I find it kind of ironic how people talk about how bad the teacher is for imposing her thoughts (games aren't an art) on others, but think it's perfectly fine for the OP to impose his (games are an art) upon the teacher.
You can bring up the whole 'games are officially recognized as an art' and 'these games are art' yada yada, but you are talking to a person who probably has no experience with video games and only thinks of them as entertainment for children. Hell, even on this forum where pretty much everyone plays a lot of games you will find people disagreeing on whether games (and Pokemon specifically) are an art.
Besides, you should have discussed this before turning it in. Whining about it now will only make you look bad and it's quite possible for the teacher to hold a grudge if you do.
Videogames are a combination of artforms in an interactive package, you are justified.
Also, 50+% of English teachers are arseholes.
Protips:
English teachers are probably the biggest douchebags in your school.
Geography & Science teachers are the coolest.
Maths teachers will teach you more than any teacher without you realising (Sneaky buggers).
Correct me if I'm mistaken, but wasn't something passed a little while ago that officially labelled Videogames as art? Also, as many fellow escapists have mentioned, art is subjective, so I don't have any idea on what grounds she can say that. If it's art to you, then who is she to say otherwise?
...because art is all about perception: if you perceive something as art, it is art. You may not think of it as art, but someone else might, and that makes it art.
Soccer is not art. It's not something creative, that can create something that makes you think. It's a sport.
Did you notice how hypocritical you were just then? You require more thought to play soccer than to play Pokemon lol, also it is known as the Beautiful game for a reason.
Soccer and Pokemon Red are in essence, first and foremost, games.
They were made for the sole purpose of being a game, an engaging method of entertainment.
Now, sure, you could whole heartedly believe that it is art, im not going to take that away from you.
Everyone has their opinion, but we can't forget that before your opinion there was an indisputable fact.
The OT thought he was being smart, he got a taste of reality and he should just deal with it, learn from it and get on with his life.
You would be wasting energy on a pointless cause. As the curriculum would NOT recognize games as art (or most teachers). You would be better off trying to be able to do it on a more 'acceptable' medium. And in the meantime lobby the leading education standards branch to allow/accept that games are art and can/should be referred to in class as a point of standard.
I personally don't see games as works of art (generally) because they are mostly tools for getting cash out of people. However, yes, they are classified as art. That said, it is much too early to pull this kind of s*** in an academic system, because the system is not as open-minded as the art community. You had to have known your teacher wouldn't accept it, it's just how teachers are. I bet in 20 years when textured surfaces that are meant to be felt are being considered as art, they won't accept that either.
Well video games get funding from the government as artwork and it sounds like public education which is funded by the government... I think you could make a strong case.
Yeah, had this been a different game, you could have had a case, I think. But you totally chose the wrong game.
Video games are recognized as a protected artistic medium, meaning that they have the potential to create works of art and that some examples of art within the medium do exist. The list of well-known examples in the video game world has been mentioned time and again in this thread, so I won't rehash it.
Your assignment was to explain how an artwork has influenced your life. I think you kind of missed the point of what your teacher was asking for, regardless of the artwork chosen, anyway. Art is supposed to communicate an idea to you, something about life, the world and/or the human condition that is meant to impact you in some way. A good number of games do this, yes, I am not trying to argue that. Those are the "good art", things made with an artistic message in mind. I think the point of your assignment was to choose a piece of "good art" and convey how the message presented in that art had an impact on you. Not "I like playing video games, so I got into technology." The fact that games are art, not to mention any message you might have gotten from a game, likely had a very tenuous bearing on your argument to begin with, if any at all. That you admit it's really only a semantic argument kinda seems to confirm this.
But there isn't much one could say to convince me that Pokemon Red had any sort of artistic message in mind when it was created. Now, from what I understand, the new villain team in Black and White brought some animal rights/environmental issues into it that could leave one to pause for thought, but in Red, it's pretty much "kid catches cool animals and makes them fight each other, stopping evil villains and becoming a pro." Not really any subtext there to find. In that sense, it's really "bad art" like any other similar games. Sorry.
And yeah, I read that Gary's Raticate thing back on page 6. Fine example of this, really...
In other words, looking for meaning in it that likely is not there, interpreting something out of the intended context. You don't see your rival's tears, he continues to act like a total douche, and there really is no hard evidence in the game that that's what happened. Or really, it's not even interpretation. It's projecting, and what I would see as a slapped together justification that fails when you look at the rest of that game and the other games in the series. Heck, it's not even an artistic message, just a character subplot. But anyway, enough ranting on that. Long story short, all I can really say is that you would have had a better chance at making a decent argument had you picked a better example of art in video games than Pokemon.
This is really something you should've brought up with her before you even started writing it. That's entirely your error.
The topic of whether or not video games are art or not has cropped up on this very site, with notable people saying "no" or "not yet". Leaving that unresolved ambiguity with such a large portion of your grade at stake is irresponsible. You should be glad you got an 85%.
You could have taken two minutes the day the assignment was given after class to clear this whole thing up before it started. You didn't. Your fault.
