Ahab the Maker

Through my research of the Maker Movement, I have been inspired time and time again as I find real people engaged in real projects through digital means, which in turn grows into something important and passionate - even something personal.

Makers: The New Industrial Revolution revels in the emergence of the small business owner. The way that Anderson claims that these small business owners are able to thrive is through the importance of using the available tools. He claims that those who use these open-sourced tools are "often the best source of new ideas and innovation" (Anderson, 115).

Okay, so what does this mean?

It means that when we remix (see my earlier blog post) and create our own version of something to synthesize a new product, we're taking ideas that have all ready gone around the block and we're personalizing them. And that's where the magic happens. That's the beauty of DIY digital edition.

In taking this concept to the stormy seas of Ahab's quest, I see Ahab as one of these small business owners. Ahab's familiarity with the whaling industry has given him the tools to create his personalized whaling experience: "Ahab's above the common; Ahab's been in colleges, as well as 'mong the cannibals; been used to deeper wonder than the waves" (Melville, 71).

He has the boat, the crew, the social network, the supplies, the experience. And when all these come together, he realizes that he can use these tools for his own personal use - that use being his personal, blood-thirsty quest to conquer Moby Dick.

Ahab's resources make all the difference. Without all the available resources, he would never have gained the reputation and ability to lead his crew into such an adventure. Like Ahab, we too have the digital resources to take our amateur skills and refine them as we gain experience and information in our desired quest. In a sense, it's even easier to become a professional than it was for Ahab.

So you may be thinking, "I don't want to be a businessman like Ahab... he led himself and all but one of his crew members into the jaws of death."

Despite the genre of political cartoon, I actually found a picture linking Ahab and Business!

Well fortunately for Makers and entrepreneurs everywhere, there is less on the line when personalizing our mission or product. Anderson says, "The step from making one to making thousands is simply a matter of how much you want to pay (or put on your credit card)" (26). As I've summarized this concept before in Anderson's book, the digital age allows Makers to create compatible digital designs that can be manufactured in small batches to accommodate our budget and start-up plan. Ahab, on the other hand, decided to go all out despite the various reality checks that he averted. Although Ahab was warned, he went past the mark and failed miserably. With less at stake for us with small batches, there's less to risk.

Are you feeling risky? It's time to start personalizing, exploring, and producing.

Name, Identity, and Meaning: How the name "ERM" or "Early Returned Missionary" Ought to Be Eliminated

In my last post, I talked about the names of the six main characters in Moby Dick and did a bit of amateur research on the origins and meanings behind those names. I know that some authors name their characters specific names because the name will add deeper meaning to the character and to the story. I wanted to see if this was the case with Herman Melville. What I found was that for the most part, the names in Moby Dick could be interchangeable with other names, but two at least seem to have been deliberately given their names (Ahab and Ishmael). We see the biblical references surrouding those names pretty consistently throughout the novel. Yet even those characters, could have been given a different name (say, Solomon instead of Ahab, or Jacob instead of Ishmael. The names would have served the same purposes and meanings).

I wanted to do more research into names and the meaning they hold for us. I asked my friends on Facebook to answer a series of questions. I originally posted one of them also on Google + and Twitter, but only one person replied to my Google + post and no one replied on Twitter (sad!), but I got a lot of replies on Facebook so I decided to just stick with them. I posted the questions about once every hour, and some people really started getting into them. It was fun for me to receive the replies. Now, I'm going to be a good English major and analyze those answers and draw some conclusions from them.

Let's start with the least intimidating of the questions: Why were you named ____? (Were you named after someone? Did your parents just like the name?) What does your name mean? If the main character of a book was created with you in mind, would you want the character to have your name or another name?

Here were the answers:

 

As I suspected, everyone knew why they were named what they were named and several knew what their names meant. And most everyone that answered the third question said that they would be fine with their name being used as the main character in a book, which surprised me as I thought more people would want their identities kept secret, but it turns out most would be excited to have the main character in a book named after them. Another person identified well with a famous book character. This to me showed that people identify strongly with their names; in other words, names are a strong part of a person's identity. If someone doesn't like their name, they generally go through some lengths to change it, right? They do not want that name as part of their identity. (Yes, I know I completely abused the singular vs. plural rules of grammar, but no one really cares, right?).

