It’s funny how we all think about a responsible way of using “media” in the class but do not realize that we all could easily start with ourselves every day by using our own voice consciously. Rudolf Steiner knew well why we have been taught in “Sprachgestaltung”!
A good storyteller and a well written book or an appealing painting can capture your attention for quite a long time. They reach me on a deeper level than the other media mentioned, because they nourish my imagination. I especially love storytelling, because the person doing it adds so much of his / her personality into it.
It is so funny to realize that a book, compared to a TV, is an highly interactive medium as it requires permanent actions. You have to flip pages, while on TV you just keep watching without moving a muscle for hours.
Another difference is the gestures / body language of the person listening. In front of a TV, or in a cinema, you sit more or less motionless in your chair or on a sofa, but listening to someone telling a story in front of you, you react (mostly unaware) with smiles, shifting positions, crossing arms etc. Fascinating.
As I am my own Research-object I think this categorization doesn´t apply to everyone. Maybe it´s not the usual way to react/ or not-react but I actually move a lot when watching a movie. My facial Expression changes with the emotional Situation in the movie/video 😀 However, I do that a lot more while listening to an actual Person.
Reading a book I feel like living in another world. I read pretty much motionless and exept for the page-turning movement I don´t do or notice anything around me.
I can feel a big difference between watching movies and reading a book on an emotional level.
After I saw a movie/series I feel like “thrown back” into the present moment, I sometimes have trouble coping with that Situation. The longer the movie, the more intense I feel that “lost” feeling. Reading a book doesn´t have that effect on me. I´m not distracted and overloaded with impressions, so I stay in the “real world”.
I hope that description makes sense 😀
Listening to someone telling a story is a dialog to me 🙂 I am empathic, reactiv, supportiv ( if it´s interesting!! so let´s guess, it´s a good story!…:) I talk silently to the person I am hearing and seeing, all the senses are awake and activ to follow the storyline. It´s a resonant communication between the storyteller and me.
Listening to something recorded is more a consuming perception, sort of floating away inside with what my senses can receive, the own inner pictures are more in my awareness. The difference between a book and a film – to flatten it: the book is mainly imaginary mindwork, which may lead to emotion and eventually to knowledge and understanding, the film goes through the emotion to the imaginary mindwork, and – if, as well a good film – to knowledge and understanding. Both can have the aim to entertain or to educate, to enrich through experience or to give impulses through questioning, IF and only if they are holding quality. And that´s a vast field 😉 What is appropriate, what is quality?!
When someone is telling a story, especially if He/She is a good storyteller I can get lost in my own imagination. I build the story in my Head.
Comparing it to a movie even if its the same story it will definitely differ from your story in your head. The movie has no free space for your own imagination and shows one interpretation of the story.
1. Describe how people listen to a) a person telling a story and b) a recording of a story.
Depending on the person, a good story teller can surely captivate her audience in a way that a recording (even of the same good story teller) never could. There certainly is another sort of energy if the story teller is physically present.
2. Characterize the difference in inner and outer activity between reading a book and watching a movie.
While from the outside it may look very similar, reading requires the use of one’s imagination. Also more concentration is needed. I can’t read too well in a noisy environment. I’d say reading is more active comared to watching a film.
3. While looking at a) a painting (e.g. Renoir, Monet, Picasso), b) a holiday photograph and c) a cartoon,
a) the spectator will surely admire it and maybe even try to interpret what the artist was trying to express.
b) I think here we usually have a personal connection between the spectator and the people on the photograph.
c) If it is just one single picture, people will probably try to look for the punch line to get what the artist’s intention was.
1.People listen to someone telling a story by closely observing the person who is talking, looking for clues in their expressions and gestures to help understand what is being told. If a recording is playing, people will usually look somewhere that is not distracting and then focus completely on the faculty of listening. In some ways, simply listening to a recording is a more personal experience and one that is less engaged with the outside world. One stays more with oneself and is more within one’s own world of imagination.
2. Reading a book is also a more personal experience, where one’s imagination can flow freely. While we are reading a book, we are not engaging with the world around us, but we are completely immersed in the story and our imagination around the story. Watching a movie is certainly a much more passive activity. It takes little effort and energy and we don’t have to be much engaged to understand what is happening. If we are watching the movie together with other people however, it can also become a social experience to some extent. We are going through the experience of watching the movie together with others at the same time.
