Why She Can't Read H.C. Andersen, and Other Fairytales
Why She Can't Read H.C. Andersen, and Other Fairytales
By Cristiana Patria Hawthorne
By Cristiana Patria Hawthorne
Why She Can't Read H.C. Andersen
Thursday, August 29
A most hot and loud morning it was. The sun hid behind its sister clouds, but the humidity had no such qualms. The construction workers below raged their daily war on the sidewalk, the cement sending our piercing screams of peril. In the scene, slept, or rather tried to sleep, a young woman of 21 years, the little DIS student, by the name of Cristiana.
With such dismal prospects of returning to the land of dreams, Cristiana instead awoke. Being awake a few hours before intended, Cristiana found herself both tired and irritable, but also with a surplus of unanticipated time on her hands. Rolling over in bed, a magical reading device by the name of Kindle caught her eye. She picked up the enticing device and opened it up to the stories she had been reading before bed.
Before long, she was entirely entranced (and slightly disturbed) by the world of Hans Christian Andersen. One after another the stories flowed, The Little Match Girl, Little Clause, and Big Claus, The Ugly Ducking... She read as she cooked her healthy breakfast of cold oat cereal. She read as she sipped her chi tea. She read as she combed her golden hair and clothed herself for the day. The Kindle had her trapped.
On the minutes ticked by. The iPhone tolled first 9:00, and then 9:30. Still, she hit snooze. After all, she knew well that it took only 7 minutes to bike to class, and she had plenty of time to reach that distant land before 10:05. But the Kindle and the Tales had her under their spell and enchanted away all notion of time. The iPhone chimed 10:00, and jolted her out of her magical trance.
She ran down the stairs and grabbed her noble steed, the bicycle. She rushed to the gate, only to struggle to open its heavy weight. The Tales may have released her, but they would not do it gently. She stumbled out in the world, only to be slowed by the very same construction that had woken her earlier. Her legs, sore from bike-use, strained at the peddles. Faster, she urged her steed. Faster.
She turned the corner and hit red light after red light. Hordes of beastly tourists strolled between her and school, blocking her path. Her tires squealed and her keys jangled. She came to the school, only to be greeted by her greatest challenge yet: Parking her bike in a stable already full! She negotiated a space, but by then it was 10:07.
She lunged towards the door, and in the process, dropped her key to the building. It spiraled out of her grasp! Poor Cristiana! She retrieved her fallen key, entred, and sprinted up the four flights of stairs. Gasping for air, she tumbled into her seat at 10:09, and breathed a sigh of relief, vowing never to read Hans Christian Andersen again.
Thursday, August 22
The classroom was up two flights of stairs, yet Cristiana could smell coffee and tea from the ground. She looked up the stairs in anticipation and began the ascent to New Media and Changing Communities. At the door, she was greeted by a smiling Media Woman, by the name of Mie. One by one, the other disciples of learning filtered through the door.
The Media Woman greeted them in kind, and handed them all a coffee or tea, to their preference. Then she began her course. It started already with a look into Facebook's insistence that they are not a media company, the consequences of big data farming, and surveillance capitalism. At every turn, she prompted her students to respond and question. She gave them the tools to visualize their learning, in the form of LEGOs, and encouraged discussion and doodling in equal turns.
She guided them through the sticky and dystopian territory of privacy and free will. They ventured down to the idea that the layman is not, in fact, Google or Facebook's true customer, but rather their true product, disguised in chrome plating. They floundered for a time in the turmoil and fear of the idea that big tech companies are not regulated, for who could oppose them?
But the Media Woman never left their side. And while she recognized the value of this cynicism and anxiety, guided them out again into future solutions, such as publically owned social media or tech companies, motivated not by profit but funded by taxpayer money. The notion was almost as fanciful as the Tales. But the Media Woman isn't afraid to tackle hard or new ideas with her students by her side.
The Marketing Man and the Latecomer
Thursday, August 22
The Marketing Man sat in the front of the sweltering classroom. In front of him, students filed in, each greeting him with a, "Hello Leif". He opened his deck of information and started an engaging discussion on the meaning of brands, and their power and advantage in an age of much product competition. Until he was interrupted by the Latecomer.
The boy shuffled in, eyes downcast not in self-depreciation, as one might expect, but rather in indifference and apathy. The Marketing Man smiled, and pointed him to a seat in the middle of the room, and returned to matters more important than the Latecomer. This would not do, for the Latecomer thrived on privilege and attention. He was not used to be greeted with such small ceremony.
