This class focused more on the informational developments of the American military industrial complex.  During and after World War II, basic mechanical and then later electrical mechanisms were developed to assist in the war effort.  Mechanisms such as the firing solution “computers” on battleships and the advanced bomb sights of American B-29s came about out of a military necessity to develop superior technologies than the opposing forces.  This necessity grew following the war, with the advent of atomic energy (another military development) and contributed greatly to Eisenhower’s theory of the military industrial complex..

As research increased on tools of war, so did the necessity for a network to safeguard the survival of such knowledge in the event of a nuclear attack on the United States.  The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) proposed such a network to connect important hubs of research and ensure research could survive an attack, the ARPANET in the early 1960s.

Over the next two decades this technology expanded and further developed, with the help of organizations such as CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research).  Physicist Tim Berners-Lee, while working as a fellow at CERN, developed the World Wide Web system to link the research oriented infrastructure of the internet to allow for common users to access its services.  Later in 1990 he developed the first web browser, and this continued to develop into today.

I feel that this is a perfect example of how military necessity spurred great informational change in worldwide society.  Because of the necessity for military researchers to more easily share information across nations and safeguard against attack, a worldwide information sharing system was created.  Contributing to this, because it was a matter of national defense for all nations developing the technology, this necessity received top billing and staffing.  Although, I do acknowledge that the information systems developed by these necessities were restricted to government personnel and researchers, and therefore could not have led to the informational-societal changes brought on by the internet in the early 1980s.

These changes connected the world, hypothetically allowed someone in France to instantaneously share documents with someone in California, and led to the more globalized society we have today.  While I do assert that the military (the cycle of conflict, necessity, research and development) is the most powerful driving force behind societal change in the 20th century, unfortunately just this alone does not lead to such change in civilian life.  It takes people like Tim Berners-Lee to recognize the potential of a military system such as the early internet, and to make it relevant and accessible to the common public.

The topic for this class was the phenomenon of cross-training present in American music during the twentieth century.  It was first introduced, as much is in this class, by discussing the minstrel show.  How musicians of all colors in American industry would “put on acts” to reenact the minstrel shows, and how this is the first form of “American Music.”

The minstrel show, while it may seem blatantly offensive, and perhaps it was intentioned that way at first, nonetheless evolved into a form of cultural amalgamation and normalization I feel.  Because, the minstrel show is in effect, a musician putting on a certain act in order to appeal to a certain audience, and I recall back to the first mentions of the minstrel show in class, when the private and public identity differentials of artists such as 50 Cent were referenced.  On stage, an artist may portray a certain image, and the image may indeed change as the audience does, and then the same artist may seem entirely diffferent in their private life.

Circling back to the cross-training of music, people of all color would participate in the “minstrel show influences” in order to normalize their culture into American society.

In this meeting we discussed the theory that what you personally interpret from a message is ultimately irrelevant to the actual informational content of the message, in a strictly informational sense.

The example of Google was used, Google uses –grams of letter combinations to convey search queries and to compile results, something which I did not know at all.  Google’s system apparently contains millions of these combinations which it uses to translate a query into “technically understood language” to find the most relevant data.  So, in theory, it does not matter what language you form a query in, Google should come up with the same results relevant to the topic each time, because ultimately the perceived meanings of the message don’t matter to machines and logic systems, only the raw information.

In a way, this makes sense to me, because of the cliched belief that “machines can’t feel or express inflections on words” like humans can.  However, in recent history there have been advances made in order to combat this “deadpan communication system,” such as emoticons, changes to the “writing” of the text itself, and punctuation which make messages and the written word “easier” to understand the meaning.

Now, it would be very interesting to see what the machines do with this…

In this class we discussed America’s “military industrial complex” and how it created the society we live in today.  First coined by President Eisenhower in early 1961 to describe American society’s increasing focus on the buildup of military power during the Cold War.  During this industrial concentration on tools of the military, many important advances were made.  The federal highway system (to enable swift domestic allocation of troops), computers and all of the involved technological aspects (to calculate trajectories and outcomes) are but a few of the society-shaping advances made thanks to the military.

