Michael Lin
English 131
10/20/10
Appropriation in Culture In the documentaries Rip! : A Remix Manifesto and Walking on Eggshells: Borrowing Culture in the Remix Age, intertextual conversations arose when both films discussed appropriation by citizens in a positive light. In Walking on Eggshells, the director focused on one specific area of appropriation which looked at how common appropriation had been in the past. Moreover, he argues that artists sometimes wish to share their music, thus arguing in favor of mass appropriation. In Rip!, the director expands on those ideas by arguing why copyright laws are evil by applying that concept to different fields like medicine and plants. Due to the ridiculousness of copyright laws, mass appropriation should be allowed and such an act will benefit our culture because many new works could be created. The main premise behind Walking on Eggshells is the prevalence of appropriation. Examples throughout history were used like Picasso’s paintings being similar to old African paintings. Moreover, in television, cartoon characters such as Bugs Bunny referenced famous people like Mozart to entertain children. Finally, in music, Daft Punk was essentially a fusion of the works of Mozart and Beethoven. With so many instances of appropriation, it is hard to punish everyone for committing it. Moreover, artists sometimes do not care about money, and so they are willing to let their music be downloaded for free or be remixed because they care more about sharing their art than making money. Simply put, we have all the music in the world for us to define ourselves and our culture. Rip! discussed a wide range of topics about appropriation and expanded on a lot of points Walking on Eggshells made. Rip! also suggested that appropriation should be something anyone can legally do. Rip! justified this by pointing out the ridiculousness of copyright because it did things like forced daycare centers to remove Disney pictures, fined people hundreds of thousands of dollars for downloading music, and even copyrighted plants used by natives for generations. Rip! did not only stay in America, but also went overseas to countries like China, Japan, and Brazil to look at appropriation there. China and Japan did not follow the same copyright laws as those in the States, so they built replicas of Disneyland to gain profits, thereby expanding on the point that it is difficult to punish appropriators from Walking on Eggshells. In Brazil, copyright laws were also not enforced, and this was not limited to just music. Brazil made their own HIV drugs at a fraction of international costs, breaking regulations and angering American drug companies. By breaking intellectual copyrights, the Brazilian government saved the lives of many of its citizens. Rip! also went back in time by noting that when America was founded in 1776, copyright laws did not exist. This allowed many influential authors like Charles Dickens to copy literary ideas from American authors like Mark Twain. The sharing of ideas brought about some of the best literary works in history. All of the evidence put forth in Rip! suggests that appropriation makes our culture better because we are not being restricted with our creativity. Brazil’s culture minister stated that “nothing comes from creation, everything comes from something else”. The sharing of ideas or appropriation allows ordinary citizens to level the playing field with corporate giants. With appropriation, barriers set forth by big companies can be broken down so people can be free to express themselves creatively. The intertextual conversations between these two texts show that they care deeply about the rights of people to be able to appropriate from whichever source they want. This benefits our culture because our art reflects our culture and we should have all the resources to better our culture.

Works Cited
RIP! A Remix Manifesto. Dir. Brett Gaylor. EyeSteelFilm, 2010.
Walking on Eggshells: Borrowing Culture in the Remix Age. Dir. Jacob Albert, Ryan
Beauchamp, and Brendan Schlagal. Creative Commons Attribution- Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License, 2010.