desire or passion?

_I think no one can imagine this book was published in 1985 - its ideas are still so trendy - a really inspiring and interesting book about desire/passion.

"Consuming Passions" by Judith Williamson

[p.11] We are consuming passions all the time - at the shops, at the movies, in the streets, in the classroom: in the old familiar ways that no longer seem passionate because they are the shared paths of our social world, the known shapes of our waking dreams.

[p.91] When I rummage through my wardrobe in the morning I am not merely faced with a choice of what to wear. I am faced with a choice of images: the difference between a smart suit and a pair of overalls, a leather skirt and a cotton dress, is not just one of fabric and style, but one of identity. You know perfectly well that you will be seen differently for the whole day, depending on what you put on; you will appear as a particular kind of woman with one particular identity which excludes others. Often I have wished I could put them all on together, or appear simultaneously in evert possible outfit, just to say, How dare you think any one of these is me. But also, See, I can be all of them. (how true...this just correlates with one of my ideas for my next move.)

[p.172] 'Film Noir' gets its name from a visual style - an abundance of darkness and shadows, sharp contrasts of light and dark, night scenes and murky interiors rather than brightly-lit sets and daylight landscapes. It also serves as a metaphor for aspects of content: a sense of moral uncertainty, difficulty in knowing the 'truth' and in distinguishing between appearance and reality. (for half a second, i want to rename my film05 as 'something'-noir...not only because the style has a bit of 'noir' in it, but also the uncertainty embedded within. however, naming is tricky - i need some guidance.)

[p.205] Personal ownership...property brings with it security and independence. (Margaret Thatcher, election broadcast)

[p.205] In the world of fear, people cling desparately to their own possessions.

[p.206] Home is not property, it is belonging somewhere. Who owns the view from my window? What makes a street more homely than a house, a Council Estate safer than Real Estate, the whole of London more personal than a back garden?

[p.209] The walkman is a vivid symbol of our time. It provides a concrete image of alienation, suggesting an implicit hostility to, and isolation from, the environment in which it is worn. (just like the mobile phones nowadays...)

[p.210] Individualism, Privatization and 'Choice' - The walkman is primarily a way of escaping from a shared experience or environment. It produces a privatized sound, in the public domain; a weapon of the individual against the communal. (i guess this is slightly different from now - we want to privatize still, but we want to share what we privatize.)

[p.210] It attempts to negate chance: you never know what you are going to hear on a bus or in the streets, but the walk-person is buffered against the unexpected - an apparent triumph of individual control over social spontaneity. Of course, what the walk-person controls is very limited.

[p.210] The wearer of a walkman states that they expect to make no input into the social arena, no speech, no reaction, no intervention. Their own body is the extent of their domain. The turning of desire for control inwards towards the body has been a much more general phenomenon of recent years.

[p.210] While everyone listens to whatever they want within their 'private' domestic space, the pecularity of the walkman is that it turns the inside of the head into a mobile home.

[p.211] In all media, the technology of this century has been directed towards a shift, first from the social to the private - from concert to record-player - and then of the private into the social - exemplified by the walkman, which, paradoxically, allows someone to listen to a recording of a public concert, in public, completely privately. (<3)
[p.211] In urban life 'the streets' stand for shared existence, a common understanding, a place that is owned by no-one and used by everyone.
[p.229] The academic idea of 'postmodernism' where, because no meanings are fixed and anything can be used to mean anything else, one can claim as radical almost anything provided it is taken out of its original context.
[p.230] Marx chose to begin his great study of the capitalist system with - the commodity; not because of its economic role alone, but because of what it means.
[p.230] The conscious, chosen meaning in most people's lives comes much more from what they consume than what they produce. (i'm not that sure about this yet.) Clothes, interiors, furniture, records, knick-knacks, all the things that we buy involve decisions and the exercise of our own judgement, choice, 'taste'.
[p.230] Consuming seems to offer a certain scope for creativity, rather like a toy where all the parts are pre-chosen but the combinations are multiple.
[p.230] Consumerism is often represented as a supremely individualistic act - yet it is also very social: shopping is a socially endorsed event, a form of social cement. It makes you feel normal. Most people find it cheers them up - even window shopping. People's wants and needs are translated into the form of consumption.
[p.230] Buying and owning, in our society, offer a sense of control.
[p.232] The TV and video boom shows not only a trend towards the privatization of entertainment but offers the ability to control. In analyzing these products we can understand more about the society which both produces and uses them. What are potentially radical are the needs that underlie their use: needs both sharpened and denied by the economic system that makes them.

_ultimate (?) reasons behind those social networking actions: we are scared to be forgotten & we want to be known/understood.