PHILOSOPHY BEHIND THE EXHIBIT

Why Media Archaeology?

 

"Let's get our hands dirty"- this phrase is the last sentence of the Digital Humanities Manifesto 2.0. It signifies a shift in thinking about the tools and objects we use everyday to produce knowledge. Digital humanities is still dominated by the demand to use tools for creation of digital work rather than explicitly considering the tools themselves but scholarship has emerged that places importance on the technology as an object of study.  By using an ontological approach that recognizes the significance and accumulation of agency that the technology has, this type of scholarship emerges as viable form of study through which to view cultural socio-economics. As witnessed in Bruno Latour and Steven Woolgar's book Laboratory Life, the science and social inform one another, specifically within institutions.  For example, the mere physical allocation of space within the lab to various individuals denotes key hierarchies between the scientists and lab technicans (45). By observing the room's materiality, Latour and Woolgar identify traits the reinforce this hierarchy, such as the stacking of files and division of labour (45). Thus thinking through the materiality allows Latour and Woolgar to surmise how individual workers are treated, how specific knowledge is produced and why it is produced in such a way. 

 

This approach that I take derives from concepts of media archaeology, which describes the “technological 'beginnings' (archai) of operativity on the microtechnological level” (Ernst 57). Media archaeology "having to rethink many of the institutional and aesthetic contexts of seemingly familiar media technologies" (Parikka 64). Parikka argues that media archaeology is important in thinking through political implications of technology, as the invisibility of hardware increased from cinema to the user friendly devices of the 80s to current technology (64). Thus through "objects, we can interpret the birth of the automated factory system" (Parikka 65); this particularly useful when examining objects such as scanners that mediate factories, workers, and material. Furthermore, “media theories only work when being tested against hard(ware) evidence” (Ernst 60); therefore, I apply media theory against the hardware and encourage others to do so simultaneously. 

 

Black Box/Erasure

 

In the process of interacting with an actual tool and de/reconstructing it, this concept  "is most often about what isn’t at hand, or what we don’t know, or what we’re willing to conjecture" (Sayers "The Relevance of Remaking"). By focusing on the material itself, we as scholars can think through the tools and the implications of using them. For example, the notion of elision provides an interesting way of viewing these scanners. What is most obviously missing from most of the scanners is the software that allows the scanner to function with computer systems. This is partially due to the vintage of these machines, but also the irrelevance of them in the face of technological development. The Apple Color OneScanner only works with specific eras of Apple computer operating systems: systems with the 7.5.5 version of the operating system but also systems that still use floppy disks for installation. After searching the Apple website online, there are no updates to this software or CDs available in order to make the system compatible with newer versions of Apple products. Therefore the elision of compatiable software notes the specific era of the scanner as well as the ways in which the Apple corporation controls product operations. Through not updating the software, the Apple corporation essentially renders the product obsolete and any potential customers will then be forced to buy new products that work with their operating systems. Thus this erasure acts as a mechanism for control by defining who is permitted access to certain technologies and subtly forcing customers to buy more expensive hardware that then works with newer operating systems. This modality of control by the Apple corporation is described in current terms by Lori Emerson when considering the Apple app store user agreement. Emerson describes the "rigid" boundaries determined by the user agreement, such as the termination of an app if an easter egg or hidden code is discovered (Reading Writing Interfaces). Further, Emerson notes that Apple iOS developer guidelines render "the interface design tradition of making sweeping generalizations about 'people,' [and] assumptions about nature and intuition, all of which are tied to statements about the necessity of hiding the device's workings via interface and therefore the necessity to black-box the device" (Reading Writing Interfaces). Thus the elison left by the company acts as a similar mechanism of control, black-boxing the past devices in order to promote newer material. 

 

Furthermore in comparing the 1987 Microtek MSF-300G with the 1996 Apple Color OneScanner 1200/30, there are noticable physical elements missing from the Apple scanner that make it seamless , namely the screws and remenants of construction. While the Microtek scanner has screws available for users to unscrew thus allowing the front face of the device to be unattached, the Apple scanner has no indication of how to unlock the device. Instead it has a smooth design with no obvious points of entry. This shift in material construction illustrates a similar ideological shift in the Apple corporation, whereby newer Apple devices "marked a profound shift in personal computing away from the sort of inside-out know-how one needed to create on an Apple II to the kind of perfunctory know-how one needed to navigate the surface of the Macintosh- one that amounted to the kind of knowledge to click this or that button" (Emerson Reading Writing Interfaces). Through the process of attempting to deconstruct these scanners, the user-friendly approach of Apple makes it more difficult to disassemble them. Thus again corporate mechanisms of control and the call toward hiding or black-boxing the means through which these devices operate illustrate the growing trend of invisible interfaces. 

