World Scholar's Cup 2015 Study material: Main Topics

World Scholar's Cup 2015

This time WSC 's gonna be lots of fun due to the topics on the theme 'The World Unbound':

Consider to the other pages for detailed description and study material on all subjects but for the start here's the subjects given to us.. :

Art & Music

Peering Over the Edge

I. Post-Structuring the World

· Bonaventure Hotel

· Sydney Opera House

· Oslo Opera House

· Dancing House, Prague

· Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao

II. Artifacts and Artifictions

· Puppy | Jeff Koons

· The Human Condition (1935) | Rene Magritte

· The History of Chinese Painting and the History of Modern Western Art Washed in the Washing Machine for Two Minutes | Huang Yong Ping

· The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living | Damien Hirst

· Campbell's Soup Cans | Andy Warhol

· Artist's Studio-Look Mickey | Roy Lichtenstein

· Darth Vader | Tommervik

· A RUBBER BALL THROWN ON THE SEA | Lawrence Weiner

· Rubik Mona Lisa | Invader

· Prada Marfa

· Prometheus Bound | Peter Paul Rubens

· Guernica | Pablo Picasso

· Fidel Castro (1959 Photo) | Agan Harahap

· Michael Jordan | LeRoy Neiman

III. The Sound of the Unbound

· Fake Plastic Trees | Radiohead

· It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine) | REM

· Best Imitation of Myself | Ben Folds Five

· This Is Just a Modern Rock Song | Belle & Sebastian

· 4'33" | John Cage

· Giants in the Sky | Stephen Sondheim [from the musical Into the Woods]

· Sasha Zamler-Carhart: Music & Music Notation

IV. On a Heroic Note

· Heroes | David Bowie

· Gotham City | R. Kelly

· Superman | Five for Fighting

· Calling All Angels | Train

· Star Wars Main Theme | John Williams

· Symphony No. 3 [4th movement] | Ludwig van Beethoven

V. Discord and Harmony

· It’s a Small World After All | Disney Theme Parks

· L’Internationale

· Nothing to my Name | Cuī Jiàn

· Symphony No. 11 [4th movement] | Dmitri Shostakovich

· Light and Day | Polyphonic Spree

· Redemption Song | Bob Marley

· For the Good of the Game | FIFA

Special Area

Heroes and Superheroes

I. Questions to Discuss

· Are there different kinds of heroes?

· Do different societies have different views on what a hero is?

· Are heroic decisions rational decisions?

· What is the so-called “hero’s journey”? Does it apply in real life or just in fiction?

· Is there such a thing as a “villain’s journey”?

· Is heroism a personality disorder?

· What is an antihero?

· How is an antihero different from a villain?

· Are there villains in the real world—and, if so, do they know they are villains?

· Is a superhero just a hero with superpowers?

· If you were a superhero, would you keep your identity a secret?

· In real life, do villains ever think of themselves as villains? How about in fiction?

· How is a hero different from a leader? Or are they the same?

· Is society biased in favor of male heroes? How about superheroes?

· Are there enough stories about women who are heroes?

· Does it mean something different to be a heroic woman than a heroic man?

· Can the superheroes of today be compared to the gods of the ancient world?

· Are superheroes portrayed differently in different media?

· Are superheroes more popular than they used to be? If so, why?

· How different would our world be if we knew that superheroes existed?

· If we were to discover people with special abilities living among us, would we celebrate them—or fear them?

· Are superheroes ultimately an American creation reflecting or serving American interests?

II. Origin Stories: Calling All Heroes

· Prometheus Unbound: Heroes of Ancient Civilizations

· Medieval Heroes: Long Live the King (and the Rogue)