Okay, next I decided to start asking about something closer to my heart. I wanted people's instinctual reactions to the names (or titles) "returned missionary" or "early returned missionary." Here are the replies for "returned missionary."

The responses vary from serious to light-hearted. If everyone was honest about writing down their first-instinct response then the general pictures that comes to mind is of a young LDS male, desirable for marriage, who just did something amazing, although he might not have a clue what he's going to do next and he's probably going to be awkward until he settles back in to normal life.

I'd say that's generally the first thing that comes to my mind too. Again, the answers varied, but those were the general agreements. 

Here are the responses for "early returned missionary":

The answers to this questions were much more serious. Usually people responded with some kind of reason for why the missionary returned home early, and it's never a happy reason. Most also show a genuine concern for the person's well-being. Some said that they usually think, "None of my business," which some could interpret as "I want nothing to do with this," but I think it was meant more as, "It's not my place to judge this person." Others alluded to dying or not being able to "hack it." One person said, "Relief."

None of these responses are wrong or bad. They are all accurate in one way or another. Most are kind. But they are markedly different from the spiritual/light-hearted responses the name "returned missionary" received. "Early returned missionary" is different from "returned missionary."

Do you see where I might be going with this? Probably. Humor me though while I explain/expound.

 When I came home early from my mission (physical illness was the reason), I was fortunate enough to have a good support group around me, and for the most part I did not feel harshly judged for coming home early. Yet while I did not exactly feel judged, I did feel "marked." Everyone in my ward knew I had come home early. My friends knew. My family knew. People asked me if I was going to go back to the field. They asked when. When I chose to stay home, people asked me if I had forced myself to go on a mission when maybe I wasn't supposed to. I didn't have answers to these questions. I just wanted them to stop. I had served a mission!! It was short, but I had served one! But I hadn't served it for the expected amount of time, and therefore I had failed. I had done something wrong and I hadn't repented well enough for it; I hadn't had enough faith; because if I had repented well enough or had enough faith I would have been healed and I would still be on a mission. God would still be able to use me. 

But no, I was an early returned missionary. An ERM. I cringed every time somebody called me either name. It hurt. "That title will haunt me forever," I thought. 

I asked my friends one last question. Would you say that "returned missionary" is a name one earns or is it a name that should be given to anyone who comes home from a mission?

 

 

It sounds like the general consensus was, "If you served a mission and are now home, no matter the length of time in the field, and no matter your thoughts and intentions while serving a mission, you are a returned missionary. Whether or not you served honorably is another thing."

I was so surprised by these responses. I thought most people would say that, "You are a returned missionary if you served the 18-24 months or if you came home early but it wasn't your fault." But no, almost everyone said that if you serve a mission and come back, you are a returned missionary.

So where did Early Returned Missionary/ERM come from?  My guess is that it started on a forum somewhere for those trying to help missionaries who return home early. It sounds like it was a easy way to distinguish online between someone who came home early and someone who served the amount of time. "Returned missionary" is still in the title, but it is marked with "Early." 

Some of my friends think that we should just get rid of the terms "returned missionary" and "RM" altogether. They think it encourages us to label each other, or in other words to judge each other, and in a church that emphasizes Christlike behavior those labels ought to be done away with.

They might be right. But even if they are, I think that the names "returned missionary" and "RM" are going to stick around a little longer. As members of the church, we've been encouraged to stop calling ourselves "Mormon," but that name is dying hard. Why? I think its become part of our identity for so long.

What I personally would like to see happen is the death of the name/term/title/(whatever you want to call it) "Early returned missionary," or "ERM." Especially "ERM." I recognize that it is not meant to hurt those who did return early, (or if it is, shame on whoever uses it that way!), but it does. It hurts a lot. It's not a title of honor. It's not something I want following me around the rest of my life. Even if I returned home early because I made a mistake and was caught, I would  not deserve to be called an ERM the rest of my life. It's like The Scarlet Letter that Hester Prynne has to wear the rest of her life. She sinned and she needed to be held accountable for that, but being marked for the rest of her life was unfair, especially when so many others were committing sins (even the same sin!) all around her.

