release paralysis

brainstorming ideas of the performance.. shall i call it 'witnessing' (perhaps too convinient a word?)

main words
- witness
- ship - the middle passage
- pain
- outsiders insiders, divided by generations
- audience participation
- performance
- visual arts
- ritual

we are witnessing
how to let people witness
performing to remember, performing to witness
eyes... watching, ears... listening
how are we effected? -memory -trauma
hardship that leads to surviving and thriving

we are all witnesses of something in history.

storytelling.. what did you witness?

(quotes of people's testimony. what can i do with them?)

what are you to do after you've witnessed? what can you do?

the clueless witness

two saturdays ago i blurted out in a class discussion that i have absolutely no feelings whatsoever over the abolishment of the slave trade 200 years ago. being a singaporean and chinese i felt like an absolute outsider of this political/social/historical bad blood between the white and black people. the issue has become so much more about the two races than any other equally important subjects like the european colonalization, oppression, eurocentricism, human rights etc.. that even if i could relate to any one or all of the other subjects, i couldn't break through the first wall of defence, that of the feud between the blacks and the whites.

and without the emotional drive i cannot bring myself to prepare a heartfelt performance to commemorate the historical event which the rest of my class have been so enthusiastic about for our assignment. it just doesn't seem to concern me and xiao (yes, this is a name), the other chinese girl in our class. we felt emotionally disconnected. of course everyone else in the class was either black or white (with the acception of the canadian indian guy ali),or from north america or the carribean and had lots to talk about and to get 'connected' with. me and xiao, we only felt connected to each other.

so prof honor wanted us to read this article about witnessing. after reading it i thought this would be my best bet to draw out some inspiration for the performance. after all it is addressing my position as a witness. this entry would be my exploration of that inspiration. gave myself a deadline by monday to draw out a proposal.

Julie Salverson's very ineresting article 'witnessing subjects' - main points
- witnessing is 'the notion of coming upon something unexpected and being impacted by the encounter such that one is comelled to respond to the address.
- to become a witness is to become exposed and vulterable.
- is to respond to a call of the other.- ethical (but what if there is no call?)
- the idea of a quick-fix mentality reduces the other to become a tragic victim. artists may eroticized the pain in their representation in mimesis- a very reducting way.

- witness should not restrict herself to perceive strength and resilience in survivor and the possible vulnerbility or damage in oneself as a lister to stories of violence.
-witnesses as being paralyzed
-how to include witness's own relationship to violence in the transaction of witnessing. for the victim sake to trust the witness and for the witness's sake to address his violence.

on reading about resistance in sg

after reading 'mediating the liberalisation of singapore theatre; towards a bourdieusian analysis', i am blown away just because i have never read a piece about resistance in sg described in such a powerful academic way. framed with bourdieu's concepts some more and have examples! ok. good for me because easy for me to understand. 3 theorists i wanna read about after this: bourdieu, brecht and gramci. (i'm sure i've read them all before but i can't remember what brecht is about accept for him being connected to the 6 penny opera or something) t chong rocks!! definitely rocked my world today.

perhaps its because i never expected to read something like that. some articles i've read so far (which isn't many actually) seem too impersonal, maybe not a very good word, distant, apathic? there may be some criticism of the state but on the whole they are about the movements of the bigger things by the power that be, so much so that i feel that they lack a discussion of the micro levels- ie the communities and the people. globalization yes, u can talk about how the whole world moves, but we shouldn't forget about the individuals, the communities that live within it and the effects and the efforts that they've put in it. understandably its probably not feasible to write about the micro and the macro all in one paper. but why issit that almost every article i pick up on sg globalization and art (in fact i can't find many art articles if they are not bound to globalization - prob york don't have many journals on critical asian art and culture) sounded like we are just small little unnoticeable flies that will have no effect what so ever on the bigger politics of the world? that the world is moved by all the big names, the government, the state, the big corporations, the big guys with the money, that u the reader, the small fly have nothing in your power to change a thing in it and can only see the story unfold before your eyes with your hands tied, no more like you have no hands or deformed ones that can't do anything.

maybe there's something between the lines that i couldn't catch. in any case, i wished there were more case studies and examples on what the little people did in the age of globalization.

but anyway the thought of active practice of (non-confrontational) resistance by your middle class citizens existing in sg is an exciting and strangely comforting thought to me. because i've always wondered how and why there are no news or knowledge of such things happening. accept for mr brown n his supporters on the internet, how come no one else talked about other communities of resistance?

so what i'm thinking about right now..
all this about resisting the state and liberalising our voices and all that.. first of all i've to be careful not to create a dichotomy between state and civil society. because that can easily lead me to disillusionize the state as the one and only people's 'enemy' frame of mind. that doesn't make a lot of sense seeing that the state is also keeping the society together. plus there are multiple communities in the society we all have to live with, not only the state. we aren't homogeneous. the public will also have clashes in views. like religious views. thus the idea of liberalization as something only the state can give the people is somewhat inaccurate. cause we are also bound by our religion, gender... principles, frame of mind? ..

