As Nadine and myself are presenting on Wednesday i thought i would put up a few points about this weeks reading. Nadine gave you a summary of the article, so i thought i would just highlight a few points that i found interesting or that i thought were key to the core of the article. First off, as Nadine and i were reading this we found it interesting that JenniCAM was a site that"blossomed into a web phenomenon"(p.286) gaining national media attention and a fan base of people who followed it intensely, when Jenny was an ordinairy girl whose show as quoted in the article, only "replicates the ebb and flow of the everyday" (p.287) and a lot of the time showed footage and images that have been described as "anything but thrilling" (p. 287). Although there was nudity and sexual material from time to time the images people followed were often just of "Jenny's bedroom furniture" (p.288). It has also been said the Jenny slept most mornings till noon, yet people were fascinated and continued to follow JenniCAM. One fan even went to the extent of drawing up a graph to show viewers when jenny was most active. One of the questions that Nadine is going to ask, and that we both wondered was why JenniCAM was such a huge hit? why did it spark such interest in people to watch the daily routine and lifestyle of a complete stranger? This article by Krissi M. Jimroglou, i think tries to argue why this may have been a fascination to many people. The article speaks about how JenniCAM crossed many boundaries, such as "body/machine, Private/Public, and real/fiction" (p.290).
- It would appear that JenniCAM was the first 'reality show' so to speak, it was one of the first instances that challenged many social norms, the article quotes that the particular crossing between public and private was something that inspired a lot of fascination with JenniCAM. It states, "The erosion of the line between the private and the public composes part of the fascination and abhorrence of JenniCAM (p.290). and serves as a 'voyereusm'- seeing what should not be seen. More so, because she is female, she is perhaps crossing the stereotype in which women are often portrayed. As The article explains, "cultural politics have maintained a certain set of rules for the display of the female body. Jenny flouts these rules and offers herself to be looked at as both a private and public sphere" (p.290). The article goes on to say, "In the instance of JenniCAM, there is a voyeuristic pleasure derived from the study and analysis of the body and life of a female subject, the othered body." (p.294). Perhaps this is something that can help explain why JenniCAM inspired such interest to the people following it.
- Perhaps it is also important that JenniCAM included video clips that as the article said, "featured Jenny giving tours of her apartment or answering commonly asked questions about her life" (p.287). It also shows "cropped images of Jenni's body" (p.287) and viewers could also read her poetry. Perhaps features like this make Jenni a bit more personal and viewers could feel they could connect with her on some level, and know some characteristics about her instead of watching the daily routine of someone that they knew nothing about.
- The article also argues that JenniCAM illustrated what was described in the article as "cyborg subjectivity". The article quotes, " through the integration of body and technology, JenniCAM is a hybrid, neither fully human nor fully machine yet constitutes in part as both" (p.288) and that JenniCAM emerges as a particular type of cyborg". (p.288). the article perhaps highlights here that JenniCAM exists as a cyborg purely through the fact that she has intregated herself with technology, appearing to her viewers with the "sense that she has plugged her body into the machine and is connected to the machines of her equipment." (p.290). and "her life narrative is mechanised". (p.290).
- Another point in the article seems to highlight the fact that JenniCAM operates in the light of Freud's 'fort-da', the back and forth, the loss and return of objects (p.296), which may have some involvement in understanding the pleasures people derived from JenniCAM. The article states that JenniCAM "engages the viewer in a back and forth presence and absence of, not only Jenni's body but also of the JenniCAM itself" (p.296). The viewer then, "takes pleasure in the disappearance and return of the image, its loss and return brings great pleasure to those engaged in the fort-da pleasure of the JenniCAM." (p.297).
- In the article it says, "This site is not pornography. Yes, it contains nudity from time to time... but it is a site about ral life."(p.287). Im not sure how relevant this is but i couldn't help but wonder how much the sexual material In JenniCAM affected its reputation and/or popularity. If this sexual element had been left out, do you think people would have been as interested or followed the site so intensely? More so, would the characteristics of the audience for JenniCAM been altered? I know JenniCAM, as the article discusses, is a site about a lot of other things too- but I couldn't help but wonder how the sexual material in it affected its portrayal as a whole.
- Considering the part in the article about the female body as the 'other' and the voyeur JenniCAM creates in its attempts to 'demystify the mystery of women' (p.294), which supposedly contributed reasons to why JenniCAM provoked such interest in people. How different would reactions be to something like JenniCAM if the gender roles in such an experiement were reversed?
- In your eyes, how much of a 'cyborg' is Jenny. How do her 'cyborg' qualities compare with characters that star in reality shows today. Is there something particular that makes Jenni a Cyborg?
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