On my website, www.earlyhomecoming.com, I avoid the terms "early returned missionary" and "ERM." I recognize that many, many people are using these terms for good as they study the effects of returning home early from a mission. It's a non-wordy way to say, "a missionary who returned home early." But it's unfair, and I would hate to see it become a popular term used in the church. So please, let's drop it. And maybe, let's drop "returned missionary" too, and just leave it at "I served a mission."

There is more that I can go into about this. I could get all doctrinal about missionaries and missionary work, but I'm not going to, at least not in this blog post. Maybe in a future one. For now, I'm just going to ask that we remember the importance of names, how they serve as our identities, and how no one wants anything to tarnish their name, not even a well-meant title. If we don't like something, we get rid of it. We change our  names. But if we're in a society that won't let us forget our names, our identites,  we either become depressed or indifferent, or we escape. According to a study done by the University of Utah, "34 percent of those who returned early went through a period of inactivity in the church. One third of those never returned to activity." 

This is a problem. I don't know how many of those 34% were called "ERM's" or "Early Returned Missionary," but I'm positive that they felt marked in some way.

So here's my call to action: Let's get rid of the term "ERM" or "Early Returned Missionary" from our vocabulary, from our culture, as much as possible. I recognize that the names will likely still be used in some circumstances for good, like as in forums, but as much as possible let's just get rid of them. Let's stop calling each other undesirable names. Let's not be like Captain Ahab's mother who named him after a wicked king because of a "foolish, ignorant whim."  Let's not wrong each other because we have hard times. Let's just help each other. Let's change our culture.

Meeting Queequeg via Tagul

My Tagul Word Cloud for Queequeg's Introduction

I really liked the Word Cloud that Greg made using Tagul. I decided to do my own experiment with Tagul and look at Queequeg in a more substantial way.

First I used the Gutenberg Project to pull up the HTML version of Moby Dick online. I copied the paragraph where Ishmael first introduces us to Queequeg to see what the patterns are in our understanding of Queequeg's character through Melville's choice of words.

It was significant to me that the most frequented word in Queequeg's description was "head." The head is very symbolic to Queequeg's character as it points our attention to Queequeg's literal head that displays a very exotic hair cut and tattoos. His head embodies his foreignness in both ideology as well as its physical presentation. The head also represents Queequeg's characterization of a cannibal and the fact that he is a head collector - which inspired me to create the word cloud in the shape of a spear head with "exotic" font.

It is interesting to examine the rest of the words that make up the Queequeg's description as the thematic presentation of HUMANITY emerges through basic human descriptions along with titles and bigger thematic descriptions of light. Therefore, Queequeg himself leads us to question the complexities of humanity.

The various words presented in the word cloud function to describe Queequeg's physical appearance combined with more substantial terms such as "sun," "light," and "yellow." Is it possible that these words add a dimension of enlightenment to Queequeg's humanity? I would argue absolutely.

What do you think?

Translation of a Moby Dick Passage

I use Google translate every single day for the languages I'm studying. As soon as Dr. Burton talked about this being an option for this assignment, I knew I wanted to do it. I love learning languages and linguistics. In recent years I've found it extremely fascinating to learn of different languages' direct translations and how that can alter a person's view on a word or situation.

The passage from Moby Dick that I will be translating comes from Chapter 87, "The Grand Armada." I chose this quote, because I love the ethereal and serene tone that Ishmael uses and how it significantly contrasts with Ahab's evil and cynical view of the whale's existence:

Original:
"Some of the subtlest secrets of the seas seemed divulged to us in this enchanted pond. We saw young Leviathan amours in the deep. And thus, though surrounded by circle upon circle of consternations and affrights, did these inscrutable creatures at the centre freely and fearlessly indulge in all peaceful concernments; yea, serenely revealed in dalliance and delight. But even so, amid the tornadoes Atlantic of my being, do I myself still for ever centrally disport in mute calm; and while ponderous planets of unmanning woe revolve round me, deep down and deep inland there I still bathe me in eternal mildness of joy."

