downdraft”, where you just get every single idea in your head down and somehow piece it together. Next, you compose your second draft which is your “updraft”. Here you fix everything up and piece it together. Lastly the third draft, you carefully go through it with a fine tooth comb, looking for imperfections.

My revision plan is to integrate my opinion more into my essay as well as building stronger claim sentences in each of my paragraphs. I will take the steps of figuring out what I want to relay in each paragraph and build a strong claim sentence that can be based on my opinion that I want to voice in the paragraph as well. My biggest challenge is finding one central topic to build my claim off of. I need to stay focused on the one definite claim instead of different opinions and ideas. I plan to read my essay aloud to friends and family member and ask them if they could pick out the main focus of that paragraph. If they cannot fully understand it as an outside listener, then I must go back and revise it to be more clear.

My impressions on peer review…

I think peer review is helpful in the aspect that you are given the opinions of other students. It is interesting to see the interpretations that other students have. It is especially interesting reading other student’s essays who read the same two pieces of writing as I did, but interpreted them differently. I find it to my advantage when reading other students work and seeing different techniques that they use when analyzing text. I find it helpful to see how they were able to integrate quotes as well as explaining them.

I believe that everyone should live life constantly learning and trying new things. When reviewing other students work, I believe we are learning. We are learning their style of writing and learning about the techniques they use to write a strong essay and relay their ideas. Later on, it may be beneficial for the reader to try to use some of the techniques they learn through reading others’ papers and apply them to their own writing.

One thing that I find not beneficial is having someone make a wrong “corrections” to your essay. Especially in the beginning of the year when classes have just started and we have not yet written a paper, having someone else correcting you paper is scary. Just starting college, no one in our class has yet written a college essay for our professor. We do not know how the professor grades, and do not know what the professor is looking for. I find it helpful to start peer review after we receive feedback from what the professor is looking for on our first essay.

To me, art is not a waste of time. I thoroughly agree that art is not a waste of time after thoroughly reading Southan’s piece multiple times with different points of view, as well as listening to the Ted Talk featuring Zander’s point of view about music as an art. Through brainstorming, I feel that it somewhat helped me to draw a few connections between the two pieces. Both articles are trying to help others live their best life. The Effective Altruism group feels that it is important to forget art and to help people financially rather than creatively. The creative group of people are also trying to help people live a great life, but by displaying their talent and inspiring people.

I believe that when people are sharing their own musical talent with the world, they are benefitting others. Many times when I am down, playing music has helped me through my time. It has, in fact, cheered me up several times. It as also made me think about the lyrics and see a different point of view. Looking at different artists’ work helps us look at different places and situations differently than we would have before.

Art may not financially fix every situation, but in my opinion, art is existent for the better of society.

In the third ted talk, “How Does Music Transform Us?”, Benjamin Zander displays his appreciation for music as it is a form of art. He believes that art has no limit and that art has much power over people. He believes that it, “speaks directly to the heart”. 

He states early into his TEDtalk that music may not,” necessarily change the world, but that it has the power to change us from within.” As a conductor, Ben gets to look into the eyes of the players. He finds himself to have great power when he looks into his players’ eyes and sees them shining. 

The musical piece that the TEDtalk played during the conversation reminded me of a movie called “The Notebook”. The same musical piece was played in the movie during sad times. Like they discussed during the TEDtalk, “it [music] can change the way you experience something”. If I had watched The Notebook without the classical music playing in the background then it may not have been as emotional.

As Zander expresses his feelings about music, he feels that, “it opens the emotional pause to all of life’s experiences”. I strongly agree with these thoughts and think that music is an important role in forming our emotions.

While re-reading the article, “Is it OK to make Art?” after obtaining information from the Effective Altruism website, I had a slightly different perspective of the article.

One brand new thing that came to light after re-reading the text a second time is that, “Everyone can be doing more than they currently are”. After going back and forth trying to pick a side whether I agreed with the EA’s or if I agreed with the aspect of art and creativity, I could not choose a side. However, I do believe that every single person could always find a way to help others more than we currently are. 

Something new I noticed was the analogy that every time we stop trying to stop the world suffering around us, it’s like, “taking a nap” and ignoring the girl who was drowning in the pond. If we are not constantly working towards our goal, then we are actively working against it, by not fixing it.

Decoding the text helped me to better understand the text. For example, I used http://www.dictionary.com to find definitions of words like coalescing, futility, negligible, as well as egalitarianism. Knowing exactly what each sentence was saying helped me to comprehend the message behind the words of the text.

The first thread that I was personally shocked by was when the article described the findings of Peter Singer. He published an essay which questioned why when people saw a girl drowning they would jump in and save them without a doubt. no matter if it were their fault or if their clothes would get wet. He applied the same logic to people dying of poverty and different diseases yet we have the opportunity to help them. For some reason, most people choose not to. This was shocking to me as I had not even thought of this viewpoint. I know that many other places in the world have different living conditions than myself, but this opened my eyes to how much we need to learn to give back.

The second thread I agreed with is that good deeds come in all forms. I think that many people can do something to help out another person. The EA had proposed a question asking, “does your preferred good deed make as much of a difference as simply handing over the money?”. I believe that money cannot fix everything. Although money may help, it is not a cure. For example, countries in poverty do need money to help some aspects of their community, but they also need the right people there with the right mindset and capabilities. Not only do you need money to fix a country, but you also need the people who work together to build a community.