Tag: essay

The library of odd things: A home for obsolete media, and rare finds: part five: Who decides what a library should be

~ SamRandom ~ Leave a comment

Introduction

The question of who gets to decide what a library should and should not be is deeply ingrained to what I aim to discuss in this series. There are several forces that need to be taken into account for this discussion, specifically librarians, patrons and policy makers. Each group has their own biases, needs and wants as well as underlying information when it comes to their news on the libraries collection. This chapter will break down how each group’s interests collide as well as contradict the creation of the library of odd things.

The patrons

The users and visitors of libraries are known as patrons when speaking in library terms. Patrons are individuals that use one or all of the services that are available in public libraries. Patrons have many needs and uses related to the library. Many patrons wish to borrow some form of media or read them at the library. Some patrons also come to the library to use printers, scanners and computers that are available at the library, as well as access to free internet access.

Many patrons already know what they want well before they enter the library, when they do not they often refer to the librarian on duty, regarding tips on fiction or nonfiction media. The answers they are given  are once again limited to the librarian’s skill and interest in that specific area. Sadly, it has been my experience that the Swedish librarians do not get enough time or resources to be as good of a source for this sort of help that I and many patrons would have liked. 

When the knowledge exists it is mostly the thanks of the specific librarian putting down their own time and energy to learn these things. This lack of knowledge infrastructure is one of many problems that needs to be solved if the Library of Odd things is to work as proposed.

With this said, many patrons already know what they want, and simply wish to be pointed in the right direction of where it is located. It is naturally in most patrons’ interest that the things that they are after are as close at hand as possible, something that might lead to less used or known texts getting pushed to the background.

This need for what they know they want is balanced by the patrons’ needs and wishes for novelty and new experiences, as well as the fact that the patron may not always know best what they need or want.

The patron also expects that the text that they want is also available to them as soon as possible. And here we find the first conflict of interest, both with other patrons and with the library staff. Due to the fact that the library has both limited budgets and space, is it impossible to make everyone happy, and often texts that are more often requested or are well known get preferential treatment to the texts that do not.

While it would be easy to fill a library with nothing but the latest top sellers, does this work against the library’s goals of education, democracy and the need for everyone to be able to find what they need in the library’s collection. This is a problem I have gone deeper into in earlier chapters.

The librarians

The role of the library is at the core of what this series of essays wish to explore, likewise are the role of the librarian at the core of what I wish to discuss. What should a librarian be, guides, guardians, curators?

The guide

In the role of the guide we are meant to lead the patrons to new experiences, new texts and new forms of knowledge. This role would fit particularly well in the library of odd things, as it would mean that the patrons would be able to get the most out of the library’s eclectic collections.

This approach would need a much larger amount of time and resource to be allocated to the education and training of these librarians, as well as the possible need to hire more librarians in order to be able to amicably cover all areas of the library to a satisfactory level.

The biggest downside of this approach, or way of looking at library work is that it takes up a lot of time for the institution as well as being costly to maintain. Furthermore can this hands on approach seem off putting to a fair few patrons who just want to get their books and leave.

The guardian

The primary role of the guardian is to safeguard the library and its collection, this has been a role that has been emphasized for much of the library’s existence, especially before the notion of a public library became widely implemented.

There will, as long as we live in a capitalist system of scarcity, always need to be some form of enforcers, guards and collectors of materials and protectors against damage. As the general social climate gets more and more brutal, and more and more social expectations and work is put on less and less resources, will the libraries find themselves exponentially more under stress by various aggressive and dangerous forces.

It would be an easy solution to lock down the libraries as much as possible, to add guards and remove as much freedom as possible from the patrons. This would undoubtedly go against all that the public library as well as the library of odd things wishes to accomplish.

While it is vital that the librarians and patrons feel safe at the library, and that the collection and building is kept in good shape, it is not in my opinion the primary responsibility for librarians to make sure that this happens.

The curator

Another large and important part of the library profession is the work of the curator. Curating collections are vital when they are limited by space and budgetary constraints. Decisions must be made about what should be kept, and what needs to be thrown away, as well as what new materials will proquired.

As I have mentioned before, more or less all space being used in most Swedish public libraries, and as a result is the only way that a new text will enter circulation, is if another one takes its place. These decisions, while made with oversight of rules, regulations and guidelines are ultimately at the hands of the librarians, it is up to them to make the final dissection of keeping or discarding a text. The direction making is made partly by their own knowledge and intuition as well as with the help of policy documents created by library leadership and management.

Furthermore does the ability to fulfill this part of the job come from the same skill set and interest that makes a librarian a good guide. The librarian needs interest and knowledge to be able to properly curate and take care of a collection, they also need time and resources to carry out this work properly. This will be extra important in my proposed Library of odd things, as these collections will inevitably contain both rare and often technologically obsolete texts that require extra time and attention to look after.

While I have chosen to split up the roles of a librarian into disparate parts, and to some degree pitted them against each other, it is the truth that every librarian is all of these roles, and more, often at the same time. How much time, energy and resources that a librarian can spend on each role is very much linked to the libraries organization and guidelines, as well as the policymakers that write them.

Policymakers

The ultimate power of the future and shape of the public libraries lay in the elected officials and governing bodies that control and oversee the libraries. In Sweden are libraries ruled by counties, and as a result are given widely different structures, budgets and assigned goals. There is for example no set rule for what department should take care of the county’s libraries. These can range from education and culture, to tourism and sports and recreation. The department that the library lands under often strongly dictates what form of starting position the library has when it comes to arguing for their budget.

Just as with the problem of adding new books to a collection, is there often a problem with adding new programs or increasing budgets for programs on a county level, often is the entire budget spoken for, and it is a question of taking from one department and adding to another. These arrangements are of course not set in stone, and can change as the local political landscapes shift and transform.

As a result it is often that there exists a somewhat antagonistic relationship between those that need the money, and those that make the budgets. As there is always a limited amount of resources to go around, does it mean that someone will have to work with less than they hoped.

