Monthly Archives: November 2013

The Shock of the Flash: Prof. Flint on the History of Documentary Flash Photography

Leave a reply

This post was contributed by Oyedepo Olukotun, an MA History Of Art with Photography student in Birkbeck’s Department of History of Art.

“Flash photography startles (and) gives significance to that which might otherwise go completely unseen”, so began Prof. Kate Flint in her potted history of documentary flash photography.  Prof. Flint, Provost Professor of English and Art History at the University of Southern California, gave her talk, Intrusive Light: Flash Photography and Documentary work, at the Friday 15 November 2013 installment of the “Birkbeck forum for 19th-century studies and Birkbeck History and Theory of Photography Research Centre” series, chaired by Prof. Lynda Nead.

Riis versus Beals: The Man Ray and Lee Miller of Documentary Flash Photography?

To start our foray through history, Prof. Flint introduced us to the photographs of Jessie Tarbox Beals, a contemporary of Jacob Riis at the advent of the 20th century. In spite of being, what Prof. Flint describes as a “huge self-promoter” and “daredevil”, Beals is overshadowed by Riis in the history of photography, even though the two worked together as part of the “early American documentary movement”. We were told how Beals, a pioneering woman photographer, often had her work confused with Riis’s or even wrongly attributed to him.  The image that occurred to me while listening to Prof. Flint was a parallel between the story of Riis/Beals and Man Ray/Lee Miller.

Lange versus White: The Shock of the Flash

To draw parallels between the uses of flash and natural light, Prof. Flint presented a sympathetic and ethical Dorothea Lange, of 1930s Farm Security Administration fame, compared with an impetuous Margaret Bourke-White. Lange made a point of shooting her subjects outside so she did not have to use flash, not just for aesthetic reasons, but for ethical reasons also, as using flash to shoot indoors meant intruding on her subjects’ private spaces. In complete contrast to Lange, Bourke-White, further to using flash indiscriminately and without reverence, went on to mock her subjects in the captions she put on her photographs. The reaction to the use of flash by some of Bourke-White’s subjects, a band of Christian worshippers, was seen as akin to the shock of being visited by avenging angels!

Parks versus DeCarava: Black or light

As examples of African American documentary photographers, Prof. Flint contrasted the documentary flash photography of Gordon Parks with the anti-flash rhetoric of Roy DeCarava’s photographs. Juxtaposing Parks’ output with the profile of the short-lived 1930s “negro” news and picture magazine, Flash Prof. Flint showed us how flash photography played its part in the African American associated subject matters of being on the periphery, violent race relations and skin tone, or more appropriately, skin lightness.

Parks’ zeal for flash was contrasted, by Prof. Flint, with DeCarava’s “love” for natural light and its “near transcendental significance”. Claiming he “hates it (flash) with a passion”, DeCarava’s principle was to let black be black and dark be dark. On this expressive note Prof. Flint ended, appropriately concluding “the vocabulary of flash photography has been an emotionally loaded one throughout its history”.

The contents of Prof. Flint’s talk forms a part of her forthcoming book Flash! Photography, Writing, and Surprising Illumination.

The Weird: Fugitive Fictions/Hybrid Genres

Leave a reply

This post was contributed by James Machin, a PhD candidate in Birkbeck’s Department of English and Humanities.

The 7 and 8 November saw a strange and unsettling confluence of scholars and enthusiasts of weird fiction in Bloomsbury. Is the weird a mode? A genre? Is it horror? Science fiction? The fantastic? The uncanny? A hybrid of all of these things? Everything was up for discussion. M. John Harrison — who has been described as ‘a writer of faultless fluency’ by Robert Macfarlane, ‘a Zen master of prose’ by Neil Gaiman, ‘a blazing original’ by Clive Barker, and, memorably, ‘an existential anarchist,’ by Michael Moorcock — headlined an exciting line up of contemporary writers reading their own work at the Horse Hospital on the Thursday evening. The night also saw the weird psychogeography of the local area ably investigated by Robert Kingham of minimumlabyrinth.org and a fascinating Q&A session expertly chaired by renowned genre critic John Clute, during which the weird was interrogated from the creative viewpoint.

