About David (Jhave) Johnston
David (Jhave) Johnston is a Canadian poet, specializing in digital poetry, combining his studies of computer science and interface designing. Most of his work is based online and is considered “interdisciplinary” as it remixes sound, video and poetry (Oboro). David has produced many works that play with and explore the use of language. He has and still is involved in both collaborative and solo digital practices, recognized locally and internationally. The Jhave in his name is a nickname that combines “ave” from his first name David and “Jh” from his last Johnston. He is the developer of his own site http://www.glia.ca/, and his work can be found there (Johnston).
Summary
Give Me Your Light is a non-interactive digital poem that taps into the world of a dying kitten and chained monkey living in Malaysia. Presented as a set of video clips equipped with sound, music and word, Give Me Your Light takes you on a journey by an algorithm (Johnston). The events of this piece loop and video clips repeat themselves in a different manner; some are in colour equipped with sound and others are black and white without. This digital poem is avant-garde in the way that it is produced for a reader to just sit and watch. Shifting from traditional interactive generated artworks, in its movie like form, Give Me Your Light provokes the reader to analyze their own emotions within the work.
Analysis
Give Me Your Light provides a powerful message in its digital poetic manner. Jhave presents his message through an algorithm, expressing the steps to solving problems in the world just as we see in this poem. Using a chained up monkey and a dying abandoned kitten as his muse, he uses them to represent the terrible living conditions in Malaysia and also as a metaphor for horrid living conditions of individuals around the world. “The dying abandoned kitten in a parking lot stands-in for the fatally ill, homeless runaways and abandoned children. The chained monkey suggests slaves, prisoners, abductees, captives, detainees and internees” (Johnston). The steps Johnston explains with words throughout the poem are – 1. Please remain calm, 2. Consider the source, 3. We are taking care of this, 4. Don’t get upset, 5. Don’t be alarmed, 7. We understand your concern, 8. Get over it. From this I feel that the message is towards agencies or government’s ability or lack thereof to solve problems that are brought to their attention and this is the order that it is dealt with. While it is easy to place the governments or agencies in the hot seat, if we step away for a second and disconnect from the images on the screen, we can say that this could be the same way people deal with each other in day to day living.
This piece of work serves two purposes as it presents forward this powerful message and it “test[s] the boundaries of the literary and challenges us to rethink our assumptions of what literature can be” (Hayles, 5). Kathrine Hayles also expresses that “electronic literature can be seen as a cultural force for helping to shape subjectivity in an era when networked and programmable media are catalyzing cultural, political, and economic changes with unprecedented speed” (37) . This poems uses technology in its popular form in today’s society to relay the message Johnston is trying to make of shedding your light on dark situations.
The multimodal elements –music, words, sound and video clips (both in black and white) assists in bringing forth the emotion Johnston wants the reader to feel with his piece. Just as the beating drums in “Dakota” by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries, evokes feelings and emotion, the sounds and music in this poem does the same. Isa Tousignant in Akimbo describes it as a poem where, “nothing really happens, except that it creates – at least in me – an endless and unbearable feeling of hopelessness in the face of human stupidity and helplessness in regards to fate’s cruel path” (Johnston). The use of the multimodal elements assists in these emotions that readers are bound to – just like Isa Tousignant- feeling when watching this poem in its digital/multimodal form.
Works Cited
“David (Jhave) Johnston.” OBORO. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Mar. 2013. <http://www.oboro.net/en/person/david-jhave-johnston-en>.
Hayles, N. Katherine. “Electronic Literature: What Is It?” Electronic Literature: New Horizons for the Literary. Notre Dame, IN:University of Notre Dame, 2010. 1-40. Print.
Johnston, David. “GLIA.” Glia.ca : Digital Poetics. N.p., n.d. Web. 1 Mar. 2013 <http://glia.ca/about.html>.