Adam Reed, blogging & agency

Note to self: Though slightly outdated by 2009 standards, Reed provides a decent background to blogging up to 2005. Consult for background chapter.

Reed aims to look at the blog as anthropological text, by focusing on “the ways in which people hold that texts can act as substitutes or extensions of them” [224]. Thinking of text as person, Reed’s argument could fit in well with the idea of blogged self as substitute/simulation – more real than real, it stands in the place of a self that cannot always be truly present (and, given the mediated nature of the self online, this blogged self will only ever be a portion of the ‘true self’ — not that this makes it any less authentic than the offline, physical self, as this self too only ever shows a particular face…). Reed asks a number of questions that are pertinent to my own research, including “Who does it substitute for? How is agency extended? … How is the ‘person’ composed and how does that composition alter over time?” [224].

Reed conducted an ethnographic study of bloggers, using both online and face-to-face interviews in order to gather his data. Speaking of one of his subject’s blogs, Reed notes:

These entries, and the ones I read later, in the following weeks and months, enforced the impression that here was the world as Leo saw it. The weblog appeared to provide a day-by-day account of passing moods and experiences, of his life as it happens. [226].

What Reed is saying here is simply but poignant; a blog has traditionally been a space wherein the author can present their view of the world, as interpreted through their own experiences and ideologies. In my ever-present fear of the corruption of blog culture (through advertising and freebies and what not), I fear that this personalised view of the world might be under threat. Reed voices perfectly the sentiment that I hope all blogs should entail.

Reed goes on to discuss the fact that “the ‘I’ narrative” [226-227] is central to blogging, with the “entity depicted in the digital text” responsible for narrating and perpetuating a coherent (but not necessarily streamlined) whole. The blog and the blogged self are both dynamic, contrastingly starkly with the more “static” representations of personhood found in print and on earlier webpages (227); this dynamism is largely credited to the frequent updating of blogs:

At the heart of journal blogging is an ethos of immediacy. Weblogs entries are meant to be ‘of the moment’, a record of how the individual felt or thought at that particular point in time. The claim that the text and subject can be temporally contiguous relies on the assumption of virtuality, but also on the ease of online publishing that allows posts to be put down on the digital page straight away… the weblog is valued for capturing a person’s impressions almost as they occur. [227]

Reed proceeds to contemplate the status of blog-as-therapy [228], “a means of clearing the mind in order to move a subject’s though processes along”. This concept is analogous to early beliefs such as the Ancient Greek hupomnemata, where it was perceived that a person only had so much room in the mind, and must write down thoughts in order to make room for new learnings, and not forget them in the future. These notes to the self were then used as memory-joggers in the future, a permanent record of previous lessons that could be referred to as needed. A blog operates in much the same way.

There are always aspects of the subject that remain outside or beyond the text, impressions that they cannot or do not want to post. What is censored and why seems to obey no coherent rule…; the most important thing for bloggers is that the claim stands, acting as an implicit defence of their fullness of being… In fact, the digital text is taken to provide a partial version of the subject. [230]

The above quote will tie in nicely with a discussion of symbolic interactionism and performance in chapter four. For Reed, the above provides a tidy opening into the role of audience in blogging. Reed argues that “As well as drawing out the ways in which the digital text substitutes for the ‘I’ of the blogger, individuals are concerned to explore how it mediates between persons after publication” [230]. The blog, as public document, is received in different ways online, and has the potential to be remediated easily – as re-postings on other people’s blogs, or even in the way that it is interpreted and regarded. The blogger must be aware that the self they present online via their blog is the only version of that self that many of their readers will ever encounter. This provides a double-edged sword situation: on the one hand, bloggers may try not to offend or shock their readership, in order to avoid controversy (as an example). On the other hand, doesn’t this censored version of self imply deceit of the audience? Reed later mentions, however, that “the most important visitor to the text is the blogger… this document is produced so a subject can view himself or herself in a mediated form, exteriorised as text” [231]. There is something inherently exhibitionist about the blogger, though:

She compared weblogs to the graffiti that one finds across the city, texts left for strangers to read… the blogger was like someone who leaves scrawled notes on park benches and inside telephone boxes, or who tacks postcards to the front doors of public buildings. [232]

Reed also considers the reasoning behind blogging (i.e. using a public document to record one’s history) and a more private diary [233]. Undoubtedly, the public nature of a blog leads to more editing than one would perhaps employ in a traditional diary, and yet the potential for feedback and the knowledge that someone is hearing your voice are unparalleled.

