In-Class Writing

Do you feel this is an ethnographic study, a work of entertainment, both? Explain your answer. Who are the interview subjects and why are they important? What roles do the interviews play? Do they move the story along? Lend a perspective on the subculture? What are some of the attitudes, beliefs, rituals, artifacts, etc. that make this group a subculture?What is the structure of the piece? How is it organized? Does this help or inhibit your understanding of the subculture?What were some of the stereotypes you held about skateboarders before watching this? Do those stereotypes still hold true? If so, why? If not, what changed your perspective?The rhetorical triangle (ethos – do we trust what the creator of this is telling us…? What if you knew the filmmaker was also one of the skaters? Pathos – what emotional response did you have and why? Logos – how was the piece constructed?)

I think that the documentary is both entertaining and educational, because it is a look into a culture that I am not familiar with. The interview subjects are all the main people from the skateboard movement in the 70s. They were there and they were at the forfront of it all making them the best at that time. The interviews are the whole thing, along with old movies and pictures. If there were no interviews, sure the story could still be told, but with them, it is so much more interesting. It's like getting backstage passes at the concert of your favorite band...the coolest thing ever. The homemade skateboards are certainly an artifact, not to forget about the drained pools. They had rules about who could come and who couldn't and they kept themselves an exclusive group. I think that the documentary is focusing on not only the Z-Boys experience but also the facts of history that pushed these kids into starting their own "revolution." I have a lot of skater friends. Kids like that tend to hang out with kids like me, rockers, because adults riddicule us for being who we are. That, of course, just pushes kids harder to do what they want. Someone tells you no you will only want to do it more. Skateboarders get a bad rap for getting into trouble with cops, skating on private property, and not giving a damn about rules.