The Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture Pages 337-343

        In this last section of chapter eight the book talks about postmodern space, geography, and the built environment. Just reading the title I had no idea what this section would be about, but after reading it I now know it's about the separation of time and space because of the urbanization and communication between technologies that our world experiences today. One of the primary issues that lingers over the concepts of postmodernism is "the degree in which they are a response to the fading and shifting aspects of modernism and the degree to which they signal a new era of some kind, a new episteme, a new way of thinking and being, a new way of making art, popular culture, and buildings, a new way of writing fiction, and so on" (pg. 343). We do not live in a world that is postmodern, but in a world where the tensions of modernity and postmodernity are active and present. Globalization's production of a wide economic divide has caused global capitalism to stray further away from the center of economic wealth and technological advancement. 

The Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture Pages 401-413

        In these sections of chapter ten the book talks about global brands, globalization and media flow. Everyone knows what a brand is and everyone seems to have a favorite when it comes to a certain product. There will always be one you like more than another, but global brands make this a lot easier for everyone to decide. Global brands can be seen as homogenizing forces, bad consumption habits, symbols of capitalism and even result in the emergence of specific cultural and national identities under the sign of the brand. Certain brands can even become symbols of modernity or cultural imperialism. Before reading this I didn't even realize that global brands so closely related to globalization. Everyone identifies to a specific nation, region and culture, but the aspects of having a global and local identity are not contradictory, but interdependent. Each and every definition of globalization varies from person to persona and topic to topic, but because each and every person is different, each and every view of the world is going to be different. So understanding every form of visual media or image is essentially necessary to understand visual culture today. The ways in which popular culture is produced and travels the world has a great impact on each and every person, no matter how different. Television, cinema, the Internet, almost anything technological that can transmit a message is going to affect each person differently, but how we react to these messages is what ultimately defines our world, and what is going to be left of it after we are gone. 

The Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture Pages 389-401

        In this section of the book visual culture is taken into a broader sense and looked at on a global scale. The globalization of communication technologies over the past few decades has shown that global image flows may allow "an increased circulation of concepts, ideas, politics, and images, but this also helps to foster the growth of multinational corporations and the expansion of political influence by powerful nations over distant domains with fewer resources" (pg. 389). The idea of global scale, globalization, and images are all closely related. With things like satellites we are able to get images of the world. A global presence is thus created and the whole globe is connected. Certain images not only provide the visual pleasure of looking at an interesting image, but also provide information about current changes in environment, in historical ways, in political ways, etc. These images, especially satellite images, are great tools in the global sphere. There are so many ways to use these images to help us understand things; to understand the global movement of culture for example was have to define imperialism. Cultural imperialism "refers to how an ideology, a politics, or a way of life is exported into other territories through the export of cultural products" (pg. 397). In a sense it's like another way of broadcasting. This way of transmitting ideas, ideologies, concepts, etc. globally isn't anything new. When everyone knows what is going on in the world, increased globalization of media helps to confirm national ideologies giving people a sense of participation in the audience. 

The Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture Pages 265-279

        In this section of the book its all about advertising, consumers, and desire. Consumer products and brands and the advertising that sells them aim to present an image of things to be desired, people to be envied and life as it should be. Advertisements and advertisement companies have to predict what they think the consumer world wants, needs, and has to have. Because ad make promises to the viewer/audience it is our job to interpret these images in the best we know how. Not all images are going to be interpreted in the same way by everyone. The consumer world and consumer societies promote this idea of individual choice even though consumers are being told what to buy the advertisements make it seem like it was the consumer's idea. With a constant demand for new products, consumerism will never end, everybody always wants more. Also with so many products being made overproduction happens causing advertisement companies to work harder to persuade the consumer to buy more. The idea of selling self-sulfillment is a big money maker for advertisement companies; it is crucial to marketing and consumption. Advertisements plays on our emotions of envy, desire and belonging. Advertising asks us not to consume the product, but to consume the signs in the semiotic meaning of the term. No matter what the item or how we feel about it there will always be pressure and pleasure in consuming. There will always be that needing feeling to purchase that item, followed by a disappointment feeling after we purchase the item. 

The Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture Pages 183-200

        In this section of the book it talks all about visual technologies, image reproduction and copies. The term reproduction is defined not in the ways we think it might be; it is used to describe the ways that cultural practices and their forms of expression reproduce the ideologies and interests of the ruling class and the reproduction of ideology through media also reproduced the political order and its episteme. Technology has always been evolving over time, but what many overlook is that it has important and influential effects on society. Technology has a weird way of popping up when it is needed. Usually some one has a problem and then as more and more people have the same problem, someone eventually invents some way to solve that problem, usually with some kind of new and evolving technology. Photography emerged as a popular medium, not simply because it was invented, but because "it fulfilled particular social demands of the early nineteenth century" (pg. 184). From photography evolving, like all technology does, the world was introduced to image reproduction or the copy. Different things can be copied in different ways, but now when it comes to the image and the mass reproduction, it is much harder to tell which is a copy and which is an original. Not only is it hard to tell images apart, but also many kinds of artwork today. "Reproducibility as a quality of the medium moved the artwork out from the centuries-long emphasis on uniqueness and authenticity as the qualities that confer value to it" (pg. 195). The authenticity of an image or artwork is valued above all else and because of this it has become the center of all things. Our society values authenticity with just about everything, people, clothes, brands, images, artwork, icons, etc. A copy's value does not lie in its uniqueness, but in its aesthetic, cultural, and social worth throughout the world. 

The Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture Pages 223-260

        In this section of the book it talks all about media and how and where it is used. Media is used in everyday life and in our mundane routines. We see the world and our lives through theses screens  or information translated from those screens by voice output. Mass media and the masses refers to the changes in structure of our societies "undergoing industrialization and the emergence of a massive working class" (pg. 233) and how media on a global scale effects it and it affects media. Broadcasting and webcast media is almost an entirely different thing in itself. In this section broadcast is defined as  "one central source broadcasting a signal to many venues, but narrowcasts is defined as "targeted, vis cable and other means, to niche audiences". When the narrowcast model was introduced it allowed for the development of community-based programming, but when the explosion of consumer-user productions and web media hit, broadcast communications lost much of its dominance. Later in this section the idea of propaganda showed up again and how mass media is a form of propaganda in itself. Weather it is good or bad it is a very powerful thing that can serve many different social purposes in different cultures. Media, the public sphere, and national and global events are all persuaded by propaganda and mass media. Many different forms of media helped to create the public sphere and the differences between public and private emerged. The circulation of ideas has been sped up to basically instantaneous. The primary function of media promotes feelings of connectedness in the audience, and with that comes a national connectedness which in turn creates nationalism within the county. There are a variety of different people and communities to broadcast to and a variety of sources and media to broadcast.

Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture Pages 200-220

        In these pages of the textbook the first thing that I read about that was really interesting was about propaganda and how reproduction allows images to circulate with political meaning. I have heard and learned about propaganda before, but never really put two and two together. The only way for propaganda to survive is through images. The increased ability of images is to captivate and persuade which is basically the definition of propaganda. Another piece of this I found interesting was the issues of copyright and ownership that goes along with images and propaganda. Even though the audience is allowed to feel certain emotions and loyalty toward the images they see, for all audiences to see the image needs to be copied and distributed worldwide. "The proliferation of images through reproduction also means that images can be more easily accompanied by different kinds of text, which can dramatically change the signification of the image". Propaganda can be changed from city to city with the same intention of meaning, but the meaning can change so much, especially when text in added. The codes and laws of copyright and ownership not only regulate the amount and flow of copies, but also shapes peoples minds and ideas about what constitutes a legitimate use of a copy and what constitutes to be unlawful. "The Fair Use Doctrine (made law in the Copyright Act of 1976) permits copying without permission of the copyright holder in certain limited cases" (pg. 208). I thought this was interesting because who decides who gets to regulate these laws and say which "certain cases" are legitimate and which aren't. In the reproduction and the digital image section it talks a lot about cameras and photoshop. Cameras allowed the photographer to see the image immediately after taking the photograph, allowing "instantaneous pleasure of the image". With the advancement of computer programs like photoshop everyone is now allowed to edit, enhance, correct and manipulate an image in order to alter its composition, framing, color and combinations of elements and scenes. It has always been a possibility to fake realism in photographs with constructed scenes made from our imagination.  

