Urban Tribes

In 1985, Michel Maffesoli coined the term "Urban Tribes", using it to describe the theory that people who consume media will often split themselves into different groups or "tribes"in order to find other people to identify themselves with. They will often imitate different aspects of the media they consume like clothing, language, lifestyles etc. For example, people who are in the "Goth" Urban tribe will most likely be wearing black clothing in order to imitate the stereotypical Goth image. People join Urban Tribes in order to find their own personal identity, as well as to find comfort in belonging with other people with similar interests and beliefs.

Personally, I feel that if I had to belong to a certain Urban Tribe, it would have to be the "Gamers" Tribe as I believe that is the one that fits me the most. I don't have a specific style of clothing I wear and the media I consume the most is definitely Video Games

The "Gamers" Tribe are not particularly concerned with music videos as they don't consume as much music media compared to most of the other tribes. If they want to listen to music, they will simply listen to the song on its own, much like how I do.

Practical Task - Lip Sync

For my lip-synch task, I have chosen to sing to "All Star" by "Smash Mouth". This was a test to see how well we could lip-sync to a songs lyrics, as well as testing how well we could edit different takes together while keeping the lip movements in sync. (Visual cuts off at 2:25)

Postmodernism

Postmodernism is a movement that began in the 1970's. In a nutshell Postmodernism is the breakdown of barriers between genre's and styles, often combining genre's that wouldn't normally mesh together i.e. Sci-fi/Western.

A common theme of Postmodernism is the use of Intertexuality. Intertexuality is where one form of media references another form, whether it pays homage to it or mocks it through a parody. When a video flat out imitates it, it is known as a Pastiche.

Video Examples of Postmodernism:

The Darkness's music video of their song "I believe in a thing called love" is littered with plenty of references to Sci-Fi, among other things. The music video takes place mostly on a ship flying through space, a staple in any Sci-Fi movie to begin with. The interior of the spaceship looks identical to the interior of the USS Enterprise, a spaceship belonging to the Star Trek franchise.

For a short moment of the music video, there is a small reference to Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody", with the floating, disembodied heads superimposed into the background signing along to the lyrics.