Category Archives: logs

N – Week 7 Log

This week I’ve been examining the relationship that nature has with shamanism while using the technique of the Siberian Ulchi people to reach deep states of being called trance states, these states of being are a meshing of waking and sleeping where the lines become blurred  and the subconscious rises to the surface in this way one can examine thoughts that would usually be pushed down out of fear.  This observation of the what we would call the shadow in western society allows for a decompression like effect to take place, bringing the shadow into the light allows for a reintegration of the world to heal the natural fragmenting process of undisciplined minds.  While doing this I have also been reading about and applying the Geothean method to everyday activities such as going on walks in nature, rock climbing, and more consciously using it in conversations with people.

Note: An easy trap to fall into during this process is once the unconscious mind is tapped to try and examine what might arise, this actually is highly counter productive to the goal of the activity and will have the effect of actively pulling one out of the trance, it is best to do this after one has come back from the trance

May 12th

2 hours – meditating in nature and writing poetry intermitenly

Meditation in the style of Siberian Shamanism using a method of swaying and total acceptance to enter a trance like state.

1 hour – listening to and repeating vocalizations of the bear dance for shamanic practice

These vocalizations are intended, when able to be repeated by heart, to produce a trance state.

May 13th

1 hour – reading Nuero chapter 7

1 hour – drafting sempass

.5 hour – reading adaptive capacity, a meshing of science and poetry Dr. Ankur Desai and Deanna  Pindell

1 hour – meditating in nature and writing poetry on my musings

1 hour – meditating in the HCC and writing poetry of me observing them observing me

1 hour – meditating in my room to music and writing poetry on what inspired me to write

.5 hour – listening to and repeating vocalizations of the bear dance for shamanic practice

May 14th

2 hour – discussing consciousness studies and origins of metaphor and the basic metaphors which we create our personal worlds from, along with gene expression on the basis of top down creation of action or bottom up creating/changing genes

2 hour – reading article on shamans as they are masters of healing the mind and body

1 hour – writing poetry on the musing of our discussion

2 hours – filling out logs

May 16th

1 hour – meditating in nature

1.5 hours – discussing shamanism with Justin Geere, a shamanism researcher who traveled to Peru to live with the people who practice this specific form of spirituality on his findings associated with Dieta, Ayahuasca, and the nature of the shamans view of the mind (outside of class).

.25 hour – meditating on astroturf as part of an experiment to see if it would dramatically effect my ability to meditate.

May 17th

1 hour – meditating in nature

2 hours – reading and analyzing Holdrege paper

1 hour – reading My Poets

1 hour – applying the Goethean method by applying it to my daily rock climbing

            having a conversation with the climbing route to be able to complete routes previously     unable to do

May 18th

1 hour – practicing shaman vocalizations with drumming rhythm while meditating

1 hour – writing poetry

1.5 hours – reading My Poets

2 hours – formulating poetry anthology

2 hours – using the Goethean method while walking in nature listening to the natural rhythms and flows

May 19th

5 hours – listening to Alan Watts speak about the nature of all wisdom paths, and hearing his synthesis of them all into a coherent image using the motif of duality and non-duality through the symbol of the yin yang

1 hour – filling out logs

1 hour – reading Nigredo on delving into the shadow, the first stages of reconciling the mind with the shadow

.5 hour – mapping my own shadow

1 hour – reading My Poets

1 hour – posting and writing and rewriting poetry

Reading List:

The Four Agreements: The Toltec Book of Wisdom – Ruiz

The Secret Language of Plants – Beher

My Poets – Mclane

Doing Goethean Science – Holdrege

Total Hours: 40.75

Spring Week 6 Log

Sunday 5/5:

 

-1 hours reading TGAO (The Great Animal Orchestra)

-1 hour reading Neuro (ch.5)

-1/2 hour writing Neuro reverie

-2.5 hours recording music

-1 hour editing tracks

-1/2 hour calculated poetics readings

 

Day total: 6.5 hours

 

Monday 5/6:

 

-2 hours at the student seminar

-1 hour reading TGAO

-2 hours recording music

-1 hour calculated poetics readings

-1/2 hour writing calculated poem

 

