SOC 328 Final Paper

"Humans have been writing symbols on walls since time immemorial." (Ehrich) Throughout the ages, man has used writing on walls to communicate their ideas, hopes, and dreams, to express or document the situations of the times, or merely to leave a trace that they had been there at some particular point in time. "The urge to write on walls is apparently as old as civilization itself. Before the invention of writing, for instance, prehistoric people outlined their hands on cave walls, as if to say, 'I was here'" (Benton & Di Yanni, p. 123)

Graffiti is often misunderstood today. "Historically, the term graffiti originally referred to the inscriptions, figure drawings, etc., found on the walls of ancient sepulchers or ruins, as in the Catacombs of Rome or at Pompeii." (Wikipedia) Today, these markings are still visible in different forms. "The contemporary movement spawned in the subways and streets of Philadelphia and New York in the late '60s has had a symbiotic relationship with academics, journalists, and photodocumentarians almost since its inception. Graffiti's insularity attracts anthropological curiosity, its rebel codes ferment sociological inquiry, and its eye-burning virtuosity and butterfly ephemerality demand documentation and cataloging." (graffiti.org)

For example, "In contemporary society, our national parks and monuments are plagued by this apparently basic human need to announce our presence, as generation after generation has inscribed their names and dates of visit on canyon walls and giant redwoods." (Benton & Di Yanni, p. 123) In addition, "Contemporary hip hop graffiti - today the dominant form of public graffiti and illegal public art in the United States, Europe, and elsewhere - took shape some 25 years ago as a distinctly local and urban phenomenon. Emerging in the Bronx and other New York City boroughs as part of a homegrown hip hop culture, this form of nongang graffiti was developed by inner-city youths as a stylized system of subcultural status and street-level communication. Tagging subcultural nicknames on walls and subway cars, painting larger two-dimensional throw-ups and still larger, multicolored pieces, hip hop graffiti writers and the crews that they organized illicitly remade New York City's public spaces and public meanings. Soon, however, the aesthetic codes and wildly stylized images of hip hop graffiti began to spread from New York City to other large cities and small towns in the United States, to the urban centers and isolated villages of Europe, and to Australia, New Zealand, and Japan." (Ferrell)

As we have learned, diversity is expressed and embraced in many forms. "In the late 20th century, the idea of cultural diversity emerged as a major force in American culture". (SOC 328)) As a result, graffiti was used by political activists to make declarations as well as by street gangs to mark territory. By some accounts, the history of the underground art movement most commonly termed graffiti actually began in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during the mid to late '60s. Whether it began in New York or Philadelphia, graffiti drew upon and responded to cultural resistance to oppression. Language plays a key role in graffiti, particularly written language. "Foucault and Deleuze, among others, have pointed out that language, and in particular written language, is an instrument or form of power. One suspects, indeed, that to some extent written language was developed to preserve and disseminate the decrees of rulers, as well as to keep records of debts and violations. It is hard to see how one would set up or preserve an elaborate hierarchy, a proper state, without a written language, and though tribal cultures have had a variety of inscriptional tools, they've rarely had anything like hieroglyphics, or written Chinese, or Sanskrit, or English, unless they were subjected to them. Indeed the rise of the state - systematic power worked on a large territorial scale, eventually global - coincides with the development of written language and is inconceivable without it. Much the same might be said of the huge religious hierarchies associated with Judaism, Islam, Christianity, and Hinduism. These have relied to one extent or another on the mystique of text, and a monopoly on its interpretation or even on sheer access to it, as in Catholicism in relation to Latin, for instance. The God of monotheisms, conceived by analogy to human rulers, expresses himself in text, as to Moses: gives laws. World capital also proceeds in the same way, more or less: advertising is largely incomprehensible without text; the idea of franchise, the recognizability of Wal-Mart, trade regulations, even which crops are planted where, the transfer of funds, all depend on textual forms. Science depends on repeatability of experiment, which in turn supposes the careful written description. Technology is cumulative in virtue of its textual encryptions. All forms of systematic power, we might say, are text-heavy, are forms of sentencing." (Sartwell)

Graffiti artists, in this sense, consider themselves writers. "Our environment bristles with rules expressed in signage. Graffiti, though it often employs images, is fundamentally a form of writing, and indeed graffiti artists refer to themselves as "writers." The medium of much of it is the name. The name itself occupies an uneasy or ambiguous zone of the language." (Sartwell) Whether considered art, writing, or symbolism, Graffiti can undoubtedly be considered true art because graffiti, rap, and hip hop, as discussed in the modules in class, all draw upon ancient African oral and written traditions of passing stories on from one generation to the next, whether in the form of writing, symbols, pictures, or music.

In this light, "Graffiti is also strongly related to the art of typography; indeed, many graffiti artists have invented a repertoire of alphabets, created in their black books and deployed on trains and walls. In addition, they have appropriated lettering styles from advertising, comic books, and many other sources, which they have adapted to their purposes." (Sartwell)

Graffiti is notorious for marking historical events for those in the future to see and read. "One of the earliest records of the Spanish conquest of the American Southwest is preserved on Inscription Rock at El Morro National Monument in New Mexico. It reads, 'Passed by here the Adelantado Don Juan de Onate, from the discovery of the Sea of the South, the 16th April of 1605'. It is the first of a long legacy of such inscriptions, culminating in the graffiti that today 'decorates' so much of the local landscape - the so-called 'tags', or names, of graffiti 'writers' that vie for prominence on many walls of urban America." (Benton & De Yanni, p. 123)

