KEYWORD : KINETIC
Newton’s law states that a body remains at rest unless acted upon by an external force. Humankind’s newfound emotional attachment to social media has hindered our kinetic impetus, limiting our willingness to prompt our bodies into motion and thus as stated in the aforementioned Law, we remain at rest; stagnant.
In the body’s state of stagnancy however, the micro-calculated social media sleights are sustained within the psyche, and it is by way of such stratagems that the human mind is manipulated.
The avatar is a play on Newton’s cradle but with social media applications sandwiching our key bodily organs substituting for the balance balls. The contraption is atop a phone with a depleted battery logo, as a metaphor for our drained physical and mental state post-media manipulation.
A falling of the avatar is that one must understand the source of the design to comprehend the core idea of the keyword.
End-of-semester-update: As the semester progressed, the meaning of the avatar become more and more apparent in my day-to-day life. I started implementing social media detox hours throughout my day in attempt to relieve myself from the attachment. However, once the pendulum started its motion it was difficult to interrupt it. As I studied related giants that work in and around the basic constructs of my keyword, I was able to understand the layers of cognitive human consciousness, and how media has long been used as a medium to influence such various layers of the mind. Exploring the research of various scholars helped become more aware on the various ways media criticism is implemented as a paradigm of politics that engages sociology and linguistics. By becoming more informed, I am now more aware and thus less receptive to cognitive manipulation and in turn more connected with my physiological and psychological self.
