(Note to the Professor: this post is replacing this weeks “Ideas” post.)
The three artifacts I will be discussing are the same ones I selected and talked about for last week’s post on cultural artifacts (mine is the post titled “IDEAS: In the Air: Strawhats, Models, and Opponents (O.G. 10/16; updated 10/13”)).
Cultural Artifacts related to my topic I could write about for a future paper include:
(just for the record, my topic concerns differing conceptions of Luffy — lead protagonist of the manga One Piece and his ship’s captain — as a leader, either good or bad, and how these views are disposed by bloggers, forum commentator, and vloggers.)
- Gol D. Roger’s strawhat: As the hat which was originally the old King of the Pirate’s (Gol D. Roger) property, the story and Luffy himself are crucially tied to it. The idea that there is much freedom in the open, blue seas is heavily contrasted by the idea that fate is actually at the helm of the ship, and that ship’s captain just so happens to be the man who now hold’s the strawhat, Monkey D. Luffy. It has much symbolic value for the discussion of leadership and perhaps even symbols associated with it. Vloggers argue over its significance in the story, and some even have it in the background of their One Piece discussion videos.
- Full Crew Cosplay: The idea of forming a crew is almost non-existant without the presumption that will someone (or some few) will have to step up and command leadership positions for the crew. The crew itself is tied to the “followers” though. When groups of cosplayers come together and all manage to organize that everyone of them follows through with the idea that all 9 need to get together and be dressed as individual member of the current 9-member Straw Hat Pirate crew (Luffy’s crew), I think that is highly significant of power structures at play. Leadership its self is presumed on the idea that the group member together make a kind of “whole”, which its self in interesting in a metaphysical sense and alludes to leadership often times being “all in the mind”, just like the great “Kings” of before who were always right about whatever the claimed.
- “Luffy vs. Strongest Other Person” Match-Up Arguments: Significant in the respect that a new discourse, many consequently in argument form, has arisen concerning what powers one character has to overpower (or not overpower) the other (think back in early High School when some kids could always be heard arguing: “Who would win, Batman or Superman? The Joker or Doc Ock? etc.” Now this kind of discourse has consumed Luffy into it. In an episode when Luffy had to save his brother from execution by fighting the entire Navy-Marine fleet, it revealed by Dracule Mihawk (an observant in the battle at the moment) that Luffy’s greatest power is the power to round up everyone and get them on his side (mostly pirates, even pirates who fought against each other, although there are exceptions). This discourse/discussion could also offer plenty to uncover and extended about the nature of what really makes leaders powerful.
Such would be some of the “cultural artifacts” (although not all very “concrete” ones, so to speak) I would discuss related to my topic if I have to write a paper about them. Thank you!