An essay replacement describing the failure of asking and design entrepreneur to write an academic essay. Relate to https://www.slideshare.net/hsiyanghsieh/graphic-not-writing-an-essay

1. !
!
!
!
!
!
!
The Essay Replacement
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
— — — —
MA CCE ・DESIGN PATHWAY
09 September, 2014
!
!

2. !
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
Content
!
INTRODUCTION…………………………………….………………………. 1
!
ME …………………………………………………….………………………. 1
!
TUTOR………………………………………………………………………… 4
!
SCHOOL………………………………………………………………………. 6
!
EDUCATION…………………………………………………….……………. 7
!
ESSAY…………………………………….…………………………………… 8
!
SUMMARY…………………………………….………………………………. 9
!
WORK CONCLUSION……………………….……………………………… 10
!
MORE INFORMATIONS……………………….……………………………. 11
!
BIBLIOGRAPHY……………………….…………………………………….. 12
!
APPENDIX………………………………………….………………………… 13
!

3. This writing is accompanied with a graphic work. The letter and the number in the brackets indicate
the location of the graphic.
!
In order to accomplish my postgraduate studies, I was asked to write an essay. However, after two
months of experimenting, I talked to various people, trying to find a reason or at least an excuse, to
convince me to write an essay but failed. Eventually I found I cannot, shall not and do not want to
write an essay. Hence for me, the purpose is clear — to accomplish postgraduate study without
writing an essay (K6). According to Michael Franzese (2009), the strategy to reach a purpose is to
make an offer that is not refuseable. Moreover according to Stuart Diamond (2010), to make a
successful negotiation, I need to understand the issue and the relevant factors completely.
Therefore the aspects I need to explore include: myself, tutors (or educator), and the school
(education institute), understanding what the relation between them, how they will be influenced,
what risks in terms of costs may happen to them. In the following parts all these issues will be
discussed and a solution will be proposed. In other words, I need to know who I am selling to, how
many bargaining chips I have, how much I can lose and what is the bottom line, so the best offer
can be made.
!
!
!
ME
I am going to start from the “me” part (G6). The most efficient way to reduce the obstacle that is
essay towards my master degree is to prove that I have dyslexia. This is also what a lot of people
told me to do during the two months of experimenting (Relevant conversations at Appendix A and
Appendix F). Dyslexia is inherent. As a non-native English speaker, growing up in different
language system (English is phonogram; Chinese, my mother tongue, is logogram (C6)), I have
not needed not to make any effort to be diagnosed with dyslexia. Once it is proved, I will be able to
have access to extra resources to help me with essay-writing or gain some confidence. With the
extra help, the essay quality will be less influenced by inadequate writing skills or language
problems. Tutors will be less tortured in the grading work and the school can decrease the risk of
having an inadequate essay to humiliate its reputation. However, dyslexia is not an ideal solution
(J8) from either short-term aspects or longer-term aspects.
!
From short-term aspects (J7) the problem between me and the essay, which will be discussed in
the later part, still exist. I do not eliminate the pain from the process of writing an essay. Meanwhile
with the same tuition fee, I seem to take some advantages with extra resources to help me, but
actually the extra resources decrease the challenge of the essay. This challenge is part of the
postgraduate education training, even though I am going to prove this training does not really work
later. If the challenge is decreased, the training I shall get from the postgraduate education is also
decreased. In other words, it benefit no-one and I have the right to ask for extra help but it is
actually my loss with the decreased benefits from this part of training.
!
1

