Culture Jamming Tute Reflection Wk 9
Upon reflection of this weeks tutorial based on Culture Jamming and its aligned theories, the majority of discussion was based upon ideas of ethical trading, fair and free trade, token advertising, the green market, etc. Within this discussion, the tute seemed to establish two polar opposite, but yet inextricably linked theories. One hand the group argued that the boycotting of multi-national corporate organizations such as Nestle and Cadbury, which exploit children through slave labour, would aid in raising awareness of unethical employment. One the other hand, it was argued that the abandoning of such companies would in fact lead to a grater level of poverty within those already poverty-stricken countries. Another interesting binary that was raised in the tute discussion was the monetary price a consumer pays for ethical trading. Paradoxically, the consumer is guilt-ridden when purchasing products, and thus supporting companies, which endorse unethical employment and exploitation of their workers. This seems to be a complex catch22 situation, in which the consumer will constantly be trapped in. What role then, or what effect can Culture Jammer’s have on the limiting, or suppression of slave labour and exploitative means of production? Are programs such as Adbusters or PETA for example active in addressing foundational problems with capitalism, markets and multi-national corporations, or do they merely promote shock-value techniques such as Calvin Klein’s “Heroin Chic”?
A key point however, which was not addressed in the tutorial discussion for this week was whether or not we actually believe Culture Jamming effective forms of protest. What is it exactly that Culture Jamming seek to achieve? In Christine Harold’s 2004 article, Pranking Rhetoric: “Culture Jamming” as Media Activism, she suggests that Culture Jamming is “seeking to undermine the marketing rhetoric of multinational corporations, specifically through such practices as media hoaxing, corporate sabotage, billboard ‘liberation’ and trademark infringement” (p190) Harold further extrapolates “…pranking (the process by which Culture Jamming works upon) by layering and folding the rhetorical field – addresses the patterns of power rather then its contents. It does so by taking its cue, in part, from the incredible success of commercial rhetoric to infect contemporary culture.” (p209 my brackets) If we then assume that Harold is correct in her assumption of the ways in which Culture Jamming works, in what ways and to what extent do we belief Culture Jamming to be an effective form of subversion, inversion, prank or parody.
Cheers,
Blake Chitty.
I think that Culture Jamming certainly has the potential to be an extremely successful form of protest and I think that it does play a role in making the public aware of certain issues. It is very easy to become desensitised to marketing and advertisements because we are constantly bombarded by advertisements constantly and I think Culture Jamming, by pranking mainstream advertisements and the like do get our attention. By being different from the norm, and by taking common advertisements we see everyday and then warping and changing them does get our attention because often it is something we haven't seen before and is attention grabbing. I think the real risk is that companies are catching on to this trend, and they are beginning to use culture jamming themselves to push their own product. With culture jamming being traditionally associated with subverting the mainstream, there is the risk that these commercially produced and supported advertisements will be mistaken as being subversive when they are rather reinforcing the mainstream.
ReplyDeleteI also think that Culture Jamming has the potential to be an effective form of protest. It definitely plays a role in creating public awareness in issues such as ethical trading, fair and free trading and what nots. However, while I somewhat agree with owenls about culture jamming catching our attention, i also argue that these prank advertisements can sometimes be forgotten easily as well. Thus, these advertisements may not be as effective as it may seem.
ReplyDeleteAlso, although culture jamming is an effective means to create awareness, there are also other forms in which people have used to create similar awareness too. Thus, I do somewhat believe that culture jamming is an effective form of subversion, inversion, prank or parody. But I also believe that there are other forms as well.
I had never even heard of Culture Jamming until reading this weeks articles. I was aware that every now and then there were parodies of ads and the like, taking the piss out of the people who did the originals, but I usually put it down to someone having a joke. I never considered that there were real issues beneath motivating these mockups. As such, I don't think that your average person really pays much attention to alot of these culture jamming techniques.
ReplyDeleteTo my mind these techniques are only effective in a short term, localised manner. The few ads that I've seen done in this manner made me laugh, but guaranteed within a day or so they were forgotten, a quirk one day, unremembered the next. Advertisements are there all the time an ever pervasive presence, that we eventually learn to block out, but they are still there in the back of our minds. If Culture Jammers want more sucess I suggest doing more on a larger scale, so they too can have equal footing at the backs of our minds. That way when we go to purchase one of these contested products we will have both sides of the argument there to help us with our choices, which is assumadley the point of Culture Jamming. This however does bring us back to one of the points being, large, rich corporations are generally the ones being targeted and not many Culture Jammers have nigh unlimited resources at hand to throw into this.
The availablility of the internet at affordable prices would help with the organisation of Culture Jamming activities, and increase attacks on websites of issue, but to actually get out there in the real world uses up resources that I just don't see Culture Jammers having to hand. I like the pie in the face idea, a cheap alternative, but many people would think 'yes, take that, I've always wanted to pie that person' and not really think much about why they were pied, and the underlying issues that prompted the pieing.
On the matter of supporting child labour based companies, even if we were to continue buying their products, or even paying more for them, the costs wont get passed onto the workers. Buying from companies that support free trade should encourage people to move to factories with better pay and working conditions. Unfortuanatley if there are no free trade factories where you live it's a choice of continue where you are until they go out of buisness or move to another town, which may not be possible for many people. It's a crappy situation but ultimately shouldn't the governments of these countries be trying to fix these problems internally? That's where the greatest change will come from, I don't think that they buying patterns from overseas will change factory conditions very much. It's all good and well to raise awareness with Culture Jamming techniques, but the change has to happen there, willingly.
I too enjoyed the last tutorial’s discussion, particularly the point about culture jamming in relation to capitalist bodies. Many interesting points have been brought up even now..
ReplyDeleteThe point about Family Guy and The Simpsons reminded me of how much The Simpsons makes fun of the Fox network (who fund it). In one episode particularly, when Homer finds out something grousome and damming about Fox and attempts to tell Lisa and the viewer at home about it, and as he and Lisa are talking, ‘Fox’ dubs over them in very different voices, saying ‘Fox brings you great family TV shows such as.... and …’. A very interesting approach by The Simpsons script writers, but while it is a humorous and interesting take, the heroism is lost in the knowledge that someone from Fox approved that before airing. I guess that follows on from the discussion regarding the attempt at a solution creating the same problem.
I think that culture jamming is an extremely effective means of raising awareness or important social issues - particularly in a society where it can be difficult to captivate the attention of the masses concerning these issues. People just don't seem to care anymore, and culture jamming presents important issues in an entertaining and captivating way.
ReplyDeleteThere is room for improvement, however, on perhaps not only raising awareness but actually aiding/preventing these problems elsewhere - it's a long shot, but it could work.