"Please Don't Stop the Music"

“Please Don’t Stop the Music”

            Have you ever met someone who didn’t like music? Sure, each of us has a favorite type. But, overall, music is universally appealing.  Even if someone doesn’t like a specific genre or song, the music can still influence them. I find that this happens to me when I am listening to Miley Cyrus’s music. Personally, I am not a fan of hers.  But as soon as I hear “Party in the U.S.A”, my foot and body start bopping to the music. What is even stranger is that I feel upbeat about it. 

Cognitively the song does nothing for me, but it does end up affecting my body and emotions.  Why does this happen? According to Jeffery Walker, it’s the music’s techne that affects our dispositions. He states:

            … in the case of logos or music, the pharmakon is a particular techne—such as the application of a particular rhythm or melodic mode—that causes the soul of the hearer to be “put into a state”… or to have its “disposition” rearranged according to the “disposition” of the pharmakon or techne applied, and this “state” is expressed behaviorally and physically as a particular type of pathos: “fearful shuddering”, “much-weeping pity”, “lament-loving longing”, and so forth (Walker 78).

            Walker believes that music’s beats and rhythm changes our dispositions to the emotion the music exudes. If this is the case, it may that my upbeat feeling, when listening to Miley Cyrus, is due to her song’s happy beats and rhythm.  But if the beats and rhythm are the cause of my affect, could it be that music is not self-contained?  Edbauer would say that emotions aren’t instilled in music. The beats and rhythm produce a disposition which “hovers” around the music like a virus, ready to infect its next victim (Edbauer 14). This is one of the reasons why music can so quickly and easily affect us (even in our sleep)!  

                

          

           Music influences our emotion and affect. But could this be biologically engrained in us? A recent theory suggests that emotion, affect, and music are pre-adaptations to the formation of language (Panksepp 47). Jaak Panksepp explains Dan Shanahan’s theory in The Power of the Word May Reside in the Power of Affect. “Just as emotional communication may have been a pre-adaptation for human invention of music,both may have been essential for the emergence of language,” states Panksepp (49). 

            Like Damasio, Panksepp writes that emotions and affect developed in the lower subcortical area of the brain (Damasio 133; Panksepp 48). He notes that children with little cortical-cognitive apparatus still posses’ emotion and consciousness (Panksepp 48). As the subcortical area continued to evolve, our ancestors began to develop gestures and vocals. Panksepp believes though that the first gestures and vocals were more musical or poetical than language seen today (47).  After the gesture and vocals, the next progression was the beginnings of language.

            In his journal, Panksepp states specific evidence to supports his theory. This includes:

1) Animals communicate affectively by sounds.

2) Proto-musical competence precedes language in human mind development.

3) Music is the “language” of emotions and its affective power arises from subcortical emotional systems (Panksepp 49).

            If the subcortical areas of emotion had not developed, then music may not have evolved. If music didn’t evolve, language may have never come to be. The progressions between these stages may be the reason why these concepts are still interconnected. Language “…was never completely liberated from the affective-musical motivational ground from which it arose,” writes Panksepp (49).

Because music could have a biological tie to emotion and affect, modern psychologists are realizing the importance of studying it. Research on emotion and music ranges from the way music is played to produce an emotion to how certain brain disorders affect response to music. To get a better understanding of music, emotion, and affect, I decided to look at two psychology studies to see what their experiments found.   

Study 1: Similar Patterns of Age-Related Differences in Emotion Recognition from Speech and Music

            For the first study, researchers wanted to see if aging had an effect on emotion recognition and intensity.  To test their hypothesis, the researchers conducted the experiment through vocal expression and music. Subjects were divided into a young (20-33-year-olds) and old (65-85-year-olds) groups (Laukka and Juslin 184). For the musical experiment of the study, four professional musicians played a melody on an electric guitar. The melody was played with a weak, strong, and neutral intensity. But the melody was also played to produce four separate emotions (anger, fear, happiness, and sadness). Participants in both the young and old groups heard 27 variations of the melody, i.e. high intensity and happiness, low intensity and fear. After hearing each variation, researchers asked the subjects to evaluate the emotion the melody produced (Laukka and Juslin 185).

            After the results were combined, it was discovered that there were age-related differences in emotion recognition. The older subjects had a harder time recognizing the negative emotions of fear and sadness in the music. But both the young and the old groups didn’t have problems in recognition of positive or neutral melodies (Laukka and Juslin 197).

            What is interesting about these results is that they contradict the characteristics that Aristotle described for elderly man. In Aristotle’s Rhetoric he states, “They are cowardly, and are always anticipating danger, unlike that of the young, who are warm-blooded, their temperament is chilly; old age has paved the way for cowardice; fear is, in fact, a form of chill (86).”  In this quote, he depicts elderly men as fearful of everything. While the research study did include women, almost half of the subjects were male. So if elderly men are suppose to be fearful of everything, why wasn’t the older group recognizing the negative emotion of fear in the music?



Left Side: Middle-Aged Man's Brain/ Right Side: Elderly Man's Brain



            The researchers considered two possibilities to explain the results. The first consideration was that the areas in the brain that emotion recognition relies on changes with age. Not only does the frontal cortex lose volume as we get older, there is also a theory that the right hemisphere ages faster than the left—negative emotions are processed on the right side (Laukka and Juslin 188). This idea relates back to Damasio’s concept of the biological affecting the social.