Day total: 7 hours

 

Tuesday 5/7:

 

-2.5 hours in class (Guest Poet: Susan Gevirtz)

-1/2 hour reading TGAO

-1/2 hour revising reverie

-1/2 hour revising the eAlphabet site

-1/2 hour reading Exercises in Style

 

Day total: 4.5 hours

 

Wednesday 5/8:

 

-1.5 hour in class (calculated poetics)

-1.5 hours in artist lecture (Susan Gevirtz)

-1.5 hours working on my term paper

-1 hour recording music

-1 hour reading TGAO

-1/2 revising calculated poem

 

Day total: 7 hours

 

Thursday 5/9:

 

-2 hours in class (calculated poetics lecture and seminar)

-2 hours recording music

-1.5 hours editing recordings

-1/2 hour reading TGAO

 

Day total: 6 hours

 

Friday 5/10:

 

-2 hours recording (gathering) sounds from the Evergreen campus and woods

-1 hour reading TGAO

-1 hour reading Neuro (ch.6)

 

Day total: 4.5 hours


Saturday 5/11:

 

-1 hour reading Neuro (ch.6)

-1 hour recording (gathering) sounds from the Evergreen campus and woods

-3 hours recording music

-1 hour editing recordings

 

Day total: 6 hours

 

Week Six Hours: 41.5 hours

 

Total Hours: 41.5 hours

pi-trivet3

Pi week 6 log

May 5th – 11th

5 hours – reading Number Sense by Stanislaus Dehaene, Dali by Robert Descharnes

3 hours – video; The Dali Dimension by Joan Ubeda et. al, and Zero to Infinity: A History of Numbers by Edward B. Burger

1 hour – listening to Radiolab episode Numbers

4 hours – Calculated Poetics

3 hours – writing and revising term paper

This week got into some beefy stuff of the origins of mathematics and art produced out of exploration into the frontiers of mathematics today.  I began the week by watching The Dali Dimension: Decoding the Mind of a Genius about Salvador Dali and the vast depth of knowledge he kept current with throughout his life about the great scientific discoveries of his time.  He attempted to represent abstract ideas like Einstein’s theory of relativity and ideas from quantum physics as well as biological ideas like the discovery of the double helix as the structure of DNA.  This continued late into his life with his last painting The Swallowtail which was inspired by the equations of catastrophe theory.  Earlier in his work, he depicted 4th dimensional objects 2 dimensionally on canvas, relating the transcendental nature of these concepts to a spiritual or religious experience.  His techniques and interest in fusing art and science to visualize concepts will serve as a main example of tapping into our instinctual math abilities as well as aiding in learning the typical concepts of our math curriculum.  This may relate to the Waldorf philosophy and curriculum of math as well.

While in the school library searching for The Dali Dimension, I stumbled across a DVD lecture series called Zero to Infinity by Edward B. Burger, a professor and mathmetician from Williams College.  The lectures are pleasant and delightful.  Edward B. Burger makes the concepts easy to follow and his passion radiates through the screen.  In it, he covers how the concept of number differs from that of numbers, explaining the numbers are to number as humans are to humanity.  In the introduction, he explains how hard it is to actually define number and that no consensus of a definition exists.  Numbers are abstract as they are concrete.  He then begins explaining the history of numbers, and how concepts and counting systems evolved and led to great philosophical changes in people’s relation to the universe.  It is a great, comprehensive suppliment to Number Sense and provides many concrete examples of alternative and historical number and math systems.  His explanation of the Babylonian counting system fit perfectly with my story of passionately learning it in my 4th grade class from a wonderful teacher.