3.The painting and the photograph I think also have qualities that allow for the imagination to become active. The painting feels more alive and flexible, and one can imagine entering the painting and even influencing or changing the scene. The photograph feels more like a backdrop to something that could take place in the imagination. It gives us a good sense of the place, but it does not feel as flexible.
1. a) Mostly, the listener looks at the storytelleror is able to watch him/her. Therefore, the listener can watch how the storyteller tells the story, for example the bodylanguage, gestures and mimic which accompanies the storytelling. > outer activity of the listener is more afforded
b) in contrast to that, poeple who listen to a recording of a story cannot watch the storyteller and therefore other forms of language (gestures…) do not add further meaning to the words. The storyteller is more a voice than a whole person. > inner activity
2. Reading a book, your imagination is recquired. You have to create your own images or your own “movie”. And this creative process of imagination is based on your own individual set of experiences. Watching a movie, you use your senses (eyes and ears), and what you perceive is the product of someone else’s imagination. The way of translating the various codes (words and images+noises) is different.
3. A painting does not only convey a message by the image which it represents. There is also a message or infomation within the way it has been created/constructed/made and its relation to reality. A holiday photograph is more like what it shows, a snapshot of a real moment, which is situated in the past. A cartoon tells a whole story/ a plot.
As I look at a painting, for me it takes a lot of time because I like trying to perceive the different layers that a piece of art consists of. I like it to meditate on what that painting means to me, what it tells me and what I feel looking at it. Looking at a holiday photograph contains a more sentimental quality. I look at a photograph in order to remember a past moment in my life or a friend shows me a photograph in order to tell me about his/her past experiences.
I really enjoyed listening to stories told by people, mostly because I was able to fall into “listening mode” being able to relax, close my eyes and imagine the world I was told about. When looking at a comic I wanted to see the next pictures before really taking in the details of drawing. I also felt remembered to when I tried to draw comics and with that a certain degree of frustration of not being able to draw with hard outlines.
I really don’t like going to the cinema because I always feel like I am completely drawn into the story and I have no way to resist. Then when the film is over and I leave the cinema it always takes me at least 5 to 10 minutes to come back to real life.
In books I am always very much drawn into the story, sometimes so much that I have to stop reading for a few minutes to just get to terms with the situation I (the main character) ended up in. But it never happens to me that I feel like I am losing control and when I put the book away I don’t need time to come back to the real world.
1) People will listen to others telling them a story while being physically present in a very different way than to a recording of the same story. A recording has no body language, no limbs and face to emphasize certain aspects of the story and the act of speaking itself. The same is true for live streams and video conferences, where we can see our counterpart but can not fully receive their (in lack of a better word) presence. A recording might be better suited to transport mere facts, though.
2) While movies represent the vision of their respective makers, reading a book will have its reader inevitably come up with their own visualization in their mind. These inner pictures will be very individual, depending on previous experiences and associations of the reader.
Of course, they can be influenced and shaped by the books cover art or having watched a movie adaptation first. For example, if you have seen the Harry Potter films before reading the books, you will most likely see Daniel Radcliffe in your mind while reading about Harry.
What’s interesting is that this effect can also be seen in real life, where the apperances of actors “overwrite” how people remember faces of acutal people. For example when I think of Nelson Mandela, I see Morgan Freeman and when I think of Johnny Cash, I see Joaquin Phoenix.
3) I can’t tell much about this one, because I’m not really an art person. I rarely look at paintings in a way that goes beyond “that looks nice”.
I’m also not really a photo person but when I do look at old photos they immediately trigger memories and laughter.
Cartoons are something I watch in the form of moving images, not really in the form of still pictures, so whatever I could say about that would fall in the movies category.
Q1 – In comparison to audio records, personal telling creates a deeper and more sensual impact on the listeners, as they do not only hear a voice, but are also able to observe the movements, mimic and the entire body language of the story telling person.
Q2 – Generally, reading a book will open a large room for feelings, senses and imaginations. The reader is able to create his internal world, according to individual phantasy, whereas TV movies already present a determined setting and surrounding, limiting space for own images. Frequently, people who have already read certain books and afterwards watch a movie are quite disappointed, as they had created a completely different picture on the basis of the book.
Q3 – Looking at paintings usually requires some time, if one really wants to take a look at every detail and to find out more behind the scenes of the bespoke piece of artwork. The more often one looks at a painting, the more little details you may find and add them to your overall impression, which consequently may change over the time. A holiday photography in contrary reflects one’s owns experiences and memories – which may be positive or negative. Due to the experiences made the usually to not provide much space for additional interpretations. Cartoons mostly do not attract the full attention to the images, but are more diverged by the speaking bubbles. So they do not go that deep in the world of imagination.
