This, I, You

Focusing on “So Is This”, I noticed that throughout the film, Snow refers to himself as “the author”, not “I” or “the director”. He makes a choice of not using the pronoun “I” to refer to himself, yet refers to the viewer as “you” and repetitiously emphasizes the word “this”. The usual role-shifting of the words “I” and “you” does not occur between the author and the viewer. It only occurs in the viewer’s mind, as he or she translates the “you” that he/she sees to the concept of self.

On the other hand, Snow overuses the word “this”. “This” is a true shifter; the meaning can be occupied by any referent, and it isn’t always clear in the film what the referent is in that particular context. Snow’s decision to emphasize the shifter “this” and confuse the viewer at times, but refrain from using “I” and simplify the thought process (although at most times unconsciously done) of going back and forth from “you” and “I” raises the question, was Snow’s intention to confuse or not to confuse the viewers? Was it just a personal preference to choose the word “this” for emphasis rather than “you” or “I” or any other pronoun? Or does his intention not even matter because of what Barthe claims about authorial intentions?

Perhaps it was that “this” can refer to a lot more things than “you” or “I” can. If used, “I” would only refer to the author himself in this case, because there is no direct communication between the author and the viewer. It is one-sided. The author can refer to the viewer as “you”, and the meaning of the word “you” would be occupied by anyone present in the room, whereas saying “I” would only refer to Snow himself throughout the whole film. The viewer referring to themselves by saying “I” in their minds, wouldn’t count necessarily because it never gets delivered to the author; it never gets uttered and it just remains as a concept of the self. Referring to himself as “I” would have just been less interesting for Snow because in the context, “I” wouldn’t play its full role as a shifter; it would just remain a word describing the author. Also, since the viewers are “reading” the film, using “I” instead of “author” would just simply confuse them because they are saying to themselves “I” for the author and “you” for themselves, but have to switch them back in their heads.