I also scheduled a sit in and interview with Tim Morrissey and his 4th grade class at Olympia Waldorf School this next Friday.  I’ve also begun an interview by email with Anita Lengus, faculty member here at TESC, about the history of math education in the United States.  She’s been quite willing and helpful despite a busy schedule, as has Tim.

pi-trivet3

Pi week 5 log

April 28th – May 4th

4 hours – reading Number Sense by Stanislaus Dehaene and Doing Goethean Science by Craig Holdrege, The Measure and Construction of the Japanese House by Heino Engel

1 hour – researching the abacus and learning the Japanese abacus

2 hours – writing and revising term paper

4 hours – Calculated Poetics

I began writing my paper this week with an introduction on Sensing Boundaries.  I reread the Craig Holdrege methodology of Goethean science to find connections to this process of engaging our intuitive number sense.  The time i spent last week listening to Radiolab for cues on how to tell a good story paid off as I wrote an introduction I’m quite pleased with.  It will lay a good groundwork for entering the conversation of what instinctual number sense is and how to engage it.  After reading Number Sense this week, I’ve learned enough information to launch right into a discussion of what this intuitive number sense.  That way I can define it well before I explore ways to awaken and engage it.   

The book begins by explaining the number sense we see in other other species such as crows, chimps, dogs, an even horses and compares them to the abilities we see in infants.  They are not that different and in fact have so much in common, that one can track the progress of number sense in these species (evolutionarily speaking) along with the growth stages of babies.  It seems that infants enact the entirety of number sense evolution as they mature into adulthood in the same way that their embryos enact the entirety of evolution that came before them while in the womb.

The distinction comes when they begin to comprehend the concept of integers; fixed number values that allow for a linear concept of numbers, each digit with a fixed value.  This begins to happen around the ages of 2 or 3.  From there, quantities beyond 5 become understandable.  From there, a child’s increasing abilities also mirror the entire evolution of number sense in human history, finally reaching the complex system of algebra of calculus we have now.   

I will be able to explain this concept in the third section of my paper that relays the history of number systems and how they evolved from relying heavily on the instinctual logarithmic notion to the cognitive linear one.

I also did some research on the Japanese abacus as a part of a research paper in my other class, Chanoyu: Traditional Japanese Culture and the Way of Tea. I’m not sure how much of this will tie into my paper, but I would like to do a brief lesson on the abacus in my presentation.  Learning the Japanese math and number system also provided fertile ground for the exploration of alternative math forms that may make its way into the history of mathematics section of my paper.

 

 

S – Week 6 Log

5/5: 3 hours of reading Digital Poetics: The Making of E-Poetics, 1 writing Bachelardian Reverie, 1 hr of Calculated Poetics reading and writing, 3 hrs with Unoriginal Genius

5/6: 2.25 hrs of class, 1 hr of Calculated Poetics, 3 hours with Prehistoric Digital Poetry: An Archaeology of Forms, 1959-1995

5/7: 3.75 of class, 3 hrs of learning NetLogo (3 tutorials)

5/8: 3 class, .5 hrs of meeting with David McAvity, 2 hrs of QuASR tutoring about NetLogo

5/9: 2 class, 3 hrs of learning NetLogo, 3 hrs freewriting

5/10: 2 hrs reading Prehistoric Digital Poetry: An Archaeology of Forms, 1959-1995

5/11: 3 hrs with Neuro, 3 hrs with Digital Poetics

Ms – Week 6 Log

May 6th

4 hours Reading Poetry and the of the Senses (Susan Stewart) and A Dirty Smell of Mangoes (Ernesto de Souza Pochito

2 hour Writing and Editing olfactory poems

May 7th

4.5 hours Creating poems

2 hours reading assorted Proustian texts

May 8th

3 hours Writing/Journaling on smell and memory

3 hours Reading and researching “Proustian” work

Many 9th

2.5 hours Editing, formatting, revising poems from earlier in the week.

1.5 hours Journaling/creating poems around scent

2.5 hours Reading de Souza Pochito

May 10th

2 hours Reading de Souza Pochito

2.5 hours Creating poems, editing poems

1 hour Editing Cento poem from class week 5 (Tuesday), piecing together bits for a Cento from My Poets

May 11th

2.5 hours sifting through pictures from childhood and writing down scents associated with memories

3 hours Reading online articles about Marcel Proust, researching Proust

May 12th

2 hours Writing/Editing poems

2 hours Journaling for my Midnight Chapter

1.5 hours Reading Proustian texts

1.5 hours Reading (re-reading) Susan Stewart

Totals

This week: 40 hours

Cumulative total: 40 hours

Reading List:

Poetry and the Fate of the Senses

Remembrance of things past

A dirty smell of mangoes

Proust was a Neuroscientist

 

 

F ~ Week 6 Log

May 5th, Sunday

3 hours reading and note taking on The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty Have Been Used Against Women by Naomi Wolf.

