Argentina

Hay varios informacion sorbe Argentina y el gobierno antes de la Junta.
http://www.portalplanetasedna.com.ar/rosas.htm
La pelicula muy interesante se llama Camila, velo velo velo!

Some Activist Blogs

I discovered a couple interesting blogs during my research of social movements in Argentina. One is called Latin America Activism. It was started by journalist/filmmaker Marie Trigona who is based out of Buenos Aires. Her writing is informative and engaging. It's also interesting to see how she is piecing together a career as a radical activist (and translator) by contributing to many alternative blogs, papers, radios, video collectives, etc... She has an extensive list of organizations she works with. I find her writings on the Dirty War and Argentine workers occupying and recuperating abandoned enterprises particularly strong.

http://mujereslibres.blogspot.com/

Renegade Eye is a collective blog comprised of alternative, independent journalists. The contributors have a hodge-podge of expertise and interests, all coming from different regions of the world, which leads to a well rounded and refreshing coverage of global issues/events (at least in the articles I have read).

http://advant.blogspot.com/

Public Access TV—Discussion Questions

1. What makes video different than some of the other forms of alt media we’ve talked about?

2. Is it an effective tool for democratic communication?

3. What does Stein’s study conclude?

4. What do public access stations have in common? (303)

5. What are the immediate concerns or goals of all three cases?

6. How do the three stations described in the chapter foster democratic communication?

7. What does this have to do with hegemony and the public sphere?

Things to Review for the the Midterm

Popular vs mass media
Textual poachers
Audience
Hegemony
Counter-hegemony
Radical media
Detournment/Culture Jamming
Public Sphere
Ideology
Mass media press
Frames/framing
Muckraking
Print
Zines
Radio
Video

Some of the cases to be familiar with:
Intellectual property
Yesmen
SDS
KPFA
FIRE
Adbusters
Witness
DOM
(these last two we'll go over in class)

Microsoft Songsmith Remixes

Microsoft Research Labs has come up with some interesting software called Songsmith, and if you already haven't seen the web ad, here it is:



(Notice that even though this is an official Microsoft Research Labs video, everyone in the video is using a Mac... hmmmm)

Okay, I know what you're thinking. Is this for real? Sadly, it is. A small youtube phenomenon has cropped up in the past couple weeks; remixes of well-known songs using Songsmith, with new instrumentation, reapplied to the original music video. Many of these are just plain ridiculous, almost as ridiculous as MS Songsmith itself. Here are a couple my favorites.

Eye of the Tiger - Survivor


Running with the Devil - Van Halen


UPDATE: I've found a little bit more explanation about Songsmith. Leo Laporte explained the origin of the software in his podcast, TWIT (This Week in Tech). Apparently a couple of people from MS Research Labs pitched the software to MS, but they weren't ready to consider it a product (this is an interesting division in MS I wasn't aware of). So, the developers, on their own, hired a company to make the ad and apparently they made it available for sale on the MS Research Lab site. If you want to listen to the podcast, go to http://twit.tv/179 (the discussion is about 48 minutes in).

Obama

First and foremost I wanted to say that I feel priveldged to be able to be part of this history in making. Obama is creating a powerful message weather others want to think so or not. The fact that I am alive and able to participate in this time is sensational. Although now that Obama is president talk is cheap and people want to see action. I would like to take a minute and discuss what I though the highlights of the inaguration were, as well as how this historical moment proliferates the question which is underlined in our class. I throughly enjoyed Obama's speech and thought it was different from pervious speechs performed by other presidents. He expressed that our nation is one, unity is the key. His speech was very we-centered. In addition to stating that our nation together must pull ourselves out of this slump, he also gives grants to the public. He does not make a distinction between the government and the people, he truly believes we are one, that the people run the government. That our nation depends on us, even though both our economy and hopes are down. Another point I found espically apperant was his frankness. Obama did not try and sugar coat anything, he told us the candid truth, but with confidence that life will go on.
Moreover now that the radical side has risen to the top, the question our class hopes to find an answer to will come forth. What happens when radical becomes mainstream? Now that Obama is the government, and in theory the people are the governemnt. What will the anarchist do? Since now the minorities seem to have power, more control than ever. What will happen to that counterculture? The only answer I can conclude to is that eventually it will open other people's eye to different lifestyles, and relalize that they are perfectly okay. On the otherhand, I do not believe that I will ever see a time where there is no such thing as radical, it is a cycle, at least right now. If the radical rises then that in fact will be mainstream, and vice versa. One day I hope that all people will at least look for the understanding to feel for another who may be opposite of them. This is when I think radical will be no more. When we can all live in a world filled of peace and understanding.

