Pro-Life, Pro-Media, Pro-Change

This weekend, I went to Washington D.C. for the March for Life, a national protest on the Roe vs. Wade decision that was passed on January 22^nd, 1973.  I also went to the national Students for Life of America conference while I was there.  One of the lectures I attended at the conference was called “How to Use New Media to Promote the Pro-Life Message” The talk was very enlightening, and it reminded me of Wednesday’s lecture about effective presentation strategies.  Indeed, it is essential in the Pro-Life movement to be as communicative and as persuasive as possible. The goal is not to sell a product, but rather, an idea.  All of the presenters at the conference applied the presentation practices we discussed, such as allocating energy wisely and focusing on key topics in power point presentations.  The new media talk resonated very strongly with me, as someone who wants to utilize my visual and verbal communications abilities to promote social change.  There were two presenters, Bryan Kemper from the Stand True organization, and Kate Bryan of Live Action.  They advised new media students to gain a strong handle on all facets of social media to promote the pro-life message.  They even generated pro-life content on their webpages, such as suggested statuses and hashtags that we can copy and paste in our profiles to further extend the message.  I was truly fascinated by the idea of affecting change through my social media posts; it is such a powerful way to share an idea in way that is incredibly far-reaching.  Not only this, but using social media to further the pro-life mission gives me a chance to engage in meaningful discussions with people of opposite beliefs.  Because of our lecture on Wednesday, I also took note of the way the conference was presented.  In line with color psychology, one of the main colors used throughout the conference was green. As we learned in lecture, green denotes money and education.  The main point of the Students for life conference was to educate students on the pro-life movement and teach them how to be active on their own campuses. Overall, the principles I’ve learned in our Communications and New Media class were very much at play at the Students for Life conference.  I am very excited to see how new media plays a part in Pro-life movement. 

New Media is Good Media

It is interesting to think about how our culture is so heavily influenced by new media.  In class, we discussed Lev Manovich and his 2001 work, The Language of New Media. Manovich explains the 5 qualifications necessary for a product or system to be considered new media. These are: numerical representation, modularity, automation, variability, and transcoding. He  The two characteristics of new media that stood out to me the most were variability, and modularity.  In order to be truly varying, media must have multiple versions and customizable content.  We find this concept very alive in our culture today; media users would rather have content tailored to their personal interests and needs rather than general information. For instance, advertisments on facebook are often posed in correlation with the user's profile information, including status updates.  More and more, consumers are given the option of controlling and generating their own media.  We find this most prevalent in smartphone applications such as SnapChat, and Instagram.  With these applications, users can upload and send their own pictures to other consumers.  Snapchat even allows users to create their own GIF's.  All of these popular, customizable, products prove that culture closely follows technological advances.  New media is directly related to popular culture and shifting trends.  

The other outstanding quality of new media is modularity. Modularity focuses on the breakdown of media into elements which can function both separately and as a whole.  Media exists in the form of images, sounds, shapes, or behaviors.  Says Manovich, "these elements are assembled into larger-scale objects but continue to maintain their separate identity,"(Manovich, 51). The most prominent example of modularity at work is the internet.  Web pages are their own media elements, yet they contain thousands of pictures, videos, and links.  Each of these items are an independent source of media, yet they are also united with the external web page.  This concept is also found in video editing software, which allows one to create pictures and alternative clips out of filmed content. They are elements on their own which also construct larger videos and films.  

Variability and modularity are two new media characteristics for which I am very grateful.  New media would greatly lack appeal and relevance if it could not follow technological advances and trends. Nor would contain enough intricacy and complexity to provide for consumer desires.  New media lets modern people create updated meanings of their culture.