1 hour reading Neuro and configuring notes for a Bachelardian reverie

May 6th, Monday

2 hours reading and note taking on The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty Have Been Used Against Women by Naomi Wolf.

2 hours of peer development, sharing to each other about how our field studies are going. This was a wonderful session of connection and communication.

4 hours reading and note taking on Vagina: A New Biography by Naomi Wolf.

2 hours reading and note taking on Neuro and configuring notes for a Bachelardian reverie.

May 7th, Tuesday

2 hours reading and note taking on Neuro and configuring notes for a Bachelardian reverie.

2 hours of the 0-core component lecture on Tuesdays, guest lecturer, helpful recommendations of books towards my field study.

4 hours reading and note taking on Vagina: A New Biography and The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty Have Been Used Against Women, both written by Naomi Wolf.

Body Scanning and Breathing exercises throughout the day.

– – –

Health concerns have popped up today, and of all places the pain is in my pelvis. I have been focusing so much time learning about the correlation between the brain and the pelvis/vagina, now I am aware and mindful of my own tension.

– – –

May 8th, Wednesday

1 hour with the Calculated Poetics class, shared my “Ode to Romanesco” poem (in progress).

5 hours reading and taking notes on Vagina: A New Biography by Naomi Wolf.

1 hour writing poetry and deciphering notes.

Body Scanning and Breathing exercises throughout the day.

May 9th, Thursday

6 hours reading Vagina: A new Biography by Naomi Wolf

Breathing, body-scanning, laying supine, chanting mantras, sleeping, breathing.

May 10th, Friday

2 hours reading and taking notes on Vagina: A New Biography

2 hours reading and taking notes on The Naked Woman by Desmond Morris finding interesting parallels between how the female body had changed over time relating to evolution and agriculture.

Breathing, resting, soaking up sun, sleeping, hydrating, breathing.

May 11th, Saturday

3 hours reading The Naked Woman by Desmond Morris, note taking.

May 12th, Sunday

2 hours reading The Naked Woman by Desmond Morris, note taking.

Body Scanning and Breathing exercises throughout the day.

Totals

This week: 44 hours

Cumulative total: 44 hours

 

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Ab – Week 6 Logs.

Week 6:

Monday, May 6

1 hour – sorting type at Sherwood Press

1 ½ hours – revising mid-quarter evaluation.

½ hour – writing reverie on Neuro chapter 5

½ hour – looking over anthology, adding class bibliography.

Tuesday, May 7

2 ½ hours – Guest speaker Susan Gevirtz (so great!)

1 hour – looking up recommended anthologies from Susan, San Francisco State University Poetry Center and Mills College.

½ hour – mid quarter evaluation with Sarah.

2 hours – starting to format the anthology in Indesign.

½ hours – check in meeting with Sara Martin on anthology.

Wednesday, May 8

2 hours – watching Indesign tutorials.

1 ½ hours – artist lecture: Susan Gevirtz on gender and genera.

Thursday, May 9

4 ½ hours – watching Indesign tutorials and playing with anthology format in Indesign.

½ hours – reading Neuro Ch. 6

Friday, May 10

4 hours – working on anthology in Indesign

1 ½ hours – reading Neuro

Saturday, May 11

½ hours – looking up Yoko Tawada and Caroline Bergvall

Sunday, May 12

2 hours – Finished Unoriginal Genius!!!!

Weekly Totals: 24 ½ hours

Cumulative Totals: 187 ½ hours

E – Week 6 Log

Classwork – 10 Hours

The reading from Rose this week was particularly dense with medical jargon. It was a bit of a difficult read. Also hard to think about the idea that it might be our own biology that makes us sick and prone to criminology. I share Rose’s skepticism (or perceived skepticism  about whether or not this field can ever truly come out of the dark ages of racism. It is an interesting idea, although it is proving once again that no issue is as simple as we would like it to seem. Life has to be pretty persistent to survive under all those conditions. The guest speaker was also fantastic, it was an awesome class full of great ideas. I love the core portion of the programs.

