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September 2022

Form Analysis/Brainstorming

My first thought was to tell a story focused on polymorphic colonial organisms, which are organisms that are made up of individuals units, or zooids that have different specialities. For example, zooids may be responsible for feeding, defense, navigation or reproduction. In order for the larger organism to survive, the individuals need to all exists, and work together. Another classification of colonial organisms are chimera colonies, which are many sub-colonies of closely-related, but not genetically identical. There are theories that the diversity in the chimera colonies has advantages in being more resilient to environmental threats.

I haven’t been sure about what metaphor to use, because a lot of my ideas have been pretty literal. I was thinking of presenting an organism with different jobs. And in this way, I was hoping that the form I chose to have some movement. My first thought was to create a guide that takes inspiration from Parable of the Polygons by Vi Hart and Nicky Case, and to create a website that allows the user to move components around the screen. But then I realized that I spent so much time in front a computer, and maybe it would be a useful exercise to create something more tangible, and less technical. During the summer session, I noticed that I sometimes struggled to be creative at my computer. Since I write code for work, it’s sometimes challenging to turn my analytical, work-focused brain off, and be creative when writing code.

When brainstorming about analog ways to tell a story of movement, I came to the idea of creating a pop up book. This seemed like a good way to show movement in a paper form. After doing a bit of preliminary research, I realized that this is also a very technical skill, that will require my analytical mind. But, it’s away from a screen, and doesn’t require my fingers to be on a keyboard, so I think that it may be a good choice for my own creativity.

Now I am thinking a bit more critically about the metaphor I want to use, and how a pop up book may enhance that narrative. To sum up the metaphor that I keep coming back to, in the style that Lakoff and Johnson use in Metaphors to Live By, it would be “diversity is good”. I also keep realizing that though my form and the specific narrative will be different, the over all theme and metaphor is very similar to Parable of the Polygons. I like the idea of using Hart and Case’s general premise, but doing it in a different form. I think that the pop up form will be a bit limiting, mostly because it is new to me, and I will likely not be able to tell such a full story due to time limitations and lack of skill. But, I think if I focus on reimagining this first interaction of Parable of the Polygons, I can still create an effective guide.

 

It would be interesting to show different elements (zooids?) that when they get closer together, they become “happy”, and when they’re further apart they are sad. Maybe something like this:

 

 

I wonder if this is too similar to Parable of the Polygons, and if there is something different I can do to bring the narrative a bit more closely tied to colonial organism, and biology, and kinship. Potentially, I could borrow the ideas I learned from Margaret about slime mold, and their potential self-sacrificing behavior.

I also wanted to add a couple images of my first pop up experiments. These were created by following the Duncan Birmingham’s first two tutorials in The Popup Channel on youtube.

Metaphors We Live By Response

  • Lakoff + Johnson give several examples throughout the text of linguistic metaphorical systems. Are there any you found odd, outdated, or different from metaphorical systems that you use, either personally or in your language, culture, or social sphere? For instance, do you speak about conversation as battle, or use orientational metaphors the same way the authors describe?

As a non-native speaker of English, I have two different language systems in my brain. For some sentences in English, I can understand it’s meaning but cannot translate them into Chinese directly. For example: “It’s difficult to put my ideas into words.” is a form we don’t use in Chinese. We usually say 只可意会不可言传 (can only be felt and understood in one’s heart but cannot be explained in words.) or 难以言喻 (beyond expression) to express the same meaning. In the phrase 难以言喻, 难 means hard, 以 equals “to, “言 means say/speak,  and 喻 means metaphor.

 

  • Can you identify a metaphorical system that you commonly use? What do you think is the motivating rationale (“experiential basis”) behind that system – or is there one? Have you ever intentionally (or unintentionally) changed the metaphorical system that you use to speak about a certain subject, to reflect a different experience or worldview?

I love to use metaphors in my daily life. Metaphors and analogies help to think and express myself a lot. I like to analog my thought into something that is world-wild consensus to break through the limits of language. When I answered the “Who are you outside of IMA Low Res?” I said,  “I am a star in the sky who wish to light the moon up.” This comes out from a fact: the sun light up the earth. The moon is usually neglected when compared to the sun. However, the moon also lights up the night silently. I want to be like the star around the moons in society to accompany them when they try their best to light up the night.

