So I'm going to be super honest with you and say that I'm still struggling to understand your intentions/understanding for your thesis. It just seems as if the real topic 'bad taste/shock/exploitation' etc still isn't being explored in your discussion in any real or meaningful way. You have this habit of diluting your own topic whenever you write about it and I need to keep calling you out on it or you risk getting lost in your own tangents - let me try giving you a very clear chapter structure and see what you think:
Chapter 1: 'Bad Taste ('shock value') & Aesthetics' - Defining 'Bad Taste' as a tradition in art, culture and imagery. Chapter 2: Understanding the appeal of/need for 'Bad Taste' from a theoretical point of view (Abjection). Chapter 3: The Films of John Waters as Case-study of 'Bad Taste'
I think this structure would be very focused for you - so chapter one is where you define 'bad taste' as it relates to debates around aesthetics - and as a tradition in culture-making... 'Bad taste' is a complex category, characterised by lots of related terms, such as kitsch, camp, vulgarity, grotesquery etc, so it would make for a really good diagnostic chapter for your reader, as you seek to give a definition for them derived from your research.
Chapter 2 is where you seek to 'explain' the appeal/need/role of bad taste culture theoretically by looking at ideas around abjection. So having establishing the tradition of bad taste in art and culture etc in chapter 1 for the reader, you then seek to answer the obvious question - which is 'why' do we need/want/enjoy bad taste culture if it is revolting/anti-social etc.
Chapter 3 - you use the films of John Waters exclusively to further examine bad taste in a very specific context as it relates to the work of one practitioner...
You're looking for a very linear, very strong development of your argument, and you need to think about the logical ordering of ideas as required by the non-initiated reader. Let me know if you think this is helpful...
Thanks for the feedback. I agree with you that my structure seems unfocused, and I think this may be down to my own perspective being somewhat unfocused. After sitting on it a few hours, I think this may be the best way to describe why I want to write about the topics mentioned; I want to study more into what makes a product memorable.
I have seen films where bad taste is the spectacle, and read books covering what makes the audience drawn to the subject matter rather than repelled. This is interesting to me, as I never considered that the 'abject' or 'transgressions' were at all relevant to viewership, but instead, I found out they have more to do with the creator themselves. Mentality behind viewership, as I have read, is based around the viewers desire to connect with the content, that is, how they connect on an emotional level in response to different films.
In essence I think the more I have investigated this question on my own terms, the less it has become about the original question because I am constantly seeking answers that are stemming off into their own fields. I would like to focus on the memorable part of it, how it affirms the authors identity according to the audience. So essentially what you are recommending to me is a element of what I want to investigate and not the entire picture.
Hey Anabel,
ReplyDeleteSo I'm going to be super honest with you and say that I'm still struggling to understand your intentions/understanding for your thesis. It just seems as if the real topic 'bad taste/shock/exploitation' etc still isn't being explored in your discussion in any real or meaningful way. You have this habit of diluting your own topic whenever you write about it and I need to keep calling you out on it or you risk getting lost in your own tangents - let me try giving you a very clear chapter structure and see what you think:
Chapter 1: 'Bad Taste ('shock value') & Aesthetics' - Defining 'Bad Taste' as a tradition in art, culture and imagery.
Chapter 2: Understanding the appeal of/need for 'Bad Taste' from a theoretical point of view (Abjection).
Chapter 3: The Films of John Waters as Case-study of 'Bad Taste'
I think this structure would be very focused for you - so chapter one is where you define 'bad taste' as it relates to debates around aesthetics - and as a tradition in culture-making... 'Bad taste' is a complex category, characterised by lots of related terms, such as kitsch, camp, vulgarity, grotesquery etc, so it would make for a really good diagnostic chapter for your reader, as you seek to give a definition for them derived from your research.
Chapter 2 is where you seek to 'explain' the appeal/need/role of bad taste culture theoretically by looking at ideas around abjection. So having establishing the tradition of bad taste in art and culture etc in chapter 1 for the reader, you then seek to answer the obvious question - which is 'why' do we need/want/enjoy bad taste culture if it is revolting/anti-social etc.
Chapter 3 - you use the films of John Waters exclusively to further examine bad taste in a very specific context as it relates to the work of one practitioner...
You're looking for a very linear, very strong development of your argument, and you need to think about the logical ordering of ideas as required by the non-initiated reader. Let me know if you think this is helpful...
Hi phil,
DeleteThanks for the feedback. I agree with you that my structure seems unfocused, and I think this may be down to my own perspective being somewhat unfocused. After sitting on it a few hours, I think this may be the best way to describe why I want to write about the topics mentioned; I want to study more into what makes a product memorable.
I have seen films where bad taste is the spectacle, and read books covering what makes the audience drawn to the subject matter rather than repelled. This is interesting to me, as I never considered that the 'abject' or 'transgressions' were at all relevant to viewership, but instead, I found out they have more to do with the creator themselves. Mentality behind viewership, as I have read, is based around the viewers desire to connect with the content, that is, how they connect on an emotional level in response to different films.
In essence I think the more I have investigated this question on my own terms, the less it has become about the original question because I am constantly seeking answers that are stemming off into their own fields. I would like to focus on the memorable part of it, how it affirms the authors identity according to the audience. So essentially what you are recommending to me is a element of what I want to investigate and not the entire picture.