Bolter, speaks of remediation in terms of technology and uses this to make examples. This is something which is not seen as much with theorists such as Jenkins or Manovich. So taking what Bolter is saying about technological mediation, I want to look at how this would transfer into the way our society and culture looks at remediation and how we accept that along side technological advances.
Bolter says remediation is "the representation of one medium in another" (Bolter, 2000: 45). So this is taking one media form, the example he uses is paintings and photography, and representing them in another, digital picture galleries.
When reading through Bolters work, I couldn't help but draw parallels between this and the Convergence Culture which Henry Jenkins writes about (Jenkins, 2008). Although Jenkins talk about the formation of multiple mediums into one.
"By convergence, I mean the flow of content across multiple media platforms" (Jenkins, 2008, p2)
Inline with Bolter's writing, these "multiple media platforms" would show representation of their Old Media forms in this New Media platform. How we can stand beside the Mona Lisa painting and either take a photo of it or download a photo of it will just never be the same.
I came across a video shared on Facebook which outlines how mobile phones have taken over the human existence. Its portrayals different events where humans are on their phones or video recording a gig, when they would enjoy it much more if they didn't use their phone
Its shows the convergence and remediation of going to a concert (Old Media) and capturing it on video (New Media) even though you may never watch it again.
Remediation is really in the advancement of technology, but this advancement can often be for the worst. We can get so engaged in finding ways to interact with the media easier that we start to lose the sense of our own human beings. Soon they will be lost in cyberspace, forever
Bibliography
Jenkins, H., 2008. Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide Revised., NYU Press.
Bolter, J.D. (2000) Remediation: Understanding New Media (Cambridge, Mass.; London: MIT Press)
CharstarleneTV, (2013) I forgot my phone [Online Video] 22 August. Available from; <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OINa46HeWg8> [Accessed: 6 November 2013].
Showing posts with label technology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label technology. Show all posts
Wednesday, 6 November 2013
Wednesday, 30 October 2013
Are we human or are we technology?
In today's society, people can't do without technology. The most popular device used by mass culture is mobile phones, using these devices give us quicker access of communication. As these are imbedded as an extension of the human body that we can't go anywhere without. However this new technology plays a higher role in new media. When William Harvey's unearthed the circulatory system it leads to the impression that using technology to discover the system helps to evolve technology on discovering how the body functions.
"the concept of 'human' is unthinkable without technology but we act as if it is." (Shaw, 2008, p.81)
Society revolves around these technology such as laptops, mobile phones, tablets which we are growing up with, there is not that many people in society that are not I.C.T literate. These concepts can be associated with Michel Foucault who identifies
"the soldier is 'manipulated, shaped, trained' so that it 'obeys, responds," (Shaw, 2008, p.82)
As people we understand what it means to be human whether we are male or female. This considerations comes across from a higher power in the context of how we function and our appearance as a gender. Fred Pfeil discusses Bruce Springsteen's projection, and the icons that follow.
"he moves activate a form of consciousness that refers to industrial technology... masculine identity in a time of insecurity and flux."(Shaw, 2008. p.84) here he is then marked from fitness to health and also items of clothing as consumers. As this is relating to what is the norm to a mass culture, as society buys into produces created to be marked to their insecurities
"In Foucault's term...is a 'marked' body."(Shaw, 2008, p.85)
Cyberspace is often a retreat from the realization of influences that are market towards consumers, giving the attentive of being what or whoever they choose to be situated as their own individual. Gibson refers to this as
"bodiless exultation of cyberspace"(Gibson,2008, p.86)
As a conclusion humans wouldn't be able to progress information fast, if it wasn't for technology, in addition to technology couldn't be as advances without humans pursuing to establish further.