Also, in Chinese, there are 歇后语 (a two-part allegorical saying). In a 歇后语, the former part is a metaphor or metaphor, and the latter part is an interpretation of the meaning. It’s commonly used in my daily life. Here are some examples of 歇后语:

黄鼠狼给鸡拜年–不怀好意。 A weasel wishing Happy New Year to a chicken —  bad intentions



肉包子打狗–有去无回。 Chasing a dog by throwing meat dumplings at it — no return.


兔子尾巴长不了。 The tail of a rabbit — cannot be extended; won’t last long.


    

  • What metaphors/systems of metaphor are commonly used when discussing your topic? If “the essence of a metaphor is understanding and experiencing one kind of thing in terms of another” (5), what other kinds of metaphors might be useful for discussing your topic or an aspect of your topic?
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This is the main difficulty I face when working on my topic: fenestra. Fenestra itself is used as a metaphor. The word initially meant window, but it’s now used for small openings on the bones, blood vessels, and insects’ wings. Fenestras are usually used for transporting molecules and balancing pressure. This makes me think about the underground water system,  funnels, sluices, and filter papers.


		

	






	

		

			
Metaphors We Live By
    

  • Lakoff + Johnson give several examples throughout the text of linguistic metaphorical systems. Are there any you found odd, outdated, or different from metaphorical systems that you use, either personally or in your language, culture, or social sphere? For instance, do you speak about conversation as battle, or use orientational metaphors the same way the authors describe?
    

    
One metaphorical saying that has never quite clicked in my brain is when someone says “shoot”, and they mean “go for it”, like Lakoff and Johnson mention, “You disagree? Okay, shoot!“. Though this is a pretty common phrase in English, and in my culture, my brain usually interprets the word “shoot” as a euphemism for “shit”.  So my first instinct is to understand the person as saying, “shit, you disagree with me”, rather than the intended meaning of, “okay, you disagree with me, let’s hear your argument”.
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  • Can you identify a metaphorical system that you commonly use? What do you think is the motivating rationale (“experiential basis”) behind that system – or is there one? Have you ever intentionally (or unintentionally) changed the metaphorical system that you use to speak about a certain subject, to reflect a different experience or worldview? 

    This is so hard to identify! I usually don’t know when I speak in common metaphors and idioms until I’m speaking with someone who English isn’t their first language – because I recognize that English has a lot of idioms that don’t make much sense when taken literally. But trying to come up with something on my own is difficult!One system I have been able to identify is “north is up or straight ahead” and I think this is mostly because when looking at a map, North is usually oriented at the top. This has some cascading implications that “south is down or behind”, “west is left”, “east is right”. This obviously gets tricky, and becomes untrue when I am not in fact facing north. Furthermore, I realize that I internally think of specific places as being up, down, left or right from my current location, or possibly from where I grew up. For example, even if I were always facing north, when I think of “the west coast”, I often envision a place that is to my left. But, this is very dependent on where I am, and which “west coast” we’re talking about. The west coast of Ireland for example is actually to the east of me, and is “to the right”. So in this case west is not left.
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  • What metaphors/systems of metaphor are commonly used when discussing your topic? If “the essence of a metaphor is understanding and experiencing one kind of thing in terms of another” (5), what other kinds of metaphors might be useful for discussing your topic, or an aspect of your topic? 

    The term “colonial organism” itself could be part of a system of metaphors. It is using a human-centric idea of colonies and applying that to organisms as a way for humans to understand how they live and survive. But the organisms themselves likely don’t have any concept that their way of living, and being dependent on one another for life is “different” in any way. Scientists also seem to use the term “kin” or “kinship” when talking about microorganisms that are genetically similar, and use this metaphor to understand how the interact with organisms that are genetically different. This has become especially interesting to me since talking with Margaret about slime mold – she mentioned that science doesn’t know if the slime mold amoebas even “care” that their neighbors are kin or not. Based on their behavior of self-sacrificing in order for others to survive, it is unknown if this is done because they are competing with those that are different, of if they are just cooperating to that life can continue. Humans use a human-centric metaphor system when looking at anything that is not human as a way to understand their biology, behavior, relationships, etc. And though that metaphor system makes sense, since it is a way to compare, it is not always accurate.
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Interview with Margaret Smith
Once I learned that Margaret has a degree in Evolutionary Biology, I knew that she would be a great person to talk about colonial organisms with! A couple of big picture ideas that came out of our conversation were:


    

  • Maybe nailing down exactly what a colonial organism is, or isn’t, doesn’t really matter. I was feeling the need to put this concept in a box, but maybe it’s okay if the idea of a colonial organism is a bit more fluid than that. After all, the term “colonial organism” and its classification is all based on decisions made by humans. The organisms themselves don’t necessarily care how they’re classified! Lots of organisms live in colonies, and are dependent on one another. And maybe that is the more important thread to pull at, over determining if a bee is a colonial organism or not.
    • 

  • On the other side of that coin though, it is very interesting to zoom out and consider if all earth itself, all living things are colonial in some way. For much of human existence, the species weren’t able to survive without other living things, or continue the species without each other. I’m now reflecting on how to some extent that is changing, with modern science we are able to generate food in a lab, have a child without a partner, etc. The colony of living things on this planet is certainly changing.

