(Blogwriting-05) The Public Sphere

Jürgen Habermas defines "The Public Sphere" as a realm of social life where 'private' individuals freely gather, discuss, and form a public opinion.

In the past, the media of the public sphere, in his essay of "The Public Sphere: An Encyclopedia Article" are "newspapers and magazines, radio and television". However, today, we have a new medium, internet, which is the culmination of the other media. It has combined different aspects of media. We can now watch television news, television shows, read newspaper articles and magazines, and listen to radio online. Furthermore, internet users are given a virtual space to discuss and share personal opinions on matters.

Daily Kos is a political blog, where internet users explore not only informational videos, but also share political opinions. There is a poll about Obama on the first page. So, the blog displays certain politics-related information and events.

Chapter 5, Visual Technologies, Image reproduction, and the copy in the book of 'Practices of Looking' suggests:

"Technologies interact with people and the forces of politics, economics, and other aspects of culture in various social and historical contexts, resulting in changes not only in the technologies themselves but also in social practices and uses"

As suggested, technologies affect various aspects of people's lives. Not to mention how to communicate with each other. Internet has been one of the most important innovation in our era. It has made it possible to communicate with someone from the other side of the world, to receive massive information at once, and to create virtual spaces to express themselves and interact with other users.

Because internet users are given chance to freely comment and discuss about matters and videos and, through discussion it can form a kind of dominant public opinion, the daily kos blog can be considered as "the public sphere".

Segmentation: REPORT by Bruce Conner

1) Radio Voiceover
- radio broadcast about JFK assassination.
- leads the "development" - beginning, middle and end.
- motivates the story, and tells the story as narrative.
-usually not syncing with visual material of the film, the audio of voiceover separates itself from video, which creates irony, contrasts, and symbols.
-live: realistic aspect

2) Footage of JFK
-repeated footage of JFK and Jackie in a limo parading: gives the sense of realism. Cues the story to start. Lets the audience to engage with the story. The staccato style of repeated images create intensity and rhythm.
- Historical moments: inauguration, Airforce One, Jackie and JFK waving hands, JFK with Catholic pope. They give the sense of realism to the film.

3) Irrelevent Footages
-Blank white screen, flicker: gives certain intensity to the audio of reporting on the assassination. Motivates the audience to engage more with the audio. Flicker changes regularly, which avoids monotone and creates tension.
- Count down: creates intensity. Presented with the audio : The sentence, "The president of the United States is dead" and silence for a while.
- Commercial, technology development: symbolizes the promise of idealized future. Contradicts with the death of the president. This "promise" becomes irony when the film also shows the footage of Jackie, who can't open the car door, whereas in the advertisement a woman easily opens a door with a happy smile.
-Light bulb: a bullet shattering light bulb glass symbolizes bullets that killed the light, JFK.
-Bull killing: is presented with a narrative description of JFK, which symbolizes that JFK is a victim like the bull in the scene.
-IBM 'SELL' button: broadcast sells the story of the JFK assassination without knowing the exact truths. / JFK becomes a legend.

(Blogwriting-04) Barthes' Ideas

Roland Barthes, in his essay of “Rhetoric of the Image”, introduces terms in semiology- signifier, signified, denotative message, and connotative message. Before using his ideas to analyze the poster, I would like to clarify the terms.

Language is a collective system of arbitrary relationships between objects and words. In other words, people sharing the same language agreed to call a certain object with a certain word. Analyzing semotics in visual image requires the same principle, yet more complex.

Signifier is an object presented. Signified is what the object refers to in certain circumstance. Signifieds vary under different circumstances. Denotative message is a literal message, and connotative message is a deeper meaning below the surface.




“The text directs the reader through the signifieds of the image, causing him to avoid some and receive others”

As mentioned above, signifieds can vary with a single signifier. A viewer can come up with different interpretations by analyzing a pure visual image without text. Imagine the advertisement without the texts, just the picture. It can be a mere photograph, a work of art in a museum, or a public service advertisement. There comes variety of signifieds out of the same picture. However, the texts, “The Final Episodes – April 8, 9pm/ Made in America” cause a viewer to receive that the picture is an advertisement for a TV show and to avoid other options. Texts let viewers to narrow broad ideas down to more plausible ones to get better understanding of it.