The allotted budget for a library is the most clear and direct way that policymakers can be seen to make a difference for a public library. The budget directly dictates how much space the library has to its disposal, how many librarians can be employed and how many new texts can be bought in.

As mentioned before, can policy makers also make decisions on what can and should be in public libraries, though this is a much more controversial point of their power. Ideally are the actions of the policymakers, that are directly or indirectly elected by the general public through elections, following the wishes of said public. This public also involves the patrons of the library, this group might indeed take the library in account when voting for a local election.

Conclusions

To finish up this chapter I will quickly break down how the decision process of what will turn up in a library looks like. The patrons may choose to ask for a text to be added to the collection, as well as ask for a book to be removed in some rare cases. Patrons can also indirectly steer the role of the library by voting on officials that share their views on the library question.

Elected officials then decide the budget, policies and guidelines of the library, and in doing so create the framework that the library works within. The librarian and chief librarian then take both of these facets into account when making decisions regarding, staffing, curation, programming and other decisions within the library itself. This is ofcourse a simplification of a very complex system but one that I hope helps contextualize what I aim to discuss with this series as a whole. 

This leads me on to the topic of the next chapter, why any of this matters, and why I chose to start this series in the first place.

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The library of odd things: A home for obsolete media, and rare finds: part three: Known and unknown needs

~ SamRandom ~ Leave a comment

Introduction

This text is the third installment in a series of essays discussing a hypothetical new form of public library, the Library of odd things. This form of library focuses on providing new, old and novel experiences to their patrons, unbound by the need to show usefulness or to cater to statistics and loan numbers. This library is primarily meant to work as a thought experiment and present the readers with new ways to look at media curation and preservation.

In this chapter I will discuss two driving forces when it comes to acquiring new materials for a library, I will label them as wants and needs. What we balance and look at these terms, and how they are applied to collections will shape how our hypothetical library of odd things will take form. This text will discuss what a patron knows they want and need, as well as what they are unaware of that they want and or need.

What the patron knows they want

A modern public library must always keep in mind what it is that their patrons are most likely to want to borrow, as well as what they might need in their everyday life, work and studies. This way the library will be sure that the library has the texts that the patrons are most likely to ask for. This assurance can partly be made through the following trends, news and interviews within the book world. Patron tips and suggestions are also a great way to expand this part of the library’s collection.

It is in my opinion more common than not that the patron already knows beforehand what they are after when entering the library, often looking for a specific title, or a specific topic of research. The patrons more often than not have a specific title in mind. The optimal solution for these patrons would of course be that we have these texts at hand for them when they come to the library. If a text is popular or new, as it often is, they are presented in prominent parts of the library, easily accessible to the patrons that want them. Likewise are collections of texts such as detective novels or cook books often given more space than less well read topics, yet again for ease of use.

In our library of odd things, popular texts might still need to take up a large part of its collection, but not necessarily in the shape and form as in current public libraries, less used media such as vhs tapes would be presented next to books and dvds. As the patrons get more used to the Libraries of odd things, it is my hope that the patrons will learn how to navigate the library’s new form of collection. Hopefully, just with tool libraries the patrons will come to look for specific texts and machines used to experience them.

What they are unaware of

A seemingly conflicting goal of the library is to introduce their patrons to new texts and information that they had no idea that they needed. While sometimes aware of this unspecified need, the patrons are more often not made aware of it when they are faced with a solution to said need. This means that the more varied our collection, the more topics and perspectives it covers, the bigger the chance that the patron will find the answer to a problem or a need that they did not know they had, or that a library could help with. This can range from a reference work that helps them see a problem at another angle, or present an unsuspected solution to a conundrum, to a story that gives them the insight, comfort or inspiration they need.  

If a patron is unable to see the more specialized parts of our collections, it will be nearly impossible for them to become aware of it. By presenting the most popular texts and genres in the front, will the layout discourage hunting for new experiences and browsing around as the patron looks for their intended texts.

The easiest way to provide this need is with non fiction texts and other forms of reference materials. The realization that “I did not know that there is a book for that”, is an apt way of describing this unknown need. Perhaps a book on biology or botany may help a patron to get a handle on their garden slug problem. Maybe an obscure travel book is just what the patron needs to jog their memories. The examples are endless, and I have seen many examples of them first hand.

Fictional materials can likewise be used to solve problems that the patrons were not aware of, or to fill a need they did not know that they had. Once again is it a question of not knowing that they wrote texts about that, or more often than not, not being aware that there were books for them. As the adage goes, each book has its reader, and each reader its book.

This form of discovery will be the primary goal of the Library of odd things. As mentioned before, the library will have a large collection of popular texts, but the focus will always be on exposing the patrons to new and old forms of media that they would not be able to use otherwise. It is well noted here that the limits between known and unknown needs are not solid, and one unknown need is another patrons known need.

The problem of cataloging and finding texts

When it comes to known as well as unknown needs, we will run into the same problem of the patron needing to find the text, regardless if they are actively looking for it or not. First of all, must the library have the text in question at hand, bringing us back to the problem of curation and all that it entails. 

The second problem is the fact that the patron must be able to find the text in question. This leads us to a problem that we have not hit on yet, the problem of organization and categorisation. The problem of categorisation rejects simple answers and simple solutions, as there is no universal and true way of cataloging anything to the most optimal and objective standard.

This is especially true when it comes to texts, both fiction and nonfiction. While there are of course general guidelines to follow, like keeping the authors in alphabetical order, and organizing non fiction under topic and fiction under general theme, there will never be an absolutely perfect system.

Many texts can be categorized in several topics at once, for example the history of medicinal plants, does it belong in history, medicine or botany, and how granular should a collection be with cataloging. The problem becomes even more complicated and granular when we are talking about fiction. What genre will we pick out, what genres will be placed in general fiction, should be pick out things like lgbtqiia+ characters for example. There are no simple and straightforward answers to these questions, but it will fundamentally shape how the patrons are interacting with our collections.

