[-empyre-] Viral Witnessing

Fri Dec 4 03:14:09 EST 2009

Hello everyone:

We (Patty and Sam) want to raise the issue of the ethical questions of the shifting landscapes of international human rights work and the circulation of imagery in the new viral Web 2.0 world. 

It might be useful to check out Witness at http://www.witness.org, where Sam works, and a leader in human rights advocacy in both analog and digital forms that is "user generated"  Also, check out Witness' THE HUB, a user generated human rights portal.

Corporate entitities have inscribed viral into their DNA, moving from marketing to engagement cross multiple platforms to increase shelf life of media products through what Axel Bruns has called "produsage".  A product is no longer a product but a process of consumer engagement, whether with a movie or with Mentos candy. As many studies have shown, viral is more of a myth than a reality:  not many campaigns, whether corporate or political, go viral, because it is unpredictable and uncontrollable. Viral is perhaps more myth than fact, more fantasy than embodied reality, more vaudeville than intervention.

 Yet counter movements have emerged to interrogate the user-centric, the viral, the multiplatformed. Ricardo's important transborder projects discusssed last week point to new ways of thinking and practicing the viral.

We want to raise questions and contradictions about the viral, the virtual, and the spreadable in the world of human rights, a node where issues on the ground meet circulatory culture.  This area is unresolved, emerging, problematic and hopeful.  

This week, then, we offer our speculations and unresolved Questions as an opening for discussion about the manners in which new circulatory networks of media, new participants in documentation and documentary and ubiquitous tools for film-making impact on the possibilities for creating human rights action through media, and also impact the traditions of established analog social issue documentary.

 Where do issues of circulation, aggregation and remix intersect with human rights values, documentary tradition and real-life social change?

We focus here on nodal points that are unresolved conundrums, knots that need unknotting, questions that need collaborative thinking and action… These are questions that are very real and concrete for human rights practitioners, filmmakers and people facing human rights violations in diverse communities around the world.

What is at stake, we ask, for documentary media in this new human rights advocacy landscape?

Let me (Sam Gregory, from Witness)start with an anecdote. 

Recently I was driving down a remote country road in Syria in a shared taxi. A man turned back to me and offered me his cellphone, saying ‘Change’. His Spider-man themed phone was far more modern than my old Nokia so I was puzzled. 

But as he showed me the phone what he wanted to do became clear: he wanted to change clips. And what he wanted to exchange were not just silly pet tricks, the money shots from porn videos, and young girls dancing, but violent videos of people being hit and beaten-up, so-called ‘happy-slapping videos’. 

I realized he wanted to swap what I would consider abuse videos. Filmed by perpetrators, professionals and amateurs, circulated by bystanders and ordinary citizens human rights videos are entering new spaces. For us this is a starting point to consider the new issues and questions that arise around circulation, exhibition and action in human rights media in a world of radically increased, pervasive and transformed production, distribution and usage.

-------
Patricia R. Zimmermann, Ph.D.
Professor, Cinema, Photography and Media Arts
Roy H. Park School of Communications
Codirector, Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival
Division of Interdisciplinary and International Studies
953 Danby Road
Ithaca College
Ithaca, New York 14850 USA
Office: +1 (607) 274 3431
FAX: +1 (607) 274 7078
http://faculty.ithaca.edu/patty/
http://www.ithaca.edu/fleff
BLOG: http://www.ithaca.edu/fleff10/blogs/open_spaces/
patty at ithaca.edu

