I sympathise with ‘jetstep’s’ argument in his article www.ecommerce-blog.org/archives/the-un-usability-of-online-video/. However I would argue that the problem isn’t the use of video. The problem is the content; the way the ideas are portrayed in the chosen media.
Ideas delivered orally that were originally intended to be read, without any attempt to translate them into a form specific to the medium, digital or otherwise, is patronising to the audience and fails to do justice to the original ideas.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem Kisses (1793) http://www.readbookonline.net/readOnLine/37398/ is a very good example of the importance the role storying plays in creating meaningful content.
As Coleridge wrote in his poem, when communicating complex ideas orally, storying them is analogous to mixing a magic potion.
‘Cupid, if storying Legends tell aright,
Once fram’d a rich Elixir of Delight.’
Coleridge’s ‘Cupid’ (or author), in a strong reference to the oral or non text based communication (tell, eyeless, heard, sounds, murmuring, lips – to name a few), has taken on the guise of an ‘eyeless chemist’ and is gathering powerful ingredients he will mix into a ‘love-kindled’ elixir destined for Sara’s lips, from ‘Nectar’, ‘Ambrosia’, ‘magic dews’, ‘tender pledge of sacred Faith’, ‘gentler Pleasure of the unspotted mind—‘, Day-dreams’, ‘And hope’. Carefully chosen ingredients designed to capture the imagination.
The ‘precious Compound…’ (of messages) is being meticulously ‘mix’d’ into a seductive tale of ‘responsive love’ for a very particular audience. Creating an online video is no different. The content or ‘Compound…’ is key.
Storying ideas that will be read is very different from storying ideas that will be heard. Ironically Coleridge’s ‘chemist’ was eyeless. His message of love or potion was not intended to be read by the recipient; it was designed to be experienced.
‘The eyeless Chemist heard the process rise,
The steamy Chalice bubbled up in sighs;’
Cupid’s brew was ready. What would it be like ‘breath’d on Sara’s lovelier lips’.
Mobile media video is a very exciting medium. It does however demand that we meet certain criteria that we have not been challenge on in the past. It’s not enough simply turning the written word into a video. If the messages (complex ideas) are not ‘mix’d’ contextually then your intended audience simply won’t hear or see your point.
As with Coleridge’s ‘Cupid’ and the effort put into mixing the ‘rich Elixer of Delight’, a lot of people pay a lot of money for video production. Unlike ‘Cupid’, it seems that relatively few make sure it’s what their audience want to see.
The content must acknowledge the central role the user plays in mobile media video or one click and your audience will vanished.
In my previous article dated 6 March 2011 I said that I would be meeting Peter Singer in mid May to discuss the piece of work I wanted to create with him on world poverty. We met on 18 May and Peter has agreed to collaborate on this performance.
I knew it was going to be a difficult job persuading him to participate. Indeed after he agreed he said, that he had attended the meeting expecting the outcome to be that he would not participate. I had attended the meeting expecting the outcome to be that he would not participate. I was very pleased when he said he would. Remarkably the anticipated ‘No’ became ’Yes’ quite unexpectedly.
It will be a challenging few months, as I resolve some crucial questions about the form, audience and platform for this piece of work?
Particularly the form as it plays a crucial role in how this material is communicated to the relevant audience. Over the next few weeks, I will be speaking with a couple of people I think could be helpful in determining the answer to this question.
Peter Singer’s work has been described by some people as controversial. However, I wonder whether what they mean is that they would prefer the arguments did not become a common or public discourse; that for these people their heart might say yes but their head says no.
Understanding the ‘tension’ existing between the arguments and the audience in this piece of work will play an important role in how the meaning is communicated. I want to capture this ‘tension’ in the way the piece is created. I believe it will help to positively drive the piece of work if used creatively.
And whilst it is early days, I want to explore the possibility that elements of a ‘debate’ style might work. Not a traditional debate but borrowing from this genre key aspects which would sit well with this material, Peter’s approach/style and the relevant audience.