Just as mentioned with the comparison between large and general collections, and smaller more specialist collections will each specialty category lead to more work, and more space in the library. Each fiction genre we split will need its own space in one form or another, and each non fiction topic that we break down will mean more work, and cataloging for the library. These might not seem as great concerns, but over an entire library collection it will make huge differences. 

Conclusions

How we present our collections are vital to how patrons can interact with the texts within its limits. The reason I split known and unknown needs between each other is that their goals are often at odds with each other when it comes to designing library spaces and other collections.

As mentioned before, will the patron that knows their need either go directly to the part of the collection that they want, or ask the librarian to send them to the right part of the collection. Because these patrons often are looking for similar things, would it make sense for these kinds of patrons to present the most borrowed texts in the front of the library, both physically and digitally.

This comes in conflict with the library trying to present the patron with texts that they are not aware of, or discovering texts that the patrons are not nearly as aware of. A patron looking for a specific popular detective novel for example might be annoyed that they need to traverse the entirety of the poetry collection to get there. On the other hand may moving forward the poetry section lead to patrons discovering a love for poetry the would never have found otherwise.

There are no right and wrong answers to these conflicting goals, but they will be very important for my project for the Library of odd things. This conflict leads us to our next set of questions, what should the library be for, and who gets to decide that purpose.

The library of odd things: A home for obsolete media, and rare finds: Part two, quailty and quantity

~ SamRandom ~ 3 Comments

This is the second part in an essay that I wrote about media curation and the role of public libraries in Sweden, as well as how it can be handled differently. I discuss the concepts of quality and quantity in this chapter, as well as the implications these definitions have on media curation, both in current public libraries, as well as in my imagined Library of things.

Quality and quantity

I will begin my arguments with the most straightforward, but possibly one of the more controversial aspects of the Library of things. The idea that media can have quality, and that someone by default, needs to decide what that quality is. The concept of quality is by its very nature a subjective form of measurement, and one that does change over time and space, culture and public.

The term quality will in this chapter primarily be used in the differentiation between nice and mainstream media. With nice media I am here referring to things that stand out from the rest in its category, be it from awards, professional and academic acclaim or by the uniqueness of its presentation and content. This definition is not to be confused with the term good, but rather as a way to single out certain texts from a broader context. 

This definition is in contrast to mainstream media, that is made to be broad, approachable and in many cases, disposable. Here would find the masses of feel good novels and thrills written to be read and then forgotten. Likewise here is where you will find cookbooks, tv dramas, action and horror films of all kinds. Note that I do not use the term quality here as a direct notation of what is good and what is bad, as that is frankly a topic that is too wide, and too complex for this text to cover in any meaningful way. I am also fully aware that these definitions are strenuous at best, and often blend into each other in complex and fascinating ways.

For the interest of this text will this definition be used to define between texts that the library can count on being borrowed, and texts that, while not being as popular, are more likely to leave a larger impression on the patron that do borrow it.

Besides quality, must the question of quantity be taken into account. The quantity of texts, or the number of items that a library can have at a single moment is ofcourse limited by its physical space. There is only so much room that one library can fill with texts before something needs to be removed in order to make room for something new. It is an unfortunate result that every piece of media that is bought in a modern library does need to take the place of another piece of media, each purchase and removal of a text much as a result be argued for.

The physical space of bookshelves and other storage devices must also be taken into account when planning for what form a library’s collection will take. A current public library tends towards having a small variety of media available, books, audiobooks and movies for example. This approach allows them to maximize the space available for these collections, as well as minimizing the curation time needed, as they all follow the same general workflow. This allows the library to take a quantitative approach to media collection, leading to a  large chance of the patron finding the item they are looking for, as long as it is not too obscure or old.

In this form of library, can the librarian be a bit more lenient with how much the library buys, especially if they are under no obligation to keep the media in question for posterity or future research. This means that texts of both mainstream and more nice material can quite often easily find their place side by side. There are still limitations however, especially considering the libraries limited, and sadly often restrictive budgets. This budget still makes sure hard choices must be made about what to buy and not to. I discuss the librarian’s role in curating a collection in more detail in a future chapter.

In the form of the library that I am describing, will this question become even more important, as the nature of the collections means that different areas will need to be set aside for each collection, and more complex and varied storage forms will need to be put in place. This would sadly mean that the librarians would need to be even more discriminatory in the forms of media that they choose to take in. This, I would argue, will be one of the biggest limiting factors, but also one of the biggest assurances of quality for the library’s services.

When creating a collection it is always important to keep in mind why this collection is created, what form of problems they are meant to solve and for who. The current driving forces behind many purchases that I have been purview to have been based on the concept that we should buy them, because people want to borrow them from our collection. In my experience will these collections gravitate more towards mainstream media, unless there are librarians present with a special interest or dedication to a certain media form or genre.

By Evan-Amos – Own work, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=12814264

In comparison would the Library of odd things need to be even more discriminatory with what they buy in, and as a result does the question of nieces versus mainstream become even more important.

In this scenario will the work of curating become even more important, as the space and time is even more limited. This means that the questions of what and why certain media is included or excluded becomes even more important. When for example, a library decides to include a series of Nintendo 64 cartridge games from the popular and groundbreaking gaming console with the same name, what should be included?

Do we include titles that we know were popular, like Super Mario 64, do we only include those titles that were critically acclaimed at the time, like Goldeneye 64. Do we aim to search out more obscure titles that later became cult classics, or that may be remembered fondly by our patrons?

I do not claim to have any easy answers to these questions, as they are complex and deeply rooted in each library’s situation and capabilities. I would argue that a balance is to be strived for, between high and low culture, nice and mainstream, obscure and well known, in this way will the library of odd things best serve its purpose of exposing their patrons to the largest amount of new and novel experiences, as well as old and potentially nostalgic ones.

