Category Archives: Digital

Story of racism on plane

Nationality: American
Age: 22
Occupation: Photographer
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 3/23/12
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

The story goes, which my informant learned from a friend sharing the story on facebook, an old white woman got angry that she was seated next to a black man. She kept getting upset, yelling at the flight attendant as the other passengers looked on in horror, no one saying anything. The flight attendant told the woman the only other option was to be seated in first class and then solves the woman’s problem… by moving the black passenger to first class. Everybody on the plane then started cheering, it is said. The story was one many of her friends were posting on facebook just a few months ago, and it had many thousands of likes.

My informant thought it was cool that facebook to quickly spread such a story, and she liked the story because it was inspiring. I think it’s interesting because of how it perverts expectations. It makes you angry and you want to keep reading to see what happens because it has evoked an emotion from you, and then, because you are already in an emotional state, it is able to flip the anger into joy when the unexpected occurs. We are so happy to see justice in the story then we have a greater attachment to the story. In an age of information where there are millions of stories at your fingertips, we seem more interested in those that are different or more complex (i.e. here the story flips expectations). The story may not be true, but because it is heartwarming, people like it anyway and may even want it to be true more.

“The Lyre” — Marching Band Gossip Publication

Nationality: Vietnamese
Age: 17
Occupation: Student
Residence: Irvine, CA
Performance Date: 3/12/12
Primary Language: English
Language: Vietnamese, Korean

My informant lives in Irvine, California, where she participates in the marching band at her high school. The marching band is very closely-knit, made of about a hundred and twenty people, where, she said, “everyone knows everyone and anything that happens is general knowledge in like, two seconds.” Calling themselves bandos, they form somewhat of a sub-culture in their high school, always hanging around the music building and forming their friendships and relationships oftentimes solely within the confines of the marching band.

In this closely-knit community, they have an unofficial gossip publication called “The Lyre,” which is passed out to the members on the bus on their way to performances at football games and competitions. The secret of the writers of “The Lyre” is very heavily guarded, although most people know that they consist of a group of seniors hand-picked by the seniors from the previous year. “The Lyre” is written secretly, printed secretly, and circulated amongst the band at least once every other week, containing generally about fifty pieces of gossip about goings-on within the band, whether made-up or real. The title of “The Lyre,” in fact, is a pun on the word “liar,” and so about half of the gossip is usually fake, made with the intention of being humorous. The other half though, of course, is real, and though monitored by the band director to make sure that nothing potentially offensive makes it through, it caused, my informant says, some pretty awkward situations:

“I think I’ve been in it like ten times, which is an okay number, and none of them have been too bad, except for this one time when they uh, paired me up as a joke with this junior guy who I actually really liked, and I think the guy knew I liked him too. I was a freshman and he was a junior so obviously, you know, it was pretty hopeless and sad. Anyway, everyone always pokes fun at the people who are on The Lyre so they teased us about it for the rest of the football game, like making us stand next to each other in the performance arc and stuff, and since Winter Formal was coming up, they kept teasing me to ask him to formal, which I actually really wanted to do, but then now that they’d said it I didn’t want to do it anymore obviously, because they’d think it was a joke or something. And the writers of the Lyre would feel so freakin’ important. So yeah. They had a whole shitload of control.

A piece of gossip would be presented with the initials of those involved (which were usually very easily recognizable, especially if you were the only one in the band with those initials), like this:

KL and DJ have been seen spotted frolicking off-campus for lunch. Sure didn’t look like they were “just friends” when they were sharing ice cream in the Crossroads the other day.

The fake ones were generally very obviously fake:

SM has had flowers growing on her head for the past week! Who planted it, and who’s watering it? It continues to be a mystery.

Nobody took “The Lyre” very seriously, however, and it was always somewhat of a joke, something light and funny to read on the long bus rides to football games and competitions. “It probably came from how close we all were,” She said. “I think if any other club or group did this, it probably would never have worked out. People would’ve gotten offended or something, and there would’ve been drama. But we all knew each other so well, and so these little things never mattered to us, it was all just funny. And it was also a way to get closer too, through like, shared pain and embarrassment, or something. It’s like, a place to cultivate our inside jokes and isolate ourselves even more from the rest of school. [Laughing] It’s such a cultish thing to do, but it was so fun.”

 

 

 

Annotated Piece 2 – Analysis of NY Times Article “Talk with Your Fingers”

The following post is a brief analysis of the article written by John McWhorter, an opinion contributor to the New York Times.

A link to the article can be found here: http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/23/talking-with-your-fingers/?ref=opinion

This article caught my attention as one that, perhaps unknowingly, provides an excellent modern take on how folklore is tied to written communication. I highly recommend that you at least briefly read this article, as it contains a unique perspective on an issue that is relevant to all of us: written electronic communication. In the age of text messages and emails, it seems many of us go hours without a single meaningful face-to-face interaction. In addition, the very nature of our communication expectations has accelerated, making us more impatient than ever.

In this article, John McWhorter explains that written communication’s inception was not dissimilar from the text messages of today. Citing “The Epic of Gilgamesh” McWhorter includes a passage that was used to describe the fall of a city:

I will pull down the Gates of Hell itself,

Crush the doorposts and flatten the door,

And I will let the dead leave

And let the dead roam the earth

And they shall eat the living.

McWhorter points out that Gilgamesh was in fact a canonized piece of the region’s folklore. Because spoken word strives for efficiency (according to McWhorter), the story of Gilgamesh is told in relatively short bundles of words.

This is how McWhorter knows that “The Epic of Gilgamesh” was in fact a piece of transcribed oral history, not a previously written story.