            In Descartes’ Error, Damasio talks about patients who have “Gage matrix”—side effects from brain damage that are similar to Phineas Gage (56). One such patient, A,  had massive damage in his frontal lobes on both the left and right sides, with the right side having a larger excision (Damasio 54). Because of the damage, the patient no longer showed or felt emotion. Damasio wrote that patient A had “…no sign of embarrassment sadness, or anguish at such a tragic turn of events (56).”  Patient A had damage in the same areas that the researchers in the study were predicting caused the lack of emotion recognition. So it could be possible that, when we age, our biological brain areas for emotion recognition deteriorate. And if this occurs then our social response to items, i.e. not being afraid of something fearful, will be affected.  

            The other explanation for the results’ outcome was geared toward the participants’ motivation.  According to the socioemotional selectivity theory, in order to keep their well-being, older people focus more on positivity rather than negativity.  But young individuals are more likely to focus on negative aspects (Laukka and Juslin 188). From an evolutionary perspective, this makes sense. The young would want to protect themselves from anything that could injure or kill them, which would limit their reproduction of offspring. But elderly people have most likely already reproduced. Looking out for danger or negative material would be less necessary for them.

             After reading the theories to explain the results, it seems that Aristotle may have been incorrect in his characteristics of elderly men. But one can't be too harsh at him because Aristotle was not aware of how evolution plays a big role in whom and what we are.

Study 2: Mixed Affective Response to Music with Conflicting Cues

            In this study, researchers wanted to disprove the theory that emotions are only bipolar. If this theory were true, then one would not be able to feel two emotions at the same time, i.e. happy and sad (Hunter, Schellenberg, and Schimmack 327). The researchers believed the best way to test this theory would be to use music because it can produce non-intentional feelings (Hunter, Schellenberg, and Schimmack 328). Two experiments were conducted to see whether music, with conflicting cues, could create mixed feelings. Experiment one had 40 undergraduates individually listen to forty-eight 30-second excerpts from different genre recordings. As a control measure, pure and mixed feeling clips were paired from the same genre, artist, and CD.  After each excerpt, participants rated the clip on a scale on how it made them feel, zero-not at all to six-extremely. The scale included the categories of happy, sad, pleasant, and unpleasant (Hunter, Schellenberg, and Schimmack 332-333).

            The second experiment used another 40 undergraduates and the same procedure as that of experiment one. What changed in this trial was that instead of rating their feelings on a scale, participants marked their responses on a two-dimensional grid. The first grid’s axis was happy and sad, while the second grid was pleasant and unpleasant. Like the first experiment, the axis was numbered zero to six.  Subjects were told to pin point their feelings on the grid (Hunter, Schellenberg, and Schimmack 338-339).  

            What the researchers found was that in both experiments, conflicting cues in music did produce mixed feelings of happiness and sadness.  Experiment two was the best support for this hypothesis because it didn’t use unipolar scales like experiment one. The researchers indicate that these findings are important. Not only does it prove that emotions can simultaneously be produced, but it also shows that mixed feeling are not wholly independent of each other (Hunter, Schellenberg, and Schimmack 342-343).

            This is not the first time we learn about bipolar emotions. In Rethinking “the Public”: The Role of Emotion in Being-with-Others, Smith and Hyde write about Aristotle’s model of pathos, which says that in order to provoke an emotion one must move from the center of the emotional continuum to the ends (45). The research study disproves this concept though because its results indicate that the continuum is not even necessary. While Aristotle may have been incorrect about the continuum too, he does believe that emotions affect each other. In their article, the authors write that Aristotle thought that being scared at something could also make you angry at what made you fearful ( Smith and Hyde 45). While Aristotle would say that this is moving along the lines of continuum could it be, like in the experiments, that these emotions are mixed together? Again, the researchers noted that mixed feelings are not completely independent of one another (Hunter, Schellenberg, and Schimmack 343).

            The research study in general may sound familiar to you. In Massumi’s Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation, he opens up his article with the story of the German children and the film of the snowman. Researchers in that study found that the children were experiencing both sadness and pleasantness when watching the wordless version of the film (Massumi 23).  This was due to the primacy of the affective in image reception (Massumi 24). Intensity, affect, is especially prevalent when there is an unexpected jolt that produces suspense and potentiality (Massumi 26-27). In the case of the children and the film, the jolt may have come from the fact that they were seeing a film without words. The wordless film may have been a surprise for them, and not knowing what was going to happen next could have increased their skin conductance (more skin response more pleasantness).

            In the case of the study with the conflicting music cues, it may be that the participants were jolted as well. Because people usually associate the music they are listening too with a particular feeling, hearing the conflicting cues may have jolted the subjects. It would have been interesting to see what would have happened if the researchers also looked at the skin response of the participants.  The subjects’ skin response could have possibly increased with the music’s conflicting cues, just like that of the German children and the wordless film.

            After reading about the findings of these studies, I now see, more than ever, how influential music is to our emotions and affect. But I also realize that this influence may be due to the interconnectedness between emotion, affect, and music, which could be biologically and evolutionary based. This concept could explain why music is universally appealing. With this information in hand, rhetoricians should keep in mind the power that music can have on an audience.  Music was here long before language, and it will continue to play a powerful and influential role in our lives.

                                                                       

 Works Cited 

Aristotle, First. Rhetoric.  Trans. Rhys Roberts. Mineola, New York: Dover Publication, Inc., 2004. 86. Print.

Damasio, Antonio. Descartes' Error Emotion, Reason, and The Human Brain. United States: Penguin Books, 54-133. Print.

