Narratives; Then and Now

Figure 1: Experiencing Songlines With Technology

Narratives have shaped our history for as long as we have existed. Telling stories, through oral or written language, continues to shape our cultures through time as entertainment as well as informative especially as the format changes.

The Australian Aboriginal looks at the world as “shaped by a remarkable concept”, an oral narrative called The Dreaming, also known as songlines seen to the right (Stanner, 1979, p.23). Chatwin (1987) identified that,  to “understand the concept of the Dreaming you have to understand it as an Aboriginal equivalence of the first two chapters of Genesis…”. This shows how important this narrative has and still is in Aboriginal beliefs. This narrative can be said to have become more influential as technology allows us

Self-narratives have increased in popularity as we shift to a more “me” focused and technological society. This week's lectures suggests that self-narratives are like maps, it “constructs for a particular purpose and context.” And creates an emotional value having the ability to create a place. Twitter is a network made to share self-narratives with one another, but the interaction between users makes it possible for other people to construct your identity as the software and other users affect what is seen about you. If someone searches your twitter handle, other user’s tweets to you or may have retweeted you also appears causing your image to change.

In a virtual network such as Twitter, our self-narratives are not only shaped by the software but by the people who we are friends with.  The paper On The Study of Social Interaction in Twitter found that majority of interaction is between two people, large groups showed “very strong trend… but tended not be well connected although reciprocity was always very high.” Users are aware that their tweets can get replies as well as retweets. The quality of tweets helps connects followers connect with the user,  which helps shape the identity of the user.

References

Experience Songlines on screen during NAIDOC Week | Arts NSW. (2016).Arts.nsw.gov.au. Retrieved 25 August 2016, from http://www.arts.nsw.gov.au/index.php/news-and-publications/news/experience-songlines-on-screen-during-naidoc-week/

Kuttainen, V. (2016). BA1002: Our space: Networks, narratives and the making of place, lecture 5: Story lines. [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from http://learnjcu.edu.au

Macskassy, S. A. (2012) On the Study of Social Interactions in Twitter. In ICWSM.

Stanner, W. E. H. (1979). WHITE MAN GOT NO DREAMING, Essays 1938 -1973.
            Australian National University Press, Australia.