VIU Arts and Humanities series probes nature of communities

There is a scene in the Oscar-nominated film Up in the Air where two corporate


high-flyers compare the merits of various airline and hotel loyalty plans


before romance and inevitable complications ensue.

The plans, with their easy to use membership cards, are one example


of the evolving types of communities that are being examined by faculty of Vancouver Island University’s Media


Studies Department, English Department, and Graphic Design Program and Creative


Writing student Alison Pitcher.

“It’s an exercise to think about what is changing in our


culture and our society,” said Doug Stetar, chair of Media Studies at VIU and


one of the presenters of the Arts and Humanities colloquium Process over Product : : Collaboration and


Machine Communities.

“We look at the Internet and social media and the way people


travel now and we see groups and communities forming that never could have


formed in the past,” Stetar said. “At the same time, we feel our local


communities are under threat.”

VIU’s Literary Theory Research Group and the Datastream


Media Collective are collaborating to examine the nature of communities through


a variety of inter-disciplinary approaches. The inter-disciplinary approach to


the colloquium is one of the key ways to break down barriers and allow the


participants to take a broader perspective at societal issues.

“We need to have a conversation about what’s going on in


society and how much we know about what is going on,” Stetar said.

Participants will provide a look at their works in progress


at VIU’s Library Boardroom 10 to 11:30 am Friday, Feb. 19. The presentations


are free and open to the public. The projects will be shown in more complete


form in May.

The collaborations between theorist/writers and digital


artist/practitioners are inspired by Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben,


author of The Coming Community. The


concept of “machine communities” reflects the kinds of associations created by


corporations, governments and others that use technology such as databases. 

Among the works are:

Desire & Machines: Auralizing Community by English


professor Daniel Burgoyne, Digital Media Technology professor Robin Davies, third-year


English and Creative Writing student Alison Pitcher, and Digital Media


Technology professor Marian van der Zon. Examples of historical and


live aural machine communities will be used to show human-machine interactions and


their impact.

Knitting: A Community


Machine?  by Graphics Design


technician Kevin Mazutinec and English professor Frances Sprout. This explores how the


ancient craft of knitting is influenced by the evolution of online websites


such as Ravelry.com where old-fashioned knitting circles have been replaced by


a database with more than half a million members.

 Archival Machine Communities & the


State of Exception by English professor Richard Lane and Digital Media


Studies chair Doug Stetar. This collaborative video probes themes such as


forces colliding, shifting rules and the horrific example of community evident


during the Shoah or Holocaust.

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For more information, contact Katharina Rout (Katharina.Rout@viu.ca)


or Helen Brown (Helen.Brown@viu.ca)