Rosemary Lucy Hill

The work that visualisation conventions do

ABSTRACT This paper argues that visualisation conventions work to make the data represented within visualisations seem objective, that is, transparent and factual. Interrogating the work that visualisation conventions do helps us to make sense of the apparent contradiction between criticisms of visualisations as doing persuasive work and visualisation designers’ belief that through visualisation, it is possible to ‘do good with data’ [Periscopic. 2014. Home page. Retrieved from http://www.periscopic.com/]. We focus on four conventions which imbue visualisations with a sense of objectivity, transparency and facticity. These include: (a) two-dimensional viewpoints; (b) clean layouts; (c) geometric shapes and lines; (d) the inclusion of data sources. We argue that thinking about visualisations from a social semiotic standpoint, as we do in this paper by bringing together what visualisation designers say about their intentions with a semiotic analysis of the visualisations they produce, advances understanding of the ways that data visualisations come into being, how they are imbued with particular qualities and how power operates in and through them. Thus, this paper contributes nuanced understanding of data visualisations and their production, by uncovering the ways in which power is at work within them. In turn, it advances debate about data in society and the emerging field of data studies.

The Feeling of Numbers: Emotions in Everyday Engagements with Data and Their Visualisation:

This article highlights the role that emotions play in engagements with data and their visualisation. To date, the relationship between data and emotions has rarely been noted, in part because data studies have not attended to everyday engagements with data. We draw on an empirical study to show a wide range of emotional engagements with diverse aspects of data and their visualisation, and so demonstrate the importance of emotions as vital components of making sense of data. We nuance the argument that regimes of datafication, in which numbers, metrics and statistics dominate, are characterised by a renewed faith in objectivity and rationality, arguing that in datafied times, it is not only numbers but also the feeling of numbers that is important. We build on the sociology of (a) emotions and (b) the everyday to do this, and in so doing, we contribute to the development of a sociology of data.

Visualizing Junk: Big Data Visualizations and the Need for Feminist Data Studies

The datafication of culture has led to an increase in the circulation of data visualizations. In their production, visualizers draw on historical antecedents which define what constitutes a good visualization. In their reception, audiences similarly draw on experiences with visualizations and other visual forms to categorize them as good or bad. While there are often sound reasons for such assessments, the gendered dimensions of judgments of cultural artifacts like data visualizations cannot be ignored. In this article, we highlight how definitions of visualizations as bad are sometimes gendered. In turn, this gendered derision is often entangled with legitimate criticisms of poor visualization execution, making it hard to see and so normalized. This, we argue, is a form of what Gill calls flexible sexism, and it is why there is a need not just for feminist critiques of big data but for feminist data studies–that is, feminists doing big data and data visualization.

Heavy Metal, Gender and Sexuality: Interdisciplinary Approaches

equal of his early idol, Bob Dylan, “but since Phyllis had enough for both of us, she lifted me up. She was the first one who told me I was a good songwriter. It had never occurred to me” (70). As Nesmith makes clear, there are other potential pitfalls associated with stardom. He philosophizes at length on what he calls “Celebrity Psychosis,” an egocentric condition in which a celebrity loses his or her sense of self and reality to delusions derived from fame. He also coins the term “Hollywood Mind” to describe the capitalistic attitude that typifies the Los Angeles arts scene, in which widespread commercial success becomes the measure of artistic greatness. For his part, Nesmith was eager to divorce himself from these two afflictions later in his career. Seeking out a well-formed spirituality, the author explains how the teachings of Christian Science instilled his artistic process, intellectual life, and interpersonal relationships with a more selfless sense of purpose. Nesmith is also eager to attribute his entrepreneurial spirit to the influence of his single mother Bette, a self-made woman navigating the misogynistic landscape of the twentieth-century corporate world, who as a secretary and artist invented Liquid Paper. Although Bette expressed disdain for some of her son’s early moral quandaries, she emerged as one of his biggest supporters, proud of his artistic invention in the realm of the music video. Upon her untimely death, Nesmith was devastated. “I was standing alone in her house and began to cry uncontrollably for a time longer than I could count or can remember,” he recalls. “It was High Lonesome in its most acute, severe form. Every pore wept, every beat of my heart hurt, every breath I took was cold” (201–2). Indeed, the confessional nature of Infinite Tuesday bestows upon the reader a sense of its author’s keen self-awareness, acute sense of humor, reverence for intellectualism, progressive spirit, and continual search for spiritual meaning. The title itself, taken from a 1940s Punch cartoon of two hippos alone in an expanse of water with the caption “I keep thinking it’s Tuesday,” further reveals the author’s lighthearted celebration of the absurd. While readers expecting a lengthy Monkees tell-all may come away disappointed, those who wish to travel with Nesmith along his journey of music history and self-discovery will relish in the literary nuance of the work. Ultimately, Nesmith tells his story with impressive responsibility. He treats the varied characters who have crossed his life’s path with a sense of unassuming respect, remaining cautiously aware of his duty as an author: “I am committed to the facts as I know them, but I am aware that I only remember them one way” (1). With this caveat, Nesmith cogently analyzes the absurdities of life, the imperfections that characterize the human experience, the unexpected pitfalls and pleasures that arise from fame, and the artistic consciousness that makes it all worthwhile. For those interested in the popular culture of the 1960s, this “autobiographical riff” will come as welcome music to the mind.

