Moma Assignment

“Private Lives, Public Spaces” is an exhibit that allows different perspectives on home movies.
Three home movies I chose were a video about a child playing with toy houses, cherry
blossoms, and a family dancing at a party. Through Judith Howard’s lenses of identity, I view
these movies in a different light. 

One of Howard’s ways of constructing identity is through group schemas, which is related to
stereotypes. This includes information about gender, race, age, or class. I used this to define
an identity for the video about a child playing with the toy houses, as well as the family
dancing at a party.

In both videos, race, class, and age came to mind. For the child, he had white skin and
seemed to be about six-years-old. Because the boy had toy houses, it is possible that he
was the son of a very successful family, or at least comfortably living. Judging by how
the child was wearing his clothes, the video seemed to be made in a generation-long
before mine so the child must have definitely been wealthy. The same concept is made
with the family dancing at a party. They were all caucasian but they were all different ages.
There were people in their twenties, forties, and possibly even sixties. In the video with
the cherry blossoms, there were no people but there was a dog that appeared.
It had dark brown fur. 

While I was able to identify the two videos using basic information, according to Howard,
this can be a problem because it leaves out potentially valuable information. This kind
of info can include the child’s parents. What do his parents do? Did the child get his
toys honorably? Did he steal the toys? These are questions that I am unable to answer,
but it can help to construct an identity to the child in the video. With the family at the
party, what was the party for? What kind of music were they dancing to at the party?
There are many unanswered questions that would have helped to create an identity
for the people in the video. The dog in the cherry blossom video, there are many
questions to construct an identity, so the only identity that can be made is that the dog
had dark brown fur and the type of breed it was, but I didn't know what breed it was. 

Howard also explained another way to construct identity is that people attach
symbolic meanings to objects. This way can apply to the video with the child because
he was playing with houses. The child could be playing with houses because he wanted
to create a different life than the one he has. His family could be problematic and the
child wanted to imagine a different life through the means of playing with houses. 

The exhibit was probably called “Private Lives, Public Spaces” because the videos were all
related to people in their everyday lives but were probably filmed in public spaces. It is also
possible that the videos can be interpreted as viewing people, or the world, from the
perspective of a stranger, a stalker, or another dark concept. I think that’s also how the
exhibit wanted people to view the home movies.