And that's a discussion that could, and should have been held before any sort of writing occurred. OP was being egoistic and myopic in assuming video games are generally accepted as an art form. That he waited only until after he got his graded paper back to have this discussion is entirely his fault. As I said before, this could have been a two minute discussion after class the day the assignment was given.
Being pissed at his English teacher is certainly easier than being disappointed in himself though.
Did you notice how hypocritical you were just then? You require more thought to play soccer than to play Pokemon lol, also it is known as the Beautiful game for a reason.
Well, first off, this highly depends on the case at hand. Soccer can probably take more thought than Pokémon, but Pokémon can easily take more thought than soccer as well.
Soccer and Pokemon Red are in essence, first and foremost, games.
They were made for the sole purpose of being a game, an engaging method of entertainment.
Your point being? Art can be entertaining and still remain art. Are books not art? Are films not art? Of course they are, but they're also entertainment.
Everyone has their opinion, but we can't forget that before your opinion there was an indisputable fact.
I'm biased, given that I'm doing a major which focuses on videogames and internet culture, and I say that annoyance perhaps is justified, anger not so much. Perhaps you should pity her that she has lacked that part of experience. Better yet, try to educate her.
Some good games for this are stuff like ImmorTall (http://armorgames.com/play/5355/immortall), Today I Die, etc. They're 'artsy' games. Ico and Shadow of the Colossus perhaps as well. If she refuses to play them simply point out that denying video games is a little like denying children's cartoons as texts.
Your solution: ask her if you can write a short paper explaining why games are art to you, and if she thinks that paper is well-written and puts forth your arguments clearly, she can bump up your grade on the original one.
Think of it like extra credit. It shows your enthusiasm for writing and willingness to work hard for your grade, which English teachers love. She should go for it. If she says no, then you have a bad teacher.
are you saying that if I decide to copy the mona lisa then that invalidates the work of da Vinci? I mean we are talking about the FIRST gen of the game. Sure you could justifiably argue that for black and white or pearl or Soul Silver.... the list goes on. But Pokemon Gen 1 was the first of the franchise. (hence Gen 1) it was one of the first game boy games to require saving.... and it actually could only hold the one save file. They literally packed as much into that cartridge as modern day tech would allow (modern day being the 1990's). And as far as being unique goes? Can you name another game that had 150 different creatures to capture each with a unique set of abilities, multiple cities a plethora of items and the ability to trade and compete with friends that came before 1996? Because I can't... Though many have copied the concept in games since I can't think of one that came before.
I think Shin Megami Tensei did that first but still I think you missed my point. It had fairly unique gameplay that's true but when you're calling something art you don't look at its entertainment value, you look at its aesthetic and how thought-provoking it is. It's good entertainment but not art to me.
The prompt for my essay was "Describe how an artwork has influenced your life." So I wrote my paper about how Pokemon Red got me into video games, and how that has influenced my interest in technology. This was last month. I finally get the paper back, having scored an 85%, which ordinarily I'd be okay with but, on the grade sheet, she wrote "The paper was excellently written but video games are not works of art." She said I had not 'followed the directions properly'. I tried making my case but she would not relent. I'm thinking of going to my counselor, since it makes up like half my quarter grade and I'm kind of pissed about being docked points because she disagrees with me on what is, at best, a semantic argument. Should I?
7) Get possibly suspended for threatening a teacher (if you even phrase your "threat" slightly wrong you could get in trouble).
8) Write next assignment and get marked without any leniency most teachers usually mark with and end up with 70%.
9) ***** and complain and watch as nothing gets down because the teacher will cover her ass with rubrics.
10) Right exam and get a 70% losing out on an easy 85% in a class because you thought that starting a feud with a teacher was a good idea.
Let me tell you a story. I went to a Catholic secondary school and in my final year I had a very no bullshit kind of teacher. There was a major assignment (about a quarter of our grade) and he said that for every day it is late you would lose 5-10% (can't remember). A kid who thought he was being clever said you can't do that and you have to accept work submissions even if they are late (up until the day of the exam) and they have to be marked without penalty (there was some weird clause that didn't allow a penalty to be applied). My teacher told the kid he was right, and he would take it up until the time it said in the clause but handing it in late would cause you to lose all of the teacher's goodwill and you would be wishing for that penalty.
7) wrong. There is absolutely nothing wrong with telling a teacher to give you the grade you deserve or you will report her unfair grading practices to the principle. I did it all the time. I even had to go to the principle once. And you know what, I got the grade I deserved every time. I never got in trouble, the teacher did. so just wrong.
8) Again wrong. I've gotten away with it all the time, and I never got a bad grade later because of it either.
9) She can't. It's considered art by the only universal authority on such things(admittedly not that important, but more than enough to win this argument) in this country, she can't cover her ass. So wrong again.
10) Again, did it all the time and got away with it. You shouldn't start a feud over nothing, but when she gives a bs grade for no reason, you need to ask her to give you the grade she deserves, and if she doesn't you need to go over her head to get the grade you deserve.
It's called an empty threat dude, maybe you should stand up for yourself once in a while.
People like you, people who don't stand up for themselves, get walked on for their entire lives, hope you enjoy it.
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