Peter Singer’s arguments are powerful, compelling and more importantly, they are hard to ignore. To ensure the audience has every opportunity to understand their meaning these arguments need to be situated on a platform in a particular way to ensure their meaning is captured and communicated.
When I am creating a piece of work the important components that need to be considered, in addition to the performer and their material (ideas/arguments), are the audience (relevant to the material), the platform (where this material should be situated to reach this audience) and the form (what is the best frame/structure for these ideas/arguments and this audience).
Who has ’wealth surplus to his or her essential needs [that isn’t] giving most of it to help people suffering from poverty so dire to be life threatening’ ? (‘The Singer Solution To World Poverty’, The New York Times, September 05, 1999)
a conversation with Peter Singer
I wrote to Peter Singer in March 2010. I wanted to speak with him about creating a piece of work, using the oral form, based on some of his ideas.
I had read some of his material in particular his article on ‘Famine, Affluence, and Morality’ (http://www.utilitarian.net/singer/by/1972—-.htm). I had also looked more closely at his arguments for animal rights while a student at university in a course within Philosophy titled ‘Humanity and Animality’. I know enough about Peter Singer to know that his ideas, some of them, are controversial but not enough to understand them thoroughly. There were a number that I thought had the potential to (when incorporated into a piece of work) capture the imagination of the audience, in particular, world poverty and food consumption. They are very relevant today in real and practical terms to every single person worldwide. I also knew from my research that Peter had presented the material on world poverty before at universities and charities. In addition, I believed Peter was comfortable using the oral form to communicate his ideas to others. Not exclusively of course as he is well known for his written work.
I decided at the beginning of 2010 to ask him if he would be interested in speaking with me about creating a piece of work; a live performance installation. I have never met Peter Singer and know no one who has so I had no idea how he would respond to my approach and if indeed he would respond at all. I knew, as with anyone well known and in demand, that it would be difficult to get Peter’s attention and even harder to get him to seriously consider thinking differently about how and to whom he communicates his ideas orally.
All credit to Peter Singer and an indication as to why he is in such demand, he responded to my approach. And whilst he has not yet agreed to participate in the piece of work, he has agreed to talk about it and is receptive to being persuaded. He has also sent me the material this piece of work would be based on were he to participate (see links below). We meet in mid May 2011 to discuss what I propose. Subject to that discussion, the topic of this piece of work would be ‘world poverty’.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/17/magazine/17charity.t.html
http://www.nytimes.com/1999/09/05/magazine/the-singer-solution-to-world-poverty.html
Peter has presented these ideas before at universities and charities. They are very relevant today, as evidenced by both David Cameron’s ‘Big Society’ and Ed Miliband’s ‘British Promise’. There is an opportunity for these ideas to be discussed publicly.
I am an artist working with oral communication. I create pieces of work using the oral form in which complex ideas are communicated to an audience in a live public performance; what could loosely be called a performance installation.
Peter Singer’s arguments on world poverty are cogent. To maximise their impact they should be put to an audience in a way that ensures the audience has every opportunity to be persuaded. I want the audience to be shown a different side to the argument on and their role in world poverty. The piece of work I want to create will be designed to achieve this.
At the risk of pre-empting my discussion with Peter Singer I want to take advantage of foresight. I thought it might be helpful to record my progress with this piece of work. Because I believe whilst embryonic, it will prove to be a significant piece of oral communication both as a piece on world poverty and as a piece of work in a new and unique art form.
My blog posting titled ‘Repaying my social capital debt’, prefaces this article and the first of many postings I hope to publish prior to the first performance.
In each posting I will discuss my progress with the process including the challenges I am facing as honestly as I can.
