Reading Davis’ talk was extremely hard. Very confusing and lots of re-reading passages. He says that society today, as a whole, is deviating further away from society in the Renaissance, in the sense that nowadays, society is becoming more and more based on visual cues. I agree with this statement, as you look around, at the movies and shows, everybody is trying to outdo everybody else with big explosions and lots of on screen action and whatnot. Its becoming more and more of a brute force thing, innundating you with all the visual cues. There’s none of that simple elegance of sounds. Which brings up another part of Davis’ talk about the differences between visual and acoustic space.

“Where visual space emphasizes linearity, acoustic space emphasizes simultaneity—the possibility that many events that occur in the same zone of space-time. In such a scheme, a subject—a person, maybe—organizes space by synthesizing a variety of different events, points, images, and sources of information into a kind of organic totality”

The way I see it, visual space is portrayed as this grid like structure. Rigid and non moving. That it doesn’t adjust to changes. Acoustic space, on the other hand, is viewed as this fluid ethereal…stuff. Acoustic space is something that does adapt to the changing times, and as a result, acoustic space has a good foothold of become much more than what it is today, as acoustic space tends to put you right in the middle of everything. Although it seems Davis is of the opinion that soley an acoustic world (or nearly all acoustic) is the best, I still believe that there is benefits to a visual display. I am with Davis though that in today’s society, people don’t view sounds as highly as they should. Sound is just an accompaniement to say a movie, where I believe an emphasis of sound or visuals would make it much deeper and have many more levels of emotion.

“But in an immersive acoustic environment, you might hear all the sounds you would hear on a street corner, spatially organized in real time, surrounding you. This is much, much, stronger than a visual experience, which tacitly distances you, places you in a transcendent, removed position, rather than embodying you at the center of a new context.”

 Clearly, you can see that Davis sees the acoustic space as better. You have to actively engage yourself in it, as opposed to an idle spectator on the sidelines. and with today’s machine’s having such a developed “acoustic domain”, I think Davis truely believes that future will be integrated more and more with this acoustic space. One of his final comments is this:

“As our machines become more complex, our relationships with them will become more complex, and whole new domains and dimensions will keep opening up”

While I do think that his ideas about the acoustic world are true, sound being a lot more poignant than visuals, this statement was very chilling. Just thinking about the statement conjures up images of humans eventually becoming machines. Integrating ourselves with metal and wires just to reach new dimensions of an acoustic world, or whatever it will evolve into. Maybe its just me…

 Megan Nordstrom

Going from Davis’ talk to Megans portfolio was very very different. Immediatly, you see that you can understand what she’s saying! Alas, I found her whole pirate theme annoying and distracting. I thought that took away some of the credibility of her portfolio, but I assume part of my feelings about that is due to my dislike of people acting like pirates, whether in appearance or voice; but i digress! Trying to eliminate my bias, I thought her portfolio was pretty well written and interesting, yet, i enjoyed it less than Davis’ talk. Maybe because it was easier to understand and i didn’t have to read and re-read it, and didn’t get that much accomplishment finishing it.

“‘It is not necessarily what the narrator says about the production of car, but how he says it. He uses a slow, knowledgeable approach that helps gives a feeling of ‘Old America” (2)… By unpacking the voice of the film’s narrator, I am able to show how the type and style of narration relates to the time period and social issues of that era… ‘It was obvious that the director wanted the audience’s main focus on the narrator’s voice instead of on the images’ (3). “

 I thought that this was pretty important in that different aspects of the sound changes how one percieves it differently. the choice of words, and the way that he says it all serve to help people interpret it. Then of course the images would only serve to strengthen their interpretations of the narration. The narration has many layers that you would need to consider all together to be able to grasp the full idea of what he’s narrating, much like what Davis says, about the acoustic space making one more involved, instead of the visual world where all you do is sit around detached from it.

