3P18 - Audience Blog #3
Oct. 28, 2015
Greetings! Please have a look at one of the greatest comedians of all time performing at his pinnacle:
This is Louis CK. In the scope of his career the only thing which matches his popularity is the criticism he has received by perturbed audience members. Like all great comedians, Louis CK stands to aggressively expose his audience to elements of their lives which they would otherwise choose to neglect out of respect, fear, or taboo societal conceptions. This is precisely why his routine is important; the emotional magnitude of audience reception only confirms this. By a hegemonic type of rhetoric - a 'let me remind you about reality by offending your jaded sensibilities' act - Louis CK enlightens people. His satire, even when it is not recognized as 'satire' by his audience, retains persuasive power, for basic moral principles are prodded in a focused manner, allowing the audience to use their affective reaction to form an opinion. If the satirical rhetoric is composed in a logical and irrefutable manner then this opinion is likely in accordance with the purpose of the speaker.
Watching this segment of Louis CK, I realized for the first time just how complex his method of encoding rhetorical information is - it is certainly more complex than the average audience member's ability to decode it without serious contemplation. But this is actually a very good thing, because while the audience registers his syntax (his selection of information presented) to a certain degree, the paradigm (the arrangement of syntactic information) in all its nuance is not as obvious. This allows CK to progress his routine from seemingly disconnected ideas until the meaning or affect of the sum transcends the parts. The audience typically receives CK's routine from a negotiated position, where they begin their decoding by relating the information to a dominant ideology, while looking for its contradictions and developments.
Nov. 4, 2015
I will never forget the archaic type of love I had for the appropriation of my primitive first cellphone. I must have been somewhere between 11 and 13, old enough to have experienced the internet in its earliest form - but I had not yet in my life ever sent a text message. My pocket heavier and woefully indiscreet with the outline of a rectangular plastic block, I found myself possessing greater freedom. This phone, however, with its limited to nil online capability only eased my conversion to strong implicated and reliant usage of cellphones in general, and did nothing to build social capital the way my newer iPhone does. Smart phones open the proverbial doors to online possibilities, and I am now able to facebook, tweet, insta-insta, and blog at will... Of course, that doesn't imply that I'm going to.
Several years later I remember making the upgrade to HDTV, replacing the now far outdated CRT television set. Our new TV was objectified much in the same way as the older model: placed in a TV cabinet in our living room. It is interesting to note in particular the continued inclusion of the cabinet housing. Remaining located in the living room implies that viewing television was to continue its role as a leisurely family activity - but the fact that the new TV was forced into the coffin-like housing of the old is more important. It suggests that although the new TV has high definition capability, its allure had not earned it the ability to be constantly exposed, as it would be on a modern wall mount. Obviously the ability to shut the TV away from view, and occasionally even lock the doors, proves upon inspection to be a method of keeping us from excessive viewing.
*shudder* I feel so repressed...
The organization of the TV in the living room has no gender-specific implications, for both men and women are equally free to waste their time under my roof. As you can probably tell, my parents never intended for my home to be an ahead-of-the-curve-tech-testing-haven, so our devices and usage were limited. Our consensual (high conversation, high conformity) home placed more value on activity and verbal interaction. As a result my initial tendencies to communicate online were conservative.
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