reading for Tuesday

Hi All:
I emailed everyone the article. Email to let me know if you didn't get it and I'll send it again. (adrienne.russell@du.edu)
And don't forget to check out FIRE.

Detournement and culture jamming

Hi everyone!

I have never actually blogged anything...this is all new to me. so hopefully I won't make a complete fool of myself. anyway the other class when we talked about that fancy french word 'detournement' we discussed how in ch 5 pg 59 it meant "subversion and diversion" "redeploying official visual imagery to subvert the established order." In the book it described groups like surrealists and situationalists which took part in this movement of radical media. As I was going through some past papers I had read in a communications in popular culture class, we read an article on culture jamming. I am not sure if the article link is posted right....but it's called culture jam by kalle lasn.

it is basically about the situationalists and what they did. I thought detournement fit in with culture jammers because they subvert the ideology of what culture is. They rebel against the norm of society.

file://culturejamming

Jaydiohead

Related to the idea of remix and mash-ups, make sure and check out Jaydiohead, by Minty Fresh Beats. This is similar to the idea of the Grey Album, except with Jay-Z laid over Radiohead instead of the Beatles. The tracks are available for download on the site. Get them while you can!

The tracks are very well mixed, and tend to lean towards putting Jay-Z lyrics over Radiohead music. It isn't the first time we've seen remixes of Radiohead's music. The band put up a site that has challenged fans to use the "stems" from select songs on their latest album In Rainbows for a remix. Being a HUGE Radiohead fan myself, I think this what Minty Fresh Beats has done here has the potential to be incredibly transformative.

Radiohead has a reputation for being radical in many instances. Their album In Rainbows was released on the Internet with a "name your own price" model. Although this has already been done before by artists such as Prince, it's never been done on such a large scale (the act was seen as a big fat middle finger to the music industry). Thom Yorke, the lead singer of Radiohead, who has an anti-WTO and anti-globalization stance has been involved with a good number of activist causes. Although their lyrics tend to be cryptic at times, with albums such as Hail to the Thief, it's not too hard to understand that their lyrics tend to a somber critique of the world we live in.

I'm looking forward to taking a closer listen to the juxtaposition of the two artists and see what radical messages emerge. I'm not too familiar with Jay-Z, so if anybody has any insight into some of these remixes, I'd love to hear your take on them. Here's a quick preview of one of the tracks, "Wrong Prayer". It also looks like Minty Fresh Beats is offering up the ability for people to make their own videos to go along with the songs, and the best will replace what they have posted!

Internet as New Radical Media

Hey gals and guys!

So, the Internet is, in my opinion, the ultimate Radical Media because it is practically free, and it can reach millions in a couple of clicks.

I want to share with you these media, which I will present in class today:

AVAAZ.org

SEIU.org

RestoreTheRepublic.com

RepublicMagazine.com

Example of Detournement in the Fine Art World

Following our discussion of detournement last class, I stumbled upon a fine art example that was actually on display at the Denver Art Museum as a part of the temporary modern art exhibition RADAR two years ago.

When considering detournement, which could be defined as reapproprating well-known media to create work with a different message, Japanese artist Yasumasa Morimura's subversion of the iconic Mona Lisa immediately came to mind.

