Ross McPherson
I must say that I found this week's readings with densely packed economic jargon quite frustrating. Pretty much the only thing I know about economics is the idea of supply and demand, so I can't unpack too many of the concepts presented. That being said, I find it quite interesting that the current global economic climate is neither unique nor was it unforseeable. The framework presented in the Craft reading (I think it was Craft) accurately describes our current near crisis status as well as how we got here. I found the idea of fuite en avant particularly relevant: that is, something one does in a losing situation--more of the same or something even worse in the hopes that people will feel compelled to support the cause. The war in Iraq certainly comes to my mind. I liked the multipled perspectives presented in the Kassabian reading--how music also contributes to producing the diegesis, the ideas of source music, dramatic scoring, source scoring, and the attention continuum. While reading the piece I began to think about the film There Will Be Blood. The score for the film was written by Jonny Greenwood, of Radiohead fame. I think the music in this film was groundbreaking because it combined source music with dramatic scoring. The "music" in the film is comprised of sounds which one might hear if one were on a site which was being drilled for oil. For example, wooden blocks are used for percussion. There are many sounds of metal contacting metal. There are instances where men are pounding with their tools which creates a kind of source music, but their rythmic pounding also forms a beat for the dramatic score.