How can we live?

"How can we live?" is composed and performed by spoken word poet Award, whose profile can be viewed on Poetryclick.com. Award is depicted here.



Marcus Banks (2001) writes in his chapter "Encountering the visual" that "social researchers need to be aware of their own influences and orientations before they attempt to do research on the visual and visible aspects of culture and social life" (p. 13). As I have encountered and reproduced the visual images, still and moving, in this blog - Award's performance is among the most visually saturated with animated graphics, audio effects such as layering his own voice in the lyrical refrains of "How can we live?", and what Banks names "wallpaper shots" of posters, magazine covers, photo stills of AIDS victims, concept maps, demographic maps, charts illustrating statistics and awareness posters. Banks calls wallpaper shots "images that are largely or even completely redundant, either because they merely illustrate what is being said by the reporter or journalist, or because they are simply pleasant but bland images of location providing low-key visual interest as a background to a verbal presentation that is either abstract in nature or temporally remote" (p. 17). Applying Banks textual methods of analysis, online viewers are obligated to question both the mode of production the artist employs and the connotative intentionality of the producer. Assuming the artist and the producer are the same person, further examination is needed. Banks asserts:

"...from the standpoint of the overt intentionality of the images - the very ephemerality of the production as a whole may undercut most if not all attempts to seek deeper meaning. These images are highly contingent upon the circumstances of their production, and are often beamed live or almost live to the viewer, with very little time to consider image content or subsequent editing. Consequently, readings of the internal narrative - that is readings of the text of the image alone, uninformed by any ethnographic investigation into the social relations of such production - are largely unverifiable" (p. 17).

In order to spotlight the driving points - motifs of his lyrics - Award leaves most questions of intentionality up to the viewer - Why was a photograph taken and displayed at a particular point in the video? When? Under what circumstances? Who are the people depicted in certain photographs? What are they doing? Why are they doing it? How else might one represent the theme and motifs of Award's lyrics? (Banks, pp. 15-16). Especially notable are the tables and diagrams that Award presents as scientific representations of knowledge. Banks writes about these particular representations:

"These are techniques used to present information, both concrete and abstract, where spatial arrangement and non-linear order are necessitated and where the inevitable linear sequencing of words is insufficient. Non-indexical and often non-figurative visual representations such as these (that is, images that are not mechanical representations of reality, such as photographs) are common in social science texts and form a sub-category of the overall designissues surrounding the production of academic texts" (p. 23).

While his message is saturated by the symbolic realm of his chosen scientific depictions, the literal meanings are lost to the viewer who cannot determine much of the information displayed in the corresponding graphs and charts, nor are we able to identify the origins, original creators, or further identify a denotative meaning other than that of questioning ourselves: What do we know already regarding the motifs and theme of Award's poem/performance? How can we investigate the scientific information being depicted and referenced in this production? What conscious and unconscious experiences do we connote with the images? What conscious and unconscious experiences does the artist bring to his production? These questions frame a discussion of visual methods, but also questions imbued by media literacy studies that seek to empower viewers, users, and learners to problematize the media they/we encounter. Just as the artist may be problematizing his audience's perspectives on a topic in which there is much information available, but little or not enough concern. Yet, unfortunately, the epilogue/closing credits of Award's YouTube production lists the artist's copyright, website, an image of himself, and a promotion of his book available on Amazon.com and free booklet available for downloading on his personal website. These final frames, while self-promoting, are valued unfortunate by me due to what's missing: more information about his stated cause - How Can We Live with world AIDS issues? Where can we learn more about the visual images and scientific information the artist chose to represent in his production? What web resources does the artist find to be the most useful? What non-profit organizations does the artist support and does he encourage his viewers to support?

Perhaps strikingly different from media productions only a short decade ago contrasted with those today is that the power of new media allows viewers to not merely view the production on a video web posting site such as Youtube.com, but also view its statistics. As of 15:22 EST, the video has been viewed 2,503 times (including 3 times by me). It has been rated 13 times by viewers, all thirteen have rated it 5 out of 5 stars. 7 comments have been posted and 5 links (prior to my linking, which will appear upon this blog posting) have been posted on outside websites. Viewers can also see how many times the links posted on the outside sites have been clicked on to view the film directly from the site. For example, the top clicks the video received was 35 from a Zine site: http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/. Viewers also have the option of nominating the video for Honors or adding the video to their "favorites list" from which the friends of viewers can have access to depending on the viewer's personal settings and/or the viewer her/himself can access repeated viewings of the video without conducting a search each log-in. A closer look at the seven comments posted reveals ephemeral nature of the video and its online audience; Comments are limited to 500 characters, limiting comments from longwinded exegeses: Username "intendingtoburn" wrote one year ago "A very challenging poem, it certainly left me with a lot to think about." Username "TLHoward" also wrote one year ago "This is a very moving poem, I have never got so emotional over a poem before. This has made me think." Another user, "callady30," writes one year ago "This poem really touched me deeply... How can we live?" User "Halmtier" asked 11 months ago "Want to change the world? Join our community today! It's fast, friendly, and free! www.rainesrevolution.com 'Average people conquering average problems'." The poet/video producer/Youtube user never responds to his audience, though his future audiences are also able to view prior reactions, respond, add their own or engage in dialogue with each other, which in effect is a video-blog. Treating this video as a case study, further efforts may be made to contact the artist and conduct online, over the phone, or in-person interviews to unpack the overt and subverted intentions of the artist's production, reactions to his viewers' comments and possible location of his larger goals for the work.


Reference:

Banks, Marcus. (2001). Encountering the visual. In Banks, M., Visual Methods in Social Research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. pp. 13-48.