Blog Assignment 3: Jai Ho!

Looking at Walter Benjamin’s article on “The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction” we can use his ideas and see how in today’s media we see reproduction of certain art forms, in our case the Jai Ho dance and music, and how they can have social and cultural significance (Benjamin, 1936). The original video is a celebration of the movie Slumdog Millionaire; it is not only part of the credits, but it is a celebration of the triumphs of the characters in the movie and a fun and entertaining way to end a movie. From that video, sparked several reproductions, which show how perceptions can change with replication, like Benjamin suggests, and how common reproductions are, especially with our mechanized forms of reproduction that we use today (Benjamin, 1936). None of the reproductions I will discuss are the same as the original, so they put the original in the eyes of viewers that would not have necessarily have seen it before, just like Benjamin spoke of in his article (Benjamin, 1936). These videos create a larger audience for the original and that is especially the case with the Pussycat Dolls video; it creates a more mainstream pop version of the song and video. It maintains a similar scene, but changes the lyrics and the general tone of the song. The audience has changes to a more North American, popular culture based group. The meaning of the original was to be victorious and celebrate the successes of the movie, as I said earlier, but the Pussycat Dolls version has transformed the first concept into a more love story oriented song. The song speaks of someone being another’s destiny, which was an idea in the film, but it has a much larger emphasis in this video (Vevo, 2009). This video is also much more sexualized and made a little more mainstream, the audience is different than those who would watch the first video, and I think that is what Benjamin was trying to say, he stated that the new versions of the original would broaden the spectrum which the original could not get by (Benjamin, 1936). I do feel the Pussycat Dolls video is monopolizing the idea of Jai Ho a bit just for a profit; by making it more globally friendly, you lose some of the cultural and social significance that the original had. Benjamin said that this is a strong possibility when recreating art; you tend to take away from the original and what it represented and create a bit of a joke out of it (Benjamin, 1936).
The third video, which is just a recreation of the dance, shows us how movies and youtube videos can influence our daily activities. These people have gone out of their way to memorize the dance in order to recreate a moment that they enjoyed. They want to show others that the dance is possible for all; they do not really put any strong emphasis on the importance of the song or lyrics, but that the dance was for all to participate in (Hagen, 2009). The last video truly shows what Benjamin is talking about. The Tamil dancers are celebrating, like in the original video, but they are putting their own cultural spin on the Jai Ho dance. They have created their own moves to the song, but have maintained the general uplifting aura of the song and movements. They, like in the original, are celebrating something, their own culture, and I think this shows that something like the Jai Ho video can be transformed cross culturally, without losing too much of its message (Khohar, 2009).
These videos are examples of what Benjamin was talking about; how reproduction is made and perceptions are changed once the replicas are seen (Benjamin, 1936). All pieces of art are reproducible, and we see this in these videos that one art form can transform into something completely different, depending on cultural interpretation.

Blog Assignment 2: Mediation and Globalization

In Mazarella’s article “Culture, globalization, mediation” we see that there is an on going argument, especially in anthropology, that globalization studies are not the way of our future. He also discusses the divide of opinion on whether mediation helps or hinders our social lives. He argues both for the positive, that globalization, along with mediation processes, aids our social lives and are at the foundation of them to begin with (Mazzarella, 2004).
Mazzarella is certainly interested in processes of mediation in ethnography. He says that culture itself is an effect of social processes of mediation, and that we can find out more about cultures in ethnographic fieldwork by using mediation (Mazzarella, 2004). He believes that mediation creates new concepts in social life and also, that media is a foundation of social life now a days. Mazzarella writes that mediation in ethnographic fieldwork can help us separate the “virtual and actual”, what is real and happening now and what is has potential in happening (Mazzarella, 2004: 348). There is no speculation in the use of mediation in ethnography, the ethnographer finds out for himself or herself what is real and what is not. He is also interested in cross cultural practices of mediation. We can construct our own cultures by looking at other cultures through mediation (Mazzarella, 2004).
Globalization affects our cultural understandings, as well as other cultures, through processes of mediation by creating a sense of separation that people do not seem to want. Mediation can be seen as a negative, as it creates “distance, intervention, and displacement” instead of a unity that people want to feel (Mazzarella, 2004: 348). In a sense, globalization has disavowed mediation, as it has made us want to separate ourselves from the realities we discovered when globalization arose. Globalization revealed political and conceptual problems in what we see as “culture”. And this has made us see the mediated quality of culture; which seems to have become a very negative concept, although Mazzarella is trying to argue the contrary (Mazzarella, 2004). But I find this all struggling, as globalization to many is thought of as a bad thing, one cultural idea is boring and unfair to those who do not want to conform to the globalized ideal. One of his main arguments is that our cultural politics of globalization are extremely contradictory; to say that mediation is the most important part of out lives, but then say that it is ruining them as well (Mazzarella, 2004). Globalization can help us understand other cultures through mediation by showing both sides of the story, we do not assume what is going on, we find out the facts and then make sure all have a grip on what is truly going on.
Mazzarella points out that there is no definitive answer, mediation processes can be both positive and negative, but they help aid in understanding the worlds cultures, our own and of others. Globalization has made it easier to understand the world’s cultures as well, as we have created a global culture in the process.

