Reflexivity

3-dimensional timespace

A Golden Globe for best drama? Ouch. Most of my friends and colleagues will be disgusted. There is barely even a story in Avatar, because the re-presentation of the colonizing logic that elevates white men as heroic figures is left completely unproblematized.

I am not supposed to like Avatar. There are so many problems with it.  Really. And I did not enjoy watching much of it.  I winced, squirmed in my seat, felt bored, and was not even enthralled by the visual effects.  The three-dimensionality is pleasing at an aesthetic level, yes, and may deserve awards, but to consider Avatar drama is to cheapen the real human lives of actual indigenous peoples, women, environmental activists, and anyone else who applies their conscience to the experience of watching this film. Drama involves, by definition, “serious subject matter…usually involving conflicts and emotions through action and dialogue.” As a buddy keeps reiterating, there was not a single surprise, no unexpected twist, no nod or wink of any kind from the director, actors, script-writers, camera-operators or graphic artists of Avatar to a socially-intelligent audience.

A Window upon Us?

The drama of Avatar is less about the movie itself than how it serves as a blank screen for viewers to project a firestorm of passionate support and cynical disdain. There is a principle of feedback usually applied to interpersonal communication: whatever someone tells us about ourselves is more informative about the feedback giver, a window upon their perception – such as what they value and what assumptions they use to interpret behavior – than it is about ourselves as the target of feedback. As social and cultural critics, many academics in the social sciences/humanities believe it is our job to pounce upon popular culture to try and dismantle what we see as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ in the public sphere. It does not matter if the object of analysis is classified as ‘high’ or ‘low’ art, was intended for our explicit consumption, or purports to promote or hide overt political intentions. The debate over Avatar, however, is dramatic because it complements the very dynamics critical analysis intends to combat.

I cannot – nor do I want to – dispute the specific criticisms made of the racism, sexism, ableism, colonialism, out-of-control capitalism, and militarism in the film. I agree with these analyses. The question I’ve been mulling is whether this mythic representation of a glorified white male savior has an equivalent meaning in today’s world as it did in the historical world that postcolonialist, social justice, cultural studies, and critical communication scholars and teachers rightly deplore? I think not. I suspect that by assuming these images and representations “mean the same” as they did in the past, i.e., that they will lead to the same kinds of attitudes and behaviors, uneven relationships and hierarchical oppressions as has enabled white domination in recent centuries, then we contribute to “making” them mean what they used to: we collaborate, discursively, in co-constructing the social continuation of stereotypical hierarchies and inhibit processes of identity development and social change.

We. Perhaps I should resist writing in the plural, but what I mean to admit and expose is that I am also part and parcel of these discursive dynamics. Does my whiteness make me more susceptible to the folkloric elements in this classic story? Am I more willing to forgive egregious excess because I overvalue the seeds of incremental change? Perhaps. What might have improved the story of Avatar would have been for Jake Sully to support and affirm Tsu’Tey (Laz Alonzo) as the heir to Aytucan (Wes Studi) instead of competing to replace him. Or he could have given the idea of riding the monster raptor, Toruk, to Neytiri (Zoe Saldana) and supported the matriarchs in leading completely and openly.

Calibrating to another timespace

The running debate I’ve been having with friends involves things like how so many of us got suckered by the hype, and whether or not there is any redemptive value in the film, and if so, what the heck could it possibly be? My attention was originally captured by a fan review posted by a friend on Facebook, which was followed in quick succession by a blistering anti-racist critique and a thoughtful examination of prosthetic relations and doubled consciousness. I continued reading and listening somewhat incredulously as the debate rose in pitch, arriving even to the edge of tension with friends. I keep wondering to myself, how can so much be at stake? And what do these arguments “do” as communicative work in the world? SEMP suggests the furor is evidence of addiction, an intriguing hypothesis that reminds me of how I interpreted the panic of the monied class in the early days of the financial crisis.

Here’s what I perceive. It is (on the one hand) the same ol’ same ol’ white supremacist myth but with a twist (on the other hand) that matters. The audiences who are most responsive to the positive message of ‘going native’ are among some of the ones who most need to get it: young people (mostly men and some women) who have had enough privilege and/or culturally-constructed desire to experiment with the alternative realities invoked by videogaming.  Many have grown up in such insulated conditions that patriotism (to nation, to the profit imperative, to so-called legitimate uses of violence – to name the most obvious) is so embedded as to be unquestionable.  Yet these same young people are a bit freaked out (if they’re paying attention whatsover) to the inevitability of climate change, the sensationalism of terrorism, and subsequent threats to the security and comfort that is all they’ve ever (really) known.

The lack of any sophistication at all in Avatar’s storyline (a major bone of contention from erudite friends) allows the alternative message to shine: endless consumption has to be reckoned with, and there must be other options than fighting-to-death over natural resources. As caricatures exaggerating some of what is ‘good’ (albeit in a culturally-biased and fragmentary way) and ‘bad’ about the types of people cultivated by the present global political-economic system, it seems clear that the primary intended audience of director James Cameron’s “story” is not graduate students or intellectuals – by assuming that we are Cameron’s target we miss the potential use of a culture’s particular and situated mythology to generate change from the inside.