Morimura appropriates da Vinci's famous Mona Lisa in his triology, Monna Lisa in Its Origin (1998), Monna Lisa in Pregnancy (1998), and Monna Lisa in the Third Place (1998). In the gallery world of "high art," Morimura takes an almost religious image and subverts its meaning by inserting his own image into da Vinci's painting, as in the arms of Monna Lisa in Pregnancy.


Monna Lisa in Its Origin (1998)


Monna Lisa in Pregnancy (1998)


Monna Lisa in the Third Place (1998)

Defying the Mona Lisa's demure, feminine smile, Morimura turns her into a gender-bending interpretation of reproduction. Perhaps Morimura is commenting on the fact that the original Mona Lisa might have been a gender-transformed portrait of the artist, Leonardo da Vinci. His work could also be commenting on the limits of the binary gender structure by presenting the image of a pregnant iconic female, transformed into a sort of half-male.

I also thought the subversion of environment was interesting, as in the second image, where Morimura depicts scenes from the Allied bombing of Nagasaki in the background. In the third, we see the background of another one of da Vinci's works, The Virgin of the Rocks. Does this deterioration of location, from idyllic curving paths and majestic hills to an obviously barren, human-destroyed wasteland to a sort of dark, underground cave counteract the creation of life apparent in the Mona Lisa figure herself?

Whatever his purpose, Morimura obviously partook in a form of culture jamming that plays both on the pretension of the art world and gender barriers. Although his work may not be as ubiquitious as a remixed movie trailer on YouTube, Morimura takes detournement into a plane of "higher culture,"introducing the subversion of popular (if old, and even iconic) media into modern discussion.

In this vein, another example to point out would be the different versions of the Mona Lisa found on a Spanish-language blog, Antidepresivo. Even more examples can be uploaded by users at Mega Mona Lisa. These, which seem to fall more under the category of culture jamming, comment on the ubiquity of the Mona Lisa image while simultaneously commenting on the ubiquity of such pop culture phenomenons as reality stars (Paris Hilton), music icons (Marilyn Manson), fads (Barbie), and film (Pulp Fiction), among others.


Two of Antidepresivo's versions of the Mona Lisa, as Paris Hilton and Marge Simpson

Readings on the Press

Sorry, everyone! This is the reading for Thursday!!!! Just read chapters Downing 10, 11, 12, 14 and we'll discuss them in class on Tuesday.

Reading for Tuesday is:
1) Downing 13;
2) Randolph T. Holhut’s A Brief History of American Alternative Journalism in the Twentieth Century ;
3) Stephen Perkins’ Approaching the '80s Zine Scene: A Background Survey & Selected Annotated Bibliography .

Downing chapter

How did radical media foment the French Revolution?

What are some of the other historical movements that depended on radical publications?

What makes comics or novels “radical”?

A Brief History....

What’s a muckracker and what conditions let to their emergence and widespread popularity?

Why did its popularity fade? And why was it revived in the 60s?

What was “New journalism” created early in the 60s?

What are some examples of print alternative journalism that exists today?

Approaching the 80s Zine Scene

What is a zine?

In what way or under what circumstances are fanzines political (this is not really in the reading, you just need to think about it). Why were people so into their punk zines?

What role did zines play in 60’s countercultural movements?

How do art publications contribute to alternative discourse?

What do zines do?

Gitlin discussion questions

Hi everyone. I know this reading is dense. Here are some questions to guide you through. Please be prepared to discuss them on Thursday. And please don’t be frustrated. Once we get some of these complex ideas down we will be moving on to the fun part—enjoying and critiquing radical media products!

1. What does Gitlin mean by ideology and by the statement “the mass media have become core systems for the distribution of ideology.”

2. What does he mean by the statement “Just as people as workers have no voice in what they make, how they make it, or how the product is distributed or used, so do people as producers of meaning have no voice in what the media make of what they say or do, or the context within which the media frame their activities.”

3. What happens when political movements rely on mass media?

4. What is a media frame? And what were some of the frames used in coverage of SDS described in the chapter Preliminaries?

