EE2 2023 Thread (1 Viewer)

[MJRey]

Hey, extension 2 students!
Have you started your projects? Any exciting ideas?

 

[raspberriesandpears]

hi! i've got my viva voce on monday so i'm very stressed about that at the moment! i'm most likely going to do a short story on the 1832 Paris Uprising (pretty obscure I know) with a Pandora's Jar metaphor
currently been digging through old french trial documents and reading some short stories

 

[MJRey]

hi! i've got my viva voce on monday so i'm very stressed about that at the moment! i'm most likely going to do a short story on the 1832 Paris Uprising (pretty obscure I know) with a Pandora's Jar metaphor
currently been digging through old french trial documents and reading some short stories

Good luck with the viva voce tomorrow! Just remember to be yourself and let your enthusiasm for your ideas carry you, even if they're not fully developed. But wow, that sounds like such an interesting story! And the Pandora's Box extended metaphor would be amazing! Greek mythology has always been incredibly fascinating in my opinion.

 

[raspberriesandpears]

thank you )) yeah i was pretty set on a greek mythology aspect since year 7, and it's great to get it in there somewhere
i think the viva went okay - i guess we'll see when i get my marks back! but i managed to answer all the questions and they didn't seem to want much more from me so i think it's okay

 

[thatnormster]

Yeah I've started drafting, holidays and all. Holy fuck, I just feel so disoriented because I read some exemplars and I just don't know what gets a good mark and what doesn't.

But anyway, I'm pushing though. I'm doing a short-story. I changed my idea up a lot from the one I proposed during my Viva (which I got pretty okay for). But bottom-line is, it's going to be about Advertising; its history and significance in society (will maybe centre David Ogilvy, real historical figure, as a character. Maybe deuteragonist. The guy's called "father of modern-day advertising", whaddya think!) Advertising is used as a framing device for, I don't know, the disillusionment pervasive in the post-modernist and contemporary world? Advertising because it shows how people.. want to be unique? Want to stand-out? Blah blah blah stigmatisation of mediocrity? Yeah I don't know. I need to develop it a little. I made it sound way smarter than it's going to be.

All I know is the title's gunna be "Everything is Advertising" that's it.

 

[Master Singleton]

I highly recommend you to buy the book Economical Writing, Third Edition: Thirty-Five Rules for Clear and Persuasive Prose by Deirdre N McCloskey and read it over the holidays while practicing the 35 rules as in University this book have helped me greatly writing and articulating my ideas clearly. You can buy this book on Amazon or via the University of Chicago Press.

 

[jordan c:]

Yeah I've started drafting, holidays and all. Holy fuck, I just feel so disoriented because I read some exemplars and I just don't know what gets a good mark and what doesn't.

But anyway, I'm pushing though. I'm doing a short-story. I changed my idea up a lot from the one I proposed during my Viva (which I got pretty okay for). But bottom-line is, it's going to be about Advertising; its history and significance in society (will maybe centre David Ogilvy, real historical figure, as a character. Maybe deuteragonist. The guy's called "father of modern-day advertising", whaddya think!) Advertising is used as a framing device for, I don't know, the disillusionment pervasive in the post-modernist and contemporary world? Advertising because it shows how people.. want to be unique? Want to stand-out? Blah blah blah stigmatisation of mediocrity? Yeah I don't know. I need to develop it a little. I made it sound way smarter than it's going to be.

All I know is the title's gunna be "Everything is Advertising" that's it.

It's an interesting premise, you can definitely branch out with a lot of ideas! So with the foundations being centered around consumerism and your critique on it (I think), you really need to be inventive with that topic. It's been done a lot. But having a historical figure in your writing is great! The idea of a deuteragonist sounds pretty good as well. Do you have any idea on how your narrative will be structured so far? Generally all its events, characters, and setting stuff. Oh and have you also researched into any critical theory related to David Oglivy and your topic? I'm sure he's prominent in literature, and you can find a lot of scholarly articles on the online State Library. That stuff is gold for your literature review and journal! (Maybe it can also inform you on his dialogue and how to characterise him in nuanced ways)

 

[lev1athan_]

Hi new here - I'm a bit worried about if my concept is too cliché and overused in previous major works. Like would I get shit marks for it? It would probably depend on how well I execute it right (that's a problem TOO). Anyway I'm thinking of writing an Absurdist play because I fell in love with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead in year 11 ext 1 coursework. I have ideas for my concept and all the jazz (need to flesh out) but do let me know if you think that my idea is too cliché. I saw an Absurdist play in the 2019 Young Writers' Showcase and... (here's an excerpt of feedback from the EE2 2012 scripts)

