Minor Differences in College Life versus Post-Graduate Life

I’m currently working on a post that’s actually substantial, but in the meantime….Lately I’ve been noticing that there are certain things that used to be a normal part of my life in college that are almost completely absent from my life after graduation. Conversely, there are things in my post-graduate life that were never part of my life in college. I’m not talking about big things. Obviously, I don’t go to class every day anymore and I didn’t get a paycheck at the end of every month in college. No, I’m talking about little things like:

1.) YouTube. When I was in school, I spent so much time on YouTube. It was a convenient means of wasting time when I should have been working on papers. Now, the time that I spend tethered to a computer is in an office, where my co-workers and boss could see and hear what I was doing if I started watching videos every half hour. So, I’m really not on YouTube very much anymore, and I’m completely clueless about this whole Harlem Shake phenomenon. (It makes me feel old.)

2.) Walking. I’m willing to bet that I still walk more than the average American since I don’t have my own car. However, when I was a student, walking was built into my day. The longest amount of time I’d spend sitting would be in four-hour seminars, but after the seminar was over, I’d have to stand up and walk home or to the library or to my next class. Now, I spend eight hour days sitting at a desk and I don’t have an excuse to get up and walk around regularly. It’s tough to get used to and my back doesn’t like it much. (And we wonder why Americans have so many health problems.)

3.) Conversations about old-people things. Yesterday, I had a chat with my dad about what exactly a 401(3)b–the non-profit version of a 401(k)–is, under what circumstances you can tap into it, why you need alternative savings as well, and what happens to it if you lose or change your job. I’m very grateful that I have parents who are willing to explain this stuff to me and give me financial advice, but retirement was an issue that never, ever crossed my mind when I was in college.

4.) Feeling dumb. Occasionally I’ll see something on a blog or in the news and it will call up vague memories of something I learned in school that I just can’t remember anymore. Just today I was reading a book on politics that briefly referenced the sociologist Marcuse. I can recall a time when I read some of Marcuse’s work and feverishly crammed notes about him for a test, but for the life of me, I can’t tell you anymore who he was or why he’s important. (I can, however, describe in great detail the couch I was sitting on while doing the cramming. It’s odd what the brain remembers and forgets.) When these instances come up, I feel really dumb–like I should know something that I’ve forgotten. (I also wonder why knowing it at the time seemed so incredibly important, and if it really was so important, why don’t I remember it now?)

5.) New priorities. Of course, learning doesn’t stop just because someone is no longer in school. I now know tons of things about grant writing, fundraising, types of nonprofit designations and what they mean, how to create a social media campaign, and the weird and confusing world of government contracts and subcontracts. These are all things no one ever taught me in school, but they’re things I’ve either picked up interning in the nonprofit world or had to go out and learn myself. So, maybe it’s not that I’m dumb, but the topics I’m interested in learning and my priorities about what I’m learning have definitely changed.

Obviously, when I graduated and entered “the real world” I expected a lot of things to change. These are just some of the minor changes that I either hadn’t expected or hadn’t really thought about until now. It’s strange to think that I’ve been out of school for almost a year now, but in many ways, I’m still thinking of myself in relation to college. Being a student has consumed my identity for most of my life, and while I’d say I’m doing fairly well outside of academia, it’s like that identity hasn’t fully updated yet.

The Big Phallus Theory: The Big Bang Theory, Nerd Culture, and Women

(While I tried to avoid them, you may find some SPOILERS for The Big Bang Theory in this post.)

 

One of my favorite sitcoms is The Big Bang Theory. While the show is not always strong on plot and rarely portrays life in academia accurately, its likeable characters and nearly unending stream of insider gags for nerds make it an entertaining means of spending half an hour. I love Leonard, the everyman. I enjoy Sheldon’s elevated dialogue. And I can both sympathize with and laugh at Howard and Raj’s awkwardness. I also appreciate that it features a smart, sensible heroine, Penny, who isn’t afraid to assert herself and can talk back to the guys.

