Being Virtual and How it Changes Us – Experical

Second Life is an MMO that most closely mirrors a virtual reality. A player can create a detailed avatar, visit shops, talk to others and visit virtual equivalents of real world places. The documentary Life 2.0 covers some interesting points and problems that have been created by this technology.

In this documentary we see issues like legal problems. A woman’s virtual designs are being stolen so she takes the case to court. This poses the question how would law be enforced in a virtual reality? Would every law be up held, or would that take away from the fun of freedom? What about how laws differ between countries, would laws within virtual reality differ depending on the Country you live in? There is also the disturbing case of a man who created an 11 year old girl avatar (that in itself is not the disturbing part). He knew his addiction to Second Life was going too far, so he made his avatar go on a killing spree. His account was suspended, but how would violence be dealt with in virtual reality? No one was hurt but the intention was still there

In second life, and in virtual reality, we can make our avatars look however we want. As mentioned before a man made a young girl as his avatar (it turns out it helped him discover a childhood he missed due to abuse). How can we trust anyone we meet in a virtual reality, that they are how they present themselves? On the issue of trust, there is also the issue of fidelity. Second Life can be just that, an entirely separate and full life, just as a virtual reality life would be. In Life 2.0 we see a couple who meet over Second Life, and leave their families. If having a life in virtual reality became common place, couples would have to make agreements about if those commitments still applied to their other life.

Second Life is turning your life into a game. It may be one that resembles your current life or you may create a totally new life.

This creative video demonstrates how it is possible to become addicted to technology. I briefly tried playing Second Life, and I think the reasons it has’nt taken off and become addictive for more people is due to lack of development and ease to use. If an easy to use and fully immersive virtual reality was created and these problems are erased, we easily have the capacity to become addicted to it.

How a Virtual World Will Change Us

The documentary ‘The Dark Side of The Internet’ was made by a group of online producers all who have become successful in their field, mostly reviewing TV, film, video games and books. The contributors to this video have first hand experience of having an online persona and dealing with people online. Shortly before this documentary was made some controversy happened within their online community. It provoked threatening reactions from some as Alison describes. I am going to summarise what The Dark Side of The Internet calls The ABC’s of the internet –

A – Anonymity

Anonymity means you can say things you would not normally say in a real life situation. The person you are talking to could be much older or younger than you. You have no idea who they are or how to treat them. When you can act anonymously you can do things like use foul language at people or tell them to kill themselves (a favourite of online commentators) without any repercussions.

B – Bullying

People use the internet to reach out for help when they have no one to go to in real life. Online bullying can follow you anywhere and due to anonymity the bullying can be much harsher with no consequences.

C – Celebrity

Online celebrities are people who release content online but are still very accessible to the public. These celebrities are personas with people believing they know them when they don’t.

The celebrity point leads back to creating a persona in a virtual world and having people think they know you, when they actually don’t. A big point discussed in the documentary is that people change the way they talk online because they have anonymity and are not face to face with the other people they are communicating with, they convince themselves that the people they are talking to are not really people or that their words do not matter because they’re ‘just on the internet’.

Another interesting take on online communication is Why are online gamers often jerks? by Gamespot.

 

 

Marina Abramović

While researching Pina Bausch and her performance style as well as from discussion in class I came across Marina Abramović. Here performances are inspirational, and even if we as a company cannot produce such extreme work due to constraints, I think the mentality and effort behind her work is something we can learn from.

In this video we see a moment from ‘The Artist is Present’ where Abramović shares a moment with her former partner. The idea of inviting people to sit and look at her is an interesting exploration of the way people to relate to each other and shows how little you have to do to create a performance.

In the above Marina and Ulay talk about there work, split, and their walk across the Great Wall of China that they used to say goodbye to each other.

Silent discos use wireless head phones to give everyone the experience of being at a club but if you take of your head phones all you hear is the thumping of people dance. I assume Marina Abramovic is using similar technology at the silent party although, what isbeing heard through the headphone is not clear. I am unsure of the meaning of this art piece but I found it interesting and serene to watch

Portal – Concussive Ignition

This group were influenced by the video game Portal, so in this blog I am going to look at the game and how aspects of it can be used in their performance.

Portal was created by Valve in 2007 as an ‘add on’ to ‘The Orange Box’ a re-release of some of the company’s older games. It was unexpectedly popular and a sequel was made continuing the story of you, the player, trying to escape Apature Science, a futuristic laboratory/testing centre. During the game you have no contact with anyone, apart from the Robot Glados (in the video above) who is trying to kill you, but only once you have finished testing the portal gun (its a gun, that shoots portals).

