Delineating identity exploration

represented participants. The students develop their thematic interpretation of the poem as showing one’s true self by creating a storyline about a homosexual who reveals her sexual orientation. The digital video delineates identity explorations, exemplified as but not limited to, revealing one’s sexual orientation.

The video opens with a clip of a black screen on which the white text

“I want to meet…” suddenly fades in from left to right. The written text is the title of the poem by Karin Boye that the students are working with. The text remains on the screen for a few seconds before it tones out from left to right. Ther is no sound on the audio track; total silence. The silence is broken abruptly by the transition to the first scene³⁵ both by a change in audio and by hard-cut clip. The first scene (see Figure 4 for a screen shot of the scene), which includes both exposition and rise of action, starts with a loud sound that could be characterised as intimidating or threatening, and contiunues through the whole scene. Shortly after the sound, a male voice starts the recitation of the poem: “Armed, erect and closed in armour”.

Simultaneously with the loud sound the image trace shows, using full shot from a slightly high angle view, a group of six youngsters gathered around a teenage girl. The setting is a staircase in a school environment. The school itself holds meaning potential (see Lindstrand, 2006, p. 83) because it represents a social setting in youth culture where constructions, explorations, and expressions of identities are exposed. Also, the staircase indicates a public and social space or arena within the school environment. The girl is standing with her back to the group, with slightly lowered eyes. The intimidating sound, together with the placement of the youngsters around the girl, implies that the girl in the middle is exposed in some way. The male voice continues: “forth I came –“ and at the same time the girl turns around to face the group of people surrounding her.

The male voice continues: “but of terror was the mail-coat cast / and

35 I consider this a scene, although by handbook definition it could be considered a shot since it it filmed in one shot. But scene is a more applicable description, because the students have edited the shot, although not the visual material, so it can be considered a scene that establishes location and continuity.

of shame” at the same time as the people in the group flinch backwards as if reacting strongly to something the girl says.

One of the youngsters pulls his hoodie over his head and three others cross their arms; two explicit gestures that signify turning away and dissociating oneself from something. The girl looks at the youngsters for a while, and then turns around and runs off while the group watch her closely. At the same time the male voice continues: “I want to drop my weapons, / sword and shield. / All that hard hostility / made me cold.” The combination of these three aspects – the intimidating sound effect, the voice reciting the poem aloud, and the acting of the represented participants – together create a representation of a serious situation marked by disapproval and rejection.

Figure 4. Screen shot of the students’ digital video, scene one.

This way of portraying exclusion, by the disapproval and rejection shown by the girl’s peers, arose when the students recognised that they were to use moving images and would be acting in the video themselves. In the beginning of the videomaking process, they had not yet settled on appearing in the video themselves, but were also considering animation and still pictures as a film format. But in a

discussion with the art teacher, he encouraged them to use moving images and to act in the film. The representation of exclusion, represented above, is achieved by the acting of the youngsters together with the intimidating sound effect and the voice-over reciting particular stanzas from the poem. As presented before (see Section 5.1.2), earlier in the videomaking process the students had represented exclusion by sketching a person surrounded by fire and a fog representing death, but in their digital video, using the available modes and semiotic resources, they expressed this issue by other means.

The image fades to the following scene, scene two, where the setting is somewhat different (see Figure 5 for screen shot of the second scene). The enviroment is still a school, but now a corridor with lockers in the background, a more withdrawn space than the public arena of the staircase. The frame depicts the girl sitting huddled up on a bench with her head down. The intimidating sound used in the previous scene still plays on the soundtrack, at high volume. The body position of the girl, together with the intimidating sound effect, portrays exposure and vulnerability. Suddenly, the sound effect fades out and another teenage girl approaches the girl on the bench from behind. The newcomer places her arm around the shoulders of the huddled girl, who looks up and smiles. The other girl leans against her as in a gesture like an embrace, and the voice-over recites the poem: “Mightier than iron / is life's tenderness, / driven forth from the earth's heart / without defence. / The spring dawns in winter's regions, / where I froze.” The acting of the girls and the fading of intimidating sound, together with the recitation of the poem, create a mood of care and considerateness.

Figure 5. Screen shot of the students’ digital video, scene two.

The image fades to the third– and final – scene of the two girls standing facing each other. The setting is a school corridor. From this point on the scene is played in slow motion. As the voice-over recites:

“I want to meet life's powers / weaponless.” the girls reach out, grasp each other’s hands, turn their backs to the camera and run off hand in hand down the corridor. After a couple of steps they jump up in the air, and while they are still airborne the clip is cut, a black frame appears and the credits start to roll. At the moment the girls grasp each other’s hands, after the voice-over has finished the recitation, the sound of a pounding heart – present since the beginning of the scene – becomes audible as all other sounds are silenced. The girl’s acting, the sound of the heartbeat and the lines of the poem combine to create a sense of hope and change.

Figure 6. Screen shot of the students’ digital video, scene three.

The relationship between the two girls can at this point be seen as friendship. The beating-heart sound effect in the third scene can be considered as indicating care and feeling in a non-romantic sense.

The sequence of “failed scenes”, however, makes clear that the relationship beteween the two girls is more than friendship. This thematic choice for the students’ interpretation becomes very clear when listening to their discussions during the videomaking (see Section 5.1.1 and 5.1.2), but is more ambiguous in the digital video.

In the first sequence of the “failed scenes”, the reference to marriage is already apparent in the use of the sound effect of church bells. In the recording of the videomaking process, the students comment on the relation between the church bells, marriage, and Finnish marriage law, which does not allow people of the same sex to wed. The issue is a matter of debate in both the media and politics at the time being, so in this way the students are commenting on an issue of topical interest. The most explicit reference to – and also standpoint on – homosexuality occurs in the last clip of the video, a frame of white written text on a black background: “Thanks to Karin Boye (who was

homosexual)” (see Figure 7) accompanied by the sound effect of applause and cheers.

Figure 7. Screen shot of the students’ digital video, final clip.

In short, the digital video presents a girl confronting her peers, being rejected, getting support from another girl, and running off with this girl. With different semiotic resources the students creates their thematic interpretation of the poem as showing one’s true self by creating a storyline about a homosexual who reveals her sexual orientation. The students use different semiotic resources in their digital video for different purposes but throughout the video the students use the acting of the represented participants, sound and visual effects, and the reciting of the poem to represent the storyline of a person revealing their true self. They also use written text, particularly to substantiate and clarify their thematic interpretation.

The use of voice-over in reciting the poem is a central part of the digital video and, together with the other modes used, serves the purpose of narrating the story. The analysis illustrates how the students in the video represent their interpretation by the actions of the participants; by the choice of locations and settings that

constitutes a context for the represented participants; by the use of sound and visual effects; and by the use of written text to substantiate and clarify their intentions and interpretations.

The relationship between the two girls can be seen as friendship, just as the storyline can be regarded as about being accepted or finding friendship. The digital video is thus open for interpretation and can in this sense be referred to as poetic. However, as illustrated in the analysis, there are signs in the coda that the issue at stake is homosexuality, with the most explicit reference in the written comment “Thanks to Karin Boye (who was homosexual)”

accompanied by the sound effect of applause and cheers. The represented participants, the setting, and the students’ references to homosexuality refer to explorations and reflections regarding identity that are characteristic of adolescents. Thus, the digital video brings up identity explorations, exemplified as, but not limited to, revealing one’s sexual orientation, among adolescents.