Monday, October 6, 2008

Final Paper

Advertising in Berlin

Abstract:


My purpose in doing this project is to understand how a city that was half communist and half capitalist for just over fifty years has adapted to wholesale capitalism in the last eighteen years. To do this, I will study billboards, because I believe advertising is an essential and extremely visible part of capitalism. I will also study the way ads are treated by Berliners: the ads were often defaced, replaced, the defacements themselves defaced. As well as a general survey of a sample of billboards found in Berlin, I will be analyzing two case studies: a particularly large ad that I saw almost every day and changed during my time in Berlin, and an interview with two artists who made an art work of illegally gluing their own messages onto billboards.

Background:

At the end of my senior year of high school, I went to Mexico, and my sister went to Germany. I got back a week later, plus a scar or so, and lots of interesting memories, and by the time I had all my stitches out, she was home to trade photos and stories with. I had photos of Chichen Itza, she had photos of the Frauenkirche. I had the Caribbean, she had die Nordsee. I had a raccoon stealing my piece of chocolate cake, and she had photos of billboards with condoms on fruit. Apparently they were all over. One of the many political issues I am interested in is the battle between comprehensive and abstinence-only sex education – our high school taught abstinence only, and many of our lectures were actually rather inaccurate. The idea that there was a culture where it was okay to put condoms on billboards was interesting to me.

This interest could have gone two ways for my project: studying European views on sex, or studying the limits of what is appropriate for advertising. I discarded the sex question almost immediately, for the same reason I ultimately decided not to study Neo-Nazis. I was not comfortable, at this point in my life, with the idea of asking Germans sensitive questions in English. That is not to say advertising was some sort of last choice, only that it was the most practical of many topics that interested me.

I decided to study themes in advertising. Logically, I knew that the culture ads are made for will affect the content and the themes of the ads. This was influenced by my background as an Eastern Washingtonian living in Western Washington. I have definitely noticed differences between ads made to appeal to Seattleites and Yakimanians, in both what they are selling and how they are selling it. I know I am in Yakima when I see an ad for a very conservative radio show, and that I am in Seattle when a company is selling itself to you by claiming to be environmentally friendly. (Admittedly, this trend is traveling east, slowly, as “green” products sell well and conservative people realize that they have to live on Planet Earth, too.) So it stood to reason that Berlin ads would reflect the dominant culture of the city and country. Germans , so while American car ads may feature a splashing background of red, white and blue, German ads probably would not use the German flag as casually. Europeans tend to be less concerned about alcohol, cigarettes, and nudity than Americans, so it was probable I would see ads reflecting that.

Problems did occur throughout the project, however. I am very interested in advertising and communications, but have never formally studied either, other than the brief advertising section of a particularly bad Women Studies class. This quarter, Fall 08, I am finally taking intro to Communications, and learning the actual terminology and studies. This certainly did not help me two weeks ago in Berlin. I have tried to make this as academic and intelligent as possible, but I do not think it will be up to actual Communications standards. As a History major, I shudder to think of a lengthy history paper written by someone who has not taken a single class in the field.

The second problem was the very fact that Berlin is such an international city. It did not have the typically German advertising I saw in Munich or Frankfurt; its ads looked like the ads of any large city. Munich has had a major AIDS prevention advertising campaign going on for at least two years – it was the Mach’s Mit ad my sister photographed that got me interested, and I did see the “condoms on fruit and veggies” ads frequently while I was in Munich the first time. (The second time, almost all advertising space was taken up by Oktoberfest ads.) I spent about an hour at the train station in Hofheim, a small city near Frankfurt, and it also had a distinctive campaign overshadowing the other ads: Brot für die Welt, or something along those lines. That being my experience with German advertising, I was quite dismayed to find Berlin not very much different than Seattle. I have a short discussion of the themes I observed at the beginning of the Analysis section, but it was nothing statistically significant or extensive, so I expanded my topic to include how ads were treated by Berliners, and found two short case studies that answered my questions.