After reconvening the next morning at Senate House, it was the turn of the scholars to continue the discussion of all things weird through the medium of three keynotes and twenty seven papers across nine panels. American editor and critic S. T. Joshi, who has perhaps forgotten more about H. P. Lovecraft than most of us will ever know, discussed the evolution of the weird tale through the work of Lovecraft and another ‘revolutionary’ of the form, Edgar Allan Poe. Mark Pilkington of Strange Attractor Press then led us into the rabbit hole of the imagination of fin-de-siècle weird artist Sydney Sime, giving every indication that Mark’s forthcoming book on Sime will be a fascinating read.

The first panels of the day saw discussions on weird occultations, genre weirding, and also the birth of a new literary adjective — ‘Harrisonian’ — which considering Harrison’s increasing reputation as the UK’s premier exponent of the form, we hope will stick. You heard it here first! After lunch, there were panels on the pre-modernist weird, weird landscapes and other weird media: topics included the monstrous and the human in William Hope Hodgson, the imaginative space provided by the Antarctic in weird fiction, and weird manifestations in online roleplaying games.

Dark-corridorBirkbeck’s own Professor Roger Luckhurst began his keynote by informing the audience that, in contrast to his wide-ranging presentation at last year’s China Miéville conference, his paper for the Weird Conference would explore a single aspect of the weird suggested to him by a close reading of Rudyard Kipling’s 1890 story ‘At the End of the Passage’. Thus, we were treated to a fascinating, haunting and unsettling disquisition on the place of the corridor in the cinema and literature of fear, which made debouching into the warren-like maze of Senate House for afternoon coffee a little disquieting. The final panels of the afternoon saw discussions of the weird crossover with musical subgenres in heavy metal culture, the posthuman weird, and also a bold and perhaps mischievous attempt to reposition Arthur Machen as a Modernist before Modernism. In the final keynote of the day, U.S. scholar and author Victoria Nelson shifted focus away from the Anglophone world to guide us through the weird Russia of Vladimir Sorokin’s Ice trilogy.

The task of unravelling (or indeed ravelling) the disparate and tangled weird threads of the day fell to the plenary panel of John Clute, S. T. Joshi, and Victorian Nelson, deftly and insightfully chaired by Guardian columnist, critic, and author Damien Walter. Although the numerous devils in the details were amiably disputed, a consensus seemed to be reached that the Weird represented something, and that that something was gathering speed and demanded ongoing interrogation.

Special thanks to: Jon Millington and the Institute of English Studies at Senate House, Roger Luckhurst, the Modern Humanities Research Association, Birkbeck School of Arts, and Birkbeck Centre for Contemporary Literature.

‘The conference has re-enthused my interest in academia and research.’ Dr Justin Woodman, Goldsmiths, University of London

‘One of the best readings I’ve ever attended, either as a performer or an audience member. Full of energy.’ M. John Harrison

‘A superb achievement! This was, hands down, the most riveting and intellectually exciting night of readings that I’ve had the pleasure to attend!’ Helen Marshall (British Fantasy Award winner 2013, ‘Best Newcomer’)

TRANSITIONS 4 COMICA SYMPOSIUM

4 Replies

Saturday October 26 saw the return of the annual Transitions Comica Symposium to Birkbeck.  The symposium provides a space to promote emerging multi-disciplinary research in the field of comics studies, whether defined as comics, comix, graphic novels, manga, bande dessinée, or any other form of sequential art.  This is the fourth time the College has hosted the event, which has rapidly become a major event in the burgeoning field of comics studies.  The symposium is run in conjunction with Comica, the London International Comics Festival, organised by the inestimable Paul Gravett.  Transitions 4 was organised by me (Tony Venezia), Hallvard Haug (Birkbeck), and Nina Mickwitz (UEA), with the support of Birkbeck’s Centre for Contemporary Literature.  This year we had two informative keynote speeches; from Dr. Ann Miller (Leicester), on issues of translating French comics criticism and theory, and Dr. Paul Williams (Exeter), on the possible applications of Franco Moretti’s ‘distant reading’ for comics studies.