Edbauer, Jenny. "Unframing Models of Public Distribution: From Rhetorical Situation to Rhetorical Ecologies." Rhetoric Society Quarterly. 35.4 (2005): 5-24. Print.

Hunter, Patrick, Glenn Schellenberg, and Ulrich Schimmack. "Mixed Affective Responses to Music with Conflicting Cues." Cognition    and Emotion 22.2 (2008): 327-352. Web. 4 May 2011.

Laukka, Petri, and Patrik Juslin. "Similar Patterns of Age-Related
Differences in Emotion Recognition from Speech and Music."
Motivation & Emotion 31.3 (2007): 182-191. Web. 4 May 2011.

Massumi, Brian. Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation. Durham: Duke University Press, 2002. 23-27. Print.

Panksepp, Jaak. "The Power of the Word May Reside in the Power of Affect." Integrative Psychological & Behavioral Sciences 42.1 (2007): 47-55. Web. 4 May 2011.

Smith, Craig, and Michael Hyde. "Rethinking “the Public”: The Role of Emotion in Being-with-Others." Quarterly Journal of Speech. 77. (1991): 446-466. Print.

Walker, Jeffrey. "Rereading Aristotle's Rhetoric." Ed. Alan G. Gross & Arthur E. Walzer. 74-92. Print.

Images and Videos Used

1) "Party in the U.S.A"

April 28, 2011

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M11SvDtPBhA

2) Two-year old wakes up to Waka Flocka

April 26, 2011

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tYtDxphi1c&feature=share

3)  Middle-aged man’s brain and elderly man’s brain

May 4, 2011

http://www.medscape.org/viewarticle/719320_2

4) Evolution

May 2, 2011

http://www.creativesocialblog.com/advertising/the-evolution-of-agencies-not-borne-of-the-digital-era/attachment/evolution-man-computer

5) Happy and sad music

May 4, 2011

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIuBs8FNFm0

6) “Please Don’t Stop the Music”

May 4, 2011

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6e6wE8UnJJs



Presentation

To view my presentation, click here. Enjoy!

Images and Videos Used



1) iTunes dancers

May 3, 2011

http://sean26-wwwsean26.blogspot.com/2010/11/research-for-design-apple-advertising.html

2) Two-year old wakes up to Waka Flocka

April 26, 2011

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tYtDxphi1c&feature=share

3) Aristotle

May 2, 2011

http://vccslitonline.cc.va.us/tragedy/aristotle.htm

4) Evolution

May 2, 2011

http://www.creativesocialblog.com/advertising/the-evolution-of-agencies-not-borne-of-the-digital-era/attachment/evolution-man-computer

Final Project Rough Draft

Please Don’t Stop the Music

            Have you ever met someone who didn’t like music? Of course we all have our favorite types, but music, overall, has a universal appeal.  Even if someone doesn’t like a specific genre or song, they can still be affected by the music. I, for instance, am not a fan of Miley Cyrus’s music. But as soon as I hear Party in the U.S.A, I find my foot and body bopping to the music.

Cognitively, the song does nothing for me, but it does end up affecting my body.  Why does music have this intense effect on us? According to Jeffery Walker, it’s the music’s techne that affects our dispositions. He states:

            While in medicine the application of pharmakon causes the secretion of “juices” from the body, resulting in a pleasurable feeling of well-being, in the case of logos or music, the pharmakon is a particular techne—such as the application of a particular rhythm or melodic mode—that causes the soul of the hearer to be “put into a state” (both Aristotle and Gorgias use the verb kathistani)  or to have its “disposition”  (taxis) rearranged according to the “disposition” (taxis again) of the pharmakon or techne applied, and this “state” is expressed behaviorally and physically as a particular type of pathos: “fearful shuddering”, “much-weeping pity”, “lament-loving longing”, and so forth (pg 78).

            Walker believes that the beats and rhythm of a song changes your disposition to the “sad” or “happy” melody the music exudes.  As we  have read from Massumi,  affect is the reasoning behind our emotion and dispositions. But if the beats and rhythm are the cause of the affect, then music  is not self contained.  Because as Edbauer would say, the beats do not have the emotions of happiness or sadness instilled in them. The beats produce a disposition which “hovers” around the music like a virus, ready to infect its next victim. This is one of the reasons why music can so quickly and easily affect us.  And sometimes, we can be affected without cognitively realizing it!

            Music is influential and powerful. But few may realize just how important music is. A recent theory suggests that emotion, affect, and music are pre-adaptations to the formation of language. Jaak Panksepp explains Dan Shanahan’s theory in The Power of the Word May Reside in the Power of Affect. According to Panksepp, the human brain evolved to in a way that produced the areas that control emotion and music. Eventually, the evolution led to the development of language. Like Damasio, Panksepp writes that emotions arise from the lower subcortical part of the brain. As the subcortical area evolved, our ancestors may have developed gestures and/or vocals. But Panksepp believes that the gestures and vocals would have been more musical or poetical, then the language seen today. The step from the musical or poetical stage of evolution would be the beginnings of developing language.

            “Just as emotional communication may have been a pre-adaptation for human invention of music, both may have been essential for the emergence of language,” states Panksepp (pg. 49).  In his journal he states specific evidence to supports his theory. This includes:

1) Animals communicate affectively by sounds

2) Proto-musical competence precedes language in human mind development,

3) Music is the “language” of emotions and its affective power arises from subcortical emotional systems.

