Sign Here! Handwriting in the Age of New Media 2006

Repositorium für die Medienwissenschaft Sonja Neef, José van Dijck, Eric Ketelaar u.a. (Hg.) Sign Here! Handwriting in the Age of New Media 2006 https://doi.org/10.5117/9789053568163 Veröffentlichungsversion / published version Buch / book Empfohlene Zitierung / Suggested Citation: Neef, Sonja; van Dijck, José; Ketelaar, Eric (Hg.): Sign Here! Handwriting in the Age of New Media. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press 2006. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5117/9789053568163. Nutzungsbedingungen: Terms of use: Dieser Text wird unter einer Creative Commons BY-NC 4.0 Lizenz This document is made available under a creative commons BY- zur Verfügung gestellt. Nähere Auskünfte zu dieser Lizenz finden NC 4.0 License. For more information see: Sie hier: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0 Sign Here! Handwriting in the Age of New Media features a number of articles from different fi elds, reaching from cultural and media S studies to literature, fi lm and art, and from philosophy and information studies to law and archival studies. Questions addressed in I this book are: Will handwriting disappear in the age of new (digital) media? What happens to important cultural and legal concepts, G such as original, copy, authenticity, reproducibility, uniqueness, and SIGN iterability? Where is the writing hand to be located if handwriting is N performed not immediately ‘by hand’ but when it is (re)mediated by electronic or artistic media? H Sonja Neef is junior-professor of European Media and Culture at the Bauhaus University Weimar/Germany. E José van Dijck is Professor of Media and Culture at the University HERE! of Amsterdam and chair of the Media Studies department. R Eric Ketelaar is Professor of Archival Science in the Department of Handwriting in the Age Mediastudies of the University of Amsterdam, and Honorary Pro- E fessor in the Faculty of Information Technology at Monash Univer- sity, Melbourne. ! of New Media Sign Here! Handwriting in the Age of New Media is the fi rst part in KetelaarEric(eds.)Dijck/ vanJosé /Sonja Neef the series Transformations in Art and Culture. Amsterdam University Press www.aup.nl Edited by Sonja Neef / José van Dijck / Eric Ketelaar isbn-13 978-90-5356-816-3 isbn-10 90-5356-816-6 Amsterdam University Press Sign Here! Transformations in Art and Culture The series Transformations in Art and Culture is dedicated to the study of historical and contemporary transformations in arts and culture, emphasizing processes of cultural change as they manifest themselves over time, through space, and in various media. Main goal of the series is to examine the effects of globalization, commercialization and technologization on the form, content, meaning and functioning of cultural products and socio-cultural practices. New means of cultural expression give meaning to our existence, and give rise to new modes of artistic expression, interaction, and community formation. Books in this series will primarily concentrate on contemporary changes in cultural practices, but will always account for their historical roots. The Publication of this book is made possible by the Dutch Research Organisation, nwo Cover design and layout Frederik de Wal, Schelluinen isbn- 13 978 90 5356 816 3 isbn- 10 90 5356 816 6 nur 674 © Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam, 2006 All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the written permission of both the copyright owner and the author of the book. Sign Here! Handwriting in the Age of Edited by Sonja Neef, José van Dijck, and Eric Ketelaar Amsterdam University Press Table of Contents 7 Sign Here! Handwriting in the Age of Technical Reproduction: Introduction José van Dijck and Sonja Neef Section One: Authentic Copies 23 Authentic Events: The Diaries of Anne Frank and the Alleged Diaries of Adolf Hitler Sonja Neef 51 The Authority of Drawing: Hand, Authenticity, and Authorship Michael Wetzel 60 Authenticity and Objectivity in Scientific Communication: Implications of Digital Media John Mackenzie Owen 76 Authenticity in Bits and Bytes Hannelore Dekeyser Section Two: Re-Mediating Handwriting 95 Signature Identity Content: Handwriting in an Age of Digital Remediation Richard Grusin 116 Writing the Self: Of Diaries and Weblogs José van Dijck 134 Hands on the Document: Arnold Dreyblatt’s T Archive Arnold Dreyblatt and Jeffrey Wallen Table of Contents 150 Faithfully Submitted: The Logic of the Signature in Marcel Proust’s A la recherche Mieke Bal 164 (Hand)writing Film History: Saul Bass Draws Martin Scorsese in a Title Sequence and Writes his Name Underneath Rembert Hüser Section Three: Handwriting and (Dis-)Embodiment 183 Writing on Archiving Machines Eric Ketelaar 196 Blood Samples and Fingerprint Files: Blood as Artificial Matter, Artistic Material, and Means of the Signature Thomas Fechner-Smarsly 206 Writing Over the Body, Writing With the Body: On Shirin Neshat’s Women of