Who Protests?
-Bombs, Beards & Barricades, p. 26
Sick comics, 1968
TIME Magazine Cover 13 Dec 1999
Occupy Wall Street Toby Toons October 9, 2011
Flattened Identities
Bra-burning Feminists?
Demonstration in Atlantic City in September
1968 that targeted the Miss America Pageant
What Greenham women looked like in the
Tabloid Media
What Greenham Women actually looked like
“They call us whores, slags, sluts,
lesbians. They are all sexual insults. We
seem to threaten their manhood, but
we can do without them...Living with
women is a wonderful experience.
There is strength here.”
- Sharon Ross, The Guardian, July 30 1983
The Portrait –
Many Faces of Protester
Portraits of #OWS
“What I learned is that these people are not wackos,
anarchists, or indigents. They are overwhelmingly working
and middle class people of all backgrounds who feel that
their government has failed them and does not represent
their interests. They are there to protest corruption, not to
tear the rich from their penthouses and drag them down in
to the streets. They just want the basic promise of
America; that everyone has a fair chance to live with
opportunity and dignity. These people are your friends
and neighbors, their children, and your own. They are
Americans, they are Patriots, and they have a right to be
heard.”
-Eddie McShane
2011 Person of the Year
“As a moniker, The Face of
Protest served both to
individuate the social act of
protest-thus rendering it as
identity-and to enact a process
of selection and repetition
that effectively codified
meaning.”
-AK Thomson, p. 51
Presence/Absence
Original Photo: Sarah Mason , 25, Occupy LA
The MaskMany Functions of Protest
Black Bloc, Seattle WTO Protests 1999
“Wearing masks is such an effective tactic
that more and more police departments
are implementing anti-mask laws. The
practice of "masking up" is
controversial within activist circles. Some
activists criticize mask-wearing
because it contradicts the image of
activism being open and accessible, in
other words, "we have nothing to hide."
There are several reasons for wearing
masks at an action:
1) to protect ourselves from illegal police
surveillance;
2) to promote anonymity among the
ranks, which helps protect against the
rise of charismatic leaders;
3) to provide cover for activists engaged in
illegal actions during the demo, and
4) to promote solidarity within the bloc.”
-(infoshop.org, 2001) in AK Thomson p. 57
“… Besieged by those who desire justice,
the men of money are getting scared.
They want to name the faces of
resistance name them thugs, terrorists,
flat-earthers, delinquents, dreamers.
They want to capture, catalogue and
criminalise the faces of those who are
saying "enough is enough." They want
to wipe the smile of resistance off these
faces forever…
Carnival against Capitalism,
Quebec City 2001
During Carnival, as in rebellion, we wear
masks to free our inhibitions, we wear
masks to transform ourselves, we wear
masks to show that we are your daughter,
your teacher, your bus driver, your boss.
Being faceless protects and unites us
while they try to divide and persecute.
By being faceless we show that who we
are is not as important as what we want,
and we want everything for everyone.”
“As the worldwide occupations grow people are
rioting and showing their leaders and financial
institutions that they will no longer be pushed
around. On november fifth we ask every single
person who is involved with these worldwide
occupations to wear a guy fawkes mask in defiance
of your leaders’ police brutality, censorship, sexual
bigotry, racial inequality, unemployment,
foreclosures, lack of health care, and any other
reason …
Anonymous, Occupy, 2011
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70BR6XI84UU
[We wear the mask] not only to protect our privacy
and redefine the word anonymous back, but to
convey an idea of freedom. The word anonymous
has been redefined … becoming the unified voice
and becoming part of our society of people who
seek nothing more and then the quality of life to
improve. Being anonymous now simply means you
are a human being … Become one with your
fellow humans. Do it for them, do it for yourself,
do it for all.
We are anonymous
we are legion
we do not forgive
we do not forget
expect us”
Thinking Beyond the Sign
“Speaking about what the mask enables and
not what it means … effectively reformulates
the relationship between activists and objects
.... From the managerial realm of surveillance
and the bio-political possession of the body
comes the mask.
By wearing it, the activist enabled her passage
through violence from ontology to politics.”
-AK Thomson, p. 57
Thinking Beyond the Sign
1. Seeing Through the Surface
• Who is in the picture and who is not in the picture?
• How do myth, stereotypes and archetypes influence how
and who we see?
• What does the circulation of particular images produce?
2. Seeing Beyond the Surface
• What is the purpose of activist objects? (clothes, tools,
signs, instruments, props, etc.)
• How do ‘context’ and place matter?
• How can we best analyze the system of people-objectsplace? (human and non-human entanglements)
Material-Semiotic Street Fights
Derry, Northern Ireland 1969
Material-Semiotic Street Fights
Cairo, Egypt 2011