Interrupting kneejerk belief in the bad

I was intrigued to learn that the cast was contractually forbidden to discuss the storyline. I am definitely prone to finding silver linings, and I’ve always been drawn to the underdog – just as I’m glad the Na’vi survive, I am unsettled by the intensity of academic attack, not on the film per se, but on the viewers of the film who are inspired by its story of betrayal to the military-corporate ethos. Because, ultimately, the critiques say nothing “to” the inanimate film or its characters. Whether or not they are rendered in two- or three visual dimensions they are merely symbols. What matters are the uses to which these symbols are put, and I am concerned that the main thing being accomplished is the reinforcement of cynicism and general hopelessness in the face of perceived inevitabilities.

Avatar is not science fiction; it is fantasy. Fantasy asks for the willing suspension of disbelief. Fantasy evokes a temporary reality, a vision of possibility premised on a vein of reality – emphasize the hope or dwell on dread, its your choice. I prefer to support the chance that plunder and profiteering can be made methods of the human past, rather than surrender to the empty promise of a futile future.

References/Resources:

Barbara, Speculum de L’Autre Femme, Why critics of Avatar are missing the point
Rob Beschizza, boingboing, What storytelling risks could Avatar have taken?
Mary Bustillos, The Awl, I Hated ‘Avatar’ with the Fire of a Thousand Suns
Mary HK Choi, The Awl, Flicked Off: Avatar
Adam Cohen, New York Times, Next-Generation 3-D of ‘Avatar’ underscores its message
Joshua Davis, (esp. language details – inventing Na’vi) in Wired, James Cameron’s New 3-D Epic Could Change Film Forever
Erkan, Erkan’s Field Diary, Avatar, the movie
Stephanie Jo Kent, Reflexivity, “believe the data”
Annalee Newitz, i09.com, When Will White People Stop Making Movies Like “Avatar”?
Lisa, Sociological Images, On Avatar, The Movie
Sr. Rose Pacatte, National Catholic Reporter: Riffing with Myth
Christina Radish, AvatarMovieZone, Laz Alonzo talks James Cameron’s Avatar
Selva, The Scientific Indian, review
The Snake Brotherhood, NationStates, The whole Avatar debate
Emmanual Reagan, merinews, Avatar a Spiritual Fantasy

Popularity: 44% [?]

Dr Linus Nyiwul’s dissertation defense was conducted almost exclusively in the language of math, with very little generic English explanation for the non-resource management layperson. So I cannot write very much about it, except that it was obvious that his faculty members are excited about the potential of this framework Dr Nyiwul has created for government regulators to exploit market mechanisms by leveraging emissions standards against the needs of firms to attract investors.
There are a couple of premises that Dr Nyiwul builds upon, including a perception that investors would prefer to put their money into “green” companies, and evidence that companies who improve their own environmental management systems experience increases in stock value (e.g., Feldman 1996). Dr Nyiwul described a whole lot of complicated stuff that needs to be properly balanced:

• setting a standard,
• needing to monitor to ensure companies are meeting the standard,
• keeping the cost of monitoring low enough to be reasonable (for government) while
• making the threat of monitoring real enough that companies prefer to comply rather than risk being caught and having to pay the penalty.

Somehow all those things get crunched through some equations that calculate

1. “marginal damage” (whatever this means! it apparently refers wholistically to “society”) and
2. monitoring costs (to the government) and
3. costs of compliance (for the firms)

…. now, where it gets real interesting is when the government establishes two emissions standards: a regular standard (the minimum to be deemed “in compliance” and avoid penalties) and an overcompliance standard – which would earn a special certification proving uber-greenness (or something en route to such glorified status). There is pilot project currently underway, the National Environmental Performance Track (NEPT), which has weaknesses but whose results – plugged into Dr Nyiwul’s equations – demonstrates that TWO STANDARDS IS GOOD POLICY! Not to mention that firms which earn the overcompliance certification have a special marketing asset to appeal to investors. (They have to meet the minimum “regular” standard first, then apply and demonstrate accomplishment of the overcompliance standard.)

There was some fancy problem-framing, as Linus described one finding, saying that it came about in one way if you set the problem up this way, and comes about in another way if you set the problem up that way. (I love the fact that subjectivity can be found in math!) There are some issues with firms getting to self-report emissions (apparently without verification, unless the regulator goes to conduct the actual monitoring?) And there was quite a discussion about looking at the problem endogamously: with free entry into and out of the market. And output and size effects really matter (but cannot be reversed) in terms of the direct and indirect effects of enforcement costs. Yea, I don’t really know what those sentences mean in “real” economic terms, but there may be other things in play at times which can lead to inconclusive results.
but…. drumroll please! Dr Linus Nyiwul concludes, and his faculty agree:

The challenges that issue forth from Dr Nyiwul’s work include (in no particular order):

1. identifying which are the important uncertainties (given that anything could be uncertain except for whatever is under direct regulatory monitoring)
2. defining clearly what “overcompliance” means (if “compliance” means paying the right tax, i.e., reducing emissions in order to minimize tax…. does overcompliance move a firm into a “credit” situation?)
3. how to extend the framework from a single firm to an industry
4. identifying how the framework as it is fits within known policy issues and concerns, and
5. extending the frame beyond emissions to look at a lot of other policy issues.