With the implementation of more Libraries of odd things can this problem be alleviated somewhat by allowing cross library loans, much in the same way that Swedish public libraries are today able to borrow books from other public libraries as well as some university libraries.

While this is not a perfect solution, is it one that can be readily applied with already existing infrastructure. 

This chapter is meant as a beginning to the discussion rather than the be all and end all solution to a series of very complex and somewhat controversial problems within the contemporary library world. Next chapter will discuss the needs and wants of the library patron, as well as how these concepts can be defined and used in everyday library work, especially when it comes to the question of curation.

The library of odd things: A home for obsolete media, and rare finds: Part one, introductions

~ SamRandom ~ 4 Comments

What you are about to read is the first part of a longer essay that I have decided to split into smaller chapters for ease of reading in a blog setting. In this essay I will discuss several concepts regarding how the Swedish library system works, and the role of the Swedish public library. Later in the text I will introduce an alternative to this model, that I have dubbed the library of odd things. This chapter will contain the introduction to this model, as well as my primary arguments.

Introduction

I have for a long time noticed a trend in public library work I can only liken to a form of gentrification of the materials at the public libraries that I work at. The first and most obvious way that the libraries are limited are the kinds of books and movies that are available at the libraries that I have worked at. I have noticed that collections of short stories, comics and poetry have become fewer. While this is a vital discussion as well, is it not the topic that I wish to discuss in this essay. Today I wish to discuss the usefulness and novelty of discounted and obscure media formats. As I start to work, MP3 audiobooks and other older audio formats have already disappeared, along with the fate of VHS and CDs.

It can easily be argued that these forms of media have long served its purpose, and given the limited space of the libraries, it would make sense to remove the older, and seemingly useless forms of media.  In this text I will argue that this does not always have to be the case. We do not always have to buy every åpopulauir feel good novel or detective series to every library. These series do take up lage part of many libraries’ budgets, as well as library space. As publishing of books only seems to increase as they are catching up with lowering costs of books, and companies like Amazon selling books on a loss, is this something that libraries need to look into sooner rather than later.

I would argue that it is impossible to keep up with this form of publishing and release pressure, and it will lead to more and more rare and old collections needing to be moved to give place for these new, and cheap books. Not to mention that the shelf life of these books will inevitably become shorter and shorter as well, as they too will be replaced with new best sellers of the month. With a shifting media landscape and the ability to get your hands on mainstream books becoming cheaper and easier, and in the face of dwindling library numbers, would I argue that it is time for the library to return to its roots, and provide the media that no others can, and most importantly, do it for free.

In light of this development I would like to argue another form of libraries, a somewhat controversial topic in modern librarianship. In this, an older form of the library would once again be put in the center, rather than the services that the library currently struggles to produce. In this kind of library the focus will be on discovery and the exploration of media old and new. Here old VHS and vinyl records would share shelf space with high end vr games and digital multimedia. A library like this would be able to, in theory, encompass all of human expression, and let it be available to the general public, free of charge.

This essay will be separated into several chapters, each which takes up its own aspect of the core question behind the essay, at the end I will present and discuss some of the more common counter arguments to this thesis, and finishing of with some concluding thoughts about how one can continue to work on this project if it seems interesting. The next chapter will discuss the controversial topic of quality and quantity when it relates to handeling media in public libraries.

All images taken, and used with promition from: https://pixabay.com

Blog update: July

~ SamRandom ~ Leave a comment

Hi, I am currently working on several rather big projects that are hopefully coming to fruition sooner rather than later! In the meantime I have been semi-regularly updating my patreon page with some interesting shorter essays. If you like what I write and would like some more, as well as support me financially in the process, please consider taking a look!   

https://www.patreon.com/posts/essay-atlantis-86703899?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link

Essay: the mushroom and the soil

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Today’s essay partly comes around thanks to a wonderful series of video essays, exhibitions and talks hosted on the Serpentine museums official youtube site. Many of the speakers helped me to open my eyes to what soil can be and what it means to us as humans and living creatures.

In this text I would like to share with my readers my love for all forms of fungal life. More specifically will I try to sell you on the wonder of soil dwelling fungi! These forms of life, for those that are not aware of it, do not fall within the animal or plant kingdom. But rather form their third kingdom, that of the micilia, here we find mushrooms, molds, lichens and until recently, slime molds. 

The kingdom of micilia is a deeply fascinating one, and one that still holds many mysteries, we so far only know of, and have been able to to catalog a very small percentage of the worlds fungi, lichen and molds. These species are highly adapted and adaptable to the areas in which they inhabit. From the symbiosis between fungi and algae found in the lichen to the rapidly growing single cell organisms of the microfungi, is it truly a varied and complex world of wonder and mystery!

These various kinds of life forms are, while looking a lot like plants, indeed a lot more closely related to the animal kingdom. For one is the micilia not made out of plant fibers, but rather microscopic chitin, the same materials that crustaceans and many insects form their outer shells from. Furthermore, these lifeforms do not perform any form of photosynthesis, instead extracting nutrition from the surrounding areas by sending out acids much in the same way that our stomachs do to ingest nutrition. In this way many fungi and other mycelia have an incredibly important role to play in the decomposition and reuptake of dead organic material, be that animal or plant life.

This essay in particular will focus on the many kinds of micilia, that is the large networks of string-like structures found underground, as well as microfungi, and their impact on soil health. I will begin by defining what I mean with soil, and how it is different from dirt. Dirt in the most simple terms is the combination of clay, organic matter, stones and sand. What makes soil different from dirt, scientifically, is that soil is teeming with life. Soil teems with fungi, insects and thousands of different forms of microbial life, all which does its part to turn dead organic material into nutrition for the plants that grow upon it.

As mentioned before, fungi work to decompose and pick up nutrition from many of the dead organic material found in and on the grounds, from animals to dead flowers and fallen branches. They do this by the spreading of their micilian networks. This not only keeps the ground clear, but also makes sure the minerals and other nutrients found within can be reused by the rest of the ecosystem. Recent science has taught us that these micilian networks are capable of seeking out nearby dead biomatter to feast upon, and will to a much greater extent move in that direction.