Isolation 

As I mentioned there is no contact with anyone during this came apart from Glados whoseinterruptions are annoying and demoralizing. The player goes through numerous testing chambers all which look similar. The player is given a ‘companion cube’ with a heart on, the only piece of decoration in the game, to help on one of the levels. Players become attached to this cube as it is the only object in the game that is trying to help the player and its aesthetic inspires connection. Later, the player is forced to incinerate the cube and is left alone again. This isolation makes the player comply with testing and not try to find a way out. Having no allies to work with makes the thought of escape harder, so the player goes along with the game, hoping to disable Glados when they finally reach her. Isolating the audience could make them more likely to comply with instructions. If they cannot talk to each other they can’t come up with any alternatives to going along with an experiment.

Sterile Environment 

The group are planning to use Lab Coats in their performance, which will contribute to the feeling of a sterile environment. When the environment around you is plain you have nothing to connect to. Adding this to the lack of connection in those around you wearing coats, restricted contact and the only communication being with a cruel character, should leave a player/audience member even more isolated and have no choice but to connect to the communication they are being given. Compliance is furthered if there are no distractions and no aesthetic to take solace in. The contrast to this is demonstrated in Portal 2, where much of the test has collapsed and there are plants growing in the building. The player feels less like complying because they can see freedom.

Portal

 

Portal 2

No distractions from the aesthetic of the set or costumes means the audience have nothing else to focus on expect the task at hand and have nothing else to relate to (adding to the isolation effect).

Cruel Authority Figure 

Glados makes comments like those above throughout the game. She taunts the player, and tries to make them believe they can’t complete the tests and escape. The crueller Glados becomes the more the player wants to prove her wrong and show her what they can do. The insults make you want to work harder so you can hear her reaction when she realizes you are getting closer to her.

No Context Is Given

The player wakes up in the chamber pictured above and makes their way through a series of rooms with no idea why they are there. After a while you are told you are in Apature Science, and that you must test the portal gun. The player realizes that previous employees are all dead, killed by Glados, but this is not until later in the game. As a player we know the character is called ‘Chell’, but the character does not know the playersname, who they are or why they have been chosen to test the gun. To try and find meaning in their imprisonment the player keeps testing, hoping the game will reveal more.

Possibility of Reward

The Cake Is A Lie

Throughout Portal you are constantly promised cake if you complete all the tests. The promise is from Glados, which makes you doubt it, but there are also charts on the wall that show a cake symbol after you have completed the tests. The player knows it’s unlikely they will get cake, but they want to find out what the reward might be. Rewarding players/participants in an experiment where everything else is bland, will motivate them to keep going if they become confused or bored of the process.

Eventual Compliance

During a level in ‘Portal 2’ an area of the testing facility starts to collapse. The player has the choice to continue into a test chamber at the instruction of Glados, or try to escape the collapse. The player is so used to listening to Glados and following her instructions, many players continue to test and die in the collapse. Once participants/audience members become used to listening to instructions from authority, they are less likely to think about what they are being asked to do.

The Faceless Authority – Concussive Ignition

In fiction, a faceless authority is often effective in ordering compliance and inspiring fear. Instead of having one figure head in charge there is a faceless entity, panel or single person who is the highest authority we are allowed to see. Making the highest authority figure literally faceless and bland is also an effective tool.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pictured above are Slender Man from the video game Slender and The Silence from Dr Who. Both characters wear bland suits, a sign of business like authority, that makes it hard for the audience to gauge any sense of personality from them. Lab coats also give the impression of a sterile villain, with implied medical or scientific knowledge.  The Silence have distorted facial features, while slender has no face at all. Professor Albert Mehrabian conducted experiments  ‘In silent messages’ to find out how we communicate when expressing feelings and attitudes. He writes on his website – 

Inconsistent communications — the relative importance of verbal and nonverbal messages. My findings on this topic have received considerable attention in the literature and in the popular media.

Total Liking = 7% Verbal Liking + 38% Vocal Liking + 55% Facial Liking

This means that 55% of communication (when expressing feelings an attitudes) comes from facial expression. An avenue which is blocked when you use authority figures like the ones seen above. I think  we also feel reassured if we can make eye contact, which is not possible with a faceless authority. Humans are often see faces where there are none, so to be confronted with an authority figure, that we cannot work out due to lack of a face or part covering leaves those under  there power vulnerable and makes it harder to work out how to challenge that authority. 

