I read an article (I can’t remember where) that suggested the selfie stick is no longer simply a fad; it’s gone to the next level and has become a cultural phenomenon, whatever that means. I think what the author was getting at is that its presence in our daily activities is symptomatic of deeper cultural rumblings. It captures something of the zeitgeist. Who am I to argue? As a photographer, I’m committed to capturing the zeitgeist however it might appear in my frame. Wandering through the crowds during the Pan Am Games, I was struck by the truth of the author’s statement. The selfie stick’s time has come.
Why do people use a selfie stick? One thought that occurs to me is that people want to place themselves in their context. It’s not enough simply shoot pictures of themselves. They want to say: I was there! I was at that place or event! A selfie stick pushes the camera far enough back that it can include some of the place or event in the frame.
Something I notice about the use of selfie sticks is that it isn’t specific to age or ethnicity. If there’s any pattern I’ve observed, it’s that selfie stick use tends to be a couples thing. People want to be shown together in a place or event. Maybe the next big thing will be the selfie stick break up app that deletes one of the people from the selfie stick photo after they’ve gone their separate ways.