Even more so, it is not uncommon for fungi of our forests to create symbiotic relationships with trees, flowers and other plants. In return for sharing some of the nutrition of the decomposition in return for sugar from the plants photosynthesis. Furthermore, it has been shown that the mycelial networks of many fungi have managed to connect several species of trees and other vegetation together, and created a form of communication network between them, sharing nutrition as well as electrical signals, this wondrous discovery will be the topic of a future essay!

While you might rarely see a mushroom body as you wander the woods, know that the soil living fungi is always there, just underneath the surface, and their presence is vital to ours, and every other living organisms existence. Sadly these complex organisms and their relationships to other lives are being disturbed by deforestation, acidification and most of all monoculture farming. Thankfully things are changing, and many interesting projects of so-called permaculture are starting to flourish across the globe, something I would love to return to another day. For now, know that the fungi is everywhere, even if you can’t see it.

Further reading:

https://www.youtube.com/@SerpentineGalleriesUK

Stamets (2019) Fantastic Fungi, ISBN 9781647221720

Essey: Alcohol and the self: A study in drug use and self perception

~ SamRandom ~ 1 Comment

Trigger warnings: 

Alcoholism, mentions of abuse and implied assault.

Disclaimer:

I want to begin with a series of disclaimers. First and foremost, I must make it clear that I myself do not drink alcohol and have not been truly drunk even once in my life. However, I, like most people, have had experiences with seeing both the positive and negative effects of the use of alcohol. Furthermore, I want to also clarify from the start that I will denote alcohol as a drug in this text as this decision to do so is vital for the point of this essay. The purpose of this text is to discuss and elaborate upon the discussion and culture of perceived alcohol use within a Swedish context.

Introduction

I am not a drinker. I have been drunk once or twice but I just never got into drinking myself. As someone who does not use alcohol, I have had countless discussions of why I chose not to partake in this socially acceptable and expected drug. This text is meant to be an exploration of these discussions, and why they so often turned sour or hostile.

It has dawned on me more and more that these discussions were never about me and my abstinence, but rather what that abstinence does with the narratives around alcohol and drinking. Alcohol use is common in Sweden- about three out of four adults consume alcohol (The Public Health Agency of Sweden, 2022). Although the dangerous consumption of alcohol is decreasing, between 16 and 30 percent of Swedish adults, depending on which study you refer to, still claimed that they had consumed unhealthy amounts of alcohol. Despite these concerning numbers, the topic of alcohol abuse is not something that is often discussed, and when it is indeed raised, it is often framed in a negative light, decrying those that have fallen to this so-called vice. Documentaries, tv series and commercials often depict those who are afflicted by alcoholism as being failures of sorts; that it is due to their personal failings and choices that they find themselves where they are.

Shame and normalcy

I will begin with unpacking two concepts that will be integral to my discussion. The first of which being the notion of shame. I will use shame here in the context of doing something that you have an ethical, emotional or social aversion towards doing something. This shame can be internally motivated (i.e. the action can go against something that you believe or feel). It can also be externally motivated from actual or perceived expectations of wider society the subject exists within.

Alcohol seems to be uniquely positioned in Swedish and western society as a bridge between what is and what is not considered shameful behavior in my experience. The trope of the drunk ex sending embarrassing texts, unwise plans made while inebriated, drunken fights and unfortunate drunken hookups are commonplace in media, especially in romantic comedies. Doing dumb things under the influence of alcohol is almost expected, and in some ways, welcomed. With that said, these actions are simultaneously tied with the shame that comes with the confrontations that will inevitably occur once the effects of alcohol have worn off. 

This leads us to the next term- normality, or normalization. As mentioned in the introduction, alcohol is an almost universal part of most Swedish citizens’ lives. Over eighty percent of adult Swedish citizens have used alcohol at least once within a year, according to the Swedish health department’s latest report. This trend seems to be changing, partly due to influences of other cultures, but it’s also due to a change in the outlook of alcohol by younger generations. The same study shows that comparatively, older Swedes take up a larger percentage of alcohol consumers, and the notion that ‘alcohol is dangerous’ is much more prevalent amongst younger individuals. (The Public Health Agency of Sweden, 2022)

The ambiguity of the use of alcohol makes it hard to look at in the same light as tobacco or cannabis use for example. Alcohol is, and has been for most of its history, a part of Swedes’ daily lives. As mentioned before, the shame and difficult situations that arise from the use of these drugs are not only seen as normal, but often quite comical. This can sometimes make the shameful and painful parts of alcohol use difficult to express earnestly in day to day conversations.

Pain and addiction

Much of the discussions around alcohol that I have been a part of, inevitably comes back to two topics- addiction and pain. The first topic, addiction is something that many that I have spoken with about alcohol have had, or at the very least, have had second hand experiences with. Alcohol is after all, an addictive substance, and is the only truly psychoactive drug that is both socially accepted and juridically legal. (The Public Health Agency of Sweden, 2022)

Alcoholism is also often hidden in plain sight in Sweden. We can all see the cues to the alcohol store when it opens, hear about tales of binge drinkers and on and off alcoholics, but like so much else, it is easily ignored because, once again it is both normal and shameful. The prevalence of individuals who suffer from alcohol makes it unfortunately easier for others to ignore it, as well as to see their suffering as normal or expected. Very much like as it is with homelessness, does an alcoholic also represent what would happen if an individual would fail to meet social expectations. To become addicted to alcohol -to fall from grace so to speak- is often depicted as a personal failure. This shame of becoming the other, of becoming someone that has failed, also makes it harder for most people to empathize or even acknowledge those who suffer from alcoholism. To do so would be to acknowledge the risks in their own behaviors and choices.