Repaying my social capital debt
I have just set up a direct debit to donate a percentage of my income to Oxfam to use in their work. I was prompted to do this after reading a number of articles by Peter Singer including, ‘Famine, Affluence, and Morality’1 and ‘Should a Billionaire Give – and What Should You?’2
In the second of these two articles Singer writes, ‘People can earn large amounts only when they live under favourable social circumstances, and that they don’t create those circumstances by themselves.’ Singer uses the term ‘social capital’ to describe the accumulated value of these circumstances. Wikipedia defines social capital as, ‘a sociological concept, which refers to connections within and between social networks…the core idea [being] that social networks have value’.3 And, today being Sunday 30 January 2011 we have a very good example of the value and power of social connections in the political uprising taking place across North Africa in Tunisia and Egypt attributed in part to Twitter and Face book. Had those ‘social networks’ not been in place would there have been an uprising? Indeed as we speak, by way of demonstrating how ‘valuable’ social networks are, Hosni Mubarak has closed down the internet in Egypt.
I have, directly or indirectly, consciously or unconsciously, availed myself of the social circumstances available to me from the moment of my birth. I was privileged to be born in Australia, into a politically stable and affluent society, to a comfortable middle class family in which both my parents were educated, had full time employment and, relatively speaking, good health. This social circumstance gave me the confidence I have as an adult to utilise resources around me and problem solve in my life. My children have inherited this capital.
And whilst, as Singer says, I have not created the circumstance of my birth, I have however taken full advantage of it to achieve personal happiness, education, financial security, good health etc. Directly as a result of my birth (where I was born and who I was born to) opportunities have been presented to me. Without these opportunities, including my ability to utilise them, I would not be who I am today. My social circumstance has enabled me to prosper generally.
This makes it difficult for me to argue that my success is mine alone; that ‘I’ve worked hard for my money [and] no one is going to tell me how to spend it’.3 On this basis my achievements (financial or otherwise) have not been solely through my own singular efforts. Warren Buffett again quoted by Singer in his article, says, ‘if you stick me down in the middle of Bangladesh or Peru, you’ll find out how much [my] talent is going to produce in the wrong kind of soil’. I am not convinced I could produce there either. Or, a little closer to home, I am not convinced (no matter how resourceful I might consider I am) that, had I been born on a council estate to chronically unemployed, disabled or ill parents I would have resolved to extricate myself from a cycle of deprivation.
The argument for social capital/circumstance limits the value of your wealth, acquired solely through your own efforts, to a very small percentage of your ability to earn. Singer writes, ‘Herbert Simon estimated that “social capital” is responsible for at least 90 percent of what people earn in wealthy societies…’ leaving me with 10 percent I can call my own.
The problem is they are cogent arguments. And, whilst you can quibble over the amounts, you can’t deny the principle argument, that the social circumstance of your birth has contributed to your wealth in whatever terms you are wealthy today. And that unless you have repaid this in some form or another, it remains a debt owed by you. This means that it’s simply not enough for me to stop spending obscenely on items I want but don’t need.
If I know that I have a social capital debt and do nothing about repaying it, am I responsible for the impact this has on others?
What forms part of my ‘social capital’ debt and how should I repay it?
__________________________
1. Peter Singer, ‘Famine, Affluence, and Morality’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, vol.1, no.1 (Spring 1972), pp. 229-243 [revised edition].
2. Peter Singer,‘What Should a Billionaire Give – and What Should You?’, New York Times, December 17, 2006.
3. Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_capital
4. See footnote 2.
Naming – what we call our children
Dear Sam
Thank you for sending me the article ‘A Lone Voice’ by John Birmingham in (Sport & Style, Sydney Morning Herald, Issue #20 – December 2010).
It was disappointing to read yet another article about alcohol, women and young sportsmen – in this case, football players. Sadly the ‘lone voice’ to which John Birmingham refers is not the players. They have been silenced.
Birmingham assumes that the problem with football is a player problem. He does not question the original premiss the narrative is based on – that the problem of unacceptable behaviour in football, is a problem with players. He merely serves to reinforce the existing narrative.
My amazement is not that there is still a ‘problem with unacceptable behaviour’ in sporting codes (League, Soccer, AFL to name a few) notwithstanding the time and money that has been thrown at it. My amazement is that we continue to believe the narrative, that ‘unacceptable behaviour’ is solely a player problem. I haven’t heard a voice in support of players. Indeed, I was told by an advisor to the RFL UK that, on more than one occasion, players have said, ‘No one asks us [about unacceptable behaviour]’.
