Topic 2 Development

Topic:

Nightmare

Question:

How to stop or transfer a nightmare?

Multidimensional thinking： 

Are nightmares bad for everyone?

How to correctly evaluate the various effects of nightmares on people, whether positive or negative?‘’

Are nightmares more of a psychological or physical problem? Or is it really a problem?

Map:

Topic:

The environmental/social impact of fracking.

Goal:

My main goal is to understand how fracking harms the environment and how locals/environmental groups attempt to disrupt and oppose fracking operations. I also want to present in an interactive way the tradeoffs between safety and profit that fracking companies make.

Critical analysis:

How has fracking harmed the environment?

What are the alternatives?

Stakeholders:

Governments (local and federal), the planet, the climate, groundwater, local communities, indigenous communities, environmental groups

Maps:

Topic:

Questions:

Maps:

Topic:

The deletion of words’ pronunciation reduces the rhythmic beauty of some ancient poems in Chinese and may lead to some cultural loss.

Random thoughts:

• Based on the research, this topic can be somehow related to feminism since most poets in ancient China were male. There are brilliant but controversial female poets, and I am interested in them, too. I’m a little hesitant to change my intention. Or maybe I can find a way to show both perspectives but mainly focus on one of them.
• Culture&beauty are too big. I need to find a way to narrow it down to some specific points or concepts.

Questions:

• What’s the history of ancient Chinese Poetry? How does it evolve based on time? How do the content and the theme change?
• How has the “beauty” of Chinese poems been decided? (focusing on rhythmic beauty)
  • Future question: who decide this?

Maps:

Link to system maps:  https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVPI0fKpY=/?share_link_id=466501556636

Reference:

• Chinese Poetry: the Birth of Literature
• A Brief History of Chinese Poetry: Classical to Contemporary
• 古诗词韵律中的平仄知识
• How does rhyme work in Mandarin Chinese poetry?
• Classical Chinese poetry forms

My topic is investigating the process of what solidifies events, stories, and points of view as history to be learned and shared through the generations.

I thought it would be fun to put an actual process between memory and history and how and why this information is edited in a particular process or path before it is considered historical and worth spreading/teaching/learning.

My inspiration was to tie in the research and information found here with my Connections Lab project – History of Here.

Topic: Education, Pedagogy, AI teacher

System map:

This is a system map I made focusing on the big topic – pedagogy. I might narrow it down to a smaller topic. For now, I’m interested in how AI could replace teacher in class. How would it solve problems in traditional pedagogy.

Stakeholders: students, teachers, parents

Critical Analysis: There are many problems in traditional pedagogy, for example, teacher could not put equal amount of time and effort on every student; students learn things in different paces, but they have to learn the same thing in class; students have different interests and talents, but many are buried due to lack of attention and encouragement; the qualification of teachers are sometimes not guaranteed; etc. I would like to stress these problems and limitations in my project. And maybe provide a possible solution: AI teacher.

Form/Affordances: I want to use game as the form, haven’t decided whether it’s a table top game or computer game.

Metaphor: teaching / learning is a game

Tone: sarcastic

Intended experience/outcome: there are limitations with traditional pedagogy and teachers, what if there is no human teacher anymore. How would it change the way we learn and teach.

Initial Thoughts:

For my next research project, I’m thinking of doing something related to the swastika symbol.
Needless to say, it’s almost a common “fun fact” that Nazis borrowed it from ancient religions, which was originally a symbol of blessing. While there’s no doubt about the unforgettable horrible things the Nazis had done, and how there are still people out there who still admire the Nazis, and hence embrace the symbol of it, as an Asian growing up in a Buddhist home, I was never really sure what to do with an odd feeling associate with it. Of course, the two are slightly different, but it’s easy to trigger people when using the Buddhist symbol, 卍。

Before Covid hit, while Japan was busy preparing for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, one of the major news was the government’s decision of removing the 卍 sign at Buddhist temples, due to the fact that “many western foreigners protested about it.”

I’m curious if I can do deeper research not only on the history of the use of this symbol worldwide (I think Native Americans used it too, and probably others as well), but also on the debate on whether it’s disrespectful to use the 卍 symbol, even though it’s not the Nazis symbol, and has been there for over a thousand years old. Also, can this whole issue of canceling the swastika in general be seen as a completely different set of issues from the Nazi issue? Can the former be used as a critique of post-colonialism and cultural hegemony?

On a related note, while I’m not sure if it’s too much of a stretch, I’m also thinking of recent years, saying the mandarin word “that” and the Korean word “I am”, which both sound like the US tabooed N-word, had become a controversial issue, so serious that there are couple cases of US professors getting fired for saying those words. I wonder where we can draw the line of showing respect, not just to one side, but both sides, and what is considered too far and what’s not through research.

Narrowed down focus after a week:

Topic:  A discourse on the power dynamics of the dominant culture(s) through the lens of the swastika symbol in contemporary societies.

Topic: The evolution of design in Mecha Anime

Answers:I will research both Japanese and American style. I find the design trend is very close to what people want themselves to be. The robot is just a mirror to reflect the hope of human beings(flying to the space, change the shapes,being Indestructible)

Great – I see your topic refined to “The robot is just a mirror to reflect the hope of human beings.” The questions to get to a focal point can be along the lines of “why?” Who are the stakeholders in creating this desire (animation companies, robotics industry, etc)? Why do we want to fly to/in space, shape-shift, be Indestructible?

Progress:

Topic: Animation, timeline, robot design

System map: I will research on its origin, history and the culture in different countries. 

Stakeholders: audience, director,toy factory

Critical Analysis: why the design of robot is changing all the times, how does it change,what and who make these changes

Form/Affordances: I want find some way to make audience design there own robots

Metaphor: The growth of mankind itself

Tone: Industrial style

Intended experience/outcome: what kind of things we want most but we can not do by ourselves and need a robot to help us