I actually enjoyed reading this piece, because of a class I took last quarter (Digital Arts and New Media 200).  I learned about similar philosophies but on a deeper level, which I think helped me to grasp what Davis was talking about.  In my eyes, what Davis wants us to realize is that times are changing and with this comes advances in our culture.  He wants us to take hold of it and embrace it, as well as contribute and help develop it.  Sound is a unique and powerful way to view the world, and with it we can influence the lives of others–good or bad.  “Acoustic space is the space we hear rather than the space we see” (Davis).  I can easily agree with this quote, because sometimes I think that the sounds we hear are more powerful than the things we see.  This acoustic space can be used an infinite number of ways, all unique and expressive of an individuals desire. 

As far as comparing these two texts, they are dramatically different.  I think that Megan (although she seems to be a very intelligent person) is trying less to please or convince her audience, and more so just writing for the purpose of the class. Davis obviously is trying to sway his audience through out the paper, and is much more blunt and upfront about his opinions. 

Erik Davis’s “Acoustic Cyberspace” is one doozy of an article. And for, all it’s jargon and lofty concepts, it was an article I thoroughly enjoyed. This concept of sound as an amazing “place” is crazy interesting to me, which means I was willing to slow down, google words as I needed to, and try and straighten out exactly what it was Davis was trying to get across to the reader.

Firstly, I was taken aback by Davis’s dismissal of visual representation. For as long as I can remember, I’ve been taught to express myself through crayola crayons and word documents. But the longer I dwelt on this concept, the more the inadequacies of visual representational stood out to me. Anyhow, once I understood what Davis was getting at there and how profound that concept was, I was very willing to accept the arguments Davis made regarding acoustic cyberspace.

My “favorite” quote from the paper might be a little silly, but to me, it embodied a lot of what the tone and the structure of what the article was attempting to convey.

“What made early radio so exciting, in terms of
the technical, the social, and the imaginative, was its openness:
it was a space that wasn’t entirely defined, wasn’t totally
mapped.”

Essentially, I feel that once you clear out the mumbo jumbo, and get to the underlying point, the author is trying to tell you how exciting sound is. How neat it is that there is this space yet to be explored, that allows for almost unbounded self expression and exploration. And how savage it is that technology is a tool paving the way to an epic cyberspace of sound (even if that cyberspace has its own set of shortcomings). Davis is ecstatic about this new technology.. just like people were about early radio (which is why I chose this particular quote). The word choice within the paper was geared to a more educated audience than the residents of 121 B, and I feel that this quote is a boiled down version of what the paper was saying in technical terms.

Megan Nordstrom’s portfolio is stylistically the opposite of Davis’s article. Her portfolio is written in a dialect that us 121B n00bs can understand. Her writing also contains an obvious them, “Beware matey, there is no parlay on this island if you don’t fulfill the course outcomes!” Personally I found the over exaggerated use of a pirate theme to be more annoying than enjoyable, but it was none the less affective. Her word choice evoked obvious sounds and connotations, which would have been lost on the reader without the use of corny pirate metaphors. Additionally, Megan eased us into the world of acoustics nicely, taking comfortable baby steps, unlike Davis who chucked us bodily into a sea of sound.

I’m also enjoying the Marshall McLuhan recording.. “Writing was an embalmic process that froze us” is a pretty epic claim.

For the balance of your sequence one writing, you’ll be analyzing a film with some degree of voice-over narration. Before you begin, perhaps some history and some terms would help you approach the very notion of voice-over, hence the Kozloff readings (here and here) for Thursday’s class (on January 17th).

Please carefully read the Kozloff texts and annotate them in your own blog entry. After your notes, please address the following in that same entry:

• How might someone object to the use of voice-over narration in film and why?
• Why do you think Kozloff feels the need to defend voice-over narration and how does she go about doing so?
• How familiar are you with voice-over narration and how does Kozloff’s writing intersect with your familiarity? (Here, feel free to provide some example films, if you wish. You might also return to Nordstrom’s e-portfolio for points as well.)
• Finally, given your own experiences with voice-over narration in tandem with Kozloff’s arguments, what film are you considering for analysis in your sequence one writing? (You can list several films, if need be, although I urge you to start refining soon. See the list I provided if your ideas are running dry.)

