At the 2009 annual meeting of the Tamil community in Tampa, Florida, Karan Khokar and Divya Ikara together with a group of background dancers were performing a dance, more precisely they were doing a dance they themselves refer to as the Jai Ho. How come we know about it? The entire choreography is up on Youtube.
Jewish-German cultural theorist Walter Benjamin was one of the first to realize: The aura is dead. Due to the development as well as refinement of technologies such as photography and film at the turn of the 19th century, the original – formerly the epitome of what is today known as the wobbly concept of 'authenticity' – ceased to exist. A large number of reproductions means no original. No original equals loss of tradition. These were Benjamin's simple and easily comprehensible equations laid out in his 1936 essay The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (2005:2–3). While it is certainly true that since 1936 artworks or objects of cultural and social significance (and the term 'objects' is not limited to material culture but used as in 'possible objects of enquiry' and thus comprising for example songs or dances as well) have been widely reproduced, it is definitely worth investigating further into the consequences anticipated by Benjamin as well as rethinking some of his main arguments.
The aura is dead. Or is it? According to Benjamin, the aura is the specific quality radiating from the work of art, or almost anything for that matter, as long as it is distant (2005:3). Furthermore, the existence of an aura is closely connected to the idea of the ritual (2005:4). Only if the object in question is unique and embedded in some sort of ritual, can we speak of it as 'possessing an aura'. Admittedly, modern-day technologies rather aggressively promote artworks, dances, songs, films, etc. instead of withdrawing them from the public in order to prevent their 'aura' from fleeting away. Thus modern mass media assure the viewer immediate access and a close, intimate, often almost physical relationship to these 'objects'. From this Benjamin deduces that while its traditional cult value decreases, the work's exhibition value is heightened (2005:4). Among the consequences are the emergence of what Guy Debord so aptly described as the Society of Spectacle, and cultural demise.
In a small San Francisco living room a Caucasian couple – Rachel and Mick Hagen – is dancing to a song. Jai Ho. It is the same song the Tamil dance ensemble performed to but it is not the same dance. There is a TV screen to the couple's right-hand side. Twenty seconds into the clip, we begin to notice that their movements resemble the ones done by the actors onscreen. Why are the Hagens as well as the Tamil musical ensemble doing the dance and how do the two YouTube videos relate to Benjamin's thoughts on aura and tradition?
Both groups, the Western couple and the Tamil dance ensemble, reference a song-and-dance sequence featured at the end of the Hollywood movie Slumdog Millionaire. The 2008 film draws on the Bollywood tradition of singing and dancing as an integral part of cinematic practice. Yet, it is also grounded in a very different tradition, namely Western Blockbuster cinema, and thus indeed a hybrid on a variety of levels. In Bollywood cinema it is rather common that song-and-dance sequences become popular after having been featured in films (Novak 2010:48). Taken out of their original contexts, reworked and made to fit new situations, these segments are referenced over and over again. While this practice used to be far less common in Western popular culture, it seems that the 'Bollywood way' has finally reached the other side of the world, thus providing us with an intriguing case study to start rethinking Western notions of originality and authorship. What exactly then do these clips tell us about the global flow of culture and the destiny of aura in this context? I am arguing that these videos develop a life and thus history of their own, for aura in this context is created anew.
Ironically, this aura is created by virtue of reproduction. That this is actually not as great a contradiction as one might think is shown by the fact that the original – and thus aura in the first place – only comes into being the very moment the replica is made, for without the reproduction there is no original. The original never exists on its own. Moreover, going back to the Jai Ho YouTube videos, we see that an entirely new ritual evolves. The ritual in this case is surely no longer performed by the 'originating community' or a specific religious group, i.e. by an exclusive circle of people, but by people all over the world, the consumers of popular culture imagery. Facilitated only by reproduction, it is the ritual of the constant reenactment of consumerism and self-stylization. So even if we follow Benjamin in saying that the authority of the original is degraded by the reproduction and that this implies a detachment from tradition, I do not see why we could not also say that at the same time a new history begins – starting precisely with the reproduction. One might argue then that it is YouTube as a medium or a media platform that not only initiates this ritual of 'putting oneself out there', but that maintains itself by the very ritual it created. Consequently, we might say that wherever there is a reproduction there must be an 'aura' of sorts. It is precisely due to the very character of modern-day technologies that aura is produced. In this context it is not about the original any longer, but about the new ritual and its contribution to and assistance in the process of meaning-giving. Due to the fact that repeatability and reproducibility are intrinsic to mediums such as film in general, photography and YouTube videos, their proliferation cannot rip the original off its aura: There hardly is an aura to begin with.
