looking for a theme: smiley faces in daily life
I like collecting smiley faces randomly in daily life. By collecting, I mean I take pictures of every smiley faces I see, no matter where it is and what format it is.
This time, I wrote a blog about smiley faces, per se, on WordPress. On the one hand, I think it is a good way to keep a record of them because it is digital and suppose to last forever (hopefully). Digitalized or collective memory has been a big topic in recent years, especially with the emergence of social media. There are many discussions on social media memory in academia, politically (Birkner and André, 2018), culturally (Bartoletti, 2011) or sociologically (Pentzold and Sommer, 2011). Personally, I feel very relieved because I consider digital memory as my life track. From a historical perspective, I want to show future generations how life has been and remind myself to seize every moment.
Secondly, I want to share a positive attitude with people on the Internet. Internet enables us to reach as much information as possible, which as a result, might remind us the dark side of the real world. I have seen many hatred posts on Twitter. I hope my smiley faces post can make the audience’s life a bit easier, even just for a second. I believe this is the power of digital publishing: expressing positive energy quickly and world-widely.
Last reason why I post on WordPress is that internet is an open community and I want to find like-minded friends. Bartoletti (2011) has pointed it out that digital memories can be built in a more engaged way. If people can comment with more smiley faces, it will be a shared memory and of course, shared fun. It will not be so hard because I can find smiley faces almost everywhere in life. For example, I found one in rubbish dump, outside a bar, in a church, even when I was taking snacks. It is a common emotion and I believe there will be a lot of participators. The biggest challenge for now is to get the post recognized and stand out among an enormous amount of information online. It is an interesting question and I will keep exploring.
Smiley face in garbage dump
Smiley face outside a bar
Smiley face in a church
Smiley face snacks
Reference:
Birkner, T., and André D. (2018) Collective Memory and Social Media: Fostering a New Historical Consciousness in the Digital Age?. Memory Studies, Jan. 2018, doi:10.1177/1750698017750012.
Bartoletti, R. (2011) Memory and Social Media: New Forms of Remembering and Forgetting, in Pirani, M. (eds) Learning from Memory: Body, Memory and Technology in a Globalizing World. Cambridge Scholars Publishing: 82-111.
Pentzold, C. and Sommer, V. (2011) Digital networked media and social memory. Theoretical foundations and implications. [online] Available at: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/2a83/47cdb640932132812faacc3081f1bcf21131.pdf. Accessed 27, Aug, 2019.
GJY 