What I can’t stand is that, like most of nerd culture and the wider culture, the show often reeks of sexism. Some of it, like Howard’s frequent lewd comments that reduce women to sex objects, I can ignore. Indeed, if I restricted myself only to popular culture that presents women as nothing less than fully realized human beings, I’d probably never be able to watch another movie or television show again. I’ve become so used to explicit sexism, in the form of derogatory comments about women, in my media diet that, I confess, I often recognize it and then choose to ignore it. It’s one of the patriarchal bargains I make as a feminist and a woman living in a culture that recognizes my gender’s worth only in so far as it meets certain standards of sexiness, attractiveness, and compliance. What does bother me about the show that I haven’t been able to ignore so easily is the implicit sexism in the lack of female nerd characters.

Seriously, where are the women nerds? I see them everywhere in real life. They attend conventions, they go to the movies, they cosplay, they talk about Star Wars and Star Trek  and play Skyrim and Dungeons & Dragons. They consist of the majority of people that I know and I’d say nearly all of my female friends are nerds. I know women who can code websites, quote Lord of the Rings, act out scenes from Doctor Who, recite the noble gases and their atomic weights, and kick your ass in Call of Duty. Why are these women not represented, or even acknowledged, in The Big Bang Theory? I’m not even asking why they aren’t main characters–though a show about four female nerdy friends would be awesome and so much more entertaining than Sex and the City–so much as I’m wondering why, in the show’s universe, they don’t even seem to exist.

Well, one might point out, what about Amy and Bernadette? Perhaps, in the strictest sense of the term “nerd,” someone who is brilliantly smart and obsessives over even the tiniest minutiae of something, Amy and Bernadette are nerds. They’re both smart, they’re both biologists, and they both have Ph.D.s. To give credit where credit is due, just a few decades ago it would have been unthinkable to have not one, but two women characters in the S.T.E.M. fields on a television show. However, Amy and Bernadette are still ultimately defined in the show by their relationships with their male significant others. They are judged, and often found wanting, by their ability or inability to meet cultural standards of attractiveness, and they do no participate in what has come to be the domains of nerd culture–things like comic books, science fiction shows and movies, and video games. There are no women regularly featured in the show who enjoy these pursuits, even though such women exist in real life.

In real life, however, nerd culture often has just as much, if not more, of a problem with sexism than The Big Bang Theory does. While The Big Bang Theory ignores nerd women and pretends that they don’t exist, real life nerd culture can be downright hostile toward women attempting to claim the identity of “nerd.”  Whether its people accusing women of only pretending to be nerds in order to hook up with guys or creating the “Idiot Nerd Girl” meme that I’ve attempted to reclaim in this post, a lot of guys seem to want women out of their conventions, their role playing games, and their Internet spaces. But why? The most obvious answer is sexism, but it would be too simple to leave it at that, so I’m going to dig a little deeper.

Though the cultural perception of nerds is changing, it is still largely a negative one, as evidenced by the male main characters on The Big Bang Theory. All of them, in some way, have failed to live up to to our culture’s unrealistic and burdensome ideals of masculinity. None of them are physically strong. Neither are they particularly attractive. They know little of sports. They aren’t charismatic or suave or charming. They aren’t physically or emotionally tough. They prefer the comforts of their apartments to the outdoors. Nerdy men are, as the show and the wider culture seem to suggest, not masculine. The show has frequently paired short, wimpy Leonard with Penny’s tall, dark and handsome beaus to make this point. Leonard, Sheldon, Howard, and Raj could often be better described as “feminine” than masculine. There is, however, one group that is lower than nerds on the social hierarchy: women. Whatever male nerds are, they are still more masculine (and thus higher on the hierarchy of patriarchal culture) than women. But when women start entering nerd spaces–and demanding an equal right to be there and be recognized as nerds–they challenge the modicum of masculinity that nerd culture has been able to salvage for itself. They also challenge the perception of women, within both nerd culture and the wider culture, as nothing more than accessories that convey masculinity, and thus worth, on a man. (Think about how, when Howard was first dating Bernadette, he worried that she wasn’t good-looking enough. An attractive girl conveys to society that there is something “manly” or “masculine” about the man she is dating, thus increasing his worth in the eyes of patriarchal culture.)