Bibliography
Shaw, D (2008) Technoculture: The Key Concepts (Oxford: Berg Press)
"the concept of 'human' is unthinkable without technology but we act as if it is." (Shaw, 2008, p.81)
Society revolves around these technology such as laptops, mobile phones, tablets which we are growing up with, there is not that many people in society that are not I.C.T literate. These concepts can be associated with Michel Foucault who identifies
"the soldier is 'manipulated, shaped, trained' so that it 'obeys, responds," (Shaw, 2008, p.82)
As people we understand what it means to be human whether we are male or female. This considerations comes across from a higher power in the context of how we function and our appearance as a gender. Fred Pfeil discusses Bruce Springsteen's projection, and the icons that follow.
"he moves activate a form of consciousness that refers to industrial technology... masculine identity in a time of insecurity and flux."(Shaw, 2008. p.84) here he is then marked from fitness to health and also items of clothing as consumers. As this is relating to what is the norm to a mass culture, as society buys into produces created to be marked to their insecurities
"In Foucault's term...is a 'marked' body."(Shaw, 2008, p.85)
Cyberspace is often a retreat from the realization of influences that are market towards consumers, giving the attentive of being what or whoever they choose to be situated as their own individual. Gibson refers to this as
"bodiless exultation of cyberspace"(Gibson,2008, p.86)
As a conclusion humans wouldn't be able to progress information fast, if it wasn't for technology, in addition to technology couldn't be as advances without humans pursuing to establish further.
Bibliography
Shaw, D (2008) Technoculture: The Key Concepts (Oxford: Berg Press)
Super "Meat" Identity
Our cultural cyborgification has been written into our very DNA
and has left a digitized finger print on all that we perceive to be
apparent in our everyday lives. Societies "retreat from the
flesh marks the dissolution of the body in a incurably informed world
in which the 'meat' is constantly manipulated and thoroughly
mediated" (Shaw, 2008, p86).
With regard to the above statement, Shaw looked at the connotations surrounding the idea of the prefect solider and later on in the text he states the unacceptable of a woman's meaty exterior versus their "technological solution to [their] 'problem'" (ibid). He found that the "super" solider worked well inside a team and used a common term "well oiled machine" (Shaw, 2008, p82) to illustrate his point of the prefect human and its fundamentals towards a formation of prefect technologies. As well as the soldiers inside fundamentals towards technologies we have to look at their intended sexuality.
Shaw goes on to write about the imperfection of the woman and the capitalist need to use a technological stance to change their appearance through external environment. Without context we state the soldier to be a man not underlining the fact that they could be a woman and vice versa with the stance towards appearance through external environment.
When reading Shaw's text you find a underlining meaning through his readings, which highlights the stereotypical format of technology. Seen through the points above and the study of Pat Cadigan's cyberpunk story Synners (1991). Shaw breaks down the human interaction between the four main characters which stated the difference of the weak and their empowerment through the technological and new media stance.
This now leads to "the notion that the media now allows us to all create out own complex, diverse and many faceted notions of personal identity" (Creeber, 2009, p18)
Shaw may look at the embodiment of the "circulatory system" but his underlining factor shows us that technology identifies changes in the world and produces what we understand as the ordinary.
Bibliography:
Shaw, D, (2008) Technoculture: The key Concepts (Oxford: Berg Press)
Creeber, G. (2009). DIGITAL THEORY: Theorizing New Media & Cubitt, D. (2009) Case Study: Digital Aesthetics in ED. Creeber, G. & Royston, M. (2009) Digital Cultures: Understanding New Media; Maidstone, Open University Press.
With regard to the above statement, Shaw looked at the connotations surrounding the idea of the prefect solider and later on in the text he states the unacceptable of a woman's meaty exterior versus their "technological solution to [their] 'problem'" (ibid). He found that the "super" solider worked well inside a team and used a common term "well oiled machine" (Shaw, 2008, p82) to illustrate his point of the prefect human and its fundamentals towards a formation of prefect technologies. As well as the soldiers inside fundamentals towards technologies we have to look at their intended sexuality.
Shaw goes on to write about the imperfection of the woman and the capitalist need to use a technological stance to change their appearance through external environment. Without context we state the soldier to be a man not underlining the fact that they could be a woman and vice versa with the stance towards appearance through external environment.
