Reflective Summary

On the Colourful Quilt (2019)

The Colourful Quilt is a photo story to depict one of the ordinary challenges in the everyday life of an aged person. The photo story is narrated through a series of photographs. It explores the themes of endeavour, helplessness, assistance, compassion, and success. Abai, the main character, suffers a moderate level of visual impairment and she cannot thread a needle to sew a quilt. Her efforts fail repeatedly until her granddaughter helps her by crossing the yarn through the needle's eye and let the grandmother get the job done successfully.

To narrate this, a variety of technical skills of screen media production are applied in a strategic creative approach and with reference to terms and theories of screen media. In particular, the techniques such as camera angle, staging the action properly within the frame, creating a meaningful composition by making a relation between elements, creating a contrast to highlighting specific objects and emphasise its importance, and proper using of foreground and background are used in this photo story. 

The photo story starts with some high angle shots, which creates the impression that the subject of the camera is not big or powerful. The first image invites curiosity because it shows an aged lady's hand positioned at the edge of a drawer and she tends to open the drawer. The next three shots create a sequence, consisting of the movements of the hand that has just opened the drawer and took out the colourful fabrics. This sequence gradually advances further to initiate the action that the story revolves around it. Furthermore, the fourth shot is from the point of view (POV) of the character. In this photo, the character looks down from her own point of view, which signifies that she possesses a good mastery of her sewing tool.

Close-up shots are taken to show when the character is opening the small ball clasp handbag and searching inside for hand stitching materials. The focus on the sewing equipment such as scissors, thread spools, and needle on the pincushion is deliberate to emphasise on content details and build anticipation and tell the audience about what is happening. Likewise, in photo number 20, the extreme close-up highlights the four yarns that have gone through the needle hole. It is zoomed in to emphasise the importance of the action.

Each photo is the building block of the narration in this photo story. A sequence of continuing images illustrates a particular concept or action. The three failed attempts to thread the needle are demonstrated in the pictures 15 to 17. Particularly, in image number 17, while the foreground shows a clear image of the needle with yarn at the hands of the aged person, due to lack of success a state of discontent has reflected in the facial expression of the character at the background. As a narrative structure, in this photo story, the frequent failure leads to the climax of the narrative. However, this climax is followed by falling action, which is the assistance of the second character who gives a hand to thread the needle and leads to resolution.

To direct the climax of the story towards a happy ending and develop the narrative with the further compelling denouement, the smiling character has shown as the background of the newly made quilt. With its eye-level shot and the composition that created the appearance of depth with high contrast between the elements, the last photograph concludes the story effectively.  

A Summary of the Essay

The essay ‘China’s rise: Offensive or defensive realism’ by Ghazala Yasmin Jalil describes China’s foreign policy and argues against John Mearsheimer’s theory, which posits that China’s emerging great power is a revisionist force and a threat to the United States. The essay explains Mearsheimer’s theory of offensive realism, assesses his theory in accordance with China’s growing power, and argues that unlike Mearsheimer’s claim China’s political power is underpinned by defensive realism rather than offensive.

Examining Mearsheimer’s theory, the essay explains that states have a strong desire to maximize their power and the international system leads every country, with great power, to be the greatest one. The essay mentions that the theory is inspired by Waltz's idea of defensive realism. According to Waltz, it is not the human lust for power which pushes states to maximise their competence but the anarchic features of the international system. The essay outlines the basics of Mearsheimer’s theory and explains its auxiliary theory that great powers are confined to the sea boundaries and, therefore, while threats are possible, a worldwide hegemony is impossible.

The essay outlines positive changes in China’s policy since the 1970s. Jalil believes that China does not support the insurgency, China improves relations with neighbouring countries and the international community. China commits multilateral agreements, collaborates in international trade, develops regional infrastructure, and facilitates North Korea's dilemma. The essay interprets China's policy on Taiwan, its military modernisation and its increasing presence in the South China Sea under defensive realism. The essay objects Mearsheimer’s idea, which on the one hand, denies global hegemony, and on the other hand, claims that US concern about China's policy on Taiwan will lead to clashes between these two powers. The essay concludes that, far from being an aggressive revisionist power, China is just a status quo power and more than a threat to the US, it is an opportunity.

