What’s Others Idea of Trace?

Sigmund Freud

Freud brings in the idea of unconsciousness and how it interacts with memory trace (Kwon, 216). Trace is also an organisms ability to return to a setting position through the usage of unique analogies (Kwon, 217). Freud also concluded that dreaming is another type of remembering and that trace is crucial material for solidifying imagery (Kwon, 228).

Henri Bergson

Bergson describes memory as a neuron theory that looks at how human perception is a motor design that is unconscious matter (Kwon, 214). Thus, we are not able to reach pure memory and images that could be displayed with cerebral movement (Kwon, 214). Bergson concludes that memories can be erased by habitual action due to automatism of the brain (Kwon, 215). Therefore, memories supplement understandings and use signs to recall imagery (Kwon, 215).

Jacques Derrida

Derrida brings the idea of image-oriented dreams, difference, and the concept of teche (Kwon, 218). Teche was described as the relation between life and death, present and represent, and therefore determines writing as a stage of history (Kwon, 219). Derrida concludes that trace was an independent space that the unconscious has to decode within the concept involving writing (Kwon, 219).

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Building Trace Through Music

This exercise will allow me to work with different types of music as well as imagery to build a story filled with trace words. By adding in word signifiers that can build imagery to the reader, can also showcase who I am as a writer. I will interact with colour in the background of my writing to see the effect it has on my creation. Lets dive on in!

Cody Johnson – Country Music

Trace Words Found

• Fall
• Light ball glow
• Ride of a bull
• Pain and sore
• Thunderstorm
• smoke
• Dark night
• Cross on chin
• Countdown

The pain sliced through me like a bulls horns to the ribs. Glass shattered over me like the path of lightning in the sky. One, two, three, four, five. Breath. The night limited my vision except for the faint glow of the street lights. The grip on the steering wheel was the grip of a bull rider. Hands bleeding from the ride. The cliff held my car like a cross necklace on a neck. Orienting myself, I gripped my ribs. Water soaked my clothes, except it was red. Horns of steel pierced my side like a bull ring. Falling. The countdown of the clock, was the countdown of my life.

Ariana Grande – Pop Music

Trace Words Found

• Rewriting DNA
• Heart bulse
• Teddy bear
• Medical room
• Honey like vision

Pain soaks my vision. The medical room increases the pressure in my heart. Long and dragging. A scan of my heart would probably get me emitted too. Thick and slow pulse, like honey, increases my panic. Nausea and static tingles my limbs.

I noticed his eyes frantically scanning, unsure what was occurring. I placed his teddy bear under his paws. His best friend. To support this uncertainty.

“Your the bestest boy,” I cradle his head.

The doctors insert a needle into his arm. A honey like medicine that’s flowing through my body. His pulse is visually in his eyes. Slowly retreating. No preparation would make this better. The room draws quiet and slow. It limits my ability to breath. The vet takes up too much room, depriving us both of oxygen.

“Goodbye, my boy.”

My DNA is rewritten. I gracefully grab his best friend out underneath his heavy paws. I hug it tightly, like a lasting goodbye.

“I’ll love you eternally.”

Joel Sunny – Violin Cover

What Trace Comes to Mind With the Music?

• Bridgerton
• Kiss
• Ballroom
• Energy
• Bright colours
• Flowers
• Fairy lights

The pull of a kiss. The drawing of time. An unconditional shake in the hands. Tastes of bottle rocks explodes stars in mouths. An unconditional dance of two mouths, flowing with the beat of life. Warmth suffocates cold. Intertwined. Bright colours dance in the darkened vision. Just like when you close ur eyes and press hard. Pinks, Purples, Blues, and Greens explode like wildflowers in a mountainous field. It must be the energy. Electrocuting my eyes and mouth. The ballroom is just a capsule of space in time. Just me and him. Bridgeton, but alive.

Skillet – Hard Rock

Traces Noticed

• Fire
• Red and Orange
• Firefighter
• Rain
• Black leather
• Sparks

Skull shaking, bone burning. A screech of black leather ravens pierce the goddess green tree canopy. The cry of threat echos the valley. The smell of fresh rain threatens the animals. Blue turns to red. Blackout. Sparks escape the devils chambers. Fire graces the lush vegetations. War begins. A black-out shape escapes from the smoke. It stops, arms extended horizontally, opening for a huge awakening. Screech worse than the ravens escapes the thing. A battle cry. He picks up his fallen axe, ready to destroy the devil of an element.