4. From long-term aspects (J7), if I employ “dyslexia” to relieve my pain from writing the essay, I may
find myself hit by unpredictable risks. Firstly, I may be doubted with language or communication
problems since it is not easy to ask people to understand what dyslexia exactly is and what its
effects are. It is a medical term in English which sounds like illiteracy in Chinese. It is not about
what the fact is, but more about the impressions (or misunderstandings) the public have around
dyslexia and the English tests. In a conversation with a friend, I myself laughed out loud when she
said she is dyslexic because I thought she was joking, as while she is perfectly literate and
dyslexia sounded like an intelligence problem for me at that time (Appendix A). Secondly, I may be
labeled as someone who finds excuses to escape from a challenge, which almost every
international postgraduate student can accomplish by themselves in the UK, especially since I
have gone through the IELTS (The International English Language Testing System). The IELTS
proves if a person is an eligible English user. If a person is dyslexic, this person has language
problems. If a person with language problems can go through the IELTS, either the IELTS or the
dyslexia test has some problems. In other words, it will imply that I might go through unreliable
tests or I played a trick. (If we have a further discussion on this part, there are some controversies,
but here we focus on the points from a general view which will not take a further concern on the
difference between IELTS and dyslexia.) (A relevant conversation can be referred to in Appendix
H) The concerns above may be taken as exceptional cases but these kind of potential risks
actually exist and I need to give them no opportunity to take place. Since the existing solution —
dyslexia — does not work well and does not really help me with easy writing towards the master
degree, I need to resort to a better solution which will (L7):
1. Replace and equal the benefits I shall get from essay working.
2. Convince the relevant authorities — tutor and school — without hurting their rights and
advantages
3. Benefit my future career as a design entrepreneur — the ultimate goal for this course.
!
According to the previous conditions, I will continuously focus on the “ME” part (G5), because I was
asked to write an essay due to people’s beliefs — it is good for me — including tutors, the
education system, and some seniors who tried to advise me for a “better life”. (Please refer to
Appendix C for more details about how people tried to convinced me.) Is it really good for me?
When I started to reflect on myself, the relationship between me and the essay and what I shall get
from this postgraduate course, I found the essay is not good for me. I needed to write an essay
because it was on my way towards getting a master degree (G4). I need to get a masters degree
because it proves that I am eligible in creative and cultural entrepreneurship field as a masters
degree means that a person is able to “master” their field (H6). However, the essay is not
functional in this loop of endorsing an entrepreneurship master.
!
In order to understand what kind of skills an entrepreneur shall be equipped with to master in their
field, the life circle of business (G8) will be expanded to see what he/she will encounter during the
process when starting out. There may be some fluctuations during the process of starting business
(G8: Green line) according to different contexts, but a business will approximately progress through
2

5. starting point, growing and maintaining. At a certain point, the environment changes or some
factors are no longer the same as the initial conditions, the business will need adapt (I8: after the
grey dotted line). It can be expanding for example, opening branches. If the business growth is
expected to continue, the entrepreneur will need to alter the business type, have some internal
changes or sale the company. Otherwise the entrepreneur can end the business closing the
company too. These parts (I8) will not take place immediately. Entrepreneurs may have to concern
about it, but I am going to focus more on the first three stages: start, grow and maintain (G8). At
first the intelligence or creativity, which is different from person to person - case to case, shall be
eliminated from this discussion. As from the Creative and cultural entrepreneurship courses, we
learned that intelligence and creativity are not for executing the business. At the starting point an
entrepreneur needs to know where to get resources to start the business, such as funding and
networking. To progress the business (G8: Grow) the understanding of the markets, minds of
strategies and concerns on finance are required. When the business becomes stable, the
management turns to be an issue. Meanwhile communication, negotiation, legislation etc. are
relevant issues or skills an entrepreneur may have to confront. There may be some paper work the
entrepreneurs have to conduct like a business plan, but none of this will require the ability of essay
writing.
!
In addition the pathway I took is design, so besides the entrepreneur, I also need to prove that I am
an adequate designer. To understand what makes an adequate designer, the designers’ position
shall be explored first. The design we know today started from Bauhaus (C8) (If we separated the
ideas of “design" and “craft”). After World War One, Bauhaus was established to educate people to
be able to practice in the after war recovery work. Therefore it integrated craft masters and form
masters, creating an education system with equal emphasis on form and function. Form and
function continue their importance in today’s design education, but the designer’s position has
been changing along the way. Some assume designers shall have the social responsibility. Some
think designers play the role between market and production, so should be able to understand both
and generate ideas fitting to demands on both sides. Some declare designers are more like
“practical artists” bringing aesthetics to a product. No matter what a designer shall be, different
kinds of designers will encounter different cases and come up different solutions through different
processes. It all depends on how a designer has allocated himself/herself. Despite of those
conditions deferring from case to case, the design process can be approximately analysed in four
steps(F8): case in, understand, solve problem, and design release. In “case in”, the designer
needs to be able to approach the design cases they want. Some get cases by establishing their
reputation by entering competitions, getting awards, or involving themselves in prominent institutes
such as school or agency. Some put themselves into in-house design department or studio, so
they get cases either from the company or from their supervisor (senior designer or design
director). For “case in”, a designer need not only being able to identify himself/herself, but also
have networking or socialising abilities. After getting the case, the designer has to understand what
is the task by researching or experience (F8: Understand). “Solving problems” demand the some
design know-hows like: design method, human factors, materials, manufacturing process etc in
3