The essay provides a brief explanation of Mearsheimer’s theory and argues against it by providing China’s current and previous political behaviours since the 1970s. The essay develops the idea that China does not show a revisionist tendency and its growing power is not a threat to the US. The whole essay is written against the theory of John Mearsheimer. ‌ Jalil proposes that Mearsheimer’s theory is based on “assumptions”, which begs the question that to what extent the foundations of Mearsheimer’s theory is based on assumptions and to what extent they are based on facts. The essay does not provide any argument to prove that the fundamentals of Mearsheimer’s theory are really assumptions. This has reduced the level of reasoning of the paper. If there are some facts in the basics of Mearsheimer’s theory, then what does it mean with the quality of the paper to be unbiased. Furthermore, other factors need to be considered in US-China confrontation. The issue of Human Rights in China, even as a leverage to intervene, have a role in this context, which has remained largely ignored in this essay.

Reference:

Jalil, G. Y. (2019). China’s rise: Offensive or defensive realism. Strategic Studies, 39(1), 41-58. Retrieved from https://search-proquest com.ezproxy.uws.edu.au/docview/2217797444?accountid=36155

The Arguments and the Key Points

In the essays:

Anwar, Dewi Fortuna. (2018). Indonesia’s vision of regional order in East Asia and U.S - China rivalry: continuity and change. Asia Policy, 13(2), 57- 63.

This essay highlights the positive outlook and diplomatic efforts of Indonesia to bring order to the region of Southeast Asia. The essay notes that following the independent until 1966, Indonesia had a sense of threat from Western neo-colonialism, confrontation with Malaysia, and good relationship with China. However, between 1967 and 1990, as one of the founders of ASEAN, Indonesia had stopped relations with China. Anwar, the author, posits that since then Indonesia has had a leading role in bringing order to the region through emphasising on the centrality of ASEAN and rejecting any foreign interventions. To argue this, the essay outlines some key elements of Indonesia’s foreign policy.  

The author highlights Indonesia's policy of rejecting external military bases and any foreign direct intervention in Southeast Asian waters. Indonesia has always been concerned that foreign assistance should be limited to technical support. Anwar asserts that Indonesia had urged on the other countries of the region to assume the primary responsibility for order in Southeast Asia without external intervention. The essay argues that Indonesia has preferred diplomatic solutions rather than military campaigns to resolve confrontations with Malaysia. Indonesia has played a leading role in establishing ASEAN, which is an obstacle to external threats. All these, including Indonesia's effort in regionalism which is beyond ideological and political differences, developed norms and principles that protected the region of becoming the battleground of external powers and turned it into a Zone of Peace. The essay concludes that Indonesia’s efforts led to an inclusive structure consisting of all relevant powers in a balanced way. 

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Medcalf, Rory. (2019). Australia and China: Understanding the reality check. Australia Journal of International Affairs. 73(2), 109-118.  

In this essay, Rory Medcalf emphasises the importance of Australia’s new security laws and its Indo-Pacific foreign policy, which is based on security-oriented foreign investment. By recounting the causes and consequences of a reality check, the author rejects seven myths in the discourse of Australia-China relations, and outlines Australia's necessities in order to rebalance bilateral relations with China, which is as follows:

The Australian Government should reassure China that Australia seeks a relationship of mutual respect. Medcalf affirms that potential tension will exist for the future, however, the author highlights the importance of the modulation that had previously expressed by ex-Prime Minister Turnbull but rejects any retreat from national security gains. Secondly, Medcalf suggests a close relationship with the Chinese diaspora in Australia to assure that legislation will have no other effect than protection. Thirdly, an inclusive consultative mechanism consisting of business CEOs and the leaders of state and territory governments is advised. The author states that Australia has to legislate against foreign political donations and to stoop assisting China to achieve emerging technologies. For an effective reaction, Australia should advise its American ally on moderating public debates. In the end, Medcalf once again quotes the ex-Prime Minister in which he said the relationship with China is way more important than to be failed with ambiguity.