Weaker Major Works were characterised by:
• attempts to use Absurdism to explain a lack of coherency in the script
• a lack of awareness of the paradoxical nature of Absurdist Theatre, ie underlying the seemingly nonsensical rendering of character and action there must be a criticism or shaping of meaning

So the evidence is stacked against me but something inside me would just like to deny the fact that writing an Absurdist play is the most cliché and overused shit ever. Sad face. I'm already balls deep in research and I'm quite reluctant to back out but then again I also do not want my major work to be that 5am garbage truck at your front door so idk guys

 

[raspberriesandpears]

i am not at all familiar with the absurdist style but i would say don't necessarily be deterred because it's cliché, that doesn't mean you can't do well with it. you're clearly very passionate about that style and i'm sure you can do super well!!
how closely do you work with your teacher, i.e can they provide some assistance?
also how far through are you - i'm not doing much literary research at the moment which i worry could screw me over, but i'm just trying to write a cohesive narrative with my historical facts straight before getting theory into it

 

[fuzi]

Hi new here - I'm a bit worried about if my concept is too cliché and overused in previous major works. Like would I get shit marks for it? It would probably depend on how well I execute it right (that's a problem TOO). Anyway I'm thinking of writing an Absurdist play because I fell in love with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead in year 11 ext 1 coursework. I have ideas for my concept and all the jazz (need to flesh out) but do let me know if you think that my idea is too cliché. I saw an Absurdist play in the 2019 Young Writers' Showcase and... (here's an excerpt of feedback from the EE2 2012 scripts)

Weaker Major Works were characterised by:
• attempts to use Absurdism to explain a lack of coherency in the script
• a lack of awareness of the paradoxical nature of Absurdist Theatre, ie underlying the seemingly nonsensical rendering of character and action there must be a criticism or shaping of meaning

So the evidence is stacked against me but something inside me would just like to deny the fact that writing an Absurdist play is the most cliché and overused shit ever. Sad face. I'm already balls deep in research and I'm quite reluctant to back out but then again I also do not want my major work to be that 5am garbage truck at your front door so idk guys

Hey!

Okay, speaking as a student who just did extension 2 english in 2022 with a creative nonfiction piece about Absurdism and the Absurd condition, I would say for one, don't let the NESA feedback intimidate you out of what you want to do. Is the feedback important? Absolutely, but it isn't supposed to be a be all and end all of what you can and can't have in your major work. The feedback is more a warning of what you should be careful around. Do a play in line with the Theatre of the Absurd, sure! But don't use it as a scapegoat for incoherence in your writing. The Theatre of the Absurd wasn't just confusion for the sake of it, it was for a purpose.

Which brings me on to my second point; whether or not an Absurdist play is a good pick for you is also dependent on your actual idea for what it's going to be about. Do plenty of research on form (I have some resources for the Theatre of the Absurd for its relation to how the Absurd is perceived, so feel free to let me know if you'd like them). If your concept is something that fits well into the Theatre of the Absurd or could belong in there, do it! Innovate! But if you are writing something that just quite isn't right in that genre, then it may not be the best. Again, this all depends on what your concept and everything is, but key take away: don't do it for the sake of doing it, do it for a purpose.

Final tid bit, I understand the thought of having to lose your research or change what you want to do is really frustrating and would make you panicked, it did the same for me too, but I would also suggest being flexible! I came into the course wanting to do an objective, factual critical response in the representation of morality in Absurdist realities in Hayao Miyazaki's films and blow minds with academia. In the end, it was a personal, creative non-fiction essay that in some ways dealt with the same thing, but in some ways it dealt with more.Whatever it was, me at the start of year 12 would not even believe I thought of writing that, but it was all for the best.

Best of luck with your major work!

p.s. for quality assurance, my major work got a 46/50 examination mark, and if you'd like to read it for inspo feel free to let me know and I'll share it )

 

[lev1athan_]

I am super passionate at this! I don't think I'd want to trade it for anything else so it's a bit sad thinking of letting it go. But thank you for your post! I've thought about it and this is the thing I love most about english so I'll probably be continuing on with it.
I work pretty closely with my teacher but he said his family from overseas is coming over so I don't want to bother him on his holiday time and all... I'll ask for assistance when we're back to school :')
As for literary research, it seems pretty logical to conduct research before getting started but I think either way works. I'm not far into ACTUAL research but I've researched everything I'm GOING to research. I've done intensive studying on three plays and according to my list I've got five left that I want to read - currently reading The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus (philosophical essay because it's something I've wanted to read for a while and also literally the basis of absurdism. So concept research I haven't done much of and I haven't researched much on the conventions of script writing but it's the holidays... so...I've just been reading plays :')
Also I have no idea how to quote messages so here you go

Quote Reply

 

[lev1athan_]

Hey!