6. terms of “form and function”. Lastly, at “Design Release”, the designer may need some
presentation skills to demonstrate the design well. After we scanned through the entire design
process and consider various conditions, essay writing is still not a skill a designer will ever need in
his/her career.
!
The masters degree of creative and cultural entrepreneurship design pathway is supposed to
endorse me as an eligible design entrepreneur. However, according to the review above, no matter
as a designer or as an entrepreneur, essay writing is what will never be needed. If the essay does
not play any critical role in a person’s career as a design entrepreneur, how can it be a standard to
evaluate if a person is a qualified design entrepreneur or not? Therefore, the essay shall be
replaced with some other work.
!
!
!
TUTOR
Since the essay does not benefit me as a creative and cultural entrepreneurship design pathway
student, we are moving on to “Tutor” — an element that directly relates to the essay (F5). Tutors
educate students and students submit work to prove their learning outcome (C4). To educate
students tutors give lectures, lead seminars, and host conferences (D5). These methods for tutors
are more like sharing their experience. From the education point of view, these works are passing
knowledge to the next generation. Though some preparation work will need to be done, this work
for an educator is more under control than assigning works to students. When a tutor assigns work
to students, students learn something or get something from the process of working out the
assignment. However, the tutors get almost nothing during this process, but pay lot of extra effort
to give tutorials and grade the work. Why do they have to make an assignment to give themselves
a hard time? From the submitted works, the students prove what they have learned from the tutors,
so the works can be recognised as the feedback of the tutors’ teaching. Tutors grade the work to
let students know how well they perform in the subjects. The work plays the role of communication
between tutors and students, but does the work need to be the essay? Why is it the essay? If we
compare essays to other formats of work like projects, reflection, or a design, essays are generally
a more efficient way to grade. There is specific format for the essay including: words, structure,
and reference systems. The grader can quickly check some points according to the typical format.
As mentioned earlier, the tutors need to make extra efforts to help students with the work. An essay
is less ambiguous and take less effort for grading work, so the graders can efficiently mark them.
To sum up, the essay’s functions for the tutors are supposed to be:
1. Checking the learning outcome of the students
2. An efficient grading media.
!
Based on the above two ideas, the essay method will malfunction in my case. Comparing to
visualising information like this graphic work, my writing skills are not the best way to demonstrate
what I have learned from the creative and cultural entrepreneurship courses. In an essay, the issue
4

7. should be defined clearly with precise focus. During the entire creative and cultural
entrepreneurship training, I was trained with various subjects. Merely in the first module — Theory
of Cultural Industry, assorted issues were introduced including creative city, happiness or work,
advantage of creative industry etc. In the main courses networking, investment, intellectual
property, business plan, cooperation and so on were all introduced. All these issues were
introduced to me because they are supposed to be the elements an entrepreneur shall be able to
conduct. If only one is picked as the topic of the essay, how can the essay be able to reflect how
well I have comprehended this course? On the other hand, if there is one essay able to include all
the subject around creative and cultural entrepreneurship, the essay may turn out to be cliché.
Therefore the essay can not be employed as a sound media to prove my learning outcome.
!
In addition, since English is not my first language, my writing in terms of the essay is not an ideal
and efficient way to grade me (C4). The tutors may need some extra effort to understand what I try
to explain and suffer from the uncomfortableness of the way a non-native speaker using English. It
seems that I will make more effort to improve my English. Then we are back to the language issue
(J8) and move forward to the issue Patricia Ryan raised in a talk in 2010. According to her words:
“although English is a global language which shall support to transmit knowledges, it has become
the barrier in front of all subjects.” To reflect on her idea in terms of the creative and cultural
entrepreneurship courses and me, should the work I submit prove my abilities as an entrepreneur,
or a work demonstrating how excellent my English is? Shall I be graded with the understanding
and know-how of an entrepreneur or how good my English writing is? If I am given a fail in the
essay, what have I actually failed? Is it English academic writing or the creative and cultural
entrepreneurship? As Samuel Johnson said, “Language is the dress of thought.” Languages play
the role of communication and are the tool for people to approach further knowledge (A6).
However the language used in an essay plays a critical roll in grading when assessing the thoughts
of the writer.
!
Therefore, even though an essay written in English is supposed to be the most efficient way for
tutors to “communicate” with students in terms of learning outcomes, grading, and feedback, it fails
when the student is not an English native speaker. The essay is not a handy tool or medium for
international students to best demonstrate their understanding of the learning outcomes and the
way tutors’ grade work is negatively influenced by this. Essays inhibit the quality of communication
between tutors and students and the benefit it brings to the tutors in terms of grade as well as the
student not performing well in English academic writing. A better solution like this graphic work or
other media should be resorted to in order to decrease the influence from the irrelevant elements
like language or the fixed format of essay writing.
!
To replace the essay with another form of assessment, the first issue the tutors may encounter is
the fairness (C4). If there is a case, where a student can replace an essay with other work without
a passive condition (e.g. dyslexia), does that mean any student can replace the essay with other
work they are better at? (Besides, this question itself has some problems, because all the
5