             Just like with Walker, Panksepp makes the connection of affect and music. But his claim states that without the progression of emotion/affect/and music, language might not have developed. The progressions between these stages may be the reason why these concepts are still interconnected. Language “was never completely liberated from the affective-musical motivational ground from which it arose (pg. 49).”

Modern psychologists have realized the power and influence that music has. That is why numerous studies have been conducted to analyze it.  Research on music ranges from the way the music is played to how certain brain disorders affect response to music.  Looking through the research, two specific studies had results that interestingly connected with our readings throughout the semester.

Study 1: Similar Patterns of Age-Related Differences in Emotion Recognition from Speech and Music

            For this study, researchers wanted to see if aging had an effect on emotion recognition and intensity.  The study was conducted through vocal expression and music. Subjects included 20-33 year olds who were labeled as the young group. Participants ranging from 65-85 were placed in the older group. For the musical part of the study, four professional musicians played a melody on an electric guitar. The musicians played the melody with a weak, strong, and neutral intensity. But they also had to play the melody, with the different intensities, to produce four separate emotions (anger, fear, happiness, and sadness). All participants in both the young and old groups heard 27 variations of the melody, i.e. high intensity and happiness, low intensity and fear. Researchers asked the subjects to evaluate the emotion the melody produced.

            After the results were combined, it was discovered that there were age-related differences in emotion recognition. The older subjects had a harder time recognizing the negative emotions of fear and sadness in the music. But both the young and the old groups didn’t have problems in recognition of positive or neutral melodies.

            What is interesting about these results is that they contradict the characteristics that Aristotle described for elderly man. In Aristotle Rhetoric, Aristotle states in regards to older men, “they are cowardly, and are always anticipating danger, unlike that of the young, who are warm-blooded, their temperament is chilly; old age has paved the way for cowardice; fear is, in fact, a form of chill (pg. 36).  In this quote, he depicts elderly men as fearful of everything. While the research study did include women, almost half of the subjects were male. So if elderly men are suppose to be fearful of everything, why weren’t they recognizing the negative emotion of fear in the music?

            The researchers considered two possibilities that could be the reasons for the outcome of the results. The first consideration was that the areas in the brain that emotion recognition relies on could change with age. Not only does the frontal cortex lose volume as we get older, there is also a theory that the right hemisphere ages faster than the left—negative emotions are processed in the right side. This idea relates back to Damasio’s thinking of the biological affecting the social. In Descartes’ Error, Damasio talks about patients who have “Gage matrix”—side effects from brain damage that are similar to Phineas Gage. One such patient, A,  had massive damage in his frontal lobes on both the left and right sides, with the right side having a larger exercision. Because of the damage, the patient no longer showed or felt emotion. Damasio emphasizes that “there was no sign of embarrassment sadness, or anguish at such a tragic turn of events (pg. 56).”  Because the patient had damage in the same areas that the researchers in the study were predicting caused the lack of emotion recognition, it is a strong possibility aging affects brain processes and recognition.

            The other explanation to clarify the results of the study had more to do with motivation.  According to the socioemotional selectivity theory, in order to keep their well-being, older people focus more on positivity rather than negativity.  But young individuals are more likely to focus in on negative aspects. From an evolutionary perspective, this would be smart because the young would want protect themselves from anything that could injure or kill them, which would limit their reproduction of offspring.  But for older adults, focusing on negative aspect is no longer a “useful investment”.  Elderly people have most likely already reproduced, so looking out for danger or negative situations would be less necessary for them. If the socioemotional theory is the reason for the results found in the study, it seems that Aristotle would have been wrong in his characteristics of older men. But on cannot be too harsh at Aristotle  because he was not aware of how evolution plays a big part in whom and what we are.

Study 2: Mixed Affective Response to Music with Conflicting Cues

            In the second study, researchers wanted to disprove the theory that emotions are only bipolar. If this theory were true, then one would not be able to feel emotions at the same time, i.e. happy and sad. The researchers believed the best way to test this out would be to use music because it can produce non-intentional feelings. Two experiments were conducted to see whether music with conflicting cues could create mixed feelings in the subjects. Experiment 1 had 40 undergraduates individually listen to forty-eight  30-s excerpts from different genre recordings. The pure and mixed feeling clips were chosen from the same genre, artist, and CD, so no confusion would be made because of musical style. After each excerpt, participants rated the clip on how it made them feel on a scale, 0-not at all to 6-extremelly. The scale included happy, sad, pleasant and unpleasant.

            The second experiment also used 40 undergraduate subjects and the same procedure as that of experiment one. What changed in this trial was that instead of rating their feelings on a scale, participants marked their responses on a two-dimensional grid. The first grid axis were happy and sad, while the second grid was pleasant and unpleasant. Like the first experiment, the axis was numbered 0-6.  Subjects were told to pin point their feelings on the axes.

            What the researchers found was that in both experiments, conflicting cues in music did produce mixed feelings of happiness and sadness.  Experiment 2 was the best indicator of this because it did not use a unipolar scale like experiment 1. The researchers indicate that these findings are important. Not only does it prove that emotions can simultaneously be produced, but it also shows that mixed feeling are not wholly independent of another.