      

    • A couple other terms we touched on, that I’d love to do some additional research on are:

        

      • biome
        • 

      • superorganism
        • 

      

      • 

    

    • 

  • When Margaret worked in a lab, her focus was on dictyostelium discoideum, an amoeba known as slime mold. We specifically talked about several life cycles these amoeba, and spent some time looking at their social cycle. This is a cycle that the amoebas go through when they need food. They start out being individuals and aggregate, changing into several different shapes to eventually form a sort of fruit. When the fruit erupts, so to speak, it’s spores are transported to a place where there is hopefully food.
    

    
Once piece that is particularly fascinating about this is that only the amoeba in the fruit survive this cycle. The rest die, and sort of sacrifice themselves so that the ones that are in the fruit can survive. In the lab, Margaret and her colleagues found that the fruit was not an equal split of the different genetic material in the aggregation. Are the amoebas that die sacrificing themselves for those that are more genetically similar? Is it cooperation or a competition?
    • 

  • Based on the above, it’s clear that the systems involved in how dictyostelium discoideum live, are complex. I also learned just how difficult it is to compare the life cycles of organisms to each other. At first, I thought that perhaps humans have more cycles than dictyostelium discoideum, since we are larger, more complex creatures. But Margaret questioned maybe humans have less cycles that  dictyostelium discoideum – we cannot reproduce asexually! It makes sense, but was still an interesting revelation to see how human-centric my thinking is.
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Metaphors
One metaphor that Lakoff and Johnson discussed, “time is money,” initially struck me as a little off, or not as universal in my culture as the others. My first reaction was to think “yeah, we say that sometimes, but it’s more about time being a limited resource.” When I turned the page to see “time is a limited resource,” I laughed. I didn’t even think of how closely related “time is money” and “time is a limited resource” really are, and how money, resources, and value are employed in metaphors all over our language. So many of these — “happy is up,” “future is forward/up” — feel so fundamental that it almost doesn’t feel like a metaphor. It FEELS like happy IS up. And I think that’s the point. The feeling of things impacting our language and understanding is powerful — and can also be limiting.


One metaphorical system that is commonly used amongst my friend group is that of pets being children. We refer to them as “fur babies,” dogs go to “doggie daycare,” fancy or expensive kennels are “spas” or “camp.” I think the motivating rationale for this is that many of us do NOT have kids yet, but we do have this special bond with our pets, and we need to take care of them. The deep love, connection, responsibility, and other mix of feelings motivates this connection.


I think that one of the ways that I have somewhat intentionally changed the metaphorical system that I use is when speaking out things and about groups of people as gendered. It is common to hear “she’s a beaut” when talking about things like cars or boats or other objects that one is excited about. This is starting to feel really dated though, and gets into an objectification of women/women as objects system that is deeply problematic. I’m also trying to be more aware of gendered terms for people that are not as inclusive as I’d like to be, like “guys.”


Gardens are commonly discussed as paradise, oases, natural, peaceful, and purity. But sometimes gardens are serious drains on the environment. Some gardens actually decrease biodiversity and encourage the spread of invasive species. They are sometimes far from the “natural” landscape. It might be useful to consider plants inhabitants.


		

	






	

		

			
Borders Cohort Reading
I have to admit that I’m “reluctant” to read the chapters from “Borderlands / La Frontera”. For the mixed form of English and Spanish. And the topic is also weird for me at first glance. Strangely, however, I feel like I entered the environment described by the poem in the first chapter. After that, the author talked about the history of the U.S.-Mexican border and Chicana. Considering the title Borderlands, I think the language mixture also shows “borderlands” in the text, which is a novel form for me to read.