---- Original message ----
>Date: Wed, 2 Dec 2009 12:28:48 -0500 (EST)
>From: empyre-bounces at gamera.cofa.unsw.edu.au (on behalf of "Renate Ferro" <rtf9 at cornell.edu>)
>Subject: [-empyre-] Two  new guests.....  
>To: "soft_skinned_space" <empyre at gamera.cofa.unsw.edu.au>
>
>Thanks Ricardo for the update.  I'd like to introduce you to two other
>guests who will taking our discussion threads into the first week of
>November. Welcome to Patty Zimmermann and Sam Gregory.  Here are their
>bios and they will be making introductory posts to you soon.
>
>Renate
>
>
>Sam Gregory and Patricia Zimmermann are collaborators working on an on-going
>research and presentation project, Speculations on the Virtual and Viral
>Witness.
>The project explores and opens up the contradictions, ethical and political
>implications of circulatory culture for transnational and international
>human rights
>as it moves from fixed analog representations by professionals to more
>fluid and
>changeable user generated modes designed to move across cultures for
>advocacy.
>
>Sam Gregory is the Program Director at WITNESS (www.witness.org,
>hub.witness.org)
>which uses video and online technologies to support human rights advocacy
>worldwide.
>He is a video producer, trainer, and human rights advocate. In 2005 he was
>the lead
>editor on Video for Change: A Guide for Advocacy and Activism (Pluto
>Press), and in
>2007 he lead the development of the curriculum for WITNESS' first ever Video
>Advocacy Institute, an intensive two-week training program. He has worked
>extensively with grassroots human rights activists - particularly in Latin
>America
>and Asia, including the Philippines, Burma and Indonesia, integrating
>video into
>campaigns on a range of civil, political, social, economic and cultural
>human rights
>issues.Videos he has co-produced have been screened to decision-makers at
>the US
>Congress,the UK Houses of Parliament, the United Nations, and at film
>festivals
>worldwide. He has been interviewed on using video in advocacy for the
>Christian
>Science Monitor, the National Journal, Videomaker Magazine, Reason, PBS
>Now, Voice
>of America and many other media outlets. In 2004 he was a jury member for
>the IDFA
>Amnesty International/Doen Award. He has also worked as a television
>researcher/producer in both the UK and USA, and for development
>organizations in
>Nepal and Vietnam. He is on the Board of the US Campaign for Burma, and
>the Tactical
>Technology Collective.
>
>Patricia Zimmermann is professor of cinema, photography and media arts at
>Ithaca
>College in Ithaca New York and codirector of the Finger Lakes
>Environmental Film
>Festival (http://www.ithaca.edu/fleff) This year’s festival explores the
>theme of
>Open Space in an online, web 2.0 environment. She is the author and/or
>coeditor of
>Reel Families: A Social History of Amateur Film (Indiana), States of
>Emergency:
>Documentaries, Wars, Democracies (Minnesota), Mining the Home Movie:
>Excavations in
>Histories and Memories (California), and The Flaherty: Four Decades in the
>Cause of
>Independent Cinema (Wide Angle). She has published extensively and
>internationally
>in the areas of film history, documentary, new media, political economy of
>media,
>technological history, critical historiography, and film/new media theory. In
>addition to her scholarly work, for the last six years, she has written,
>produced
>and directed many  collaborative projects in the area of live music and
>multimedia
>projection that combines archival material with new technologies, in
>collaboration
>with major archives in the United States and internationally.  In 2010,
>she will be
>the Shaw Foundation Professor Endowed Chair of New Media Technology in the
>Wee Kim
>Wee School of Communication and Information at Nanyang Technological
>University in
>Singapore. She blogs at http://www.ithaca.edu/fleff10/blogs/open_spaces/
>> Hola all soft_skinned_Trans(i)s,
>>
>> We the Chicana Coyotek Gangs (CCG)
>> are really happy to bring today's
>> Transborder Immigrant Tool Weather Report.
>>
>> We are well liked in the Netherlands,
