Unit One: Two Cultures

After reading  “Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution” and “Third Culture: Being in Between” I realized how much it reinforced a concerning trend I noticed in my transition from high school to college. As a student at a small private school, there was plenty of room to explore whatever fields I wanted. I was able to take the math and science AP’s to prepare for university but I was still encouraged and given the opportunity to enjoy english and art.  Granted, this was through classes I was required to take but in high school I had the time and classes were not as difficult. I have included a video from my school to give you an idea of where I went to high school.

One of my favorite books in high school.
I picked this up after reading other Salinger
books for school. 

Coming here, obviously studies require a greater level of focus. The entire campus is laid out to maximize a students efficiency, with Arts on North Campus and Sciences on South Campus.  I think that with this efficiency we are creating a sort of divide within the student population. In CP Snow's article, he elaborated that scientists and literary intellectuals do not really know how to talk to each other, they stay within their practices and often look down upon the other sect of academics. Here at UCLA, the students from both Arts and Science majors can still talk to each other, but they are slowly being polarized by the culture of the split campus and the difficulty of their majors.

Selfie with Haytham Nawar. Yes, he was not totally ready for
this photo but it is the only one I took.

I attended Haytham Nawar’s exhibition opening, Collective Bread Diaries: a taste of protest, on Thursday. He had a unique perspective on what it means to make art, using a much more collaborative approach than I have seen before. Through collecting his bread drawings, he created a small community. This community may be made up of artists, though he gave the impression that he was acquiring the drawings from anyone who wanted to submit them. This most likely brought together people from all sorts of different educational backgrounds.

I feel like this class will give me an avenue to see some things I would not otherwise make time for.  In my time here at UCLA I hope I can take some more classes that increase my knowledge of art and literature in ways that I enjoy while I pursue my psychobiology degree. I want to be able to hold conversations and share ideas with people from both cultures after I graduate.

Sources:

Bellevue Christian School. “Bellevue Christian School - Junior-Senior High.” YouTube, YouTube, 29 Aug. 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=113&v=vEIJwxiF--Q.

“Franny & Zooey | Being True to One's Self.” Dion Ys Us, 19 July 1970, dion-ys-us.com/stories/2016/7/7/what-jd-salingers-franny-and-zoey-tells-us-about-the-importance-of-being-true-to-ones-self.

Kelly, Kevin. "The Third Culture" Science 13 February 1998: Vol. 279 no. 5353 pp. 992-993. Web.

Snow, C. P. “Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution.” Reading. 1959. New York: Cambridge UP, 1961. Print.

Vesna, Victoria. “Toward a Third Culture: Being in Between.” Leonardo 34.2 (2001): 121-25. Web.