Symposium Reflections

After a semester long attending research seminars, the EMPA Honours students were presented with an opportunity to let their research shine. Stumbling in out of the rain the theatre almost appeared bare as the drop out rate became apparent. Without trying to create a divide the English students perched themselves to the right as the Media and Performing Arts students casually collected the back row. A move to integrate initiated on day two failed as the English students opted for safer terrain with their compatriots.

Klara opened the seminar and her casual performance made the whole process look less daunting but her carefully structured thesis outline on masculinities in Latvian film left a few of us worried – Had we done enough?

Noni’s Marxist performance left us with little desire for the sugary goodness Coke provides, presenting an oppositional approach to Coke’s image. The stunning red dress, the colour of Coke, was in opposition as she sat alone, flat, unanimated and depressed.

Nick’s stimulus and response presentation investigated the feedback system of interactive performance. The sensorial experience toyed with the idea of birth – the birth of the cyborg.

Heroin addiction is a mixed bag of extreme elation and catastrophic lows and Milana investigated this experience on screen. Like the drug the screen image is attractive for some and spectatorship becomes paramount in her investigation.

Sarah-Jane’s gendering loss on screen presented the fall of the woman as she relinquishes her child and the differences in representation for the man.

Patrick and the acousmatic gave sound a voice in film where the image has nearly always been privileged. The existence of a being or monster is played out through sound without ever actually having appeared on screen.

Rodney and his political cartoons opened up a can of worms for the audience trying to understand the relationship between power and control, and war time propaganda. Disney profiteering from a cause he never believed in is a story worth telling.

Zabrina got our toes tapping with her presentation on the rise of the musical television series Glee. A highly interactive television series, Glee proposes a neat case study on the effects of digital consumerism.

Emma Maye delighted us with her feminist performance on gendered violence. Highly entertaining, drawing on modes of performance such as Vaudeville, the representation resonated with the atrocities of recent female gang rape by footballers.

Darren shifted our attention with the small shifts in media ecologies. He presented us with actor-network theory suggesting the slight technological changes are just as, if not more, important to theorize as the large ones.

Following on, Andrew presented the implications for anonymity amongst Internet users. The pros and cons of remaining anonymous on the Internet are highlighted by the glory of wanting to be identified when the anonymous impacts the world. These are the many contradictions of the growing media environment.

Jessica’s light in urban space presentation accounted for light as a precious substance which is taken for granted in public urban space. The proposed case study on Vivid Sydney presents an interesting investigation as the protest against the festival layers politics over art.

Recurring media panics are the crux of Anushka’s argument, determining how the media and the public perpetuate panic on the Internet.

Kyle lightened the day with his comical imagery of the traditional gamer and presented the theatre with the new exergamer – the convergence of the gamer and the exerciser. Kyle investigates how the Wii Fit is changing the gamer’s future and fighting the obesity epidemic.

Katie’s exploration of love and faith highlights the complexities of the modern world with the varied religions and spiritualities that occupy our planet. Can the notion of love know no bounds when it comes to crossing paths with faith? Are we blinded by the illusion of love?

As Katie left a warm fuzzy feeling in our hearts it was time for me to present the importance of theorizing distribution for the Australian film industry.

And then our task was done.

The symposium presented an interesting two days where the crossover between the coursework classes became apparent. Attending those research seminars really did pay off – not just in terms of trying to decipher theory but also for presentation techniques. I can’t help but wonder what the English students were doing while we toddled off to seminars after a hard days work?