The Creation Of Adam Analysis

Text: A Wider-Brimmed Umbrella Term

Words on a page, lyrics to a song, and scripts of a film are all examples of texts—“That portion of the contents of a manuscript or printed book … which constitutes the original matter, as distinct from the notes or other critical appendages,” as defined by the Oxford English Dictionary (OED). Essays lend corroborated insight into an unfamiliar subject, lyrics express the poetic value of a songwriter’s personal experience, and scripts can be analyzed as novels would be for thematic and literary elements. But is this distinction becoming strained in dealing with newer, wider forms of analyzable media? At the bare minimum, “text” will always refer to the written word, but just as a novel or essay may be considered

a text in order to interpret larger-scope messages, so too could musical notation or film’s cinematography. The definition of “text” should not be constrained to the written word alone; if a concreted, self-reliant, and self-contained anything is to be analyzed, then it should be deemed a text.
For example, one should be immediately familiar with Michelangelo’s The Creation of Adam, in which God extends his pointed hand to meet Adam’s.

The symbolic meaning behind the figures’ respective postures is widely accepted as portraying movement, or a transfer of life. In this way, viewers of the painting infer symbolism—a tenet of both artistic and literary analyses. It goes without saying that The Creation of Adam is a painting, as opposed to a written work, but the fact that it can be analyzed in the same way literary symbols are should categorize it into a broader umbrella term. The Creation of Adam is then both a painting and an analyzable work of art. However, the same methods of symbolic analysis can be applied to Edgar Allen Poe’s The Raven or Victor Fleming’s film adaptation of The Wizard of Oz—both of which are considered works of art in their mediums—thereby forcing the aforementioned umbrella term to include other mediums for interpretation. Because the painting, film, and poem can all be analyzed from a shared symbolistic prism, the classification of all three could perhaps be

“texts.”
The reason for this wording is a result of both convenience and missing vernacular. Paintings, poems, films, and even this essay are “things,” entities singular in existence and concretely real. In literary and artistic analyses, a writer can reference any of these “things” and make arguments as to their effect. However, “things” is hardly an appropriate term in academic settings. There must, therefore, be a term to replace “things” and a term which is accurate to the method of analysis used. “Text” is directly taken from its understood OED definition to fit a larger role. A poem will still be a text, a sonnet will still be a poem, a biopic will still be a film, and a painting will still be art, but a secondary definition of “text” might lend a solution to the “thing” term which encompasses poems, films, paintings, and music.
But, of course, the word “art” already describes these mediums. Merriam-Webster defines art as, “Something that is created with imagination and skill that is beautiful or to express important ideas or feelings,” while OED defines the plural case as, “the various branches of creative activity, as painting, sculpture, music, literature, dance, drama, oratory, etc.” Although both definitions are similar to this essay’s idea of “text,” the two diverge in how they are used. “Art” is a generalizing term used to describe the various mediums and what their works collectively are, but “text” serves a much more conditional purpose. A definition for “text” could read, “Something in the various branches of creative activity that can both express important ideas or feelings and be analyzed in its extant state.” A painting would always be visual art and, therefore, fit into the general category of “art,” but in the case that it is analyzed and referenced in an essay or another form of criticism, the term “text” would also apply. A text is any “thing” under analytical scrutiny, whereas art is any “thing” that holds important creative value.
However, the claim that any “thing” can be a text should not be confused with the false assumption that anything can be a text. As stated before, the products of art, music, literature, drama, essays, or oration are collectively considered “things” when together. Additionally, self-reliant compositions, such as films and recorded sounds, fall into the category of texts because they are concrete in their existences and offer useful information when analyzed. After a high school football game, coaches usually assemble their teams to review footage from the night before. In these cases, the recorded football games would be texts because they are analyzed and referenceable. However, if a coach were to draw a diagram of a certain play gone wrong, his drawing would not be a text because it would not be self-reliant. A text is anything that contains its own context—it does not assume an understanding of another text—and whose entirety can be analyzed without the aid of another. A taped football game can be a text, a recorded amateur song can be a text, and an essay with cited quotes and paraphrases can be a text because all three can be analyzed in their own rights.
A conclusion can then be made that in order for a “thing” (be it art or essay, recordings or statistics) to be a text, it must achieve two broad qualities. So to differ from labels like “art” and “literature” and also add a conditional element, a “thing” must first be analyzable, analyzed, and significant to an analysis. Secondly, a “thing” must be all of concrete, self-reliant, and self-contained. A “thing” must be real and provable, in tangible, documented, or otherwise reproducible forms—in this way, being concrete. To be self-reliant, a “thing” cannot depend on another source for kairos or missing information and must supply its own argument to be considered. Lastly, a “thing” must have self-contained context, not needing further elaboration to assist the analysis’ point. If these criteria are met, then a “thing” can be considered a text.
Moreover, it should be noted that a text will usually be larger than an essay’s excerpted quote. Although a quote may act as a text in an analysis (Famous quotes tend to have their own contexts, arguments, and documented existences.), they may also be pulled from an even larger text. A symphony, its movements, and even the individual bars of music therein may all be considered texts. However, the key of a movement would not be a text because it is a tone to be dissected from the bars of music—therefore, the point of its analysis. Likewise, individual notes would not be texts because they lack context, which the greater bars or movements do provide. If one were to think of these notes as words or phrases from a novel or study, then they would be the quotes which do not qualify as texts. It must be understood that for an analyzable “thing” to be a text, it must exhibit context, argument, and provable existence. Using quotes provides the analyzer an ability to reference a “thing,” which then turns the “thing” into a text.
In straying from the purely written-word definition of “text,” this debate of what does and does not constitute a “text” is understandably difficult.

However, in lieu of a proper term to classify both artistic and significant “things” like plays, musical compositions, novels, paintings, and essays, which all fall under the same analyzable roof, a substitute is necessary. OED’s definition of “text” reads as, “That portion of the contents of a manuscript or printed book … which constitutes the original matter, as distinct from the notes or other critical appendages.” The argument of this new, secondary definition is that the set limits of manuscripts and printed books will erode as further studies are made into other \ mediums. Therefore, the portion of the contents of any significant work must be concrete and found in a lasting form. It must also constitute its original matter, staying true to the work’s overarching arguments. Lastly, it must be distinct from notes or critical appendages by exhibiting independent context in support of the argument. In this way, a “text” can be the substitution for “thing” in cases of analysis. Looking forward, this will be a necessary expansion in order to include arguments for significance in unwritten mediums like graphic design, cinematography, and music

composition.