“In the photograph- at least at the level of the literal message- the relationship of signifieds to signifiers is not one of ‘transformation’ but of ‘recording’, and the absence of a code clearly reinforces the myth of photographic ‘naturalness’: the scene is there, captured mechanically, not humanly (the mechanical is here a guarantee of objectivity).”

We have been introduced arbitrary relationships between signifier and signified. This quotation presents another kind of relationship between signifier and signified- the denotative message in the photograph. As introduced, denotative message means literal meaning. Compared to drawing, photograph has been regarded relatively ‘real’ and ‘true’ in depiction because the mechanism is more reliable in representing reality than artists’ hands.
The poster presents an image of New York City and a middle-age man looking somewhat gloomy and worried. Speaking of denotative message, this photograph clearly presents what is there. If this was to be painted by an artist, it may have looked differently. It may distort the atmosphere that the photograph gives.

“The variation in readings is not, however, anarchic; it depends on the different kinds of knowledge- practical, national, cultural, aesthetic- invested in the image and these can be classified, brought into a typology.”

Analyzing linguistic message requires the knowledge of a certain language. If I had no knowledge of English at all, I would not be able to understand the image thoroughly. As mentioned before, signifieds can vary under different circumstances, which are “the different kinds of knowledge”. Because every culture has different interpretation with the same image or gestures, each come up with different conclusions and would not fully understand each other’s interpretations. For example, if someone had no familiarity with the fact that the texts of “The Final Episodes” insinuate that this picture is to advertise a TV show, he would not grasp the fundamental purpose of the picture. The Statue of Liberty may not stand out to indicate the setting of New York City to someone who does not know where the statue exists. Because it does not tell what year this is for, if it were for the red color of the text, someone might interpret it as an advertisement for an old show. Current economic situation of the United States, the knowledge of the nation, may influence someone to think about recession by looking at it.

(Blog-3) The Blair Witch Project

"..for the first time- and this is the effect of the film- man has to operate
with his whole living person, yet forgoing its aura. For aura is tied to his presence; there can be no replica of it. The aura which, on the stage, emanates from Macbeth, cannot be separated for the spectators from that of the actor. However, the singularity of the shot in the studio is that the camera is substituted for the public. Consequently, the aura that envelops the actor vanishes, and with it the aura of the figure he portrays."

"Magician and surgeon compare to painter and cameraman. The painter maintains in his work a natural distance from reality, the cameraman penetrates deeply into its web. There is a tremendous difference between the pictures they obtain. That of the painter is a total one, that of the cameraman consists of multiple fragments which are assembled under a new law. Thus, for contemporary man the representation of reality by the film is incomparably more significant than that of the painter, since it offers, precisely because of the thoroughgoing permeation of reality with mechanical equipment, an aspect of reality which is free of all equipment. And that is what one is entitled to ask from a work of art"

Man-made art works were possibly replicated by other men throughout the history of art. However, seeing an original work is different from seeing a replica because the original has its unique traces of physical conditions and changes in its ownership (Benjamin). In his essay of The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, Walter Benjamin declares that there is such thing called Aura. It is related to authenticity and originality of a work of art. Aura is an “unique existence of the work of art” (Benjamin). Replicas lack the unique existence. In other words, the one and only original works have values that replicas cannot exhibit in themselves.

Film is a medium of the age of Mechanical Reproduction. Unlike original drawings, films can be produced massively at the same time. Although we have easier access to art works through mass reproduction, we cannot experience the aura of the work of art with mass reproduced works of art.

Suppose there are actors presenting the same story on different stages. Although the elements they work with are the same, their different interpretation, manipulation and circumstances give each such different unique characteristics and existences. These works of art creates aura out of their own originality. In film, however, one actor plays one character in the same way, and it is reproduced for mass audience. Everyone sees the same work, which makes it lose uniqueness and originality.

However, in terms of displaying realism, film offers an aspect of reality that is free of equipment (Benjamin). In other words, reality presented in painting depends heavily on a painter’s skills, whereas filmmakers’ skills do not impact as much in representing reality. Representation of reality in painting is more likely distorted and manipulated in the process of painting with artists’ hands.

