Exploring The Paradox Of Group Identity, Music, And Humanity

Exploring the Paradox of Group Identity, Music, and Human Connection

Paper: Essay 4: A few weeks back I went to see Kamasi Washington at the Riv in Uptown. Washington is a sensational jazz artist often compared to John Coltrane. Washington’s new album, is entitled, Harmony of Difference. See of-difference-ep/. It is a masterpiece.

In class we watched the video and discussed Truth, Washington’s final track on the album. Listen to it again carefully, very, carefully. The song is actually 5 separate melodies that are played simultaneously. Why? What does Washington mean when he says that his compositions create a “wall of music”—and why is it called Truth, and what’s with the album title?

Also, attached is an excerpt from “Gooseberries” by Anton Chekhov (A great Russian author). It is a conversation between two brothers. Read it. CAREFULLY. Then read it again. Then again. Prompt: The short story and the song have everything to do with this entire class, and the main lesson I have tried to convey, and hopefully you have learned. By now you should be able to articulate that main point – the thesis – of this class in one clear short sentence. That sentence is your title to your essay. Then write a 5 to 10 page essay explaining how the song, its composition, the video and title, and the Chekhov reading each relate to what we have talked about and learned this semester. I am looking for, and expecting, a moving essay, focusing on what you have learned in class, and exploring your views, experiences, and opinions on the subjects that this class explored.

This should be a personal essay that reflects on you, not some recitation of the stuff I taught you. I want you to focus mostly on the last unit but to also deal with the entire semester. The principle paradox of this class is how can we reconcile the need for and benefits of the in-group, like self-esteem, self-confidence and social intelligence, with the direct negative consequences of this way of organizing our social world into groups that classify, including bias, discrimination, and even genocide? In-groups members exhibit implicit trust of each other. Out group members have implicit distrust of each other.

This drives in groups closer and drive apart groups from each other. When different groups occupy the same space, this dynamic creates conflict from simple bias to, at the extreme genocide. We talked about empathy, super-ordinate identity, cultural appropriation, empathy, allophilia, and personal moral character (virtue), I-thou, and not being an asshole, as some of the ways to bridge the gap between you and The Other; to solve the problems caused when two groups occupy the same space. Some of these methods of conflict reduction were highlighted in various scenes in Remember the Titans, including the contact hypothesis, super-ordinate goals, and shared identity. You can discuss the movie as well, where it fits with your thesis.

There are some “check offs” to help guide you towards an effective paper. You must cite at least four of the readings from the class and include discussion of Trust. You must synthesize the Chekhov short story and Washington’s song into your thesis. This paper requires thought. Lots of thought.

More thought, better demonstrated, better grade. The paper is 5 to 10 pages. It is due on December 14, 2017 via email. I will be glad to review a rough draft or outline if you email it to me, or want to meet during office hours. On December 7, 2017 we will discuss the prompt so have questions.

In this paper you must: Be creative. Be critical. Be forceful. Be opinionated. Your paper should demonstrate that you have thought deeply about the prompt, the song, the material in class, and how they relate to you, and what you have learned about yourself and others. Your essay should be submitted in Word, 12 pt font, double spaced.

There should be a works cited page, and you may imbed hyperlinks or other multimedia (in fact, you probably should for this assignment). This will be the best paper you have EVER written. A short story by Anton Chekhov Gooseberries "It was hard and sour, but, as Poushkin said, the illusion which exalts us is dearer to us than ten thousand truths. I saw a happy man, one whose dearest dream had come true, who had attained his goal in life, who had got what he wanted, and was pleased with his destiny and with himself. In my idea of human life there is always some alloy of sadness, but now at the sight of a happy man I was filled with something like despair. And at night it grew on me.

A bed was made up for me in the room near my brother's and I could hear him, unable to sleep, going again and again to the plate of gooseberries. I thought: 'After all, what a lot of contented, happy people there must be! What an overwhelming power that means! I look at this life and see the arrogance and the idleness of the strong, the ignorance and bestiality of the weak, the horrible poverty everywhere, overcrowding, drunkenness, hypocrisy, falsehood. . . . Meanwhile in all the houses, all the streets, there is peace; out of fifty thousand people who live in our town there is not one to kick against it all.

Think of the people who go to the market for food: during the day they eat; at night they sleep, talk nonsense, marry, grow old, piously follow their dead to the cemetery; one never sees or hears those who suffer, and all the horror of life goes on somewhere behind the scenes. Everything is quiet, peaceful, and against it all there is only the silent protest of statistics; so many go mad, so many gallons are drunk, so many children die of starvation. . . . And such a state of things is obviously what we want; apparently a happy man only feels so because the unhappy bear their burden in silence, but for which happiness would be impossible. It is a general hypnosis. Every happy man should have someone with a little hammer at his door to knock and remind him that there are unhappy people, and that, however happy he may be, life will sooner or later show its claws, and some misfortune will befall him -- illness, poverty, loss, and then no one will see or hear him, just as he now neither sees nor hears others.

But there is no man with a hammer, and the happy go on living, just a little fluttered with the petty cares of every day, like an aspen-tree in the wind -- and everything is all right.' "That night I was able to understand how I, too, had been content and happy," Ivan Ivanich went on, getting up. "I, too, at meals or out hunting, used to lay down the law about living, and religion, and governing the masses. I, too, used to say that teaching is light, that education is necessary, but that for simple folk reading and writing is enough for the present. Freedom is a boon, I used to say, as essential as the air we breathe, but we must wait. Yes -- I used to say so, but now I ask: 'Why do we wait?'" Ivan Ivanich glanced angrily at Bourkin.

"Why do we wait, I ask you? What considerations keep us fast? I am told that we cannot have everything at once, and that every idea is realized in time. But who says so? Where is the proof that it is so? You refer me to the natural order of things, to the law of cause and effect, but is there order or natural law in that I, a living, thinking creature, should stand by a ditch until it fills up, or is narrowed, when I could jump it or throw a bridge over it? Tell me, I say, why should we wait? Wait, when we have no strength to live, and yet must live and are full of the desire to live! "I left my brother early the next morning, and from that time on I found it impossible to live in town. The peace and quiet of it oppress me. I dare not look in at the windows, for nothing is more dreadful to see than the sight of a happy family, sitting round a table, having tea. I am an old man now and am no good for the struggle. I commenced late. I can only grieve within my soul, and fret and sulk. At night my head buzzes with the rush of my thoughts and I cannot sleep. . . . Ah! If I were young!" Ivan Ivanich walked excitedly up and down the room and repeated: "If I were young." He suddenly walked up to Aliokhin and shook him first by one hand and then by the other. "Pavel Koustantinich," he said in a voice of entreaty, "don't be satisfied, don't let yourself be lulled to sleep! While you are young, strong, wealthy, do not cease to do good! Happiness does not exist, nor should it, and if there is any meaning or purpose in life, they are not in our peddling little happiness, but in something reasonable and grand. Do good!"