In week 4's reading, we were asked to read about the flanuere and (through this) Walter Benjamin's 'Arcade project', in which he became very involved with the arcades of Paris, analysing them and living through them.
R. Prouty described it as:
"For Benjamin the experience of walking through the arcades was a
Proustian exercise in involuntary memory, except, instead of personal
memories, the arcades were a storehouse of collective memories."
- On the Arcades Project, R Prouty.
The arcades would generally contain expensive home items or fashionable clothing, all very much a sight to look at, however arcades were losing steam by the time Benjamin had started his research. He found that noteable types of people would come by the arcade who he would consider flânures, because of their tendancy to take their time to experience the environment of the arcade at a leisurely pace.
Facebook is similar, but instead of being the dilapidated home of style, it is the billion-user social-network. Facebook introduced timelines in 2012, as a way to browse all your major events in years gone by, even going so far as to include your birth. It was the update that transformed Facebook from just the social network to a platform telling the story of many different users, a collection of memories, much like Benjamin's interpretation of the arcades. You can view any user's history on Facebook and any memories they have listed.
This week's lecture, Dr Victoria Kuttainen (2015) taught us about social mapping and how infanstructure can promote a change in the users, Facebook allows the lifestyle of the flânure, through feeds, in where the user scrolls in an seemingly endless experience of constant information overload; including the life happening of friends, shared articles, desired products, viral videos, news, etc. Additionally the attitude of the flânure is empowered through it's structure and availability on any sort of device, and the easability to just pull up your phone and spend 5 minutes on Facebook idling. You can go at any pace you want, but you're encouraged to observe and digest in an "endless succession of spectacles" (G. Barnes, Passage of the Cyber-Flanuer, describing consumption in cyberspace)
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References
Images
http://www.vetsintech.co/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/facebook-logo.jpg
http://www.spleenhouse.net/images/arcade_entrance-edit.jpg
Prouty, R. (2009). On the Arcades Project. Retrieved from
http://onewaystreet.typepad.com/one_way_street/2009/04/on-the-arcades-project.html
Prouty, R. (2009). A Turtle on a Leash. Retrieved from
http://www.onewaystreet.typepad.com/one_way_street/2009/10/a-turtle-on-a-leash.html
Barnes, G. (1997). Passage of the Cyber-Flaneur. Otago University. Retrieved from
http://www.raynbird.com/essays/Passage_Flaneur.html
Van Luyn, A. (2015). BA1002 Our Space: Networks, Narratives, and the Making of Place. Lecture 4: Maps. Townsville.
I agree with you.According to Frisby for theFlaneur, the cityscape appears to be the landscape ( Frisby 1994, 94). he creates an imaginative picture of the streets, houses and marketplace. the urban cityscape of Chemnitz provides the perfect base for the flaneur of creating an individual romantic picture of the city. Now days it is almost impossible to be a Flaneur in the proper sense, which means as Walter Benjamin described it. The arcades, which were presented as the playground of the flaneur, are no more ( Bauman 1994, 1948). Where they still exist, they are often deserted. And if there are no people, there is also no crowd in which the traditional flaneur could hide. The original home of the Flaneur, the arcades of Paris changed and transformed over time. Due to the possibilities which are offered by the internet and in particular by instagram, the modern flaneur becomes the voyeur. Information about almost every person are present in the internet, via instagram can watch everyone, he or she can even spy on everyone. Some people appear in instagram with information about every step they take. This virtual world is the new faneurs paradise.
ReplyDeleteReferences
Frisby, D. (1994). The Flaneur in social Theory. 81-111. London: Routledge
Bauman( 1994). The urban cityspace. 121-129. London: Routledge
Kuttainen, V. (2015). BA1002: Our space: networks, narratives and the making of place
Lecture 4. Retrieved: http://learnjcu.edu.au
The interpretation that Frisby has in his readings flow well with your thoughts. I agree that he paints this wonderful picture in your mind of the streets. Your blog is developed well from the lecture readings, it’s obvious that you have read all the required readings, but I feel that the blog should be written more on your thoughts. I’d be interested to know more about your opinions and what you think of the new option to browse users history on Facebook; or your opinion on the new easy to use technology to search others history and how this impacts you/ society. I agree with your comment about scrolling through information at your own pace and observing what others are doing, I personally think there are many positives and negatives from this but again I’d be interested to hear from your views.
ReplyDeleteReferences
Kuttainen, V. (2015). BA1002: Our space: networks, narratives and the making of place
Lecture 4. Retrieved: http://learnjcu.edu.au