The effects of alcohol can sometimes lead to dangerous behaviors and poor decision making skills. Accidents due to loss of motor skills, lack of self awareness and a heightened sense of invulnerability are all well attested effects of the drug. These injuries or other pain caused under the influences can often be easily laughed off by the surrounding population, and is once again, somewhat normalized and accepted. This normalization makes it harder to verbalize and discuss openly what happened during said painful events. This may lead to more internalized regret and shame over the individual’s actions. This, tied with the addictive nature of the drug, can easily lead to a spiral of dependency and disgust of the substance. (Pietrangelo, 2023)

Alcohol affects different people differently, while some gets solemn and quiet, others gets loud and boisterous, and others get angry and violent. Many have each of these reactions at different times. When violence and anger shows up, it is not uncommon for those closest to the intoxicated to be the one that suffers the most. This, like many other negative effects of alcohol use, is something that everyone at least has a third hand account of. Many I have spoken to have tales of someone who has suffered at the hands of someone with alcohol dependency, or simply with especially aggressive or violent reactions to alcohol. The shame is present here as well, both in the shame of the perpetrator and their victims. I want to be very careful with my claims here, as I have not been personally affected by this form of tragedy, nor do I have expert knowledge in the subject. I, like many others, have second or third hand experiences, as well as experiences of ingesting several media presentations of alcohol and violence. (Pietrangelo, 2023) I will end my discussion of this particular topic here as a result, as it is such a big subject that there is no way I can even begin to do it justice in this short essay on my personal experiences.

Alcohol and the self

I would argue that very few people initially see themselves as an addict, and often need help from others to see this. The argument often goes like this, “alcoholism, abuse and other destructive behaviors are something that happens to others, not me”. Among the people I have spoken to regarding their alcohol use, all of them are clear that they are more or less in control of their alcohol consumption. This is not to say that the people I talked to were wrong or lying. It is simply a trend I have noticed. 

I will once again tread very carefully here, for I have very little experience in talking to individuals that have been, or currently are clinically addicted to alcohol. What has become apparent, if the rest of my conclusions are to be believed, is that to be an addict, is to become an other, in the eyes of those around you.

The self and other as non drinker

There are several tropes I have encountered regarding the non-drinker in Sweden. Non-drinkers are often seen as prudes, being boring, not fitting in or wanting to just make a point. Many of these negative tropes I would argue, can be linked to shame and normalcy that we have discussed earlier. Seeing how normalized the use of alcohol is, it is not surprising that one would be seen as somewhat of an outsider for not drinking. Seeing someone not drinking would also confront someone who drinks with several of the concepts discussed earlier. The self image of the non drinker, is in all intent and purpose unimportant to the text.

Conclusions

This text has not meant to present a complete image on how alcohol culture looks in Sweden, or how this pertains to Swedish society in general. I aim to share some of my personal experiences with alcohol as alcohol discourse as someone that doesn’t personally drink. I likewise would like to air some of my grievances I have had with said discourse, and try and formulate them in text.

In this text I have tried to argue that by normalizing the use of alcohol, it makes it hard to criticize the use of the drug without criticizing the users of the drug. This may lead to individuals finding it hard to express their feelings on things that have happened regarding their use, or others use of alcohol. I do not wish to demonize alcohol or alcohol use as completely evil, but simply to try and open up and change how we discuss alcohol, both its good and bad sides.

Note that I have not discussed the more positive aspects of alcohol, both as a drug, and as a social construct, this is simply due to the fact that I believe such a topic deserves its own chapter, as it is way too complex and nuanced to fit in here.

The Public Health Agency of Sweden. (2022.). https://www.folkhalsomyndigheten.se/the-public-health-agency-of-sweden/living-conditions-and-lifestyle/andtg/alcohol/

Pietrangelo, A. (2023). What Are the Effects of Alcohol on the Body? Healthline. https://www.healthline.com/health/alcohol/effects-on-body#physical

Essey: mellodifestivalen, a tale of big egos and low expectations

~ SamRandom ~ Leave a comment

Melodifestivalen is the Swedish regional part of the eurovision song contest. Here is where Sweden’s representation is chosen in a several week long media spectacle. Seeing how this is the Swedish broadcast networks (SVT) biggest crowd pusher of the year, it is no surprise that the company wants to get as much out of it as possible. This can be most easily seen by the extension of the contest that has happened over the many years of its run.

Melodifestivalen is  one of, if not The must see television show on Swedish TV. This can come from genuine enjoyment, scorn, an unwillingness to miss out, or a combination of all the above. In this essay I will use the series as a way to deconstruct two major themes that can be found in many of SVTs productions. One being that of a sense of ego and inflated importance, as well as a sense of entitlement to lowered standards. There is this air of SVT productions that are expected to be measured with a lower standard because they are “just public television”. I will in this essay aim to discuss how these two modes of thinking often contradict each other.

Low standard and the sense of being “just SVT” is something that is easy to spot in the production of Melodifestivalen. Despite being played in a grand arena, having a grand budget, almond raking in millions of views, is it always a sense of amateurish feeling over the production and script writing of the show itself. The jokes are corny and not very well thought out, the presenters give off the feeling of uncomfortable convention hosts. Many of the jokes that are pulled from this real or perceived amateurishness, like the ironic use of comic sans, or the fact that a joke did not land, being the punchline to the joke more often than not.

This is not an opinion I am alone with, and as I have alluded to,  are there many that watch the show to groan at the bad jokes and corny performances, as well as the often sadly misguided musical performances. This is a fact that SVT is well aware of, and has on more than one occasion made light of in their comedy often at the expense of their detractors.

A good example of this is the year that SVT used muppets to present their different viewers and their reason to watch. One pair of these puppets being an elderly, upper class and intellectual couple that watched the show seemingly in pure duress, and spent the entire show berating and degrading it. This would have been a fine thing to do, even though the Muppets did it first and better with the peanut gallery, if it wasn’t for the fact that the old couple that “just didn’t get it”, were always right!