As you know, from the discussions we’ve had, I have spent the past year researching the problem – ‘unacceptable behaviour’ in football. I have spoken with various people involved in the sport nationally and locally (League – Australia & UK, Soccer – UK and AFL – Australia) at length including a number of people who provide specialist advice to management, such as academics, programme developers, etc., people whose continued commercial success depends on a close relationship with the people who run the game.
The problem of unacceptable behaviour is a complex one.
When I step back from the information provided to me by various people it would seem that, whilst football management has acknowledged the need to be seen publicly to be dealing with the problem (appointment of welfare officers in clubs etc), they do not appear to have publicly accepted their role in the problem itself. The welfare officer at a premier Brisbane club said, ‘players bring it (unacceptable behaviour) with them into the club’. And miraculously an industry has emerged on the back of dealing with this problem. An industry which appears to serve the interests of those who have developed programmes, research projects, or brands to protect and distracts the public from the powerful role football management play in the problem itself.
I was told more than once, ‘we take an unknown 16 year old boy off the street, sign him up under contract and overnight he is unable to walk down his local high street without being recognised’. It would seem to me that football managers are aware of their role in the problem’s existence but are not willing to take responsibility.
We create heroes to satisfy our own greed then when our appetite is sated we look to satisfying the next desire. We pump up their adrenaline to a point which serves our purpose with no consideration for the post-adrenaline climb down as we discard them in favour of the next emerging star. We do this in industries which focus on young men and mega bucks – sport, banking and armed forces, to name a few.
It is too easy to argue as a number of codes do, that they have prioritised dealing with the problem. This merely serves to reinforce the narrative and distract the public from the real issue. There is too much at stake for the playing field to be level. Whoever they are – clubs, trainers, management, external providers of training programmes, vested interest group (academics who have created training programmes on the back of their specialty), etc., the risk to their profit is too great.
What disturbs me more than the problem itself is the extent to which the public have bought the narrative. The problem was named and nurtured by the very people who had the most to gain. What hidden agenda did they have when they ‘named’ the problem unacceptable behaviour?
To ‘name’ something in Daoist Philosophy is to limit whatever is being named to whatever it is being named. The name you give something ultimately becomes the means by which it is identified. Julian Assange has been ‘named’ a sexual predator and a hacker, much more emotive terms globally than simply being a risk to American national security. ‘Naming’ is a very powerful control mechanism.
Why has the problem of unacceptable behaviour not gone away, notwithstanding everything that has been thrown at it by some very wealthy clubs and powerful people? The problem has not gone away because the narrative about the problem is about players, not about the exploitation of players by management. The problem has been named, unacceptable ‘player’ behaviour. The named problem and the problem are not one and the same.
Early this year I was asked by the Department of Health (DOH) UK to work with them on a piece of work titled ‘HCAI Public Facing Campaign’. The national media in the UK owned the narrative about hospital superbugs (MRSA & C Diff) not the NHS/DOH. The media argued episodes were on the increase whilst the NHS argued episodes were on the decline. The DOH commissioned a piece of research to identify how the NHS could re-claim the narrative nationally. They asked me to create a piece of work from the outcome of this research. The owner of the narrative, in this case the media, had greater control. According to the DOH, the national media had claimed and named the narrative on hospital superbugs. To deal with this, the NHS had to either refute it or create a separate and distinct narrative.
Re-naming or refutation can be difficult. You are always living in the shadow of the original narrative or story; always working from a negative position. If players were to speak up it could be hard for them to separate their ‘voice’ or narrative from the existing dialogue on ‘unacceptable behaviour’. To speak up by creating a unique and separate discourse around the issues that concern them would be a feat in itself. What platform or opportunity exists for them to create a distinct and separate dialogue over which they have ownership? What freedom would they have as players to speak about being a player?