We ran parallel sessions throughout the day, with presentations from PhD students, early career lecturers, and graphic artists.  This was the largest Transitions yet, with nearly one hundred delegates and speakers in attendance from around the country and abroad, including a special deputation from Singapore.  This gave the conference a pleasing international flavour.

Special thanks to Joe Brooker, Carol Watts, Catherine Catrix, Roger Sabin, Ernesto Priego and everyone at The Comics Grid, and John Miers.

With the continuing support of the Centre for Contemporary Literature and Dr. Roger Sabin we hope to stage Transitions 5 next year.  Watch this space…

 Below are some comments from this year’s participants which sum up what a great day it was.

Tony Venezia

 

‘Transitions 4 was the biggest and most well-attended yet, with a refreshingly international feel. It was good to see bandes desinées, manga, and Singaporean manhwa all discussed in the same place, when the tendency is for these traditions to be dealt with in discrete conferences. The keynotes from Ann Miller and Paul Williams were of a very high quality, and, as ever, the audience discussion at the end was lively and thought-provoking, especially on the issue of how academic disciplines find it hard to deal with the topic of narrative drawing. Despite the challenging economic climate for the Humanities, comics scholarship is in a very healthy place – and Transitions is the proof. ‘

(Dr. Roger Sabin, Reader in Popular Culture at Central Saint Martins.  Respondent for all of the Transitions symposia.)

‘It was a pleasure to present at Transitions this year and to be a part of the growing research interests in domestic and international comics.  The symposium really highlighted the importance of interdisciplinary approaches, which was also represented by the wonderful diversity of presenters and delegates who attended.’

(Tara-Monique Etherington, PhD. Student, University of Exeter.  First-time speaker.)

‘I’ve never been to transitions before – it was interesting to go to conference outside my usual field and community of practice. The best part of it was talking to others working on similar projects.’

(Muna Al-Jawad, consultant Geriatrician at the Royal Sussex County Hospital, and practice-based doctoral researcher in Medical Humanities at Birkbeck.  First-time speaker.)

‘Transitions proved to be an engaging forum for learning about a diverse range of comics, as well as offering the chance to reflect on the place of comics in academic culture.  Though I’ve been writing on the Gothic for some years, comics studies is still fairly new to me and this was a really stimulating and supportive environment in which to give a paper. It was a great day – very well-attended – with a really fascinating diversity of presentations.’

(Rebecca Janicker, PhD. Student, University of Portsmouth.  First-time speaker at Transitions)

‘There was so much going on in terms of stimulating papers and discussion, not to mention the informal meeting of new people from what seems to be a very friendly and supportive comics studies community.’

(Michael Connerty, teaches courses on animation history and comics at the Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design and Technology in Dublin.  First-time speaker)

‘This was my first time attending a conference as a speaker, and was truly a boost of inspiration – I gained new insights in the field as well as made new acquaintances with a shared interest in political cartoons that I will stay in touch with and discuss further research.’

(Rebecka Klette, studying BA History of Ideas at the University of Lund.  Coming to Birkbeck to study for a MA in the subject in 2014.  First-time speaker.)

‘A truly international symposium. I have learned much from the debates and exchanges at Transitions 4.’

(Lim Cheng Tju, Singapore editor for the International Journal of Comic Art and co-editor of Liquid City Volume 2 (Image Comics, 2010); postgraduate student at Institute of Education, University of London, 2013-14.  First-time speaker.)

‘I have enjoyed experiencing the development of Transitions from a modest platform for UK-based emerging comics scholars to a busy annual gathering of a diverse range of inter-disciplinary academics and practitioners linked by comics.’

(Nicola Streeten, graphic artist and PhD student at University of Brighton. Nicola presented at the first Transitions and has chaired panels at the last two.)

Interrogating the Social Unconscious

2 Replies

This post was contributed by Ceren Yalcin, an Intern at the Birkbeck Institute of Social Research (BISR).