second point. and i can't help questioning this: is liberalization (and human rights) all there is to it??
this one i don't know how to answer. but i have a feeling it isn't. it is important yes, but...
perhaps what i am thinking of is that, if the people resist and disent against the state, what grounds would that be on, towards what kinda goals? if its just for the sake of being liberalised- of gaining freedom, that still leaves alot of problems unsolved. but if to be liberalised gives the people a chance to express and speak about other concerns, of working towards something beyond freedom of the individual.. of something else.. i dun even know what. i have this idea of a common good and it sounds socialist but then more of like- is it possible that everyone can work to be equals with no leaders? sounds easy to say but almost impossible to realise. and anyway, how do u make everyone understand things on the same page?

thus i've been thinking about this resistance thing. base on what reasons should we resist on? education? awareness? common good? (but then what is the common good?) i'm tempted to put in sprituality but i don't know how to connect that. inner peace? how do u resist for inner peace?

ok. that's probably going to be my project.

some thoughts about my POS

yesterday's meeting with the pop ed class people was really refreshing. talked about alot of stuff and i've ideas swimming round my head now.

some conversations i had with denise brought me back to thinking about my interests in love and compassion and what to make of life.

niko and i had a common interest in interactive work with the public. his ideas came from the diggers - giving things out for free and instigate some kinda revolution. my ideas came from art practices i remembered reading and wanting to do them in my 3rd yr undergrad. n we talk about the possibility of working on our final projects together on something like this.

so now comes the question: what am i going to do for my final project. and how am i going to change my POS? (deadline next tuesday. am going to meet honor to talk about it.)

some of my thoughts:
- trying to change my POS to something more meleable. maybe my final project will not be about singapore. but a reflection? a reflection plus a project work.
- the idea of spirituality? can i put spirituality into art, into thinking about politics, into education, into changing the society?
- i think maybe i can leave my POS the way it is. the final project will just be a different thing. a reflection.

i think sometimes this studying of singapore is a little bit forced on myself. because i've found that it is really restrictive and it kinda stopped me from being creative. perhaps i need to add in some art or practical component. perhaps i should just follow what i really want to study. - love and compassion in spirituality and art - interactive, conceptual art. art that can be also not art. depending on how u see it. but which is interactive and hopefully beneficial to the people who come across it. possibly like what the diggers would do..

in terms of singapore, how would that connect?
what i've learned about singapore.
- globalization in sg.
- activism.. somewhat.
- art and theatre. and the dessent coming from these practitioners.
- civil society
- how community-based art is used n worked in sg (just a little0

how can this be connected to spirituality and art?
art and doing things.. hmmm..
thinking of it. alot of artists are activists.. kind of.

i dunno man. gotta let it sink abit.

devising my plan

underlines from my 'plan of study' abstract

strategies of resistance (transnational civil society --- contest citizenship? --- relate to identity? --- a diff kind of individualism that is of obligation to others?)
highly politically controlled environment
investigate the internalized costs of this environment
explore the strategies of resistance to it through art making and popular education

notes i wrote at the end
to investigate the internalized costs of a highly politically controlled environment (with effects from globalization)
-- should i investigate resistance- or would better word be dissent?
there is dessent (or is there?) because.... globalization also? transnational citizenship and activism?
can this be seen in cultural expression?? (blog, film, plays, performances, art, what other expressions?)

*******
themes.. topics

how do people identify themselves, see themselves and their lives in this globalized and transnational, politically controled environment. how do they produce their identity or what kind of identity have they produced?

what are people doing to make things better (or to change things). what can be done to make things better (or to change things). -- not necessarily that things are bad and needs to become better, but what are the actions that have been done or are being acted out?
how do they express themselves.
resistance, dissent, cultural expressions, social services, activism, education and awareness etc

possibility of pop ed and community arts-- in the form of workshops in non-profit organizations.

so do i want to look at how people express themselves of their identities

who campaigns?

what i was thinking about this morning.

thinking in terms of campaigns.. (maybe can substitute it with other words?)

what kind of campaigns (can be awareness, charity, persuasive) are there in singapore? (let's think of campaigns that reach a significant amount of people)
- local activist
- transnational activist
- the government

correct me if i'm wrong, are there more government campaigns than other campaigns? or are government campaigns more 'national' hence more people know about them and so it seems that campaigns in singapore are governmental. or maybe the combination of both.
speak chinese campaign,
courtesy campaign
romancing singapore
no smoking campaign
art outreach (not really a campaign but an educational organization with programs to teach art appreciation to the public. because we dunno how to appreciate art enough?)
nkf show?

the other campaigns that i can think of, are transnational.
breast cancer, women awareness, action for aids, landmines, LGBT awareness (got anot? i think not.. not sure)

are there any local campaigns?
the free hug campaign? hmm
is it possible for local campaigns to happen? or it is a once in a blue moon thing? is the group who want to save chek jawa a local activist campaign or is it a transnational one (since it is environmentalist)?

perhaps the 3 categories can be blurred into each other's boundaries.
government campaigns can also be a transnational one and vice versa, transnational campaigns can also be local ones and vice versa?