Methods:

The bulk of my research was simply taking photographs as we walked around Berlin. I found the best locations for billboards to be in U-Bahn/S-Bahn stations. Various photos are recognizably from Jannowitzbrücke, and both the S-Bahn and the U-Bahn part of Alexanderplatz, though the blue tiling came out more green. I also photographed billboards above the street, over construction, on sidewalks, bus stops, and anywhere else I saw an interesting ad. Since arriving back in Seattle, I had the most interesting and relevant photos from my collection printed, and have been comparing and categorizing them. I put my beer ads together, my clothing department stores together, etc. I feel like this method was limited only by my selection bias in which ads to include. The language barrier in advertising is low because the text has to be simple and short for people to understand it without looking at the billboard for more than a few seconds.

I conducted only one interview, and I may not have even done that if I had not been sick the day the Kooperative Kunstpraxis presentation occurred. I met Manuela Mangold at her apartment, and walked with her to the apartment of Andreas Paeslack. Paeslack was very talkative and interesting, so although I meant to interview both of them, the interview was mostly Paeslack’s views. Mangold translated, as I do not speak German and Paeslack does not speak English. For the majority of the interview, I did not ask specific, steering questions, and asked the two artists to tell me in general what the Words for the Masses project was about. After I got a good description of the project and the reasons behind it, I asked specifically why all of the messages on the advertisements were criticizing capitalism, and not exploitation of women or the overwhelming heteronormativity of society, for example. As intended, we then spoke about communism, how growing up in East Germany affects one’s view on capitalism, and how people generally cannot see outside of an ideology. This interview was of course limited by the language barrier, but I admit it was also slightly damaged by my strangely Cold War assumption that anyone who criticizes capitalism is a communist. Paeslack could clearly see that that was my assumption, and felt the need to tell me he was not actually a communist.

Analysis:

The themes in the ads themselves were interesting, though as previously discussed, not worth an entire research project.

For a foreigner who did not speak German, the most obvious theme was foreign companies and different languages in the billboards. About a third of the billboards had at least one phrase in English. Often, a foreign company would have everything but the product name or a major catchphrase written in German. Coco-Cola, an international star of the consumer world, had every world of every ad translated but the product title “Coca-Cola Light.” A handful of American CDs shared a billboard, which was all in German except for the website, www.niceprice.de. Two Asian companies, Sony and Samsung, had ads, but the ads were mostly German with just a phrase in English: no Japanese or Korean involved. This suggests that there is still very much a divide between the traditional Western societies and Asian countries, even the countries that are very, very Westernized and compatible with American and European culture. (Other advertisements suggest the divide is slowly breaking down, however: lychee-flavored beverages and foods were becoming increasingly popular.) The tourism bureau of London had at least two advertisements with not a single word auf Deutsch. This suggests two things: that the posters are at least partially targeted to English-speaking tourists in Germany, such as the many Americans and Australians we encountered, and that if Germans do visit London, they will be expected to speak English. This is the direct opposite of the situation in Germany, where businesses are careful to remain accessible to English-speaking tourists. Even the url listed on the London ads suggested Germans were not being taken seriously. Most foreign companies bothered to get an address ended in .de, but London only added a German page, a /DE, onto their generic .com site.
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The bulk of the advertising containing English actually was from German companies, and seemed to be targeted toward tourists. Berliner Pilsner advertises it is “Made in Berlin,” and the show at Friedrichstadt Palast advertised specifically that it was “suitable for non-German speaking tourists.” Berlin Tourismus offers a “Berlin Welcome Card.” The overwhelming presence of advertising targeting English-speaking tourists, informational signs in English, and store clerks who speak English made it entirely possible to spend a month in Berlin and never be forced to learn more than a few words. Whether this is a consequence of American presence in much of Western Germany after World War II (America being the only economic survivor of the second World War and getting an economic boost for decades in the postwar years), the strength of the English pound against the Euro, or even the large numbers of Australians I encountered everywhere in Europe, it is impossible for me to say.
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German advertising did use foreign language for at least one other reason besides attracting tourists. The Wild West Pizza Potato cannot possibly be intended to attract Americans, but may be related to a certain love of the Wild West described by Manuela Mangold and Andreas Paeslack. Thanks to a series of children’s books by Karl May, Germans of a certain age simply like the Old West. Although May died almost a century ago, Westerns were still very popular with people of Manuela Mangold’s generation, and she described playing Cowboys and Indians as a child. One other company, Berlinwasser, used French in its Berliner Wasserbetriebe ad to a completely different effect. The water company uses the French “Eau” instead of the German “Wasser” to give the impression that the rubber ducky or spaghetti has given the water a fond, possibly romantic, nickname. To be perfectly accurate, Berliner Wassbetriebe is partially owned by a French company, but the primary shareholder is the city of Berlin, and the second is RWF, a German electrical company.
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As mentioned in the background section, I was thinking about the use of nationalism in advertising in the United States, and how I probably would not see it in Berlin. Even the ads for the special open-house at the Reichstag and the ads for Deutsche Bahn, the national railway company, did not have a single German flag in the photo. What I did see in Berlin was not national pride, but city pride. One Bionade ad had a lovely play on words with Berlin’s historical Unter den Linden street. It translated approximately to “Tastes good under, next to, and if you wish, even on the Linden.” The two beer companies with large ads both heavily featured the city of Berlin. Berliner Pilsner’s city pride was cheapened somewhat by putting “Made in Berlin” in English for the tourists, but Berliner Kindl’s “So schmeckt Berlin” (approximately “Thus tastes Berlin”) seemed entirely genuine. Berliner Kindl even had a contest where one could win a party at the city’s biggest symbol, Brandenburg Gate.
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Case Study #1: The Lifecycle of the Common Advertisement

