on Academia

Let's review. I'm studying at the National University of Singapore, taking courses in Geography of Development, Southeast Asian Geography, Japanese Mass Media, and the Culture Industries. Well, now that I'm halfway through the semester (gulp!) the essays are starting to make their way into my life. I've already written one and have done a proposal for another. And, as is usually the case with my work, the topics seem somewhat random and irrelevant to my desired end goal: urban planning.

So, just what am I writing papers on this semester?

The socio-economic effects of tourism and the decline of agriculture in Costa Rica. I'm not too sure either, but it merited a B+ despite not making much sense at all. In a nutshell, I argued that the last decade or so of development work in Costa Rica has not benefited the general population but rather deepened and reinforced existing power inequalities. Yeah, I may or may not have taken economics in one hand and cultural studies in the other and then hit the keyboard frantically.

The growth and maintenance of the film and television industries in Vancouver and the effects this has on Hollywood authenticity. This one is the proposal, so I'm not sure at all where my research will take me or what the final paper will actually be about. Right now I'm just throwing buzz words at the prof in hopes that it'll look like what I'm doing has relevance and enough existing academic literature to make a decent paper out of. If all else fails I'll write about X-Men. Fingers crossed!

Maritime territory disputes in the South China Sea. Finally, something that is simple and makes complete sense. It's exactly what it sounds like: political geography. More or less I'll be looking at the relationships among Southeast Asian nations and China and the way that claims to land in the South China Sea are made and handled. Huzzah for simplicity!

A comparison of magazine advertisements between GQ UK/US and GQ Japan. Another rather straight forward topic, but again only in the proposal stage so I'm not even sure if it will happen. Everything rides on me being able to get my hands on a copy of either the British or American issue of GQ to complement the Japanese issue that is more readily available. What exactly the paper will entail I won't know until I have a change to go through the magazines and have a eureka! moment. 




first photo by novelpursuit, second photo by Rose Robinson, third photo by shapour bahrami, fourth photo by the US Navy, fifth image by .HEI