Week 2 Workshop

My first workshop (as illness prevented me from going to the first one) and I’m starting to understand just how practical an RMIT degree structure is. A ton of discussion, brainstorming, filming, editing and collaboration.

In the workshop, whilst deliberating on the introduction of David Gauntlett’s Making Media Studies, we discussed how some implications could be involved in media practice, such as the fact that we should expect to find the most relevant ideas and knowledge in different places. Therefore, collaboration between creators with different insights about media is necessary, and though this is only my first media workshop, I found this whole idea of collaboration within the classroom to be extremely advantageous as it provides a whole range of different interpretations and past experiences that can be useful to your work.

As I hadn’t completed Project Brief 1 when I arrived at our Week 2 Workshop, I couldn’t receive any feedback on what I had done, but instead observe others’ and try and provide some sort of positive or negative reaction. While I find it difficult to present any critical feedback of other student’s work, I think I need to remember it is one important part of collaboration and is sometimes necessary in order to improve.

Studying media is confusing. Personally, I find the term hard to define. What is media? It’s everything. It’s everywhere in what we see, touch, hear, etc. That white t-shirt my friend is wearing speaks to me as a piece of media, as it broadcasts the kind of fashion she is into and how she chooses to dress her body says something about her personality.

I found this whole idea come to life in this week’s reading where a particular quote stood out to me:

“We should look at media not as channels for communicating messages, and not as things. We should look at media as triggers for experiences and for making things happen.” (David Gauntlett, 2015).

We also spoke about this theory in the lectorial, in which afterwards we were prompted to go out into Melbourne CBD and search for pieces of media. And while I stood in Federation Square taking photos of signs and television screens, I could have really taken photos of people simply talking or someone ordering their soy flat white at one of the cafés. But it took me going through this exercise and later reflection to digest just how much of the world, I believe, is media.

Still, Federation Square had some excellent examples of tangible media in the form of signs, advertisements, architecture etc…

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Week 4 – Lectorial

At the age of four, my mum took me to my first ballet class. At the age of ten, I began singing lessons. Twelve years old and I fell head first into drama class and any extracurricular theatre programs I could find. Though I feel I’ve mostly been quiet and reserved my whole life, I loved to perform. Explaining why I love to dance, sing and act is something I can’t put into words, as incredibly cliché as it sounds. But sometime last year, I fell out of love with it. Not just that, I despised it. I would have rather been skinned alive than forced onto a stage for people to see me perform. Why? I couldn’t tell you. But a large part of me believes it’s because I simply realised, performing is HARD. I had been trying to follow this passion and imagining a career in it almost my entire life, so I was somewhat surprised to have a moment where I hated it so much. I concluded that everyone else was better than me and turning up to a single drama class suddenly took a huge toll on my health.

Not turning up, however, was worse. When I wasn’t there, it was like my body and soul was punishing me for missing out on something I once loved so much, and I started to regret ever thinking that not going would make my performance anxiety issue disappear.

It took me a while, but when I finally did get back up on the stage, it was like every struggle I had encountered previously happened for a reason, and every slight hardship I had faced was all worth it. I remembered what it felt like to face the lights and hear the applause and be apart of something special.

I guess the point is that while many may think this whole experience led me to come to a conclusion of realising just how much I love performing and accepting it as my one and only job prospect in life, I’m not sure I’ll ever again have those dreams. Of course I performing, but at this point in my life it’s the kind of self-indulgent love where I’m more concerned about the kind of joy it brings me, or as Cal Newport puts it, ‘what the world can offer you’ rather than ‘what you can offer the world’. (Be So Good They Can’t Ignore You, pg 38). Last year I became aware of what I didn’t like about singing, dancing and acting, and realised I didn’t love it enough to create a sustainable career.

These days, I still have no clue what a sustainable career looks like or if I’ll ever have one. And while it’s only been about twelve hours since I first read a snippet of Newport’s novel, I don’t think I’ll forget his words on the ‘Craftsman Mindset’, suggesting that ‘you put aside the question of whether your job is your true passion, and instead turn your focus toward becoming so good they can’t ignore you.’ (Be So Good They Can’t Ignore You, pg 39). Because while I won’t be fooled in thinking that it will be easy, I am willing to accept the fact that it will probably be worth it when I’m not twenty-nine years old and suffering crippling depression due to failing as a performer.

I will still perform. I still do perform. And though it was difficult to accept at first, I think continuing my performance tendencies as a hobby brings me more happiness than a career in it ever would.

Tiny me thinking ballet was the best.

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