· The Golem, the Monkey King, and the Original Superheroes

III. One for All: Understanding the Hero

· The Heroic Mind: Insights from Psychology

· The Hero in Society: Insights from Anthropology and Sociology

· The Monomyth and the Hero’s Journey

IV. With Great Power: Superheroes of the 20th and 21st Centuries

· Emergence in Comic Books

· The Comics Code Authority

· The Social and Historical Context of Superheroes

· Ascendance of Film Franchises

· Role of Superheroes in a Postmodern World

V. Can We Be Superheroes? The Science of… (Examples)

· Enhanced Vision | Exoskeletons | Human Flight

· Invisibility | Rapid Healing | Strength and Super-strength

· Super speed | Telepathy | Telekinesis

· Teleportation | Time Travel

VI. Additional Terms to Learn (Examples)

· Achilles’ Heel | Archetype | Byronic Hero | Comicon

· Bystander effect | Epic | Everyman | Fatal Flaw

· Great Man Theory | Hero Worship | Hubris

· MCU | Paragon | Pulp | Risk-Seeking

· Sidekick | Trope | Villain | X-Altruist

VII. Additional Superheroes to Research (Examples)

· Astro City | Wild Cards | Squirrel Girl

· Batman | Iron Man | Ms. Marvel (2014)

· Captain America | Superman | Buffy the Vampire Slayer

· Goku | Captain China | Wonder Woman

· X-Men | Spiderman | Sylar

VIII. Selected Film: The Dark Knight

IX. Additional Questions & Cases to Discuss (Examples)

· Would Superman have been a Soviet hero if he had landed in Russia instead of Kansas as a baby? In other words, to what degree does the fate of a superhero depend on nature versus nurture?

· Should it be a goal of well-functioning societies to "destroy as many opportunities for heroism as possible"?"

· Why do some people sacrifice themselves to save others, while others stand back and hope for the best -- or run the other way? In other words, what is the psychology of heroism?

· Are Byronic heroes more popular than traditional heroes? Are they more desirable?

· Are there genetic and personality similarities between heroes and villains?

· Do Thomas Carlyle’s six types of heroism still apply today? Do they omit any kinds of heroism that have become prevalent in the 20th and 21st centuries?

· Can animals be heroes too?

· Should superheroes be more ethnically and culturally diverse?

· Did 9/11 jumpstart a new era of interest in superheroes? How long will it last?

· Are superheroes the Greek gods of today’s world?

· Why are there so few notable British (and non-American) superheroes?

Science

Liberating Technologies

I. Questions to Consider

· How is a technology different from a tool, if at all?

· Are all technologies liberating technologies?

· Are there examples of technologies that do more to oppress than to liberate us?

· Do technologies come attached to ideologies?

· Do users need to understand the technologies they use?

· What are the implications of the Internet for “liberation movements”?

· Are governments able to suppress liberating technologies?

· Do people ever willingly buy technologies that reduce their own freedom? Have you?

· Do women and girls face extra barriers in their access to technology?

· Would cheap renewable energy be the ultimate liberating technology?

· Have Wikipedia and other online sources freed us from the elite management of knowledge?

II. Denying the Limits of Nature

· Freedom from Death & Disease: Vaccination, Antibiotics, and Sanitation

· So What if You Were Born That Way?: Transforming the Mind and Body

· The Walking Alive: Prosthetics & New Techniques for Defeating Paralysis

· Seeing What Goes Bump: The Power of the Electric Light

· To Baby or Not to Baby: The Impact of Reproductive Technology

· Learning from Dracula: Immortality and the Science (?) of Transhumanism

· The Lazarus Effect: Pushing the Frontiers of Resuscitation

III. Defying the Limits of Society

· Read All About It: The Early Legacy of the Printing Press

· Machine Wash Only: Household Technologies and Women’s Liberation

· You Can Get There From Here: The Impact of the Train and Automobile

· The Tweet Heard Around the World: Social Media and Social Upheaval

· Learning.com: The Internet and the Open Education Movement

· The Pocket Veto: Mobile Technology and Democratic Development

IV. Additional Questions & Cases to Discuss (Examples)

· Should governments allow people to vote online? And would online voting be good or bad for democracy?

· Are technological advances the key to making microfinance sustainable?

· Can mobile platforms effectively help free people from basic human needs? Or are they overrated?

· Can technologies liberate us from exposure to disease? Or is something lost when humans are treated by non-humans?

· Is it fair to say that the electric light delivered "liberation from one of the primordial limits imposed by nature on the human will"—nighttime?

· Are transhumanists helping "the human race transcend its biological limits" or are they just transcending the limits of plausible science?

· Does “sousveillance” limit the power of the “surveillance” state?

· Should access to the Internet be equally available to all people?

· Can technology free us from stage fright? Or is this approach just avoiding the problem?

