YouTube and Nostalgia

In my first post I mentioned a module I’m currently sitting in on, entitled Ritual, Remembrance and Recorded Sound. Well, last week Ian Biddle delivered a compelling lecture which dealt with the role of the archive as a space in which we store data we wish to safeguard for posterity. A large component of this discussion considered the use of digital media and the internet as modern-day archives, where our anxieties over the possibility of forgetting past events, or of being inhibited from renewing our experience of them at a later stage, is compounded through the ever-encroaching threat of ‘data memory loss’. While the technologies have become increasingly sophisticated, the paranoia felt towards the possibility of loss has remained, only manifested in new ways. Where once we obsessed over musical disks becoming distorted, scratched, or contaminated with dust and fingerprints, now we squirm at the prospect of our boot drive crashing, setting up an intimidating obstacle for many as we seek to redeem lost reservoirs of valuable data. An example of a related phenomenon would be that, as I write this, I’m experiencing a compulsion to click the ‘Save Draft’ button at regular intervals, fearing that there might be a power shortage or computer error which leads to my text being condemned to electronic oblivion. [Click.]

The internet, then, can be interpreted as a kind of universal archive, where vast streams of collected human knowledge and experience are made accessible to immense populations of people from disparate regions of the globe. Logistical barriers which previously made ownership and authorship of knowledge more clearly defined have subsided to a considerable extent, creating a space wherein data flows freely and equally from peer to peer.

This brings me to the case of YouTube, an incredibly powerful  resource which opens up an ever-growing archive (albeit a rather disarrayed, anarchic archive) of visual and aural material, the richness and diversity of which has the potential to captivate the individual for as long s/he will allow him- or herself to be immersed. Although it is frequently the case that people visit the site purely to browse new or previously ‘uncharted’ content, it equally grants one the opportunity to uncover materials encountered at some point in the past which have since that moment either been forgotten or proven impossible to access at will. YouTube, then, surely represents one of the most fervent spaces for feelings of nostalgia to thrive that mankind has ever produced.

Let me present two very different nostalgic gems of mine that YouTube has allowed me to seize and pin-down in my own personal archive, namely my Favourites page.

• Ryan Giggs’ goal against Arsenal in extra time of the FA Cup semi-final replay, 1999. I remember jumping uncontrollably around my best friend’s living room when it went in, almost struggling to come to terms with the unfathomable genius that had just unfolded before my eyes. I remember going home, still reeling from the excitement, and accidentally knocking my garage door off its hinges. (Actually, don’t hold me to the accuracy of this last point. I recall the significance of the garage door, and I’m certain that I knocked it off its hinges at some point, but it is possible that two distinct memories have been conflated in my head. If only I’d had a camera-equipped mobile phone to record the action!)

• The Japanese-animated The Adventures of Pinocchio from 1984, I believe. I grew up watching a VHS tape of this film with my younger sister. If I remember correctly, we received the video through a rep’s promotion in my parents’ pharmacy. I’m fairly certain that it’s still buried somewhere at home, but our VHS player has – as predictable in the age of DVD – been redundant for a long time. Encouragingly, however, when I went to retrieve this video from YouTube, I noticed that someone has uploaded the entire film in installments, so one of these nights I may have to get under the covers with my laptop and take a virtual trip down memory lane.

Coming to Write, Going to Write

How did I come to start my own blog?

Well, the impetus originated when one of my teachers at Newcastle University, Dr Richard Elliott, informed us students of his idea to publish a blog to accompany a module he is currently presenting in collaboration with Dr Nanette de Jong and Dr Ian Biddle. That module – Ritual, Remembrance and Recorded Sound – has been assembled as a platform in order to address issues pertinent to a body of research that all three are aiming to develop and subsequently publish in a unified volume. That blog – Technologies of Memory: Ritual, Remembrance and Recorded Sound – was established here on WordPress, accessible to any student involved in the course who wishes to put forward ideas relating to topics raised in class. Although I myself am unlikely to have the time in the near future to engage with these issues in a substantial way (I am only present on the course as an auditor, and thus the majority of my focus lies in other areas), I naturally want to remain abreast of progress made by my teachers and fellow students.

It is for these reasons that I was drawn to WordPress a number of weeks ago, and since then the prospect of having a blog of my own to house whatever idiosyncratic ramblings that might surface has appeared more and more attractive. Regardless of whether or not these postings draw any sort of readership beyond my own eyes, the act of writing in itself should bring its own rewards, whether they be mentally or emotionally therapeutic, or, conversely, shaped by egotism and self-aggrandisement, or – what is most likely – encompassing both of these aspects. At this moment I cannot predict confidently what the writing process will generate in terms of subject matter, but it is likely that my perspective will be swayed by those interests which occupy me most on a day-to-day basis. Discounting myself as a self-contained interest, these can probably be ranked like so:

1. Music. I am currently working towards an MA in musicology, with a specialism in the field of popular music studies. Aside from my reading-and-writing, research-oriented academic pursuits, I have a healthy interest in composition (mainly songwriting) and performance. Of course, I also advocate listening for its own sake.
2. Football. By this I mean soccer, in case there are any Americans who might wander by these pages. My commitments lie foremost with my national side, the Republic of Ireland, but I’m also an avid Manchester United supporter.
3. Everything else? Current affairs, media, film, literature… Let’s find out together.

Yes, the writing should be rewarding. For now, however, there’s a different kind of writing that requires more urgent attention.