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Media Criticism Fall2006 Session17

Theories of Mind: Media and the construction of self

• The self is a construction of media
  • But we also construct our media
  • And the content of our media
• The construction of self through media is the real issue in the Psychoanalytic analysis of media
• So Cutting through all the deep Freudian theory and its adaptation
  • It remains true that we forget everything we learn several times while we are young
  • But while we forget it, we don't lose it
  • It becomes a substrate of who we are
    • confidence
    • ability to trust
    • ability to love
    • discipline
    • jealousy
    • fear
    • patience
    • self-control
  • This "substrate" quality is what psychological constructs like Id, Ego, Superego, and Oedipus Complex are all about
    • The assumptions that emerge from the things we forget
  • We may not remember what happens when we are young, but it still deeply shapes who we are
  • That is the fundamental concept beneath the unconscious mind
    • Forget versus repress may simply be a value judgment
• The unconscious is shaped by our experience of language and the expressed perceptions of others
  • It finds expression in our choices
    • The things we choose to watch
    • The meaning we assign to it
    • Our behavior
      • Freudian slips
      • Failures of memory
      • Jokes and Puns
      • Neuroses
      • Dreams
  • What's the right way to hang the toilet paper?
    • People often have strong views about "what's right" here
    • There is no "right" way
    • But we tend to view the way our parents do it as "right"
  • This is fundamentally what "the unconscious" is all about
    • The things that we assume are "right" without really thinking about them
  • When analysts view film or video as "dream expression", it is this forgotten unconscious that they are referring to
    • From the standpoints of both creation and consumption
    • Meaning exceeds the surface
    • We experience the unconscious as if it were a language - Jacques Lacan
  • We are "spoken" by our culture
  • We become what we assume by the messages we attend to
  • We commit to what we believe in the messages we create
• X equals Sum Media
  • Relationships
  • Communities
  • Organizations
  • Societies
  • Our selves
• In the end, psychological theory is largely an extension of semiotics
  • but with an ideological overlay of vocabulary
  • in which we oppress ourselves

Assignment due Monday

Write a one or two paragraph introduction to your term paper that establishes a thesis and the methodology you plan to use.

Assignment next Wednesday

Create an annotated bibliography of at least six sources (books, book chapters, or journal articles) that use or describe the method(s) that you have selected. They can apply the method to any body content in any medium. What matters is that they apply your method to some body of content. For each source, write a one paragraph statement of what seems to be important in the book or journal article. Note that each chapter of Allen points to many potential sources.

Assignment due the Monday before Thanksgiving (in two and a half weeks)

First Draft of Complete Term Paper