Tuesday October 21, 2014 Discussion

        The discussion/field trip that we took on Tuesday was really interesting talking about art in the gallery, art in general and artists. I thought hat was really interesting question that came up was, "Why are people so afraid of art?" I never really thought about it before as a fear. What is it about art that makes it so scary? I think that art in general is not scary, but the emotions, feelings, responses and reactions is what is scary. Everyone's immediate reaction is to not say or do anything that would make others judge them in any way, so being forced to look at art and the emotions that art can bring out of a person can a scary process for many people. If people would just go in the gallery and look at it,  they will realize that it is not going to hurt you. Another interesting point that was made during this discussion was that art is marginalized. It made me wonder why? I think that art is marginalized because it isn't as common as people think it is. Those who grew up around art and who's lives are influenced by art and around art daily don't realize how many people out there who either don't like art or don't categorize it as anything legitimate. I think that all art is significant in some way or another, no matter what it is. The artist or artists who created the work had to have had some kind of meaning or purpose behind the work.   

Google changes 'to fight piracy' by highlighting legal sites

        The BBC News article titled "Google changes 'to fight piracy' by highlighting legal sites" talks about how google has implemented this new policy to help fight piracy. They have made their search engine more legitimate and legal. Even though the companies that want their name and label to come up first have to pay Google for this, it helps the user be less likely to download or stream illegal content. In the comments of this article someone wrote, "If it's not Google's responsibility to police its own remain whose responsibility is it? Governments? The Internet Police?" I thought this was an interesting point because Google itself is also a company that needs to make money and just like any other company they have every right and responsibility to have full control over their domain on the Internet. The music industry and entertainment sector of the web may not agree with Google's new policy. They may not have the funds or opportunity to pay Google for these 'pop ups' especially if they are a new band/company/label. Google may only be limiting who pops up on their search engine to those who can afford it, but is also limiting the amount of piracy, legitimacy and legality. 

Women, Fire and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal about the Mind

        In Women, Fire and Dangerous Things, author George Lakoff begins by describing what a category is and how all the different things that dominate our lives are assorted into categories. "...things are categorized together on the basis of what they have in common" (pg. 5). I liked this quote because of how true it is. Everything that humans categorized is by similarity and I thought it was interesting how things are never classified by how they differ. The newest theory of categorization shows that the way humans categorize is based on their principles. One things that Lakoff said that I thought was really interesting was when he said, "Without the ability to categorize, we could not function at all, either in the physical world or in our social and intellectual lives" (pg. 6). I never thought about the ability to categorize as a vitality of life. I believe that humans do not need to categorize to function, but I also believe that having this ability allows humans to be exactly that, human. As the properties that these categories have become the defining factor of that category it has become easier for the coding of computer software to take over this ability to categorize. I feel like this isn't anything new. For years, since the computer and the internet were invented, the computer has slowly been taking over multiple jobs that were originally done by humans. I never thought about categorization and categorization methods as something that needed this much discussion, but Lakoff definitely seems to think so. I think it is an interesting topic that forces the reader to see things in a whole new light. 

Practices of Looking Pages 49-62

        Chapter two of Practices of Looking is titled Viewers Make Meaning, so I was expecting this chapter to be about the viewer, how viewers view different pieces of digital work and what different pieces of work can mean to the viewer. The book defines a viewer as "an individual who looks" whereas an audience is "a collective of lookers". I never thought that a viewer and a audience could be so different from each other, but both use their eyes to view these images that seem to call attention to those viewing it. I liked how the book talked about how even though images ken be seen in the same way, they can have different meanings to different people. "I do not have to like or appreciate the dominant messages of the image to be interpolated by it or to understand that message" (pg 50). I liked this quote because I felt like it was basically saying that the viewer doesn't necessarily have to like an image for it to have an effect on you. 
        In the next section titled Producers' Intended Meanings I assumed that it would be about Producers, but when I think about producers I think about movie producers and the movie industry of Hollywood. I had no idea there would be producers for digital images. I knew that people who create different things sometimes have a meaning behind their work that isn't always portrayed to the viewer or audience, but because of technology today consumers can produce their own media to create their own meanings. Our everyday reality of producers as consumers has become the norm because the technology and manipulation of images has become so ingrained that it no longer surprises me about how much piracy and plagiarism is occurring in the digital world today. 
      The last section Aesthetics and Taste talks about ho both aesthetics and taste are the fundamental concepts of value and pleasure that it brings to the viewer. The value of a piece of art can bring pleasure through its beauty, style, reactive virtuosity or its technical virtuosity. But an interesting point that the authors make is that what most people would consider naturally beautiful or pleasing is actually "culturally specific" (pg 56). This basically means our culture has predetermined what we think should and should not be pleasing to the eye. This type of brainwashing prevents the viewer and audience from foaming their own opinions of likes and dislikes. 