            This is not the first time we learn about bipolar emotions. In Rethinking “the Public”: The Role of Emotion in Being-with-Others, Smith and Hyde talk about emotions on a line of continuum.  The authors describe Aristotle’s opposites of emotion, i.e. anger-calm, kindness-cruelty, and how in order to provoke an emotion in the audience, the rhetor must move along the line of emotional continuum. The research study would contradict this notion because its results indicate that the continuum is not necessary. But Smith and Hyde do bring the point that emotions affect each other. In their article, they discuss how being scared at something can also make you angry at what made you fearful. While they say that this is moving along the lines of continuum could it be, like in the experiments, that these emotions are mixed in together? Like the researchers noted in their discussion, mixed feelings are not completely independent of one another.

            The results from the research study may sound familiar. In Massumi’s Autonomy of Effect, he opens up the article with the story of the German children and the film of the snowman. Researchers in that study found that the children were experiencing both sadness and pleasantness when watching the wordless version of the film.  This was due to the the primacy of the affective in image reception. Intensity, affect, is especially prevalent when there is an unexpected jolt that produces suspense and potentiality. In the case of the children and the film, the jolt may have come from the fact that they were seeing a film without words. This may have been a surprise for them, and their skin conductance was showing this (more skin response more pleasantness). In the case of the study with the conflicting music cues, it may be that the participants were jolted as well. Because people usually associate the music they are listening too with one feeling, hearing the conflicting cues may have jolted the subjects. It would have been interesting to see what would have happened if the researchers also looked at the skin response of the music participants.  It may be that the music’s subject’s skin response would increase with the conflicting cues music, just like that of the German children and the wordless film.

            (Conclusion in progress)

            Music power and influence over our affect and emotion is undeniable. Studies on music are beginning to show us new and old ideas on the realm of

Blog 11: Rhetoric in Movement

             Edbauer does a good job of wrapping up what we have learned throughout the semester. The key point that I took from her argument, and everyone else we have read, was that rhetoric is always in movement. I liked her comparison of rhetoric to a city, and how we should think of it more as a verb then a noun. She writes “…we recall how we saw that “city” might better be conceptualized in terms of a verb—as in to city—as opposed to a noun. This grammatical oddity parallels the ways we speak in terms of rhetoric as a verb: we do rhetoric, rather than (just) finding ourselves in a rhetoric (pg. 13, para.1).”
           It’s funny, because as I wrote the last three words in the quote, spell check insisted on changing it to “in rhetoric”; a more abstract vs. situational phrase. As we have seen throughout our readings, rhetoric is always in movement between people, situations, and places. Massumi and Brennan argued in their writings that we are always open to affect. If we have this type of openness, especially through our skin, then affect, emotions, and rhetoric, are never static or embedded in an object. It is in constant circulation, just like a virus Edbauer says.
           Edbauer compares viruses to rhetoric. She writes about  the baboon, cat, and  C virus to use as an example of apparel evolution. An example I thought that tied in with apparel evolution was HIV seen within humans and monkeys. Both instances demonstrate how rhetoric is not situated in a particular place. You don’t see a specific origin because the rhetoric has blended between intensities and energies. “A rhetoric emerges already infected by the viral intensities that are circulating in the social field. Moreover, this same rhetoric will go on to evolve in apparel ways: between two “species” that have absolutely nothing to do with each other (Edbauer, pg. 14, para. 1).”  I like how Edbauer compared rhetoric to evolution, because I believe rhetoric has evolved throughout the centuries, from Aristotle to the writers and philosophers of today.  Just like specfic species evolved in particular ways, the evolution of rhetoric has evolved in different contexts.
          The last point I would like to bring up is Edbauer’s example of “Keep Austin Weird”. This was a good demonstration of a rhetoric situation that has moved throughout different exigencies and audiences. But the content, or heart, of the rhetoric is still found throughout these different scenarios.  Again, this goes to show that rhetoric is not embedded in a situation but  is transmitted and affected throughout.  Something that came across my mind when thinking about this was the different places that that Texas Fight song is played. The song can be heard at football games. But it is also played as the closing song for one of the bars on 6^th street. Again, rhetoric in movement.
         After reading about the different viewpoints on rhetoric, I believe I have a wider understanding of it. While there will never be an overall consensus of what exactly rhetoric is, I now have the basic knowledge and vocabulary to notice rhetoric in situations I would not have considered before.

Final Project Proposal

            After reading the New York Times’ article about music and the brain, I started thinking about emotion/affect and its role in music. I wanted to know more about this connection; so I looked up what research has been done in the psychology field on the topic. What I found intrigued me.

          One of the studies I found was titled “Similar Pattern of Age-Related Differences in Emotion Recognition from Speech and Music.” Another was called “Mixed Affective Responses to Music with Conflicting Cues.”  What was interesting was these studies connected in some way with what we have read throughout the semester, such as Aristotle’s age differences and emotional vs. rational thinking. One article I found extremely relevant to our discussions was “The Power of Word May Reside in The Power of Affect.” The article’s abstract describes how pre-adaption of language may have required social–affective brain mechanisms, gestures, and poetic or musical vocals.

         For my final paper, I am interested in doing a research summary of the journals and articles I found on the connections between emotion/affect and music. I want to connect the studies and their findings to readings we have read throughout the semester.

Final Paper

1) Discuss why emotion/affect influence peoples' love of music.

2) Decide which journals (and how many) to use.

3) Summarize studies and findings.

4) Relate studies and findings back to articles we have read throughout the semester.

5)  Create eight-page-research report for peer review.

Blog 10: The Economy of Emotions

           I like how Ahmed takes an approach to emotions that is different from our other readings. While she does talk about the transfer of emotions from body to body, she explains that these transfers are “economic” and don’t reside in the subject or object.  When talking about the emotion of hate, Ahmed states “Hate is economic; it circulates between signifiers in relationships of difference and displacement (pg. 119, para.1).” Because emotions are circulated, this means we project them towards others that trigger that particular emotion.  