Allah Series Begüm Özden Firat 221 Perfor/m/ative Writing: Tattoo, Mark, Signature Sonja Neef 237 Contributors 241 Illustration Acknowledgement 242 Index 6 Sign Here! / Introduction 1. The ‘please-do-not-write-by-pen’-sign José van Dijck and Sonja Neef 7 Sign Here! Handwriting in the Age of : Introduction On some computer screens, particularly large projection screens used for class- room presentations, you may find a peculiar pictogram, showing a right hand holding a pen, crossed out by a bold red diagonal line – not unlike a non-smoking sign – conveying the warning ‘do not write here’.1 Against a backdrop of an old- fashioned blackboard in the seminar room, the sign takes on a historical meaning. Indeed, we only rarely write with chalk or pen these days, as our private desktops and public classrooms are inundated with computers and media equipment, and our writing tools mostly consist of keyboards, screens, and projectors. Handwrit- ing, in the age of the Internet and digital media, is considered by many to be a back- ward technique, a slowly deteriorating and gradually vanishing tradition, and the myth of its decline is as widespread as the pictogram. After all, the sign addresses only those rare specimens of the human race who are, as of yet, unfamiliar with the very basic principles of multimedia. Like the non-smoking sign, ‘writing without a pen’ is now supposed to become the default mode in our contemporary class- room. Ever since the invention and spread of moveable type in modern times and of the typewriter in the late-19th century, the idiosyncrasy of manual writing has given way to standardized, replicable, power-driven letters produced by machines. With the advent of word processors, the significance of ‘hand’ in conjunction with ‘writing’ is expected to diminish even further, as the cultural emphasis on digital flexibility and infinite manipulation is displacing values traditionally attached to handwriting, such as authenticity, uniqueness, and personality. But despite the 8 Sign Here! / Introduction widespread and invasive mechanization of writing, the power and meaning of handwriting goes way beyond its standardizing instruments of inscription. Hand- writing has given rise to a number of cultural practices, such as letter writing, and cultural forms, such as diaries or Post-it notes. Moreover, handwriting is also an aesthetic category that we still uniquely associate with a manual craft: from callig- raphy to urban graffiti, from tattooing to signing, the physical, the human hand is pivotal in the production of letters and texts. Will handwriting actually disappear in the age of new (digital) media? In fact, we argue in this volume that this question is philosophically and historically incor- rect. It is philosophically erroneous because it presumes a teleological relationship between media and their ensuing practices and forms. Technologies, cultural practices and forms, however, always change in conjunction with each other, and al- though specific apparatuses may be displaced in the course of time, related forms and practices hardly ever vanish. If we look at the history of handwriting, we may notice that in spite of the emergence of generations of ‘writing machines’, manual script has never disappeared; on the contrary, as it evolved, handwriting adjusted its practical functions, social meanings and cultural aesthetics. The introduction of the typewriter, for instance, shifted the emphasis to the standardization of script, but it may even have increased the notion of authenticity associated with handwriting. The invention of machines like the Xerox copier or the digital scanner once again shifted the use and meaning of handwriting by enabling the reproduction of individual handwriting, and, in the case of Optical Character Reading (ocr) as it is also used in the latest invention of the tablet PC, the automatic tran- scription of manual script into typeface. In addition, technologies that are not immediately script-related, such as photography and film, also affected the cultural meaning of handwriting, if only because these technologies allowed for an exact ‘recording’ of the manual act or its product. Handwriting, in other words, has never disappeared in the wake of new technologies, but has always adjusted its use and meaning in the face of larger technological, social, and cultural transformations. It is therefore hard to believe that handwriting will vanish, as long as its technologies are intimately tied to particular cultural practices and forms that are con- tinued in the present. Technologies, forms, and practices are inscribed with cultural values that change along with larger social and cultural transformations. Important cultural concepts, such as original and copy, authenticity, reproducibility, uniqueness, or iterability, are never anchored once and for all because the cultural value of these concepts shifts with every innovation or transformation.

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