8. individuals are unique and the controversy of the real fairness, but this is a deferent issue.) How
can a fair enough standard or rule for the diverse format of submission if a essay is replaced brings
up some difficulties. In addition, another risk for the tutors who agree to replace essays will be the
challenge of their own position. Before a tutor became a qualified tutor, he or she has usually
written a lot of essays because essays are frequently used to evaluate the understanding of the
learning outcomes in academic field. If the purpose on essay becomes irrelevant, it seems to imply
that the processes and the evaluation systems a tutor has been through is no longer relevant
either. According to the above, the essay should be replaced, but the fairness and the tutors’
positions are under risk, reducing the willingness for the tutors, who are in charge of making
decisions, to support this case. Therefore the “boiling frog” method shall be employed. The
replacement can not be too radical, and the core value of the essay shall be kept and respected. In
other words, the replacement shall leave some ambiguity, when fairness is doubted, the “right” of
the replacement has reduced inference in regard to the capacity of a student. The ambiguity leaves
the tolerance of the tutors to assume the value of the replacement is equal to the essay. The
replacement aim to demonstrate the students achievement in creative and cultural
entrepreneurship and the ability to consider an issue comprehensively, decreasing the controversy
to the purpose of an essay.
!
!
!
SCHOOL
Another key element relating to purpose of an the essay is school. School started with core values
(I6); the founder of the school had the intention to educate people. Schools provide resources for
students (like me) to learn better, including tutors, facilities, resources etc (I5), so students can
benefit. Distinctive achievements from students endorse the quality of education in the school,
giving it good reputations. With a positive reputation, the school can attract better people to
generate better outcome creating a positive loop (I5). However, due to the weakness in academic
writing skills, the essay from me is not an ideal outcome, considering this loop. If we take this issue
as a business, a good business need to be able to bring in the next business like the loop (I5).
Even though the school can get the tuition fee from me no matter what I generate, this “business”
seeds the potential risk. If I am not a good business for the school which means the school invests
the education resources on me but my outcome is not good enough to bring positive reputation to
the school, the positive loop is broken. Maybe failing me may simply get rid of me from the school’s
record and the reputation of the school is less damaged, the education resources which have been
invested on me turn to the waste.
!
When it comes to a business, a solution can be found. This condition can be referred to the
practice that has been done in creative and cultural entrepreneurship courses — the Tyneside
Cinema at New Castle. This cinema with limited resources was encountering the potential risk of
becoming obsolete. The practice was to employ the existing resources and values and figure out a
solution to help the cinema adapt to the future. The school has the resources including qualified
6