Translated first into Spanish:
Algunos de los secretos más sutiles de los mares parecían divulgada a nosotros en este estanque encantado. Vimos joven Leviatán amours en las profundidades. Y así, aunque rodeados por el círculo en círculo de consternaciones y affrights, hicieron estas criaturas inescrutables en el centro libremente y sin temor se entregan a todos los concernments pacíficos, sí, serenamente revelado en coqueteo y deleite. Pero aún así, en medio de los tornados del Atlántico de mi ser, es lo que a mí mismo siendo por los siglos de retozar en el centro de la calma silencio, y mientras que los planetas pesados ​​de retirada de fuerzas ay giran a mi alrededor, en el fondo, y tierra adentro allí todavía me bañan con mansedumbre eterna de alegría .

From Spanish to Bulgarian:
Някои от най-неуловимите тайни на моретата изглеждаше разкривана пред нас в този омагьосан езерото. Видяхме млад Leviathan Amours в дълбочина. И така, макар и заобиколен от кръг на кръг и ужас заля, направи тези неразгадаеми същества в центъра свободно и без страх се отдадете на всички мирни concernments Да, тихо разкри в флирт и наслада. Но все пак, в средата на торнадо атлантическите на моето същество, е това, което за себе си изобщо да лудуват в центъра на спокойна тишина, и докато отстраняване тежки планети се въртят АЙ сили около мен във фонов режим, и вътрешноводния там все още се къпят с кротост вечна радост.

From Bulgarian to Japanese:
海の微妙な秘密のいくつかは、この魅惑の池の中に私たちに漏らしたようです。我々は徹底的に若いリヴァイアサンアムールを見ました。掃引円とホラーの輪に囲まれながら、だから、静かにいちゃつくと楽しさで明らかに、[はい]をすべて平和concernmentsにふける自由に中心にこれらの不可解な生き物を作成し、大胆に。しかし、私の存在の竜巻大西洋の真ん中に、自分自身について何がこれまで平和的な沈黙の中心に楽勝し、重い惑星を除去しながら、バックグラウンドで私の周りAY力を回転し、内陸まだあります柔和永遠の喜びで入浴。

From Japanese to Hebrew:
נראה שחלק מהסוד העדין של הים, זה לגלות לנו בבריכה של הקסם הזה. ראה אמאר הלווייתן הצעיר ביסודיות. בעת היותו מוקף במעגל של אימה ולטאטא המעגל, ולכן, כמובן, אתה יכול ליצור תמוה היצורים האלה במרכז באופן חופשי ללהתמכר concernments שלום כל [כן], ההנאה הנועזת לפלרטט ובשקט. עם זאת, באמצע האוקיינוס ​​האטלנטי טורנדו של הקיום שלי, מה שנצח את ידי למטה במרכז השקט שלווה עד כה על עצמם, תוך הסרת הכוכב הכבד, מסתובב סביב א.י. כוח שלי ברקע, ועדיין בפנים הארץ רחצה בשמחה כנועה נצחי שם.

From Hebrew back to English:
It seems that some subtle secret of the sea, that we discover the magic of this pool. See Amur young whale thoroughly. While being surrounded by a circle of terror and sweep circuit, so, of course, you can create strange creatures freely indulging center concernments Hello all [Yes], the pleasure of flirting and quietly bold. However, the mid-Atlantic of my existence tornado, which beat down the center of the Pacific by peaceful so far on their own, while removing the heavy planet, revolves around AY My strength in the background, and still inland bathing submissive eternal joy there.

