Cory's Paper: Music Isn't Mimesis

Cory is going to write a paper on how music is not a form of mimetic art. He argues that other forms of representational art are props that represent something. Meanwhile, music is not a representation of anything. While it is true music generates emotion, these emotions are not inherent to music. In other words, music can't represent emotion. Therefore, they are not a form of mimetic art.

This is Cory's initial thoughts, and he is still formulating other supporting premises.

Thoughts on the Four Questions: An Addition to Shkurkin's Post

If anyone didn't notice Shkurkin has a pretty good post about what the authors have said about the first three questions. Just want to add to that by adding my thoughts about question 4

Audience coordinate imaginatively with the author/ each other on that content [CONTENT]?


Aristotle: Certain plot elements generate universal emotions. For example, tragedy arouse pity/fear

Walton: Use of props assist in collective imagination (Collectively agreeing upon what is to be imagined in a certain scenario)

Walton: Experiencing a mimetic artwork with someone else is different than watching it alone.

Gerrig: Certain fictional truths are generated by a majority of the audience, while some are logically apparent but ignored (ex. Mona Lisa has a liver).

Clarke/Gerrig: Audience recognizes the difference between aspects of demonstration (Decoupling principle).



In addition, I wanted to give some insights on what Quotations as Demonstrations has to say about the other three questions:

[Imagination]/[Play] Direct quotes are better than indirect quotes because we can re-experience more vividly in our imagination the scenario when the quote is direct.

[Mimesis] Four aspects of demonstration involved in mimesis (Depictive, Supportive, Annotative, and Incidental Aspects).



This is just my rough sketch of the four questions, and I hope others can expand on it.

The Collective Mimetic Experience

In class today we briefly talked about how watching a movie with someone else is a different experience from watching alone. I’d like to add that there is a bigger difference when watching a movie at home than when at a movie theatre. In the theatre, watching a movie is predominately a solitary experience. The only genre of movies for which this isn’t true is comedies, where the usual silence from the audience is broken by laughter. By contrast, watching a movie at home is a more intimate setting. There is usually more talking during the movie, and it is easier to watch the reactions of your fellow audience members. Furthermore, I believe that our mimetic experience is changed by the fact that we are so aware of others’ reactions. A couple days ago I watched Last Night, a movie about a married couple led to temptation while apart from each other one night. A majority of the movie is comprised of suspense over whether or not the two individuals will give into their temptations. While watching, I found my own anxiety augmented when I noticed that my roommate had the same feelings.

            

According to Wikipedia, mass hysteria is the sociopsychological phenomenon involving the manifestation of the same or similar hysterical symptoms by more than one person. In a high-stress environment, it is so powerful that people can develop life-threatening physical conditions simply by watching someone else exhibit the same symptoms. Given that we can nearly kill ourselves by modeling others, it seems natural to think that something as small as our mimetic experience can be influenced by modeling the emotional experiences of our peers. 

Walton and Funny Games

Walton brings up an interesting discussion in this week’s reading about whether or not an audience will enjoy a movie that supports morally questionable themes. For example, is it appropriate to enjoy a movie that claims slavery is just? Walton brings up this topic when discussing coordination between individuals during a mimetic experience. More specifically, he is talking about how we must align with the mutual beliefs of the time period during which the mimetic work was present. However, this question is relevant even for modern films. For example, Funny Games is about a family held hostage by two young men. Throughout the movie, the family is forced into physical and mental torture. In the end, the young men kill the entire family and dispose of their bodies in a nearby lake. The last scene shows the two men entering another family’s house to repeat their mayhem. This movie depicts a variety of morally questionable themes, such as the general theme of evil prevailing. As Walton mentions, to truly enjoy a story like this, one must be willing to accept these morally compromised themes while watching the film. Yet, will the audience enjoy this film? In regards to Funny Games, my feelings are mixed. I enjoyed that the film didn’t have the atypical happy ending that similar films had. At the same time, I felt unsettled after watching it.

Walton suggests that we should avoid such films that exhibit vicious or perverse conduct. Yet, there is a huge market for movies like Hostel that exhibit “torture porn.” Perhaps, like I when I was watching Funny Games, people get enjoyment from watching such violent acts, but at the same time feel unsettled when watching them. This coule be why, though there is a large market for torture porn, these movies are not the norm. People enjoy these kinds of movies on occasion, but generally like to see movies with good moral values.