Popularity: 12% [?]

For her final oral examination for a Ph.D in Resource Economics, Siny Joseph presented an analysis of Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) for seafood. I echo the words of the external member of her committee, who said,

Dr Siny Joseph’s field is I.O. Economics – a term that I had to Google after the defense! My complete ignorance of the jargon in this field should alert you to the high probability that I have misconstrued or misunderstood major elements of her work. I will do my best to summarize and hope for correcting comments as needed.

Extrapolating from the wikipedia entry and my limited exposure to other disciplines, Industrial Organization explores the economic interaction between two dynamic forces:

1. the strategic behavior of firms (which I believe is the purview of my friends specializing in strategic management) and
2. the structures of markets (statistical analysis like I’ve never seen!)

Given my lowest-score-in-the-cohort competence in all things math, most of the substance of Siny’s analysis and discussion with her Committee Members occurred in a language I cannot even pretend to understand: replete with “k-bars,” and K’s with subscript L’s and H’s, “thetas” and fixed parameter values composing profit maximization formulas… Go grrl go! Her findings, however, were described in comprehensible English – and they are fascinating.

Seventy percent of seafood purchased by consumers in the U.S. is imported; of these imports, 80% comes from less developed countries. COOL (Country of Origin Labeling) is legislation introduced in the 2002 Farm Bill, and implemented with seafood in 2005, with the idea that food quality and food safety are linked with where the food originates. Coincidentally, COOL is being extended to more foods this year with continuing debate over exemptions and on-going criticism of delays, making Dr Joseph’s research findings immediately relevant. Regarding seafood, huge sectors are exempt: restaurants and other food service providers, specifically, and products deemed to be “processed.” In general, then, COOL applies to the seafood you buy in a grocery store or market to cook at home.
It seems the first major task in an I.O. economic analysis is to define the boundary between what is included and what is excluded from the study. Siny focused on the US market, presumably because the boundaries could be readily established. (In a case study on shrimp, she explained the distinction between a “covered” and “uncovered” market, explaining she’d had to go with the former – specifically an undifferentiated market – because the mathematical expressions for the latter were unmanageable. Basically (I think!) this means using idealized equations rather than ones more representative of real life.) Generally, Americans will assume that seafood of domestic origin is of higher quality than seafood of foreign origin, and consumers are most willing to pay the costs of labeling during and immediately after food scares – so that they (we, smile) can make (at least) this basic differentiation.
But (I kept thinking to myself) – labeling after a scare doesn’t do much to protect consumers during the scare and of course has no contribution to risk prevention whatsoever. So why isn’t labeling just done, as a matter of business habit? “Because,” Dr Joseph explained, “firms can masquerade low quality seafood as high quality when consumers don’t have all the information, and that’s where the profit comes from.” She and her committee members debated nuances of the statistical measurements, recommending and justifying choices of particular statistical tools, but did not question Siny’s basic finding that (now, with only three years of info available) the greatest profit comes under what’s called “voluntary COOL” (which does occur with some seafood products), followed by partial implementation of COOL (the status quo), and drops the lowest under “total COOL” – an ideal she recommends because “real consumption is greatest when there is full implementation of COOL.”
The rub for me during the whole presentation is the use of this indicator called WTP: Willingness to Pay. What I’d like to see is a complementary WTP2 (squared) equation: Willingness to Profit. Somehow the whole debate seems framed with WTP2 as an unquestionable given – companies have the inalienable right to maximize profit and consumers have to pay for safety. It just strikes me as wrong; at least out-of-balance. Firms can afford to pay much more than any individual can! Anyway, Siny’s Committee engaged vigorously with her findings: “I like the story you’re trying to tell,” said a professor by speakerphone, wondering about pursuing the angle of diversion, and all of them wondering about policy recommendations based on these findings.
There was a measure of “Total Welfare” that supposedly mixes the best consumer outcome with the best business outcome…. and Dr Joseph did present some evidence that companies would label voluntarily under certain/specific conditions (of known/demonstrated consumer demand?), but for the most part companies are trying to duck this completely. For instance, shrimp traders are required to label unprocessed shrimp, so they would rather do something that qualifies as “processing” in order to avoid labeling. Doesn’t it cost to do that, too? Honest – I get very confused! Why is one type of cost preferable to another? I think someone needs to institute an equation such that consumer WTP cannot exceed 1/2 the square root of the actual incurred cost apportioned over the entire volume in order to somehow link a decrease in the firm’s WTP2 (willingness to profit) with the increase consumers are willing to pay. (Which is probably why I’m not an economist.)

Nonetheless, even if the current data is not totally amenable to a single clear and concise argumentative point, I definitely agree with Siny’s committee member: “I like your plan of attack.” I want to be able to argue convincingly that the government (through legislation) should be on the consumer’s side – not only in the grocery store, but I would also like to be able to confirm the quality of seafood purchased in restaurants.
Keep it up, Dr Siny Joseph!

Popularity: unranked [?]