Lecture 2 - Existentialism

We start lecture 2 of the last semester of HCJ with our old friend Nietzsche. We open with the well known phrase of his “God is Dead”, meaning that God as a whole didn’t ever have any existence. He believed that if there was no God, there is no need for morality, more importantly no meaning for morality. Nietzsche says that this allows us to have freedom to decide for ourselves with our own personal values. The open sea is a metaphor that is commonly used to show this belief system of Nietzsche’s. This whole system of thinking, we were told soon after, was known as the End of Certainty. Nietzsche felt that this was the chance for mankind to be free. He believed that freedom allowed us to find our true selves. This is where his phrase “the over-man” or the German translation “the übermensch” comes from. The over-man defines himself and his place in the world with the decisions he makes of his own free will; “one is not born a woman, but becomes one”.

 Heidegger is the next philosopher on this histories check list that shall be covered. He wrote the famous book Being and Time was about what it meant for a person to exist. In this book he concludes all beings have a Dasein, a creature of ‘presence’ that lives in each and every one of us.  “This entity which each of us is himself . . .  we shall denote by the term Dasein.” (Heidegger, Being and Time). This idea of Dasein can also be read in the sense that a person only exist from the time they are born until the moment they die. He believed that we were stuck in our own minds, when applied to an individual; this can make everything impossible to understand for we can never be fully understanding of what is happening to us. He also believed that being part of this world is not spatial; he believed that rather than being ‘in’ the world and being just ‘there’, we are engaged with it. The world needs to exist for us to exist. We are defined by our engagement and involvement in the world and when we are asked to describe ourselves we do not speak about our true selves only the social aspects of our selves. This way of thinking is an exact opposite of Descartes famous words “I think therefore I am”.

In an existentialists view there is no such thing as a blank slate, instead there ‘facticity’, something that will define you on your development through life. For example; where you are born can affect accent and lifestyle, how wealthy your family are also determines these aspects. This is known as ‘Moral Luck’. Existentialists also see the future as the most important dimension, as it gives us the opportunity for possibility. There is an obviously link between this way of thinking and Heidegger’s theory. This link is transcendence. Transcendence is my reaction to my very own facticity. It relates to how define ourselves through the use of reactions from facts we’ve learned that we had no control over.

Jean- Paul Sartre also had a very valid opinion on this movement of learning who we are and our place in the world. The main idea of Jean-Paul Sartre is that we are, as humans, "condemned to be free." He believed that humans cannot escape choice. Everybody has to make choices in order to progress with their lives but you can however hide away from it. However, Sartre believed that this could also be a bad thing as a person should not follow society; they should be their own individual. Each person should take responsibility for their own actions and not place the blame on anybody else or lie to escape punishment.  A main point from Sartre that is appropriate to end on as it something i truly agree with is we are allowed to escape our past, and every person has the right to be able to do so. Every person that uses their past as an excuse should however be exempt from this as there is no excuse. 

The Battle of Algiers

The viewing for this lecture was the war film The Battle of Algiers. Before the screening of the film we were told that this film in particular was a “handbook/guide” for all wanna-be terrorists. So it sounded delightful from the off. This film, released in 1966 is a war film based on the Algerian War, between 1954–62, against The French Government in North Africa. The film highlights both the French troops and Algerians using every form of violence they could think of in order to kill the other including makeshift bombs and walk by shootings and suicide acts. One in particular that stuck in my mind was a makeshift bomb placed in a woman’s handbag; she then leaves the bag in a cafe full of people. I think you can guess the rest and probably predict how the film pans out.

Lecture 1 – Film and Network – Is technology changing due to social status or is it the other way around?

The first lecture of Semester 2, the last semester I must add in which we do HCJ *sad face*, we were introduced, well informed more about, to the changes that the introduction of television and film had on journalism and how it has helped it develop into what we know it as today.

As we learnt from previous lectures, Newspapers began with the Gutenberg Press. It’s safe to say that with the help of advances in technology, printing of documentation is a lot easier than it used to be when the Gutenberg pressing system was the only method of printing. The basic layout of newspapers; Big Bold Title, possible headlining picture, catchy by line etc, have all stayed pretty similar to how they were in the 1950’s. 

As you can see from these pictures not a lot has changed. But one thing I have learned from reading the tabloid newspapers that when a story is particularly serious, or “juicy gossip” in most cases from The Sun, the headline takes up a lot of, if not all like in the above picture, of the front page. These papers as we’ve learned previously were conceived from the American-Style ‘Picture Papers’. These picture papers were the nearest thing to television in the 1930’s, before it was invented; they were the people’s way of seeing the world. Following the end of the Second World War there was a huge baby boom in England and by the late 50’s and 60’s this generation of youngsters were in their teenage years. Britain during the 50’s and 60’s was very affluent with full employment across the country and the introduction of the welfare state meant that every citizen was entitled to free healthcare and education.. This however wasn't the biggest point of impact however was in the introduction of Television.

A huge impact on the sales of Newspapers was at the height of the ‘Baby Boom’. But when television was broadcast in 1958 the ‘Baby Boomer Parents’ would be in there late thirty’s/early forty’s, making them a loyal audience to the Newspaper but The Mirror, the biggest paper at the time, didn’t think about the Boomers themselves, they were in their teens and television was a very attractive concept to them. And why wouldn’t it be attractive to them, it carried programming like Coronation Street, they are very appealing to teens, well, the ridiculous ones.ITV also brought a new technique that hadn’t been previously explored, ITV contained advertisement breaks which allowed companies to advertise their products to the younger generation who had disposable income, unlike their parents who suffered the hardships of the war. This allowed advertisers who had previously only been able to advertise to a newspaper audience to reach out to a wider target audience on the small screen. Also because of television, particularly the political side of it, caused the journey of the enlightenment to come to an end. 

