In sickness and in health

When a system is disrupted, and reveals the possibility of it’s extreme, the malfunctioning casts a new light or shadow on how we observe(d) it. Some doors
that seemed open, suddenly close. Can open‐closed be observed as a binary opposition? And if not, how do we structure the meaning around them? Or, is the
contrast stronger between open non‐open? I will consider two cases in which doors are partially open/closed in regards to their functional and dysfunctional state: The painting “The Effects of Good Government” from 1338. Siena, and the case of Twitter over usage during the swine flu epidemic in 2009. What connects these two is disease, as a means of infecting a system. In the vast abundance of space online for everyone, of discourse of connectedness to the world and endless exchange, thin lines between wanted and compulsive. I would like to examine the walls that exist in the discourse of openness in media.

Full essay