The narrative of Whisper

Image 1. Whisper logo.  WhisperText LLC, 2012. 

Narratives are a way of seeing the world, just like different genres of novels, plays and media. Most narratives can be classed as stories and Victoria Kuttainen (2016) states that “even ‘fictional’ stories can reflect ways the author sees, visualizes and experiences the real world.”

There are certain similarities and differences between Bruce Chatwin’s (1987) “Songlines” and the network I have chosen. The Songlines explains a “Dreaming” to be an emblem, totem or symbol of a certain clan in the aboriginal community. It states that any species can be a Dreaming. A virus, element, animal can all be Dreamings. Networks have a similar idea. The virtual network I have chosen, Whisper, has a purple box with a white “W” in it. Which, when seen on other websites, means that someone has mentioned Whisper or posted a Whisper post there.

There are other similarities between the Songlines and Whisper; they both tell stories of tradition, they both have symbolic icons for representation and they can be applied to anything. E.g. people can post anything in whisper, regardless of if people judge them. The same can be said about Songlines when they talk about how every species can be a Dreaming.

There are also differences between the two. The main difference is that the Dreaming can be seen to be truthful as it is historical and based around live cultures, where as Whisper can be seen as misleading as it has no truth to back it up. The viewers can only but trust what the author has posted to be true.

What makes the Songlines a narrative? The fact that it has been talked about in many cultures, it’s been published, and even spoken about in documentary series such as the First Australians (2008), among many other reasons.

So, it can be said that Whisper is a form of narrative, it has symbols to represent it, different stories within it and it can be recognised in almost all communities.

References.

Chatwin, B. (1987).  The Songlines. London, England: The Spartan Press.

Kuttainen, V. (2016). BA1002: Our space: Networks, narratives and the making of place, week 5 notes [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from https://learnjcu.jcu.edu.au

WhisperTextLLC. (2012). Whisper application logo. [Image] Retrieved from www.en.Wikipedia.org