Aristotle and Question 3

Unlike Plato, I don’t think Aristotle believes that mimetic works corrupt the audience. In his discussion of the elements of good mimetic art, he talks extensively about factors required to incite an emotional response from the audience. However, unless I missed this section (which is likely), he never explicitly states how this emotional response negatively affects the audience. He mentions in Book 13 that one part of a good tragedy is that we can empathize with the actions occurring while at the same time being comforted by the fact that these actions could not happen to us. In this respect, a distance is established between the audience and the artwork. This occurs because, while mimetic artworks imitate reality, they are not direct copies. Aristotle aptly reflects this in is his discussion of a tragic character from history. He discusses a good tragic character as one whom “reproduces the distinctive features of [the real] man, without losing the likeness, makes him [better] than he is…” In other words, the character is a stylized version of the actual man. The audience recognizes this difference, and subconsciously knows that the play is a more stylized version of reality. Because of this separation, people can think about a mimetic work and not be harmfully affected by it.   

The Magic of Mystery

There was an extensive debate in class today about what fear is and how it relates to mimesis. Particularly interesting was the multiple interpretations taken on what Aristotle says about this topic. In Book 13, he mentions that “pity is occasioned by undeserved misfortune, and fear by that of one like ourselves…” One interpretation of this was that that the audience is fearful of the fate of the character. For example, we are afraid for Oedipus and his fate at the end of the play. Another interpretation was that we are fearful that the misfortune depicted could happen to us. Going back to Oedipus, we are fearful that we share the character flaws that Oedipus has and could share similar misfortune. Both interpretations seem like valid causes of fear, and I think it’s difficult to tell which Aristotle intended. If pressed, I would side with the second interpretation because of the part about “that of one like ourselves.” This can be interpreted as meaning that a situation that could happen to ourselves is most fearful. What does everyone think about this?

Another good topic mentioned in class is how in horror movies we always want to see the monster, but are ultimately disappointed after it is shown. This topic got me thinking about an article I read by JJ Abrams on mystery. He says that mystery is always around us, but in our times most mysteries can be solved in a few seconds. Wondering how old Bob Dylan was when he died? Just Google it. For this reason, mysteries in stories present an anomaly. They force us “slow down and discover” the story, and actively engage it. As he aptly states “the experience of the doing really is everything. The ending should be the end of that experience, not the experience itself.”

Extending this to horror films, perhaps what incites our fear is the mystery behind the monster. By withholding the monster from the audience, the director forces them to actively engage their imagination to picture the monster. This in itself is an integral part of the experience.

Here’s the original Abrams article:

http://www.wired.com/techbiz/people/magazine/17-05/mf_jjessay?currentPage=all

Aristotle's Poetics

An interesting thing I realized after reading Poetics is that very few modern movies are classical tragedies. According to Aristotle, the plot of a tragedy generally involves a single character that starts off having good fortune, but ultimately is ruined by the end of the story due to some large character flaw. At the moment, I can’t think of any modern movie that follows this general plot line. The closest one is The Wrestler, where the main character ultimately dies due to his desire for fame (though his death is never explicitly shown in the film). However, the main character doesn’t start with good fortune, as he is a washed-up wrestler who lives in a trailer. Considering how emotionally effective The Wrestler was, it is surprising to see that there aren’t many more pseudo-tragic films.

Despite the fact that films are no longer strictly tragic or epic, many of the elements of a good mimetic artwork that Aristotle describes are present in modern films. For one, Aristotle states that while a historian “describes the things that have been,” while a poet describes the “things that might be.” In other words, a poet is allowed a creative looseness in the accuracy of his story in order to attach a greater meaning to his story. For example, the movie Black Hawk Down is based on a true story, but the scenes in the movie are not completely historically accurate. This aspect was sacrificed to convey deeper themes of the hardships soldiers face in battle.

Aristotle continues to say that emotional events are most effective when “they occur unexpectedly and at the same time in consequence of one another.” In other words, a good narrative has emotionally arousing scenes that follow as a plausible consequence of the story, while at the same time are not predicted by the audience. Creating a narrative that lives to this standard is hard, and many stories often fail to satisfy both conditions. For example, writers often use deus ex machina to abruptly resolve all of the tensions built up in a narrative. While the resolution is unexpected, it is hardly a plausible ending to the story. On the other hand, typical romantic comedies like How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days are the exact opposite. While the endings to these movies are plausible, they are very predictable.

The fact that many of the standards that Aristotle discusses are still used today reflects that these elements are fundamental to our enjoyment of narratives.