As I write this, the Steam Summer Sale is in its 4th day. On Saturday, I snagged the latest expansion pack to Civilization V, Brave New World. OCD poster child that I am, it chewed up my weekend as I beat two playthroughs as the Shoshone and Poland. I'm part Polish, so I just really wanted to be Poland, okay? Na zdrowie!
I'm not posting this to talk about video games however, but because this particular game is such a fine illustration of a concept close to my heart called tangential learning. I've had people ask me, here and at other locations, what the hell is wrong with me. Slightly less frequently I'm asked where I come across all of the obscure and seemingly unrelated information I've accumulated. From mythology to world religions to counterculture scenes to languages to history... Well, a lot of it is tangential learning. It's the concept that says in the process of consuming media or through social interaction you are turned on to something that you previously didn't know was interesting.
The most obvious examples are typically in movies that are about historical events and turn out to be popular. 300 is the most commonly sited example of this. Okay, yeah, I'm as exasperated as any purist about the dubious historical authenticity of having Persian ninjas and derogatory references to homosexuality at the battle of Thermopylae, and no, I don't think I could have crammed anymore ten-dollar words into the first half of this sentence. But think of how many people saw the movie and decided to look up the actual history of the battle on Wikipedia. Cold Mountain was an Oscar-bait flick that may have encouraged a few people to learn more about the American Civil War.
More recently, how many of you saw the film Hugo? A fictionalized account of the rediscovery of professional illusionist turned film auteur Georges Melies, the man who single-handedly invented special effects. I would think as magicians that would appeal to some of you. Of those who saw it, how many of you then sought out the handful of Melies's movies that have survived? How many of you have already seen at least one of them? Mind, if I don't see any of you raising your hand to at least one of those questions, I'm going to be deeply disappointed in you. All of you. And yes, I can see you through your monitor.
In my case, Civilization V has been one of the biggest cases of tangential learning. The game has a guide called the Civilopedia that includes information about all of the civilizations presented in the game, their iconic leaders, the various military units they can build, the various buildings and structures, world wonders, natural wonders, technologies, great people from throughout history... I've learned a lot from this game that I didn't even know I thought was fascinating. I now have a knowledge of the broad strokes of the history of many historic and modern nations and empires. I've had a chance to hear a lot of obscure languages spoke aloud (though not always by native speakers sadly). And I've had my horizons expanded in looking at the aesthetics of other cultures.
I didn't know I liked ancient Thai aesthetics until I met Rhamkhamhaeng of Siam. I had no idea I would be interested in learning about the history of Korea until I got a chance to play as King Sejong of the Choson dynasty and learn about his life and career. And after meeting and learning about King Kamehameha of Hawaii and learning about some of the history of the South Pacific, I'm actually doing research on the cultures therein in hopes of writing a new fantasy novel drawing inspiration from them. As an aside, if you've ever heard Hawaiian spoken aloud, I hope you'll agree with me that it is such a friendly-sounding language.
I bring this all up for two reasons. We live in an era of information where the world is quite literally at our fingertips. But asking someone to just research something is like putting them in the Iron Chef's kitchen and telling them to make something. If you start out with uncountable possibilities, you're going to waste a lot of time paralyzed by indecision. The worst feeling in the world for anyone in the arts is staring at a blank piece of paper. So let's start with that problem. Specifically, when faced with the possibility of doing anything, we waste a lot of time trying to narrow it down to something.
Tangential learning is not a conventional solution in this sense. Rather, it simply changes the dynamic. There are examples of media that were designed with tangential learning in mind (see above), but not as many as I would like. More often, tangential learning is a happy accident. For example, did you know that Sephiroth in Final Fantasy 7 is actually named from a concept in Judaism? Look it up. Or perhaps that in several of Jonathon Demme's movies, he casts his mentor Roger Corman in bit parts, and that Mister Corman actually has had an astronomical effect on the film industry because of the sheer number of visionaries who got their first jobs through him? The result is that simply through consuming media as you would normally, you go off on a related thread because one thing about it interested you and you begin to learn more about a wider, interconnected world.
I have actually heard the argument that in the modern world, developing a greater capacity for tangential learning is going to be extremely important to success as it allows you to understand the relation between various areas of study and allows for more expansive critical thought. It's like Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. Only not.
