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Nov. 8th, 2007 02:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
minxyI was going to do this meme:
Name any story I've written, and any character in it (canon or OC),and I'll tell you three things about that character which I didn't put in the story.
But then I realized that I did a similar one rather recently. So you are welcome to ask me about any character in any story and I'll natter on for a bit, but I have something else I'd like to talk about.
It started from tutoring over the weekend and through a wierd cycle of frustrating presentations from minions making the same mistakes over and over again, and got me thinking about presentations. Specifically, how you present yourself to a group or individual, and how it changes their reaction.
Exerpt from RL: I was tutoring in physics, and my tutoree was making things a lot harder than they needed to be in practice (though in theory he completely understood.) At one point, he realized it was the same explanation he'd just heard and said 'you've explained this twenty times, haven't you?'
To my mind, I could have responded in several ways, but I was hoping to not be intimidating and not add to his frustration, I said 'you understand the explanation ever time, I think you're throwing in unnecessary roadblocks when you try to crunch the numbers, though.' I was kind of pleased with myself because he didn't throw his hands up with exclamations of pain/anguish/hatred of physics problems and instead looked back at the page. I asked him if he could talk it through, and about mid-way through the attempt he sat up and said, 'wait, this is really simple, isn't it?'
I was pretty thrilled and took it mostly as the aha moment, but there was also this look on his face that suggested he was working on a theory that he was an idiot, so I broke out a particularly broad statement about physics and math and science in general all being based in very simple logic. It's not that any of it is magic, it's that it's a *series* of simple logical steps that additively take you way beyond the average person's daily thought processes, but there is nothing about it that can't be broken back down to simple, logical steps.
One of my underlings today tried to give a presentation. This is not a skill she naturally possesses and for the life of me I can't seem to get her to pull together a professional, clear way of presenting information. So her work is pulled apart because she can't express it well, and she is not respected because she can't finish a sentence or remember that now is not the time to giggle and use slang or answer the question she thinks she heard and not the question she was asked.
But see, it's all about how you present yourself as a teacher or a lecturer. Or a leader. Or a peaceful explorer. Or not the former right hand of an evil false God. Or not a threat.
Which, finally, brings me to the meta section of the thoughts.
I think Sam is supremely bad at changing the way she presents herself to a particular effect. She always stands like an athlete, she always looks directly at what she's interested in, you can always see the interest on her face. Fanon (and, to some degree, that S10 episode where they played cards in the cabin) has it that Sam could not play poker to save her soul; I suspect this is a related trait.
By extension, Vala is a brilliant feign. You almost never see what she's really thinking. Someone needs to write me a ficlet in which Vala goes undercover to win a space ship in a card game and absolutely, completely, totally forbids Sam from even being in the same village. Space pirates!
Right. So Daniel I think has a presentation as completely harmless (witness, if you will, his continuing woobie status in fandom despite biceps that would make a Jaffa drool), but I'm not sure it's a conscious decision on his part. His 'what? I won't hurt you,' is as innate (and not quite the same as 'I couldn't hurt you') as his 'what? Of course I'm right!' attitude. And connected: Daniel is right, and Daniel believes that he won't hurt you, therefore you shall believe it as well. The end, let's move on to letting him study some of your treasured archeological sites. (*eyebrow waggle*)
For the record, I think Sha're was pretty much, of necessity, also an unconscious manipulator with her body language and the way she presented herself. She though, is more of a 'what? I'm a woman, of course I'm harmless. Now you just look right through me and I'll be over here teaching myself and the visiting aliens to read, and then I'll incite a massive rebellion that will trigger the beginning of the end of your race, kaythanks.' She was pretty special, though.
Jack and Teal'c, I would like to conclude, are fucking *masters* at deliberately presenting the person they want you to see. Masters. Deliberately, at opposition to known facts about them, and completely effectively.