Rupert Murdoch, as we know is one of the most well known tycoon of the 20^th and the 21^st century, began his British newspaper empire in the late 1960’s when he bought The Sun and The Mirror in an attempt to persuade young people to stop watching television and pick up a newspaper. He re-launched The Sun as a modern newspaper for the younger generation by including a free pop out magazine containing gossip, horoscopes and the sports results. This became a major part of the newspaper and magazines were also included inside the newspaper. Unfortunately, as we saw not long ago in the news, The Daily Mail was closed down due to the phone hacking scandal and became a Sunday Only newspaper. But during its time, sales of the newspaper increased and so did Murdoch’s empire. Currently, he is the owner of News Corporation and Twentieth Century Fox Broadcast Company. 

Seminar Paper - Week 4 - Sartre on Franz Fanon and The Battle of Algiers

A bit about Jean Paul Sartre (1961)

Before I talk about Sartre’s writing “Preface to Frantz Fanon’s ‘Wretched of the Earth’”, I felt it was necessary to introduce the man that wrote it in the first place. Sartre was a French Existentialist born in the early 1900’s. He is considered one of the most influential thinkers and writers of the 20^th Century. His ideas focussed around human experience and consciousness. 

http://people.brandeis.edu/~teuber/sartrebio.html

Now; the chapter itself “Wretched of the Earth”

The article itself I found a little difficult to read through all the way without re-reading what I’d just read, to ensure that I understood what on earth I was reading. I’m still pretty certain I have no idea what the hell it’s about but I will do my best to describe what I think I understood from it.

This chapter is the preface to Frantz Fanon’s “Wretched of the Earth”. In short, it discusses violence as a means of liberation, just like the film The Battle of Algiers, which I found a little unbearable to watch. I found it hard to believe that people truly believe that violence is the way to make people listen. In the film, given, this tactic worked but I really fail to see how sacrificing so many lives, for a cause, is worth it. But then, perhaps I’m just extremely naive.

Back to the article; the article opens with a brief history of ‘the Earth’. It explains that ‘at the beginning’ there were two separate groups, the Five Million Men (who I can only assume we should class as ‘French or White people’ with some ‘education’) and the other One Thousand Five Hundred Million Natives (the tribal people from cultures that we would consider unusual). The first group, Sartre calls ‘men’ and the second group he calls ‘Natives’. He goes on to explain that the Men took a select few of Natives and, how shall I put it, dressed them up and taught them “the correct ways”. As we know through many years of development and research that these people classed as Natives are people the same as you and I, they just have a lifestyle different to ours. One in which they don’t need material things like technology and fashion because it disrupts their ancestral way of living. Our Western ways were pushed onto these people and fellow westerners were amazed that these Natives were able to interact in our Western Way. However, teaching the Natives only made the Native’s rebel and realise the way they were being treated was racist. 

“You are making us into monstrosities; your humanism claims we are at one with the rest of Humanity but your racist methods set us apart.”

The Men’s idea to make the native more Western in order to make them ‘better people’ ultimately failed in that it made them miserable and unhappy. Even though the Natives were in this misery, the Men continued to believe it was the right thing to educate them and leave them in their disconsolate state.

In the following paragraphs Sartre explains that Fanon, in the book he is writing the preface, says that Europe is doomed and is plummeting into a dark abyss and because she is falling at such a pace there is no stopping it. He does however claim that miracles have been known to happen. I don’t know if this is a racist attack upon the natives that Men chose to educate or just an observation that Fanon seems to believe is true.

“the Third World finds itself and speaks to itself through his voice”

This quote from the pre-face, enhanced by the previous reading from the chapter, makes me think that the Western Men are putting beliefs and words into the mouths of the Natives and are perhaps forcing them to believe that this is the right way to think and giving them a fake independence to live by. This links to the Marxist idea of the Bourgeoisie. By separating the Natives in the first place, and only educating the select few, they created a Native Bourgeoisie. This is where the film and the chapter co-inside, Fanon states that in order for the Natives to get their way of life back, they must fight against the Western man, this means they must first fight against themselves.

“The rebel’s weapon is the proof of his humanity”

Sartre explains that in the book Fanon says that the Natives will revolt as they are unhappy that their colonial way of living has been disrupted by people ‘trying to help’. He says that in the first few days of this revolt you must kill. “to shoot down a European is to kill two birds with one stone, to destroy an oppressor and the man he oppresses at the same time”

Once a rebel has done, Sartre says he will feel like a free man. He will, however at the same time, be a dead man walking. 

Towards the end, and I think this is probably a good point for me to also finish, Sartre explains that us, the Western Community are the ones who travelled to far off countries to find resources that we don’t have in Europe. Because we were the first to find Gold and Metals we have been blessed with riches that our ancestors never thought we would have. These riches have given us something that Sartre describes a Human Status. This human status has made us feel superior compared to those in third world countries, it has allowed our travelling ancestors to exploit the land and the people of the third world. This is what Fanon calls narcissism – a self love or self obsession. And i rightly agree. If you look at Britain today, everyone is obsessed with the idea of being rich in order to treat themselves beyond their wildest dreams and being better than their neighbour. To finish I would like to end on the point that i am greatly glad that racism and the idea of being better than someone is almost over. I know that we will never get over the prejudices that people have against certain cultures. I'm just greatly glad that good people don’t want to change how people think, they just accept that they are different and so are we all.