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Spring 2008 Insights
The Starting Point (Theoretical Perspective)
The Structure & Bias of YouTube:
from danah boyd:
Media are environments.
We do not stand outside of our media and simply "use them." We are engaged in media environments.
Multi-media environments cannot be understood by "adding up" the effects of each medium by itself.
As Lum notes, "we cannot conceptualize the Internet as one part writing, one part (still and moving) image, one part sound, one part computer, one part telephone, and so on; instead, it is a unique symbolic environment whose complex new languages, as Carpenter(1960) would have suggested, has yet to be deciphered" (2006:31).
Many studies of media ecology look for effects on individuals. There are many problems with this:
Social and cultural environments can be understood as media as well.
social settings are "complex, multimedia symbolic environments" each with "a unique set of vocabulary and rules that define what its inhabitants do and how they interact with everything else outside of the confines of this environment" (Lum 2006:31). Goffman is important here.
vs. Technological Determinism: Ong's Relationalist Perspective
must pay attention to the ways communications technologies are interrelated with (but do not determine) economic, social, political and intellectual structures and practices (Ong 1988:701). Understanding these interrelationships requires a nuanced understanding of cultural dynamics, communication, and mediation. Cultures cannot be taken as simple and monolithic structures but as complex, dynamic, and heterogeneous systems of practice, negotiated and continuously re-invented by humans with their own (culturally informed) agendas and biases (see Bourdieu 1977; Fischer 2007). The same can also be said for technology. Technologies simply do not exist apart from the techniques employed in their use (Strate 2006). Technologies should not be understood as simple physical objects, but as dynamic heterogeneous systems of practice involved in cycles of continuous re-invention.
"The Medium is the Message"
"The Medium is the Massage"
Goffman add defnitions of framing, fronting, facework, staging, etc. ...
Multiple Identities
Each different media presents a different environment, and perhaps leads to a different identity of the individual - e.g. I have 2 email addresses, one for office use and the other for personal use ... the content on both mailboxes is different and hence, I person only communicating on the personal mailbox may not be exposed to the style or environment of of office communication ... so, is exposed to a different identity in a way ... take this to another step, video's posted or browsed by a person may again present an altogether different identity ... and ofcourse there are brave new virtual spaces like secondlife ... which again disassociate the identity of a person from the actual person in a way ... think about it ...
Medium Theory + Goffman
Theoretical Propositions of Media Ecology (from Lum 2006: 32-33)1. "communication media are not neutral, transparent, or value-free conduits for carrying data or information ... media's intrinsic physical structure and symbolic form plays a defining role in shaping what and how information is to be encoded and transmitted and therefore how it is to be decoded."
2. all media are "biased" From Nystrom we know the following biases:
- intellectual and emotional biases based on symoblic forms
- spatial, temporal, and sensory biases based on physical structure
- political biases based on accessibility of symbolic forms
- social biases based on different types of social situations created by physical form
- metaphysical biases due to the way they organize time and space
- content biases based on symbolic and physical forms
- all of this adds up to different epistemological biases
3. These biases can "facilitate various psychic or perceptual, social, economic, political, and cultural consequences."
The Structure & Bias of YouTube:
- Asynchronous (time): Self-construction & presentation is not in real time. It can be prepared, scripted, edited, etc.
- Self-construction & presentation is in interaction with an imagined audience (not a present one)
- That imagined audience may include yourself (both today's self and the imagined selves of the future).
- No Co-Presence: Actor and Viewer not in same space at same time. N
- No social expectations while viewing.
- can result in aesthetic experience
- may create fame / admiration for "below average" authentic and honest people.
- Viewer response can also be prepared, scripted, edited, etc.
- "Conversation" is one way, delayed, or non-existent (perhaps more a series of "speech acts" not a typical "conversation"
- There is no continuous and synchronous paralaguange such as affirmation or talk-back
- Video quality is low and pixelated
from danah boyd:
- persistence
- searchability
- replicability
- context ambiguity, flux, and collapse
Media are environments.
We do not stand outside of our media and simply "use them." We are engaged in media environments.
Multi-media environments cannot be understood by "adding up" the effects of each medium by itself.
As Lum notes, "we cannot conceptualize the Internet as one part writing, one part (still and moving) image, one part sound, one part computer, one part telephone, and so on; instead, it is a unique symbolic environment whose complex new languages, as Carpenter(1960) would have suggested, has yet to be deciphered" (2006:31).
Many studies of media ecology look for effects on individuals. There are many problems with this:
- overlooks social and cultural contexts
- falsely imagines cognition to be purely individual and material, not social and intersubjective
- focus on psychological overlooks economic, political, and ideological factors
Social and cultural environments can be understood as media as well.
social settings are "complex, multimedia symbolic environments" each with "a unique set of vocabulary and rules that define what its inhabitants do and how they interact with everything else outside of the confines of this environment" (Lum 2006:31). Goffman is important here.
vs. Technological Determinism: Ong's Relationalist Perspective
must pay attention to the ways communications technologies are interrelated with (but do not determine) economic, social, political and intellectual structures and practices (Ong 1988:701). Understanding these interrelationships requires a nuanced understanding of cultural dynamics, communication, and mediation. Cultures cannot be taken as simple and monolithic structures but as complex, dynamic, and heterogeneous systems of practice, negotiated and continuously re-invented by humans with their own (culturally informed) agendas and biases (see Bourdieu 1977; Fischer 2007). The same can also be said for technology. Technologies simply do not exist apart from the techniques employed in their use (Strate 2006). Technologies should not be understood as simple physical objects, but as dynamic heterogeneous systems of practice involved in cycles of continuous re-invention.
"The Medium is the Message"
"The Medium is the Massage"
Goffman add defnitions of framing, fronting, facework, staging, etc. ...
Multiple Identities
Each different media presents a different environment, and perhaps leads to a different identity of the individual - e.g. I have 2 email addresses, one for office use and the other for personal use ... the content on both mailboxes is different and hence, I person only communicating on the personal mailbox may not be exposed to the style or environment of of office communication ... so, is exposed to a different identity in a way ... take this to another step, video's posted or browsed by a person may again present an altogether different identity ... and ofcourse there are brave new virtual spaces like secondlife ... which again disassociate the identity of a person from the actual person in a way ... think about it ...
mwesch |
Latest page update: made by mwesch
, Apr 17 2008, 1:54 PM EDT
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