9. students and staff. Even though I may be insufficient in English academic writing, I was selected
from many applicants by this school so there is something I can do. It is just that the essay can not
elicit the best positive outcome from me to the school. In order to make the biggest profit from the
school’s education resources, a better option for the school is to allow me to use an alternative
form of assessment which can better demonstrate what I can achievement from this school instead
of fixing the essay as the only form of assessing as learning. (Besides the essay, there are projects
and reflections to be submitted at the same time, but the essay is mandatory, so it is assumed to
be the “only” form of assessment here.)
!
!
!
EDUCATION
If we put tutors, school and me (the student) together, it is an issue about education (A8). Since I
am an Asian studying in Europe, both western and eastern education history will be examined to
understand what is the meaning behind education. Western education started from classical
antiquity with the idea of liberal arts (A7). A free man should know about trivium (grammar, logic,
and rhetoric) and quadrivium (music, arithmetic, astronomy, and geometry). The free man learned
trivium as tools to learn quadrivium. Eastern education can be resorted to “Rites of Zhou” in Zhou
dynasty (1122–256 BC). It included six arts: rites, music, archery, charioteering, calligraphy ,and
mathematics (B7). In modern history, when a group of intellectuals led by Liang Qichao introduced
“Democracy & Science” to eastern society (B5), the concept of science based on Rene
Descartes’s “Discourse on The Method” started to influence eastern education (A5). Historically,
both western and eastern education aimed to educate people to be functional in society.
Nowadays, when Ken Robinson started to introduce the idea of creative education via books and
lectures, the concept of education has been altered. The point of his idea can be understood but
when he started to deliver an education concept focusing on the variety of individuals’ intellects, it
revealed the fact that nowadays, the idea of education is gradually altering from collectivism to
individualism (A4). Throughout his book “Out of The Mind (2001)” and his talk “How schools kill
creativity (2006)”, he continuously motioned the difference of every individual, the various abilities
of a person, and how to develop individuals’ unique abilities using education, instead of the kind of
people society needs and starting an education institute to “produce” these kind of people. The
difference here is: the first idea focuses on what can be developed from the individual and to make
him/her useful to society; the second idea which was executed in the past focuses on how to train
people to be functional to the society, despising the inherent talents and filtering out those who can
not be functional in the expected pattern. Consequently, the essay reflects the obsolete part of the
education — exclusive standard. The essay was supposed to demonstrate a student’s learning
achievements, but when it is a fixed option which can not be altered with other presenting media,
the essay also filters out people who are insufficient in language, writing or academic thinking
pattern, even though these people can perform well in the subjects. The right of the essay in the
education system becomes doubtful and unreliable.
!
7

10. !
!
ESSAY
We have discussed about the relevant elements around an essay above. What about the essay
itself? Is an essay itself a sound way to demonstrate an idea, to train the thinking pattern or to
generate an innovative point of view? Before we start to judge the right of the essay, the structure
of the essay will be examined (H3). An essay is basically constructed with introduction, body/
content, and conclusion. In the introduction, it usually starts with some background introduction —
some broad and rough ideas. Then it will gradually narrow down and the theme / main idea will be
discussed (H3). The rest is how the idea will be demonstrated in the essay and a summary of the
supporting points. After the introduction paragraph, the body of the essay follows and the debate
on the set issue commences. Basically, each paragraph delivers a supporting idea towards the
main idea (I2). These paragraphs usually start with the supporting idea at the first sentence,
followed by several sentences of explanations, research or points of view from other academics to
reinforce the supporting idea. Finally, in the conclusion (H1), the supporting points will be repeated
again reminding readers what they have read previously. Therefore the idea the writer discussed is
proved to be true / false. When we review the structure of the essay, the only thing from the writer
are the main ideas and the supporting points the writer chose to stand for his/her debate (J3). The
other parts of the essay follow on from the main idea. The difference from student to student will
only be the writing skill and how good the supporting materials are. It is a work which can almost
be conducted by programming (K3). The writer only need to input some key elements like the main
idea and supporting points. The rest of the work is almost the same. In fact, in 2005, scientists at
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology created the SCIgen to generate papers. Though the
qualities or the values are questionable and it was the paper not the essay, the fact revealed that
these kinds of academic writing with specific format can be produced from a computer. Therefore
why should a postgraduate student make effort when this work can be done by a computer? What
is the value of writing this material? If a student make effort on writing, searching materials, and
making the materials support the debate, instead of focusing on thinking and practicing in
profession, is an essay still a valuable work to do? Furthermore, what is the value of a
postgraduate student?
!
In addition, the piece of necessity of abundant references in an essay is questionable. During the
two month research, I read some distinguished essays reserved in school library. Most of them
have a lot of references. There can be four or five quotes in a seven to eight sentences paragraph.
If everything shall be based on something from some greats, I wonder if the references are
supporting materials or the blocks for the thinking. The point I am trying to make here is not to
object the right of the reference, but having too many references. In thousands of years in human
history, we can always find some words to support our point of view (D1-I2), but what are we
actually referring to? When we refer to someone’s words, have we included this person’s
condition? The theory might work in this person’s era, culture, or field, but can it apply to the
current condition? If the reference is conditional, can it be reliable? If the reference has been
8

