Pranktivism assisting you in pranking better

John Oliver and State Run Gambling

State Gambling Activity Apply one concept of rhetoric to the video Apply one concept from linguistics Apply one concept from cognitive psych. Apply one concept from social psych. Apply one concept from semiotics Example of hegemony Example of humor Example of parody Toss a coin fifty times – heads we win, tails you lose.

How effective was the video? What types of evidence or support worked well in the video? – How come? What types of evidence or support didn’t work so well in the video? – How come?

Imagine Pranktivism Plan a prank for the end of the John Oliver video. Use two concepts we’ve covered from two different disciplines to apply in your pranktivism. The winner (judged by majority vote) gets two Tweet days recouped.

The Situationists Situationist International – An art movement in France in the 1950s and 1960s. Believed that we live in “a tautological world in which the appearance of real life is maintained in order to conceal the reality of its absence” (Plant 10). – Tautology 1 – needless repetition of an idea, statement, or word (“Tautology”). » I went there personally. » 4g cell phones are a new innovation. » There is a lot of frozen ice on the road. – Tautology 2 – When things are presented in a way that there seems to be no escape. It’s a statement framed in a way it cannot be denied without inconsistency (“Tautology”) – pretty absolute. » All men are rational. » What I see is real life. What I don’t see is not real. » All CEOs deserve to make a lot more money than their employees because they are in charge of things and people who are in charge of things deserve to make more money over the people they are in charge. Members of the movement want to construct situations that “were envisaged as incendiary devices heralding an unpredictable eruption of an alternative, non-capitalist and poetic life” (Frances).

Dérive Dérive – a concept for un-doing and re-doing our everyday urban spaces, through aimless strolls unguided by maps (Debord). It's about disturbing the status-quo. And reinterpreting the environment. It’s about experiencing our environment in a new way and, often, to highlight the "invisible" - racial, ethical, socio-economic disparities and peripheries - within what we perceive the normalized organization of the city. Examples – A crosswalk A city bus

Psychogeography Psychogeography – it’s the idea that we not only make our environment but that the environment makes us. – “the study of the specific effects and affects of the altered or détourned urban geographies or environments, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behaviours of individual participants” (Frances).

McMap

Détournement It’s taking things out of their initial contexts and bringing them together within a new context, hence replacing their original meaning with a new one. It’s proto-culture jamming.

Détouring a McMap

Situationists to Pranking to Graffiti As we watch Exit Through the Gift Shop, we want you to make connections between Graffiti artists, our concept of pranking, and the terms we’ve covered on the Situationists. Tweet and fill out the handout.