I think there is a place for women in nerd culture, and I’m sure that women will continue to attend cons, play video games, and go to special screenings of Star Wars. Just as women have fought, and are still fighting, for their right to inhabit the biology labs and physics departments where Bernadette and Amy have managed to reside, I suspect that women will continue to exist in nerd spaces and gradually gain acceptance there. I also suspect that, as nerd culture continues to grow within the mainstream, the stereotype of nerd men as less than masculine will diminish.

However, just because the stereotype of nerds as feminine may disappear does not mean that sexism within nerd culture will necessarily end. Though I would be very glad to see our culture expand its definitions of masculinity beyond its currently narrow confines, I suspect that this will do very little to challenge the standards of beauty to which women, even nerdy women, are held, both inside and outside of nerd culture. Maleness, I still sadly suspect, will still be privileged within nerd culture, in part because nerd culture is inherently exclusionary. To be a nerd, it helps to be male. It also helps to be white, cisgender, and educated. I suspect being able-bodied helps too, though I have seen a broader spectrum of ability represented in nerd culture than I have in mainstream culture. It is required that one be at least middle class, as I doubt the working class has the time and money that are necessary to indulge in nerdy pursuits. Gaming systems can be incredibly expensive, as are books, DVDs, and high-speed Internet connections. One must also have the leisure time to master the games and fantasy worlds present in nerd media. Sadly, in many ways, nerds are often primarily defined by what they consume.

I would like to think that nerd culture is smart enough to look at its own privilege and try to include a wider range of people. After all, many of us nerds define ourselves by our inability to fit in, our difference from mainstream society, and our stories of bullying and rejection. Perhaps we could use those experiences to sympathize with those whom society bullies and rejects. Until more nerds are willing to make this effort and look beyond their own privilege, however, I suspect that nerd culture will largely remain another old boys club.

A Tip About Doctor Visits

Since I sporadically blog about my health, I’m going to write about seeing a new doctor today. It went pretty well. The woman was friendly and personable and listened to my descriptions of my symptoms and the history of what I’ve been diagnosed with so far and what treatments I’ve tried. She never said “Oh, but you’re too young to have this!” And she didn’t give me any unhelpful suggestions like, “Have you just tried to stop writing?” She didn’t have any immediate answers for me, but I did have some tests done and I got some referrals. I left feeling like I’m being proactive about my health, which in and of itself sort of makes me feel better. I hate just lying around and hoping things will suddenly get better on their own, when I’ve been doing that for a year and so far it’s just made me feel useless.

I did, however, try something new with this doctor. Before I went to the appointment, I made an outline of my recent medical problems with my hands and arms. I listed approximate dates of symptoms, previous doctors I’d seen, diagnoses I’d been given, and remedies I’ve tried. I found that it was a lot easier to just hand the doctor the list I’d typed up than attempt to explain to her what I’d been going through, what I’d already tried, and what symptoms I was having. I think it helped because, previously, when I’d tried to explain what was going on to doctors in the moment, I often found myself not knowing what to say. I find doctors sort of intimidating, which I know is ridiculous because doctors are just as fallible as anyone else, but I often feel like I’m taking their valuable time away from other patients. I’m not dying. I’m not suffering from a terminal illness–at least, I doubt that I am. I often feel almost like I don’t deserve to be there when there are so many people with more serious health problems and a more immediate need for care. (This was especially true this summer when I was seeing a doctor whose office was located in a hospital. One day, on my way to an appointment, I was on my way to the doctor’s office and I found myself behind a woman who appeared to have undergone surgery on her legs. She was struggling just to walk down the hall, even with the aid of a walker and a therapist by her side. I knew, logically, that by seeing a hand doctor located in the same hospital, I wasn’t taking anything away from her, but after watching someone just struggling to walk a few feet, my own problems felt sort of insignificant. This is an issue because, when I got to the appointment, I downplayed how much my arms were bothering and making activities like typing or driving difficult. I wasn’t honest with the doctor about just how much discomfort I was in, so he assumed I was improving more than I was.)