5. According to Gans, what accounts for prevailing frames?

Zeitgeist

There are two separate movies on this sight the one that I was referring to in class is "ZEITGEIST: THE MOVIE" here is the link http://zeitgeistmovie.com/. Really interesting I can grantee you will mostly likely not get a sound night of sleep after watching. For me whatever your opinions might be about 9/11 the fact still remains several events of that day have been kept very secretive...but why?

Terms and Ideas

In chapter 5 I found several things very interesting about the new terms that were presented as well as terms used in the past. I was especially stumped when I cam across a couple of new terms the first in particular wad dada, I found that it explained the cultural movement a little better on Wikipedia look it up if you as well would like some more background.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DadaThe idea and concept of aura seemed particularly interesting to me and while I tried to find a closer definition as well as more examples like the one given in chap. 5 I have yet to come across any others. The idea that a form of art could respond or have dialogue with the artist himself as to where this piece of art is going and what its influence is. Honestly if a piece of any form of art were to talk back to me as the artist I would expect that drugs were involved. On the other hand I can grasp the concept of wanting to have a dialogue between the “perceiver and the object.” I always find as well as Benjamin in chap. 5 that there will always be a hierarchy between creator and created, in art or in any case. What I like about the concept is that it can be applied to the media and technology something we have humans have created and now we look to for answers in daily life. By this I mean we look to entertain ourselves, we look to for information, communication, and sometimes for direction in life as well as in guidance. In chapter 4 the reference made to media that "if they watch it then we must be giving them what they want and need." I find this to be true but only to an extent we to tell the media what we want more of, and the media continues to inject the public with what they want the public to consume, and so the cycle continues.

Discussion Questions for Thursday Jan. 8

Q1: What are some of the different views of mass and popular culture?

Q2: What are some examples of mass culture being oppositional?

Q3: What are textual poachers (and what are some contemporary examples)?

Q4. Why/how do the terms popular culture and audience contradict each other?

Q5: How do the media serve to make us accept the status quo, in fact to make us feel like the way things are natural?

Q6: What is radical media?

Q7: What is the impact of small-scale radical media?

Q8: What is Scott's view of resistance?

Syllabus

Activist Media: A historical overview
MCOM 3150
DMST 3900
T TH 2:00-3:50 pm
Mass Communications Building 119
Levels: Graduate, Undergraduate
Professor Adrienne Russell
adrienne.russell@du.edu
Office hours: Sturm Hall 216 Tues 11-12 or by appointment
Course Blog http://2009activistmedia.blogspot.com/

In studying 1960s-era Students for a Democratic Society, Todd Gitlin demonstrated how the group’s attempts to attract media attention ended with its giving over the movement message to reporters and editors. Today’s alternative cultures use internet and mobile technologies to access and circulate mainstream information, but also to rapidly exchange information that exists outside mainstream media channels. Activist movements today with access to digital tools and networks are no longer dependent on newspapers and broadcast networks to represent them, to disseminate their messages. On the contrary, these wired cultures are developing sophisticated public relations strategies. We are, however, just beginning to see how the proliferation of alternative networks of communication, and the content, practices, and identities they facilitate, interact with traditional political and business organizations, as well as with traditional media products and practices. This course focuses on media activism over the past half-century tied to various movements. We’ll examine the similarities and differences among media strategies with an emphasis on contemporary protest movements and their use of new and old media.

Books
John Downing, Radical Media: Rebellious Communication and Social Movements
Graham Meikle, Future Active: Media Activism and the Internet

Blog
You will receive an invitation via email to join our blog group. Please follow the directions in the email. This is not an extended discussion format as much as it is a graffiti wall and an ongoing exercise in collaborative linking. At least 4 times over the course of the quarter you should contribute to our blog a link and a short review (1 paragraph) of a site, article, example of activist media, art project, news story, or other resource relevant to the reading assignments. Please also post on the blog highlights and links related to your presentation (see below).

Exam
There will be a midterm essay exam.