As creative individuals ourselves, tangential learning is probably one of the most effective ways of broadening our horizons and making more unique, personalized presentations for our craft. As a writer myself, I tend to write from the history books. The more I learn, the more I find the desire to work what I've learned into metaphor, allegory, analog and even simple escapist pleasure just because I find it interesting and think someone else might like it as well if it were presented to them in a novel way. I've created my own virtual band based mostly on my knowledge of rock history and Western superstition and the occult for example. Inspiration is a pretty fickle thing, so getting a good grasp on tangential learning helps to overcome creative blocks by perpetually exposing you to new, interesting information that can be mined for new performing material.
There is another use here. Tangential learning works both ways. Suppose you have something you find interesting and are very knowledgeable about. It can sometimes be hard to talk about it as after a while all of your friends have heard it. And monetizing it can be difficult as career options are limited in the field of "gets paid to talk a lot and/or give your their opinions. A lot of you may not able to go through the years of academia to become a teacher or professor, nor do you desire to become a TV pundit because you have a soul. But as a magician, your whole job is to perform and interact with an audience. This is your chance right here.
You'd be surprised just how much opportunity there is to work your hobbies and fascinations into a magic act. Let's say you really like soccer (using that particular word here so everyone knows what I'm talking about and don't mix up which football is being referred to). Did it occur to you that a chop cup presents the perfect visual metaphor to describe the game or some of the most famous matches? I mentioned Georges Melies earlier. Do I really need to explain how a film buff could work that into magic? Or perhaps you're really into history. With careful planning and a sense of theatricality, even banal playing cards could be used to illustrate the major events of the War of the Roses. Through tangential learning you have a way of performing for people while also sharing some of your passions with them and maybe teaching them something in the process.
So now you know a little more about tangential learning. Hopefully this gives you some incentive to stretch your horizons and also add a unique, personal touch to your presentations that is uniquely yours. If you're still skeptical about how all knowledge is interconnected in some way, let's try a little game. Using Wikipedia, try to connect these two topics with as few links as possible: the Battle of Marathon and Elvis Presley. Have fun with that.
TL;DR - lerninz not haf 2 b hard u guyz!
I'm not posting this to talk about video games however, but because this particular game is such a fine illustration of a concept close to my heart called tangential learning. I've had people ask me, here and at other locations, what the hell is wrong with me. Slightly less frequently I'm asked where I come across all of the obscure and seemingly unrelated information I've accumulated. From mythology to world religions to counterculture scenes to languages to history... Well, a lot of it is tangential learning. It's the concept that says in the process of consuming media or through social interaction you are turned on to something that you previously didn't know was interesting.
The most obvious examples are typically in movies that are about historical events and turn out to be popular. 300 is the most commonly sited example of this. Okay, yeah, I'm as exasperated as any purist about the dubious historical authenticity of having Persian ninjas and derogatory references to homosexuality at the battle of Thermopylae, and no, I don't think I could have crammed anymore ten-dollar words into the first half of this sentence. But think of how many people saw the movie and decided to look up the actual history of the battle on Wikipedia. Cold Mountain was an Oscar-bait flick that may have encouraged a few people to learn more about the American Civil War.
More recently, how many of you saw the film Hugo? A fictionalized account of the rediscovery of professional illusionist turned film auteur Georges Melies, the man who single-handedly invented special effects. I would think as magicians that would appeal to some of you. Of those who saw it, how many of you then sought out the handful of Melies's movies that have survived? How many of you have already seen at least one of them? Mind, if I don't see any of you raising your hand to at least one of those questions, I'm going to be deeply disappointed in you. All of you. And yes, I can see you through your monitor.
In my case, Civilization V has been one of the biggest cases of tangential learning. The game has a guide called the Civilopedia that includes information about all of the civilizations presented in the game, their iconic leaders, the various military units they can build, the various buildings and structures, world wonders, natural wonders, technologies, great people from throughout history... I've learned a lot from this game that I didn't even know I thought was fascinating. I now have a knowledge of the broad strokes of the history of many historic and modern nations and empires. I've had a chance to hear a lot of obscure languages spoke aloud (though not always by native speakers sadly). And I've had my horizons expanded in looking at the aesthetics of other cultures.