11. proved through time and space, it is a truth or a fact. If it is a fact, will it need not to be referred in a
bibliography? Is it the truth or the person we are basing our debate on (K2)? We are told that, at
the moment, we are not credible so we need to base our debates on the academics. (There is a
relevant conversation in Appendix F) However, if something is a fact, does it matter who said it?
Are we learning is to admire the greats or to seek the truth? What are we educated to do, seek the
truth, defend ourselves or to pass the knowledge (K5)? Is the knowledge we are polishing going to
be a weapon or a tool? The process of an essay may train our mind to think critically and have the
ability to make our ideas robust, but can it train us to achieve something or practice these ideas in
real life? (A relevant conversation is in Appendix G)
!
If we put the education and the essay reference issues together, the abundant references which
make an essay look more professional seem to be ironic in education. We learn, we study and we
understand. When we understand a thing, we integrate the new knowledge into what we have
known before and practice the integrated knowledge in the real world either in life, business,
relationship etc. Therefore we are able to figure out our own motive or theory which a useful essay
or any piece of writing should do (G3-GI). If we are still able to tell which part of our ideas are form
is from which person, which book, and which theory, have we integrated the knowledge to become
part of us and be able to practice it intelligently?
!
To sum up, the essay is not only inadequate to play its role well between the tutors, the school and
me but also questionable itself. It cannot endorse me as an adequate creative and cultural
entrepreneur designer (G6); it cannot demonstrate the learning outcome of me fairly enough to the
tutors and loses the efficiency of grading work (C4); it cannot turn the education resources into a
good outcome from the school in my case and also loses the right in education by caring less
about the variety of talents (I6). Hence, a alternative solution in my case is needed, like this work
— the graphic and the explanation above.
!
This work is better than an essay because the issue is complex and refers to various issues. The
essay has a specific order to describe an issue. When the issue need to be very focused, the writer
has to get rid of some information which may disturb the flow of reading. As my writing above,
more than once, besides appendixes, I need to bracket off relevant information sources and some
relevant information on the graphic which cannot be included in the writing. In addition, the
reader’s knowledge background is not predictable. On the graphic, readers can make decision
themselves, and on which issues to follow further or which part to read first according to their own
thinking patterns. In a writing, the readers have no choice but follow the writers’ thinking pattern. If
the writer and the reader’s thinking pattern are too different, the writing become too difficult to read.
Though there can be some subtitles to indicate what a paragraph is about, in a sentence these are
too many words written, obscuring the key words. However, the essay or the writing is not totally
invaluable. For example, the way my mind work switches when I worked on different parts of this
work (the graphic part and writing part). At the graphic part of work, I was able to quickly jump
around different issues and accomplished the thought comprehensively. At the writing part, it
9

12. progressed slowly so I was able to think into more detail which was reversed when I was focused
on graphic. I took this work to replace the typical essay, in order to best demonstrate my
understanding of the learning outcomes.
!
Consequently, instead of the essay, this work demonstrates my understanding as a creative and
cultural entrepreneur design pathway student not only theoretically but also practically. From
theoretical point of view, I understand what kind of capabilities the entrepreneur and the designer
should be equipped with (C8, G8). As a postgraduate course student, I also presented my
understanding of how academic writing works (H3) and make a debate from different aspects. The
writing part of this work still possesses traits as an essay, like statements, arguments, references,
appendices, leaving ambiguity for the right of this work as an essay replacement. From a practical
point of view, as a designer, I visualised the concept into this graphic work for people to easily
understand the idea. As an creative and cultural entrepreneur, instead of blocking myself in a
ordinary path, I understand my weaknesses and the strength and figured out what works better for
me — replacing the essay with this work. Whether this is as a designer or an entrepreneur, I
demonstrate the negotiation and problem-solving capabilities to achieve what I want. When the
issue occurred to me — eliminating the essay on my way towards a masters degree (G5), I could
evaluate my condition in terms of benefit and loss (K8), understand who I was negotiating with —
tutors and the school (F5, H5), cogitating what they may want from the thing (essay) I tried to
eliminate, binding my benefit with them, and proposing a better offer, without being trapped by
existing options (e.g. dyslexia(J8)). Hence, this work can better prove that I am eligible for a master
degree of creative and cultural entrepreneurship design pathway.
!
10

