User:FLEM/Week 04

Minister of Animals and Plants by flem carmen and grgr

brainstorming

https://pad.xpub.nl/p/carmemgrgr_FOUR

taking a famous pop song score and playing it in XILOPHONE melody sounds whatsapp voice memos rap battle with what's the best form of animal democracy

THE CHOSEN ONE: the representatives of plants and animals in the parliament plants or animals (listing of things, animal and plants extinction or in danger

TO DO: >>>us reading conference texts with distorted voices >>>play plants song with piano and xilo <<<animals/plants to go extinction >>> selection of contents in the soupboat folder

similar info, announcement

Mixture of videos from the internet about animals

>>to write down the documentation that in the pad they described as: why this seat is occupied by that subject

<<Then upload the mp3s with the right names in the soupboat

Maybe a general description of the choice but can go with the documentation

https://www.rd.com/list/animals-ran-political-office/ https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/center/articles/2012/mother-nature-network-11-04-2012.html

MINISTRY OF PLANTS&ANIMALS - INTERNAL AFFAIRS

The idea is to represent animals and plants inside the parliament. Animals and plants are categorised as of minor importance according to the Hierarchy given in the text:

from Animacies: Humans: adult > nonadult; male/MASC gender > female/FEM gender; free > enslaved; able-bodied > disabled; linguistically intact > prelinguistic/linguistically impaired; familiar (kin/named) > unfamiliar (nonkin/unnamed); proximate (1p & 2p pronouns) > remote (3p pronouns). Animals: higher/larger animals > lower/smaller animals > insects; whole animal > body part; Inanimates: motile/active > nonmotile/nonactive; natural > manmade; count > mass; Incorporeals: abstract concepts, natural forces, states of affairs, states of being, emotions, qualities, activities, events, time periods, institutions, re�gions, diverse intellectual objects.

Parliaments are usually a place where everything should be represented, according to the ideal of democracy. Unfortunately, animals and plants are not able to talk for themselves so human representatives are usually present in parliaments, but most of the time human's needs overcome animals and plants ones. This time, we would like to give them a voice, both raising real issues but also literally giving them their own voice, their own chance to be present in the space. Therefore, some pieces will discuss well-known issues related to extinction and climate change, some others will simply express the sound of animals through a popular and mainstream lens.

We decided to give voice to the plants and animals in danger of extinction, and thought about if they could speak how would they do it. That's why we distorted our voices, changing the pitch and speed. And made short jingles and interludes that would work on this style.

THE SEATS (documentation)

The Cat - purring - the voice of a cat - [1]

The Musical Kittens - Cory Arcangel collection of cats playing the piano - [2]

Cicadas - noises - typical sound of the nature that people can hear everywhere when the temperature is mild [3]

Mr Broccoli - Piers and Susanna's Awkward Interview With Climate Change Activist Mr Broccoli - climage change personification of a piece of broccoli that wants to move to a plant-food system - [4]

The Lion King - The Lion King Circle of Life played at the Musical Awards Gala 2018 - popular well-known song played in a mainstream event talking about the Circle of Life, important topic for animals [5]

Peppa Pig - Peppa Pig Learns Healthy Habits - Peppa Pig taking about vegetables - an animal talking about plants, what else? - [6]

Minister of Animals and Plants - Animals Species made extinct by human activities - list of 116 species in extinction - the speed of the piece has been edited because the list is long and needs to be underlined - [recorded audio - text from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Species_made_extinct_by_human_activities]

The Boxer Dog - singing Hallelujah - how dogs interact with human's means [to be seated next to species minister] - [7]

jingles ?

TASK

https://pad.xpub.nl/p/SI18_four

What does it mean? The format of this week's release will be a jingle board arranged in the layout of a parliament! You will not make one audio file but several short audio snippets. Each of your contribution will be voiced from a seat in the parliament (literally each seat will be a button that plays your excerpt). The audio snippets can contain pop-cultural references of your choice (but don't feel restricted if you have another idea for short audio snippets). That means there will be no linear or predefined outcome or result but that the listener can press the buttons (seats of parliament) themselves and let the buttons talk to each other. There will be a live performance with all the entities that participate into our jingle-board parliament.

Definition:

   Popular culture (also called mass culture or pop culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of the practices, beliefs, and objects that are dominant or prevalent in a society at a given point in time. Popular culture also encompasses the activities and feelings produced as a result of interaction with these dominant objects. The primary driving force behind popular culture is mass appeal, and it is produced by what cultural analyst Theodor Adorno refers to as the "culture industry". (Wikipedia)

So pop cultural references can be almost everything! But in the times of internet, we could maybe phrase it as everything that has the potential to go viral (has mass appeal). You can find pop cultural references in memes, videos, branding, print media, radio, movies, or basically in any kind of media. They can refer to politics, celebrity culture, internet humour, (generational) behaviour, etc. - yeah, you know it! If you don't want to just collect snippets from already existing footage, feel free to make your own audio tracks that maybe reflect on pup cultural phenomenons, that re-enact pop cultural references, create fictional references (or whatever you'd like to hear in this special parliament.

Examples: |Lady Gaga, "Fantastic, brilliant,...": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBk0P27QGmc |Theresa May dancing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbCDFNRA-Wo&ab_channel=GuardianNews |The office, "NO GOD! PLEASE NO!": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydIvE3ahPCg&ab_channel=StanSmith |Britney Spears, Toxic remake: https://youtube.com/shorts/5DvhCAExk-c?feature=share

Mountain attaining same legal rights as a human person https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/22/new-zealand-gives-mount-taranaki-same-legal-rights-as-a-person

You can re-use found-footage from the internet/tv/radio (interesting option that nobody used so far) or make your own audio snippets that you find fitting. E

We'd still suggest you to think about implicancies, though, starting from these questions: what does it mean to publish something into a parliament-like interface? what kind of animacies have a more dominant voice in public sphere? how to underline that?

what does it mean to voice different human and non-human persons inside a parliament? what if what is represented inside would be substituted by what is not represented outside? How does the popular/informal influence the technical/formal?