I didn't know I liked ancient Thai aesthetics until I met Rhamkhamhaeng of Siam. I had no idea I would be interested in learning about the history of Korea until I got a chance to play as King Sejong of the Choson dynasty and learn about his life and career. And after meeting and learning about King Kamehameha of Hawaii and learning about some of the history of the South Pacific, I'm actually doing research on the cultures therein in hopes of writing a new fantasy novel drawing inspiration from them. As an aside, if you've ever heard Hawaiian spoken aloud, I hope you'll agree with me that it is such a friendly-sounding language.
I bring this all up for two reasons. We live in an era of information where the world is quite literally at our fingertips. But asking someone to just research something is like putting them in the Iron Chef's kitchen and telling them to make something. If you start out with uncountable possibilities, you're going to waste a lot of time paralyzed by indecision. The worst feeling in the world for anyone in the arts is staring at a blank piece of paper. So let's start with that problem. Specifically, when faced with the possibility of doing anything, we waste a lot of time trying to narrow it down to something.
Tangential learning is not a conventional solution in this sense. Rather, it simply changes the dynamic. There are examples of media that were designed with tangential learning in mind (see above), but not as many as I would like. More often, tangential learning is a happy accident. For example, did you know that Sephiroth in Final Fantasy 7 is actually named from a concept in Judaism? Look it up. Or perhaps that in several of Jonathon Demme's movies, he casts his mentor Roger Corman in bit parts, and that Mister Corman actually has had an astronomical effect on the film industry because of the sheer number of visionaries who got their first jobs through him? The result is that simply through consuming media as you would normally, you go off on a related thread because one thing about it interested you and you begin to learn more about a wider, interconnected world.
I have actually heard the argument that in the modern world, developing a greater capacity for tangential learning is going to be extremely important to success as it allows you to understand the relation between various areas of study and allows for more expansive critical thought. It's like Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. Only not.
As creative individuals ourselves, tangential learning is probably one of the most effective ways of broadening our horizons and making more unique, personalized presentations for our craft. As a writer myself, I tend to write from the history books. The more I learn, the more I find the desire to work what I've learned into metaphor, allegory, analog and even simple escapist pleasure just because I find it interesting and think someone else might like it as well if it were presented to them in a novel way. I've created my own virtual band based mostly on my knowledge of rock history and Western superstition and the occult for example. Inspiration is a pretty fickle thing, so getting a good grasp on tangential learning helps to overcome creative blocks by perpetually exposing you to new, interesting information that can be mined for new performing material.
There is another use here. Tangential learning works both ways. Suppose you have something you find interesting and are very knowledgeable about. It can sometimes be hard to talk about it as after a while all of your friends have heard it. And monetizing it can be difficult as career options are limited in the field of "gets paid to talk a lot and/or give your their opinions. A lot of you may not able to go through the years of academia to become a teacher or professor, nor do you desire to become a TV pundit because you have a soul. But as a magician, your whole job is to perform and interact with an audience. This is your chance right here.
You'd be surprised just how much opportunity there is to work your hobbies and fascinations into a magic act. Let's say you really like soccer (using that particular word here so everyone knows what I'm talking about and don't mix up which football is being referred to). Did it occur to you that a chop cup presents the perfect visual metaphor to describe the game or some of the most famous matches? I mentioned Georges Melies earlier. Do I really need to explain how a film buff could work that into magic? Or perhaps you're really into history. With careful planning and a sense of theatricality, even banal playing cards could be used to illustrate the major events of the War of the Roses. Through tangential learning you have a way of performing for people while also sharing some of your passions with them and maybe teaching them something in the process.
So now you know a little more about tangential learning. Hopefully this gives you some incentive to stretch your horizons and also add a unique, personal touch to your presentations that is uniquely yours. If you're still skeptical about how all knowledge is interconnected in some way, let's try a little game. Using Wikipedia, try to connect these two topics with as few links as possible: the Battle of Marathon and Elvis Presley. Have fun with that.
TL;DR - lerninz not haf 2 b hard u guyz!