For those not persuaded by this and still convinced that the Slumdog Millionaire version constitutes the original, one question remains: What about the actual 'content' of the video, its 'meaning'? Should not the author's 'intention' and the film's specific qualities not account for it being the original? Looking at the Tamil adaptation of Jai Ho, one might argue that the initial content is to a certain extent carried over and therefore important: The 'Indian' struggle for a decent living and life per se vividly depicted in the movie might be something the Tamil community in Tampa is still aware of. The fact that it is a Hollywood movie tackling these issues might then either arouse feelings of pride or disapproval in which case the 'tamilization' can be seen as an act of reappropriation. It is precisely this act of giving meaning and relevance to oneself which leads us back to the idea that it is not original which generates the ritual or that is important. It is the repetition that is significant, the formalist structure itself is what needs to be preserved for some reason or another; an idea that is also suggested and backed up by the performance of the San Francisco couple. While they may be copying the exact Jai Ho dance sequence, I would argue that it is just about the act of creating a video, for the sake of being youtubed. What if it is the specific characteristics of the medium that make it intriguing and attractive? The new ritual prompts the creation of a new aura, an aura that helps the medium maintain itself.
Following this one might say that YouTube videos are significant insofar as they provide support or guidance. They help establish some kind of temporary tradition one might inscribe oneself into. 75 years after Benjamin's essay people have become more and more mobile; our lives have become increasingly intertwined with the media – maybe in an attempt to find some sort of stability in the constant flux of information we call the 21st century. However, we see deterritorialization, to introduce a term most prominently used by Arjun Appadurai (1996:49), not only with regards to people, also in terms of customs and knowledge. Accordingly, Benjamin's exhibition value has certainly become one of the leading paradigms of our times. We watch movies, TV series and news broadcasts over and over again; we get back to old photographs, edit and enhance them; constantly analyze ourselves and scrutinize the actions of those around us. What Benjamin saw as a process of self-alienation has therefore also brought us more together. It is an inclusive ritual that has come to govern our lives.
These developments also lead, as Appadurai argues, to an increase in imagination (1996:53). In times of rapid change people are confronted with a wider variety of role models they might choose from. Through the constant re-representation of a rich, ever-changing store of possible lives our imagination is stirred (1996:54). This 'ability to imagine' is a new and crucial social practice that has become necessary if one was to navigate successfully through the flood of images characterizing our times. Therefore we cannot tell what exactly these people are imagining when doing the Jai Ho dance. Why would Rachel and Mick Hagen picture themselves as the protagonists of Slumdog Millionaire? Maybe they are rather imagining the audience at the other side of the screen, i.e. us and how we might be reenacting their performance? Why does the Tamil community of Tampa, Florida take on and modify Jai Ho? Is it an expression of the close relationship still maintained to their mother country India? Is it an act of resistance by means of reappropriation? In any case, both videos reveal how the media exert influence by suggesting possibilities and connecting as disparate parts of the world as San Francisco and Mumbai.
Useful in this context is Appadurai's term 'ethnoscape' since it alludes to the fact that what is perceived as representation, projection and imagination always hinges on the perspective from which one looks at these things (1996:33). Hence, it does not really matter what exactly our YouTube celebrities are imagining or trying to get across, for there is a large number of possible perspectives, all equally valid. What does matter, however, is the very fact that they are doing it, that they are seeking publicity, thereby perpetuating the ritual. This leads us back to Benjamin. We have come full circle – but of course we have not come to an end, for the ritual never ends.
References Cited
Appadurai, Arjun
1996 Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Benjamin, Walter
2005 [1998] The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. Andy Blunden, trans. UCLA School of Theatre, Film and Television, http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/ge/benjamin.htm .
Karan Khokar and Divya Ikara – Jai Ho Dance, Tamil Sneham, Tampa, Florida. Youtube, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqWkFMoLocM .
Novak, David
2010 Cosmopolitanism, Remediation, and the Ghost World of Bollywood. Cultural Anthropology 25(1):40 –72.
Slumdog Millionaire Dance – Jai Ho. Youtube, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7AuQKFlhXI .
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