This article written by Derek Thompson really made me sit back and think about my own consumer behavior. His explanation of consumers being torn between a curiosity of new things and a fear of anything too new is something I’m sure we all fall victim too. For some reason when I read that description in the article I automatically pictured myself ordering a meal at a restaurant I have never been to. Scared to try something completely new, yet also wanting to branch out at least a little from my food comfort zone, I usually always get something I’m at least familiar with and know I will like.
I think that both writers and readers come across the same problem in their respective writing and reading. Familiarity with a splash of originality. Personally, this is something I have been struggling with when thinking about the writing I will be doing for my campaign later on in this class. Focusing on promoting and bringing attention to mental health on college campuses, I was considering writing a press release and a pamphlet or brochure. The hesitation came when I was thinking about how I would go about making a pamphlet new and appealing. Seeking a challenge and wanting my writing to be attractive and exciting to my ultimate reader, the pamphlet can just be such a boring read. As Thompson said in the article, “But the preference for familiarity has clear limits. People get tired of even their favorite songs and movies.” So where is the line drawn? I would say it is certainly more of a case to case, person to person basis, but think about it. If you’re reading a pamphlet or paper and it starts the exact same way as a hundred other papers you have read, are you really going to be encouraged to continue reading it? The paragraph about naming children helped me with some of my uncertainties. People gravitate towards things that are familiar, but not exactly the same. Maybe a slight but exciting variation is all I need to excite my reader.
It is my belief that the MAYA acronym certainly applies to public and professional writing. I actually don’t think there is a form or style of writing that it doesn’t apply to. In the article Thompson wrote, “This battle between familiarity and discovery affects us on every level, Hekkert says- not just our preferences for pictures and songs, but also our preferences for ideas and even people.” Peoples ideas, beliefs and preferences affect how they write. When dealing with public and professional writing, the writer just has to keep his/her audience in mind. People are going to want to read a style they are familiar with, but also do not want to be bored to death. I think the most important thing is finding the line between just enough variation and scaring your audience with something they have never seen before.
Thompson later goes on in his article to say that pop culture has become an “orgy of familiarity”. If movies are continuously coming out with similar plots and characters, what does that really mean for pop culture as a whole? I think it means, that if somethings not broke, don’t fix it. People aren’t going to wake up one morning and randomly decide that they actually HATE the whole “rags to riches” or “damsel in distress” movie plot. The same can be said about writing. I’m always more comfortable writing and reading styles I am familiar and have experience with.
4 thoughts on “A splash of originality.. just a splash”
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I like how you compared things from the article to your own experiences. Thompson’s description of how Loewy saw people preferring something familiar rather than necessarily completely new definitely correlates with me. Your example of being at a restaurant is also a problem I identify with! It is so hard to choose something brand new off the menu if I have already found something I love. I’m always afraid I’ll hate what I end up getting if I get something new off the menu and regret my choice.
The part where you said as Thompson said in the article, “But the preference for familiarity has clear limits,” I think you’re right to point out those limitations. If there has been the same pop song on the radio again and again I end up loathing it.
I think, in relation to what you were saying, that we need to have some familiarity, but without differences, pieces of media would become boring. Thompson’s example of the study where neither really new scientific ideas were popular nor the super familiar ones were rated well either is a perfect scenario to show this. If people don’t have an underlying background of what they’re about to study how are they supposed to even figure how to question what they don’t know anything about?
Your allusion to ordering food at a restaurant resonates well as an example of MAYA. Almost everyone I know – I hesitate to say all because we all know that one person who needs to try the ostrich meat- can relate to that experience.
What particularly resonated with me however were the struggles with writing as they relate to Loewy’s observations and our own work this semester. We will be presented the challenge of engaging an audience that is particularly familiar with political pamphlets and brochures. There are seemingly endless amounts of people willing to shove the next piece of paper into our peers’ faces, most of which end up littering the very earth many of their campaigns are trying to protect.
Just as you mentioned, we as writers must envision something familiar enough to engage initial interest but foreign enough to maintain momentum and encourage further reading. Right now, I don’t really have the experience to say what will work in this regard. Despite that fact, I think that the MAYA principle will be particularly helpful as we consider the direction of our campaigns, whether we incorporate the philosophy or not.
I like your analogue of food in relation to Thompson’s article. People are comfortable with the familiar and they don’t tend to stray far from that. With exception to a few dare devils out there, we tend to stick with what we know we like. This applies to many aspects of our life, whether that be food, reading or any pop culture experience. Christopher Booker believes there are only seven different story plots, Overcoming the Monster, Rags to Riches, The Quest, Voyage and Return, Comedy, Tragedy, Rebirth. He believes we use the same plot lines over and over, but to make them successful we have to put a new spin on it. Such as Twilight. Vampires that don’t suck blood. They made every teen aged girl wish they had a vampire boyfriend. However, as much as this recycling notion may be true about pop culture, I question how true it is for professional writing. Are we recycling the same pamphlets and flyers? Can we go as far to say that the same speeches or government documents are recycled versions from the past? That may be true, and maybe that is why we need to think of something fresh and new. Or our hard work may end up in a waste basket with the rest of the recycling.
Enjoyed reading! I too go to restaurants in that way. Someone I was talking with recently mentioned a dish in Iceland that is (I think I have this right) shark that is urinated on and then buried in the ground for a few weeks to allow it to rot. I am adventurous, but two aspects of this dish make it too “new” for me: urinating and burying in the ground. Not enough familiar to allow me to try. Now, you want to fry up some squid or alligator, I am game to try it because of my love of all things fried.
I really wanted more on the pamphlet experience and the sorts of writing we are talking about in class, so I’ll press further on the following:
“If you’re reading a pamphlet or paper and it starts the exact same way as a hundred other papers you have read, are you really going to be encouraged to continue reading it?”
What might be an example of this? What brochures or pamphlets do you throw away immediately or ignore when they are flat on a table you walk past? What about the ones that you hesitate before throwing away? Or the ones you keep to read? Or the ones that you turn through when lingering around a table of literature? What gets you to those places? Are there certain moves that may be familiar, but yet also exciting enough to motivate you ever so much?