‘Naming’ or the creation of the narrative has a complex relationship with power going back many centuries – how we are storied, who stories us and what impact this has on our identity. If you label a vulnerable teenager a criminal do they behave like a criminal because they are a criminal or because they have been named a criminal? When you name something you limit it to that name.
I am not arguing against the ‘naming’ process. I am arguing that we need to be aware of the role discourse plays. The premiss of John Birmingham’s article, like the premiss of so many arguments about the problem in sport or in this case football, is that the unacceptable behaviour that brings the game into disrepute is the players’ behaviour because the problem has been named so. This has the effect of distracting us from enquiring further.
We need a space or place in which these issues can be raised publicly and discussed openly and freely; a creative space because art has a history of providing a place for controversial ideas. Art gives you permission to explore between the lines.
Have a Happy New Year and best wishes for 2011, pamela
Oral communication as a ‘…rich Elixir of Delight’
Use of the oral form requires a unique and particular composition of ideas. A composition or framing that is particular to the form itself.
If the storying recognises the form, ‘tell aright,’ then the result of the process, ‘once fram’d’, is an intoxicating blend.
“if storying Legends tell aright, Once fram’d a rich Elixir of Delight” (Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Kisses, 1793)
As Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote in Kisses, there is an important relationship between ‘storying’ or the way the ideas we want to communicate are ‘fram’d’ and actually communicating them orally. The one (the oral form) is necessarily contingent on the other (storying). Without storying you do not have oral communication; ideas communicated. You have something written read aloud. In this relationship they (storying and the oral or telling) are inextricably connected to the content being communicated; the narrative being told. When done well, in ‘a rich Elixir of Delight’, they bring the narrative or ‘Legend’ to life. The magic in the oral form, to which Coleridge alludes, lies in the way the ideas are brought together or ‘fram’d’; the way they are curated individually into one narrative or performance. If you choose the oral form as your communication mode, you necessarily choose storying as the means to delivering the content. Where telling pre-determines the particularity of the form, storying is the form.
I think, as a consequence of the digital age, audiences are more discerning. They don’t turn to the oral form as an information medium. They turn to the oral form expecting to be introduced to something they won’t or can’t get from digital media. There is an expectation that when used, the oral form is unique.
The ‘performance installation’ as the oral expressed creatively borrows from a number of artistic forms, including theatre, contemporary art and, not to be forgotten, the public meeting. Its difference lies in the unique access it provides both the performer (author) and the audience to the ideas being communicated; access which is not replicated in any other communication form. Used in this way, the oral as a performance creates an immediacy in the relationship between the material (often complex and difficult ideas) and the audience that is not found anywhere else.
There is no other form (artistic or otherwise) that facilitates this access to both the performer and the audience – all taking place inside an intimate performance installation.
The ‘performance installation’ is simply another name for a ‘platform’ where the creative exchange of ideas takes place; a space or place that lends itself to a relational exchange as distinct from a single dimension delivery or lecture format. It acknowledges (by virtue of its artistic form) the role the audience plays in the process of constructing meaning; as integral to the creation of meaning; that meaning is not ‘delivered’, it is created between two subjects – in this case the performer and the audience; meaning is the outcome of an exchange at any given point in time.
I believe that oral communication cannot be reasonably separated from its performance installation.
When using the oral form are you doing enough of what it is good at; are you creating a seductive blend; a ‘rich Elixir of Delight’ for your audience?
In the wake of oral communication
Why are we persuaded from using the oral form? What is it about expressing our thoughts orally that we find so daunting?
Last week I tweeted the question, ‘In the new media age is it necessary to be able to communicate orally’ is the oral form now out of date? Perhaps oral communication is over rated. Some might argue that you have more control over the written form. A point readily noted by Gordon Ramsey recently publicly publishing a personal letter to his mother-in-law in the newspaper rather than having a private conversation with her. And the Royal family with their various press releases endeavoring to ‘story’ Kate Middleton before anyone else has a chance, including Kate herself. It would not be good if a second ‘Diana’ was allowed to sneak into Buckingham Palace. A carefully worded statement or paper released publicly for all to read can’t be refuted in the same way the same statement could if orally communicated directly to an audience.
