Xu Bing’s Big Village: Globalization, White-Collar Work, and the Politics Of Emoji

Xu Bing’s Big Village: Globalization, White-Collar Work, and the Politics Of Emoji Lee Konstantinou (bio) 1. CRISIS OF PITY Early in his workday, around 9:30 a.m., the protagonist of the novel Book from the Ground: from point to point—a white-collar corporate drone named Mr. Black—reads news online in his cubicle instead of working. Learning about disasters happening around the world, our hero cycles through a range of emotions: It’s 9:30 a.m., “Time to look at the news” Mr. Black reminds himself. He signs on to the CNN website and views the news: Volcano erupts in Central America killing 30; 100 houses on fire. (Sad) Earthquake in the Middle East! 2000 deaths. (Disillusioned) A Flood in Mexico! Houses destroyed! Cars swept away! More than 200 deaths! Tsunami in Japan caused by an earthquake destroys a nuclear plant leading to nuclear leakage!!! (Oh No!) A tornado in Texas! Overturned cars! Tumbling houses! 13 deaths. (Bewildered) America and Israel sign an agreement. A regional war in Northern Africa leaves 3000 dead. City News: Drinking while driving cases lead to 8 more arrests as the trend rises in recent weeks! (Surprised) Economic News: Stock prices turn the bull into a bear market, which means it is time to save as oil prices soar and housing prices decline. (Angry) [End Page 305] Medical alert: Keep vigil as the number of Bird Flue [sic] infections has increased sharply. (Worried) Movie Schedule: The Silence of the Lambs: (9:00PM, 11:00PM, 11:50PM) Saw: (10:00PM, 10:30PM)1 Mr. Black’s reactions to CNN are examples of what sociologist Luc Boltanski calls the “crisis of pity.” Pity, Boltanski argues, is a political affect arising from social inequality. It’s felt by “fortunate or lucky people” who do not participate in some faraway scene of suffering that they bear witness to.2 The pitier may not have directly or personally caused the suffering of the pitiful, but they nonetheless feel a morally urgent relation to it. In response to this feeling, the purveyor of pity must not only affirm that they witness suffering but also vouchsafe that they feel bad about it. Pity requires a public avowal of negative emotion. During a crisis of pity, as Boltanski describes it, the usual circuit of phatic-philanthropic recognition of global misery breaks down. This breakdown is characterized by “a loss of confidence in the effectiveness of committed speech . . . a focus on the media and the ‘spectacle’ effects they produce . . . a temptation to fall back on the community, and finally, and most profoundly, . . . a scepticism with regard to any form of political action orientated towards a horizon of moral ideals.”3 The ultimate hollowness of Mr. Black’s pity becomes especially salient when thrown against the background of the other emotions he feels during his day. His momentary concern with earthquakes, nuclear accidents, and warfare quickly gives way to more pressing problems: finishing a presentation on time, finding an appropriate match on an online dating site, comforting his friend Mr. Green, who has been dumped by his girlfriend, and enduring long lines for the bathroom. Mr. Black’s low-wattage local emotions—his cycle of anxiety, irritation, confusion, fleeting consumer pleasure—seem to be more authentic, or at least more typical of his day. The global telecommunications media that give our hero access to a world of suffering remind him, at the instant he apprehends that world, of his inability to change anything. Faced with a planet in peril, all he can do is read the next article. The crisis of pity is, yes, a crisis of volition, as Boltanski argues; it’s a perceived contradiction between one’s expansive capacity to see and one’s limited ability to act.4 But for Mr. Black, it’s also a crisis arising from a contradiction between what one can feel and how one can express that feeling. Mr. Black’s crisis of pity comes to a head, so to speak, in the realm of affect. And this second-order crisis is inscribed in a most peculiar form: . [End Page 306] Click for larger view View full resolution Figure 1. Mr. Black...