Compare to the original:
"Some of the subtlest secrets of the seas seemed divulged to us in this enchanted pond. We saw young Leviathan amours in the deep. And thus, though surrounded by circle upon circle of consternations and affrights, did these inscrutable creatures at the centre freely and fearlessly indulge in all peaceful concernments; yea, serenely revealed in dalliance and delight. But even so, amid the tornadoes Atlantic of my being, do I myself still for ever centrally disport in mute calm; and while ponderous planets of unmanning woe revolve round me, deep down and deep inland there I still bathe me in eternal mildness of joy."


The Hebrew translation was pretty choppy in clarity. It wasn't as poetic and rhythmic as the original version. For me, its tone went from being very calm and mythical to a very interesting, confusing, and cryptic reading in Hebrew. The ocean went from being a very magical setting to a very dark and mysterious thing with unexplainable phenomenon.

Facebook Writing

I decided to try to write the story of Moby Dick through various facebook status's given by Ishmael. Because both gmail and facebook require that there be a last name given, I first used the name "Longfellow" since it sounded like a sailor's name. But in the end I didn't like that version, so I changed his name to be Ishmael Pequod.

My goal is to do a brief summary post of each chapter of Moby Dick. So far I am through chapter 9, so I have a lot further to go, but I know that this project will take time and I wanted to allow people to watch as it progressed. For the majority of the chapter summaries, I have taken a quote from the chapter that I felt summed up its plot fairly well. If I felt that it needed further explanation or a "tying in" to the other chapters, then I would post another status just to clarify my direction from one status to the other. I'm having fun with this project already, since I started it 3 people have added me as their friend's on facebook. I don't know who they are, and none of them have posted onto my status's, but I wonder if any of them will. If you would like to follow Ishmael's facebook adventure, just click the link.

I will be continuing the project throughout the rest of the week and hope to have it done by Sunday. Wish me luck!

*UPDATE: So it is now Sunday, and I am on Chapter 46 of the book. I plan on continuing, but my naive thought that I could go through that entire novel and finish it in one weekend proved to be shockingly unrealistic. But I will finish! I've found out a few things that I thought were absolutely fascinating.

The first thing I realized was the absolute beauty of Herman Melville's writing. I have tried to imitate it a few times in my facebook posts when I supplement my own words, but I find that his vast meaning is overly simplified whenever I do. I can't always find a passage that works for a facebook status (though often I cheat and just have a really long status, if I find the passage particularly meaningful) but my own words just do not convey the same meaning as Melville's original prose.

Another thing I've noticed is how much more interesting it is to read the story this way. Despite my obvious lack in being able to recreate Melville's masterpiece, I'm finding that rereading bits and pieces of the story looking for the key elements I want to include in my retelling makes the at first intimidating block of writing extremely interesting and enjoyable to read. I have gotten frustrated because the progress has been so slow, but one of the reasons that is, is because I find myself reading through whole passages instead of just skimming to see what I should take next. I have a much greater appreciation for the book than I did before!

I think that by doing this I've become more engaged in the external elements of the book rather than the plot. Instead of being so consumed by wanting to know what happens next and wanting the book to just continue, I am learning more about prose, language, and the value of information. I'm really enjoying this! Even though my neck is starting to hurt from crouching over my computer.

What's in a name? An Exploration of the Names of the Six Main Characters of Moby Dick

I love that line in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet ("What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet?" Act II Scene II Lines 46-47).

I decided to put Shakespeare's words to the test and look at the names of the six main characters in Moby Dick. I wanted to see if there was any extra significance to their names, or if they really were just names. I decided to look up the origins of the names, their meanings, and then the text surrounding their names in Moby Dick.

Origins

I used Google Translate to look up the origins of their names. Here is what I found:

Ahab: German
Queequeg: no response, but Spanish was guessed before I finished typing the name.
Ishmael: no response, but English and Albanian were guessed.
Stubb: Finnish
Starbuck: no response, but Italian, English, German, Lithuanian were guessed.
Flask: no response, but Portuguese and Albanian were guessed.

Then, just for kicks, I decided to see if their names would translate to a language completley different from English. Here are their names in Japanese:

Ahab: アハブ
Queequeg:  would not translate
Ishmael: イシマエル 
Stubb: would not translate
Starbuck: スターバック  
Flask: フラスコ 

The names translated back to English from Japanese name perfectly each time. When I translated the Japanese name to another language like Russian or Alabanian and then back to English, it sometimes went back to the way the  name was in English (like for Ishmael), but a different translation (such as Flask to bulb).