If you would like to come to class even more prepared, then include some questions that you have about the film(s) you are considering for sequence one. These questions can be broad (e.g., “How is voice-over narration functioning in the film I selected?”) or quite specific (e.g., “How long must a voice-over scene be for a productive analysis?”).

Let me know what questions you have, and please categorize this thing under “Blog 3 – Voice-Over?” and post it before Thursday’s class.

Also, please read and comment on at least two posts by your peers. What did you learn from them? Have you seen the films they are considering? If so, what suggestions or experiences do you have?

Heaps of thanks!

At first when reading the text I was in a loud room of girls and got very frustrated when trying to understand the piece. So I decided to into our sleeping porch and read. ( I also printed out the piece and wrote notes on it as I read). While reading this second time I found I understood the piece a lot better. Some of the notes I made include.

• visual space – sight and linear
• acoustic space – sound and nonlinear
• Sounds lead to imagry and sight does not really lead to anything
  • While sounds leads to thoughts, use of imagination etc. sight pretty much shows you anything you would need to imagine in otherwords does the work for you.
• While visuals have been monitored and controlled for a long time by government, parents etc.; sound and music are not as monitored and have more room to grow especially in the varying things on the internet.
• Particular sounds not can be asssociated with many different visuals again seeing something only dead ends the imagination process.
  • Ex. Hearing a song can make you picture many things- something personal, a particular occasion, or a visualization for the meaning/words. While seeing the music video of that same song would stop all of the individual thought processes.

Weird quote: (already in quotes) “Now we will be able to communicate acrossthe world, now we will be able to solve conflicts, now we will have better education , now we will have more democracy.”

                 Huh? First I don’t have a clue who is supposedly saying these things nor how it realtes to sound or sight…

Other quote (one I found I agreed with): …radio was quickly absorbed into commodity systems, and the state imposed its desire to organize the space of the spectrum, establishing the boundaries and rules that define the commercial radio that now dominates our ariwaves.

              Very true, originally the radio was not edited, monitored, subject to fines, nor restricted to particular materials. Like television and many other aspects of technology, sound has not yet been completely conquered but they sure are trying their hardest.

After looking over Megan’s portfolio again after receiving the prompt I feel more confortable about the class- requirements, expectations, goals, etc. I looked at her papers and structure of her portfolio; I feel that since Jentery felt it was a proper example, good enough to show other students, that it will be a good basis for how to conduct my pieces for the rest of the quarter. At first looking at it at the beginning of the year I didn’t really make too many connections with the papers I would be writing and the portfolio Megan made but now that we have more descriptions and actually the same prompts it was more help in preparing me for paper 1.2 and will continue to be helpful for the rest of the quarter.

I find this piece by Erik Davis, titled “Acoustic Cyberspace”, extremely unique in that it offers both a revelation and a caveat. Its revelation is that sound helps people explore different realms and possibilities while visual things typically display what we already know. What we see is usually something definite. In contrast, what we hear is up to more interpretation, and a close listening can reveal that. The caveat given by Erik Davis is that the messages sent through sound can be distorted and even become so complex that we lose a sense of “self” and are ultimately shaped by the ‘cyberspace’. For example, “It is no accident that you find the logic of youth subculture most strongly articulated around music.” You can ask anyone in our class and he or she will have an adamant stance on the type of music he or she tends to listen to. Music shapes us now more than ever. Artists and bands have views that we share with them and we turn to them when our families or friends don’t listen or don’t understand. Our generation thinks with sarcasm and cynicism, two products of contemporary and classic rock.