Anyway, by sitting down to make a list, I was able to remove myself from the intimidating environment of a physician’s office and focus on my health problems without comparing them to anyone else’s. Making the list also helped me focus on the most important things I wanted the doctor to know. So many times, I’ve left an appointment thinking, “If only I would have remembered to mention this or that!” Well, today, because I had a paper with all of the most relevant, most important things that I wanted the doctor to know, I didn’t have that problem. It also made the conversation that I did have with the doctor more focused. Instead of starting out by describing my problem to her, I was able to quickly bring her up to speed on everything I’d already tried or had done. The timeline gave her a quick overview of the basics like when my symptoms started and how long I’d had them, so she was able to ask me more detailed questions about what treatments I’d tried. Overall, I left feeling like someone had actually listened to me and that I’d adequately expressed myself. And, because the doctor had an accurate idea of what I’m experiencing, she was able to put together some potential plans for treatment.

So, the moral of this story: if you have complicated health issues or have trouble talking to doctors, try writing down your symptoms and history before the appointment. I suspect things will go much more smoothly.

Because I Occasionally Blog about My Health Too…

I’ve previously written about having carpal tunnel. This summer, I did some physical therapy, and for a while, it seemed to help. And then it didn’t. I went from feeling sort of normal to again having tingling, numbness, and stiffness in my hands. So, my therapist sent me back to the doctor, and my new diagnosis is stretched ulnar nerves–a problem similar in symptoms to carpal tunnel, except it’s caused by the stretching of the ulnar nerve in the elbow, which runs along the funny bone. I had some more nerve conduction tests done, and according to the tests, there’s nothing wrong with me. Except I know that there is, because my arms feel weak and numb all of the time. I could have surgery, but my doctor doesn’t feel good about that option, because other than my descriptions of my symptoms, there’s nothing that actually proves that this is my problem.

So, at the suggestion of a co-worker, I’m taking malic acid and magnesium supplements. I’m not usually big on vitamins. A friend’s mother, a dietician, calls them “expensive pee” because most people don’t need them, so their bodies just end up flushing them. And I’ve always lumped vitamin supplements in with other woo-woo remedies that don’t have double blind, replicable studies done by professionals supporting them. But I’m kind of at the point where I don’t know what else to do.

At least this problem isn’t affecting my ability to work, but it would be really nice to have some extra strength in my arms once I get out of work so that I can do things like write my own stuff or take up some of my other hobbies again like making beaded jewelry or learn how to play the guitar or actually go out with people. Sigh… I know a lot of people have problems that are much, much more serious than mine. There are people with life-threatening illnesses that have no cure. There are people who don’t have health insurance and can’t even see doctors about their problems. (As much as I wish the Affordable Care Act were more comprehensive and had a public option, I am so grateful for being able to stay on my parents’ insurance until I’m twenty-six. I’m not sure what I would have done without it, because if it weren’t for the ACA, I wouldn’t be insured right now.) I know there are a lot of things right now about my life that could be worse,  but that doesn’t make this issue any less frustrating.

Some Silly Search Terms

I was looking at my site stats today and was quite amused by some of the search terms that have brought people to this blog. Some of the more ridiculous ones include:

1.) Impenetrable Pussies–Sounds like the title of a bad porno movie. Or an edgy, sex positive, radical feminist blog. But probably a bad porno.