Okay, speaking as a student who just did extension 2 english in 2022 with a creative nonfiction piece about Absurdism and the Absurd condition, I would say for one, don't let the NESA feedback intimidate you out of what you want to do. Is the feedback important? Absolutely, but it isn't supposed to be a be all and end all of what you can and can't have in your major work. The feedback is more a warning of what you should be careful around. Do a play in line with the Theatre of the Absurd, sure! But don't use it as a scapegoat for incoherence in your writing. The Theatre of the Absurd wasn't just confusion for the sake of it, it was for a purpose.

Which brings me on to my second point; whether or not an Absurdist play is a good pick for you is also dependent on your actual idea for what it's going to be about. Do plenty of research on form (I have some resources for the Theatre of the Absurd for its relation to how the Absurd is perceived, so feel free to let me know if you'd like them). If your concept is something that fits well into the Theatre of the Absurd or could belong in there, do it! Innovate! But if you are writing something that just quite isn't right in that genre, then it may not be the best. Again, this all depends on what your concept and everything is, but key take away: don't do it for the sake of doing it, do it for a purpose.

Final tid bit, I understand the thought of having to lose your research or change what you want to do is really frustrating and would make you panicked, it did the same for me too, but I would also suggest being flexible! I came into the course wanting to do an objective, factual critical response in the representation of morality in Absurdist realities in Hayao Miyazaki's films and blow minds with academia. In the end, it was a personal, creative non-fiction essay that in some ways dealt with the same thing, but in some ways it dealt with more.Whatever it was, me at the start of year 12 would not even believe I thought of writing that, but it was all for the best.

Best of luck with your major work!

p.s. for quality assurance, my major work got a 46/50 examination mark, and if you'd like to read it for inspo feel free to let me know and I'll share it )

Woah, I came into term 1 of yr 12 wanting to do a creative nonfiction on Absurdism. Also yes I would love resources for the Theatre of Absurd! Can I also have a look at your piece? I wanna see how you went about portraying Absurdism in a creative nonfiction, seeing as how that is what I initially wanted to write.
Now that I think about it, I think I was stuck between chosing creative nonfiction or a critical response for my form, but somehow I've changed my mind to script. For critical response I was thinking something similar to yours, except it was Bojack Horseman and other Absurdist fictions. As for creative nonfiction I wanted to write some sort of piece how the Theatre of Absurd and Absurdist fictions has effect on an individual's psychology or lifestyle, I guess that same as critical response except less... critical.
And for my script I've settled on the exploration of how the philosophical notions of Absurdism have effect on one's life and psychology, stuff like that idk I might change it a bit - but all my ideas seem to blend together it's just the form I was having trouble choosing. For now I've settled with script because I've read plays that have influenced me and that's the best way I would like for my characters to be portrayed through.
Can I ask what your influencing texts were?

 

[fuzi]

Woah, I came into term 1 of yr 12 wanting to do a creative nonfiction on Absurdism. Also yes I would love resources for the Theatre of Absurd! Can I also have a look at your piece? I wanna see how you went about portraying Absurdism in a creative nonfiction, seeing as how that is what I initially wanted to write.
Now that I think about it, I think I was stuck between chosing creative nonfiction or a critical response for my form, but somehow I've changed my mind to script. For critical response I was thinking something similar to yours, except it was Bojack Horseman and other Absurdist fictions. As for creative nonfiction I wanted to write some sort of piece how the Theatre of Absurd and Absurdist fictions has effect on an individual's psychology or lifestyle, I guess that same as critical response except less... critical.
And for my script I've settled on the exploration of how the philosophical notions of Absurdism have effect on one's life and psychology, stuff like that idk I might change it a bit - but all my ideas seem to blend together it's just the form I was having trouble choosing. For now I've settled with script because I've read plays that have influenced me and that's the best way I would like for my characters to be portrayed through.
Can I ask what your influencing texts were?

Seeing as how you're so passionate about this, I see no reason for you to change from an Absurd play! Honestly, taking a more psychological look into the effects of the Absurd sounds really interesting and could work really well in the Theatre of the Absurd if you pull it off.

I'm not too sure what you mean by influencing texts,, if you mean like conceptually, naturally The Myth of Sisyphus, but also 'The Absurd' by Thomas Nagel,'The Sickness Unto Death' by Kierkegaard, 'Thus Spoke Zarathustra' and 'The Gay Science' by Nietzsche, and additionally for the moral components the biggest influences was probably 'Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals' by Kant. If you mean influencing texts in terms of how I wrote and actually writing creative non-fiction, I didn't really have any in my specific form that I drew much inspiration from, cause my teacher told me about braided essays which I thought were incredible but the thing is, it's quite niche and hard to find one specifically in same way you would want to do it cause there is just so much room for innovation in CNF. But I did draw a lot of my inspiration for writing more personal parts from John Green's 'The Anthropocene Reviewed', beautiful book.