Continued Research into Origins and Meanings

I decided to do some more research into the origin/meaning of the names and came across the site Behindthename.com. I stuck each name into the search bar and below are the screen shots of what appeared.

The only names Behindthename.com was able to find anything for was Ahab and Ishmael (both Hebrew names that English speakers name their children). Both names are biblical, which may explain why there is so much Biblical language in the book (it fits the two main characters). Starbuck had a popular culture reference, but nothing to do with Moby Dick.

In the Text

I decided to look at the text itself to see if there were any words that were commonly linked with each of these six characters. The words listed below are both those used to describe the characters, phrases near the names that I found interesting, or words that often appeared near the name at multiple points in the text.

Ahab: precise agency, inscrutable, leaped after his prey, Captain, peculiar fortunes, side-lunging strides, commanded, a queer man, grand, godly, ungodlike, above the common, a crowned king, a wicked name, King,  "I am a cannon-ball."

Queequeg: Ramadan,  entertaining, absurd notions, content, knew, harpoon, pagan, cannibal, tomahawk, savages, creature, civilized, alone, heathen, Christian, affectionate, ambitious, embrace, kill-e, Yojo.
"A native of Rokovoko, an island far away to the West and South. it is not down in any  map; true places never are."

Ishmael: Call me, one, dear, don't be too particular, said I, muttered I, thine, thought I, I, thy, unlettered. Talks to himself a lot. Lots of bibilical language--he is the narrator.

Stubb: luck, aye, easy, pipe, mate, humorous, speechless a moment, involuntarily retreated, old man, wise, laugh, odd, peculiar, Mr., drawled,  counted upon, cheered, cried, supper, Starbuck, Flask, Ahab

Starbuck: lively, friend, chief mate, courage, fortitude, Mr., murmured, paled, right-mindedness, coerced will, cooly and adroitly balancing himself, careful, prudent, humane, too good a fellow, Stubb, Flask, Ahab
"A native of Nantucket, and a Quaker by descent"

Flask: Mr., one of the wrought ones, little, curious, helped himself, presume, mate, Starbuck, Stubb, Ahab, cruel, cried, water-bearer, "Why don't ye be sensible?", startled

While these words provide more character sketches than origins or meanings of the names, I did find it interesting how one could do a mere search of each character's name and find out a surprising amount about each character before ever reading the text. Sometimes I was able to find out where certain characters were from, like Queequeg or Starbuck. It looks like Starbuck's name is a surname, not a first name like I had assumed in my original searches, same with Stubb and Flask. Let's see if that changes things.

Surnames

I went to ancestry.com to learn the meaning behind the surnames. Here are screen shots of what I found:

I decided to look up Queequeg just in case something returned. I guess not.  It looks like the other names are largely from Great Britain, particularly England (or Ireland for Flask). This isn't too surprising since most white people in the United States (particularly Nantucket, Massachusetts) at this time were from England.

Queequeg

I decided to just do a Google Search, "What does Queequeg mean?" and see what I got. I found a blog post that has a passage I really liked in relation to my own blog post: "Queequeg, a cannibal prince whose very name seems devoid of meaning, is a strange combination of everything exotic and foreign to Ishmael." His name is "devoid of meaning." That does seem quite suitable for Queequeg's character. He has so much character yet he is one of the more difficult characters to understand. Well-played, Melville.

Conclusion
I don't know how much thought Herman Melville put into the names of his characters, but it seems to me like he put in at least some. He certainly thought about who they were and what they represented to the reader, to the other characters, and to themselves. While I'm not sure that these characters could not have been called by any other name, I do think the names, particuarly Ahab's and Ishmael's, were well chosen because of the extra religious symbolism they give to their characters. This was an interesting exercise for me to do and I'm glad that I was able to use these tools to look a little more deeply into the names of these six characters.