NB: Discussion of celebrity bloggers (236-238) might be relevant to part 5 of chapter 2?

Texts to consult:

Gell 1986. Writing Culture.

Reference:

Reed, A. (2005). “‘My blog is me’: Texts and persons in UK online journal culture (and anthropology).” Ethnos v.70 n.2

Esther Milne on epistolary presence – part one

Presence: “…the degree to which geographically dispersed agents experience a sense of physical and/or psychological proximity through the use of particular communication technologies” [Milne 2002].

Consider the difference between Milne’s definition of presence, and the more traditional understanding of the word as provided by thefreedictionary.com:

1. The state or fact of being present; current existence or occurrence.

2. Immediate proximity in time or space.

3. The area immediately surrounding a great personage, especially a sovereign.

4. A person who is present.

To me, this suggests that Milne has really taken the concept of presence and re-interpreted it for the present era. Her definition is fit for a world where presence doesn’t always necessarily imply physical proximity. Today, presence is as much about the awareness of a physically absent, but nonetheless involved, counterpart. As early as 1999, researchers were staking a claim for the validity of mediated, virtual presence [Mantovani & Riva 1999, 547 in Milne]. Indeed, Milne suggests that certain kinds of presence (such as that in emails) depend upon disembodiment and geographical dispersion in order to exist.

Citing Claudio Gullen [1994], Milne discusses the role of imaginary presence in letter writing, as a lead in to her discussion of emails. Her argument looks to performance and interpretation, stating “The letter writer performs a version of self and the recipient reads that performance. These interpretive acts help to produce the imagined bodies of epistolary communication” [Milne 2002]. The versions of self that are performed in epistolary texts (such as letters, or email) are also applicable to the blogged version of self and the relationship between reader and blog. In light of this, it is fair to argue that blogs, with their assumed imagined audience and performance of identity, can be read as a form of epistolary text.

“A defining feature of epistolary discourse, then, is the dance between absence and presence: writing a letter signals the absence of the recipient and, simultaneously, aims to bridge the gap between writer and recipient” [Milne 2002].

I find the above interesting, because I wonder if the blogger could play the role of both writer and receiver, inhabiting the present space and yet being absent at the same time. If you take one of the goals of blogging to be the voyage to self-knowledge, then surely the blogger can be seen as trying to ‘discover’ an absent, unknown self in the process of writing. Even if this is too far fetched, the aim of writing for an audience – of many, rather than of an individual – still occurs with the aim of informing and reaching out to that audience, ‘bridging the gap’ between the blogger and their imagined readership (imagined not in the sense that it does not exist, but rather that it is anonymous, often unresponsive).

Yet epistolary practice is never truly absent nor disembodied, for a present and embodied being must write the letters (or emails, or blog posts) in the first place. Milne proposes that the body becomes ‘visible’ through epistolary narrative, citing comfort in the legitimacy that a physical body entails: “the fleshy body of the epistolary author is ‘present’ at the time of writing and therefore can guarantee authenticity of communication” [2002]. The author is charged with making the recipient feel as if they were present alongside the author, using language and intonation as descriptive tools. Milne goes on to say:

The presence, intimacy and immediacy created between epistolary subjects relies upon a complex dynamic between, on the one hand, materiality, physical locatedness and embodiment and, on the other hand, references to the material conditions of epistolary communication and the corporeal body.

Further, writing opens up the doors for play and passing – like any recorded history, only a version of the truth is ever presented, and “the letter form allows correspondents to enact an identity and even adopt a persona that may differ from their ‘real’ or lived body and personae” [Milne 2002]. Indeed, the possibilities for play have been one of the most heralded features of the Internet, and even if all-out deceit is not the aim of most bloggers, the potential to present a carefully manicured and scripted version of the self is tempting.

Letters are forms of writing that depend upon distance in order to exist; can blogs be read in the same way? There appears to be some sort of compulsion in the desire to post messages online to an unknown audience – perhaps in the same way that a letter writer will write to a loved one in order to update them on their life, so too may a blogger feel the need to write to his or her audience (which may include the self) in order to take stock of their lives. A sense of distance is created between the blogger-as-author, who composes blog posts based on emotion, experience, and thought, and the blogger-as-reader, who consumes these stories from an outsider position, a distance enforced by the so-called tyranny of the screen, that absolutist medium which forces authors to read back over their script and consider the implications of publicising such a post.