>> but just down the road from our
>> super lab we are not:
>>
>> On Nov 29, 2009, at 5:32 AM, whtguy916 at yahoo.com wrote:
>>
>> "Give the illegals a map to your house ASSHOLE
>>
>> DON'T GIVE THEM A MAP TO MINE
>>
>> YOU SON OF A BITCH YOU SHOULD BE ARRESTED AND BEATEN
>> FOR HELPING ILLEGAL CRIMES BE COMMITTED."
>>
>> A VERY LOUD NOTE que no? CCG is getting lots these
>> very LOUD notes.
>>
>> WE hope that the LUNAR BRACEROS from 2125-2148
>> can send some amor sin borders
>> now rather than tomorrow.
>>
>> Also, we are happy to report
>> that one of our lead chica del trans
>> dr. cardenas did some radio time:
>>
>> http://www.ksro.com/Programs/KSROAMNews/Interviews/blogentry.aspx?BlogEntryID=10074465
>>
>> by the way she connected sonically with her new little chipped-in toe
>> ring!
>>
>> Other side of el code dr. stalbaum has been doing double duty as
>> mistress of the universe and tireless dislocative tester. Her
>> new magik tool will be ready to make a scene next week!
>>
>> http://www.walkingtools.net/
>>
>> Over in OC land our poll number are down!
>>
>> Do we not give you enough LUV?!
>>
>> December 01, 2009 7:44 AM
>> Poll: 56% say border-crossing tool threatens national security
>> http://www.ocregister.com/news/tool-221803-border-poll.html
>>
>> CCG is now going to have to give up our Vegas Dreams of
>> becoming Las Gagas ricas y famous and just be one more poll dancing
>> trans-national threat.
>>
>> Meanwhile here in New Aztlán, otherwise known as North County Times
>> we have entered into a temporal cold war:
>>
>> Here's help crossing the border illegally but safely
>>
>> http://www.nctimes.com/news/local/columnists/vandoorn/article_6c7c6ca2-89dc-55a8-a206-b19bd80e657f.html
>>
>> This vato say SI!
>>
>> But, just click away it all become Fear of the nanocommunist Planet!
>>
>> http://www.nctimes.com/news/opinion/columnists/strickland/article_d06ba121-0a35-5632-b278-0b2df98cd9ff.html
>>
>> What can we say CCG likes their nanonuts con un poco de programable
>> matter:
>>
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4B6NJy9d7Vo
>>
>> Which by the way is playing at the Kid's Museum of Art in SD!
>> No one is safe now! Ha..Ha..Ha!!!
>>
>> Bueno much mas to tell but we have to go hit the dance flores
>> they are playing our song.
>>
>> Abrazos grandes,
>> CCG
>>
>> P.S. The pome of the day just for you chic at as:
>>
>> DUBLINERS
>> “La isla que
>> se repite”:
>> dub liners,
>> el Caribe.
>> Derridian
>> hospitality,
>> Joycean as
>> a “Yes,” resounding.
>>
>> por la doctor carroll
>> http://vimeo.com/6108310
>>
>>
>> --
>> Ricardo Dominguez
>> Associate Professor
>> Hellman Fellow
>>
>> Visual Arts Department, UCSD
>> http://visarts.ucsd.edu/
>> Principal Investigator, CALIT2
>> http://calit2.net
>> Co-Chair gallery at calit2
>> http://gallery.calit2.net
>> CRCA Researcher
>> http://crca.ucsd.edu/
>> Ethnic Studies Affiliate
>> http://www.ethnicstudies.ucsd.edu/
>> Center for Iberian and Latin American Studies Affiliate
>> http://cilas.ucsd.edu
>>
>>
>> Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics,
>> Board Member
>> http://hemi.nyu.edu
>>
>> University of California, San Diego,
>> 9500 Gilman Drive Drive,
>> La Jolla, CA 92093-0436
>> Phone: (619) 322-7571
>> e-mail: rrdominguez at ucsd.edu
>>
>> Project sites:
>> site: http://gallery.calit2.net
>> site: http://pitmm.net
>> site: http://bang.calit2.net
>> site: http://www.thing.net/~rdom
>> blog:http://post.thing.net/blog/rdom
>> _______________________________________________
>> empyre forum
>> empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>>
>
>
>Renate Ferro
>Visiting Assistant Professor
>Department of Art
>Cornell University, Tjaden Hall
>Ithaca, NY  14853
>
>Email:   <rtf9 at cornell.edu>
>Website:  http://www.renateferro.net
>
>
>Co-moderator of _empyre soft skinned space
>http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empyre
>
>Art Editor, diacritics
>http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/dia/
>
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>empyre forum
>empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>http://www.subtle.net/empyre