A Very Brave Film

I have finally joined the ranks of millions who have Seen Avatar and I am glad to see that I am not alone in my experience of the post-Avatar blues: http://www.cnn.com/2010/SHOWBIZ/Movies/01/11/avatar.movie.blues/index.html?iref=allsearch . It seems people were in some cases entertaining suicidal thoughts that they were not in the world of Pandora and that it was not a reality they could ever experience. Though my sadness came in a small part from that fact that I was not a Na'vi and never would be, I was much more saddened by the thought the Avatar world could become a reality. It made me sad that people are clearly capable of destroying something as good and honourable as the Na'vi way of life, as evidenced so many times on our own world - Just look at 'cowboys and indians' - However, I consoled myself with the argument that the film was not just about the bad and despicable ways of humanity, and how we have destroyed our world, but more about the idea that several good people can outweigh the will of many bad, about the overriding power of love and about never giving up.


A 'Review' of Avatar

I say 'review' because this will be more of a discussion. The world James Cameron has crafted is quite simply stunning in it's detail and one can see how it's conception has taken ten years. The language is fully formed, the biology and geology of the world of Pandora wonderfully alien and yet explicable by science. I especially loved the bio-luminescence and also the symbiotic nature of everything on the planet linked by the neural pathways which connect everything in something akin to a hive-mind, but much more autonomous. I can't help thinking that if there were some kind of planet-wide mind keeping our world in balance then the need for weapons, technology and religions would be negated and the world would be a better and happier place!

The title of this blog, 'a very BRAVE film' is my personal opinion of the one overriding aspect of the film which I found particularly astounding and that was its rating, 12A. I think every 12-year-old should see this film as it will give them a conscience. An idea of eco-friendliness and more importantly an idea of what war is really like, not an idealised construct, but something unpleasant, devastating and sad, with no redeeming features. I especially admire the film for being able to kill-off many of it's main characters and having the courage to display scenes of war the like of which are only usually seen on the news - the burning bodies, the wounds, the utter heartbreak at loss of property and loved ones. A particularly disturbing scene shows one of the Pandoran 'Horses' running past on fire - a very powerful image.

One of the most important aspects to the creation of the Pandoran world, in my opinion, was that of scale, so much of the film simply wouldn't have worked if the Na'vi had been human-sized. The end fight scene, where they admittedly out-gunned would have been a bloody slaughter if it were not for the Na'vi's superior size and strength. I also admired the way the Na'vi were much more graceful that the humans, despite the size-difference, where conventionally larger creatures are seen as lumbering and clumsy, whereas smaller ones are seen as quick and delicate of movement.

I'm still getting over my post-Avatar-blues - it may seem silly to anyone who just saw this as a few hours happy diversion from reality and as nothing more serious than that, but I believe that this film has touched something profound in the core of many of us which has made us question our own humanity. I only wish that any future space-travel will be undertaken from an Earth like the one in Star Trek - ultimately non-confrontational, exploration based and free from warmongers and not the broken planet hinted at by the characters in Avatar. If ,like in Avatar, benign science ultimately prevails I think we can rest assured that should the Na'vi turn out to be real, our friendship with them is assured.

Notes on 'Beauty and Ideas'

Please read my previous post, and watch the Youtube video if you are not familiar with the sketch 'Beauty and Ideas' by Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie.

For my assignment, I must analyse the sketch using only TWO of the following: Phonetics/Phonology, Syntax or Semantics and I'm not sure which pair would produce the most interesting essay. Here are my notes on each one, I'd appreciate any comments on what you think I should do or anything interesting you have noticed in the sketch.

Phonetics/Phonology

• Structure of nonsense words such as ‘tish’, ‘vibble’, ‘lovelet’, – compare ‘tish’ to ‘hush’ - these follow the English phonetic system in that they use only combinations of sounds permissable in English - how is it that we can imagine a 'sense' for these words having never heard them before?
  
• Occasional usage of full forms where a weak form would be more typical in connected speech - Fry uses this to enhance his 'academic' character
  
• Alliteration ‘explain, expound and exposit’, ‘colours and contains’ ‘find…mind’ ‘beauty duty’
• Alliteration of nasals ‘tumble, emolument…smitten, plenum’
• Stress placed in unusual places i.e 'extrinsic, extrinsic'
  
• Odd tone / speed of delivery: Intonation.
  