 


Following is the second chapter about rebellion. Although I do not fully understand it, I read some flavors of metaphor. I suppose that the author compares the cultural conflict to border clashes. The representation of the conflict is the author. She is a Chicana, the “borderland” between Indian and Anglo. Also, a queer, the “borderland” between male and female. The rebellion against homophobia also expresses rebellion against patriarchy. (Or white supremacy, or whatever I’m unfamiliar with in history, politics, etc.)


 


There’s also a borderland in the art area. The freeport, as the article “Duty-Free Art” said. The artworks there do not belong to any country.


 


And thinking beyond national borders is especially important in the cloud era. While I get bored with these cliches. Such as privacy protection, data sovereignty, etc. It sounds like none of these guys are on the ground (country). The Pirate Bay’s usage of airborne drones explains my opinion: you must use some material to build the network. So you cannot get rid of the real world. The network, the clouds now are the reflection of our real world. Data monopoly is no more different from other monopoly issues for the country and world. The borders that exist offline also exist online in other forms. It may only change after Musk lands on Mars.


 


These articles generally extend my understanding of borders. Beyond the view of just a line, it can be a space, a concept conflict, or the gap between ambiguous areas.


		

	






	

		

			
kinship&quilting interview
Interview flow:


For this interview, I found the tailor who made a suit for me in Shanghai. He is an old master who works in a suit custom shop. The reason that I found him is although making suit or clothes is different from quilting, the connection is still strong and tight. He gave me many clues about quilting or quilting related background majorly in Chinese family and society. 


Before I started talking the interview’s question, I claimed the meeting last not longer than 30 minutes, then I introduced my background and what was the interview’s intention. it was a research trying to find the relationship and impact between quilting or quilting related skills with family, friend and community.  Below is the summary of the Q&A from the old master.


Q: 


    

  1. Could you introduce your background or talk me about your tailor career or study experience?
    2. 



A:


My sewing skill is inherited from my father. I have almost 47 years experience of sewing. I started to work for my father since I was 17 years old.


Q: 


2. Why do you do this job? Is that you like?


A:


I do this job because of my father and the environment’s influence. I like this job, which is the reason that I can make clothes 47 years. 


Q:


3. What is the impact of the skill to you? Does it help you have more solid connection between you and your surrounding relationship?


A:


I have learned to be patient, and it does change my characteristics. (Then I asked: did you help your neighbourhood making clothes? And did this help you have a good reputation in the community?) I did help my neighbourhood making clothes and they were thankful for what I did. 


Q:


4. Was it poor in your community? If it was, did you or people you know do quilting or patchwork? 


A:


Yes, my family and the village I lived was poor compared to surrounding cities. In my family, my father usually quilted for us. We collected leftover materials and my father patched them on our old clothes. My mother do farm work instead. 


Q: 


5. If your family do quilting, who always be the quilters? And is that role important and admired by others?


A:


My father, brother and I all do quilting and sewing. My father make the whole clothes especially Chinese tunic suit during that age. 


Q:


6. Is that many male do the job related to sewing, quilting in your hometown? And why?


A:In the area I lived(Taixin, Jiangsu province), it is mainly male who did sewing. If a family member have the skills, he/she will bring other family member to do the job. A family could be a unit of small clothes factory. (Then I asked: how about female in a family? Don’t they do quilting or sewing?) Most female can do basic needle work but most of them would go to assembly line factory. For me, I don’t teach female the skill because of inconvenience. 


At the same time, another young female tailor in the store answered: I graduated from a clothes college in Shanghai, most of my schoolmates are female. 


Q:


7. Are there any differences between old time and nowadays’ sewing? 


A:


Costumer’s standard is much more higher than before. 


Q:


8. Will you wish to have more creative in the clothes? Or you still want more classical clothes?


A: It depends on the trend of market. We make costumer liked suit rather than what we liked suit. A good suit depends on its detail and fabric rather than its design. 


Q:


9. How do you feel when finish a suit? 


A: When i see my customer is satisfied I will be happy. I really enjoy making suit for people.


Q:


10. what you bring for others and other brings to you?


A: Of course, satisfaction and sense of achievement. 


Personal summary:


After the interview, I gained a lot of information. I am shocked that in Taixin Jiangsu, China, it is mainly male do the quilting and sewing work, which breaks people’s steyerotype. I believed that in different areas of china, many traditional skills were inherited only by male due to the history reason. However, the answer from the young female tailor in the suit custom shop gave me a hint that the tradition and old social practice is almost gone nowadays in China. Many young women engaged into clothing industry. 


 


 


Note: The shop is named Wbespoke in Huangpu district, Shanghai, China.