McWhorter states further that the modern “text and email” culture is in fact moving back toward the ancient story of Gilgamesh’s style. This is a result of technology allowing us to more closely tie our verbal communication to its written counterparts.

In essence, I am implying that from McWhorter’s article, we must continue to challenge our current notion that folklore is solely comprised of live oral performances.

 

 

Video Mash-Up- “The Dark Knight Trailer Recut – Toy Story 2”

Nationality: N/A
Age: N/A
Occupation: N/A
Residence: N/A
Performance Date: N/A
Primary Language: English
Language: N/A

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QFWBFIEuig


This video is a mash-up of the films Toy Story, Toy Story 2, and The Dark Knight. It was uploaded onto YouTube on August 10, 2008 and as of April 28, 2011 has gained 1,498,101 views.
The video takes the soundtrack from a theatrical trailer for The Dark Knight and cuts footage from Toy Story and Toy Story 2 to match the onscreen action and dialogue. Woody becomes the Joker, Buzz Lightyear becomes Batman, and Rex the Dinosaur becomes Alfred Pennyworth. The footage is cut together to create the impression that the Toy Story franchise is a dramatic franchise in the same vein as The Dark Knight, appropriately cutting action shots from the films to create a more adventurous tone than the two original films. None of the footage is altered (except for time cutting and splicing) and the soundtrack is similarly unaltered- the artistry comes out of the combination of these very different film franchises.
This is reflective of a very postmodern collapse of different facets of culture: While both film franchises are very successful, Toy Story is directed at family audiences while The Dark Knight skews toward adolescent male audiences. While this was made shortly after the release of The Dark Knight, the inclusion of Toy Story reflects the modern generation’s nostalgic attachment to that 90’s film series. While Toy Story 3 would bring the franchise back to relevance in 2010, this mash-up demonstrates continued interest in the series even in the late 2000s.
As with most mash-ups, there is the question as to how original this editing actually is. However, the art of film editing has always been something of a mash-up art form: Editors cut together footage created by the director of photography. As such, there seems to be a more direct appreciation of video mash-ups, because it’s a more practiced and recognized art form (and the great success in viewership testifies to that). The widespread availability of digital editing has democratized that process and made it possible for people to cut footage from popular films like this.
Furthermore, the great disparity of the two franchises (an animated comedy series and a dramatic crime-thriller) is reflective of this generation’s desire to combine interests. With digital archiving, facets of our childhood are immediately accessible, whether via DVD or the internet. At the same time, we have our contemporary interests, such as films like The Dark Knight. With both so readily at hand, there is no need to separate them. If anything, this video seems to be an attempt to combine those interests and address the desire to experience everything at once, as is common in our age of information overload. The result is a piece of artistry widely regarded as cleverly amusing.
Annotation:
“YouTube- Watchmen & WALL-E Mashup Trailer – 720p HD.” YouTube.com. 8 Aug. 2008. Web. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-Ka8DnUVEQ>.
This mash-up video goes even further with editing, altering the images of the film WALL-E to fit the trailer for the film Watchmen. Again, there is a combination of an animated comedy with a dramatic comic book adaptation. This mash-up features more dramatic editing, slowing down and speeding up footage, creating unique title credits, and even using supplemental features from the DVD release to cut something that matches the trailer soundtrack. It is debatable, however, whether or not the greater editing contributes to its lesser popularity on YouTube, as if it skewed too far away from the attachment to WALL-E.

Folklore 2.0: Pedo Bear

Nationality: American
Age: 25
Occupation: Colorist for Cartoon Network
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: 20 April 2011
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish, Japanese

White/Hispanic

California State University Fullerton

Illustration

Colorist for Cartoon Network’s Regular Show

English, Spanish

20 April 2011

Internet meme/Folklore 2.0-Pedo Bear

“I don’t remember when I first saw slash heard about pedo bear. It just kinda popped up on the Internet a few years ago. It’s just kinda this innocent looking bear thing that supposedly preys on little girls. People like to photobomb pictures of kids with it, and post them on the Internet for laughs. Its pretty much viral now, there’s now a website dedicated to pedo bear, it appears on shirts. I don’t think that in anyway is it actually supposed to be used to signify child pornography or anything. For awhile the media was portraying pedo bear as some sort of secret code or rallying message for a group of pedophiles. While I’m sure some do, it really isn’t used for that from what I’ve seen.” AT considers pedo bear as largely harmless, an Internet phenomena that’s being tossed around by bored people on the Internet. Some of its use seems to be making a joke of something that is obscene and terrible. She states, “sometimes young people put up risqué pictures of themselves online, like on Myspace. People take these photos and then insert pedo bear to show that the fact that someone is posting these pictures in the first place is inappropriate.

Looking at the description and argument put forth by AT, I conclude that her observations are pretty spot on. As an artist, she is familiar with the ways characters can personify meanings and stereotypes. Pedo bear is an example of Folklore 2.0, it originally started on 4chan, an internet blogging site. From there, pedo bear had gone viral and has jumped to several different mediums. I have seen it on shirts, mugs, hats, and stenciled on a school sign. Pedo bear has gone so mainstream on the internet, that I saw a news report to watch out for child molesters after an individual dressed up as pedo bear at an anime convention. During the Vancouver Winter Olympics, a Polish newspaper printed a picture of Pedo bear that was snuck into an image of the Olympic mascots. Calling someone a pedo bear is akin to calling someone a pedophile. The biggest characteristic is that he is basically a pedophile. Though a pedophile, the character is considered funny and likeable to an extent.