Upon analyzing Megan Nordstrom’s Response Paper 1.2, I found her emphasis on audience very interesting. The point of knowing your audience is simple, they must be able to understand what you are saying. Even though her emphasis on audience was solely to fulfill one of the outcomes of the class, it also pertains to her argument. She claims in her paper that  she “showed how narration changed the feeling of the clip in the three angles I looked at”. Without the narration the message of the clip would have been vastly different, and the clip itself would seem quite empty. Nordstrom’s quote offers a different perspective that is supported by the purpose of the paper. It seems in both cases, one for the class outcomes and one for the actual argument of the paper, that tone sets the mood which in turn changes the outcome of the message.

“Acoustic Cyberspace” by Eric Davis

Notes:
I have seen the lead singer of the Flaming Lips play the theremin on TV. That’s interesting that it was meant to be a “concert hall instrument.” I want to hear this Clara Rockmore person.

“In essence, he argued that the self that comes down to us from the Renaissance—the “molar” self of the modern West, as some have called it—is a visual self.”

Davis is paraphrasing Marshall McLuhan in this quote. Davis is establishing that people think in visual terms in order to make the argument that “acoustic cyberspace” is changing this. The discussion of “Western subjectivity” shows that Davis’ talk is intended for an academic audience. Davis’ use of the word “molar,” a psychological term, also shows that this talk is intended for an academic audience.

McLuhan’s idea that Renaissance subjectivity imparted a visual and linear way of thinking to the “modern West” seems like it might be linear thinking itself. It sounds like McLuhan could be “organizing the world in a linear, atomized, and sequential fashion.” Davis might assume that his audience is familiar with McLuhan’s ideas and generally accepts them. Since I am not particularly well read on Renaissance subjectivity, I do not disagree or agree with ideas that Davis adopts from McLuhan. For the same reason, I also do not know what Davis means by the “modern West.” I am skeptical of the idea that there is a “West.” I think that I probably have just as much in common, culturally, with a Peruvian person as with an Egyptian person. Does Davis think that people in the “East” do not view the world in a visual and linear way? If so, I am curious as to how he would describe “Eastern subjectivity.”

English 121 Portfolio by Megan Nordstrom

Notes:
What exactly is a complex claim? Is there such a thing as a simple claim?
The pirate theme is funny.
It’s cool that peer feedback is emphasized so much throughout the course.
Have students ever implemented their PSA campaigns?
I am unsure of what Nordstrom means when she writes, “listening to commentary.” Did students get feedback in podcast form?

“While revising, I used comments from Jentery and my peers to help strengthen my arguments and papers. After receiving feedback from Jentery, I would listen to his comments and edit my papers in red type by adding side notes or highlighting areas I needed to revise. I would use his feedback to relook at a section of my writing that was unclear and would reread the paragraph. By having Jentery or a peer point out certain areas help me see that my writing was unclear to my audience and I needed to further explain it. When listening to commentary, I would change all of the micro-errors (MLA, semi-colons, misspelling, etc.) and then would then look back over the paper after I finished listening to change the macro-problems and would relook at the prompt and how I could add to my paper to strengthen an outcome. It helped to change major problems while the paper was still fresh in my mind and then to look at the paper again near the end of the quarter to see if other issues stood out to me that I had not seen before.”

In this quote, Nordstrom argues that she completed Outcome #4. She describes the processes she went through to revise her work as evidence that she “used comments from Jentery and my peers to help strengthen my arguments and papers.” Nordstrom’s audience is obviously the English 121 class since she assumes the reader will know who Jentery is. Her mention of “MLA” format shows that her audience is students or others in the academic world, because she assumes the reader knows what MLA is.

This quote relates to the study of sound because the revision process must be effected by our thought processes. A visual way of thinking will shape the way we revise our work. Understanding soundscapes and how sound shapes our lives might help us think in different ways that could effect our approaches to revision.