I strongly agree with Tobias and couldn’t put it better myself.
A few years ago, while I was on the train, I overheard someone complaining about his partner. The reason for that was “he won’t stop reading, how selfish!”. Then the person kept on going on and on and on about how reading is the most solitary thing one could do.
There is something selfish about reading, that is, if you read for yourself only. You can be watching a movie, going to the museum, showing your holiday pictures, listening to a tale or going to a concert with someone else -therefore directly experiencing and sharing something- with someone, whereas reading is more thought of as a solitary activity – at least for me- . That being said, even if you watch a movie with someone, you might not see the same things. There’s always a mediate and immediate experience.
1. I suppose there is a considerable difference between the two listening activities.
a) If we listen to a person telling a story, we receive the message in a double manner, namely through our visual and auditory senses. We can observe the speaker’s body language and listen to their story at the same time. The gestures and mimic expressions make a palpable emotional impact on us as viewers and reinforce the verbal information.
b) If we listen to a story that has been recorded, we focus on the nonverbal fashion of presenting. We pay our full attention to the rhythm and the pace of speech as well as to the pitch of the voice. Due to the fact that we are not provided with any visual input, we are impelled to use our imagination and create inner images of the story.
2. While reading a book I create vivid images in my mind. These images have a very unique and individual character. They are a mixture of images that I’ve seen in my life but my brain puts them together in a new imaginative way, I suppose.
The images in my mind are not as clear as authentic images such as photos or pictures. Still, they create a vivid imprint in my memory. It also means that I take an active part in the process of imagining. Whereas watching a move puts me in passive mode of picture reception. While watch a movie I’m presented with all kinds of colourful images that are in a constant motion accompanied by sound effects. My brain stays active and needs to analyze countless bits of visual and acoustic information but my imagination remains fairly inactive.
I’ve noticed that while I’m reading, my body can be as tense as while I’m watching a film that keeps me on the edge of my seat. Also, my eyes are glued to a page of a book while reading, similarly as to a TV Screen, while watching. There are two phrases that come to my mind when I think about outer activities while reading.
3. a) looking at a painting is one of my favourite free time activities. I enjoy walking through painting exhibitions and looking a long while at a chosen work of art. Although a painting shows us inanimate objects or scenes, I often imagine the story behind it by asking myself questions and attempting to give some answers. Some of the paintings I’ve seen have left strong emotional impressions on me, a kind of awe and a feeling of connectedness.
b) holiday photos always evoke nostalgic memories which turn into stories about the past. They make me reminisce about times that will never return and often offer me new insights into my current life situation and self-image.
c) a cartoon is thought provoking. It’s meaning needs to be inferred from the image which intent is often satirical and humorous. It also contains one or some pieces of text. That is why, when looking at a cartoon we tend to analyse and evaluate to get the gist of the image-text combination. We are not as engaged in accessing and appreciating aesthetic qualities of the illustration as in making sense of the depicted content.
Q1: Actually, if it’s a good recording it can be as captivating as a person reading a story. The only difference is that the eyes have something to focus on or to “come back to”. Maybe it’s easier for the mind to wander off (imagination), while only listening.
Q2: While watching a movie, more senses are “captivated” – meaning that we don’t have to imagine much. Maybe one could say that it’s a more passive activity than reading a book and more emotions can triggered quite fast.
Q3: Again, I think it’s more passive and emotional in a way when you look at holiday photos. As for contemplating a painting our imagination is triggered to “ask” more questions, in comparison to knowing who took the photo, where it was taken, etc.
Q3:
Just some of my observations and thoughts:
Overall, these questions about different media and our connection as well as reaction to them already shows the great diversity and creativity of media.
For example, when children are listening to a person telling a story they tend to be more focused and interested than listening to a record. In my opinion, due to the physical distance and, therefore, the lack of identification as well as familiar mimics and gestures.
Regarding the difference(s) between engaging with a book or a movie the social aspect of it is what comes to my mind. So, reading is foremost an individual act that you perform often alone. Depending on your personal experience and imagination individual images come to mind. Whereas watching a movie can be a group activity, which also transports you to an already envisioned world.
This can be also perceived in the process of looking at art and at a personal photograph. But here you also have different transformation and imagination/interpretation processes (own feelings as reaction to someone else’s impression versus own feelings as reaction to own impression/experience).