            We have all been in a situation where we seem to dislike someone just because they remind us of someone we don’t like. Since emotions are not set in subjects, we displace our emotions for the person we don’t like onto the other individual. But this economy doesn’t just apply to one other person. It can extend to groups. According to Ahmed “The impossibility of reducing hate to a particular body allows hate to circulate in an economic sense, working to differentiate some others from other others, a differentiation that is never “over,” as it awaits for others who have not yet arrived (pg.123 para.1).” I thought this concept was interesting because it sort of ties into Aristotle’s thought about hate.

            When comparing anger and hate, Aristotle felt that one difference between the two was you felt angry towards individuals and hate towards groups or classes. Looking at it from Ahmed’s point, one could see why. If the emotion of hate was instilled in the person, you should theoretically just hate that person.  But since hate is economic, you would displace the emotion of hate to others who are similar (groups).  It seems that Aristotle and Ahmed are on the same page.

            I think learning about economics of emotions is valuable. If the emotion we are feeling is not instilled in the subject, we cannot displace it on to them as if it were. Relationship researchers make the note that you are suppose to own up what you are feeling when talking to a partner. This leads to better communication and a healthier relationship.  Instead of saying “You make me so angry, why don’t you ever clean up (displacing emotion on partner)!” one should say “I am upset because I feel like I do most of the housework (owning up to how you feel).”

Revision: Written Pathetic Appeal

 [For my revision, I decided to change my claim to something I  felt more strongly about. Instead of making the argument that drugs should be legalized in the U.S to reduce the Mexican drug violence, I make the claim that the Arizona Immigration law persecutes Mexican refugees. While the first half of my appeal is the same, the second half focuses on the lack of compassion that is shown to Mexican immigrants who flee to the U.S. to escape the drug violence.]
    
            The drug violence in Mexico is turning into an epidemic. To escape the horrors that occur in their country, many Mexican citizens are entering into the U.S. illegally. But laws, such as the Arizona Immigration, label these survivors as criminals. For my appeal, I make the claim that the Arizona Immigration law persecutes Mexican refugees. To get the audience to understand how bad the violence is in Mexico, I used enargeia to describe the fear Nuevo Laredo's citzens live in. But I also wanted to bring the situation close to home for readers. So I wrote about how my own hometown of Laredo has been plagued with drug violence. Later on in my appeal, I use real life examples of three individuals and families who have suffered from the violence to further connect the audience to what is happening.

            After reading my appeal, I want the audience to feel fear, anger,  pity, and shame. I hope that by experiencing these negative emotions, the audience will take on the view that more compassion and justice needs to be shown towards Mexican immigrants who come to this country to escape the drug violence. After reading about how many people have been killed in Mexico, the audience will be afraid. Readers would  understand why Mexican citizens are fleeing into the U.S. The audience may also feel anger when reading Russell Pearce's thoughts about Mexican refugees. People may believe he created the bill to persecute Mexican immigrants. But when the readers learn about what happened to Maria and Monarez’s family, they will feel pity. In the case of Monarez’s family, the audience would take on the notion that they would have done the same thing if they were in their situation. Overall, I hope the audience will feel shame after reading how the Arizona Immigration law persecutes a specific ethnicity in need. Readers may think that more understanding and compassion needs to be shown towards Mexican immigrants. To read my entire written pathetic appeal, click here!

Visual Argument: College Students With Guns

College Students With Guns

            Each Tuesday and Thursday I decide what I will need to take to Pathos. Books, papers, and pens are what I usually bring. But what if I decided to take a concealed gun? The thought is scary, but if Texas lawmakers have their way it could soon be possible. Lawmakers are trying to pass a bill that would allow college students to have concealed guns on campuses. Supporters of this bill are claiming that guns would help protect students in case of a shooter (Fantz).  While this is an understandable argument, I believe that the environments college students are surrounded by, partying and stress, are not good settings for guns to be around.  Overall, I believe that college students and guns are a bad combination.

             To begin my argument, I chose the image of the student with the books and the gun to show the oddity of the situation. Viewers may have a hard time processing the picture because it is hard to get their minds wrapped around the concept of guns and college life. This indicates that the idea of students with guns is already negatively engrained in them. The belief is probably instilled in the audience through college shootings that they have witnessed or heard about. When people start going back to those memories, it brings up the negative feelings they felt at that time.

            When the Prezi moves toward the second image, the audience sees a gun and a six pack of beer together. The picture represents the partying and drinking environment that is prevalent in college life. Viewers will connect the second image to the idea of guns around intoxicated students.  Having a weapon in an environment where people’s thinking is unclear is not safe. And college students are known to do regrettable things when they are drunk. Emotion may come from the fact that viewers may remember a time where they regretted something they did when they were intoxicated. And that regret could have been a lot worse if guns were around.

            Image number three depicts the other aspect of college that affects many students: stress.  While almost every student experiences it, each individual handles stress in their own way. But picture three demonstrates the negative routes that stressed students can take when they have a gun. Emotions will be provoked in the audience because we can all relate to being stressed because of school. On top of that, viewers also have memories and negative feelings of what happens when stressed college students have guns.