When reading Shaw's text you find a underlining meaning through his readings, which highlights the stereotypical format of technology. Seen through the points above and the study of Pat Cadigan's cyberpunk story Synners (1991). Shaw breaks down the human interaction between the four main characters which stated the difference of the weak and their empowerment through the technological and new media stance.
This now leads to "the notion that the media now allows us to all create out own complex, diverse and many faceted notions of personal identity" (Creeber, 2009, p18)
Shaw may look at the embodiment of the "circulatory system" but his underlining factor shows us that technology identifies changes in the world and produces what we understand as the ordinary.
Bibliography:
Shaw, D, (2008) Technoculture: The key Concepts (Oxford: Berg Press)
Creeber, G. (2009). DIGITAL THEORY: Theorizing New Media & Cubitt, D. (2009) Case Study: Digital Aesthetics in ED. Creeber, G. & Royston, M. (2009) Digital Cultures: Understanding New Media; Maidstone, Open University Press.
Shifting ideas of the self
One of the things Shaw discusses in his chapter
on Technobodies is that new discourses are imposed throughout the changes in
the environment a ‘body’ lives in. A society in which bodies are marked by
social class and work implies different ‘truths’ than living in a society in
which the emphasis is on capitalism, modern subjects and consumption. It actually
comes down to a shift in the cultural consumption (Shaw, 2008, pp. 83-87). This
notion goes back to the words of Creeber, who stated that the historical
periods of postmodernism and modernism imply a shift in media, media
consumption and ways of approaching media (Creeber, 2009, pp. 11-17). As
Jenkins cites Pool’s Technologies on Freedom, there no longer exists a
one-to-one relationship between a medium and its use (Jenkins, 2006, p. 10). So
with New Media being transmitters of multiple messages and carrying out
different functionalities, we should consider the way it influences a subject’s
notion of how to act and what to be.
Furthermore, this shift in discourses also implies a change in which we would define ourselves as humans. When Shaw states that “the concept of ‘human’ is unthinkable without technology” he might be right in the sense that, in a contemporary culture, the mentioned discourses happen in connection with technology (Shaw, 2008, pp. 81-82). This means that with New Media making their way into our lives, and coexisting with Old Media (Jenkins, p. 14), we could consider their role in the change of this self-definition. The way we define ourselves happens in the extent of what (new) media offer us. When technology is so engaged with the body, it will manipulate the body in a significant way, in that it offers us the necessary information about the body and determines what and how the body is. This makes us think of the body as a primarily ‘technology’ structure, with ‘technological’ processes coordinating it (Shaw, 2008, pp. 88-89).
Bibliography
Creeber, G. & Royston, M. (2009). Digital Theory: Theorizing New Media: digital cultures. Berkshire: Open University Press.
Jenkins, H. (2006). Convergence Culture, where old and new media collide. New York: New York University Press.
Shaw, D. (2008). Technoculture: The Key Concepts. Oxford: Oxford Berg Press.
Furthermore, this shift in discourses also implies a change in which we would define ourselves as humans. When Shaw states that “the concept of ‘human’ is unthinkable without technology” he might be right in the sense that, in a contemporary culture, the mentioned discourses happen in connection with technology (Shaw, 2008, pp. 81-82). This means that with New Media making their way into our lives, and coexisting with Old Media (Jenkins, p. 14), we could consider their role in the change of this self-definition. The way we define ourselves happens in the extent of what (new) media offer us. When technology is so engaged with the body, it will manipulate the body in a significant way, in that it offers us the necessary information about the body and determines what and how the body is. This makes us think of the body as a primarily ‘technology’ structure, with ‘technological’ processes coordinating it (Shaw, 2008, pp. 88-89).
Bibliography
Creeber, G. & Royston, M. (2009). Digital Theory: Theorizing New Media: digital cultures. Berkshire: Open University Press.
Jenkins, H. (2006). Convergence Culture, where old and new media collide. New York: New York University Press.