The most fascinating advertisement I saw in Berlin was the Converse ad in Alexanderplatz. Between the main room leading down to the U-Bahn and the stairs to the main level, there was a small section of hallway that had been completely covered in a single advertisement for Converse shoes. The ad featured about two dozen famous people – mostly musicians, but also actors and athletes – all in the same pose: legs further than shoulder-width apart, shoes superimposed over the next person’s feet. The website, displayed at the top left corner of one wall of the display, calls this the “Connectivity Campaign.”
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When we first arrived in Berlin, the ad was fairly clean, with a few stickers and a few initials in what looks like marker. Within the second week, a large sticker had been placed over the face of one of the women, an anarchy “A” on her chest, and her cleavage accented with more marker. One of the companies responsible for putting up and taking down ads either cleaned it or replaced it, as her face was back within a week of that.
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Soon after, someone with a can of black spray-paint did a simple line across the entire ad. It was eyelevel for the people in the ad, but the person who did it must have raised his hand above his head to specifically spray across the eyes.
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The ad stayed mutilated for the remainder of its life. About a week before we left Berlin, the ad was torn down. Underneath the ad was a piece of public art: stylized black and white Corvettes on one wall, and stylized blue airplanes on the other, all over a light gold. The walls had a nominal amount of initials drawn across it. Three metallic gold squares (one on the jet side, one on the Corvette side) were painted in the middle, with black text explaining the intended symbolism of the painting, in English. The Corvette square was titled “The Black and White Corvette Race: Paradise” and signed R.V. 03.
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When I first saw it, it occurred to me that this was an unusual placement of an ad; wallpapering an entire hallway with a single ad? It was a very good location, however. Every single person who exited or transferred to the S-Bahn at Alexanderplatz had to walk through it. It just was not a space that was typically rented for advertising, but the Alexanderplatz managers were willing to sell that spot, and allowed Converse to put an ad over a piece of public art. This is the absolute inverse of the second case study – legal, while it shouldn’t be; ads covering art, instead of ads becoming art. It almost symbolizes the gentle gentrification of a poor, artist city.
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What interested me even more about the ad was the way it changed. Because it was in such a distinctive location, I noticed changes in it the way I did not in other ads. I noticed when a face was covered up with a sticker Monday, but had not been Saturday. I almost thought I had taken the wrong staircase when the Converse ad was removed, and it became the Corvette hallways. It helped me see that there is a lifecycle for ads, almost like plants or animals. An ad is born. It is shaped slowly through life, acquiring new distinctive markers. Eventually, it dies, and something else takes its place. If an ad is very successful, such as the H&M series of striking models against a black background, it will reproduce and be seen all across the city before the end of the month. If it is not a “good” ad, such as the Kooperative Kunstpraxis’s Auschwitz ad, it will be killed early in life.

