Digital Storytelling and Cultural Studies
Consciousness-raising starts on an individual level arising from spaces of internal or external discourse that bring-about acknowledgment that personal identity is composed of multifarious identify-factors. Through experiencing displacement, hovering in places of rupture and instability, agency may be enabled that has the potential to bring about change. In using the Internet and YouTube, artists (individuals) may use performativity oppositionally, in an attempt to re-articulate Sikh signifiers as “other” and bring about consciousness-raising in mainstream, western society.
See: Puar, Jasbir K. “‘The Turban Is Not A Hat’: Diaspora and Practices of Profiling.” Sikh Formations, Vol. 4, No. 1 (June 2008): 47-91. At: http://www.jasbirpuar.com/publications/
Digitally Telling Punjabi Stories
When it comes to Digital Storytelling there are two modes: one that is supported by an institutional framework, building on the workshop model initiated by the Center for Digital Storytelling based out of the Bay Area, California and the work of John Lambert and others. The other, more popular form, consists of delivery mechanisms of social media like YouTube, where users work within a framework designed by the corporation managing the site. With this later example, corporate interests are always imbued in the product, while with the institutional or academic framework, Digital Stories operate outside of this framework. However, institutionally-based, workshop-centered facilitation of Digital Stories cannot exist without funding, so the more moving and emotional the narrative (the more effective the Digital Story), the better the chance of being awarded grants and other forms of funding.
For this project, I thought that I would consider the Social Media personality JusReign, and in reviewing his YouTube videos, many of which I have come across on Facebook over the years, I have decided to share His Punjabi Story — Draw My Life. Unlike many of his other comedic performances on the interplay between Punjabi immigrants to Canada and their children, first-generation Canadians, this video consists of images drawn onto a white board, with his voice-over narration.
Draw My Life: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Po1y_wtcXE4&list=UUJ98xGeWxpuKDAb2-Xs01Ug
Shit White Guys Say to Brown Guys: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hr4Hh34p3LM
I too, created a Digital Story of my Punjabi Story, in two parts: one, a traditional Joe Lambert-style Digital Story, consisting of pictures timed to my voice-over narration, where I drew from very personal experiences. For the section part, I wanted to express the beauty and energy of Punjabi culture layering images and music, similar to my Visual Essay (see my earlier post). I added this section to my Story because I felt that it is complementary to the first part and presents the space that I am in now, thereby completing my Story. Originally, I did not intend to author such a personal Digital Story, but it came out in working on this project — so, I just decided to go with it and needless to say, it was quite emotional.
The song that I used for the second part of my story is “Mundian To Bach Ke” (Beware of the Boys), written by Labh Janjua, and adopted by Panjabi MC in 1998 and re-released as “Beware” featuring Jay Z in 2002. I selected this song for many reasons, because it is catchy, I like it, it draws from traditional Punjabi music, it is re-mixed and upbeat, and then there is the additional layer added with the introduction of Jay Z — where he comes from, his identity, his style and the lyrics as he reflects on the post 9/11 world.
Beware Music Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wke0-lj2wzw
arthistoryvisualculturalstudies 
First off, I really like the JusReign stuff. He’s hilarious. I hadn’t heard of him before, but after watching the two videos you linked, I went through and watched some of his other videos as well. The parts where he talks about the importance of music to him, and how his parents beat him over the head with it as a little kid was something I could relate too– but it also fits with your attention to music in the latter portions of the blog post and in your DST video.
The “Draw My Life” one is really cool though. The framing of the concept of “the other” from Puar that you provided up top, alongside how JusReign relates his experiences growing up and going to school in Canada in the 90s was really interesting, and the two supplemented each other in cool ways.
“Multiculturalism” also seems to be another big theme in what you are talking about. The Panjabi MC collaboration with Jay Z really accentuates this a lot. In Cultural Studies, multiculturalism sometimes gets treated like it’s a four letter word. But the way that people read the original “Mundian To Bach Ke”– and then the remix with Jay Z– I think points towards something important. The Jay Z lyrics where he talks about 9/11 and the Reagan years as it gets interlaced with “Beware” does some interesting epistemological work. It also fits well with the collapse of difference that took place after 9/1 that JusReign comments on in the video, where fearful white North American culture began to think about difference differently, which resulted in new types of non/distinctions between “easterners.”
This is a really cool project. I hope you put up your DST video on here so I can watch it at some point. The Jay Z “Beware” music video won’t play over here because of international music licensing, so I was only able to watch a lyrics video for the remix. I’ll check it out in a couple of weeks though.
Vielen Dank für die guten Wünsche! Frohe Feiertage und viel Glück im neuen Jahr!
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I am pleased to see how your academic voice is growing to include your personal story. This adds nuance, poetry, power, and purpose as you refine it and connect it to your scholarly work. I would encourage you to take the idea of “consciousness raising” even further. As theorized by some feminists it meant finding connections between your personal experience and pain, and that of others, and then moving to a structural analysis and linked activist agenda. What would that look like if you were to theorize and act from the connections between your digital story and that of Jus Reign?
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Is this your blog Ms. Singh??…That’s really cool,i didn’t know you were Punjabi 🙂
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