Viewing, Participating, Contributing: A “Visual Signification”

I seem to be “stuck” in the realm of signification. On the one hand, I don’t want to stretch the concept too thin; on the other, I see value in de/constructing relationships and representations within and between language as well as other “signification” systems. Last week, I composed a creation myth using “Gloria” and “Trinh” as characters, relating their notions of Borderlands and difference to signification. I suggested that Anzaldua has complicated the signified (mestiza consciousness), and Trinh has complicated the signifier (I/me/you/we). The week before, we discussed Gates’s theory of signifyin(g) and its relationship to signifying. Now, I’d like to look at our proposed art installation as a form of signification through visual representation, and consider how this perspective provides additional means for unpacking the concepts of subjectivities and objectivities.

To take a step back, our installation project (as we describe in our proposal) is built on Hawhee’s conception of invention-in-the-middle, which disrupts the binary between invention as discovery and invention as creation. The participatory aspect of the installation ensures that invention is constant and dynamic as viewers move throughout the space and reflect and refract across the array of mirrors. These reflections and refractions interact in ways that are not fully controlled by individuals; instead, they intersect, build, and dissolve like the colors of a kaleidoscope. The invention of the installation is not solely dependent on discovery or creation, but rather exists in each kairotic encounter (as Amanda helped me understand) of the participant-viewers. Additionally, Foss and Griffin’s explanation of “invitational rhetoric” serves as the basis for encouraging viewers to contribute to the installation. Instead of an artist or architect providing a static installation, this project includes ways for viewers to contribute to the invention process.

As a whole, the installation is meant to be a visual representation of feminism, as seen through the theories of Hawhee as well as Foss and Griffin. In other words, feminism is the signified and the installation is the signifier—a visual version of signification, if you will. But, this installation also complicates the process of signification, making it intersubjective as well as malleable and ever-changing.

Bringing it back to “invitational rhetoric,” which contrasts with traditional, patriarchal rhetoric, I can see the interplay of subjects and subjectivities in the installation. In the more traditional model of rhetoric, the rhetor retains a centralized position and persuades the audience, privileging the rhetor’s own subjectivity. Likewise, in a static art installation, the artist (rhetor) would maintain a centralized role as meaning-maker. With invitational rhetoric, a variety of subjectivities intersect in the exchange between rhetor and audience; the discourse is decentralized. This installation is similarly decentralized, through both its initial construction (where the central point, as Rob pointed out to me, is open air and cannot be occupied by any viewers) and the multiplicity of perspectives that constantly view and change the space. In effect, the signified remains “feminism” and the signifier remains the installation, itself, but neither the signifier nor the signified are stable. They are both constructed and evolved through invention-in-between. A viewer-participant-contributor brings one perspective, uses their own body in the mirrors as well as a material contribution to continue de/constructing both signifier and signified. Similarly, invention-in-between becomes a more apt description than invention-in-the-middle. As noted, there isn’t a “middle” to be focused on nor a central site or point that can be occupied. In as many ways as possible, we have pushed for intersubjectivity. In essence, the signification process—the process of visual representation—becomes intersubjective.

I now realize that thinking about the intersubjectivity of the installation probably provides some insight into standpoint. I’ll be honest, I only have a very basic understanding of standpoint, but I think this exploratory has helped me see intersubjective discourse in/through the intersections of individual perspectives. Standpoint seems to acknowledge the value of individual perspectives while also acknowledging that they are only one piece to a much larger puzzle. It is the “larger puzzle” aspect of the proposed installation that makes me begin to consider a term beyond “intersubjective” to explain, or perhaps even disrupt or complicate, my understanding of standpoint. I’m grasping for a term along the lines of trans-subjective (which I think is a term that is used, but it’s not one I have any experience with). To better articulate these thoughts, given the work we have done on the installation, I might apply the concept of “invention-in-between” to subjectivity. In other words, I could describe the subjectivities of the installation as subject-in-between. I could also shift slightly away from this conception of standpoint and offer “subjectivity-across” with reference, not only to the colliding and intersecting subjectivities at work in the installation but also, to the amalgamation of these intersections and their impact on the overall signification/representation of feminism in the installation.

In all, this exploratory has helped me see the ways invitational rhetoric disrupts traditional models of rhetoric, but the installation has also shown me that the differences and complexities of rhetoric run deeper than purposes of “inviting” or “persuading.” Re-seeing rhetoric through a feminist lens (provided by the concept of the art installation) has helped me better grasp the power of how we understand and practice signification. Gates, through the lens of black English, shows that signification isn’t just one thing, that it isn’t a single relationship or process. I certainly don’t have a fully formed feminist theory of signification, but I can now see how my foundational understanding of signification is too clean, too simple, and too rooted in my own standpoint. I feel a need to “invent-in-between” as I reconsider the relationship between feminism, signification, and subjectivities.