Autobiographical Statement
Autobiographical Statement: Emmanuel Elpenord
I entered Brooklyn College in the Fall of 2006 not completely sure what I wanted to do with my life. The pressure of being an artistically inclined person in the Scholar’s Academy weighed heavy on me when it came time to choose a major—a career path, essentially. The last extracurricular activity I was involved in, in high school, was an acting club that produced original stage plays. My first endeavor with an actual stage production was with that club. It was a wonderful experience that left me wondering if there was more to my charismatic nature than a quipping sense of humor. Long before that, I was in the drama program of my junior high school, but didn’t have any career foresight at that point.
With all that in mind, I took the introductory acting courses Brooklyn College offered, and discovered, according to my peers and instructors, that I had a fair amount of potential in this field and should seriously consider continuing coursework with the Theater department. In the meantime, I explored my other artistic passion, creative writing, with the English department and later took Television and Radio courses, as screen acting was my main interest as an actor.
Three years later, in March 2009, I auditioned for the Baccalaureate of Fine Arts in Acting program at Brooklyn College and was among the twelve accepted into the three-year program. Currently, I’m a triple major pursuing a BA in Television and Radio, a BFA in Acting, and a BFA in Creative Writing.
Anyone aware of my research topic may or may not be asking themselves, “Why on Earth is he researching animal conservation in Tasmania?” It was certainly a question asked when I supposed the topic during group discussion. The answer, simply, would be: when I first entered high school, it was under the Pre-Veterinary Science Program. On my wall at home, I have hanging a gold bordered certificate for “Academic Excellence and Successful Completion” of the program. I studied to be a Veterinarian there for three years and with each passing year grew fonder and fonder of animals, from the cuddly to the creepy-crawly. The program gave form and structure to my innate love of animals. I ran the gamut of small pets during my childhood and early adolescence, from tons of fish, to a cat, a few generations of gerbils and hamsters, a turtle, snails, anoles (small camouflaging lizards), a garter snake, and hermit crabs. To this day, I still stop in my tracks if a pigeon, or a rock dove as I’ve learned to call them, catches my eye. Aside from eyeballing street animals, I’m a member of wildlife organizations like the WWF, ASPCA, NWF and the Nature Conservancy. Even though I’m no longer pursuing animal sciences as a career, wildlife conservation and animals in general is still and always will be one of my interests.
I first heard of the Devil Facial Tumor Disease crisis when searching for a research topic in my English 2 course. I’ve decided to revisit the situation three years later in this SCP 85 course, and ask of the reader and of myself to think more philosophically this time when considering the delicate situation in Tasmania. I’ll be considering, and challenging, the purpose of wildlife conservation, and more specifically animal conservation in response to pathological crisis as opposed to human imposition on natural habitats.
In reference to the ‘knowing your reader’ assessment at the end of Chapter 2 in the text, I will be writing this research paper under the assumption that the reader is of a general audience that knows little to nothing about animal conservation in Australia. As the writer, I plan to present my data, my evidence as entertainment in the same way television programming on Animal Planet might with factual, statistical information interspersed between interesting facts about the animal, and it’s taxonomical history. I also hope to “help the reader understand something better,” that something being animal conservation in Australia and conservation theory in general. Thirdly, and most poignantly, the problem I will be discussing is one I will discuss under the assumption that the reader does not take the problem seriously and “I must convince them that it matters.”
Comments»
That sounds like something I would like to do very much!
While we’re on the topic…some friends and I, joking around, suggested getting Macaulay to fund a trip to Tasmania over the winter intercession to film a documentary on DTFD.
If you’d like to put your acting skills to use in the service of this project–after you’ve done the research and writing, of course–we could easily develop and record a Public Service Announcement (either audio or video) about this. It would be a useful way to introduce people to your topic, and it would also make use of your major field.
No pressure, of course! Just know that if you decide you’re interested, we have the tools at Macaulay to make that happen.
Cheers,
Lindsey