Truth of war art piece
Choose Wisely
Stenciled spray paint
In my art piece I wanted to portray my idea as simply as I could, while still getting the idea across. I wanted to show in a stencil that the cause for a war is most times not worth the price that is paid. Next I brainstormed and came up with a lot of ideas. I then asked a friend about a few of these ideas to see which ones stood out and to get an outside opinion. These ideas ranged from a shadow idea that I’d seen online, a different title for the project that I did and a number of other ideas. I started getting the ideas printed on paper, which proved to be more difficult than it should have been. After that, I cut out the shapes I needed. I then used those cut outs to create cardboard stencils and spray painted it. I chose to use the triangle to show the fact that having all the things on the corners of the triangle are representative of things in life that are almost impossible to achieve all together. Which, I believe, is why people go to the extreme of war trying to achieve all of those things, but in most cases only creating more of the opposite.
Logan Shackles
January 2016
Stenciled spray paint
In my art piece I wanted to portray my idea as simply as I could, while still getting the idea across. I wanted to show in a stencil that the cause for a war is most times not worth the price that is paid. Next I brainstormed and came up with a lot of ideas. I then asked a friend about a few of these ideas to see which ones stood out and to get an outside opinion. These ideas ranged from a shadow idea that I’d seen online, a different title for the project that I did and a number of other ideas. I started getting the ideas printed on paper, which proved to be more difficult than it should have been. After that, I cut out the shapes I needed. I then used those cut outs to create cardboard stencils and spray painted it. I chose to use the triangle to show the fact that having all the things on the corners of the triangle are representative of things in life that are almost impossible to achieve all together. Which, I believe, is why people go to the extreme of war trying to achieve all of those things, but in most cases only creating more of the opposite.
Logan Shackles
January 2016
THE THINGS THEY CARRIED SEMINAR
On 12/7/15 our class did a Socratic seminar about the book The Things They Carried. During the reading, and the seminar. I was able to gain a new viewpoint of what war is like, and how it has a much more personal and immediate effect on people that are involved. In the book there are many examples of exactly how the war affected the characters, but one that stood out to me was how in the book the soldiers were all afraid of dying but more than that they were afraid of looking cowardly. This was described as a “Fear of blushing.” I thought of this as an interesting topic because it was unexpected. I thought that the fear of death would have been much larger than any other fear for most people. During this seminar I think I did well on getting my input into the discussion. For the next seminar I think I could do better at inviting people who might not talk as much into the discussion.
Timed write reflection
This essay was done to try to separate the what was true from what was untrue, and what was not really determinable. To do this we were given lots of primary sources that included letters, telegrams and recorded telephone calls, to get the evidence. We took those and examined them to create a hypothesis about what we thought happened, and put it in an essay. While reading the primary documents for this project I realized that what happened and what might not have happened are quite blurry lines. For example in the documentary we watched I learned that there was a great misunderstanding on both sides of the war as to what they were even fighting for. This had to do with the truth of war in that one side’s truth that they were fighting for one thing did not match the other sides truth. Although if you were to ask either side of the war what they were fighting for they both could have honestly answered far different things. I found this project surprising and enjoyable in the way that it was very enlightening, and brought a lot of new perspectives that I really enjoyed getting to hear and read about, and many of which influenced the way I think about war
Timed write essay
The Gulf of Tonkin incident could have happened a number of ways, but it was likely exaggerated by both parties. It is likely that both sides are responsible for the incident. This is shown in, 1st telegrams sent from the commander of the U.S.S. Maddox to the U.S. Department of state. A second source is a telephone call between President Johnson, and the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs McGeorge Bundy, and several other documents. This will overall show how the facts in this event have been blurred and the actual story has been exaggerated.
In telegrams from the commander of the U.S.S. Maddox to the U.S. department of state it is shown that the events that actually happened in the Gulf of Tonkin were unclear. In a telegram Captain Herrick says that “Many reported contacts and torpedoes fired appear doubtful.” And that there were “No actual visual sightings by Maddox.” (Captain Herrick to the U.S. department of state). This shows that the even by those on the Maddox there was no actual sightings of a torpedo being fired. Before that in a telegram from the Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge to the U.S. Department of state Lodge stated that “It would help here and possibly in Laos and Thailand, if there were screams from north Vietnam that they had been hit.” (Henry Cabot Lodge, to the U.S. Department of State). This shows that they had the idea to get some sort of action to happen in North Vietnam.
The spokesman of the Viet Nam People’s Army stated “The U.S. State Department spokesman bluntly denied the denunciations made by the High Command of the Viet Nam people's army. concerning the shelling by U.S. warships of islands belonging to the Viet Nam and the bombing of North Vietnamese localities near the Viet Nam” (statement by the spokesman of Viet Nam People’s Army) This shows that there were other circumstances in which the whole story had not been revealed. Overall this shows how there was much confusion as to what actually happened in the Gulf of Tonkin, but that there was almost surely lots of facts were unclearly spoken if at all and that they were exaggerated from one side or the other.
In telegrams from the commander of the U.S.S. Maddox to the U.S. department of state it is shown that the events that actually happened in the Gulf of Tonkin were unclear. In a telegram Captain Herrick says that “Many reported contacts and torpedoes fired appear doubtful.” And that there were “No actual visual sightings by Maddox.” (Captain Herrick to the U.S. department of state). This shows that the even by those on the Maddox there was no actual sightings of a torpedo being fired. Before that in a telegram from the Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge to the U.S. Department of state Lodge stated that “It would help here and possibly in Laos and Thailand, if there were screams from north Vietnam that they had been hit.” (Henry Cabot Lodge, to the U.S. Department of State). This shows that they had the idea to get some sort of action to happen in North Vietnam.
The spokesman of the Viet Nam People’s Army stated “The U.S. State Department spokesman bluntly denied the denunciations made by the High Command of the Viet Nam people's army. concerning the shelling by U.S. warships of islands belonging to the Viet Nam and the bombing of North Vietnamese localities near the Viet Nam” (statement by the spokesman of Viet Nam People’s Army) This shows that there were other circumstances in which the whole story had not been revealed. Overall this shows how there was much confusion as to what actually happened in the Gulf of Tonkin, but that there was almost surely lots of facts were unclearly spoken if at all and that they were exaggerated from one side or the other.
interview reflection
For the interview we had to 1, do research and watch other interviews, 2 come up with questions to ask in the interview, 3 show up and conduct the interview. My favorite part of conducting the interview would be the couple of questions that Don spent time answering and gave his stories and opinions. For example on the question “How did the war change you” He answered by telling us that it made him grow up and that he had to become much more mature and had to toughen up. This was both a part that I appreciated and a part of the interview that brought new knowledge of how personal war can be since it changes everyone in it, but in very different ways. For example in Don’s case he told us he matured and was hardened by it.