This attitude of casually dismissing criticism as overly intellectual snobs is something that can be found in other productions then just Melodifestivalen. Many of their shows like Uti Bugda and similar comedy show as a distinct lowbrow, and yet mean spirited tone towards their perceived audience. This is furthermore followed by yet again a notion that any low production values or bad quality from their part should be forgiven due to their state of public television, and as a result, not as fancy as commercial television.

SVT was, for a long time the only television that was available for the Swedish population, as the first and only tv channel made in, and for Sweden. They were from the beginning, and still are fully funded by Swedish tax money, and operate, at least in theory, fully free from both government and commercial interest. SVT is considered to be a public service, much like the BBC in the UK, and as a result is meant to work in service of the public. This project involves trying to cater to as wide an audience as possible, and to make sure to give something for everyone, or in other words, for the general public. This runs the gambit from low brow comedy shows, to high concept discussion shows on art, faith and science. In later years has this responsibility been spread over several channels where SVT 1 remained the most focused towards, in lack of a better word, mass audiences, where SVT2, Knowledge channel, and the SVT kids taking over many of the more specialized roles. It is not perhaps surprising that Melodifestivalen is hosted only at SVT 1. This sense of being in the service to the public, as well as being the first TV channel available has, I would argue, led to an elevated sense of importance amongst the executives of SVT.

SVT today does not exist alone. And for decades they have now had to contend with the competition of other, nonprofit and for profit TV stations and conglomerates, and it is in this relationship that both of their self images can be found and understood. On one end does SVT tout their role as, free (in a way) entertainment, education and culture for the public. That they serve a higher purpose than the commercial TV stations as their role as public services. On the other hand does it also seem to exist a certain defensiveness in SVTs many shows about, not being able to, and in fact, that they should not be expected to be as good as the big commercial stations with their enormous budgets and talent pools.

Nowhere else I would argue, is this dichotomy more apparent, then in the case of Melodifestivalen. There is a grand sense of being the People’s entertainment festival, and there is indeed in theory possible for anyone to join and possibly win the entire contest. There is a sense that SVT is almost doing the nation a service by providing the Swedish people of something to gather around, be proud of, and more importantly then all, to take part in, And yes, here I have to give credit where credit is due, as Melodifestivalen does rake in thousands of dollars for charity every year. At the same time the show is mired with flat comedy, self referential and erogatory comedy and an overall sense of, Don’t bully us, we are just the silly show Melodifestivalen.

This contrast is what, in my opinion, makes Melodifestivalen uniquely frustrating to watch, and I have to admit, I do still watch it every year.

Essay: Ebooks, and the tactile feeling of turning a digital page

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I have thought about why the sensation of reading things on Archive.org or in games like Skyrim had a much more satisfying feeling than reading something on a pdf. The reason is the tactile feeling these texts have. In this text I will explore the sensations of tactility, and their effects on the sensation of, and appreciation of reading.

Introduction

Tactility is something that has often been touted to describe the superiority of physical books over digital ones, and I have to agree with them. There is a completely different feeling to reading a physical book, flipping the pages, and holding the book, than scrolling through pages on a phone or PC. The feeling of flipping a page, of pulling your finger through the page. The ability to earmark a page or put in a bookmark. There are of course other senses that also play in on to this, smell sight and sound are some of these senses that can not fully be integrated into a reading on a digital book. This text will focus almost primarily on the sensations on touch, and how they relate to the feeling of experiencing a book. I personally find that I can draw a much closer connection to a book if I am able to touch it, flip through its pages, and run my hand along its spine. Just the sensation of flipping a page is enough to highlight the importance of touch when it comes to reading a book.

By tactility, I will in this text relate to the sensation of physical touch or feel, or as you will read, the digital approximation of this sensation. I aim to show that tactility is not limited to the sense of physical touch, but also the digital recreation of it. Heat, pressure and texture are all important parts of the sensation of touch, and tactality as a result. The sensation of a book can be as varied as the books themselves. From the brittle pages of an old tomb, to the rough pages of a cheap paperback novel. Many of these sensations, such as heat, can currently not be transferred to a digital medium, but I will argue in this text, that some approximations of other tactile sensations can still be found.

The PDF

The first type of text I will discuss is the one that most people are familiar with, and that most of my viewers have used in their daily lives, the humble PDF document. This document type is designed to be read only and is not written over, making it difficult to be modified (though exceptions do exist). A PDF document by default is meant to look like a physical piece of paper, with the text represented on it as if it was printed. The text itself is presented in the centre of the program, and may take on a number of forms. Different colors on the background paper, and the typeface may have been used, as well as different fonts, just as with any physical book. The program itself is made out of the previously mentioned central reading area, as well as a black and white border, where several options of reading can be found.

The PDF reader has a few options on how you may read your file, size, amount of pages on the screen at once etc but the base is still going to be of a number of pages on a blank background for you to scroll through. I bring up the PDF primarily to have something to compare the later texts with. While I do find reading a PDF document slightly less tiring than say a word document, it is still not what I would call an enjoyable experience. Why I find PDF files less tiring, I could not say for sure.

Epub and Kindle

A slight step above the humble PDF document is Adobe’s own digital book reader. Note that the same problems and advantages can be found with things like kindle readers and the like, but I use Adobe digital editions simply because it is the one I am personally the most familiar with, which is why I have chosen to use it as my example.

These platforms will present the text in a slightly more book emulated fashion, but still not very close to the actual feeling of holding a book. You are still reading text documents much in the same way as you would in a PDF document, though with a few more bells and whistles a more customizable outline of the book’s pages. Note that the books often retain some of the page layouts and typefaces of the physical books they are based on, which do lend a bit more of a tactile feeling to the experience, though this can equally be done with a PDF document.

Project Gutenburg

First and foremost, must I say that Project Guthenburg is an amazing initiative and that has done wonders for the academic world. It is an amazing project to digitize and make available enormous amounts of materials from the public domain. Most, if not all of these can be downloaded and read in formats such as Epub and kindle, which makes these texts very easy to work with. Their dedication to continuing to make available otherwise difficult to reach texts is truly the be commended. 