· Does social media really make the power of the people greater than the people in power?

· Are “citizen-driver” technologies freeing us from limits on our access to transportation? Will driverless cars?

· Do people have a right to the data generated by their own senses?

· Should we try to raise the dead?

History

Movements Toward Freedom

I. Questions to Discuss

· How do institutions condemned by so many endure for so long?

· Do civil rights movements require heroic leaders? Do revolutions?

· Is participatory democracy a grass-roots solution to civil rights abuses, or a prescription mob rule and the oppression of minorities?

· Are there lessons other pro-democracy movements around the world might learn from the relatively successful "People Power" revolution in the Philippines?

· Is non-violent resistance overrated as a strategy against oppression?

· American “founding father” Thomas Jefferson once wrote, “I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical.” Agree or disagree?

· Are certain cultures more likely to foment revolution?

· For each of the uprisings below, be sure to consider its causes, consequences, and legacies. Would you judge it to have been a success?

· For each of the original documents below, consider whether and how it has influenced other people and movements around the world. Would any of their authors have disagreed with one another?

· Has the Internet made it easier or harder for rebellions and civil rights movements to take shape?

II. Uprisings: Rebellions & Revolutions

· Long Before Astapor: The Haitian Revolution

· Triumph from Sort-Of-Below: The Russian Revolution of 1917 (and contrasts to 1905 and 1989)

· Uprisings and Downfalls: The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 and the Prague Spring of 1968

· Victory of the Mostly Non-Violent: The People Power Revolution & the Velvet Revolution

· Movements in the New Millennium: The Saffron Revolution, the Color Revolutions & the Arab Spring

III. Unshacklings: The Pursuit of Equality

· Slavery and Emancipation

· Women's Suffrage (and Equality) Around the World

· The U.S. Civil Rights Movement

· The End of Apartheid

· Civil Rights Movements of the 21st Century

IV. Original Documents (and Cases) to Discuss

· Book: The Communist Manfiesto | Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels (ch. 4)

· Essay: On the Duty of Civil Disobedience (excerpts) | Henry David Thoreau

· Essay: In Quest of Democracy| Aung San Suu Kyi (part II; p. 173 onwards

· Letter from a Birmingham Jail | Martin Luther King, Jr. (excerpts)

· Speech: By Any Means Necessary | Malcolm X

· Speech: A Tryst with Destiny | Jawaharlal Nehru

· I Am Prepared to Die | Nelson Mandela (excerpt)

· Time to Thrive | Ellen Page

· New Year's Address to the Nation, 1990 | Vaclav Havel

· Speech (Imaginary): V for Vendetta

· Nobel Lecture | Malala Yousafzai

V. Current Cases and Questions to Discuss

· Are revolutions more alike than they are different? Can they be predicted?

· Is slavery still an issue in today's world?

· Are rising food prices a driving force behind political uprisings? Or is this a matter of correlation, not causation?

· Does the United States need a new civil rights movement?

· Has television been the greatest force in promoting civil rights (including around the issue of marriage equality) or has it simply reflected already changing views in society?

· Was former U.S. Secretary State Hillary Clinton correct to call equality for women “the great unfinished business of the 21st century”?

· Was the recent Scottish vote on independence an example of a failed democratic revolution?

· Do revolutions and rebellions generally depend on outside intervention to succeed?

· Is it ever justified for one group of people in a society to have fewer rights than another group?

· Is it ever justified for one group of people in a society to have different rights than another group?

Literature

Voices of the Unbound

I. Questions to Consider (Examples)

· How does each selection relate to this year’s theme?

· Is poetry more meaningful when it is bound to form?

· Are stories more difficult to write today than they were a century ago?

· Is it appropriate to include real living people as characters in works of fiction?

· How different would stories be if characters were aware that they were characters?

· What is the best medium for stories about superheroes?