 

 

Materiality

 

The first question Sayers asks during the process of remaking vintage technology is: "From what materials was it made?" (Sayers "The Relevance of Remaking"). Materiality is of vital importance to consider. These scanners contain various opportunities for not only material criticism but cultural introspection as well. "Matters of composition are neatly tied to studies of trade, labor, colonialism, and empire, or how and what materials are acquired in the name of scientific and technological innovation" (Sayers "The Revelance of Remaking"). This concept derives from German media studies practices through individuals such as Vilem Flusser and Friedrich Kittler, whose intense interrogation of materiality reveals sociological structures and historical implications. The scanners include many raw materials as well as those processed. In the "Global Impact" section of the webpage, I attempted to illustrate just how many steps were included in this process, by focusing on the material silicon. Silicon, as is state, is an essential material for the electronic compnent of this device, as well as the most important element in modern computing. It acts as a semi-conductor and thus regulates the flow of electrons, which when measured relay a signal that is turned into binary. This ultimately is the creation of knowledge as the binary inscription is interpreted by coded programs and turned into images or words on computer screens. However, even the process of obtaining this one element involves mutiple sets including processing, filtering and condensing ("Global Impact"). In context, silicon is only one element in the scanners, other materials such as aluminum, plastic, glass, zinc, and copper similarly are processed with mutiple steps. The base elements that make these come from a variety of places, such as China, Brazil, Russia, United States and Canada.

 

Furthermore, China produces the most silicon, which then connects to cheap labor, exploitation of workers under the guise of socialism and competing political ideologies. As China's global dominance grows, competing ideologies of capitalism and socialism emphasize the difference in labor structures. While Western ideology is based in neoliberal values, China's political economy is based in socialism, "thus, comparable to the East-West culture contrast, a primary underlying contrast between socialist and capitalist ideologies is the focus on the good-of-the-group (Collectivism) of socialism and on the goodof-the-individual (Individualism) of capitalism" (Ralston et al. 180). This is illustrated in the fact that in the early 1990s the United States operated under individualistic goals with corporations privately owned, while "In China, 85% to 90% of all businesses countrywide are collectively owned. This includes all forms of organization - joint ventures and wholly owned foreign subsidiaries, as well as state enterprises" (Ralston et al. 186). Due to the oppressive regime of the government and its involvement in  business, workers rights are often forfeited. Furthermore since the government has a stake in the success of companies it can change protected land areas to mining sites for silicon. It also can change labor laws so that employees can work longer and for less, so that an increase in profits occurs, which directly benefits the government. Thus the increase of Chinese parts in scanning machines illustrates how governments control the labor force and the land. 

 

However, what studies point at is the growing convergence of East and West culture, as "global organizations not only must understand the diverse value systems within their multi-location operation, but also, if they are to create seamless organizations, must now learn to integrate these diverse value systems to create their universal corporate culture" (Ralston 178). This is witnessed in the vast amount of countries that contribute parts or labor to the Microtek scanner. In thinking about the raw materials, questions about labor are raised. Who shapes the raw materials? Who assembles the materials in parts? Who them assembles these parts together? Therefore modern manufacturing acts as means of global control as well as disseminating political ideologies to other parts of the world. Ultimately, one assembled part, such as the charge coupled device, exemplfies the changing global structure due to converging economies at a specific time as well hinting at future implications of this such as change to the labor force, and the growing decision to black box the workers and their labor. 

 

All of these ideas and political ideologies are found throughout my examination of the scanners, from witnessing neoliberalism in the origin story of creation to viewing the global locations of where the scanners originate. My hope is that as this develops more support and discoveries will help create a complex structure through which to view international relations. 

 

Works Cited

 

Emerson, Lori. Reading Writing Interfaces: From the Digital to the Bookbound. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2014. Kindle. 10 Dec 2015.

 

Ernst, Wolfgang. “Media Archaeography: Method and Machine Versus History and Narrative Media.” Media Archaeology. Eds. Hutamo, E. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2011. Web. 10 Dec 2015.

 

Latour, Bruno and Steve Woolgar. Laboratory Life: The Construction of Scientific Facts. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986. Print.

 

Parikaa, Jussi. “Media Theory and New Materialism.” What Is Media Archaeology? Cambridge: Polity Press, 2012. 63-89. Print.

 

Ralston, David A., et al. "The impact of national culture and economic ideology on managerial work values: A study of the United States, Russia, Japan, and China." Journal of International Business Studies (1997): 177-207.

 

Sayers, Jentery. “The Relevance of Remaking.” Maker Lab in the Humanities UVic blog. (2014) Accessed November 28, 2015. http://maker.uvic.ca/remaking/.