Teal'c was the right hand man of a false God and did great, great evil for a long, long time. Yet he can hold out his hand to children and they'll play games, take care of him, and trust him when everything else is exploding or dying or turning really funky colors. Even if he's turning really funky colors. Remember that time he got bit by a big blue mosquito and turned into a spiderweb? Little twelve year old red-head shared her candy bar with him, told stories, sat down and hung out for a while. Then risked his wrath (if he'd be up to it, which he wasn't) by choosing to go against his wishes. Now, that was a gutsy kid, Ally, but do you think the gutsiest kid in the world would have risked the anger of TEAL'C FIRST PRIME OF APOPHIS, LORD OF THE UNDERWORLD, KREE? I thought not.
I give you: Teal'c, former First Prime of an Evil Would-be God, recently voted most likely to be overlooked by fandom, the writers, and everyone.
Then, there is Jack. Sometimes accused of cosmic giddiness when he goes a bit far, but I think he must use that as a litmus test: do you believe that he's harmless? Then you are probably not a threat. Do you see right through it? Then you might be worth paying attention to. Can you read the situation fast enough to realize both that it's an act, and that it's funny? Then Jack might like you. Maybe. If you aren't a threat.
I think it's possible that I love nothing in canon so much as when Jack or Teal'c completely drop the facades and go all incredibly transparent. It's rare. Rare rare rare. I actually think Teal'c is generally pretty straight forward, actually, but so controlled, that for him the transparency is when he is both pretty well overcome with an emotion and also not at all inclined to school his features. I'm thinking particularly of the Talion type 'Jaffa Revenge OUTTA MY WAY' anger or his fury over the unnatural deaths of people he loves , but there are also tender moments like in Unending. Jack too, seems to be more likely to go scary black ops on you than to actually talk about admiring you... a little bit... maybe... where you going?... please come back...
Anyway, those are my thoughts on the matter.
Should you want to play the meme game:
My stories (including ficlets) are under the fanfic tag. My full length stories are also collected in this post and in the sidebar.
Ask me a character and story, I'll give you some quirks wot didn't make it to the page.
Name any story I've written, and any character in it (canon or OC),and I'll tell you three things about that character which I didn't put in the story.
But then I realized that I did a similar one rather recently. So you are welcome to ask me about any character in any story and I'll natter on for a bit, but I have something else I'd like to talk about.
It started from tutoring over the weekend and through a wierd cycle of frustrating presentations from minions making the same mistakes over and over again, and got me thinking about presentations. Specifically, how you present yourself to a group or individual, and how it changes their reaction.
Exerpt from RL: I was tutoring in physics, and my tutoree was making things a lot harder than they needed to be in practice (though in theory he completely understood.) At one point, he realized it was the same explanation he'd just heard and said 'you've explained this twenty times, haven't you?'
To my mind, I could have responded in several ways, but I was hoping to not be intimidating and not add to his frustration, I said 'you understand the explanation ever time, I think you're throwing in unnecessary roadblocks when you try to crunch the numbers, though.' I was kind of pleased with myself because he didn't throw his hands up with exclamations of pain/anguish/hatred of physics problems and instead looked back at the page. I asked him if he could talk it through, and about mid-way through the attempt he sat up and said, 'wait, this is really simple, isn't it?'
I was pretty thrilled and took it mostly as the aha moment, but there was also this look on his face that suggested he was working on a theory that he was an idiot, so I broke out a particularly broad statement about physics and math and science in general all being based in very simple logic. It's not that any of it is magic, it's that it's a *series* of simple logical steps that additively take you way beyond the average person's daily thought processes, but there is nothing about it that can't be broken back down to simple, logical steps.
One of my underlings today tried to give a presentation. This is not a skill she naturally possesses and for the life of me I can't seem to get her to pull together a professional, clear way of presenting information. So her work is pulled apart because she can't express it well, and she is not respected because she can't finish a sentence or remember that now is not the time to giggle and use slang or answer the question she thinks she heard and not the question she was asked.