Case Study #2: Worte für Millionen (Words for the Masses)

For this project, I conducted my one interview: Andreas Paeslack and Manuela Mangold, who were both part of the Worte für Millionen (Words for the Masses) project, as part of the Kooperative Kunstpraxis. The Words for the Masses project involved altering ads with speech bubbles critical of consumerism and capitalism coming out of the mouths of people featured in the ads. Batman says “KAPITALISMUS BEDEUTET SELEKTION- SELEKTION BEDEUTET AUSCHWITZ” (Capitalism means selection – selection means Auschwitz”). A very happy looking woman holding a canned latte says “Advertising is the permanent sermon of consumer culture.” (For photos of these ads, please go to Kooperative Kunstpraxis's website. It is the first project of 2005, under the "Projekte" header.)

The idea for this project was creating something large with very little money. The artists realized that there was a city-wide system of canvases, already standing there for anyone to use: billboards. (It is illegal to alter billboards or any other surfaces one does not own. This does not matter to very many people.) Paeslack compared it to art school – often, someone would not finish a piece, and would give a half-done painting to someone else to finish. It was almost more creative to finish someone else’s work and make it your own.

Paeslack did not believe there was enough criticism of capitalism in art. We are certainly bombarded with its messages at every moment, but rarely hear a credible rebuttal. He went on to describe consumerism as metaphorically a type of religion, and ads as preaching within that religion.

The artists did not just put the captions up and leave, and the reactions people had to the billboards also tell about people and advertising. The most common reaction to the boards was laughter. It is actually quite ironic – people generally walk by billboards without paying them more than a flick of a glance, but they visibly noticed the altered billboards, and generally like them. The Auschwitz alteration, however, was torn down within hours of being put up; Germans tend to be sensitive about the Holocaust, even in art.

For the second half of the interview, I wanted to know more specifically about how Germany being half communist for 51 years affected the most ubiquitous sign of capitalism – advertising. I had not seen any former West / former East divide on advertising; I was somewhat hoping that the East side would have fewer advertising spots available, but saw no evidence of this whatsoever.

I asked Paeslack and Mangold about the anti-capitalism message of the project, and asked how much that was a personal belief and how much it was just part of the art project. Paeslack took the lead again on this answer. He believes that part of art is to pinpoint problems, and this project was criticizing something not often criticized in art.

As for themes of communism as the natural adversary of capitalism, he said he was not a communist. He had grown up in the German Democratic Republic, and while he recognized that it did not work “as advertised,” as a functioning communist society, it was not capitalistic. The people who lived in the GDR and are old enough to really remember it do have a different view on capitalism than those of us who grew up in a Western capitalism state. Specifically, Paeslack said that he and others like him could actually recognize capitalism as another ideology, and not just a default state that we all live in and can only live in.

Analysis of Composition-based Project:

While I am entirely glad that I tried a composition-based research project, looking back on it after a couple weeks, the primary feeling I have about it is that it was rather restrictive. I felt like I could only show what is interesting enough to keep an audience’s attention. I feel like I was filming a History Channel show, rather than an academic history lesson, and anything that was important but dragged a little or was hard to put in mass media terms had to go. I feel like I wanted to write a monograph about Renaissance art and scriptural debates, collected only enough hard evidence for a mass market history book, and in the end was forced to write a sequel to the Da Vinci Code.

The contributions I made to our composition included slides of various photos I took of billboards, a short section where one shopper in a supermarket is critical of another’s choices, and the statements “Capitalism is organic” and “I’m not suggesting the GDR was better – no one believes that – but growing up there gives you the perspective to see capitalism as an ideology, and not just a default state.” My second character was obviously based on Andreas Paeslack; the first was a man about my age in Kaiser’s who interrupted my shopping to inform Elizabeth Korsmo and me about my choice in soups. For the composition, it was okay that these characters were definitely not “Carrot Man” and Andreas Paeslack; for me, less so. The statement “Capitalism is organic,” was an overall sense from my research, and there was no way to explain it further than that in that format, so it almost certainly could not have mattered or made an impact on people.

Overall, writing and performing the compositions was a good experience for me. Learning to think about information in a different way is never a bad thing, but coming at everything at such an oblique angle does not really suit my research ethics. I do not like altering people to make them fit where I want. I do not like cherry-picking facts more than absolutely necessary.