Reference:

Milne, E. (2002). “Email and epistolary technology: Presence, intimacy, disembodiment.” Fibreculture v.2

Paul Ricoeur on the body

I will start off by saying that Paul Ricoeur writes like an absolute mofo. I’m not even sure that he understands what he is saying, let alone me, so excuse me if my interpretation of his work is totally wrong.

Right. Paul Ricoeur. I was hoping to find some snazzy document or blog post out there on the Net to back up my ramblings here, but I could not, because it seems that no one else is nuts enough to tackle the subject. I jotted down a few notes as I was reading, but I’m really not sure what kind of use they will be…

Ricoeur straddles the dichotomy between Cartesian dualism and the perception that the mind and body are not only inherently linked, but that they have an affect upon each other. He writes:

The priority given to bodies is of the highest importance for the reason of person. For, if it is true, as we shall state later, that the concept of person is a notion no less primitive than that of the body, this is to evoke not a second referent, distinct from the body, such as the Cartesian soul, but in a manner yet to be determined, a single referent possessing two series of predicates: physical predicates and mental predicates. The fact that persons are bodies too is a possibility that is held in reserve in the general definition of basic particulars, according to which the latter are bodies or possess bodies. Possessing bodies is precisely what person do indeed do, or rather what they actually are. [Ricoeur 1992, 33].

Can we interpret Ricoeur as arguing for the body, given that traditionally the mind has been privileged over the flesh? The Cartesian mind/body split ties in well with early Internet studies work, harking back to a time when the Internet was well and truly regarded a non-physical space (oh, how times have changed!). Ricoeur seems to arguing that, instead of insisting upon a privileged mind that is in control of a body, we would be better off thinking of a privileged personhood which encapsulates elements both of mentality and physicality – “predicates” that allow the mind and body to work together to create a dynamic whole (the individual). People – with the psyche/personality being labeled property of the “mind” – inhabit bodies, and thus our phsyical presence is implicit and unavoidable.

To be honest, I didn’t read a lot of the Ricoeur I have on hand, though I will definitely revisit it when I’ve been doing some more reading (and when it’s more relevant to my current research – this fits in with a much later chapter). However, his discussion of spatiotemporal bodies in society is deliciously relevant to my own work, so I will attempt to consider some of his argument in real-person words. Ricoeur asks us to consider not only the way that we, as individuals, engage with the spatio-temporal setting that our bodies inhabit in a singular sense (i.e., how we ‘fit into’ our bodies), but also how we as bodies fit in to the world around us – “to attack the problem of the person by way of that of objective bodies situated in one and the same spatiotemporal framework” [1992, 34]. He states that “the question of our own body returns to the forefront, no longer simply in terms of our belonging to a single spatiotemporal schema, but in terms of the relation of our own body to the objective world of bodies” [1992, 34].

This reasoning would see bodies interpreted as material, and therefore as objects – but this confuses me, as wouldn’t the interpretation of the body as an objective material item (rather than a being) mean that Cartesian dualism is here employed? Can we regard other bodies as objects and yet still acknowledge that they possess a degree of subjectivity – one that we do not engage with unless compelled to do so? Is a person (and thus a body) operating in space, simply another object until turned into subject? Ricoeur seems to answer this challenge somewhat, proposing that “one does not see how the property of selfhood could be placed in a list of predicates ascribed to an entity, even one as original as the person” [1992, 34]. Perhaps, then, I am to interpret Ricoeur here as saying that it is our lack of comfort in thinking of other human beings as objective entities and subjective individuals, depending on the setting, that inhibits us of thinking of human beings as bodies in space that are simultaneously also subjective individuals.

Reference:

Ricoeur, P. 1992. Oneself as another [trans. Kathleen Blamey]. Chicago; London: University of Chicago Press, pp.33-35

Has it really been that long?

I haven’t posted here in over a year. Oh my. I really didn’t think it had been that long…

I suddenly decided this morning that I would take up the academic blogging thing again. I need somewhere to shelve my reading notes and thoughts that is easily accessible and won’t get lost in the ever-changing pile of mess that is my idea of organisation.