Metal and Sexism

Chapter 6 considers the allegations that hard rock and metal is sexist. Talking to British women fans reveals that in their experiences, hard rock and metal is less sexist than the ‘mainstream’. Using research on sexism across a range of fields, Hill argues that understanding what counts as sexism is complex and requires critical work by fans when sexism is normalised. Listening to what fans say about the context of their experiences within their broader lives is vital for better understanding. The author argues that the genre provides moments in which women fans may gain a feeling of genderlessness. Ultimately, however, the feeling of liberation only comes through assimilation into the culture, a culture that ignores women as much as possible. Nevertheless, that temporary feeling is a valuable one.

The Pleasure and Pain of Visualizing Data in Times of Data Power

This article reflects on the growing urge among researchers to visualize large-scale digital data. It argues that the desire to visualize unfolds in the context of a complex entanglement of (1) the pragmatics of data visualization, (2) the problematic ideological work that visualizations do, (3) the politics of data power and neoliberalism, and (4) visualization pleasures. The article begins by outlining the considerations that constitute data visualization design, highlighting the complexity of the process. It then provides an overview of critical debates about the way that visualizations work, which are relevant to reflective visualization practice. Then, it turns to the context (of datafication and the neoliberalization of the university) in which academic researchers contemplate visualization futures and which simultaneously constrains the realization of these futures. Finally, the article acknowledges the cracks in these structures, the pleasure of visualizing data, for example, in using visualization for advocacy and social justice.

The Media and the Imaginary Community

This chapter investigates how Kerrang! magazine, a key part of the metal media, creates an imaginary community of hard rock and metal fans. Using semiotic analysis, the author extrapolates four myths that are forged in the letters pages: two that are presented by the magazine as being common sense values of the community (equality and authenticity) and two that are less obvious, the groupie and the warrior, which determine how women and men are portrayed. These myths work together to depict the imaginary community as ideologically invested in maintaining the masculinity of the genre at the expense of femininity. Hill argues that dominant representations of women in the imaginary community render them as adjuncts to the real members of the community—the men—and this has damaging consequences.

Listening to Hard Rock and Metal Music

This chapter challenges readings of hard rock and metal as masculine music. Hill examines women’s accounts of their experiences of musical pleasure. Through analysis of women fans’ descriptions of their favourite bands, she argues that, pace Kahn-Harris (2007), fans can be very articulate about what they like. Work of feminist writers on rock music is enlisted to argue that considering women’s listening pleasure gives new insights into the meaning of hard rock and metal music. The assumption that hard rock and metal is a masculine genre neglects important aspects of women’s fandom which diverge from the dominant myths.

The Gendered Experience of Music

The final chapter argues that close examination of the specific experiences of women in their engagements with the hard rock and metal media, the music, and musical events reveals how the experience of music is shaped by sexist assumptions about women and about how music should be listened to. Musical pleasure does not exist on a universal, transcendental plane. It is informed and shaped by the socio-cultural circumstances of the listener. Hill maintains that it is vital to acknowledge how these circumstances make for differing experiences: it is an important first step for countering sexism. The chapter concludes with a short plan for how hard rock and metal may imagine a genderless future, and how this imagined community might work towards it.

Gender, Metal and the Media: An Introduction

Hill offers a much needed discussion of the lack of consideration given to gender in academic discussions of hard rock and metal music and the media. Drawing on her own experience as a musician and fan, the author argues that orthodoxies—e.g., the genre is inclusive, the music asexual and sexism non-existent—are only able to persist within the literature because scholars have neglected to understand how musical experiences are gendered. Within the context of feminist popular music scholarship, work on fandom and feminist methodological work, Hill outlines the need to study hard rock, metal and the media with close attention to the influence of gender.