There has been a moment in everyone's life where they have either felt invisible or desired invisibility. Almost everyone has been overlooked and under-appreciated at some point in there, much like the protagonist in Ralph Ellison's 1952 tour de force novel Invisible Man. The narrator who's name remains unknown recites his mobius strip of a tail. He battles racism in the south, university politics and expulsion somewhere in the middle, and encounters race riots, political occupation, and disaccord among the brethren in the North. Down on his luck, the narrator accepts defeat and decides to stay underground to thus start the story, and become invisible.
Feeling invisible is completely different from wanting invisibility. Now if you're in the market for invisibility, The Secret to Invisibility is Revealed is sold a mere $34, $24.95, and $14.05. And although the secret will most likely never be revealed, people still buy. The lone Amazon testimony concludes this service is false. Sherwood says "it is not really about invisibility but rather projecting your mind into a place you want to see. It is not the ancient art of vanishing from sight and reappearing at will, as claimed you do not vanish, you simply do not physically go where you want to be invisible. You stay home and project your consciousness. The only way to reappear at will is to physically go where you want to. I will shortly appear at will at the supermarket. Occultist call it astral projection and the CIA call it remote viewing. A lot of hype for very little." Unfortunately the author and owner of Novel Discoveries, Bill W. Williams probably has no idea what it is like to be a minority or to feel underrepresented, i.e. the true representation of invisibility. Williams has managed Novel Discoveries for over 10 years thus concluding he is a talented con-artist and anyone can sell anything, even air (which invisibility essentially constitutes). Williams claims to be revered and highlighted by Jay Leno, but ultimately Leno only points out the absurdity of this products existence. This ludicrous idea is sold not-only on Amazon, but through Barnes & Nobel, PayPal, and Google Books where the downloadable secret of invisibility comes directly to your iPad, Kindle, and Nook. And although there are no claims on the Better Business Bureau and only one bad review, it is certain this is a mirage. So if you're dying to waste money go for it, however why not support Ellison who has a real story to tell. Otherwise keep supporting Williams cockomamy disillusionment divided between his sane-visible and insane-invisible self, which mind you is spent sking in New Hampshire and swimming/snorkling in Florida.
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LAJ
100 Objects of Popular and Material Culture is an blog exploring the manifestations of human consumption and commodity-ization. The purpose of this experiment is to explore material and popular culture in contemporary society by using objects and concepts to prompt wider questions and reflections. So by emulating The British Museum's and Neil MacGregor's format of A History of the World in 100 Objects I plan to satirically analyze and reinterpreted 100 material culture objects over the course of 2014. Material Culture is the study of our culture's consumption of stuff; namely the manifestation of culture through material productions where people's perceptions of objects is socially and culturally dependent. With this, objects reflect conscious and unconscious beliefs on the the individuals who fabricated, purchased, or used them, and by extension the society where they live. So examining materiality, cultural truths and societal assumptions may be discovered. As anthropologist Arjun Appaduai states "in any society the individual is often caught between the cultural structure of commodity-ization and his own personal attempts to bring a value and order to the universe of things." Objects and commodities make up a much larger symbolic system consisting of want and need, socio-economic status, fashion, etc. Often times form follows function whether the commodity, market, and or consumer forever evolve around one-another. Philosopher Pierre Bourdieu's theories of capital flow full circle; where regardless if you are a minimalist or a hoarder the world is made up of things and everyone will leave their footprint on the earth. So by humorously analyzing marketed objects and concepts, hopefully this blog will provide further incite into ideas of over-consumption, a disposable society, consumerism vs. anti-consumers, planned obsolescence vs. sustainability, as well as the greater good of mankind and future generations. Archives
March 2015
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