 

 

 

Derren Brown, The Stanford Prison Experiment and Experiments With Conformity – Concussive Ignition

Derren Brown’s ‘The Gameshow’ is about mob mentality and how we behave when we feel anonymous. You can watch the full episode HERE. An interesting element in the programme is the use of masks, and how much being anonymous can effect what we do. Derren Brown explains that this is the kind of mentality behind internet bullying. If you are interested in the use of masks and how they can change people’s behaviour, I recommend reading the chapter on masks in  ‘Impro’ by Keith Johnstone.

You already mentioned the Milgram Experiment, so I think you might be interested in the Stanford Prison Experiment. The first video is a documentary that details the process, I encourage you to watch, it but if you do not have the time there is a summary of the process in the second video.

The Stanford Prison Experiment’s official website says the experiment aimed to answer the questions ‘ What happens when you put good people in an evil place? Does humanity win over evil, or does evil triumph?’ It goes on to say, ‘How we went about testing these questions and what we found may astound you. Our planned two-week investigation into the psychology of prison life had to be ended prematurely after only six days because of what the situation was doing to the college students who participated. In only a few days, our guards became sadistic and our prisoners became depressed and showed signs of extreme stress.’

This video details an experiment which shows that people will conform to a group even if they know that what they are doing is wrong. A group of people are asked to match two lines of the same length from a selection of lines. All of the group but one were then told to give the wrong answer, eventually the one member of the group not given this information, starts to conform and also gives the wrong answer. This video is a little dull, there is a funnier (although fictional) example of the same type of experiment below. (Watch from 00.39 – 2.30)

Adapting For The Stage -The Freely Unwritten

Adapting novels and other works for stage has always been done, but has been even more popular in recent years with adaptations of Roald Dahl’s books, ‘The Curious Incident of The Dog in The Night-time’, ‘War Horse’, and the movie ‘Once’ to name a few successful productions of the last few years. I have been looking into successful examples, as well as advice from playwrights to make a guide for adapting works for the stage.

 

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time

Richard LaGravenese adapted the book Water For Elephants for the Screen and said of the process –

‘When a book is well-loved, it’s important to keep what readers expect, but at the same time you have to understand that, when reading a story, you’re seeing and hearing characters in your head, and everyone has their own versions in their own minds. When you see the story played on screen with real people it becomes literal – one version – and there are certain ideas that work in a book that wouldn’t work on screen’.

The History of The Material

What has been done before with this material? Finding out what has been done with material will help you avoid repetition and cliche. By being aware of what has been done before you can work out what works and what does not when adapting the material. Some works have key moments or images that an audience familiar with the work would expect to see. If previous adaptations have all included these then you know that it might be easier to include these. It might also help you choose what direction you want to go on with the adaptation. If the material has never been adapted it could encourage you to work on an original idea.

The Audience

If your adaptation varies a lot from the original you might want to consider if this will change the intended audience. If the audience has changed, this might help you decide what to include and what not to include. You could choose your target audience before you begin adapting. If you have an idea of what appeals to the demographic you have chosen, this can help you decide how you want to change the original work.

How Much Do You Stay True To The Original?

Sarah Hemming writes in an article about adaption for the Financial Times arts section –

‘Reverence for the original text can be a false friend: sometimes the adaptations that work best are the boldest. Helen Edmundson’s Shared Experience version of Anna Karenina, for instance, had Anna and Levin talk to each other constantly across the stage (this doesn’t happen in the book); Tom Morris’s Bristol Old Vic staging of Swallows and Amazons seized on the resourcefulness of the children in the book and spliced it with theatrical make-believe’. 

How much you want to take from the original depends on what you are trying to achieve with your performance. If your changing your audience you will want to take aspects from the work that audience will enjoy. If you are trying to convey a specific message or tone you will take the parts of the story that work best with these ideas. Hillary DePiano, who adapted The Love of Three Oranges says –

‘Almost immediately upon starting an adaptation, your inner writer will start to chafe. You can feel restricted or confined by the original story you’ve committed to sticking to, especially if you’re used to writing your own content from scratch. How much of your own touches can you put on the adaptation to satisfy your muse without violating the core of the story you’re adapting? It’s a delicate balance. The source material is your silent co-writer and you need to find your own path to telling the original story the way you want to tell it. The source material is your silent co-writer and you need to find your own path to telling the original story the way you want to tell it.’ 

Types of Adaptation 

What type of adaptation you would like to do will be influenced by how much of the original source material you want to use, and who you want the production to be for. Here are a few examples of directions adaptations can be taken in.

The Update – The work is adapted to the current time period, or a time period different to the original setting. Even if not changed to the current time, moving a setting forward in time can help work find new audiences. Examples are: West Side Story (from Romeo and Juliet), Rent (from La Boheme), Carmen Jones (from Carmen) and Coriolanus (adapted film set in 2011).

