In one of my classes, we had to study Facebook. Who would have thought that ‘Facebooking’ would be assigned as homework. Surprisingly enough, having to look at Facebook with an academic mindset let me to question the uses of this site. Firstly, let’s face it, Facebook is a part of our lives, and I admit that I am addicted. Although I am not one to constantly update my statuses or change my profile picture every hour, nevertheless, I will find my way to access the site on my phone, my laptop, or any electric device I can get my hands on. I often contemplate deleting my Facebook account to take a step back into reality, however I have a legitimate fear of letting it go.

This brings me to the point of our emotional attachment to Facebook is what feeds the company, our sharing of personal information and preferences provides them with key information for marketing purposes. Over the years, this social networking site has evolved itself into a worldwide phenomenon. Taking note of the changes of the Facebook layout and as it progresses it created ways of including very personal information into our profiles. When I first began using Facebook in 2007, all that was required to provide was my name, my birthday and had a choice of uploading a profile picture. Since the upgrade to Facebook Timeline, we can observe the how the layout’s composition is purposely designed to invite us to share our personal details as users. It wants to know our likes, our family tree, relationship status, education & work, our religious affiliations and some to the extent from having an option to “post” about a new eating habit to losing a loved one.

These are extremely specific details of one’s life, and I am uncomfortable with the progression of Facebook creating these profile options to encourage us as users to share this information about ourselves.

Furthermore, the methods they are using to entice us to update our timeline are through the subliminal pressuring tactics as seen in this photo:

My profile is only __% complete. The use of that tool can easily entice a user to want to achieve 100% completeness, but our profiles will never be complete because they continue to add more features and options to add more additional information about ourselves. It will never end because Facebook wants to know more about us, not as individuals but as consuming statistics. What is frightening is, although we are choosing to share our lives to our friends and family, all of our information is being accessed by Facebook as a company every day. Using our Facebook activity to supplement their business. Now we may be thinking, well why don’t you just delete your account, if you are uncomfortable with Facebook accessing your information?

This again ties back into the emotional attachment to Facebook that many of us have. From the beginning of using Facebook six years ago, I have accumulated so many pictures, stories, conversations with so many people. I use Facebook to look back at past memories and use it on a daily basis to post new memories. With the upgrade to Facebook Timeline, my profile is essentially my autobiography. This website is a record of everything that has happened within those six years, and to “delete” it would to erase all of those memories. Facebook has redesigned itself to have its users create their own autobiography. Of course when we are posting or uploading pictures we do not view it as added to our autobiography but rather it’s just a part of our culture. What is interesting with our current studies of autobiography, how this modern day social network has become a way to document our life history on this website, and therefore our ‘Timeline’ is one of the 1.1 billion autobiographies in the world of Facebook.

With this new found knowledge, I am unsure as to how I really feel about Facebook any more, all I can say is, I can’t live with it, and I can’t live without it (but more so the second part).

“In its simple style, Persepolis powerfully alludes to the ordinariness of trauma: one does not need, and in fact should reject, the virtuosic to tell this tale, it suggests.” (Chute, 105)

“Ordinariness of trauma”… wait, what? I came across this line while reading Hillary Chute’s The Texture of Retracing in Mariane Satrapi’s Persepolis and I thinking to myself what an interesting formation of words, two opposing words but when used together can hold a powerful meaning. Relating this thought into our research today on the genre of life narratives, so far we have encountered new forms of autobiographies; blogs and comics. Some case studies include the Salam Pax’s Where is Raed? along with Riverbend; both of which are blogs that chronicled the daily experiences of these individuals during the War in Iraq in 2003. In addition, we also have been analysing Mariane Satrapi’s Persepolis – a graphic narrative illustrating Satrapi’s personal experience growing up during the Iranian revolution. It was through Chute’s examination of Persepolis where I stumbled upon the phrase “ordinariness of trauma” but what does that really mean? Why was this significant to me?

I wanted to explore why this statement had such an impact. I began to dissect the meaning behind “ordinariness of trauma”. First, I defined the terms separately:

Ordinariness – or·di·nar·y  (ôr dn- r )

adj.

1. Commonly encountered; usual.

2.

a. Of no exceptional ability, degree, or quality; average.

And

Trau·ma  (trô m , trou -)

n. pl. trau·mas or trau·ma·ta (-m -t )

1. A serious injury or shock to the body, as from violence or an accident.

2. An emotional wound or shock that creates substantial, lasting damage to the psychological development of a person, often leading to neurosis.