He cleared his throat. "Sir", he said, "Please turn on the air conditioning." The Marketing Man broke off, slight confusion at having been interrupted for the puzzling request. The Latecomer persisted. "It's hot in here. Please turn on the AC." The Marketing Man, realizing the Latecomer was not to be swayed, laughed quietly, in a jolly fashion, "Here, our air conditioning is the open window, the breeze, and an open door!" And he turned back to the deck, thinking the interruption over. The rest of the students eagerly readied their pens, ready for the next nugget of branding wisdom. After all, he was the CMO of two companies and had worked as a European marketing exec for Pepsi. The Marketing Man was kind, but not used to being interrupted so.
This would not do. The Latecomer opened his mouth yet again. "I am hot." The Marketing Man turned, with patience, and raised an eyebrow as if to say, And? What am I to do about that? "I am hot and I want to go sit by a window!" The Latecomer whined. And whether to move the disruption along or to move the Latecomer further from the front of the room, the Marketing Man replied, "Well by all means, go sit by the window".
The Latecomer may have cooled down, but his reputation was forever ruined in the eyes of the Marketing Man.
The Frustrated Photographer
Thursday, August 22
The Frustrated Photographer was not impressed. Not in the slightest. She had come into this class with the expectation of rigor and challenging new theory, but instead was being served only the basics. Minute after minute, the Frustrated Photographer's impatience grew, as the class discussed IOS and aperture, and students asked for camera recommendations.
The assignments seemed straight forward enough. One photobook by the end of the semester and a photo taken each day, that answered a prompt. Soon her inbox was littered with prompts such as Who am I? and What inspired you today? Not this question, thought the Frustrated Photographer. She was hoping for something more exciting than an Instagram challenge and an overview of the history of photography.
The other students seemed less interested in discussing the ethics of how the picture was taken, or the meaning of art. The professor knew less about the works they were looking at than the Frustrated Photographer did. Now, time abroad quite valuable. Each second counts. So it was with a light heart that the Frustrated Photographer dropped the course.
The Secret Language
Friday, August 23
The Pornography Notebook
Friday, August 23
Like many in the industry, the Pornography Notebook did not dream, when it was still a young tree, not yet even paper, that it would become a Pornography Notebook. Back then, it aspired only to be a Notebook, or maybe an Adirondack. But the Pornography Notebook was picked up one day by a young woman on her way to a course titled, Pornography in Scandinavia.
Now the Pornography Notebook's first reaction to its twist of fate was outrage! I could have been filled with equations, or literary analyses of REAL films, thought the Pornography Notebook. How could I have come to this fate? The Pornography Notebook refused to leave its backpack pouch on the first two days of the course, no matter how much the young woman pleaded. But by course three, the Pornography Notebook was intrigued, despite itself.
It had heard the professor mention the final project, a self-designed pornography storyboard. Well, thought the Pornography Notebook, I would make an excellent story-board... It heard the professor open a discussion with the students about how pornography should be studied just as seriously, if not more so, than other films. It has a narrative arc and is made in the same medium. But the issues it deals and problems it creates are even more controversial. The Pornography Notebook wished the young woman had written some of that discussion down. It overheard the students discuss the different contradicting gender and sex discourses in pornography and real life.
I can't let my young woman forget this information! It's too relevant and important in her society! She won't stand a chance if I don't make her take some notes! And it made a decision. This was a worthy use of its 60 blank pages. And next class, it would come out of the bag.
The Bike Gods of Copenhagen
Thursday, August 29
But the Bike Gods of Copenhagen aren't known for answering whiny bikes, and this Bike God of Copenhagen was no exception. Instead, he cast a horrible curse upon the Bike! The girl came back and biked home. Nothing was amiss. It wasn't until a few days later when the Bike was taking her home from Nørreport, that something went array.
The Bike was turning towards the curb when all of a sudden, its rider changed her mind! They were normally so in synch, what was happening?! The jerk caught the Bike off guard, and send its wheels out from under it. The girl leaped but wasn't fast enough to avoid the Bike's peddle. It slashed open a gash on her foreleg. The girl silently thanked her mother for making her pack bandaids and Neosporin.
The girl was fine and both her and the Bike were able to laugh it off. But they knew the fall for what it was, a warning. Don't mess with the Bikes Gods of Copenhagen.
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