Interview video Link(Chinese Language): https://youtu.be/AkkNZwjc8tM


		

	






	

		

			
week_3_”Metaphors We Lived by”
Metaphors We Live By


    

  • Lakoff + Johnson give several examples throughout the text of linguistic metaphorical systems. Are there any you found odd, outdated, or different from metaphorical systems that you use, either personally or in your language, culture, or social sphere? For instance, do you speak about conversation as battle, or use orientational metaphors the same way the authors describe?
    • 



A: I found two main verbal metaphors the article mentioned, which are “argument is war” and ” time is money “, are both relevant and did not feel outdated. One reason might be English is not my first language so I did not grow up in the same context as a native speaker. Second, I learned the language by its assigned meaning. Since both of the expressions are intuitive and comprehensible to me, they are not odd to me.


Though some spatialization metaphors look a bit different than how I perceived native speakers would put out, such as “unknown is up, known is down”. They aren’t isolated cases, at least it takes me a few seconds to “grasp” the meaning of “unknown” which is defined as “unclear, undecided”. I don’t think “That’s up in the air” is an outdated expression, just not as intuitive as other examples.


    

  • Can you identify a metaphorical system that you commonly use? What do you think is the motivating rationale (“experiential basis”) behind that system – or is there one? Have you ever intentionally (or unintentionally) changed the metaphorical system that you use to speak about a certain subject, to reflect a different experience or worldview?
    • 



A: Thinking back on linguistic expression reflecting a certain metaphorical concept, the naming of some editing techniques comes into mind. One technique called “mask”, where the editor selects part of the unwanted image and hides it off (or the reverse) is used metaphorically in this case. The experiential basis might be the physical techniques applied frame by frame in the film era. Before moving images practices became mainly digital, if something unwanted happened on the raw footage, editors would then need to cover up the unwanted part with other materials.


I always use metaphors that maybe only me and my friends would understand because more often we share context . By changing, I sometimes intentionally switch verbs within a sentence to exaggerate my reaction. For example, instead of saying “I’ll reach out to you”, I will say “Yall at you when I know”.


    

  • What metaphors/systems of metaphor are commonly used when discussing your topic? If “the essence of a metaphor is understanding and experiencing one kind of thing in terms of another” (5), what other kinds of metaphors might be useful for discussing your topic, or an aspect of your topic?
    • 



My topic is “grafting”, which certainly has a human-centric aspect within. Metaphors commonly used in the realm of study are verbs indicating status such as: undergo, under, between, select, etc. Usually, within the context, plants “undergo” profound changes or “under” natural conditions. “Under”  seems to be implemented as an orientational metaphor often in the case suggesting lower status of plants. (intellectually? or power of control)


I am not sure what “other kinds of metaphors” within the prompt specifically suggest. Like “what are the other ways people could describe the process of grafting”?


		

	






	

		

			
response to the Metaphors We Live By
The new knowledge that shocked me is just common sense in the eyes of the Great God.


 


For me, this book is subversive. Although I know this is nothing new in the eyes of the great gods because this is a publication more than 30 years ago, I am still very happy to encounter this book, even though it is 2022 this year. This kind of epoch-making book, no matter when you come across it, is worthy of gratitude because it can make people figure out things that they can’t figure out ever before.


 


The most shocking thing in this book for me is the construction of metaphors, the exposition of empiricism, and a series of discoveries that have been reflected from the perspective of metaphors. Now I want to say something that is not absolutely relevant to this book.


 


 


What I want to talk about is the meaning of literature. I didn’t like to read literature books much before simply because theoretical books can explain the truth clearly. The questions are clear, the answers are clear, and the process is also clear. While literary books often release the complexity behind things, with ambiguous questions, ambiguous answers, and ambiguous processes. Before reading a book, there is always a pre-set standard in my heart—“whether the hidden truth is explained clearly”. Therefore, literature books are often not as appealing to me as theoretical books.


 


Sometimes I see other people posting book lists on forums and reading hundreds of books in a year, most of which are literature books, I suddenly feel puzzled and even pity. Why do they waste a lot of time on this kind of thing? Of course, I never dare to deny or despise literature. Because among the people I admire, there are many people who spend a lot of time reading and studying literature. But I don’t understand that no matter the complexity or possibility, I can look for other disciplines to replace the inspiration of literature, such as history, anthropology, etc. What is unique about literature?