Syntax

• Morphology of novel coins such as ‘correctington’, ‘lovelet’, - for example, it is obvious 'lovelet' is a term of endearment because it is composed of the noun 'love' plus suffix 'let' which signals a diminutive as in 'piglet' (small/young pig)
  
• Examples of all major sentence types including more unusual such as:
• Vocative: ‘hold that for me Jefferey would you’
• Coordination at sentence part level – i.e. verb coordination ‘expand and exposit’
• Relative clause: ‘a tool that we use to dig up the beauty that surrounds us’
• Wh-question: ‘where is it?’
• Extraposition: ‘I think it was Karl Kraus’ (?) - not sure if this really is extraposition!
  

• • Very complex sentences ‘you contain a property of beauty therefore the substance of which you exhibit a property must exist’ •
  
• Parallel structures ‘the idea of beauty and the beauty of ideas’ •
  
• Verbless sentence ‘Noel, as you so rightly, Harrison’ - 'say' is omitted here - to what effect?
• • Contrast of Fry’s long complex utterances with Laurie’s much shorter simple sentences ‘I’m going to hold a thought now’, ‘we’ve made a return to language’- this is definitely a comic device as the juxtaposition makes Laurie's replies all the more incongruous

Semantics

• Usage of several sets of synonyms explain+expound/expand+exposit - what kind of relationship are these in? Are they synonyms, or do the different subtle meanings add something?
• (syntax or semantics?) Use of simile and metaphor – ‘language is a tool’, ‘the bows of my imaginings’, ‘wheel on wheel like the circles that we find in the windmills of our mind’ unusual semantic links –
  
• Words presented as synonymous, or at least related, such as:‘the gulf the chasm the dividing line’‘a pattern a template a paradigm an ideal an idea’‘pursues, harries, hounds’ - because these sometimes ARE synonymous, and sometimes are not, the incongruity of some of the combinations leads to humour • use of unusual and archaic language: paradigm, plenitude, bade, plenum, emolument - By the way, the meanings of these words are as follows:

plenum – area full of heated or cooled air

emolument – earnings, pay, compensation

paradigm – in grammar – a set of inflected forms, in common usage – an example serving as a model

plenitude – fullness or adequacy in quantity, measure, or degree; abundance: a plenitude of food, air, and sunlight, the state of being full or complete

Your comments/criticisms/input would be greatly appreciated

A Bit of Fry and Laurie, Beauty and Ideas

I just transcribed this sketch for use in one of my assignments. I had to do it myself as there seem to be very few already written transcripts of this fantastic show on the web. However there are ample videos on youtube, this particular sketch can be viewed here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RQzRhH67Q0 and I highly recomend you watch it if you have never seen any 'Fry and Laurie' before. I hope my transcript might be of use to someone, if you want to use it it would be worth re-watching the sketch to check the intonations etc as this was a relitively rough-and-ready transcription, enjoy:

Sketch: ‘Beauty and Ideas’

Speakers: Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie

Series: ‘A bit of Fry and Laurie’

Air Date: 13^th April 1990, BBC

SF: so in a sense in a sense in a sense Duncan, err, we are left with those two, err two none other nary another not one other more err we have on one side of the gulf the chasm the dividing line if you please we have the beauty of ideas, and on the other we have the other term of the equation if that’s nicer we have the idea, of beauty, am I sensing thrill am I connecting?

HL: err we’re busy discussing the idea of beauty and the beauty of ideas

SF: hold the thought Jeffery, would you, I’m going to give you a thought and I’d like you to hold it for me, would you do that for me please

HL: I’m going to hold a though now

((audience laughter))

SF: if beauty is only an idea a form a pattern a template a paradigm and ideal an idea, if you like with an ‘l’, then what is the beautiful? Beauty is unattainable but the beautiful surrounds us err we return to language Phillip, we make a return to language, that’s the idea that I’d like you to hold for me if you’d be ever so splendid

HL: we’ve made a return to language

SF: listen to me, listen to me lovelet, language

((audience laughter))

SF: circumscribes beauty, err, confirms, confines, limbs and delineates it colours and contains, yet language is only a tool, a tool that we use to dig up the beauty that surrounds us and is we take, our only and absolute real

HL: I’m in trouble now

SF: umm, hush, tish, vibble, err, I’m streaking ahead let me explain expound expand and exposit

HL: would you ha ha ha

SF: I find you beautiful, but you are not beauty

HL: woops

SF: therefore you contain a property of beauty therefore the substance of which you exhibit a property must exist. Where is it?

((HL looks behind the sofa, audience laughter))

SF: that is language’s task, err, err, err who was it who said ‘my language is the universal whore that I must make into a virgin’, who was is?

HL: pfff, Kate Adey?