Many cultures throughout the ages have embraced Graffiti as a means for conveying a message. "The Romans, it seems, were themselves great practitioners of the 'art' of graffiti. In Pompeii alone over 3,500 graffiti have been found. Among them is the normal fare: 'Successus was here;' 'Publius Comicius Restitutus stood here with his brother;' 'We are here, two dear friends, comrades forever. If you want to know our names, they are Gaius and Aulus;' and 'Gaius Julius Primigenius was here. Why are you late?' But the Romans were also adept at the kind of graffiti we normally associate today with 'bathroom humor': One wit apparently paraphrases Julius Caesar's famous boast 'I came, I saw, I conquered,' transforming it into 'I came here, I screwed, I returned home.' There are as well many graffiti of the 'Marcus loves Spendusa' and 'Serena hates Isidore' variety. But one writer sums up the feelings of future generations of graffiti readers: 'I am amazed, O wall, that you have not collapsed and fallen, since you must bear the tedious stupidities of so many scrawlers." (Benton & Di Yanni, p. 123)

Diversity and global culture are embraced today as well as historically in the expression graffiti portrays. "However, not only Greeks and Romans produced graffiti: the Mayan site of Tikal in Guatemala also contains ancient examples. Viking graffiti survive in Rome and at Newgrange Mound in Ireland, and Varangians carved their runes in Hagia Sophia in Constantinople. The ancient Irish inscribed stones with an alphabet called Ogham - this standard mode of writing may not fall into the category of graffiti. There are also examples in American history, like Signature Rock (a national landmark), along the Oregon Trail." (Wikipedia) Later, French soldiers carved their names on monuments during the Napoleonic campaign of Egypt in the 1790s. There is Chinese graffiti on the Great Wall of China." (Wikipedia)

Graffiti art reflects not only the culture of its time, but life itself. "Graffiti today has evolved into a complete culture from its roots as a subculture of hip-hop. Graffiti culture itself is the creator of its own fairly extensive slang primarily used by graffiti artists and not by the unaffiliated wider hip-hop culture, making it unique to style. The most prominent years in graffiti's history were the years from 1966 - 1989. During this period graffiti was evolving through activity in subway stations and on the subway cars themselves. Many contemporary analysts and even art critics have begun to see artistic value in some graffiti and to recognize it as a form of public art. According to many art researchers, particularly in the Netherlands and in Los Angeles, that type of public art is, in fact an effective tool of social emancipation or in the achievement of a political goal." (Wikipedia)

Graffiti has extended beyond its traditional historical connections because marginalized groups elsewhere are using them as forms of expression and outlet. (Week 4 Module 2) "As it enters a new era, graffiti is evolving, as all art must; the letterforms and characters of earlier years are now morphing with the influence of radical new techniques. Once a narrow, codified creative form, graffiti has grown as diverse as the cities in which it's found, and the books about it are also changing." (Berry) Globally, graffiti reaches people with a message in order to let people notice important issues and to have some fun from this. For example, in Poland, "We cut down stencils. We paint directly from a paint can. We make stickers and posters. We create our techniques like: gluing of ceramic masks, mirrors with scratched text, and stones with hammered symbols. We also use the fastening of "Kramelka", which is a wooden "peg" with a flag which is moved by wind and brings positive energy to city space. All the time we develop creatively and we invite other people to cooperation. In general graffiti is a tool to teleport thoughts, ideas of our own posture. We do our job looking for a place in a city. We create reality filling the space with positive messages." (www.graffiti.org)

Graffiti murals are displayed in public from Belfast, Ireland to Los Angeles, California. "In times of conflict, such murals have offered a means of communication and self-expression for members of these socially, ethnically and/or racially divided communities, and have proven themselves as effective tools in establishing dialog and thus of addressing cleavages in the long run." (Wikipedia)

Graffiti artists come in all shapes and sizes and draws upon ancient traditions from the beginning of time. Its method of display in public is seen on subways, walls, buildings, and streets, from Montreal to Poland. It is created by women, men, people of color, poor people, white people, Europeans, Asians, etc. Graffiti should be considered real art because it is often created by people who are trying to send a message, express themselves, or used as a form of resistance as a marginalized group. Graffiti is a reflection of cultural diversity in the late 20th century in American culture. "Women artists and writers, and artists of color emerged with a variety of unique perspectives, offering multiple histories of American life. Americans began to realize that America was a beautiful, multicolored patchwork of histories, languages, and cultures. In addition, many of these art forms have inspired other resistance movements around the world - and so, diversity is not limited to American culture, but has become part of world culture." (SOC 328) Graffiti embraces diversity and has extended to become a permanent global fixture. Perhaps one day one thousand years from now, people will run across the markings, etchings, pictures, writings, and symbols graffiti embodies today and better understand the times we live in, the social implications of our time, our hopes, and our dreams.

WORKS CITED

Graffiti in Its Own Words. Dimitri Ehrich, Gregor Ehrich. New York. New York: July 3-10, 2006. Vol. 39, Iss. 24; pg. 48, 8 pgs.

Freight train graffiti: Subculture, crime, dislocation. Jeff Ferrell. Justice Quarterly: JQ. Highland Heights: Dec 1998. Vol. 15, Iss. 4; pg. 587, 22 pgs

Graffiti and Language. Crispin Sartwell. www.graffiti.org. Retrieved 7/26/2006

Benton & Di Yanni. Arts and Culture. Pearson Prentice Hall. Copyright 2005

www.wikipedia.org Retrieved 7/26/2006

Graffiti World: Street Art from Five Continents. Colin Berry. Print. Rockville: May/Jun 2005. Vol. 59, Iss. 3; pg. 174, 1 pgs

SOC 328 Web Readings from Week 4 Module 2

SOC 328 Web Readings from Week 4 Module 3

www.3fala.art.pl Retrieved 7/26/2006

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