07 | November | 2013 | Approaches to Life Writing, Fall 2013

November 7, 2013

When fake becomes better – final project reflection

by Carol Scott

We value truth and authenticity in the stories we hear and in the stories that are told about us. We celebrate an ever more connected world, and point to the millions of people participating in online social networks worldwide as proof of our innate desire for community. But it isn’t real. The “friends” I have on Facebook are not the flesh and blood people I talk to, have meals with, confide in. Scrolling through my newsfeed is like reading a never-ending Christmas letter from that cousin with the perfect family. I see pictures of fabulous vacations, adorable pets, and joyous gatherings. I read a

stream of witty comments and assume they flowed from the keyboard in an unedited series of clicks. I’m left feeling slightly boring and unenthusiastic. So, after much agonizing over how it will be received and by whom, I post a status update and check compulsively to see if and how often it is “liked.” It’s exhausting and unsatisfying. And yet, I am compelled to keep going back. Similarly to parallel play by babies who don’t know how to interact yet – I build my tower of status updates over here and you build your tower over there. It’s all performance and voyeurism, not communication, and most certainly not community.

Why, then, the insistence on the label? Is feeling part of a communal whole so important that we will fight to keep up appearances? Are we really members of the communities we claim? What does that mean? Does getting on a mailing list make one a member of a community? Is it when you go to a meeting? What if you don’t volunteer for anything? Are we, by virtue of our identities, members of certain communities, or does membership require interaction? And what does this mean for life writing? Do we tell our stories differently online than we do in person or on paper? These are the questions I’m considering for my final paper.

I’m reading Alone Together, Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other by Sherry Turkle, Professor of the Social Studies of Science and Technology at MIT as background material, and what I’m coming to believe is that our embrace of the digital as real is a frightening departure from human interaction that has grown apace with technology’s ability to provide us with a digital escape. In her discussion of robotics, Sherry Turkle writes that even the most primitive 1980’s Tamagochi was able to lead children to think of it as a creature in pain rather than a broken toy “…not because of [the toys’] sophistication but because of the feelings of attachment they invoke.” (44)

As a parent I was frequently warned that loss of creativity goes hand in hand with a decrease in imaginative play, but I wonder now if the problem is not even more corrosive to our human relationships. Turkle is primarily interested in the Robotic Moment and our human readiness to replace human interaction with time spent with companion robots. I believe that diminished value given to the authentic, the living, prepares us for online deception, which impacts the stories we tell online about ourselves and others and the way we tell them.

Additionally, Turkle’s study of children’s interaction with robotic toys and pets shows that the children incorporate the robots into their family narrative, identifying the My Real Baby toy as a sibling,and experiencing anxiety and rivalries similar to real life families. Is it too big a leap to envision a time when biographies and autobiographies include “relationships” with robots as a matter of course, and to see “Facebook friends” as a step along the way?

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November 7, 2013

More than words…

by Ema Izquierdo

After reading this amazing book, I did a little research on Dictee and I found that there are not only words that Theresa Hak Kyung Cha wrote in her masterpiece but feelings and sentiments that can be treasure in many ways.

Soomi Kim felt Cha’s words not only in her mind but also in her soul. She is a professional dancer, actress and artist that transformed the words into movements and made her dream come true by presenting her performance in the 3^rd National Asian American Theater Festival in 2011 and later on 2012, she presented her play in the Woman Center Stage Festival in New York City.

Soomi Kim performing

Soomi Kim’s accomplishment began with the idea of her project to recreate Cha’s thoughts and to show them to the world. Her idea commenced with Kickstarter, a website that helps new ideas to become reality by raising money from people’s donations in exchange of some acknowledgment from the artist they are supporting. In this case, Soomi Kim obtained the money (a little more than what she asked for) she needed to put together her project.

I leave you the video of the project and her thoughts of Dictee. Take a look at her page in Kickstarter, there she talks deeply about Cha’s influence in her life and performances.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1583080250/project-dictee

November 7, 2013

Discussion Questions for Cha’s Dictee

by Enito Mock

1. Dictee by Theresa Hak Kyung Cha is a very complex and somewhat complicated text to get through in one sitting. What was your strategy for reading this book? Did you think about each passage and their possible meanings as if we were reading poetry?

2. Cha starts off Dictee with a quote from Sappho, a Greek lyric poet, in which she says “May I write words more naked than flesh, stronger than bone, more resilient than sinew, sensitive than nerve.” The language she uses in the text was not only thought provoking and powerful. but also unique from other forms of life writings we have read in class. What do you think is the purpose of writing the text in the language and style she chose to? Also, do you think the text would have a similar effect on readers if it had not been written in this way?

3. The sections of the Cha’s book was broken down into 9 sections, each starting off with a Greek muse and what they presided over. The connection between each Muse and the text that follows should have some relevance to what they represent. Do you think that Cha made the connections between the women she chose, their story/stories, and the Greek muses?

4. Cha’s work is an example of a text that resembles a life writing piece on collective memory. Using important figures such as Joan of Arc and Yu Guan Soon, along with accounts of herself and her mother, she was able to highlight not only their personal struggles, but also a struggle as a woman in a male dominated society. What do you think was her reasoning for presenting her life writing in this way? What power does collective memory have in addressing the lives of many in past, today, and future societies?

5. On page 32, Cha writes “To the other nations who are not witnesses, who are not subject to the same oppression, they cannot know. Unfathomable the words, the terminology: enemy, atrocities, conquest, betrayal, invasion, destruction… to the others, these accounts are about (one more) distant land, like (any other) distant land, without any discernible features in the narrative, (all the same) distant like any other.” What does this quote say to you and the way you would respond to conversations about personal or shared experiences in life?