Un-TV

Last week we were given the Un-TV assignment, which was almost as dificult as "doing nothing." I did the Un-TV assignment while my grandpa was staying with us this weekend. First I watched Hannah Montana without any sound, which was almost impossible for me to do since I got extremely frusterated because I didn't understand what was going on in the episode. When watching TV without sound, I realized that I pay much closer attention to the little details of the show, such as body momvent and camera angles, than I do when there is sound. The next thing I did was watch the TV with the power turned off. This part of the assignment reminded me of the "doing nothing" activity since I had to focus all of my attention to one thing, in this case it was the blank TV screen, which was extremely boring. Then I went downstairs and sat on the couch with my grandpa who thought I just wanted to watch the old black and white movie he was watching. However, instead of watching the movie, I observed HIM as he watched the TV screen. He was extremely concentrated, so much that it looked like he was in a different world. He was also very calm and barely moved. From this assignment I've realized how much humans today are impacted by TV and that when we watch it, we become distant from our surroundings, and become consumed by the world on the screen.