MoMa Trip

During my trip to New York I visited the "Private Lives Public Spaces" exhibition in the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). There I saw screens all along the wall playing different home movies recorded throughout the last century. From what I saw in the time I was there, there were videos that were made to save memories of moments that the family or group wanted remembered. It goes back to Howard's ideas on interactionism where people “attach symbolic meaning to objects, behaviors, themselves, and other people” in the sense that they’re making these private filmed movies symbolic to who they are. However, these movies were most likely meant to be seen by family members, such as parents, siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles, etc. The name of the exhibit shows this as these are private lives of peoples in the form of home movies being shown off in a public space such as a museum. Shows evolution of recording, lack of social media makes it more special, 

The first film I watched was called “Hunting Home Movie” which was recorded around 1946. The movie showed a man and his wife taking part in this duck hunt along with their dog. The man would shoot a duck that would be flying and as soon as he shot it and fell to the river their dog would jump in and fetch it. In the next part the man would take the feathers out and prepare it for a home cooked meal. There was a strong bond between nature and man when it came to hunting for a source of food seeing that he was careful with how he treated it. He seemed to be proud during his hunt this sort of routine or ritual a part of his identity, making duck hunting something symbolic for him.

    The other home movie I saw included recordings of people, couples and families, visiting the Grand Canyon and taking various pictures and videos around it. In a sense it felt like a certain culture that they were taking part of. According to Judith Howard, constructing an identity means one must consider interactionism, which states that people attach symbolic meaning to objects, behaviors, themselves, and other people, and they develop and transmit these meanings through interaction. You can also construct an identity through language, social status, and politics. Concept of identity – carries the full weight of the need for a sense of who one is. Cognitive structures’ such as group schemas include organized information about social positions and stratification statuses, such as gender, race, age or class.