Shaw, D. (2008). Technoculture: The Key Concepts. Oxford: Oxford Berg Press.
Thinking about the unthinkable human
"[T]he concept of 'human' is unthinkable without technology but we act as if it is" (Shaw, 2008, p.81). Shaw (2008, pp.81-82) illustrates this by the understanding of the circulatory system. Before humans were aware of this it already functioned in the same way, but this understanding had actual consequences in the way people saw and used their bodies. This could be seen as an example of the "Thomas theorem" (Thomas, & Thomas, 1928, pp.571-572). In this way, technology, which is produced by our bodies, also effects our bodies (Shaw, 2008, pp.81-83).
In this chapter society is viewed as a machine of which the people are parts (Shaw, 2008, pp.83-87). This is a fitting metaphor, but it is just one way of looking at society. It could be argued that people have always adapted to their environments in a Neo-Darwinistic way and that societies already ran like machinery before the industrial revolution gave rise to machines. In other words, although the text uses modern concepts to describe being human, these processes already existed long before that.
It is argued that "[t]he body has become obsolete" (Shaw, 2008, p. 87) because advancements in technology make differences less important and even different 'species' can be mixed. Although there is a tendency in this direction, saying that these differences have already vanished could be considered problematic in an age where discrimination -for instance the glass ceiling- is still prevalent. However, advancements like transgenics make it clear that many divisions we use, are surpassed. These old concepts might still be useful in what we could see as Husserl's (1970, p. 127) Lebenswelt but in a slightly more scientific area new ways of distinction have to be found, for instance focussing more on genetic details.
Altogether, this holistic view of body and technology is said to "evade the opposing responses of technophobia and technophilia" (Shaw, 2008, p.91). In the light of this text one could say that these concepts show a misunderstanding of the interconnectedness of body and technology. However, following the Thomas theorem (Thomas, & Thomas, 1928, pp.571-572), it could be said that if people experience technology in this way, it might still be important to look at it like this.
Bibliography
Husserl, E. (1970). The Crises of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology. Northwestern University.
Shaw, D. (2008). Technoculture: The Key Concepts. Oxdord Berg Press
Thomas, D.S., & Thomas, W.I. (1928). The child in America: Behavior problems and programs. New York: Knopf.
Technobodies
According to Debra Shaw "the concept of 'human' is unthinkable without technology" (2008 pp.81). What she means by this, and what she sets out to explain, is that the whole concept and understanding of what it means to be 'human' could not have developed over the course of history without the use of technology. In addition to this she attempts to go further by arguing just how closely linked technology has been in understanding what is suggested by 'humanity', contending that "technology should not be considered an adjunct to the body or in opposition to it but as a determinant of its ontology" (ibid.)
To exemplify this assertion Shaw examines William Harvey's discovery of the circulatory system, and does well to exhibit that, not only is our understanding of the body "produced by technology in the simple sense that Harvey had necessarily to use tools to examine the workings of the heart" (2008 pp.82) but at the same how technology "produces the body because... increasingly complex and sophisticated technologies allow us to examine it in more detail" (ibid.). We can therefore argue that this example is effective in how it describes how our understanding the body is shaped by currently existing technology, and how the body in turn serves to evolve technological progression.
Bearing this in mind we can link this idea with Foucault's concept of the body as "an object of knowledge" (Shaw, 2008 pp.82) where bodies are likened to machines in that they are "crafted according to the dictates of certain requirements" (ibid).With this approach, it can be argued that these requirements represent the ideals and standards dictated in society to which we must conform. Added to this idea of the body as an object is the Marxist principle decreeing that "the worker's body is a commodity to be bought and whose value is determined by the fluctuations of the market" (Shaw, 2008 pp.83). This leads on to the rather bleak notion that the body having now become a tool, crafted in a certain way by set requirements, assuming its place in the overall machine of society to learn "the ritualised movements of factory production" (ibid.) and continuing the process.
Shaw, D (2008) Technoculture: The Key Concepts (Oxford: Berg Press)
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