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17 Comments
It’s funny how we all think about a responsible way of using “media” in the class but do not realize that we all could easily start with ourselves every day by using our own voice consciously. Rudolf Steiner knew well why we have been taught in “Sprachgestaltung”!
A good storyteller and a well written book or an appealing painting can capture your attention for quite a long time. They reach me on a deeper level than the other media mentioned, because they nourish my imagination. I especially love storytelling, because the person doing it adds so much of his / her personality into it.
It is so funny to realize that a book, compared to a TV, is an highly interactive medium as it requires permanent actions. You have to flip pages, while on TV you just keep watching without moving a muscle for hours.
Another difference is the gestures / body language of the person listening. In front of a TV, or in a cinema, you sit more or less motionless in your chair or on a sofa, but listening to someone telling a story in front of you, you react (mostly unaware) with smiles, shifting positions, crossing arms etc. Fascinating.
As I am my own Research-object I think this categorization doesn´t apply to everyone. Maybe it´s not the usual way to react/ or not-react but I actually move a lot when watching a movie. My facial Expression changes with the emotional Situation in the movie/video 😀 However, I do that a lot more while listening to an actual Person.
Reading a book I feel like living in another world. I read pretty much motionless and exept for the page-turning movement I don´t do or notice anything around me.
I can feel a big difference between watching movies and reading a book on an emotional level.
After I saw a movie/series I feel like “thrown back” into the present moment, I sometimes have trouble coping with that Situation. The longer the movie, the more intense I feel that “lost” feeling. Reading a book doesn´t have that effect on me. I´m not distracted and overloaded with impressions, so I stay in the “real world”.
I hope that description makes sense 😀
Listening to someone telling a story is a dialog to me 🙂 I am empathic, reactiv, supportiv ( if it´s interesting!! so let´s guess, it´s a good story!…:) I talk silently to the person I am hearing and seeing, all the senses are awake and activ to follow the storyline. It´s a resonant communication between the storyteller and me.
Listening to something recorded is more a consuming perception, sort of floating away inside with what my senses can receive, the own inner pictures are more in my awareness. The difference between a book and a film – to flatten it: the book is mainly imaginary mindwork, which may lead to emotion and eventually to knowledge and understanding, the film goes through the emotion to the imaginary mindwork, and – if, as well a good film – to knowledge and understanding. Both can have the aim to entertain or to educate, to enrich through experience or to give impulses through questioning, IF and only if they are holding quality. And that´s a vast field 😉 What is appropriate, what is quality?!
When someone is telling a story, especially if He/She is a good storyteller I can get lost in my own imagination. I build the story in my Head.
Comparing it to a movie even if its the same story it will definitely differ from your story in your head. The movie has no free space for your own imagination and shows one interpretation of the story.
1. Describe how people listen to a) a person telling a story and b) a recording of a story.
Depending on the person, a good story teller can surely captivate her audience in a way that a recording (even of the same good story teller) never could. There certainly is another sort of energy if the story teller is physically present.
2. Characterize the difference in inner and outer activity between reading a book and watching a movie.
While from the outside it may look very similar, reading requires the use of one’s imagination. Also more concentration is needed. I can’t read too well in a noisy environment. I’d say reading is more active comared to watching a film.
3. While looking at a) a painting (e.g. Renoir, Monet, Picasso), b) a holiday photograph and c) a cartoon,
a) the spectator will surely admire it and maybe even try to interpret what the artist was trying to express.
b) I think here we usually have a personal connection between the spectator and the people on the photograph.
c) If it is just one single picture, people will probably try to look for the punch line to get what the artist’s intention was.
1.People listen to someone telling a story by closely observing the person who is talking, looking for clues in their expressions and gestures to help understand what is being told. If a recording is playing, people will usually look somewhere that is not distracting and then focus completely on the faculty of listening. In some ways, simply listening to a recording is a more personal experience and one that is less engaged with the outside world. One stays more with oneself and is more within one’s own world of imagination.
2. Reading a book is also a more personal experience, where one’s imagination can flow freely. While we are reading a book, we are not engaging with the world around us, but we are completely immersed in the story and our imagination around the story. Watching a movie is certainly a much more passive activity. It takes little effort and energy and we don’t have to be much engaged to understand what is happening. If we are watching the movie together with other people however, it can also become a social experience to some extent. We are going through the experience of watching the movie together with others at the same time.