It’s been an interesting year. I’ve almost quit my PhD on numerous occasions, but last night I emailed off a chapter, so, yay. It wasn’t very good, but it was writing, and that’s the main thing.

I will get around to replying to all the comments that I have neglected for the past year – I hope there are still some people around who are willing to read my ramblings and provide feedback! If not, I totally understand.

Just in case I disappear again, I can be found on a much more regular basis at my other blog, and this is what I think.

First up: Paul Ricoeur. What have I done by choosing to go there?

A long time between drinks…

… but I have been busy busy busy.

Objectives:

This research is interested in the role of online writing for the construction of self and exploration of place-identity. The central research question asks, “How do we construct a sense of self and negotiate our understanding of place in the traditionally non-spatial, mediated online world?”. I will address this question through an examination of the genre of personal blogging, by addressing the following objectives:

1. Explore the construction of self on the Internet through an interrogation of the influence of blogging and community (i.e. the awareness of audience) upon the performative subject.
2. Investigate the influence of place upon the awareness of self and subjectivity in relation to blogging and other online experience.
3. Analyse the narratives constructed through online writing, particularly blogging, and the subsequent awareness of self as gained by writer and audience.
4. Investigate the role of ‘place’ in blogging and how it is conceptualised in relation to the narration of both offline embodied and virtual experiences.

Why…

For the Research Methods section of my candidacy proposal, can’t I just say “I plan to read some books and pull together an answer based upon my findings”? Why must I go into multiple pages of theory and framework and all the rest?

EndNote: Friend or foe?

I spent quite a bit of time earlier this week screaming profanities at my computer and threatening to throw it against a wall because I just didn’t understand how to use EndNote. The seminars at uni on how-to always seem to be booked out long in advance, and I just couldn’t get my head around how to use it. Then a friend helped me to do the most basic thing (i.e. get a style) and voila – suddenly the world makes SO much more sense! Everything is easier – I can merge libraries and dragndrop and all sorts of things. I’ve even just discovered that I can the gazillions of articles I find each day to the EndNote reference, as well as my notes, if they’re typed. AMAZING!

I’m not so sure I’d go as far as to say “I <3 EndNote” yet, but I’m feeling somewhat less animosity towards it than I was earlier in the week. Thank you, Carla.

PS, has anyone checked out Omnisio yet? I don’t really have time at the moment but it looks like it could be interesting, with the ability to leave comments directly on YouTube videos. Unsurprisingly, Omnisio has just been “acquired” by Google – the owners of YouTube – for some $15,000,000. Not bad for a bunch of Aussie geeks, hey?

Wanted to purchase: 1x writing mojo

The best thing I’ve written so far:

Surely ‘place’ is a challenging, if not unusual, concept to investigate in relation to the Internet. The context is non-physical by design, and this is seen as one of its many benefits: boundaries are broken down and space rendered meaningless. But then again, we are also regarded as existing beyond corporeality, online – to an extent, at least. In fact, thinking about what it means to be online has changed significantly in recent years, to the point where it might not even be fair to consider the Internet a non-physical space. The cyberpunks tried, but it seems that we’re indelibly tied to our bodies, and therefore to our (offline) physical surroundings.

Bloggers are an interesting group to consider. For the most part, the subject matter of the blogs I will study deal not with the documentation of online findings (although they do to some degree, for sure) but rather with offline, embodied experiences. This project will question our reification in the online context, not as individuals roaming the Internet free of our fleshy encumbrance, but rather as existing simultaneously in (at least) three different places: as actors behind the computer screen, blogging everyday occurrences both for oneself and for others; as a part of the ongoing, continually written history preserved between interfaces, perpetuating online forever as a memory; and as a character in the story of one’s own life, consumed by a somewhat imaginary audience on the other side of the screen.

And is that a concern, or what? But this is the tone I like to write with… so why am I struggling so much?

90% doubt, 10% lack of preparation. This sucks.