2.) Homosocial Premise–Makes me think of a band name.

3.) Poststructuralism Fog–Also makes me think of a band name, possibly a band started by a group of English department professors.

4.) Jack Halberstam Sucks–No. No, she does not.

5.) Fog Stereotype–Also sounds like a band name

And, my favorite:

6.) Purple Jack Skellington Christmas Tree–I want one!

Seriously, though, it looks like most of the search terms that lead people here involve the name of a television show or pop culture icon with “critical theory” added to it. Either I’m attracting a lot of geeks like myself who want to read critical analyses of pop culture or a bunch of confused college freshmen. Either way, I’ll take it. 🙂

Some Thoughts on Job Searching

So, on a personal note, I’ve been job searching this summer. I had a temporary retail position, but I’ve had to quit that since my lease is up soon and unless something pans out, it looks like I’m going to be moving in with my parents at the end of the month. I’m really not happy about that. Don’t get me wrong, my parents are great people, and through their influence I became the inquisitive, thoughtful critical thinker that I am today (even if it didn’t quite turn out the way they expected). I had just hoped that once I graduated and finished school, I’d be able to live on my own, pay for my own things, and generally be independent.

One of the many problems with job searching is that it requires a lot of introspection. I write an individual cover letter for every job I apply for, which means that for each job, I spend a lot of time thinking about what makes me qualified, what experiences I’ve had that I can bring to the job, and why my background makes me a good fit for this organization or that company. I find myself second-guessing my past a lot. Should I have bothered with a Master’s degree? With only a couple exceptions, the jobs that I’m looking at and am qualified for don’t require one. The Master’s seemed like a good idea at the time…(This was when I really thought I wanted to teach English at the college level and stay in school forever. Graduate school quickly cured me of that.) I also second-guess my internships. Yes, they lead me to realizing that I want to go into non-profit communications and, yes, they are better than no job experience on my resume at all. But they were both with very niche organizations that espouse ideological values that, to some, could be controversial. Okay, I interned with feminist and atheist—erherm, “secular humanist”—organizations. In many ways, I don’t regret these internships because I loved working for them, met some amazing people, and had some wonderful (and practical) experiences. But I do wonder if I should’ve done something safe (and maybe paid?) and less controversial. It was a little awkward when I realized I was applying for a communications position at a Catholic university and nearly all of my writing samples are pro-LGBT rights or pro-abortion. (I didn’t get that job. No surprises there.) I’ve always prided myself as someone who stays true to her values, holds out for the best that she can get, and doesn’t take the easy road. But it was a lot easier to be that sort of person when I was in school, which I’m realizing is a very controlled environment that has little bearing on life in the real world, and when I didn’t have health problems to worry about.

This introspection has also made me realize that as I applied for and worked in these internship positions, and pretty much every job I’ve ever had, I kind of fell into them without really understanding what I was getting into. When I applied to intern with a feminist non-profit in Washington, D.C., I didn’t think, “This is an experience that will build a foundation for my future career goals!” I thought, “Everyone else is doing summer internships. I should do a summer internship. Ooo! Feminism and writing! I like those! I’ll apply for that!” The internship with the secular humanist organization was a bit more calculated. It was a a resume builder and fall-back in the event that I didn’t get a paid summer job. But I still didn’t really see it as something that would affect my future. I think I had this attitude because, at the time, I saw myself as a student. In the end, I figured, the internships would be over in August and I would go back to school. School was what I focused on most. Now I’m realizing that, in terms of jobs experience, the portfolio that I built with these organizations matters much, much more than my degrees.

