week 14

Digital Witnessing

I’m always getting a bit confused when trying to think about what the digital
world or reality is and how relates to an non-digital. Where does it begin and
end? Of course there is a clear “before” and “after” in a temporal sense, but
then what? Clearly it is and has become something so very natural so very human
and yet alien and artificial. If we are to think of it as an extension, then
what and who does it extend? Is a layering on top the non-digital, or perhaps
something more prosthetic like an integrated wearable tool for humans. Or why
not a total union of realities as a result of a massive meltdown, the collected
pieces of two shattered worlds glued together into whatever it is.

I’m aware that this probably is exactly what we have been discussing these last
six months, and my confusion is probably the result of asking the wrong
questions. Falling into the very same traps as I tried to write about (without
much success) in the last post. Why it is probably a bad, or at least not very
helpful, idea to try grasping something so very vast and bizarre (as reality)
by assuming there is a reasonable, map-able totality to describe. A universal
idea where everything will fit neatly to be found if we only look and think
hard enough.

Better then to not do that.

I think this flows well into the idea of witnessing though. Of how to see,
understand, grasp, portray and mediate. Not easy things to do, no matter the
distance (both the close up and far view both comes with their own sets of
limitations and possibilities). Being amidst what you are looking at, caught up
in relations and emotions so near they cover ones whole field of vision is very
different from witnessing from a distance, defined by a lack of relational
connections as described in Digital Narratives and Witnessing.

The digital do have a way of transforming distance. The digital provides means
of not only relaying information over spatial distance, but also allows for
greater emotional and social engagement which in some ways brings people,
places and situations closer. Building those relational connections. Even
though the digital may deepen engagement in both affect and effect over
distance, there is still not all that simple and clear. Questions about
scale, perspectives and filtering becomes more important then ever. What
one can relay over this distance is only a specific piece of information,
not without context, but with a very specific context. It is a direct
communication less obviously tied up in locality. It is a selection. It is
something to be thoughtful about if one is trying to portray or convey
what is witnessed from afar. Here the reading we did and discussions we
had made some very important points if one is to practicing this. The main
point is not to speak for other people and places, to relay information
without tainting it with ones owns projections of ‘what is’ or ‘what ought
to be’. Others may be to work with multiple ways of communication,
representation, contact points and general context building (among
others).

The very real warping (not used as a negative term but as a way of
thinking of how it changes things) effects of distance, and especially the
digital (screen), came through by the experiments we did. Having a camera
and the screen between us changed the forms of contact and communication
between us. A very blunt but telling sample of this was how adding the
screen in between, especially differences by the eyes opened/eyes closed,
completely changed the experience of what I believe was everybody
participating. If shifted the modes of communication in very tangible
ways, adding a layers of for example an observation and an ‘observer’. The
way of using the camera and the risk of it being used for recording added
even more tension. When one is recorded and mediated by an other, one no
longer is in control over ones representation. This also highlights the
(horrifying) importance of the gaze of others or how one is perceived.

//Jakob Jennerholm Hammar