The Retelling/Based On – Elements and ideas of the original work are taken and combined with original ideas to create a new piece of work. Examples are:Wicked (from The Wizard of Oz), Rozencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (From Hamlet), O Brother Where Art Thou? (From Ulysses).

The Original – It’s pretty much exactly the same as the original, except in a new medium. Examples are: Twelve Angry Men (film to play), An Inspector Calls (play to film), The Virgin Suicides (book to film), Mary Poppins (book to film to musical).

The Musical – The majority of musicals are not original stories but adapted from other stories. Examples The Colour Purple, Godspell, Once, Les Miserables, The Phantom of The Opera, almost every Disney musical made.

The Dark Version – These adaptations are more appealing to a different audience than the original stories, fleshing out a thin plot and picking up on small details. There is a sinister or gritty element to the story. Examples are Snow White and The Huntsman, Alice in Wonderland (2010), Robin Hood (2010), Romeo + Juliet, Three Penny Opera (from The Beggars Opera).

 

 

Women In Asylums – Linked

Women were (and according to some attitudes still are) considered to be the more emotional sex, making them more susceptible to mental health problems. Due to the ideas of a woman’s place of society and the idea that the doctor should control the patient, women were even more likely to fall victim to abuse and treatment to which she did not consent.

Unjust Imprisonment

Women could be sent to an asylum for reasons such as nymphomania or being a lesbian. Nymphomania was seen as an ‘illness of sexual energy levels gone awry, as well as the loss of control of the mind over the body’. Women could be diagnosed with nymphomania if they were promiscuous, masturbated, were flirtatious or raped. The worry was that lesbians would become ill without male interaction, to cure this they were subjected to corrective rape.

The science museum writes about how women who did not want to conform to societies norm could be sent to an asylum,( lesbians being part of this group as they were not likely to have a typical domestic and male dominated life) –

‘A woman who rebelled against Victorian domesticity risked being declared insane and committed to an asylum. This was usually at her husband’s or father’s request, and she generally had no right to contest or appeal. Women were further disempowered by moral treatment once locked away. This cornerstone of Victorian psychiatry claimed male dominance was therapeutic. The doctor ruled the asylum like a father ruled his family’.

Hysteria 

Hysteria was belived to only be found in women. Doctors thought it was caused by women’s wombs moving around their bodies, it had been believed in, in some form or another, since 1900 BC. Hysteria was associated with the effects caused by the menstrual cycle and symptoms included faintness, anxiety, sexual desire, insomnia, irritability and fluid retention . It was thought hysteria could be cured by massage, hosing with cold water and using an early version of a vibrator. If the Hysteria persisted it was sometimes cured by removing the uterus.

Archives 

In this Daily mail article a journalist looks at the records of women who were  in Bethlem Hospital. She discovers women who were sent there for anxiety, depression, and post natal depression (known as perpetual insanity). You can access the Bethlem archives HERE.

 

 

Mental Health Treatment Of The Past – Linked

Mental health treatment in pre-Victorian era was taken on by the clergy; they encouraged the patients to find healing through religions, and generally treated them in a humane way. However the clergy could only take on so many patients. Bethlem Hospital (known as ‘Bedlem’), founded by the clergy in 1247 to care of the sick and homeless expanded into caring for the mentally ill, started small but later was to move buildings and become the country’s only public mental hospital until the 1800′s. There were many aspects of treatment from this barbaric era that continued into the Victorian era and did not leave mental health treatment until the 1960′s. All these have died out now, but what might seem like an old practice continued in less dramatic forms  and were only stopped when the Victorian Asylums closed down under the Thatcher administration.

Once home the main hospital at Bethlem, now the Imperial War Museum.

 Mad Doctoring 

In the 1770 Bethlem Hospital closed its doors to the public, after being open to tourists for 90 years. It was a major attraction, the public were being given a moral lesson, seeing the results indulgence and moral deviancy. After visiting was closed the hospital became more with drawn, and this gave the doctors, and the cheif apothecary John Haslem, the opportunity to practice ‘mad doctoring’. Mad doctoring focuses on curing ‘madness’ instead of treating it. Terrible practices were used like keeping someone constantly bound, swinging them in a chair from a ceiling until they were sick, ‘cold bathing’ (immersing a patient into a cold bath to induce shock).