But see, it's all about how you present yourself as a teacher or a lecturer. Or a leader. Or a peaceful explorer. Or not the former right hand of an evil false God. Or not a threat.
Which, finally, brings me to the meta section of the thoughts.
I think Sam is supremely bad at changing the way she presents herself to a particular effect. She always stands like an athlete, she always looks directly at what she's interested in, you can always see the interest on her face. Fanon (and, to some degree, that S10 episode where they played cards in the cabin) has it that Sam could not play poker to save her soul; I suspect this is a related trait.
By extension, Vala is a brilliant feign. You almost never see what she's really thinking. Someone needs to write me a ficlet in which Vala goes undercover to win a space ship in a card game and absolutely, completely, totally forbids Sam from even being in the same village. Space pirates!
Right. So Daniel I think has a presentation as completely harmless (witness, if you will, his continuing woobie status in fandom despite biceps that would make a Jaffa drool), but I'm not sure it's a conscious decision on his part. His 'what? I won't hurt you,' is as innate (and not quite the same as 'I couldn't hurt you') as his 'what? Of course I'm right!' attitude. And connected: Daniel is right, and Daniel believes that he won't hurt you, therefore you shall believe it as well. The end, let's move on to letting him study some of your treasured archeological sites. (*eyebrow waggle*)
For the record, I think Sha're was pretty much, of necessity, also an unconscious manipulator with her body language and the way she presented herself. She though, is more of a 'what? I'm a woman, of course I'm harmless. Now you just look right through me and I'll be over here teaching myself and the visiting aliens to read, and then I'll incite a massive rebellion that will trigger the beginning of the end of your race, kaythanks.' She was pretty special, though.
Jack and Teal'c, I would like to conclude, are fucking *masters* at deliberately presenting the person they want you to see. Masters. Deliberately, at opposition to known facts about them, and completely effectively.
Teal'c was the right hand man of a false God and did great, great evil for a long, long time. Yet he can hold out his hand to children and they'll play games, take care of him, and trust him when everything else is exploding or dying or turning really funky colors. Even if he's turning really funky colors. Remember that time he got bit by a big blue mosquito and turned into a spiderweb? Little twelve year old red-head shared her candy bar with him, told stories, sat down and hung out for a while. Then risked his wrath (if he'd be up to it, which he wasn't) by choosing to go against his wishes. Now, that was a gutsy kid, Ally, but do you think the gutsiest kid in the world would have risked the anger of TEAL'C FIRST PRIME OF APOPHIS, LORD OF THE UNDERWORLD, KREE? I thought not.
I give you: Teal'c, former First Prime of an Evil Would-be God, recently voted most likely to be overlooked by fandom, the writers, and everyone.
Then, there is Jack. Sometimes accused of cosmic giddiness when he goes a bit far, but I think he must use that as a litmus test: do you believe that he's harmless? Then you are probably not a threat. Do you see right through it? Then you might be worth paying attention to. Can you read the situation fast enough to realize both that it's an act, and that it's funny? Then Jack might like you. Maybe. If you aren't a threat.
I think it's possible that I love nothing in canon so much as when Jack or Teal'c completely drop the facades and go all incredibly transparent. It's rare. Rare rare rare. I actually think Teal'c is generally pretty straight forward, actually, but so controlled, that for him the transparency is when he is both pretty well overcome with an emotion and also not at all inclined to school his features. I'm thinking particularly of the Talion type 'Jaffa Revenge OUTTA MY WAY' anger or his fury over the unnatural deaths of people he loves , but there are also tender moments like in Unending. Jack too, seems to be more likely to go scary black ops on you than to actually talk about admiring you... a little bit... maybe... where you going?... please come back...
Anyway, those are my thoughts on the matter.
Should you want to play the meme game:
My stories (including ficlets) are under the fanfic tag. My full length stories are also collected in this post and in the sidebar.
Ask me a character and story, I'll give you some quirks wot didn't make it to the page.