Where this research could go:
As I am currently enrolled in an actual Communications class, I am hoping to revisit the research I did and analyze it through my new knowledge of the field that advertising fits best in.

Notice of eventual paper posting...

So, I will be posting my paper before the deadline tonight. I turned in a, errrr, hard copy to Julie's office, because it was too good of an idea not to do. (Sorry, Shanga, MGH is familiar to me and extremely close to my only class today.)

Obviously, I do have it done, but I wrote it in a Word document, and need to spend some time reformatting it, figuring out how to redo the footnotes, and uploading photos. This will definitely occur after work and possibly after some IMA time. Either way, it will get done.

Sunday, August 31, 2008

Vlog



So, as you all know, one of our assignments was to make a video blog of one preassigned day. My day was last Friday, when we went to Sachsenhausen, the concentration camp in the greater Berlin area.

I'm really excited about this video. That doesn't necessarily mean I think I did a good job, but I'm definitely excited about it.

Thursday, May 29, 2008

Hooray.

Yes, I know, I failed to post for all of May. I forgot my password and had to try to recover it four times before stupid google-owned thing would allow me to just reset it without doing some weird blog integration thing.

May 1st- no blog assignment.

May 8th- "Blog post: reaction to movie and reading (and pull out specific themes/topics)"
  • I was not able to see the video at Kareem's, and haven't been able to obtain it since. I think Anne has it? So I will get that post done when I find it.


  • May 15th- "preliminary research on your topic. What is your process and progress. What have you found out so far?"
  • I'm not even frankly sure what I should be researching for this. I fail to see how going there, taking the pictures, and analyzing it there is going to fail. I asked my really close Com-obsessed friend if I should do any reading on advertising before I go, and she said short of taking Com 201 (which I actually am in the fall), there's not much I can do. Julie said I should research German advertising laws, but that has not been panning out. Several people have sent me photographs of German advertising, and thanks guys for the interest.
    creepy ad

    For some reason I'm tagged on facebook as this guy's armpit. Rachel, I'm telling you, I don't have erectile dysfunction. Last night wasn't typical at all, it's normally just fine...

    At the same time, though, I'm just not honestly that crazy about seeing things before I see them in context...that might sound weird, but I just don't want to see them yet.

    I guess I will try again with the advertising laws, but I'm a little "what's the point" at this point.


  • May 22nd- "Reaction to last week’s discussion"
  • The discussion this is referring to is the one in our groups, yes? I hate to say it, but there just was not a lot to talk about. We talked about our topics with each other. We managed to somehow angle the projects more toward identity without changing the substance of them. Prano said she wanted to look at high schools, and my mouth started regurgitating what I learned in 9th grade about how Germany has three types of high school: Gymnasium, Realschule, and Hauptschule. Prano apparently did not know this, and honestly I'm still not sure why I know this, other than the fact that five years ago Herr Beck thought we all should know this. It is interesting, and could definitely have an impact on everyone studying youth, like the Yarts group, if school was actually in session in Germany at that time. Overall, though, it was great because we sat on the grass and I bought candy.
  • Wasn't this topic changed, anyway? I'm going to go with the syllabus.


  • May 29th- "reaction to composition"
  • Honestly, I'm not sure what to think about this composition. We seemed to have a lot of trouble coming up with anything to do, and I felt like what we ended up doing was tacky. I felt like a lot of things Shanga criticized us on were misunderstandings between a rather literal history major and a very dramaish drama professor. There wasn't tension when we came together in a horizontal line because honestly there just isn't that much tension during a period of intense nationalism? I don't know. I am tired.
  • Thursday, April 24, 2008

    This is harder than you think it is!!! Argh!

    I am dead in the water with topics.

    Internal Security-
    It would be depressing, but it would be interesting to research: How does the NeoNazi interact with both its past (the ArcheoNazis?) and the present? How does the present interact back (trying to ban it, restricting it)?

    How effective are these supposed safe places for women? Do women feel grateful, empowered, or baby-sat? Does it encourage risk-taking, or just normal (not fearing) behavior?

    I'm not sure what topic it could possibly fall under, but I would be interested in researching German advertising and media, with regards to national problems and history. (I can explain that more in class, I swear.)