Ultimately, because of that portfolio, I really don’t regret my internships. I also don’t regret them because they were experiences in which I grew not only intellectually but also personally and emotionally. Sure, I wasn’t getting paid, but the intrinsic value that comes from working on projects that I felt excited about, from not just feeling but knowing that I was making the world a better place, and from meeting people that shared my interests and passion more than made up for the dent in my back account. (And, yes, I realize that I was privileged to be able to spend my summers working for free. I’m not denying that I got where I am today at least in part because of that privilege. And one of the reasons why I want to work with non-profits is so that I can extend that privilege to the many, many people who deserve but don’t have access to opportunities that people like me have.) At the time, even though I didn’t fully understand how those internships would play out, I’m ultimately glad that I did them.

And now I have two upcoming interviews, and in my over-thinking fashion, I’m wondering how they’re going to pan out and what that will mean for my future, because at this point, I don’t have school waiting for me at the end of the summer. Both of the interviews are with non-profits whose missions I care about. One is in a city about six hours away from where I currently live, doesn’t pay well even for non-profits, but does offer full benefits. Though I’ve spent the past year whining about how much I can’t stand my current location, as I’m starting to think seriously about moving, I’m kind of bulking at the prospect. I wouldn’t know anyone and I’m not sure what I’d do if my carpal tunnel flares up before my health benefits kick in. On the other hand, this is the best job I’ve had a shot at so far. The second interview is for a paid, part-time internship position. Even if I got a second job, I’d still probably have to live with my parents, a prospect I’m not thrilled with. However, it would only be until the end of the year, by which point, I’d hopefully have had a chance to network with other non-profits and maybe, maybe land a full time job. Also, hopefully, by then I’d have this damned carpal tunnel sorted out and in the meantime, I’d still be close to my doctor and physical therapist. I’m realizing that, however this situation plays out, I’m probably going to just fall into something again without fully realizing the consequences until it’s too late to back out.

I’m trying to convince myself that it’s okay not to know what the future holds. All I can ask of myself is that I make the best decision I can with the information that I have right now. (And to calm down, because I haven’t even been offered either of these positions yet! I’m just being interviewed!) I’ve fallen into things in the past—undergrad, jobs, internships, grad school—and overall I’m happy with the way they turned out and how I dealt with them. The same thing will happen in my current job situation. I don’t believe that everything happens for a reason or that there is some cosmic greater plan. I do, however, believe that we ourselves give a reason and a meaning to everything that happens. I’ve managed to give meaning to many of my past experiences, like my internships. However, I have other past experiences, like going to graduate school, that I regret. (Maybe in a few years, when I have more perspective on it, I won’t regret it. Who knows?) Right now, I’m hoping that however my job search turns out, I end up with more meaning than regrets.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that life is unpredictable, and while I know that, sometimes it’s hard to come to terms with, especially when I’m used to being in school, where everything has a nice, easy rubric to follow and results are guaranteed. On a more theory-related note, I watched my first Quentin Tarantino film this weekend and I have some thoughts on it. I’ve also read a serious, academic book related to current political and social issues. So, stay tuned for more serious posts coming later this week!

Trying to Get Back in the Blogging Habit Again…

So, I truly planned to start blogging regularly again. And then life got in the way. I was working toward getting my Master’s, while having carpal tunnel syndrome. Every word that I typed felt precious, as it made my fingers stiff and tingly and sometimes I couldn’t move them for days. I had to decide which words were the most important. And the most important words tended to be those that contributed to getting my degree. So I focused on writing my papers and let this blog go.

Now I’ve completed my Masters and am looking for a job. I’ve also found a wonderfully supportive doctor and a very kind and patient physical therapist who are helping me through my carpal tunnel. I have more time and my hands are feeling better, so I want to get back in the habit of blogging. I’d also like to possibly have something worthwhile, like a decent blog, to show to some potential employers. If nothing else, I’d like to remember what it’s like to write for the pure joy of writing again, as opposed to writing to please professors and get good grades.

So I’m going to try to get back into the habit of blogging again. I’ll see how it goes this time.

