Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and The Self

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. 2005. Online image. Portfolio Center. 22 Feb 2010.

-Who am I?

Actually, I do not know who I am. I have my name, I have a nationality, I can come up with some words to describe myself; however, all of them are just the label which was additive. My parents gave me a name, Ayaka. Japanese is just a name that human created to describe the nation. Therefore, it is difficult to think what elements can explain who I am. Although I do not know how to tell who I am, I can tell that I am here now and I have a history, my memory. I think memory have an important role to indicate one's identity.

-What forces shape our sense of self?

It is hard to answer this question, but I think every external force can have an influence to us to shape our sense of self. Like I mentioned in the first question, especially, memory has an important role to define who I am. It is because the memory is a record of the personal history, and the experience gives people lessons that can influence the sense. Because of this, it is important to accept and remember all kinds of memory, even though it is painful.

-What is the central conflict of the film?

Of course Joel and Clementine had a conflict because of their different personality; however, I think the biggest conflict of the film was the conscious and unconscious. When Joel and Clementine met again after the memory surgery (that was the very beginning of the movie), Clementine said, "Have we met before?"

Although they wanted to erase the painful memory, I think they also wanted to keep the memory, like Joel said "Please let me keep this memory, just this one" when he was put into sleep to erase the memory. Therefore, I think the conflict was both internal and external.

-What is the significance of the Title?

I personally like this movie's title, "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" because it strongly ties in to the theme. As previously stated, even though both Joel and Clementine erased their memory and became a "Spotless Mind," they both remembered each other unconsciously and attracted again. Although they lost their memory about each other, they had unconscious "Eternal" memory like the bright strong "Sunshine."

Slef and Song

I found a song which relates to "the Self," sang by Ikimonogakari, the Japanese singer. I think there are many mistakes because I translated the lyrics into English. (Although I searched on the Internet, I could not find the English translation) But I wish people can understand some parts.

・・・・・・・・・

"My heart as it is" (Kokoro hitotsu arugamama)

I'm standing in front of the shut door,

and I don't care how my back looks from the others.

I was looking for the "average" to feel safe.

But I'm not that kind of girl any more.

閉ざされた扉の前にたたずむあたしの背中が

どう見えるのか 何を語るか それすらに意味は無い

平均値を探して安心感に浸った憂うべき自分はもうここにはいない

・・・

I was breathing in the imagination,

and I still can see "myself," who I used to be.

This place where I am can still glitter.

I'm gonna say good bye to myself,

who wants to fake and pretend that I'm brave.

I'm moving on to my own future with my heart as it is.

想像力で息をしたあの日のあたしに逢える この場所が輝きをまた放つ

勇敢なフリをした強がるあたしを捨てて 手招く唯一無二の未来へ

心一つあるがまま

・・・

I closed my eyes and saw myself, and I was cheered by her.

To tell the truth, I knew I didn't need to fake who I am.

等身大のまま閉じた 瞼の裏側にいるいつかのあたしが背中を押して

本当は知っていた 「飾らぬあたしでいい」って

・・・

Ikimonogakari. "Kokoro hitotsu arugamama." Lifealbum. EPIC Record, 2008.

いきものがかり. "心一つあるがまま." ライフアルバム. EPIC Record, 2008.

・・・・・・・・・

I felt that this song says the inconsistency between the "Material/Spiritual Me" and "Social Me." And I think this often happens to people because many people have different "Social Me," and those can be very different than the "Material/Spiritual Me." I think we need to have some kind of "Social Me" to remain the relationships (=order) between different people, such as parents, teachers, and friends. However, having many different "Social Me" can cause the question that "Which is my true self/style?" (=chaos)

Observing People's Conversation

Sanja Gjenero. "Image ID: 1066564." 28 Aug 2008. Online image. Stock.xchang. 6 Feb 2010.

Since I speak both English and Japanese, basically I belong to two speech community. Moreover, because I am taking Chinese class, although it is a short period, I also join Chinese speech community. But the basic communities are English and Japanese. Most of the day, I need to speak English to communicate, and the main topic is about the classes and the contents we learn in the classes. Since most time I speak with people of the same age, I use casual words in my speech.

The conversation I observed was about the boy who speaker likes. The speaker was explaining how she was happy when she could be the same group with him for the group project.

Also, I paid attention when I heard people talking to catch the forms of address. People used many kinds of address, such as: First name, nickname, generic terms (buddy, guy[s], girl[s]). Although there were many ways of address, obviously people were using them to show their friendship.

-Setting and Scene

I did my observation at the dining hall on February 5th. The conversation took place during the speaker and listeners were eating lunch. Four girls, one was the speaker and others were the listeners. They seemed to be playful and excited.

-Key

In the beginning of the conversation, both speaker and listeners' tone, pitch, and loudness were normal. However, as the conversation advanced, their tone became higher, pitch became faster, and volume of the voice became louder. It was because they became excited with the content of the conversation.

-Ends

The purpose of the conversation was to tell how happy the speaker was, and to tell how she could be the same group with the boy.

-Norms

People usually know that interrupting the speaker is not good. However, because of the purpose of the conversation, when the listeners got excited, they often interrupted the speaker and asked her to tell more about the content. Although the speaker was interrupted many times, she did not seem to be angry with that. Also, all of them were frequently making eye contact. From this example, although there is a basic norm which people need to follow during the conversation, I think norm can be changed by the case.

There is a clear order in the conversation when both speaker(s) and listener(s) are in same speech community. However, it can be chaotic when speaker(s) and listener(s) have different speech community because it is hard to understand each other since they do not share same language. Also, if people do not have or lost the ability to speak or the ability to understand the language (like Genie did not have chance to develop her language ability during her critical period), the whole world may be chaotic because this world is strongly connected to the language.