I collaborate with people to create an oral performance from ideas they have authored. My role is to create a piece from their material they deliver (perform) that their audience will respond to.
It never ceases to amaze me, the number of people with something interesting to say who reluctantly communicate their ideas orally. No one uses the oral form willingly and when they do, more often than not, almost without exception, they do it badly. They try to keep the same control over the oral they had over the written. The two are very different in every respect.
Audiences respond positively to the unique relationship they have with the content when offered the oral form by a confident and competent performer. They are willingly persuaded.
What am I missing? I tweet and use the digital networking. Am I still handing over cash where everyone else uses a card? I’m not aware of being left behind. To me the oral form is the preferred medium when communicating complex and difficult ideas.
Who have you been to hear speak recently who stepped out from behind their notes and lectern to capture your imagination in a way you least expected?
A lost art or old money?
Sadly, some would say, in the digital age of tweets and social networking, we become less familiar with the oral form and its relational possibilities.
When I want to discuss a complex idea with someone, I meet them face to face. I might initially ‘write’ my ideas down either literally or in my head, depending on the complexity of the ideas or issues. But for me, this process of writing is a way of understanding my relationship with these ideas. I am always persuaded to have an oral discussion as distinct from a written exchange, particularly if the ideas are complex and require an element of explanation and persuasion or if I am looking for another point of view in contrast to mine.
During this process I always reluctantly abandon my ‘notes’, as the form in which they were created is no longer relevant. For me to effectively communicate orally I need to take the same ideas and re-frame them for the oral form; a very different process; a very different relationship. Where the former is between me and the ideas, the latter is between my audience and the ideas. In the oral form I become the puppeteer.
Structures are in place to protect narratives, including in social, judicial and traditional genres, to name a few. Some would argue for good reason. The court process, as one example of the oral form, has clear guidelines for how the ‘story’ or narrative can be created during a case. Some of these guidelines are designed to protect the judicial process. Some are designed to protect the people within the process and their authority. And in turn all are devised to limit our view of the issues. I am not advocating that this process should be changed. I am advocating an awareness of the storying process and the power it has to persuade, particularly in the oral form.
Those who are aware have the power to influence others. As the puppeteer brings the puppets to life , a master of the oral form brings the words to life in our imagination.
‘Storying your ideas orally’
As an artist working with the oral form, I am frequently asked, ‘Why some people are able to communicate orally while others struggle – what happens to an idea when it’s delivered orally that makes it make sense – in whatever terms – to others?’
My answer is always the same: communicating ideas orally is a relational act and ‘storying’ is the process of translating an idea from your head, to your mouth, to your audience. To translate ideas into the oral form you must understand the relationship you have as the author with the idea and the relationship you are willing to create for your audience. The oral form is a rich and intimate relational act for the performer and the audience. Failure to recognise this will affect your ability to communicate orally – what you say, why and how you say it.
We have all listened to someone – often well respected in their field – with raised expectations, as they orally introduced us to whatever it was about their topic that originally captured their imagination, only to be disappointed.
The performer has only a split second in which to engage us as their audience. The immediacy of the oral form lies in its transient nature. The audience can’t go back over what has been said and listen to or read it again in order to capture the meaning.
The oral form is a naturally powerful and persuasive medium; when used creatively, such as in a live performance, ideas come to life; ideas take on a new and exciting meaning.
In the performance the performer becomes the puppeteer (and his material the puppet), dangling ideas in front of us, their audience; playing with them linguistically to create a particular narrative or outcome – an image in our minds the performer seduces us with their knowledge and imagination. Carefully chosen words bringing the ideas to life in front of us, spontaneously reframing as the narrative comes to life in response to their audience.
Done well, it’s compelling and persuasive, done poorly it’s unnecessary and can be patronising.
In what way is the oral form unique?