13. MORE INFORMATIONS
There are some relevant information in the graphic which are not mentioned in the writing, because
it will distract the focus from the issues. Here are some explanations for these parts.
!
(A8)(C6)
The origins of research in western world and eastern world can be roughly analysed to the
pursuing of alchemy and immortality(A8). In the western world, the science was based on the
alchemy, so western scientist focused much effort on how things are composed, so that they could
find a method to produce precious metals. The atomic theory of John Dalton and the discovery of
electron from Joseph Thomson are examples of scientists attempting to deconstruct substances in
oder to find the rule behind them. In the eastern world, immortality was the base of the eastern
medicine in terms of “eastern science”. (There was no concept of “science” in the eastern world
until the May Fourth Movement in 1919 (B5).) Several empires such as Qin Shi Huang and Houyi
were known to be the pursuit of immortality. People studied how things could be employed by
understanding the traits of substances. These different ways of thinking leave some hints in the
other fields, like linguistics(C6). English, as a phonogram, is accomplished by a group of letters.
Chinese, as a logogram, creates the letters representing what it indicates.
!
(A3-C3)
These three are examples for the relationship between theories (D3), demonstrating how a theory
inherits from another theory.
The first example(A3) was left here because in the first module of creative and cultural
entrepreneurship course, we studied “Theories of The Cultural Industry” and we were asked to
track culture objects with the method in Celia Lury and Scott Lash’s “Global Culture Industry”. (It
was on of the topics we can chose to work on the essay.) However, Celia Lury and Scott Lash’s
method referred to Theodor Adorno and Max Horkeiner’s Dialectic of Enlightenment (A3). Theodor
Adorno and Max Horkeiner inherited from the Frankfurt School. In other words, the Frankfurt
School’s concept was practiced by these experts in their eras according to the context they
encountered. When I referred to some materials in the essay, I referred to a specific book or
specific words from Celia Lury or Scott Lash, instead of tracing back to Frankfurt School. This is to
understand how the theory was generated and generate some concepts according to our own.
That was the first time my doubts of the essay assignment began.
The second example (B3) was based on a similar idea as the first one. Martin Heidegger was
mentioned again and again when I took the second module’s optional course: Creative Technology.
He influenced a lot of followers’ philosophies and theories. However when we tried to refer to some
theories or sayings, as supporting materials, we referred to his followers instead of Heidegger
himself. The theories from the followers make the philosophy of Heidegger more complicated and
included more conditions introduced from the followers.
The third example (C3) was left here because Confucianism plays an important role in eastern
philosophy, influencing Chinese people over thousands years. It reflects how the same theory or
philosophy can be employed in different conditions along the changing eras.
11

14. BIBLIOGRAPHY
Franzese, M. (2009). I’ll Make You an Offer You Can’t Refuse: Insider Business Tips from a Former
Mob Boss. Nashville: Thomas Nelson.
Diamond, S. (2010). Getting More: How You Can Negotiate to Succeed in Work and Life. London:
Penguin Group.
Robinson, K (2001). Out Of Our Minds: Learning To Be Creative. Oxford: Capstone Publishing
Limited.
TED.com. (2006). Ken Robinson: How schools kill creativity. [Online Video]. February. Available
from: http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity#t-751334. [Accessed: 20
August 2014].
Stribling, J., Krohn, M., and Aguayo, M. (2005). SCIgen - An Automatic CS Paper Generator.
[ONLINE] Available at: http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/. [Accessed 28 August 14].
TED.com. (2010). Patricia Ryan: Don't insist on English!. [Online Video]. December. Available
from: http://www.ted.com/talks/patricia_ryan_ideas_in_all_languages_not_just_english. [Accessed:
10 August 2014].
!
12