Blog Assignment 1: Media Coverage of Haiti, CNN

I chose to study CNN coverage in the role of media relating to the on-going cholera epidemic in Haiti. It seems to me that looking back at the beginning of the epidemic that CNN in particular was not responsible for the conditions that led to the epidemic itself, but, that being said, I do believe they have not aided the situation as it has worsened over time. CNN coverage itself focused on aid and getting information to the globe on how things had gotten to such a severe point in Haiti, and what the possibilities of helping out really were, but they did this while instilling fear in the public, which I feel ended up deterring aid. I definitely feel that media is not meant to be part of the problem or the solution, that they should remain outsiders and just give information to the public about these global issues, but they need to be held accountable for what they print. Media like CNN is especially not a humanitarian group, they are there to find out what the root of issues are and what that country or others could have done to prevent the issue. One thing CNN is doing right is by trying to maintain that these people still need aid, even after a years time and billions of dollars being sent. Even one year after the earthquake in Haiti, CNN reported “Five ways you can still help in Haiti” (Angley, 2011), showing that it is still an ongoing issue. We all want the epidemic to end; we can only hope that the media continues to raise awareness of how bad it still is in Haiti, and that we need to focus on that, not on scaring the readers and creating a larger separation between the world and places in need.
While looking at Philip Gourevich’s article “Alms Dealers”, you can see that media can and has played large rolls in creating more harm than good in aid situations. This turns into situations like in Haiti, where in order to get more attention from aid groups, the government and media, people purposely cause large disruptions (Watson, 2010). They create barricades on roads so people cannot get through, or they have large protests, to get more media attention. So, media can be blamed for these situations getting worse, the people being affected in these situations become so afraid of getting a disease like cholera that they cause havoc to get more attention from the global media, hoping to finally be saved (Watson, 2010). CNN in particular is one media outlet that reacts to these outcries and jumps at the chance to show the world how bad it is in Haiti. These media outlets should know that it is not really their place to solve large problems like cholera in Haiti, they can report about them, but they are not these countries saviors.
When the outbreak first began, CNN coverage was quite basic, telling its viewers the death toll, talking about the physical origins of the outbreak, and how the epidemic could be contained and reduced (CNN Wire Staff, 2010). This coverage continued like this through late October 2010, and continued with an almost uplifting tone. This coverage then turned a little sour, when people started to speculate where cholera came from in Haiti, as there had been no reported outbreaks since the 1960’s (Young, 2010). They told the readers that the outbreak would only get worse before it got better and that death tolls were increasing rapidly. CNN started to create fear in the readers minds, telling of cholera cases moving to Florida, and tourists traveling to the Dominican Republic were warned that they could be infected there as well (Young, 2010). These are the circumstances where I believe media like CNN goes wrong. They create a separation between the place of need and those who can actually help. If you instill fear in people they are going to be a lot less likely to help those who need it. Fear never helps us and I believe that it is a terrible tactic for these media reporters to use.