    Saturday, April 19, 2008

    Rethinking Thinking

    Honestly, I thought poorly of this article. I guess it doesn't help that the pages were stapled out of order. As I read it, I just got more and more irritated with it. I considered unstapling it and putting it in order, but the pages aren't printed front and back in the right order either, so I couldn't. And this bothered me.

    The writers put down the education system - which bothered me. Both of my parents are (and one of my grandparents was) public school teachers, and most of the illusions people have about "better ways to teach" are simply illusions; either impractical, impossible, or previously tried and failed. Teaching this sort of thinking seems to me like legislating "being nice to people!" Or nailing jello to a wall. Or herding Siamese cats (undoubtedly the most stubborn and crazy cats there are). Above all, I hate people who criticize systems without proposing something viable instead.

    I just find the whole idea of this article redundant and unneccessary - at least for me. I don't think that people are discouraged from thinking creatively. I think they quite reasonably require people to prove using words and numbers. This article almost seems to bash conventional thinking, and I honestly don't like that. I know well what it feels like to think in the abstract, especially with my crafting projects, or when I get really strange ideas. (I almost feel like the Cookies are Viruses essay is required here...) I just don't like people telling me I have to think this way any more than I would like people telling me I can't think this way. (And I have never had someone tell me I couldn't think this way. Other than my exgirlfriend.)

    Monday, April 14, 2008

    Hunger

    Okay, sorry, I've had this on the editting block since........I'm not sure when. But I never finished it. So now I will.

    Mwahahahahahaha pink dots. Sorry, I really liked this template, but when I noticed at least two other people had it...it had to go.

    I ran straight from class to class to the Ave to a hair salon to Haggett to the bus stop, never eating. Elizabeth, Mary Grace and I walked from the bus to the theater together. We took a wrong turn, and I bought one of those five-dollar footlong sandwiches. I considered it pretty good luck; I was starving. While looking at a Seattle Center map, we were ambushed by a really stubborn homelessman. Upon being told we were going to the ballet, he knew Midsummer Night's Dream was playing, and asked if we knew who the choreographer was. He started quoting Shakespeare, and had an in depth discussion with Mary Grace about their respective favorite classical composers. I felt...rather uncultured. Once we were close to the theater, he felt he'd established a rapport, and asked for his money. I don't know if MG was telling the truth or not, but she said she had no money on her. He said please, he was really hungry, and ended up with six inches of my chicken sandwich. I know he would have totally preferred money, but I doubt he threw it out.

    Honestly, I think that affected me about as much as the ballet. Encounters with the homeless are always weird, but this one seemed particularly so. Besides, it's the first time in years I've actually given one something. Mary Grace showed him compassion and talked. I ignored his patter, but gave him my food.



    This was where I left off...But as for the ballet...

    I liked the first act.  I saw what Shanga meant by how they just expressed things with their entire bodies, particularly Puck. Sometimes they were over-playing it, but...it's ballet. It's not supposed to be realistic.

    I thought the costumes were fantastic. Amazingly beautiful, though apparently they did not make the role of the characters clear...what others called sprites and butterflies, I somehow took as wild folliage plants and flowering plants. Maybe they were listed somewhere as sprites and butterflies; I've never actually read the play. Shrimp colored? I just thought they were a nice peachy-pink. I love silly and elaborate costumes, though. I desperately want to take a costuming class with the drama department next year...though I'm not sure if non-majors and poor sewers can take it. I loved the color-coding of the couples.

    The second act I could have done without. I guess I'm just not into ballet. People talk about the grace, but all I see is women in positions I don't honestly believe the human body is meant to achieve. Some of those arabesques? I don't see how or why their back legs could or would be like that. It just looks awkward to me, and yet, all I hear is people cooing about the grace and beauty. When the women scooted across stage en pointe? I...just don't like that. It makes my legs and ankles hurt to watch. That motion...scares me. It looks alien, or insectlike.

    Thursday, April 10, 2008

    Response to Class today

    And now, belatedly, my response to class today.