Objectives, again…

I started typing out a rather emo and frustrated post about my research objectives earlier today, and then abandoned it as I decided it would probably be a more fruitful use of my time to do some reading about research methods, rather than bitch about my inability as a researcher. Anyway, out of the blue, I seem to have come up with four objectives that I actually quite like, and which actually sound somewhat-sortof-pseudo intelligent. Sort of. Number three is probably superfluous but I’m waiting to discuss it w/ supervisor before I give it the boot. So:

1.    Explore the usefulness of blogging – specifically, the narration of one’s everyday life and the construction of the self as a character or personality – in the adoption of a sense of self, and assess the significance of this narrative being available for public consumption.
2.    Promote the idea that identity is inherently tied to place, and that narrative is an essential way of negotiating the self in a virtual setting as it enables the “mapping” of one’s individuality and experience.
3.    Consider the role that the relationship between geographical space and cyberspace  (and the manner in which they intersect on the Internet to contribute to “place”) plays in the construction of self.
4.    Illustrate the negotiation of place as the intersection of space and ideology in a non-physical manner (i.e., how we as human beings are coming to understand ourselves and our place in the world given that we cannot rely upon our corporeal navigation of landscapes or the physical opposition of self to other objects and people).

How does that look? Maybe with those things in mind I can take the whip and crack it over the widely-spreading behind of my Background section (which, in all honesty, is a pile of loosely related information trying its hardest to come across as a coherent piece of academic writing, but failing dismally).

Reasons why I need to get off my arse.

1. I had a week off work to catch up on my Candidacy Application. “A week” in the world of someone who only works Tuesday & Thursday mornings really means 12 days. Guess what I did? Returned two books to the library, chucked a hissy fit at the stupid effing photocopiers in the Robertson Library (there’s a reason I haven’t done a scrap of copying this year – and that’s saying something seeing as I had a $50 a week copying habit during my Honours year!), opened EndNote once (and promptly left it open for a week), watched at least three cooking shows a day, faffed about online pretending to be researching (because clicking ‘refresh’ in running forums counts as research, right?), watched seven movies (a record in one week for me, I think), and generally slothed around doing sweet fuck all. As a result, I now have more work to do than I can point the proverbial stick at (which, I’m fairly sure, is more of a cattle prong than a stick at this stage).

2. My draft candidacy application is due tomorrow night. I’m waging a war against my objectives (I don’t know! I don’t give a crap!). I haven’t done any reading on research methods yet, despite leaving myself a reminder note every single day for about the past two months. And does my research bear any significance? Sometimes I’m not so sure. I’ve spent an awful lot of time over the past week wondering why the hell I’m writing about blogging when it’s nothing new anymore. But it’s certainly still relevant, and I’m not writing about blogging so much as I’m writing about the significance of blogging upon the construction of self – the storytelling elements, the way that keeping a blog helps to clear out one’s headspace, solidify one’s opinions, that kind of thing. Blogging is obviously relevent because, well, I have three that I regularly update (although not as regularly as I should). It’s just hard to stay focused when I’m reading articles from 2002 talking about blogging… I mean, you wouldn’t go writing a paper about the relevence of ICQ these days, would you? Or maybe people still use that, too.

3. At the time of beginning writing this, I had a conference abstract due on Friday. There has since been a general extension granted until August 15th – thank Christ.

4. I’ve been asked to present a lunchtime seminar at work (i.e. at the university I work at, not the university I study at) which is exciting because it will be a fantastic opportunity to showcase my research to a group of people who have a lot more experience than me, and many of whom have been researching for longer than I’ve been walking this Earth! At the same time it’s terrifying because it will be a fantastic opportunity to showcase my research to a group of people who have a lot more experience than me, and many of whom have been researching for longer than I’ve been walking this Earth! In all seriousness, though, I initially said no. I work in the Law School – and what do lawyers know about the Internet? The chair of the seminar series has been somewhat of a mentor to me over the past year with preparing for my PhD, so she obviously thinks I’m capable. It’s just a bit scary because I’m the accounts girl – I’m not an academic. I’m a member of the admin staff. These people are lecturers, not people just learning to research. The fact that they’re not going to be familiar with my subject matter should be interesting, because I’ll have to convert everything into “layman’s terms” (granted they’re all very well educated laymen!), but that same ignorance could offer a great chance for some feedback from a perspective that I just don’t have.

5. I really am a very, very, very, very long way behind. I haven’t done anywhere near enough reading!

6. I bailed out on all bar one of the seminars and training classes I’d signed up to do last semester. I just need to get my arse into gear and do them! This became painfully evident after I almost threw my poor Computey through a window last night in frustration at not knowing how to use EndNote (I swear it’s not that hard!).

So there.