II. Poems

· All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving Grace | Richard Brautigan

· The Red Wheelbarrow | William Carlos Williams

· This is Just to Say | William Carlos Williams

· One Art | Elizabeth Bishop

· Midway | Naomi Long Madgett

· Since feeling is first | E. E. Cummings

· Ulysses | Alfred Lord Tennyson

· In Search of Evanescence | Agha Shahid Ali

· Ghazal: In Real Time | Agha Shahid Ali

· Esse | Czeslaw Milosz

· Kid | Simon Armitage

· The Flash Reverses Time | A Van Jordan

· Einstein Doing the Math and Einstein Ruminates on Relativity | A Van Jordan

III. Short Stories

· The Seven Messengers | Dino Buzzati

· Two Words | Isabel Allende

· Third Class Superhero | Charles Yu

· 26 April 1905 and 11 June 1905 from Einstein’s Dreams | Alan Lightman

· Quantum Nonlocality and the Death of Elvis Presley | B.J. Novak

IV. Longer Works

· “In Dreams” and “Dinner at Eight” from Astro City: Life in the Big City | Kurt Busiek

· The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay | Michael Chabon (For Regional Rounds, The Escape Artist and this excerpt only)

Social Studies

Worlds Held Together, Worlds Torn Apart

I. Questions to Discuss

· What holds a culture together, and what might cause a culture to fall apart?

· What culture, or cultures, do you belong to?

· Is your culture the same as your country?

· Where did you develop your culture?

· Are any cultures incompatible with one another?

· Is it ever acceptable to say one culture is better than another?

· What might drive a person to abandon his or her culture?

· Does it mean more to you to see an original artwork than a perfect duplicate?

· What makes a place authentic? How about a cuisine?

· Suppose the original you had died and you were a perfect duplicate who had been created as a replacement—would you want to be told you weren’t the original you?

· Can you think of a symbol or hand gesture that means something to you but would mean something different to your parents—or to people in another part of the world?

II. The Ties that Bind

· Sources of Cultural Identity

o Frameworks to Evaluate: The Five Dimensions of Culture | Mechanical vs. Organic Solidarity | Sociobiology vs. Cultural Selection | Functionalism

o Examples to Consider: Festivals | Sporting Events | Political and Other Crises

· Socializing Agents in the 21st Century

· Semiotics: The Study of Meaning-Making

o Signs and Signifiers

o Icons, Indexes, and Symbols

o Sample Exhibits: Gendered Bathroom Signs | Hipster Beards| Car and Clothing Colors | Software Design

· Obstacles to Intercultural Communication and Collaboration

o Trompenaars' model of national culture differences

o Chronemics and cultural perceptions of time

· The Reemergence of Anarchism

III. Break-Ups and Breakdowns

· Balkanization and the Disintegration of Nations:

o Exhibit: The Breakup of Yugoslavia vs. the Partition of India

o Selection: Vaclav Havel, 1995 Harvard Commencement Speech

· Introduction to Postmodernity and Post-Structuralism:

o Simulations, Simulacra, and Hyper-Reality

o Selection: Jean Baudrillard, excerpt from America

o Selection: Umberto Eco, “The City of Robots” from Travels in Hyperreality

o Sample Exhibits: The Sims | Las Vegas | Amusement Parks

IV. Additional People to Investigate (Examples)

· Michel Foucault | Martin Heidegger | Judith Butler

· Charles Sanders Peirce | James Scott | Fons Trompenaars

· Emile Durkheim | Geert Hofstede | Robert Merton | Chie Nakane

V. Current Cases and Questions to Discuss

· Is the Internet a force against Balkanization, or something that encourages it?

· Do the so-called “weapons of the weak” inevitably include terrorism?

· Is the “World Wide Web” the world’s best example of functioning anarchy?

· Do examples such as “jaywalking, the anti-SAT movement or assembly-line slowdown[s]” show that anarchy has a place in modern society?

· How important is a common language to a shared cultural identity? Should countries and/or cultures protect their languages?

· Consider Vaclav Havel’s argument in the speech selected above. Is he setting forth an effective strategy, or simply coming across as naïve?

· Suppose a beautiful natural landscape - such as Yosemite in the United States - were to be destroyed in a freak accident - say, by a satellite falling out of space and blowing it up. Would it be right to reconstruct that landscape for future generations to enjoy? Would your answer be different if it had been destroyed by a natural event (such an earthquake)?

· Should governments try to preserve their country’s cultures? If so, how?

· What does the growing popularity of post-apocalyptic fiction (such as stories of the zombie apocalypse) suggest about today’s world? Is it related to the popularity of superheroes?