Even colored underwear is thanks to the military!  Delving into my own knowledge, I recall that in World War 1, to avoid waving bright white flags when drying underwear, troops would often dye them dark colors to not stand out.  This may or may not be 100% accurate, but it would fit perfectly with the theme of this lesson: the US military is the source of a sizable portion of American domestic advances.

I am not claiming that the military made these advances to better humanity, out of a vacuum.  I believe that many of the technological things we take for granted today came about out of a military necessity for them, and the funding of the government in order to accomplish them as soon as possible.

In this meeting, the idea of self introduced in the previous class was expanded upon.  Specifically, how the idea of self has changed as societies changed in relation to the public sphere.  The other sense of self that was introduced was the different aspects of a person that manifests in the written word, as opposed to their personal communication.  This idea by itself spoke to me, because I personally have noticed that everyone, myself included, expresses themselves differently by writing than by talking to express the message.

The public sphere-  American society, decades ago, placed more importance in logic and constraint when someone addressed other members of society, especially in the public sphere.  There would be no howling activists using emotional pleas to attempt change, but instead more civil discussions.  This goes in conjunction with another point on public speaking — “the personal is not political.  With this point, people were not really supposed to discuss “matters of the privacy” in public, namely sexuality, bodily functions, and other private acts, especially when trying to enact change in a governmental forum or for a cause.

I would have to say that I agree with the second of these points.  I feel that what one does in the privacy of their home or bedroom have no place in matters which concern the public.  And in regard to the first point of the previous paragraph, I don’t necessarily believe that emotion is not appropriate for public discourse, but I do think that personal urges and behaviors should be limited for the sake of civility.

I do acknowledge that there might be more elements to the public self than what I have learned about thus far.

This big topic for this class was slavery.  More specifically, “why are we no longer allowed to “own” another human, even through the “owned” person submits themselves to the others service, as in indentured servitude?”  That was an interesting question to pose to the class, most response followed the “slavery is wrong” argument, but then the question was brought “why is it perceived wrong in today’s day and age.

The topic then expanded or narrowed, depending on how you view it, to discuss the differences of the personal and working selves, and how this changed as slavery “ended.”  It was proposed that slavery, and indentured servitude, was the norm up to around two years ago because there was a societal differentiation between a person’s self which agreed to work and that same person’s self who actually did the work.  It was also proposed that at this point in time, people who were enslaved lacked this divide between selves, and so it was not unethical to own another person.

This topic led to a very interesting lesson, and it led to a further discussion of how modern people in this technological era who progressively develop a new sense of self, one that is different than the other two discussed.  It is evident to me that in addition to this difference between selves of someone who agrees to work and that same person’s self who does the work, there is a new self, the “technological self.”

This new self is how someone either behaves, presents their thought, or interprets the world, through the use of technology.

This class, we discussed how the perception and treatment of the natural world changed with the introduction of modernizing ideas and inventions near the turn of the century around the late 1800s.  These technologies included standardization of time, electric light, and telephones.

The most notable idea, or technology, was an industrialized process called “scientific management.”  This “human technology” was developed by one.  F. W. Taylor, who made extensive studies on efficiency and time management.  These observations were then implemented to determine the most scientifically effficient way to do things.  A new technology was introduced: the used of wires, based on the observations of Taylor, to teach other workers the scientific way to assemble a telephone.

I personally had never heard of either Taylor or the “wire teaching method.” My first reaction to this in class was a chuckle, because it looked so comical.  But then I thought about it in the scope of the era this is from.  In the industrial revolutionized America, time was highly regimented due to the value of time, and the products that were needed to be produced during the day.  The era transitioned from the farmplace carrying the most importance on humanity to the importance of the “factory work day.”

In class today, and for the readings, the subject of “sound normalization” came up.  I learned, because I had not heard of this phenomenon before, that in recent musical history the trend has been to modify the pitch and volume of music to a more standardized level.  For instance, if a song containded a piano, a string section, vocals, and a trumpet, then the volume of each “instrument” would be modified in order to create an experience roughly the same volume all the way through.

I.E., make it possible to hear “conversational singing” over a full orchestra.