I'll attach my essay with the reflection statement and everything! And a decent resource I learned about the Theatre of the Absurd is: https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?p=GVRL&...11&v=2.1&it=r&sid=bookmark-GVRL&asid=f1be62c9

 

[raspberriesandpears]

we're about halfway through (terrifying, i know). how is everyone going?

 

[Average Boreduser]

we're about halfway through (terrifying, i know). how is everyone going?

Alright I guess. EE2 is pretty easy to be completely honest, I was expecting a little more.

 

[raspberriesandpears]

Alright I guess. EE2 is pretty easy to be completely honest, I was expecting a little more.

i swear to god

 

[MJRey]

The deadline for submissions is approaching (if I'm remembering correctly). How are you all feeling?

 

[raspberriesandpears]

feeling okay about it, honestly! i literally just submitted my first full reflection statement draft to my teacher for feedback; i'm a couple of drafts in to my major work and I think I'm finally reaching the pointy end which is good! i'm still really enjoying the process of writing it although i have suffered from a bit of writers block

 

[jimmysmith560]

hi guys im a bit lost what I wanted to explore ai and I dont know if I want to do like ai and storytelling like replacing authors with generative AI being created by coorporations and the societal pressures of people like "oh ew why are you writing stoiries why dont you just use this ai tool" etc etc and have that as my idea or something else. Im a bit lost ive done brainstorming but can't get a good idea of what I want to write about. Any advice for blocks like these? I have my viva voce next Thursday

I think that your idea can be turned into an interesting Major Work that addresses a potential issue presented by constantly advancing artificial intelligence technology. You can capitalise on the notion that many people fear that AI will eventually take over their jobs in your Major Work. In terms of the way in which you can develop your idea to satisfy the requirements of the Major Work, I think that this would depend on the type of text that you wish to produce. An idea like yours has the potential to be expressed in various ways, and this means that different types of text would be appropriate for your Major Work. These include written types of text (especially short fiction, critical response and script) and audio/visual types of text.

In terms of developing your idea, you may wish to consider the following potential examples/avenues:

• If writing a short fiction, you could explore events that have occurred due to the increasing influence of AI. The text could feature some sort of dystopian element (which I think would be consistent with your idea) to emphasise the repercussions of AI. You could focus on how AI ruined the life of your main character(s). You could also do the opposite, i.e. write a text that positively portrays AI. This can also be expressed in audio/visual form (if you choose to go in that direction).
• If writing a critical response, you could perhaps engage in an in-depth analysis of your idea while ensuring that you adhere to the specific requirements of this type of text.

I hope this helps!

 

[MJRey]

hi guys im a bit lost what I wanted to explore ai and I dont know if I want to do like ai and storytelling like replacing authors with generative AI being created by coorporations and the societal pressures of people like "oh ew why are you writing stoiries why dont you just use this ai tool" etc etc and have that as my idea or something else. Im a bit lost ive done brainstorming but can't get a good idea of what I want to write about. Any advice for blocks like these? I have my viva voce next Thursday

Yeah, this idea sounds very promising. Like jimmysmith560 said, creative, critical or a script would be your best bets for the format.

Because I completed a critical analysis for my HSC, I thought I'd share my insights on writer's block and offer a suggestion on how you could approach your project if you choose to make it critical. Your experience sounds very similar to what I encountered during the drafting phase of my major work. For the majority of the year, I had a bunch of brainstorms and a variety of ideas, but I was uncertain of the direction I should take with them so I could form a plausible and convincing thesis.

The best way to navigate this was just by writing. I would write about my interpretations of each of my texts (I analysed three for context) and didn't even focus on writing an introduction and conclusion because you can only really do this when you're sure of your idea. I would incorporate some critical reading into my work (the essays I selected were guided by the rough drafts of analysis I had completed) as I did this, but realised I needed to make my argument more convincing. Plus I had a hunch that maybe the extra critical readings would give me more guidance on how to express my ideas. Sure enough, my hunch was correct and after that, I had a clear direction on my thesis and what I needed to do to express all my ideas in my piece.

I would also suggest communicating with your teacher/supervisor and leaning on them for help as much as possible. In my case, my teacher would look at my rough analysis of each of my texts and suggest things to look at or explore further. They also gave me a lot of emotional support when I doubted my ideas.

Maybe you could analyse books/films that validate the ideas you've brainstormed and why these texts present greater relevance now more than ever. Some suggestions include but are not limited to:
1. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep/Blade Runner (the book/film are both viable options)
2. Gattaca
3. Ex Machina
4. Machines Like Me

If anyone has any other suggestions on texts that could be suitable for a critical analysis of AI and it's impact on job security/overall creativity and expression, please feel free to write them down.