    Ghosts and monuments of Seattle

    ---The Underground Tour. I haven't been on it yet, surprisingly - in fact, the only memory I have of it is walking somewhere in town with my mother, and asking her why there was purple glass in the ground. I was quite disturbed to hear the answer. The underground is a piece of Seattle history, as short as Seattle history may be. I only hear about it infrequently, as one of those things one is supposed to do at some point while living here. The story (from wikipedia...then again, this isn't a blog, it's a paper) was that there was a major fire in early Seattle, and the city officials decided that the city should not only be built out of flame-proof materials, but also higher. Apparently, toliets ran backwards during certain tides. This just doesn't seem as epic as other city features. Maybe that isn't the right word, but you know what I mean, don't you. "Tour Guides regale you with humorous stories our pioneers didn’t want you to hear. It’s history with a twist!" This is just not serious like Berlin history.
    ---The Space Needle is what makes Seattle recognizably Seattle, especially to non-Seattelites. It's a monument to the Space Age. Hence the "space" part. It was built for the 1962 World's Fair, I believe. While I very rarely see it, it's just there. All the time. And because I seem to be in a dark mood right now,* I'd like to paraphrase part of a Chuck Palahniuk book, Invisible Monsters, on the topic of the Space Needle. It was abandoned by the Jetsons, and taken over by the Flintstones. The fairgoers went there in the 60s, dreaming of flying cars and walking on the moon, and now it's visited by hippies who make their own sandals out of (sometimes vegan) leather. We gave up our dreams and looking to the sky and went back to the dirt. In a way, it's sort of true.

    *In this class, divided Berlin and the DDR. In one history class, the Holocaust and eugenics. In my other history class, we just covered the extreme racism towards immigrants, what exactly was in the meat products, and the tenements of New York City before workers really had rights. I blame you, UW. I blame you for my bad mood.



    One other research topic I was wondering about:
    I was thinking about how advertising might be different in Germany than in the US. I really liked this bulletin board, and besides the definite scandel that would happen here if it was put up. (My sister took a picture of an even more explicit one while she was in Berlin. It was two bananas, one wearing a condom, one not. The one not was all black and rotten. She thought it was hilarious.) What other differences might I see if I was there, in values, technique, maybe even color schemes?

    And remember, Damen und Herren, Berlin is poor, but sexy.

    Non-class matters 4-10...because I am easily distracted...

    Ich hasse/liebe Phoenetics. Hiedi was talking about oh, if you can feel the position of your tongue changing, you should be a linguist. I almost was a linguist...I adored Ling 200 like none other, but I didn't think I could cut it for the major.

    This is the English vowel chart, or one of them anyway. Google has failed me at finding a German one that I could understand. It's really useful to me, though, especially talking about vowel height. See the height on the chart? Yeah. That's what it is. The English [i] or "ee" sound is really, really high.

    The chart for the consonants would also be heavily useful, but I don't want this to be tooooo image heavy.



    Update: Ich habe jetz einen Wörterbuch! Mein Freund gab mich ihren Wörterbuch. (Yeah, you'll have to check to see if that's right, actual German speakers. Meine Grammatik ist kaput.)

    Tuesday, April 8, 2008

    Mein Wörterbuch...

    I muss in Deutsch schreiben!  Maybe not always, but...you know...at least sometimes.  Unfortunately, my German-English/English-German dictionary (erm) went away.  Somewhere.  All my grammar notes were in it! Unglücklich.  So now I've been using Babel Fish, and it's far too tempting to translate entire phrases in it, which may prevent actually learning stuff, and the stupid thing isn't always right.

    Ich sollte ein neues Wörterbuch kaufen.  The one I have is out of print, but I don't think I like the new edition from the same company.

    So, if anyone from my class is actually reading their classmates' blogs, do you have a recommendation?

    Mine looked a lot like this, only it was German-English/English-German, not just German.

    Monday, March 31, 2008

    Is it working now?

    Argh!  I can't believe they declared my school blog spam.  I haven't been notified about it being declared unspam yet, so this post will probably not be posted.

    It was. Hurray.

    Wednesday, March 19, 2008

    Mike check!

    Check-
    Check-


    I just made this, and I would like to see if it's working.  And yes, I had to look like a dork doing it.

    Mary Grace and I bought our airplane tickets - we leave August 7th, swing around Europe for about two and a half weeks, and fly back September 22nd. Both flights are between Munich and Seattle.