a. How does capstone measure up according to the definition proposed in Henry Jenkins' "Eight Traits of the New Media Landscape"? For this entry, describe the principle that your project fits best and the one it fits worst. How might you alter your project to fit better?
b. Do you agree or disagree with Jenkins' definition, and why?
Like Manovich's definition, Jenkins' definition of New Media features multiple different principles. However, none of Jenkins' principles are the same as Manovich's. Oh, and there are eight of them this time--to qualify as "new media", it must be: innovative, convergent, everyday, appropriative, networked, global, generational, and unequal. Out of the three New Media big-wigs, Jenkins does the best at tearing apart at my animation idea, so I suppose I'll start with the principle that fits the worst with my idea. I believe "generational" might be the worst, but I think the principle itself is an odd term--yes, I do realize that cultural norms have been changing so fast that our parents are vastly culturally different from us, and new media is partially to blame for it, but that doesn't seem to describe new media itself as much as new media's consequences, so it might be best for me to ignore that term and pick a different one to call my worst: innovative. I'm not sure if creation of a storyline for an animation by the masses (as opposed from one or two individuals) is innovative or not, but I know that a 3-D animation itself isn't. There have been 3-D animations being made for a few decades now, and even though artists are getting better working with this new method, it's mostly not "new" nowadays. My best of Jenkins' principles is "networked", which the premise of the storyline creation process relies on; the network allows anybody from anywhere in the world to assist in creating the story.
Do I agree with Jenkins' definition? Again, as it turns out, the answer is yes and no. Mostly no. I've already mentioned earlier how I felt that "generational" doesn't exactly belong in the definition as I see it. But ignoring that, I also don't agree too much with innovative, as I don't believe that something needs to be totally unique for it to fall under new media. To me, new media is an art. Innovation does occur in art from time to time (take Jackson Pollock's style of art, for instance), but it's far from required for the piece to be successful. Most of the other principles I do agree with on varying levels, but I feel like Jenkins' article isn't trying to define the term New Media so much as it's trying to define the effects of New Media on our culture (which fits better with the title of the article, Eight Traits of the New Media Landscape). I am curious if anyone else felt this way about this article, or if I am just being naive.
1 comment:
I stumbled onto your class's set of assignments this morning doing a scan on Technorati. No, Ryan, since you asked, you are not being naive. I never intended this list as a definition of New Media -- at least not in the same way that Lev Manovich's selection is trying to define new media. I am trying to record a series of changes in the media landscape -- that is, in the ecology of relations between all of the media at operation at a particular historical moment -- so I am discussing shifts which occur at the intersection between old and new media. This piece was originally written as part of a larger report for the MacArthur Foundation on the social skills and cultural competencies young people need to acquire in order to become full participants in this new media landscape. My focus here is on the culture, not the new media technologies per se. There is, for example, nothing generational about computers per se, but there are significant generational differences in how they get used. I wouldn't say that a use needs to be generational in order to be "new." Rather, my goal is to bridge across this participation gap so that we can use new media in order to facilitate better communications between young and old. I hope this clarifies where I am coming from.
--Henry Jenkins
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