The Present Extensive
The self itself does not amount to much but is it not isolated, it is trapped in a trammel of relationships that are more complex and mobile than ever. – this intense dependency has become expressed through the mobile phones. Lyotard
The relation between time, notions of the self and mobile phones are yielding some fascinating ideas that cross-reference cultural and urban theory and psychology.
The Present Extensive is a way of living in time that emerges as linked to the modern city. Jose Luis Pinillos coined the phrase urban psychopathology. ‘…with its incessant mobility and rapidity of its changes, the city situates its inhabitants in a permanent here and now, where references to yesterday and tomorrow vanish. Precisely because of this provisional character that prevails and because urban existence accentuates the ephemeral nature of all events, the technified city produces in those who live there a form of living in time that has been called the ‘present extensive’ (Pinillos 1977:239)
Mobile phones have promoted a form of living in time that consists in a lack of certainty about anything other than the present or the immediate future. Many users appear to be in a kind of perpetual state of preparation, planning appointments that are subsequently transferred to another date and then to another and finally never take place at all. What our society demands as regards commitments is flexibility – never before in history has punctuality been so important. We witness this with the rapidity with which calls are made to confirm ones attendances at meetings when one is stuck on a train. This follows with Virilio who believes that new conceptions of time is found everywhere today, in the precariousness of employment, short term contracts and long term unemployment, families broken and remade because of divorce etc (1999). There are two main consequences of this new temporal conception for the construction of self: fragmentation (loss of past as a context of current behaviour) and irresponsibility (loss of future as the consequence of actions).
‘Changes in the self resulting from the use of mobile phones’, Jose M.Garcia-Montes, Domingo Caballero-Munoz, Marino Perez-Alvarez
Media, Culture and society, 2006, v28(1) 67-82
Why? Where? How?
Mobile phones have moved beyond being a mere technical device to become a key ‘social object’ present in every aspect of a users life. With the advent of anywhere, anytime mobile technologies, the sense of belonging to a place may slowly be giving way to a sense of belonging to a communications network. They are redefining what is deemed as public and private space and changing dramatically how we communicate with others. The latest phones now have an array of features for every taste, religion and gender. From in-built compasses to detect the direction of Mecca, ovulation monitors to help women conceive and the ability to listen to calls inside ones head through the conducting of sound through bone, mobile phones are undoubtedly the fetish of the century.
Mobile Dream Telling occurs both as an impromptu performance and as a commissioned work.
Currently:
Sydney Esquisse, Customs House, Sydney 5-20 August 2006.
Previously:
Function V, Spectacle Gallery, Birmingham291 Gallery, London
Creative Swing, Union Chapel, London
Where are You?
Unlike landline conversations mobiles do not mediate between a known ‘backstage’ (the location of the speakers) and ‘front stage’ the virtual space of the conversation (Goffman).They require negotiations of various front stage performances, so roles cannot be assumed they have to be affirmed. This is why often the first question asked when someone calls a mobile is 'Where are you?'
Theorist Sadie Plant believes that mobile phones have created a new form of functioning of peoples minds which she refers to as bi-psyche. This double psyche is required to attend simultaneously to the real world that physically surrounds the speaker and the virtual world that is opened up through the phone he or she is holding. She raises questions around the effects of what can be seen as a schizophrenic existence or bi-psyche, that is a divorce between what one says verbally and what one does with one’s body. On a positive note mobile phones may benefit individuals in terms of psychological maturity, being that a person is subjected to different roles and manages these simultaneously.
Forced Eavesdropping
There is ongoing research into the effects of mobile phones on social interactions and public space. A number of interesting studies and experiments have been conducted. Here is a summary of the research from the Department of Psychology, University of York, UK into the pressing question 'Why are mobile phones annoying?
- Content or volume is annoying because of the way people choose to use their mobile phones
- Excessive loudness, intrusive ring tones
- Something inherently more noticeable and annoying about hearing one side of a mobile phone conversation
- Goffman – social interaction and dramatic performance, presentation of self to a passive secondary audience (bystanders) as well as the active primary audience (interlocutor)
- Speaker may have performative intent for both the receiver of the call and the bystander overhearing it
- Obligation of the bystanders to act as an audience. Through the medium of the mobile phone a self-serving and flattering presentation of self may be foisted onto an unwilling audience evident from various urban legends in which people fake calls to impress others
- Effect of narrative. When hearing a conversation, and a story being told, narrative is a deeply compelling tool of communication, forcing us to become involved sometimes unconsciously.
Andrew Monk, Jenni Carroll, Sarah Parker, Mark Blythe
Department of Psychology, University of York
Behaviour and Information Technology, Jan-Feb 2004, vol.23, no 1. 33-41
Inspiration
Mobile Dream Telling came about from witnessing one too many private phone calls in a public space, in this instance a train carriage. A young woman described in detail to her listener a series of events and actions. When I looked at her in annoyance, she began to incorporate my reactions into her series of actions. In an instant I became both witness and participant in her days events.
I began thinking about how we communicate when we use mobile phones, the words, phrases and messages we communicate. It occurred to me that often we do describe what we are doing, such as "I am on the train", "I am walking up the street", "I will be there in 5 minutes". This peculiar sense of temporality, its relationship with grammar and language and the bringing of intimate information into the public sphere became subjects of action research.
Particular areas of interest include:
Forced EavesdroppingThe world is my living room!
Where are You?The repositioning in the listeners mind that takes place when speaking to a mobile subject.
The Present Extensive and the Affirmation of Self in Public Space
A way of living in time that emerges as linked to the modern city, urban psychopathology.
The result is an interactive performance exploring how mobile phones affect our sense of time, space and self.
