Slideshow to present ongoing research on the media life project (and a forthcoming book with Polity Press, "Media Life", scheduled for publication late 2011/early 2012). Key idea: we do not live with media, but in media.
35. to find out more about the media life project…
36.
Hinweis der Redaktion
this presentation offers the media life point of view (POV), starting point of several research and book projects, including for Polity Press (pub date: Fall 2011)
Barack Obama at IU, AP photo: May 1, 2008 the Obama at IU example shows how the individual also needs to orient herself to media in order to succeed: recording and redacting (and archiving/editing/sharing/forwarding/distributing) lived experience
Bil'in, Exxon-Mobil, Obama: examples of institutions (including individuals!) orienting themselves to media in order to succeed
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/20/education/20wired.html ML = praxeo-onto-epistemological, mediatic a priori, materiality & immateriality of media and so on (literature review): its all included; ML is as a POV the logical next step, and its simple: we live in, not with, media intellectual history: Harold Innes, Marshal McLuhan, …
From a 2003 study, we can see that only does the average American (regardless of age, class or gender) spend about 11 hours PER DAY using media - but he or she also does not realize nor remember their media use most of the time. in the twenty-first century, we navigate through a vast mass media environment unprecedented in human history. Yet our intimate familiarity with the media often allows us to take them for granted. Media use has become: automatic.
Douglas Rushkoff
example Onion video on party & murder: http://www.theonion.com/content/video/police_slog_through_40_000
example loved ones communicating at the airport: calling every couple of seconds: empty communication, micro-coordination as compared to the dancer in Pedro Calderon’s story: to an external observer this seems to be an empty (meaningless/purposeless) activity – like our immersion in media seems meaningless. however, one could see this as the dancer explains when asked: as a form of pure thinking, a pure being-in-the-world the world is hypercomplex in part because of media, yet we strive for redundancy - which can be seen as a harmony of all parts (“this makes sense; this is beautiful”) so for example in relation to this particular presentation: I am trying to give you an aesthetic account of media life perspective – telling a good/harmonious story – I am alos trying to do this within the set limits of this conference (within 10 to 12 minutes), which is an ethical account of the MLP. this position – ethical as well as aesthetic, praxeological as well as ontological and epistemological – is what we see as the solution to the so-called “emptiness” of our hypercommunication: the position of the super-observer the super-observer is a solution to Luigi Pirandello’s dilemma that every human being shares: we cannot see ourselves live. however, in our current media life, we CAN. we can, because media make visible what is invisible like art, as Merleau-Ponty observed, media put at a distance what is otherwise too close: and today this means: our lifeworld, ourselves.
In this global connection/togetherness, we are also completely alone: Silent Disco
What this means, is that we are all living inside our own TRUMAN SHOW, as the Jim Carrey character in the movie of that tile did: surrounded by omnipresent media, being recorded and monitored all the time, making and consuming media constantly, being connected to everyone else through increasingly digital, portable and networked media devices all the time - and unwilling or indeed unable to switch any of this off. The question now is: what skills and attitude do you need to cope with this kind of life? How do you survive inside your own Truman Show? THAT is what T101 is all about.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raoul_Vaneigem media life is a life where we observe ourselves live this in turn enables and powers a reflective position vis-à-vis our own behavior our argument is that this position should always be aesthetic and ethical, like the Bil’in/Avatar example: it is fun and seriously consequential at the same time. 4. and this is how we need to look at ourselves in order to be able to take responsibility for our desires
want more? IU Scholarworks 1.0 Slideshare tag T101 Media Culture Society 2011 (January) Polity Press 2011 (September) Blog tag media life Facebook newsfeed Twitter T101medialife