Free Culture–Pages 15-30

        In pages 15-30 of Free Culture Lawrence Lessing continues the introduction by talking about piracy and the war that it has unleashed. He says that because the Internet has provoked this war, piracy has become a problem for copyrighted and uncopyrighted content. The fear that Lessing emphasizes is that the author of this content will be robber of his profits when his content is being shared via the Internet. From reading this last section of the Introduction, I feel like Lessing is not completely sure where he stands on the issue of piracy. He clearly states that it is wrong, but he then goes on to also state that there are these laws that make it hard for people to not commit piracy because these laws are so strict and complicated that it is hard to keep track of right and wrong. 
        Chapter One, titled Creators, begins with the background of Walt Disney and how his ideas were not completely original ideas. The ideas were born out of the idea of free culture and public domain resulting in what was later called Walt Disney Creativity. Whether borrowing was slight or significant it was allowed, legal and approved. No permission was needed from anyone. The phenomenon in Japan called Doujinshi was something I had never heard about before, but I thought that the rules and regulations surrounding was interesting because it was essentially an illegal act. I thought it was intriguing because it kind of seemed like a way to get more people more involved with the sharing of this comic. I think that it is allowed to be a copycat comic so that people will have the opportunity to share it with others easily. Even though it is illegal I am surprised that it is still allowed to happen. I wonder if there is anything like this in America and if not I wonder if anything like this has least tried to exist. If it did I don't think that the United States government would allow it to go on for very long. Maybe one  of the reasons Japan lets it go on is only because it profits the legal comic manga. I don't feel like this is a good enough reason to let it keep happening even though I agree that it is an unique and interesting way to keep that comic Doujinshi alive. The last part of this chapter talks about how some things in our society today "remain free for the taking within a free culture" (pg 29). But what I wondered about was who gets to decide what remains free and what needs permission to be used. Lessing ends with saying that he thinks out culture is becoming less free. But he never really states his opinion on this, but I think that permission is an important thing to have for somethings, but not all things. So I guess the ultimate question is where is the fine line between the two?

Free Culture–Pages 7-15

        In Lawrence Lessing's Introduction to Free Culture he begins by talking about how the Internet is made up of collaboration, and how not one single person can be credited with its invention. I think that this was a relevant point to make because not only is the invention of the Internet a collaboration, but the every day use of the Internet continues to be a collaboration as well. Lessing goes on to say that because the Internet is constantly being used by so many different people, there has to be some kind of law that covers the people putting things on the Internet and the people viewing those things on the Internet. But he also states that even though there should be some law, these laws need to be within reason. He says, "That power has changed the marketplace for making and cultivating culture generally, and that change in turn threatens established content industries" (pg.9). He argues that these industries want to remake the Internet before the Internet remakes them and that the law is basically trying to regulate the creativity that the Internet provides to its users. Because many people do not understand the Internet and its laws, they are automatically resentful towards it. Lessing even says that the first step in a solution is just by understanding the problem. I like the quote he uses later on in this sections that states, "There has never been a time in our history when more of our "culture" was as "owned" as it is now" (pg. 12).I really liked this quote because I feel like Lessing is basically saying the we should seize the day, but in a way that accepts our 'free culture'. 