On Walter Benjamin’s “The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility, and Other Writings on Media”

In his essay on how the changes in technology that have allowed art to be reproduced, when once a single work of art was unique as an original, Benjamin traces the evolution of art forms from prehistoric cave paintings to contemporary films. Benjamin is not the first to attempt to understand how technology has impacted the form and significance of art in our society. Many of his arguments and observations remind me of similar remarks made by John Berger in his book Ways of Seeing. However, he is unique from Berger in that he includes an analysis of film as a continuation of the technological progression of art from painting to photography and finally to cinema.

Overall, Benjamin seems critical of film as an art form. He argues that in putting together a film,

What is reproduced is not an artwork, and the act of reproducing it is no more such a work than in the first case. The work of art is produced only by means of montage. And each individual component of this montage is a reproduction of a process which is neither an artwork in itself nor gives rise to one through photography. (Benjamin 29-30)

In other words, Benjamin seems to be arguing that in taking many different shots of essentially the same scene and splicing them together in order to make the best possible scene is not in itself an art. He also seems to be arguing that the act of shooting all of these different scenes is also not in and of itself art. I would disagree. While I know very little about the actual filming of scenes, I do know several people who practice photography and who would argue that the very act of choosing to frame something in a scene, that is, cutting out some things in the environment to focus on others, is a conscious choice of the photographer to include and disregard certain objects or people in a shot. This conscious choice, to them, makes the photograph art. I imagine that a similar conscious choice must be made in order to film a scene for a movie. In the case of film editing, with which I have had some experience, I would argue that the act of choosing the best possible scene or moment in a scene is no different, in some sense, from a painter looking at the various colors of paints on his or her palette and choosing which ones to mix in order to capture the exact tone or mood that he or she wishes to create in the painting. The process of creating art, whether in writing or painting or editing a film, often involves making a variety of choices about which words, colors, or shots to use and put together in the best possible configuration. This process is just as applicable in creating film as it is in creating other art forms.

            Benjamin recognizes the parallels between painter and film editor, but he sees the painter as superior to the film editor. He compares them to a magician and a surgeon and explains that the magician maintains a distance between his or herself and the patient. The surgeon, however, Benjamin claims, actually penetrates the patient’s body and interferes with its workings. He concludes by writing, “Magician is to surgeon as painter is to cinematographer. The painter maintains in his work a natural distance from reality, whereas the cinematographer penetrates deeply into the tissue. The images obtained by each differ enormously. The painter’s is a total image, whereas that of the cinematographer is piecemeal” (Benjamin 35). Benjamin’s point is that the painter, in his art, is removed from reality. The cinematographer, however, takes small pieces of reality and reorganizes them to make a different version of reality.

However, Benjamin seems to be assuming that there is a correct version of reality in the outside world. I would disagree. I believe that each individual human being, because of his or her own individual backgrounds, experiences, worldviews, and socialization, has a slightly different understanding of what is “real” that differs from another person’s understanding of “reality.” A painter, I would argue, no more accurately captures reality than does a film editor. Even the most realistic still life has some imprint of the artist’s own particular worldview or version of reality that makes it estranged from the “real world” that exists outside the minds of human beings. In fact, in Ways of Seeing, Berger argues that the purpose of creating realistic still life paintings was not to accurately portray the whole of reality but instead to support the ideologies of capitalism and materialism. Painting does not portray the whole of reality any more than film does. In fact, if film is a reassembling of various pieces of reality, then it is no different than painting and is just as removed from reality. Both are presenting views of the world that are separate from “reality.” However, the film looks more like reality than the painting does and it achieves this sense of reality through interfering with reality. I agree with Benjamin that this is a reason to be critical of film, as people can sometimes forget that a film is, in fact, not reality. However, this momentary disregard for reality, this suspension of disbelief, seems to be one of the goals of art. Many painters, writers, and filmmakers would probably be pleased if their audiences, for a moment, forgot the “real” world around them and accepted their fictional world as reality. Art, in all its forms, can have an escapist function.  