Presentation
In order to integrate diverse material into the course, each student will be asked to present in class an example of media activism (an ad, a website, a video clip, an article, a video game, organization etc.) and present it, explaining how it exemplifies, problematizes, or in some way helps illuminate an issue or idea that we are discussing in the course. The assignment is intentionally not strictly defined. Here are a few guidelines to consider as you plan your presentation: 1) you must show something in class; 2) be prepared to talk to the class about how your media product is related to a particular topic, issue, or theory; 3) consider preparing some questions for the class to encourage involvement in the analysis of your media product; 4) be prepared to speak for at least 10 minutes and not longer than 20 minutes; 5) be absolutely sure to present on the day on which you signed up to present; 6) come talk to me or send me an email if you need help coming up with or refining an idea.

Paper Prospectus
The research prospectus should serve as a plan for your research paper. It should be 3-4 double-spaced pages and should include:
1) a clear statement of your research question;
2) a description of specifically what you are going to look at (ie, audiences/users/producers, media content, media institutions);
3) an outline of the theoretical and empirical literature that will inform your work;
4) a preliminary bibliography.

Final Paper
Choose a theory presented in class or in the readings and apply it to a historical or conteporary activist media product, practice, or phenomenon. Your paper should explore the extent to which your theory is a useful way of understanding your particular object of study.

Your paper should be between 10-15 double-spaced pages and should use either APA or MLA style of bibliographic reference. All papers must build on literature in the field and include a literature review.

Talk to me if you have a different idea about what you would like to research and how you would like to approach your material.

Evaluation
Attendance/Participation 20 percent
Presentation and Blogging 20 percent
Midterm 30 percent
Final Paper and prospectus 30 percent

Schedule

T 1/6 Introductions

TH 1/8 Towards a Definition of Alternative/Radical Media: Examining the Relationships between Culture and Politics, Content and Tactics
Reading: Downing 1, 2

T 1/13 Theories and Approaches to Media and Resistance: Networks, Community and Détournement
Reading: Downing 3, 4, 5; Wikipedia entry Detournment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detournement

TH 1/15 The Whole World is Watching: The Relationship between Mainstream and Activist Media in the 60s
Reading: Todd Giltin hand-out

T 1/20 Radical Media and Resistance in Everyday Life
Reading: Downing 10, 11, 12, 14

TH 1/22 The Press
Reading: Downing 13; Randolph T. Holhut’s A Brief History of American Alternative Journalism in the Twentieth Century http://www.brasscheck.com/seldes/history.html; Stephen Perkins’ Approaching the '80s Zine Scene: A Background Survey & Selected Annotated Bibliography http://www.zinebook.com/resource/perkins.html

T1/27 Radio: FIRE; KPFA
Reading: Downing 15, 19, 21; FIRE www.radiofeminista.net
Guest speaker Margie Thompson of FIRE

Th 1/29 Film and Video
Reading: 16, 20
PAPER PROSPECTUS DUE

T 2/3 Estlow conference http://estlow.org/
Please come at noon to the Cable Center to hear Global Voices Online co-founder Ethan Zuckerman speak, and stay at the conference as long as you can.

Th 2/5 Midterm

T 2/10 Video Activism and the Making of SoleJourney
Guest speakers Sheila Shroeder and Kate Burns

Th 2/12 Field Trip to Denver Open Media 2:30-3:30
Please watch the video “Opening Access” before the fieldtrip http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4708457008927095699

T 2/17 Introduction to Digital Era Activism: The Internet and Mobile Digital Media
Special presentation by Liz Sanchez on mobile technologies and activism
Reading: Downing 17, Meikle 1, 2, TBA

Th 2/19 Power and the Politics of Representation
Reading: Meikle 3,4

T 2/24 no class

Th 2/26 Remix and Intellectual Property Reform
Reading: Lawerence Lessig Remix, introduction, link to come
Creative Commons http://creativecommons.org/

T 3/3 Culture Jamming/Hacking
Reading: Meikle 5,6,7

Th 3/5 The Yes Men

T 3/10 Presentations
RESEARCH PAPER DUE