The idea of the ‘unconscious’ is undoubtedly at the heart of psychoanalytic thinking.  Unconscious conflict, unconscious desire, unconscious mind, unconscious fantasy, unconscious thought – just to name a few derivatives of the term that can be found in Freud, Klein, Winnicott and other influential psychoanalytic thinkers. Most of these terms refer to the individual psyche, alluding to the existence of ideas that are ‘hidden’ from conscious knowledge but that nonetheless have force and motion (Frosh, 2012). What one barely hears is the term social unconscious.  As a person interested in both psychoanalysis and social theory, I was quite excited to hear about the study afternoon that wore the title “Interrogating the Social Unconscious “. The workshop was held on 25 October 2013 and was part of a series of events around the same topic organised by the Sociology, Psychoanalysis and Psychosocial Study Group, together with the Birkbeck Institute of Social Research. (If you, have missed the first event, like me, you can listen to the podcast).

So, what is the social unconscious ? And if there is the social unconscious does it mean that it is opposed to the individual unconscious? I was hoping to get some answers from the two eminent speakers that were invited to the workshop: Earl Hopper, a psychoanalyst and group analyst and Christopher Scanlon, a consultant psychotherapist and group analyst. To my disappointment, the two speakers had no intentions to provide us with ready-made answers. Instead, we were formed into small groups and got to discuss the concept ourselves. This, of course, was the idea behind the workshop. It gave us participants the chance to get our teeth into questioning, discussing and critiquing the readings we were given a few weeks prior to the event. Topics discussed in my seminar group centred on the question of how categories of the social such as class, culture and ethnicity might inform the unconscious, and most importantly to me as a training psychotherapist, why the social was often bracketed out in psychoanalytic training.

The question that has most intrigued me was concerned with the extent to which the concept of the social unconscious was developed as a rhetorical response to psychoanalysis. Weinberg (2007, p. 309) writes: “The idea of the social unconscious assumes that some specific hidden myths and motives guide the behaviour of a certain society or culture. It also assumes that a large group or society might use some shared defences. In the same manner that unconscious forces drive an individual without knowing it, a group, an organization or the entire society can act upon unconscious forces too”. I find this working definition of the social unconscious quite helpful as it shows the complexity of the unconscious mind. What I don’t like about it is the binary opposition it assumes between the social and the individual. The term ‘social unconscious’ suggests that there is an individual unconscious that is freed from societal, historical and cultural dynamics. I would agree with Dalal (2001, p. 554) who asserts that ‘the unconscious is constituted by the social at every level’. Earl Hopper’s (2001, p.10) definition sheds a different light onto the term: “The concept of the Social Unconscious refers to the existence and constraints of social, cultural and communicational arrangements of which people are unaware. Unaware, in so far as these arrangements are not perceived (not ‘known’), and if perceived not acknowledged (‘denied’), and if acknowledged, not taken as problematic (‘given’), and if taken as problematic, not considered with an optimal degree of detachment and objectivity.” What Hopper makes clear is that the social unconscious does not merely refer to the social aspects of individual unconscious. It is also not the same as the superego, or the Lacanian symbolic order. It is about shared fantasies, repressed memories, traumas and anxieties of a given group. Indeed, Earl Hopper made an insightful comment that afternoon on the fact that many participants were late to the study seminar so that we had to start 15 minutes later than planned. He asked what it was in the group’s social unconscious that had led many of its members come late. Was it the fact that the event, unlike the previous one, required a ticket? Or that the participants were made to work in groups themselves rather than being lectured? These questions give me an idea on what the term ‘social unconscious’ seeks to capture. The answers to the questions remain difficult though – but we might find out in the next event of this series!

References:

Dalal, F. (2001) ‘The Social Unconscious: A Post-Foulkesian Perspective’, Group Analysis 34(4): 539–55.

Frosh, S. (2012). A brief Introduction of Psychoanalytic Theory. New York: Palgrave McMillan.

Hopper, E. (2001) ‘The Social Unconscious: Theoretical Considerations’, Group Analysis 34(1): 9–27.

Weinberg, H. (2007). So what is this social unconscious anyway? Group Analysis, 40(3), 307-322.