            Benjamin is not only critical of film as an art form but is also critical of the actor’s role in film. He seems to see acting before a camera, as opposed to acting before a live audience, as alienating to the actor. As I was reading, I wondered what he would think of television shows that were filmed before a live audience, in which the actors are acting not only for the camera but also for people. These kinds of shows combine both aspects of film and theater and could possibly be a sort of compromise between the alienation that Benjamin argues film actors feel and the aura that actors in live theater experience. Benjamin quotes from Pirandello,

“The film actor feels as if exiled. Exiled not only from the stage but form his own person. With a vague unease, he sense an inexplicable void, stemming from the fact that his body has lost its substance, that he has been volatilized, stripped of his reality, his life, his voice, the noises he makes when moving about, and has been turned into a mute image that flickers for a moment on the screen, then vanishes into silence…” (Benjamin 31) 

Pirandello, Benjamin notes, was specifically an actor in the age of silent films. However, he generalizes this alienation that Pirandello feels to all actors, even in the age of sound film. This seems an unfair generalization to make, as there are actors who enjoy performing before a camera and do not feel as though it inhibits their acting or art in any way.

            For instance, in his memoir Kiss Me Like a Stranger, actor Gene Wilder, who has performed both on stage and in films, describes his experience as an actor in both mediums. Nowhere in his memoir does Wilder describe feeling any sort of alienation while performing in front of a camera. In fact, he expresses a preference for acting in films. In one section of his book, he describes moments in which he has been acting and the persona of the character he is portraying has completely overtaken him. He was, in these moments, no longer the individual Gene Wilder but instead literally felt as though he was Willy Loman in Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman or Leo Bloom in The Producers. His ability to leave himself behind and completely take on the personality of the character he was portraying had nothing to do with whether he was performing in front of other people or the camera. Nowhere does he describe a feeling of losing an essential quality of the art of acting because he is acting in front of a camera.

Some of the differences between Pirandello and Wilder’s experiences may come from their allegiance to diverse schools of acting. As an actor, Wilder writes that his goal was always to leave himself behind and immerse himself in the character he was portraying. In fact, in order to achieve this goal, he writes that he often had to forget about his audience completely and focus on the emotions and motivations of his character. His goal, as an actor, had nothing to do with surrounding himself with a certain aura. However, if cultivating this sort of aura was Pirandello’s goal as an actor, then he would most likely lose many important aspects of the art of acting by performing in front of a camera as opposed to a live audience. Benjamin notes that, “in the case of film, the fact that the actor represents someone else before the audience matters much less than the fact that he represents himself before the apparatus” (Benjamin 31). Wilder’s experience as an actor would contradict this statement, as Wilder seems to believe that the skill of an actor to take on the persona of his or her character is irrelevant to the type of audience for whom he performs. Benjamin seems to generalize Pirandello’s experience of film acting to all actors, which seems unfair, as it disregards the experiences of actors, like Wilder, who are not affected by the nature of their audience.

While I disagree with Benjamin on some of his points, overall, I like the fact that he traces the functions and meanings of art throughout changes in technology. He recognizes art as political and relates the political nature of art to the changes in technology used to produce art. He also discusses the effects that these changes in the reproducibility of art have on the masses and their understanding of art and what art is and how it functions in society. However, in my mind, he places too much emphasis on alienation. The nature of art is changing, yes, and it is changing through its ability to be produced and reproduced, but this does not seem to necessarily lead to alienation. Some might argue that this process actually makes art more democratic, as it can be distributed to larger groups of people and is no longer merely the property of those who can afford it or afford to see it. Art’s ability to be made and reproduced by almost anyone also allows for a greater opportunity for discourse between various ideologies of artists and can provide more people with a voice and a means of expression. While I certainly think that Benjamin’s criticism is not unfounded and that one should be critical of art, I would not take a stance quite as pessimistic as his.  

Works Cited

Benjamin, Walter. The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility, and Other Writings on Media. Cambridge: Belknap Press, 2008.

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