Michael C. Miller

Iwent to "On Being an Artist: Daily Affirmations and Gang Violence” presented by Michael C. Miller. He is a professor of Art at TAMU-Commerce. His work is really cool. It pretty much all had text and a sort of clip art style painting on Walmart fabric. Despite that awful description his work is really cool. The piece on this page was one of my favorites. He has a student find clip art and another put bits of fabric on canvas "without any design, make it ugly." From the ugly fabric he makes beautiful interesting, sometimes colorful multimedia images. His body of work reminds me strongly of Maggie Taylor, except of using photoshop and photographs he work in a studio with fabric and paint. I havnen't been drawn to collage style art before this year, but I'm becoming very fond of it.

Aside from that Commerce Week on Writing was very fun and interesting. I really enjoyed all the events I went to. I wish the did this stuff more.

Wednesday Events, National week on writing.

@ 1:00 I went to the Norris Community Panel. There were five community members who spoke and answered questions. They spoke on integration of the Norris/Commerce school system. Most of their family members became teachers, they said that for African Americans at that time (1940-1970) all you could be is a teacher. The oldest man, who's name I didn't write down, worked hard to bring change to that community. He brought people together to fight for the cleaning of arsenic polluted soil and water. He was in constant contact with the political leaders of the time, governor's of Texas, and presidential candidates. He wrote grants to bring in running water and electricity to the homes and churches. They talked about unofficial segregation of churches. It was a little disorganized but, they answered everyone's questions throughly.

@2:30 I went to the "Don't Be Silent," documentary viewing. It is a documentary about the "Shack People" outside of Rome during the 1960's and 70's. It was amazing. Firstly the cinematography was great. They used clips from that time as well as current video of the same people. A Catholic priest, Don Roberto decided to live with the "shack people." He started a school "725" where he helped them with their homework and then began teaching them his own curriculum. He thought them to have a political conscience. He had them write essays and poems speaking out on their circumstances. They sent it to the mayor, and fought for the right for a house. Don Roberto didn't want to live as the rich do, he is believes that materialism is the downfall of society. He also points out that the followers of Jesus were the poor, the outcasts and the people without hope. Those people are the ones that rise up to make a difference.

Summary: Colleges Need to Re-Mediate Remedation

Mike Rose wants other schools to change how their remediation classes are structured. His school has done so, and he uses Kevin's story as an example. Mike believes, instead of remedial classes teaching grammar in a basic form, that the classes should teach college level ideas and writing styles, and fix mistakes in class and on papers as they go. His program teaches cumulatively. In the beginning they teach summarization of articles so that later the students can go on to summarize and compare non fiction books. Mike doesn't think that cutting up grammar, style and organization lessons in to "workbook bits" helps the studetns learn in the context of a paper. They use an advanced subject when writing, so the students are prepared for the rest of their college classes.

"That is a huge point, and one that is tied to our core assumptions about cognition and language: Writing filled with grammatical errors does not preclude engagement with sophisticated intellectual material, and errors can be dealt with effectively as one works with such material," Mike Rose writes in the essay.

Post 1

I've learned that Literacy isn't declining. The way people read and write is changing. We use more electronics and less hard back books or lined writing paper. Literacy's new definition isn't only on the computer, it is also on the road, in the kitchen, in the store, and even in the garage. It isn't simply reading and writing books in an academic format, but a way of gathering information and communicating ideas.