Cure and not treatment stayed with mental health treatment as it progressed. ECT  (elctroconvulsive shock therapy) began in 1938, most of the time patients were not given any kind of pain relief. Between 1930 – 1950 doctors would use psychosurgery when ECT was not effective, these surgeries included lobotomy. Alison Foerschner writes on lobotomy in The History of Mental Illness: From Skull Drills to Happy Pills – 

‘To execute this procedure, the patient was first shocked into a coma. The surgeon then hammered an instrument similar to an icepick through the top of each eye socket and severed the nerves connecting the frontal lobes to the emotion-controlling centers of the inner brain. The intended purpose of the lobotomy was to calm uncontrollably violent or emotional patients, and it did–at first–prove to be successful. Because of the preliminary positive results and the facts that it was easy … lobotomies quickly spread around the world as a popular practice for severely mentally ill patients who were resistant to other treatments. It was only after tens of thousands of patients worldwide had undergone this procedure during the following twenty years that people started to take notice of its undesirable side effects … Aside from a twenty-five percent death rate, lobotomies also resulted in patients that were unable to control their impulses, were unnaturally calm and shallow, and/or exhibited a total absence of feeling’.

Total Mastery (Dr knows best)

Totals mastery was a part of mad doctoring and was the idea that a patient must be broken and under the complete control of the doctor. This gave doctors licence to abuse patients, which changed a little when ‘moral treatment’ was introduced in the 1800’s and became the standard way to treat patients. The Science Museum’s data base says on moral treatment –

‘Moral treatment was the cornerstone of mental health care in the 1800s. The idea it rested on was humane but paternalistic: moral treatment’s advocates believed that an asylum patient had a better chance of recovery if treated like a child rather than an animal. It was introduced by Quaker asylum director William Tuke at the end of the 1700s. Moral treatment rejected orthodox medical treatments used in asylums of the time, which mostly involved blood-letting, purging and physical restraints such as chains and manacles. Tuke’s revolutionary idea was to make his asylum a strict, well-run household. Patients were expected to dine at the table, make polite conversation over tea, consider the consequences of their actions, and clean and garden. The asylum director established comprehensive rules and constant surveillance, enforced by simple rewards and punishments. Sanity was to be restored through self-discipline.’

Even though this appears to be becoming more humane the doctors are still not letting patients make choices about their treatment, nor were patients given insight into their condition. Moral treatment does seem to mark the beginnings of modern talking therapy, as it focused on trying to make the patient live a ‘normal life’ and consider spirituality. More can be found about details of daily life in an asylum using moral treatment on the English Heritage website.

The concept that mentally ill people should have choices in their treatment and should be informed about their condition did not become mainstream until the 1960’s. The psychiatrist R D Lang put forward ideas about metal health that had not been considered before, such as schizophrenia not being entirely biological but influenced by the patients family and relationships. Until this point mental health problems had been seen as entirely biological. David Shariatmadari writes in the guardian about Lang’s book ‘The Divided Self’ –

‘Here was someone explaining madness, showing how the fragmentation of the person was an intelligible response to an intolerable pressure, often the pressure of the infamous double-bind. The mechanics of the double-bind are best conveyed by examples from the real world … Over many months, Lang and Esterson interviewed each of the 11 patients, their parents and siblings, individually, in pairs, and as groups. Their aim was to get a clear picture of the workings of the family, and to discover if the subject’s madness made sense in context.’

Lang’s questioning of practices around mental illness was led by people feeling that doctors were being too dependent on drugs. It was also starting to become clear with time, that practices like lobotomy had done more damage than good. When the asylums closed and metal health patients were cared for in the community they saw themselves more as individuals and the ‘User’s Movement’ began. This movement is about being given information about treatments, sharing information about experiences and having a say in treatment.

 

 

 

Feminist Play List – Who 4

Here are some videos and music I think you might find useful.

Laci Green’s video series talks about sex, sexuality, relationships, and body image. Her work is a good example of what it means to be a woman in this era at our age, how women really feel about issues, and answers and thoughts on subjects that we often question.

It’s also worth having a look at the Gender page on Upworthy. That where I found this video –

There is a lot of great feminist poetry on youtube, I will try and find a specific channel. This is a good start.

Here is a couple of songs I think you might find inspiring. The idea of being able to link your piece using music is a very interesting one, and although you may not want to use these songs specifically, I thought they might point you in the direction of the kind of music you are looking for.

‘Oasis’ by Amanda Palmer has a strong narrative, and is about dealing with rape, which I know Liz was interested in exploring. The song received criticism due to being so upbeat, in THIS article she addresses why she sung the song this way and in the second video she demonstrates why the song has a great impact and makes people uncomfortable being a fast tempo and major key.

More music