With that said, their reader on the website is atrocious to say the least, large blocks of text with huge margins on each side makes the writing stretched out in a strange column, and the empty spaces makes it hard to focus on any area in particular. Not to mention that the font choices were not chosen to primarily be read on a screen. It is unfortunate that such a wonderful collection of texts should be limited in its use by a less than user-friendly interface and reading experience. This is a good example of the importance of tactility, even in digital reading materials.

Archive.org

The project of archive.org is similar to that of Project Gutenburg, though larger in scope, as their efforts stretch way beyond books and other printed materials. But for this text I will simply focus on the texts, and at that the more professionally scanned and presented texts that can be found within the website’s archives.

These books have not only been masterfully digitized using state of the art techniques, they have also been recreated and presented in such a way to have the books be readable, as physical books. 

With this I mean that every single book to Archive.org in this way has pages that can be flipped through as if it was a physical book. Each page can be flipped back and forth, and the process of doing so is fully animated. This seemingly simple addition gives a dimension to the reading that is not present in any of the other digital alternatives I have mentioned so far.

The fact that the book itself is scanned and not just the text, means that the color and texture of the page itself is also preserved, for better or worse. Due to the books being recreated from photographs, also means that any notes, scribbles or stains are kept from the original. These slight imperfections further create the illusion of dealing with a physical book rather than a digital recreation. The addition of front and back covers, that can be flipped open and closed, also adds to the experience of reading through a physical book.

The Elder scrolls

The Elder Scrolls series are far from the only game series that has readable books, and not the only one that presents them in such an interactive way. I choose this series for a number of reasons, first of all is it a series that many of my readers are familiar with, it is also one that I have a lot of personal experience with personally. 

I furthermore think that the Elder Scrolls  does an exceptional job at presenting its texts in an immersive and enjoyable way. The books are written in a distinct handwritten style, the paper of the books in Skyrim and onwards are unevenly cut, making the illusion of thickness to the book even more apparent. The books also have clear animations for each page being flipped, accompanied by a satisfying page turning sound. 

Many other games have presented their written in universe materials in similar ways, and one can argue that there are examples of it being done better, but the Elder Scrolls is non the less a good example of what I aim to show with tactality. Their plentiful books and journals are easy to find in all the later iterations of the games, and can in some cases be rather integral to solving certain puzzles and quests in the games.

Conclusions

I wished to show in this text, that the tactile feel of reading a book, or for that matter carrying out most tasks, is not necessarily limited to the physical touch of that item. Digital recreations of certain items can come close to, even if not fully replacing the tactile notion of the real thing.    

This same feeling of tactality can be found in certain puzzle games, or simulator games, such as the The Room series of games. Virtual reality technology like the Oculus rift will most likely take this tactile experience even further, but for this text I have chosen to solely focus on the recreation of flipping a page. 

I furthermore wish to show the importance of these tactile elements being taken into account when designing a digital reading experience. By giving the reader a more, sensuary complete experience can they come closer to the text, and hopefully get less fatigued from the reading experience. At least, both of these outcomes have been true for my own experience, but further research is needed to say anything definitive on the subject.

The use of hallways in Fiction

~ SamRandom ~ Leave a comment
Source: Coralline

The hallway has been used as a number of symbolic objects in fiction, from doorways to other worlds, to extensions of characters mood and emotions.  I will in this essay present three genres of fiction, and their use of hallways in wildly different ways. Namely will we examine fantasy, science fiction and horror, and their uses of the hallway as a way of telling a narrative.

Fantasy

Many types of fantasy, especially those that follow the trope of “two worlds”, use some sort of doorway or hallway to access the different worlds. The use of hallways can be used to extend the notion of distance between the “real” and “other” world. A good example of this would be the wool corridor between the other mothers world, and the world of everyday life. The transportation through it, both with time and space, can create a larger sense of distance, and otherness. 

Science fiction

The blog post created by Curley (2015), discusses the idea of the corridor as a canvas to create world building and set dressing. The corridor can be used to present the tone, setting and themes of the narrative. Two examples would be the sleek corridors of the enterprise showing the futuristic utopian world that the story takes places in, where minimalism and simplicity of life has taken hold in the confederacy. This can be juxtaposed with the shops if the Alien franchise, where the ships are seemingly created from a lot of different manufacturers, and clearly made with a small  budget, where price comes before safety.

Horror

The corridor in the is almost a staple of the series, where it is used to great effect to show anything from loneliness, to claustrophobia and disorientation. A classical example would be the corridors in Saltney Cambrics, the Shining uses corridors very effective to create a sense of dislocation, and otherworldliness to the hotel of the movie. Nightmare of Elm Street uses the hallway as a way to enhance the sensation and feeling of nightmares and otherness.  

Source: the Shining

The corridors have been used as hunting grounds for monsters and villains to set harrowing chase scenes, or once again be used as a portal between the natural and the supernatural world. (Ripatrazone, 2015)

Romance

The corridor in romance films are used to show closeness as well as distance, separation and togetherness. By empathising the size and distance of the hallway can the physical distance between characters work as an allegory for both emotional and mental distance, as well as the actual distance between them in space and time.

Conclusions 

We have here seen how the hallway has been used to create a series of different moods and narrative cues, and concepts. Many of the themes are somewhat bleeding in to each other, and are used in similar ways, but I have in this chapter tried to show a distinct tradition and history of using the hallway in narratives. I wanted to show in this chapter that even a seemingly arbitrary set piece as the hallway can have a rich use of narrative and symbolic use within film making.

References: 

Let’s explore science fiction’s glorious hallways, Christopher Curley, 2015, taken from: https://news.avclub.com/let-s-explore-science-fiction-s-glorious-hallways-1798283284

The Long, Lonely Walk: Hallways in Horror Films, Nick Ripatrazone, 2015, taken from: https://themillions.com/2015/08/the-long-lonely-walk-hallways-in-horror-films.html