Sunday – 4 hours

Monday – 2 hours

Tuesday – 4 hours

Publishing – 10 hours

Sandy hadn’t yet gotten the time to read my manuscript, so no feedback  yet. I scheduled a time with her next week, should be able to get my feedback then. I did much more research on the different publishers, looking in to the exact requirements and trying to start gathering ideas for different cover letters. Only one publisher actually has the requirements that fit my novella, but it works out rather well because they are such a good fit. My cover letter apparently blew Sandy out of the water, although she and I both had ideas for revision of course. I need to reformat my manuscript in order to fit the publication standards, and I will definitely do that. I will also wait to submit until I hear back from her more about the story. I’m also having a friend look it over for edits and grammar mistakes, trying to get it as edited as I possibly could.

Tuesday – 3 hours

Wednesday – 3 hours

Thursday – 2 hours

Friday – 2 hours

How to Survive Being Blessed – 20 Hours

Far and away the toughest section that I have had to write. Got to the part about Mauri’s attack. It took me about six hours to write four pages, which is incredibly unusual for me. I want to write and write well, because I want to do this serious issue justice. Still frustratingly on the handwritten draft, even as the page count climbs to 76. Spent the normal amount of time writing but because of the difficulty of the subject matter, ended up not writing quite as much. Because of the length of Mauri’s story, I’m not certain how much of the others I will be able to finish. It just feels unbalanced without them, though it looks like I might want to try to break it up into either a series of novellas or maybe a book or two depending on length. I’m amazed that all of this writing is coming out of me, that I have this passion for writing that I can express so well.

Monday – 6 hours

Tuesday – 2 hours

Thursday – 4 hours

Friday – 4 hours

Saturday – 4 hours

 

Total: 40 hours

Cumulative total: 284

V – Log Week 6

May 6th

Polishing work, Meeting with Sarah, Glazing pieces – taking responsibility for my role with the relationship

3.5 hours

May 7th

Class (Susan Givertz), 2.5 hours, Reading Perloff chp 6, Plant research, Salal (stalking the wild asparagus/moore)

7 hours

May 8th

Pottery Studio/glazing, reading about rocks, boundaries of categories/language

Print (about snakes, the middle of opposites, childhood creativity, all in response to my readings today.  Omniscient comes from “The Alphabet Versus the Goddess” and Solipsistic comes from “Neuro”)

Texture/Transfer/PoeticResponse

Salal Research

6 hours

May 9th

Reading Perloff – 2 hours

May 10th

Herbal class – Hawthorn Lore, Reading “Centering”, writing response, Perloff

11 hours

May 11th

Pottery/ Plant ID plaques – 3 hours

May 12th

Pottery studio, reading Neuro

5.5 hours

Total this week: 38 hours

A week of woven boundaries.  I took time to be in the ceramics studio this week, to really see where it is that pottery, language, poetry, neuroscience and plants merge together.  I notice boundaries within myself, boundaries of time and of stretching thin the lines of interweaving themes that I am working with. I found constant overlap, from reading Perloff, Rose and Abi-Rached and working with the text “Centering” by RIchards.  They all touched on themes of fire, what does fire represent and look like from these three extremely different texts?  Fire became a theme for me to work with the clay, what drives me, what ignites my fire, what ignited language representation to move from image to word? What makes me wild with fire, and what keeps me sane and yet in touch with my fire?  With my ceramics tools i carve into the clay, deep words, deep and slowly rising to the top, the words sink into the clay. As the sun uses it’s fire to dry the clay I touch my knife to the clay to recognize the plants that I love, my knife as a form of applied fire.

I worked with Opening clay, making a plate to get the full sensual effect with my fingers and body by experiencing what it means to fully open clay.  This was extemely sensual. I had to ease the clay open and be graceful with my movements, words that came to mind:

persistance, pressure, light, flow, ignite breath

all of these words also resonate for me when thinking about…fire!