Practices of Looking–Pages 26-46

        In this section of the book the meaning and value of images is defined and explained. Before reading this section I knew and felt like I understood the basics of meaning and value. I knew that everything has meaning and everything has value, they can just come in different ways to different people. What was helpful in my understanding of the meaning of images was the comparison between denotative and connotative meanings within a image. The example the book used was of the Nike swoosh. The denotative meaning of the swoosh is that when we visually see the swoosh we automatically know that it is the symbol for Nike and the connotative meaning is that when we see the swoosh we think about its quality and popularity among consumers. There is no way of knowing any of this if we didn't already know how to decode the images we see around us everyday. Elements such as color, shades of black and white, tone, contrast, composition, depth, perspective, and style of address to the viewer can all help in relying the images we see to mean different things when put into different contexts. There is a similar process that goes with the value of an image as well. "Images do not have value in and of themselves; they are awarded different kinds of value—monetary, social, and political—in particular social contexts" (pg. 34). I feel like value can be a tricky thing to grasp, but it is so arbitrary varying from person to person that images can have different values just because someone put them there. I really liked that the book brought up the point that many people believe that just because a work of art is in an expensive gallery or displayed in a special way it gives that work of art value, but this is not necessarily the case. Different pieces of art can have more or less value to different people regardless of the state in which they are displayed. 

Practices of Looking–Pages 145-151

        In this section of the book the focus is on realism and how it affected and still affects our past and present. History is an important part of any culture so it is only natural to follow the development of different ways of seeing, knowing the world, and different cultures views about value and meaning. The main question the book asked in this section was, "...what do the different approaches to realism that we find in art and visual culture tell us about the culture and politics of a given social context" (pg.146). I thought this was an interesting question to bring up because each culture is going to have a different reaction to the histories of other cultures' approaches to realism. Not only are the ideas and attitudes towards realism are going to be different for each person, but each persons own history are going to affect the way they view not only their own culture, but other cultures as well. I feel like that because there are so many different aspects of realism, there can never be a right and wrong answer, just individual ones. A term that this section of the book used that i had never heard of before was episteme. The book explains that it is "an accepted, dominant mode of acquiring and organizing knowledge in a given period of history" (pg. 149). So not only will each culture have different views about different aspects of realism, but each culture within each period of history will have even more of a variety of different views about realism as well. I really liked how much the book emphasized this because so many people are affected by different things, but can end up in the same place in their lives, but also different people can be affected by the same thing and end up in different places of their lives. You never know where life is going to take you next and I think that is a goof thing because then life wouldn't be as much fun. 

Practices of Looking–Pages 9-26

        Chapter one, titled Images, Power, and Politics begins with, "Every day, we engage in practices of looking to make sense of the world" (pg.9). I really like that the chapter starts off with this because I feel like it can be real easy to take our eyesight for granted and the only way they we can truly 'make sense of the world' is by looking around us at what has been created for our visual stimulation to understand life and its processes. Because single images can mean different things to different people, they can have a variety of multiple different meanings, connotations, and significance. I liked how the section on Representation compared images as a type of language; a way to understand, describe, and define the world around us. I had never thought about images providing an explanation for something I don't understand. I liked the example that the book used of René Magritte's Les Deux Mysteres. I felt like this picture by itself really helped to emphasize that images are literally images and by saying that a image of a pipe it literally not a pipe is almost so mind blowing that it is hard to explain in words. The rest of this section of the book talks about the myth of photographic truth and the ideology of images. I thought it was interesting to rad about images and their not so truthful state. Images are not always what they are perceived to be, but because most of the time they come close, many people just take it for granted that what you see is what you get. Images created by cameras can be altered from their original state by the change in lens, aperture, lighting, etc., but with today's technology images can be altered or manipulated even more with the help of computer programs like photoshop. 

Practices of Looking–Introduction

        The introduction of the book Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture by Marita Sturken and Lisa Cartwright starts with what our visual culture is and what it entails in our society today. The very first thing that stood out to me in this section of the book was when the authors said, "We negotiate the world through visual culture...Our lives are increasingly dominated by communication technologies...that allow for the global circulation of ideas, information, and politics" (pg.1). I like this because I felt like it really summed up exactly what our world, especially my generation is going though and growing up with. I feel like the more technology evolves and becomes more complex then more complicated it gets, but every new generation is trained to adapt and change to accommodate this new complex technology because our world doesn't seem like it ever wants to give up on our technology dominated communication. The introduction of the book touches a little bit about this, but goes on to explain what the rest of the book to going to cover. It explains that even though there are all kinds of different cultures and subsets within each culture, this book is more focused on the visual, those things that we can physically see with our eyes. Things such as paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, film, television, video, digital images and advertising are what most people, including myself, think of when they think about visual culture, but the book goes on to include things like animation, graphic novels, comic books, popular culture, news images, entertainment, images as legal evidence and science images were all things I had never though about before, especially as visual culture that can greatly influence our lives.