The Blair Witch Project, directed by Daniel Myrick and Eeuardo Sanchez, came out in 1999. The film, The Blair Witch Project, has such unique approach, documentary conventions, in presenting a story. The film starts with the black screen with the white text, “In October of 1994, three student filmmakers disappeared in the woods near Burkittsville, Maryland while shooting a documentary. A year later their footage was found”. This opening creates such tension and expectation that it may be a real documentary. Unrefined and shaky camera movements reinforce the belief that this can be a real documentary. Unlike other fiction films, the film had no extra technical manipulation such as sound track or refined cinematography- other than simple editing. What is really interesting is the amateurism and rawness of footages make the story seem real.



Without artificial scary sound track, the film could achieve to create strong tension because the fear the actors, or the characters, experience look so real. What we, the audience, visually see strongly insist the footage we see is real and not fictional. Personally, I was not fully convinced the film is fictional until I saw the credit of director on the screen.
Benjamin states, “For aura is tied to his presence; there can be no replica of it”.

As mechanical reproductive medium, The Blair Witch Project cannot presents aura of actors as actors on the stage, in front of audience, would have. However, it surely tries to make the audience, with its delicate manipulation, to believe it is reality that is presented in the film.

(Blogwriting-02) Realism

Before I study how a classical Hollywood continuity film and Tokyo Story create realism differently, I would like to discuss how realism had been thought during the early time of photography.
Comparing to drawings, photography seemed to be realistic, which means it describes situation as it really is. However, there were people who doubted the realism of photography, pointing out the role of the photographer, who can choose, frame, light, and compose scenes. It was seen as another way of distortion.
Some people believed that machine are more reliable than unaided human perception and hand of artist in the production of realism (Sturken and Cartwright, 17).

There came the invention of film, or moving pictures. Producers could manipulate stories or evidences by reordering the flow of pictures. While pictorial representation was once regarded as evidence, as it complicated its forms, it became more of entertainment. Storytelling became dominant purpose in films.

I will discuss two different forms of realism presented in a classical Hollywood continuity film and Tokyo Story by director Ozu.

A classical Hollywood continuity film is mostly driven by narrative. What it means is that a storytelling is a major focus in the production. A story is completely conveyed when other elements in a film flows well, which means it has to practice complete visual continuity.
Person A stays on left, when person B stays on right no matter what angles the film uses within a scene. Keeping other elements continuous, storytelling becomes realistic. We, the audience, accept the story as real because its technical manipulation is least seen because of its rules of continuity. In other words, the natural flow of technical elements, such as lighting, framing, and editing, convinces us that the story told in the production is plausible.


In the Tokyo Story, another kind of realism is created. Director Ozu breaks the rules of continuity. The film has such simple, plain story, yet it is conveyed in an interesting way. Sometimes Ozu displays disconnected shots together. This arrangement is not allowed in continuity, however, it has such power of establishing scenes. He has a lot of long one shots, presenting slow pace of the film without accessory edits. Comparing to the continuity film, Ozu’s simplified technical skills strengthen the content of narrative. Narrative with the least technical elaboration seems to depict our everyday lives. Our real lives are not as fast and exciting as classical Hollywood film. Our real lives are more resemble the one in Ozu’s film than one in classical continuity film, slow and plain. This creates different kind of realism. Contents of Ozu’s storytelling makes the audience to sympathize because it is so plausible that is looks like something that would happen to themselves.

A classical Hollywood continuity film and Tokyo Story have different styles and forms in conveying stories. The two creates different forms of realism. In a classical Hollywood continuity film, a flow of narrative is not interrupted by technical elements; thus, the narrative has strong power to draw the attention from the audience. This narrative flow seems natural and real. Tokyo story, although interrupted by several unrefined technical manipulations, presents such ordinary narrative that it creates certain sympathy among the audience. In a classical Hollywood continuity film, a natural flow of narrative, with aid of technical skills, creates realism, whereas Tokyo Story creates different kind of realism with its plausible contents of story.