Thursday 21 July 2011

Social Media and the Autobiographical Archive

Saw Life in a Day recently, which sees footage shot on the same day from every corner of the world collated in an uplifting and fascinating film. It inspired some interesting thoughts about YouTube as a vernacular repository of memory, and an infinite one at that. The film seemed to have the same focus as the BBC’s Mass Observation project from the 1940s, in that documenting the seemingly banal everyday occurrence reveals a lot about a society. The juxtaposition of different societal practices from a vast range of countries and cultures rendered those revelations even starker. The effect of technology on individual autobiographical practices is undeniable, as demonstrated by YouTube (and indeed other social media), where, technology permitting, literally anybody can immortalise any event. The autobiographical spaces enabled by digital technology are startling. The rise of the camera saw many critics reading photographic equipment as an insurmountable barrier between the self and the event, despite the photographer’s seeming attempt to capture the event for their personal archive. Perhaps now with the emergence of endless digital autobiographical repositories, our mindset has actually altered irrevocably, to the point where we often partake in events with such digital spaces in mind. Wandering around an art gallery with one’s imminent blog review in mind, for example. Not sure what the answer is, but it is definitely an interesting issue with vast repercussions for personal and infinite social posterity. Times change and lives end but the digital archive remains. With the inexorable rise of vernacular repositories of memory, Derrida’s study of archive fever seems increasingly relevant.    

Apocalyptic Scottish Skies