Reflection

For Project Brief 4, titled “Exploring Texts in the Digital Age: Social Media, Self-Identity and Psychoanalytical Criticism”; Zachary, Monaliza and I created an artefact with separate topical sections for each of us to stylistically convey in our chosen format. A collage of the human body made by separate images was our central product with a designated section of the body reflecting our topics. I focused on the societal implications on social media through two comparative column-style pieces titled ‘Why I hate Grindr but think Tinder’s ok’ and ‘#TBT: 90s Media Influence Compared to Now’.

Over 6 weeks my group collectively developed our ideas and vision and through discussion we would evaluate the actuality of our assessment. Personally, the first few weeks were quite confusing for me and I struggled with developing an understanding of what we had to do and the topic provided (which for us was ‘texts’). Zachary certainly led to the way in this period for which I’m glad as he had a really strong conceptual understanding of the task and through his own interest in theories and readings I was able to develop on awareness and personal contention in my area of the project. The first few weeks revolved around a much more general area of research which is exemplified in my annotated bibliography and benefited more in how to later find substantial theory and direction for my articles. After that I felt I had a much stronger idea of the task and thus we were able to have effective meetings and discussions to how the look the project would look and such. We had a Facebook group chat running, in which we could constantly submit new ideas, an example being our recent decision to present it in a book folio-like presentation.

In recent weeks we definitely focused more on developing the aesthetic element of the project and the truly talented Monaliza, who assembled the actual book, did a great job at actualising the sketches and concept. We all made different contributions that are seen through the final product’s motifs such as the foil backdrop Zachary arranged.

I am satisfied with my articles and think they provide strong examples of how social media texts inform and influence the general public. I furthermore think my choice of comparing 90s media influence discourse to now and a comparison between Grindr and Tinder made for a stronger outcome. My main obstacle was getting a full understanding of the task, which I seek to improve next time. In terms of collaboration, my only regret is that we didn’t really get to assemble or curate the artefact together due to logistic complications. This could probably be improved by stronger scheduling however we all have external jobs and commitments that would continuosly interfere. We managed through this though and created something special. I am extremely happy with the outcome as a whole entity and generally think we did really well!