Thursday, January 17, 2008

Scribbling as Journalism, why not?

I'm intrigued by this article in UNC's Daily Tarheel, New journal open to all margin scribblers . Imaginative students are starting a journal titled Uncharted, the article explains,

"A new arts journal on campus will start not with a bang but a squiggle.Uncharted is calling for your drawings, your doodles and your cramped scribbles yearning to be expressed."

The editors will be taking submissions starting today on campus. Uncharted will feature the arts on a campus currently obsessed with the Tarheels (basketball team, that is.) The editors expound upon the creative brainstorming benefits of doodling,

"During class, a part of your mind is completely disconnected to your body," said doodler Trevor Brothers, a sophomore. "You look down and there's a picture.""It's better than falling asleep in lectures, but you're definitely not taking notes."

Go, Trevor, I say, and I might add, it's also better than text messaging during class. Isn't it possible that if you look at doodles on your notes, the content of the lecture pops to mind, permanently associated with that particular doodle? It worked that way for me, or at least I rationalized that it did. Somehow, my brain linked the spoken word (lecture) with the doodle in my notes in some part of my memory, forever entwined or at least entwined until the exam. Made it hard for people to borrow my notes and get much out of them though.

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