3.The painting and the photograph I think also have qualities that allow for the imagination to become active. The painting feels more alive and flexible, and one can imagine entering the painting and even influencing or changing the scene. The photograph feels more like a backdrop to something that could take place in the imagination. It gives us a good sense of the place, but it does not feel as flexible.
1. a) Mostly, the listener looks at the storytelleror is able to watch him/her. Therefore, the listener can watch how the storyteller tells the story, for example the bodylanguage, gestures and mimic which accompanies the storytelling. > outer activity of the listener is more afforded
b) in contrast to that, poeple who listen to a recording of a story cannot watch the storyteller and therefore other forms of language (gestures…) do not add further meaning to the words. The storyteller is more a voice than a whole person. > inner activity
2. Reading a book, your imagination is recquired. You have to create your own images or your own “movie”. And this creative process of imagination is based on your own individual set of experiences. Watching a movie, you use your senses (eyes and ears), and what you perceive is the product of someone else’s imagination. The way of translating the various codes (words and images+noises) is different.
3. A painting does not only convey a message by the image which it represents. There is also a message or infomation within the way it has been created/constructed/made and its relation to reality. A holiday photograph is more like what it shows, a snapshot of a real moment, which is situated in the past. A cartoon tells a whole story/ a plot.
As I look at a painting, for me it takes a lot of time because I like trying to perceive the different layers that a piece of art consists of. I like it to meditate on what that painting means to me, what it tells me and what I feel looking at it. Looking at a holiday photograph contains a more sentimental quality. I look at a photograph in order to remember a past moment in my life or a friend shows me a photograph in order to tell me about his/her past experiences.
I really enjoyed listening to stories told by people, mostly because I was able to fall into “listening mode” being able to relax, close my eyes and imagine the world I was told about. When looking at a comic I wanted to see the next pictures before really taking in the details of drawing. I also felt remembered to when I tried to draw comics and with that a certain degree of frustration of not being able to draw with hard outlines.
I really don’t like going to the cinema because I always feel like I am completely drawn into the story and I have no way to resist. Then when the film is over and I leave the cinema it always takes me at least 5 to 10 minutes to come back to real life.
In books I am always very much drawn into the story, sometimes so much that I have to stop reading for a few minutes to just get to terms with the situation I (the main character) ended up in. But it never happens to me that I feel like I am losing control and when I put the book away I don’t need time to come back to the real world.
1) People will listen to others telling them a story while being physically present in a very different way than to a recording of the same story. A recording has no body language, no limbs and face to emphasize certain aspects of the story and the act of speaking itself. The same is true for live streams and video conferences, where we can see our counterpart but can not fully receive their (in lack of a better word) presence. A recording might be better suited to transport mere facts, though.
2) While movies represent the vision of their respective makers, reading a book will have its reader inevitably come up with their own visualization in their mind. These inner pictures will be very individual, depending on previous experiences and associations of the reader.
Of course, they can be influenced and shaped by the books cover art or having watched a movie adaptation first. For example, if you have seen the Harry Potter films before reading the books, you will most likely see Daniel Radcliffe in your mind while reading about Harry.
What’s interesting is that this effect can also be seen in real life, where the apperances of actors “overwrite” how people remember faces of acutal people. For example when I think of Nelson Mandela, I see Morgan Freeman and when I think of Johnny Cash, I see Joaquin Phoenix.
3) I can’t tell much about this one, because I’m not really an art person. I rarely look at paintings in a way that goes beyond “that looks nice”.
I’m also not really a photo person but when I do look at old photos they immediately trigger memories and laughter.
Cartoons are something I watch in the form of moving images, not really in the form of still pictures, so whatever I could say about that would fall in the movies category.
Q1 – In comparison to audio records, personal telling creates a deeper and more sensual impact on the listeners, as they do not only hear a voice, but are also able to observe the movements, mimic and the entire body language of the story telling person.
Q2 – Generally, reading a book will open a large room for feelings, senses and imaginations. The reader is able to create his internal world, according to individual phantasy, whereas TV movies already present a determined setting and surrounding, limiting space for own images. Frequently, people who have already read certain books and afterwards watch a movie are quite disappointed, as they had created a completely different picture on the basis of the book.
Q3 – Looking at paintings usually requires some time, if one really wants to take a look at every detail and to find out more behind the scenes of the bespoke piece of artwork. The more often one looks at a painting, the more little details you may find and add them to your overall impression, which consequently may change over the time. A holiday photography in contrary reflects one’s owns experiences and memories – which may be positive or negative. Due to the experiences made the usually to not provide much space for additional interpretations. Cartoons mostly do not attract the full attention to the images, but are more diverged by the speaking bubbles. So they do not go that deep in the world of imagination.