((loud audience laughter))

SF: I think it was Karl Krauss but it needn’t have been, it needn’t have been, now, tell me it’s time to ask you to give b-back to me the thought that I bade you hold

HL: umm, I was holding the thought that we’d made a return to language

SF: correctly correctington, language pursues beauty, harries it hounds it, courses across the rough-lands of inquiry and in so doing can itself BE beautiful ripple on ripple, image on image wheel on a wheel like the circles that we find in the windmills of our mind

((audience laughter))

HL: Noel Harrison

SF: Noel, as you so rightly, Harrison. Now, language can be beautiful and Madeline asleep in lap of legends old plenitude, dishes, her breast tumble, emolument, forage, smitten, plenum, vulva, words that have their own sonority and beauty which is extrinsic, extrinsic to their connotational or denotational referends

HL: I think he said vulva

((audience laughter))

SF: so, Timothy I’ll leave you with a thought a breath a fruit that drops from the bows of my imaginings, think beauty, but be beautiful, say beauty, but say it beautifully, beauty is duty and duty beauty so there, goodnight I don’t feel quite so well now

((audience laughter))

((HL makes worried face))

Mackerel

So here it is, my first foray into the world of recipe blogging, and before I share with you my dinner for this evening, I'd like to invite you to take a look at what are, in my opinion, some of the best food blogs on the net. First my all time favourite:

http://homesicktexan.blogspot.com/

which has wonderful recipes such as refried beans, Quesadillas, ginger pancakes and many more Tex-Mex delights.

Next, and also highly recommended:

http://glutenfreegirl.blogspot.com/

giving every gluten/wheat intolerant new hope and a new joy for food.

I'll be sure to update the minute I find other food blogs which are really worth shouting about. And now, Mackerel. I have to confess that I have never cooked a fish in my life. Dash, my boyfriend, thinks they're smelly, slimy and disgusting, and I'm OK with that, he's very unfussy about most other food so we can have exciting meals, sans fish. However, today he left to visit his parents for four days so I decided to have a little culinary adventure. I popped to Sainsbury's, chose the cheapest fish - a mackerel, watched; I have to say with some dismay; as it was "topped and tailed" before my eyes, and then asked the man on the counter if it had any bones in, he said "no", he was lying.

It was when I got home that I was so glad I have watched over the years hours and hours of what Dash fondly refers to as "Lizzie porn" - I'm referring to Ready Steady Cook, Saturday Kitchen, Master Chef, Chinese Food Made Easy and the whole host of other food programmes which I insist on watching, to the exclusion of all else, any time they are on (so long as they don't feature bloody Nigella Lawson!). I have to say, "thank you Ainsley Harriet for teaching me how to bone a fish" because I needed it today!

Ingredients - to feed 1

• 1 Mackerel
• real butter (salted) - about 1tbsp
• 1/4 lemon
• salt and pepper
• frozen sweetcorn and broccoli
• few sprigs fresh parsley
• 1 medium potato

The fish and the veg cook very fast, so it's best to prepare the potato first, I peeled mine and cut it into bite-size chunks and put them to boil in salted water. Then I put about 2tsp butter into a griddle pan and put the fish, cut into fillets with bones removed, skin-side down, I then dusted the flesh-side with salt and pepper (in hindsight, not quite enough, but it's better to under-season and add more later). When the fish was cooked about half way through I turned it over so the flesh-side was down, it was at this point I put the broccoli and sweetcorn on to boil and chopped the parsley finely. A chef would probably say that I overcooked the fish, but I like it crispy, when it was golden brown on both sides I turned of the heat and let it rest while I drained the veg and potatoes. I put a little butter over the vegetables and potatoes and seasoned them with salt, pepper and parsley, I also scattered a little parsley over the fish and finished it with a squeeze of lemon.
Bon appetit!

A very successful experiment, though perhaps I will remove the skin next time as I did find it a little too greasy as Mackerel is a very oily fish.

It begins...

I can see this becoming my new online hobby, replacing my current addiction to 'Farmville' and 'Cafe World' on Facebook... yes I'm sad, I know, and perhaps even replacing my current obsessive checking of my two Deviantart profiles (check out my amateur attempts at photography at http://scoutingforgeeks.deviantart.com ).

Currently I am sitting in on 'Research Methods' an English Literature seminar I'm going to because I have a gap in my exceedingly un-busy schedule, actually it has turned out to be really interesting, I wish there was an official module like this for the Language side of the course, oh well.

Anyway, I will try to keep my blog entries short, sweet and eclectic, spanning my many interests in technology, photography, literature, linguistics and cookery. Hopefully I can share with you some of my favourite blogs, my favourite recipes and my musings on the latest research in linguistics.