ALICE WASS
Exploring Media
Postdigital Emotion
Entry Six
‘Postdigital Emotions’, explored the phenomenological perspective of how we understand emotions, through events and experiences and how we react to these. Kant explained “all our cognition begins with experience…(but) that does not mean that all of it arises from experience” (1996: 43) as we can be affected though images or videos. There are three main emotional states: affect, emotional labour and immersion.
The key to understanding affect is the concept of moving from passivity to activity. This is seen in Seigworth and Gregg’s theory (2010: 1) that affect is being moved and moving towards objects of desire, which is proof of the body’s constant immersion. Affect comes before emotions and provides a framework for understanding emotions. An example of affect was the death of Asharf Mohammed Shaheen in Egypt, who burnt himself alive, encouraging people to demand change. Before we react to something, affect has happened, because affect means ‘before’ and ‘cause’. This is different to effect which looks at the ‘consequence’ and is not responsible for motion.
Emotional labour explores how the boundaries between work and play have blurred. Boxers are an example of this as their job is to win a fight, but their enjoyment of the sport turns work into play. Another example was the 2016 viral Range Rover advert, where a car painted with the words ‘cheater’ was positioned around London and individuals posted these pictures on social media. They were actually doing marketing work for Range Rover, while posting something fun, so becoming prosumers.
Dyson (2009) explains immersion as when a spectator temporarily suspends their disbelief and willing transports themselves into another created world. The popular example of immersion is gaming, as seen in T Taylor’s (2006) chapter, ‘Play between worlds exploring online game culture’ examining the importance of emotion in creating immersion in multiplayer games. A different way to look at immersion is through social media. Users have the ability to link all their own accounts, allowing users to become fully immersed in the digital experience, in a similar way to Google Glasses.
These concepts link to the idea that the personal is political. We align ourselves to others with similar belief systems and cultures, such as online activist groups. Emotions are not just attached to place and experience but to bodies, and personal attachments. Sara Ahmed’s article ‘Affective Economic’, focuses on affective economies of fear. Ahamed said “feelings are crucial to the forming of surfaces and borders, is also to suggest that what ‘makes’ those borders also unmakes them” (2004: 12). This explains how emotions not only create our understanding of the world but also have the power to break and change that understanding.
In the seminar we watched ‘Black Mirror’, ‘15 Million Merits’. Set in a society where people are enclosed in automated space, where every surface has a video screen with personalised entertainment. The people earn their living cycling on stationary bikes generating power in exchange for ‘merits’ a form of virtual currency. We used this episode to explore the key ideas of postdigital emotions, by discussing Bing’s character and how his emotions nearly overthrew a whole system. Critically analysing the emotional structures and the politics of emotions presented in the episode helped create an awareness of the importance of the topic and provided opportunity to test theory on a media artefact.
I then explored the key emotional structures in the Netflix Original Show, ‘Altered Carbon’. The theory of affect is seen through the death of Takeshi’s true love and how it influences his behavior and the change he wants to make. Immersion is seen as all the characters have screens in their eyes. Emotional labour is presented when a married couple’s job is to fight to the death to win a new skin, the lack of consequences transform work into play. The personal is political, as religious groups get together to protest against stacks and the rich group together and live up high up in the sky to separate themselves from the rest of society.
References:
Ahmed, S. (2004) Affective Economies. Social Text 22.2 79 (2004): 117-139. Web.
Dyson, F (2009) Sounding New Media: Immersion and Embodiment in the Arts and Culture. University of California Press
Gregg, M and Seigworth, G (2010) The Affect Theory Reader. Duke University Press: London
Kant, I (1996) Critique of Pure Reason Abridged. Hackett Publishing Company: United States of America
Taylor, T. (2006) Chapter 2 Gaming Life worlds: Social Play in Persistent Environments (21-66) Play between worlds exploring online game culture. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press