I strongly agree with Tobias and couldn’t put it better myself.
A few years ago, while I was on the train, I overheard someone complaining about his partner. The reason for that was “he won’t stop reading, how selfish!”. Then the person kept on going on and on and on about how reading is the most solitary thing one could do.
There is something selfish about reading, that is, if you read for yourself only. You can be watching a movie, going to the museum, showing your holiday pictures, listening to a tale or going to a concert with someone else -therefore directly experiencing and sharing something- with someone, whereas reading is more thought of as a solitary activity – at least for me- . That being said, even if you watch a movie with someone, you might not see the same things. There’s always a mediate and immediate experience.
1. I suppose there is a considerable difference between the two listening activities.
a) If we listen to a person telling a story, we receive the message in a double manner, namely through our visual and auditory senses. We can observe the speaker’s body language and listen to their story at the same time. The gestures and mimic expressions make a palpable emotional impact on us as viewers and reinforce the verbal information.
b) If we listen to a story that has been recorded, we focus on the nonverbal fashion of presenting. We pay our full attention to the rhythm and the pace of speech as well as to the pitch of the voice. Due to the fact that we are not provided with any visual input, we are impelled to use our imagination and create inner images of the story.
2. While reading a book I create vivid images in my mind. These images have a very unique and individual character. They are a mixture of images that I’ve seen in my life but my brain puts them together in a new imaginative way, I suppose.
The images in my mind are not as clear as authentic images such as photos or pictures. Still, they create a vivid imprint in my memory. It also means that I take an active part in the process of imagining. Whereas watching a move puts me in passive mode of picture reception. While watch a movie I’m presented with all kinds of colourful images that are in a constant motion accompanied by sound effects. My brain stays active and needs to analyze countless bits of visual and acoustic information but my imagination remains fairly inactive.
I’ve noticed that while I’m reading, my body can be as tense as while I’m watching a film that keeps me on the edge of my seat. Also, my eyes are glued to a page of a book while reading, similarly as to a TV Screen, while watching. There are two phrases that come to my mind when I think about outer activities while reading.
3. a) looking at a painting is one of my favourite free time activities. I enjoy walking through painting exhibitions and looking a long while at a chosen work of art. Although a painting shows us inanimate objects or scenes, I often imagine the story behind it by asking myself questions and attempting to give some answers. Some of the paintings I’ve seen have left strong emotional impressions on me, a kind of awe and a feeling of connectedness.
b) holiday photos always evoke nostalgic memories which turn into stories about the past. They make me reminisce about times that will never return and often offer me new insights into my current life situation and self-image.
c) a cartoon is thought provoking. It’s meaning needs to be inferred from the image which intent is often satirical and humorous. It also contains one or some pieces of text. That is why, when looking at a cartoon we tend to analyse and evaluate to get the gist of the image-text combination. We are not as engaged in accessing and appreciating aesthetic qualities of the illustration as in making sense of the depicted content.
Q1: Actually, if it’s a good recording it can be as captivating as a person reading a story. The only difference is that the eyes have something to focus on or to “come back to”. Maybe it’s easier for the mind to wander off (imagination), while only listening.
Q2: While watching a movie, more senses are “captivated” – meaning that we don’t have to imagine much. Maybe one could say that it’s a more passive activity than reading a book and more emotions can triggered quite fast.
Q3: Again, I think it’s more passive and emotional in a way when you look at holiday photos. As for contemplating a painting our imagination is triggered to “ask” more questions, in comparison to knowing who took the photo, where it was taken, etc.
Q3:
Just some of my observations and thoughts:
Overall, these questions about different media and our connection as well as reaction to them already shows the great diversity and creativity of media.
For example, when children are listening to a person telling a story they tend to be more focused and interested than listening to a record. In my opinion, due to the physical distance and, therefore, the lack of identification as well as familiar mimics and gestures.
Regarding the difference(s) between engaging with a book or a movie the social aspect of it is what comes to my mind. So, reading is foremost an individual act that you perform often alone. Depending on your personal experience and imagination individual images come to mind. Whereas watching a movie can be a group activity, which also transports you to an already envisioned world.
This can be also perceived in the process of looking at art and at a personal photograph. But here you also have different transformation and imagination/interpretation processes (own feelings as reaction to someone else’s impression versus own feelings as reaction to own impression/experience).