Graffiti as a Voice for Teens - Term Paper Example

Graffiti as a Voice for Teens Within a school environment, the main point of concern or centre of attention is the students. This implies that academic and non-academic activities will be structured to their suitability, in terms of factors such as age and background. Students in high school are within their teen years and this marks beginning of adolescence. As a common factor among the majority population, adolescence should be the focus when structuring all activities. The administration must acknowledge that the students are at a point in their lives where peer pressure is at its peak. Peer pressure may be in either positive or negative ways; where the students that succumb to its negative side, will end up making bad choices that lead them to a slippery slope. The result of a slippery slope is the unfortunate development of bad habits such as smoking, alcohol and/or drug abuse and engaging in criminal activities. For this reason, every high school should create an open forum for the students where they are free and at ease to discuss challenges they face in their everyday lives. Teachers and counselors should then be at hand to talk them through overcoming the challenges and turning them into opportunities for growth and success into the future. In creating such an open forum, the school should consider the emotional, physical and mental status of the students and come up with creative and exciting activities in order to encourage their participation. Considering their emotional, physical and mental status includes recognizing that the students will be talented in different areas where non-performance in academics does not render them failures. Students may instead be skilled in non-academic activities such as painting, drawing, playing musical instruments or photography. Teachers should hence, reserve this in mind when interacting with the students in class. The administration should also consider this when structuring such open forums. Adolescent have thoughts and interpretations about various issues in their environment, and will want to express these through various means. Because of their youthfulness, their energy needs to be directed into positive ways of voicing their views and opinions to prevent them from being destructive. Besides that, there may be students that lack interest in political or environmental issues, which undoubtedly will affect them. The administrations should then use the ‘crowd mentality’ to arouse interest in such students using creative works from the students that have an interest. The crowd mentality is where people, mostly teens, find themselves ascribing to what the majority is doing regardless of the fact they may hold a different perspective. One such form of creative works is graffiti where those that do them have are exceptionally gifted in artwork. These works are illegal and regardless of the positive message they bear, they will be condemned and those found responsible are fined heavily. This is because graffiti are often made on public or private property without permission from the owners, making it vandalism. However, the government and private corporations or individuals angered by such works should make the effort to shift their mentality. They should view such works for their creativity and influential power that they possess. The amount of time and effort taken to produce graffiti should be considered for the end result is something with great detail or deep thought poured in; this has the effect of generating both an emotional and mental appeal which then moves people to act. For my paper, I have chosen graffiti aimed at creating awareness on cancer and its different types. My choice is one depicting lung cancer which if it appeared at our school; I believe it would more likely have a positive rather than a negative effect on the entire population. This is because lung cancer is brought about my smoking, which is a habit easily developed by many especially students who do not realize its addictive nature. The graffiti clearly depicts a lung and the various colors used could suggest the destructive affect that smoking has on the lungs. Very few words are used on it ‘Cancer or Clean’ and ‘Art or Vandalism’. These provoke audience to think about the graffiti concerning the message it holds and determine whether it counts as vandalism or art and whether maintaining a clean environment is more important than creating awareness on cancer and its various types. The organization responsible for this graffiti uses the tagline ‘Urban Consciousness: A Cancer Awareness Mock Campaign’. Its urban aspect stems from the fact that graffiti, as a form of art, is used rather than promotional materials such as wristbands and t-shirts. The powerful nature of art allows it have more influence on people than promotional materials as they provoke both emotion and thought regarding the message. This provoking power then moves people to talk about it and share their thoughts on cancer. Such an effect would be crucial in a school environment because a habit like smoking is easily ‘passed on’ among students as a result of peer pressure. Even the administration may be responsible for enabling the habit, as it is possible to adopt the habit from being a passive smoker. Firstly, graffiti should be accommodated by the society because it allows creative persons to freely express themselves. Instead of condemning it as violence, local authorities should appreciate emotional and mental appeal created by such works of art. Private corporations should embrace such works and use them for their promotional and advertising campaigns. This will encourage other individuals, especially teenagers, to explore their talents and use their free time to create such works. Consequently, they will be shifted away from negative behaviors including criminal activities, alcohol and drug abuse. The school should find a way of creating a platform that allows and encourages students skilled in artwork to share and inspire others with their talent. Where such a platform is created, the likelihood of graffiti being done on public property or private property without owner’s permission will be minimal or none existent even. This is since people, who tag buildings, as it is generally termed, do so to get attention. If they are accorded such attention through providing them with an open platform, they will have no need to tag public or private property. This will deter their rebellious attitudes. Secondly, messages attached to graffiti receive immense attention and people go on to form their perception. Such attention implies that people will be made aware of social problems, in this case cancer, where people may not have the ability to access information on the disease. Families with cancer patients suffer not only emotionally, but also financially because of the cost implications arising from cancer treatments and medicines. Moreover, some cancers are preventable if people are educated and where they are detected early, they may afford the patient the alternative to live a longer life. Early detection through regular check-ups is encouraged as this may prevent the cancer from spreading and thereby affording the patient a higher survival chance. People will seek out all this information and this will be as a result of the provoking effect of graffiti. The school can use that opportunity to educate students on the disease and share their personal experiences on the same where it may have affected them either directly or indirectly. Thirdly, graffiti viewed as a work of art implies that students that are skilled in artistic works will be inspired to explore their talent. Since graffiti receive great attention and still passes on a positive message, this will encourage students to share their work. This ensures that their energies are directed towards positive activities that not only develop their talent, but also gives them a sense of responsibility to the society in that they are motivated to find a message and attach it to their own works. This graffiti encompasses various aspects of art where paint and drawing are combined to produce a well-defined lung and with appropriate colors to pass on the message on cancer. Students within school may look at the art as challenging to produce; however, if they come together each with their different skills to combine them and produce something much greater. Therefore, the school administration can use this graffiti to cultivate a sense of team spirit and responsibility towards the society. The latter can be achieved by asking students to identify an issue that they relate to on a personal level and create a message that they can then attach on graffiti. This will make students develop an interest in current affairs and become aware of how certain issues affect them. Not to mention, they can be part of making positive impact in the society that in turn gives them a sense of pride. Overall, the graffiti should be embraced for the influential power that it has and the opportunity it allows teachers as it can be used as a teaching tool. This is because crucial life skills such as working with others and participating in driving positive change in society can be passed on to the students. They should be viewed positively because they pass on a message that creates awareness and contributes to driving change in society. At the same time, youth within society are encouraged to explore and develop their talents as they realize that they can access a large audience both directly and indirectly through word-of-mouth. Where art is used, it is important to acknowledge the thought process that it evokes. This is essential where sensitive issues need to be discussed but people shy away from them or where the issue is seen as ‘unchangeable’ because of its long existence. For example, corruption can be seen to be a norm and society will accept it but through graffiti messages people can be moved to demand for it to be addressed and persons responsible be held accountable. Therefore, graffiti should be valued as a form of art and creation of awareness. Read More