Anne Wilson – Christian Music

Trace Noticed

• Pain that makes you fall down
• Suffering
• Unconditional love
• Bible
• Church
• Youth
• Change
• Blonde

The sun shone. A blanket of warmth graced my skin, and intertwined with my bones. My soul shined like blonde hair in the sunlight. Grace and beauty. Radiating happiness escaped my body as stepping into Sunday Sermon at church. Youthfulness and unconditional love from the Father. However, it was not church I was stepping into to. Pain almost numbing, sticked to my skin. Wet suffering of nature dripped onto my skin. Wet, cold, moist. Winter. Pulling my gloves tighter. I pushed the door open in a rush, I entered the game of manipulation.

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Imagery Trace

This section will allow me to strengthen my understanding of how and where to find trace words in the everyday life. This will allow me to take pictures of objects and things that I find unique to me. In our class, we completed a activity called the Art Date, where you go on an adventure and notice any trace words or things. Therefore, throughout my daily activities, I have snapped a picture that stood out to me. I can then write a small paragraph including the trace words in a separate situation.

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Integrating Assignment Written Work

In class, we completed fiction writing practices and creative writing applications in short stories. After completing my research on trace, I am really interested on how I can use trace words to strengthen my previous writing applications and stories. I will use sentences from my previous work and integrate trace words to develop the material setting.

Fear – Fiction Practice 2

Previous line:

As the line creeps forward, I get more nauseous. My breaths are tight from the limited air, and my tongue tingles with the two-stroke smoke in the air. I look for an escape, but I feel trapped in my helmet with no way out. I can’t breath. The clicking of the timer in my head grows louder and louder with every second it counts down my doom.

New line:

As the line creeps forward, I get more nauseous. My breaths are tight from the limited air, and my tongue tingles with the two-stroke smoke in the air. I look for an escape, but I feel trapped in my helmet with no way out. I can’t breath. My fingers frantically kept missing my button to release my head from this jail. A snap shakes my head as I release the button, like the stomping of a bull. Slamming that white pearl helmet to the ground, I scurry to the start line. The Masters class is beginning to warm up their engines, the same suffocating feeling in every one of those eyes. It could be of fear or something else. Pure adrenalin. Wobbling back to my bike, that pear helmet has to be transparent as it has vanished in thin air.

What did I do:

I tried to integrate my trace of the helmet into the material setting. Fear made my character have to take the helmet off but their inability to think straight, may have caused them the race. Their helmet seems to be misplaced, causing them to have to become more worried.

You or Me? – Fiction Practice 7

Previous line:

“Elize?” Her crispy dried-up lips parted. I shuffled towards her and leaned my body against her bed. Her eyes scan towards me. The colour was leaching from them. It’s like she is in a black and white film. No colour decorates her body. I guess being terminally ill really does remove who a person is.

New line:

“Elize?” Her crispy dried-up lips parted. I shuffled towards her, bringing a damp cloth to her mouth. Soaking those fried lips with the only intake of water she can get. Her eyes scan towards me. The colour was leaching from them. It’s like she is in a black and white film. No colour decorated her body. I guess being terminally ill really does remove who a person is. Remembering that I had my Rhode blush in my purse. I jump over and sprawl through it, fingers gracing the oily smooth surface. Taking two fingers, I smear the rosebud pink on my fingers like paint, and she’s my cavas. Giving her colour back into her body, like leaching ink.

What did I do?

I have found that when a character notices something, they usually act on it. Since my character Manning noticed her sisters dried-up lips, she feels the need to support her sister. By placing a wet cloth to the lips, it allowed Manning to interact with the material setting. Changing who she is as a person.

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My Conclusion

After completing this research question, I came up with my own definition of what trace words are. Trace words are the ability for characters to interact with their material world, specifically the surrounding elements of living life. Trace words are not just mental descriptions of objects but a way to describe a noticeable object that the character will later interact with. An example I pondered was how can I make my trace words interact with the material setting. Thus, researching through music and imagery, it showed me that the objects I noticed in my daily activities was something I in fact did engage with. Such as seeing a red glove on my walk and needing to take a picture. Thus, I interacted with the element by taking a minute out of my day to give it attention. I feel like this semester, I was having a hard time with trace material was because I believed it was only a way to describe things uniquely, however, that is not the case. They are objects the characters interact with the further build who they are as a person.

My Understanding

Reading my work back from beginning to end, I can notice a huge difference in writing the music videos and the fiction practices. Seeing how I learned that trace words are not just descriptions but actual information thats occurring in the story. Seeing how my character interacts with the dried lips and how my other character interacts with her material setting really shows that this research question has strengthen my understanding of what trace is.

References:

Kwon, Teckyoung. “The Materiality of Remembering: Freud’s Wolf Man and the Biological Dimensions of Memory.” New Literary History, vol. 41, no. 1, Jan. 2010, pp. 213–32. EBSCOhost, research.ebsco.com/linkprocessor/plink?id=87a49485-3238-3521-aa4b-fefd9fb88890. 

Mikaili Tweed is a fifth year university student in the Bachelor of Arts, Geography and Environmental Studies.