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MEDIA AND THE ARCHIVE: Motions and Transformations

Inside the Traditional Archives of Special Collections at Doheny Memorial Library, USC

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The Remixed Archive In Remix Theory, Eduardo Navas writes that "Remix affects culture in ways that go beyond the basic understanding of recombining material to create something different." In this unit, we explore how archives change, evolve, and are transformed by the affordances of technology in enabling (prod)users to reuse and recombine existing elements in order to make something new.

What happens when we reimagine and reinvent a work to build something radically different? If, as Navas suggests, remix can be used "a tool for autonomy," what transformative and subversive potentials does remix have? How does remix function as what Virginia Kuhn formulates as a "digital argument that is crucial to the functioning of a vital public sphere"? What does remixing the archive achieve, and what are the ethical limitations and boundaries of remix?

The "contrapuntal," as articulated by Edward Said in Culture and Imperialism, provides a productive lens through which we can think about how remix can rethink master narratives. Said takes the notion of the contrapuntal from music, where two or more distinct melodies form a polyphony; furthermore, the contrapuntal, or counterpoint, also refers to the backstitch in sewing techniques, where stitches overlap and are not consecutively sewn, but rather in a back and forth (non)sequence. The contrapuntal, like remix, has to do with bringing together oppositional perspectives and thinking through disparate experiences: it is as much a knitting together as it is a "tearing apart," as Michael O'Krent has suggested during a class discussion.

With remix's affinity with amateur making, we could perhaps think about how care goes hand in hand with remix. Heather Duncan's post, "The Destruction of Memory," calls attention to the intersections between archives, care, the haptic, and the affective through artist YoonJung Kim's works:
Here, we are again informed by Edward Said; in an essay on "Professionals and Amateurs," Said calls for an intellectual spirit of amateurism that he defines as "an activity that is fueled by care and affection," and one that calls for a contrapuntal--and perhaps collaborative--ethics:
the desire to be moved not by profit or reward but by love for an unquenchable interest in the larger picture, in making connections across lines and barriers.
Said's definition of amateurism--with its emphasis on care and love--is motivated by the origins of the word itself: amateur comes from the Latin amare, to love, and it is in this spirit that Said sets out to address the role of the intellectual and the ways in which the stifling pressures of professionalism could be countered by amateurism. Roland Barthes, in one of his vignettes in Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes, also discusses the amateur; he writes,
the Amateur renews his pleasure (amator: one who loves and loves again); he is anything but a hero (of creation or performance)...
The amateur, or the remixer, therefore, as someone who takes care in their craft.
Readings/Selections
Virginia Kuhn, "The Rhetoric of Remix," in Transformative Works and Cultures special issue on "Fan/Remix Video" (2012).

Kelly Logan, "Through the Looking Lens" (final project for a Media Arts + Practice class, "Remixing the Archive")

Remix video selections to be viewed in class.

Recommended: #TransformDH Video Showcase (2015)