Acoustic cyberspace by Erik Davis:

“Acoustic space is capable of simultaneity, superimposition, and nonlinearity, but above all, it resonates. … Where visual space emphasizes linearity, acoustic space emphasizes simultaneity – the possibility that many events that occur in the same zone of space-time. In such a scheme, a subject – a person, maybe – organizes space by synthesizing a variety of different events, points, images, and sources of information into a kind of organic totality.”

Davis’s word choice here is sophisticated and geared towards a more educated audience, using words and ideas such as “superimposition” and “space-time”. It seems as if Davis geared his talk to those already familiar with these ideas, being as those who would actually attend his talk probably already have an interest in the acoustic cyberspace world and what not. His tone implies a slight bias towards acoustics over visuals when he says, “Where visual space emphasizes linearity, acoustic space emphasizes simultaneity”. His use of the word “linearity” seems to imply that visual space is unimaginative and that it relies on the obvious (what can be seen) rather than any in-depth understanding.

Davis does not support his points with any firm evidence but his wordiness and use of language seem to be effective sources of understanding his ideas. As I read through Davis’ talk, I found myself trying to visualize what he was saying in order to get a better understanding of what he was trying to convey. However, I found myself unable to visualize his ideas and had to “listen” to what Davis was saying in order to understand his ideas. I think his wordiness, unconventional ideas and vocabulary were enough to support his point that “where visual space emphasizes linearity, acoustic space emphasizes simultaneity”. Davis forces his audience to rely on acoustic space which allows for a wider range of subjectivity and understanding. This quote is important to the study of sound and sound technologies because it implies that sound and sound technologies are the key to a broader dimension. Where visual-space is limited to what is seen, “acoustic space is capable of simultaneity, superimposition, and nonlinearity”. The use of sound further emphasizes the visual world such as the use of sound in movies (i.e. Background music). The sound emphasizes feeling and invokes the desired mindset that the movie is trying to portray.

Megan Nordstrom’s work:

“Appropriately chosen for this film, the narrator’s voice is that of an older man, who speaks with experience and knowledge of the time. His words are simple and straightforward, but his slight variance of tone captivates the audience. The narrator generates a picture of the ‘old fashion American man’ in our heads, who could possibly remind us of our grandfather or even FDR.”

Megan Nordstrom’s writing was much easier for me to understand. Nordstrom’s writing, unlike Davis’, is geared towards a general audience rather than a selected few. She avoids abstract ideas and writes in very simplistic and straightforward manner. She used evidence and examples that most people are familiar with such as her comparison of the image the narrator depicts to an “old fashioned American man” and FDR. Nordstrom’s implication that the sound of the narrators voice “generates a picture of the ‘Old fashioned American man’” supports Davis’ idea that acoustic space is capable of superimposition. She superimposes the narrator’s voice onto an image she is already familiar with. Nordstrom’s writing relates to the importance of studying sound and sound technologies because the sound fully completes the movie. In order for the producers to depict the right images in the movie, sound is added to enhance and emphasize the desired feelings and mindset of the movie.

Also per the Davis talk, Marshall McLuhan is an important name in various circles (academic and otherwise) for his work with new media, technology, society, and culture.

Below are sides A and B of the album, The Medium is the Massage. Give it a listen and notice how pastiche – a mix of different sounds and voices – functions. We hear McLuhan as our “narrator,” as other voices and sounds interject. Not dissimilar from what a DJ does or…hmmm…maybe what writers do, too? Enjoy!

 

 The Medium is the Massage, Side A: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

 

 The Medium is the Massage, Side B: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

On the evening of December 24, 1906, Reginald A. Fessenden used the alternator-transmitter to send out a short radio program from Brant Rock, Massachusetts. This broadcast is believed to be the first two-way, trans-oceanic wireless radio transmission, paving the way for a century of broadcasting to come. As people in the U.S. and elsewhere would soon realize, listening and receiving information would take on an entirely new, “disembodied” connotation in the 20th and 21st centuries.

Here’s a recreation of the broadcast for your ears. Note the voice. Sound familiar?

 

 Reginald's Radio: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download