3. An event or situation that causes great distress and disruption.

So, the gist: how extremely dire situations integrates itself into normalcy. This is exemplified in Salam Pax’s blog on his experience with the war in Iraq (2003), in Riverbend’s blog and her struggles with the war. This idea is also prevalent in Satrapi’s Persepolis, although I have mentioned the effects of war several times, please know that this new concept I am discovering is not limited to war, and this is why…

As I continue down the path of life narratives as a genre, I reflect back to one film I saw a few years ago. Desert Flower, a film based on the life story of Somalian model – Waris Dirie – who is a victim of female genital mutilation (FGM) and this film portrayed her struggles of this traumatic experience and the impact it had. Without spoiling the film, just in brief; FGM is considered a social practice in many parts of the world, and it was not until Dirie’s exposure to western culture, where she was informed that these practices are not “normal” but is recognized as a violation of human rights. Therefore, Dirie produced her film Desert Flower as a way to educate the world on FGM. Just as Pax, Riverbend and Satrapi’s life narratives are used to inform a global audience of their social situations.

From here, I look more deeply into the “ordinariness”, how that is depicted when clearly these are not usual circumstances (at least not where I am from). Joining the two words together (ordinariness + trauma) are extremely difficult to comprehend, especially when I (along with many others) have never personally experienced conflict to the point where it is immersed as a part of daily life. When reading the blogs of Pax, Riverbend, and reading Persepolis and learning of the horror stories and the hardships that they face, but they complement these experiences with very relatable situations such as school, work, traffic etc. With referencing household routines it provides a sense of typical interaction, easing in the tragic stories of wounded or killed civilians, houses being raided by soldiers, or on a “normal day” Riverbend describes it as “[being] up at early morning, did the usual ‘around the house things’, you know- check if the water tank is full, try to determine when the electricity will be off, checked if there was enough cooking gas…”. Trying to understand the depth of three simple words can define how life narratives can humanize some of the most inhumane situations.

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This week marked a historical event in Canada, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) held national conferences throughout the nation in hopes of rectifying the illegitimacies of the residential schools. The after effects of these institutes continue to impact the First Nation’s community along with many other Canadians. Now, as one nation we are able to come together and begin the healing process. I was able to partake in a couple of the events that were held at UBC. I visited the Museum of Anthropology (MOA) where they displayed an exhibition on the victims of the St. Michael’s Indian Residential School. They showcased testaments of former students, along with formal apologies delivered by the churches, RCMP and the Government of Canada. In addition, I went to the Belkin Art Gallery to observe the artwork created by those affected or victimized. Upon seeing both of the displays, I was disturbed to say the least. I was left unsettled by the violence and cruelty that these individuals suffered and I felt a sense of pain which left me feeling uneasy. I was unable to attend the actual conference where they were showcasing the witness statements from former students of the residential schools. However, I was still overwhelmed with emotion just by the various art works, short films and reading testimonials of those involved in the cultural genocide.

What was pro-founding to me was how much impact the art and plain text had over my emotions. Simple forms of media, yet so influential. I underestimated the impact these exhibits would have, I assumed that only when I attend the conference to bear witness of personal stories or watch them on live television, would I be truly affected. Why was I led to believe this? It seems as though I, along with my generation, are desensitized to aspects of realism. To elaborate, we are surrounded by technology and media and in order to confirm legitimacy we need to ‘see it to believe it’. For example, the news is never just the report, they will display explicit imagery and/or videos as validation, Global News, when you report that there was a fatal motorcycle accident, I believe you! I do not need to see paramedics moving the body.

We see this in video games, television shows and movies, especially with sexuality. What is the significance of showing explicit imagery when the act is already implied? As if the audience is incapable of coming to the same conclusion… why the added sultry display? Maybe it is the shock-value that provides certainty.

Returning back to topic of the TRC, as mentioned earlier I was under the impression that I would not be able to grasp the full nature of the events without observing first-hand, the dark and painful personal testimonies (relying on shock-value). Yet, when I attended the MOA, reading the statements allowed me to visualize and react to the suffering that each individual endured. Furthermore, my encounter in the Belkin Art Gallery, upon seeing the various artwork I was most moved by the pieces created by the artist Gina Liang – as a part of her rehabilitation – depicted her experience of sexual and physical abuse through her paintings. Although attending the TRC conference would have added more depth to my experience, I am grateful for what was available to me. It was through reading plain text and interpreting art that I found true appreciation and understanding of our First Nation’s hardships. We are living in a time of overexposure and sometimes we need to remind ourselves that less is more.