            When the presentation moves toward the fourth picture, the audience is hit with a grotesque image of a dead Charles Whitman. The image represents how the issue of stressed students with guns was prevalent and dangerous even forty years ago. Generations of college students with guns have led to negative outcomes. Viewers will feel negative emotions from the fact that the picture is very graphic.  While most of the audience was not even born when the shooting happened, they may remember how they felt at the most recent UT shooting.

            The last picture’s message leads to the fifth and sixth images.  The picture of Colton Tooley is a recent example of what happens when a stressed student is in possession of a gun. Tooley would remind the viewers that guns and students are not a good combination.  Next, is the image of the caution tape over the UT tower. The picture depicts how easy our campus can become a crime scene when guns are around. Both images evoke emotion because the audience is most likely going to remember how they felt the day Tooley took his life.  

            As the presentation continues, picture seven shows the ultimate case of why guns and college students do not mix well. The student shooter from Virginia Tech is probably the worst-recent case scenario of a stressed student with a gun. The audience will probably remember the sad photos and memorials they saw during the tragedy, indicating the damage students with guns can do. Because the image shows the shooter pointing the gun straight at you, negative emotions are sure to be roused up in the viewers.

            When the audience gets to images eight and nine, they see the chaos and tragedy that can result from students with guns on campuses. The picture of the police officers carrying the student evokes emotion because the scene looks like it could be from a war. But sadly, the incident took place on a regular college campus. With the image of the of individuals who were murdered that day, emotion is set in the viewers because the victims died going to school, something we do every Tuesday and Thursday.

            The last image displays, again, the abnormality of guns and college together.  Emotion comes to the viewer from the fact that all the negative emotions the other photos provoked are now going to be tied to the concept of guns and college life. The picture of the gun and the word college together are now going to carry these negative feelings and associations.

            After seeing the slideshow, I hope the audience will feel a range of  powerful emotions.  The main emotion the images should provoke in the viewer is fear. Seeing the different environments guns could be around on college campuses, the student shooters, and the chaos that can result from them should make the audience afraid. The other emotions that viewers should feel are sadness and alarm.  Sadness will come from the image of the individuals who were killed at the Virginia Tech Shooting. Viewers will feel alarmed though when they see the first three images, the Tower with caution tape, and the I gun college picture.

            By provoking these negative emotions, I hope to get the audience to take on the view that guns, even concealed ones, should not be permitted on college campuses. After looking at the images, viewers may feel alarmed about stressed individuals caring guns to school. The audience may come to believe that it is not safe to allow this.  But when viewers see the image of those that were murdered at Virginia Tech, they may become sad and take on the notion that guns do horrible things to innocent people.  In the end,  I hope the audience will become fearful after seeing the images of Charles Whitman, Colton Tooley, and the Virginia Shooter and think that guns on campuses, or guns in general, are just too dangerous for anyone to have.

Work Cited

Fantz, Ashley. "Texas Considering Concealed Handguns on Campus." CNN. N.p., 22 Feb 2011. Web. 4 Apr 2011.

Photo Credits

Image 1: Student with books and gun

http://www.flickr.com/photos/_borna/2412858578/

March 29, 2011

Image 2: Six pack of beer with gun

http://www.crimefilenews.com/2008/11/disarming-off-duty-police-officers.html

March 30, 2011

Image 3: Student with gun to head

Photographer: Tono Balaguer

http://www.123rf.com/photo_4417163_unhappy-sad-student-suicide-gun-metaphor-stacked-books-over-white.html

Image 4: Dead Charles Whitman

http://republicofaustin.com/44-years-after-the-ut-tower-massacre-is-charles-whitman-still-a-bad-guy-graphic-pics/

April 3, 2011

Image 5: Colton Tooley

http://law.rightpundits.com/?p=2303

March 28, 2011

Image 6: Tower with caution tape

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2010/0928/UT-shooting-comes-just-as-Austin-campus-debates-concealed-weapons-law

April 4, 2011

Image 7: Virginia Tech shooter

http://www.e-manonline.com/blog.php?entry_id=4575

March 28, 2011

Image 8: Police officers carrying student

http://www.virginiatechmassacre.com/virginia-tech-massacre-pictures-1.html

March 28, 2011

Image 9: Those killed in Virginia Tech Massacre

http://womenofcaliber.wordpress.com/2009/04/16/are-you-a-%E2%80%9Cgun-free-zone%E2%80%9D/

March 28, 2011

Image 10: I gun college

http://www.thishappenedintexas.com/

March 29, 2011

Blog 9: The Thinking Body

            I have to say that I enjoyed this week’s reading. Edbauer did a great job of explaining Massumi’s ideas about affect, and I feel that I am getting a better understanding about this topic. One thing I have been noticing though is  a recurring theme between the readings from Damazio till Edbauer.  It seems that the age old debate between body vs. mind is being mentioned or hinted throughout these readings.

            For centuries, there has been a debate over which substance, the body or mind, is superior. Philosophers like Descartes thought that the material substance (the body) could not think (Wiki). Hence, the mind would be the superior one.   I think many people, especially scientists, have carried over this ideology as they place cognition ahead of bodily matters. As a society, we have come to value the mind (cognition) over the body because we feel it’s the rational one.  But Edbauer changes this idea when she writes “Although we are often eager to give primacy to consciousness and cognition—thereby also reducing corporality to a secondary importance –Spinoza finds evidence that the noncognitive aspects of the body reflect a kind of thinking (pg. 15, par. 26).”  