(just thought of another type of campaign, the transnational corporations)

i was just thinking about how all these work in sg. it seems to me you are either with the government or the transnational society if u want anything at all to happen. so maybe the local activists are also part of the transnational activists. since we all know english and is easier to communicate. (partly a joke)

hmmm...
is everything either governmental or transnational with spurts of ad hoc local activism?

this is what i think so far,
if there is a need for campaigns or awareness or anything like that (in sg), they most effectively work top down. ie the government directs it because they feel that there is a need of something in the society. in these cases they are not really what the people realized and thought that they needed themselves, that they could change themselves.
its difficult to look for any activism in local independent organizations. (if there are, it is spontaneous and ad hoc and they disperse right after.) if there are action needed to make the society 'better' or more 'aware', it seems to be mostly the job of the government who does this nationally.

on the other hand activism in sg seems to be under the umbrella of transnational activism. some sort of outside in. campaigns that are not governmental are most effective if they are connected to a transnational organization or corporation. and this could be attributed to the need for the state to maintain a 'global reputation'.
if transnational campaigns are outside in, then does that mean that the local activist are just hitching a ride to wherever these transnational organizations want to go?
or maybe it benefits both ways??

why am i thinking about this?
because i realised why community art or popular education is so unpopular in singapore. not just because nobody knows what those terms mean. i mean why i think that they will be hard to practice in singapore. or why there almost non being practiced right now.

1st i realised that community art has a different meaning in sg. was looking up the national art council website. community art is being organized by the art council, ie government.
for them, community art is to make art available for the community to appreciate. art is understood still in the sense that it is elite and 'high class' and only people who are 'talented' can make them. the art council is promoting art awareness. how to and why appreciate art.

but the community art that i learn here is different. it is about making art with the community, about letting the community express themselves and learn with and from each other. art is not thought of as a something that only 'talented' people can make, nor that only the final product is useful (as a form of analysis and decoration). in community art, the process of making art is also very important. everyone can be an 'artist' and learn from being artists together.

as i was thinking about this difference, it struck me that in a way, sg the country of people is a huge community in one. a community that changes when it is told that it is time to change. it is made to move in this huge body. instead of transforming internally part by part, it transforms externally as a whole. whether the community actually did transform wholly as it was told to, i dunno (since it only changed externally, not internally. how can u change as and when u want when u don't really understand why u r changing?)
but that's how i think the system works. (unlike here, where change is done in pockets, i think)

so what i am pondering over is, can campaigns and raising awareness.. change.. can it be born locally, bottom up?

maybe the system of governance is such that it is difficult for that? to make change we have to do it in indirect ways? through the transnational way?

on the other hand, are we effected/influenced by transnational thoughts and ideas?

1st post

i've originally decided to use this blog for grievances. but not today. i need to sort out my frustration on what the hell i'm gonna research on.
argh! how.

my confusion.
on one end, i have pop ed, community art, oppression, activism, creative expression, art and all things art, facilitation activities, organization. etc
on the other end, i have globalization, development, politics, economy, dessent, asian studies, singapore modernity, very academia and no hands on.

the more i study about the globalization part, the more distracted from pop ed i got. i thought globalization is the key to pop ed. ie because of globalization and all the bad stuff that development brought, sg needs pop ed activists for something 'revolutionary'. (whoa.. ) but it seems that it has instead disproved my hypothesis, i think.

what i saw was that sg takes on development and democracy in a different way, a more authoritarian way. the states take charge of the market and the economy to build up the country's economy status. it uses the same passion for many other areas of governing the country.

when i was looking for some organization in sg that i can go to for an internship, i googled community arts in singapore and i realised that it has a different meaning and it is in a different sphere altogether. community arts is government sponsored and encouraged. it isn't organized by the people nor is it grassroots. it is top down, not bottom up. its like a huge collective thing, like a campaign for art awareness. there is community participation but without the personal politics. it seems somehow that community arts is country development, not personal development. and i begin to realise the many other collective activities and campaigns that are initiated by the government too.

so if all these are already initiated by the government to be not political, can the grassroots bring it up as political? or can it not?

what should i research on? should i just focus on the development of singapore? the effects of globalization. and the dessent in sg?