I Love Plastics : A diffractive material-cultural analysis of human-plastic relationships in Finnish cultural landscape based on Yle's plastic awareness campaign
Onali, Alma (2021)
Onali, Alma
2021
Master's Programme in Cultural Studies
Informaatioteknologian ja viestinnän tiedekunta - Faculty of Information Technology and Communication Sciences
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Hyväksymispäivämäärä
2021-03-31
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202103122539
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202103122539
Tiivistelmä
As plastics have reached both the deepest oceanic corners and orbits in space, as sea creatures choke on plastic bags and plastic particles of different sizes accumulate around the globe, it has been acknowledged that we are living amongst a “plastic crisis”. However, a life without plastics does not seem to be possible anymore. Thus, something in the relationship between human beings and plastics needs to change.
This study analyses human-plastic relationships in a Finnish cultural context. My data consists of multimodal media content produced for the Finnish public broadcaster Yle in spring 2019 under the plastic awareness campaign called I Love Plastics. I approach this data through new materialist and posthumanist theories, in order to explore the ways how plastics and human beings and materially and culturally entangled. These theoretical and philosophical fields answer scholarly to the ecological crises of contemporary times through rethinking the concept of human and attuning to the affective, intra-active becomings in assemblages that consist of human and more-than-human actants. The method used is a diffractive material-cultural analysis, which follows a rhizomatic way of producing knowledge. Diffractive reading is an interpretive methodology that sees research as a “practice of entanglement”, where different texts, theories and concepts are read through each other. This methodology does not only apply for the analysis in this work, but it is a research practice and a tool for thinking that runs through the whole thesis.
The first aim of this study is to produce new insights on the complexity of human-plastic phenomena and conceptualize different kinds of modes of becoming-with plastics in the situated context of Finnish culture and society, and even touch upon the ethico-political aspects of these becomings. The idea is to observe what kind of human beings emerge from plastic entanglements, and how and why are these processes unfolding in our society. The second objective is to contribute to the methodological development of new materialist and posthumanist studies and to explore the empirical possibilities of these theories.
The analysis starts with a critical observation of the hegemonic consumer-subject. After that, I move on to map out historical, cultural and affective becomings related to specific plastic artefacts, such as plastic buckets, nylon stockings and film material. My analysis is culminated in the last chapter, where I present my figuration of becoming-sober, which is a conceptual ethical subjectivity that is inspired by plastics. This becoming hints towards a new, collective subjectivity, that is committed to dealing with plastic troubles in an ethical, creative, affirmative and compassionate way. Altogether, my analysis shows that our relationship with plastics is by no means rational or straight, and thus our plastic relations are not simply stories of capitalistic malice or greedy laziness, but they are also stories of affirmative action, desire, and joyous encounters
I propose that a more deeper and nuanced, culturally and materially complex understanding of plastic relations is needed in order to cultivate curiosity and thus, inspire change. My conclusion is that when we think actively with plastics and become aware of their affective materiality, a window for change through affirmative becomings opens up. These changes are not big or radical, but as they accumulate, the results can be crucial for the future of this planet.
This study analyses human-plastic relationships in a Finnish cultural context. My data consists of multimodal media content produced for the Finnish public broadcaster Yle in spring 2019 under the plastic awareness campaign called I Love Plastics. I approach this data through new materialist and posthumanist theories, in order to explore the ways how plastics and human beings and materially and culturally entangled. These theoretical and philosophical fields answer scholarly to the ecological crises of contemporary times through rethinking the concept of human and attuning to the affective, intra-active becomings in assemblages that consist of human and more-than-human actants. The method used is a diffractive material-cultural analysis, which follows a rhizomatic way of producing knowledge. Diffractive reading is an interpretive methodology that sees research as a “practice of entanglement”, where different texts, theories and concepts are read through each other. This methodology does not only apply for the analysis in this work, but it is a research practice and a tool for thinking that runs through the whole thesis.
The first aim of this study is to produce new insights on the complexity of human-plastic phenomena and conceptualize different kinds of modes of becoming-with plastics in the situated context of Finnish culture and society, and even touch upon the ethico-political aspects of these becomings. The idea is to observe what kind of human beings emerge from plastic entanglements, and how and why are these processes unfolding in our society. The second objective is to contribute to the methodological development of new materialist and posthumanist studies and to explore the empirical possibilities of these theories.
The analysis starts with a critical observation of the hegemonic consumer-subject. After that, I move on to map out historical, cultural and affective becomings related to specific plastic artefacts, such as plastic buckets, nylon stockings and film material. My analysis is culminated in the last chapter, where I present my figuration of becoming-sober, which is a conceptual ethical subjectivity that is inspired by plastics. This becoming hints towards a new, collective subjectivity, that is committed to dealing with plastic troubles in an ethical, creative, affirmative and compassionate way. Altogether, my analysis shows that our relationship with plastics is by no means rational or straight, and thus our plastic relations are not simply stories of capitalistic malice or greedy laziness, but they are also stories of affirmative action, desire, and joyous encounters
I propose that a more deeper and nuanced, culturally and materially complex understanding of plastic relations is needed in order to cultivate curiosity and thus, inspire change. My conclusion is that when we think actively with plastics and become aware of their affective materiality, a window for change through affirmative becomings opens up. These changes are not big or radical, but as they accumulate, the results can be crucial for the future of this planet.