            What Edbauer is trying to explain is that the body thinks through affects. And what is even more amazing, and scary, is that it does this before we even cognitively think about it.  “Before we approach a situation cognitively, as subjects, we are already involved relationality (Edbauer, pg 20, par. 30).” For me, this idea is very powerful. Coming from a psychology major, I know the extensive time, money, and research that goes into studying cognition. But seeing as there is intensity, even pre-sense, that thinks before you even think makes me believe that maybe we should be studying affect as much as cognition.

            As rhetoricians, affect will have a profound effect on how we move our audiences. In college, I think students worry too much about trying to make the perfect sentence or paragraph. Obviously, Bush is an example of how what we say is not important. For all the words he makes up, or sentences he rearranges, Bush still exudes his affect towards others, and he still changes us in a way. The real goal we should be working towards as writers is becoming in relation with our audience, entering into that transition passage.  The only one worry I have about affect is the power it has. If someone like Bush can affect us, before we can even cognitively process it, what other kinds of people can put us under this “relational” spell?

Work Cited

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dualism_(philosophy_of_mind). April 3, 2011

Visual Argument Rough Draft: Guns on College Campuses

Guns on College Campuses



              For class today, I will need to my book, pen, paper, and gun.  Find this sentence strange? Well, it is. But it hasn’t deterred lawmakers from trying to pass bills that allow college students to have concealed guns on campus. The debate is a hot topic right now with gun enthusiasts claiming that guns could help protect students in case of a shooter. For my visual argument, I make the claim that college students and guns are not a good combination.

             I chose the first image of the student holding the gun with the books to show the oddity of the situation. The viewer may have a hard time processing the picture because it is hard to get your mind wrapped around the concept of guns and college life. This shows that the idea of students and guns is already negatively engrained in us. The belief is probably instilled in us through college shootings we have heard about or witnessed. When we start going back to those memories, it brings up the negative feelings we felt at that time.

            The second image represents the partying/drinking environment which is prevalent in college life.  With the gun on top of the six pack of beer, the viewer gets the association: guns around intoxicated students.  College students do regrettable things when they are partying or drunk. So having a weapon in an environment where people’s thinking is unclear is not smart. Viewers may feel emotion from the fact that they can remember a time where they regretted something they did after drinking.  

            Picture number three shows the other atmosphere of college, stress. Some handle stress better than other. But the image demonstrates the negative routes that individuals who are stressed can take with a gun. Emotions will be provoked in the audience because we are all know what is like to be stressed. And we have the memories and negative feelings of what happens when stressed college kids have guns.

            The last picture’s message leads to the fourth and fifth image.  The picture of Colton Tooley is an example of what happens when a stressed student is in possession of a gun. Tooley would remind the viewers that guns and students are not a good combination.  Next is the image of the caution tape over the UT tower. The picture is to depict how easy our campus can become a crime scene when guns are around. Both images provoke emotion because the audience is most likely going to remember how they felt the day Tooley took his life.  

            Picture six is the ultimate case of why guns and college students do not mix well. The student shooter from Virginia Tech is probably the worst case scenario of a stressed student with a gun.  Because the image shows the shooter pointing the gun straight at you, emotions are sure to be riled up in the viewers.

            Image seven and eight supports the claim by showing the chaos and tragedy that can result from students with guns on campus. The image of the police officers carrying the student evokes emotion because the scene looks like it could be from a war. But the sad fact is it was on a normal college campus.  With the image of the dozens of individuals who were murdered that day, emotion comes from the fact that these were people who were killed doing what we do every day, going to school.

            The last image displays, again, the abnormality of guns and college together.  Emotion comes to the viewer from the fact that all the negative emotions the other photos provoked are now going to be tied to the concept of guns and college. So the picture of the gun and the word college together are now going to carry these negative feelings and associations.

            After viewing the slideshow, the emotions I want the audience to feel are fear, sadness, and alarm. By provoking these negative emotions, I hope to get people to take on the view that guns should not be permitted on college campuses. The audience may feel alarmed about stressed individuals being able to carry guns on campuses and think that is unsafe to allow this.   But when they see the image of those that were murdered at Virginia Tech, they may become sad and take on the belief that guns do horrible things to innocent people. Finally, when the audience becomes fearful after seeing the images of Colton Tooley and the Virginia Shooter, they may just think that guns on campuses or guns in general, are just too dangerous for anyone to have.

Photo Credits

Image 1: Student with books and gun

http://www.flickr.com/photos/_borna/2412858578/

March 29, 2011

Image 2: Beer with gun

http://www.crimefilenews.com/2008/11/disarming-off-duty-police-officers.html

March 30, 2011

Image 3: Student with gun to head

Photographer: Tono Balaguer

http://www.123rf.com/photo_4417163_unhappy-sad-student-suicide-gun-metaphor-stacked-books-over-white.html

Image 4: Colton Tooley

http://law.rightpundits.com/?p=2303

March 28, 2011

Image 5: Tower with caution tape

Image 6: Virginia Tech shooter

http://www.associatedcontent.com/topic/61535/virginia_tech_shooting.html?cat=9

March 28, 2011

Image 7: Police officers carrying student

http://www.virginiatechmassacre.com/virginia-tech-massacre-pictures-1.html

March 28, 2011

Image 8: Those killed in Virginia Tech Massacre

http://womenofcaliber.wordpress.com/2009/04/16/are-you-a-%E2%80%9Cgun-free-zone%E2%80%9D/

March 28, 2011

Image 9: I gun college

http://www.thishappenedintexas.com/

March 29, 2011