If people can tweet at religious services for Jewish high holy days, can tweet seats at all your performances be far behind?
Well, obviously the reality is much more complicated than that. Synagogues aren’t at the forefront of using social media to engage their religious communities. Not yet at least.
But a recent article in the New York Times recounting a Rosh Hashanah service at the Jewish Museum of Florida contained some sentiments familiar to those in the performing and visual arts; including high cost of accessing the event, the need to “re-engage and energize young professionals” and a desire to make the experience accessible to that demographic.
“We can no longer assume that young people will join the Jewish community,” said Rabbi Gary A. Glickstein, Temple Beth Sholom’s spiritual leader. “They need to be helped on that journey.”
Substitute “participate/attend arts and culture events” for “join the Jewish community” and you have an oft repeated phrase of the arts community. (Albeit incorrectly attributed to Rabbi Glickstein.)
As part of the experiment, the organizers changed the formatting slightly and used technology to achieve the same intent as the conventional religious practice. They termed it an experience rather than a service.
The article seems to attribute willing participation in rituals people often avoid contributing to at regular services to the anonymity provided by the technology. What people texted about their own fears and failings appeared anonymously on a screen. The technology allowed people to share and bond as a community without necessarily making any individual feel vulnerable. Thus the organizers were able to serve the spiritual needs of the attendees.
The fact that the organizers felt it was necessary to change the formatting of a traditional religious practice signaled to me that it may take more than just allowing people to tweet at a performance to engage younger audiences. In many ways, tweet seats feels like an overlaid concession to younger audience members telling them they will be allowed to watch and text about the experience as long as they don’t disturb anyone else or have any expectations that the content will change.
Yes, I know there are plenty of people doing interesting and innovative programming that will inspire people to tweet without any prompting. My main thrust is to suggest both that it may be necessary to change the format of the experience to be more complementary to tweeting activity at an arts event and that it may be possible to do so without sacrificing the intent and significance of the experience.
I was encouraged to see that this was organized at a museum. I took it as a sign that the museum was responsive to the community it served and recognized as a viable resource to meet its needs.
Though those attending the Rosh Hashana services in Miami described their experience as “refreshing and fun,” the changes to the service didn’t seem to have a frivolous result. People described the sense of community and engagement they had and their feeling that the experience was honest and thought provoking, all of which I assume are typically the goals of most Rosh Hashana services regardless of where they occur.
Of course, there will always be occasions where live tweeting is not really appropriate…like a bris.