If “the essence of a metaphor is understanding and experiencing one kind of thing in terms of another”, the literature itself is just metaphors that are useful for enjoying a totally different angle of life. Some linguistics books have inspired me to find the irreplaceable and vital meaning of literature from an unusual angle. Let’s talk about the story first.


 


How to quickly find out the meaning of your life? One of the ways is to write a novel about the life you are currently experiencing, and see if it has an inner coherence and if the meaning is contained in the coherence. What is the meaning? To quote Whig: “Meaning does not come from empirical facts, but is given to it by the observer, so as long as he pleases and finds it convenient, meaning can be given to phenomena at any level at which the empirical facts are organized into a structure, Give it a name and think of it as an “entity” with some coherence and identifiable boundaries.” To condense life into a story is to delineate our lives into comprehensible empirical facts. If there is any inherent coherence to this story, it is the so-called “meaning of life”. Many great literary works, such as Margaret Duras’ “The Lover” and Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby”, maybe the author trying to write autobiographical novels to find the meaning of his life.


 


The meaning of life found above is facing the past, and literature can also provide the meaning of life facing the future. In the modern age of “God is dead”, the lack of meaning is a very common status quo. We always feel that the choice of meaning in life is too many and too difficult, because we have to consider the attractiveness of a certain meaning to ourselves, and also consider the problem of how to walk in the future. As a result, many people gave up the difficulty of comparing meanings with each other, and either turned back to the embrace of religion, or fell into the emptiness of meaning. Specifically, it is very obvious in developing countries like China. For example, in China there are The number of Christians has exceeded the number of members of the Chinese Communist Party.


 


However, by reading some classic and serious literary books, we can experience a virtual life, feeling the various encounters, thinking, and countermeasures after a certain meaning choice, and the final look back-whether such a life has any meaning and meaning. For example, Goethe spent 60 years writing “Faust”, which makes people see the journey of an intellectual who is willing to sell his soul for the endless desire for knowledge. Another example is Huxley’s “Brave New World”, which will make people see how a life of unconditional pursuit of happiness has become boring and terrifying. Another example is “The Great Gatsby”, which makes people see the reality that in order to realize their dreams, they finally have to be disillusioned. The reason why literature is ambiguous is that the coherence in it needs to be defined by readers. Just like modern life, the meaning of life needs to be found and affirmed by itself. These are areas where theoretical books cannot help people make choices. Stories inspire people to find their own coherence through the experiences of others in finding coherence.


 


 


After talking about literature, I also want to talk about poetry.


What is poetry? Poetry is an attempt to be infinitely close to things. This definition is interesting as if the classic definition of information is “information is something that removes random uncertainty”. These definitions go beyond the relatively narrow field and rise to the height of philosophy. While it may seem that these definitions “do not live up to their name,” what is important is that they inspire us to look at the world from a different perspective. Just as someone went on to think above and said that information is the essence of the world, and poetry, in a sense, is the feeling of things that we can best grasp.








From the point of view of the book Metaphors, We Live By, any change in language, whether in content or structure, leads us to understand it differently. Perfect poetry, as a form of language, inspires all relevant metaphors and carries the lingering charm of the words at the time. Therefore, poetry is an attempt by our metaphorical animals to be infinitely close to things.








Poetry is not only a literary genre, but a way of metaphorical animals’ desire to be infinitely close to things.

Literature is not just a matter of literature. Just as the application of linguistics is beyond people’s imagination, literature has its unique and important role. To quote Calvino: “I have confidence in the future of literature because I know that there are feelings in the world that only literature can give us by its special means.”


		

	






	

		

			
System map: border and Migratory birds


The discussion of the last week, give me a lot of different ways to think about the topic what is the Border. We made a general one in class, and I made one for our topic which is the Migratory bird.


after I dug deeper for migratory birds, I got shacked about t over 40% of birds are already gone. Think about covid 19 took away part of our people, and we feel really bad already, how about we lost 40 % of us? That’s the reason why I wanna explore more about Extinction. First of all, I will use the shocking number to bring out my topic and thoughts,  and make a picture of how birds dying affect our society.


Things I have learned from the system map are,


1, a system map helps us find out more ideas directly related to the topic.


2, a system map helps for group work, to separate each part of team members.


3, a system map helps out to find a metaphor behind the topic and gives people a bright, and clear picture of the topic.


That is pretty much what I have got learned from the last class. also, those links below are a part of the references that I am going to use for my project.


 


https://www.fws.gov/program/migratory-birds


Exploring The Underground Network of Trees – The Nervous System of the Forest




How is Paper Made From Trees?