Tables and Chairs, Papers and Prayers
Ever since I came to Athens I have failed to arrive fully. My dorm functions like a hotel room- a place I come in an out of, but don’t settle in to. Despite this, I spend a good deal of time there, at least being alive. I realized tables define my sense of place and living somewhere, and my dorm doesn’t have one. The tables I use never become ‘mine’ – I only use them as part of a transaction, giving work or money to use them.
I think a table represents everything about living somewhere that I enjoy. They offer common space for talking, reading and interacting with someone. They can be a literal projection of a conversation, where ideas and people collide. They create an experience of interaction by orienting people towards each other and giving them common ground and space to work through. Tables make a destination, and make particular forms of interactions happen by way of structuring space. They suit the way I enjoy dealing with people: in conversation, with a comfortable distance that commits at least attention and time to each other. Other things can go on at the same time, but to some degree, they always subordinate themselves to the people also at the table.
Television has the opposite effect. TV only has chairs that view a screen connected to a central broadcasting point. That point connects to other places by way of video and sound. It has the opposite impact on conversation by orienting all the viewers towards the events in a unidirectional gaze. At best, it’s a one way conversation, and even then, the talker speaks in such a way to drown out other people. Whether through camera shifts or volume, TV makes sure it has your attention. The power to control conversation lies in its hands: producers and advertisers spend vast amounts of time and money to constructing a medium that wills control over how and when people speak.
And so, the seduction of ‘place’ on television. The connections formed through cabling and electronics create only superficial conversations where the physical orientation of the conversationists subordinates all other activities fully to the superiority of television’s methods. These physical factors slowly pervade and destroy the experience of sitting and talking over a table.
Duncan
I think a table represents everything about living somewhere that I enjoy. They offer common space for talking, reading and interacting with someone. They can be a literal projection of a conversation, where ideas and people collide. They create an experience of interaction by orienting people towards each other and giving them common ground and space to work through. Tables make a destination, and make particular forms of interactions happen by way of structuring space. They suit the way I enjoy dealing with people: in conversation, with a comfortable distance that commits at least attention and time to each other. Other things can go on at the same time, but to some degree, they always subordinate themselves to the people also at the table.
Television has the opposite effect. TV only has chairs that view a screen connected to a central broadcasting point. That point connects to other places by way of video and sound. It has the opposite impact on conversation by orienting all the viewers towards the events in a unidirectional gaze. At best, it’s a one way conversation, and even then, the talker speaks in such a way to drown out other people. Whether through camera shifts or volume, TV makes sure it has your attention. The power to control conversation lies in its hands: producers and advertisers spend vast amounts of time and money to constructing a medium that wills control over how and when people speak.
And so, the seduction of ‘place’ on television. The connections formed through cabling and electronics create only superficial conversations where the physical orientation of the conversationists subordinates all other activities fully to the superiority of television’s methods. These physical factors slowly pervade and destroy the experience of sitting and talking over a table.
Duncan
posted by Duncan at 11:04 PM
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