What does it mean to greet someone in a different language? In this video, President Obama does just that, over and over again. The repetitive nature elicited by editing these clips together suggests an effort on his part to learn these greetings. This effort is further emphasized by the moment where he doesn’t get it quite right and admits to having practiced. He later appeals to the human tribe, citing familiarity and likeness across different cultures. Of course, the video produces a reminiscence for Obama’s presidency, but I can’t help but wonder: what is this “human tribe?”
Like The Family of Man, this video evokes feelings of camaraderie and a natural human similarity. This effort to learn a simple aspect of another culture highlights similarity through the difference of speech. These are greetings, after all. The similarity is inherent. The difference lies within expression both in language and in culture. The viewer is expected to feel that these differences are negligible, allowing for this “human tribe” to form.
Learning about each other and finding similarity through our cultural difference is presented as the ideal. But the limitations on adopting other cultures is reinforced. The video does not show Obama wearing non-Western clothing. It does not show him participating in events that would be jarring to an American audience. Rather, Obama remains dressed in a suit and plays with a ball. He sees the sights and pats babies’ heads. After all, that which represents American culture is not undercut by the presentation, at least to some.
Posted on the Facebook page USA New Today, a page that regularly posts content depicting Obama in a favorable manner, this video is presented as a nostalgic piece: something to remind viewers of the good times we all had under our former president. But those who do not remember Obama’s presidency positively may have a hard time getting the same thing out of this video. Obama was often perceived as being too soft on other nations and was often criticized for it. To those who remember Obama’s presidency as largely negative, this video may serve as a reminder of their frustrations. In fact, they may read the opposite of the points I have made above. They may focus on the difference rather than the similarities that the video attempts to highlight. So maybe there isn’t one “human tribe.” Maybe, instead, difference cannot be wiped out by similarity.
Roland Barthes’ Mythologies reads The Family of Man in a similar manner. He concludes that this presentation and assumption of likeness creates an alibi for the actions of man, rendering them harmless. If we are able to focus on the camaraderie and the interactions of cultures presented in this video, we are then able to ignore and dismiss other actions that may be deemed unfavorable.
Returning to the video’s presentation of Obama’s many greetings, the usage of these phrases can be read as a myth. In his concluding essay “Myth Today,” Barthes presents a method of understanding myth as a second-order semiological system. The chart he provides to explain this looks like this:
So when, for example, Obama says “Grüß Gott,” he is saying much more than “God bless.” On the first-order of language, Obama makes the sounds of the phrase, forming the signifier. That which is signified is the meaning “God bless.” Together they form the sign which the audience hears and understands. But beyond its obvious meaning, each greeting demonstrates something else. The sign itself signifies something more. The audience doesn’t just understand the greeting. They understand that Obama has made an effort to be accepted with kindness and open arms. This is something you can almost see on Angela Merkel’s face as she processes the sounds she has just heard.
On the most basic level, we are presented with a video of President Obama greeting audiences in other languages. Beyond that, audiences within the video hear Obama and receive (perhaps to varying degree) his message of commonality. But another point is this: viewers will understand one of two things. Either they will understand that the former president’s era is to be missed for his outreach to other nations (the view encouraged by the video’s producers), or his opponents will see this effort as a symbol of his weakness.
The video may seem inconsequential to many. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if most people saw this in their feed and kept scrolling after less than a second. But videos, images, and texts such as these are doing a great deal of work to produce a particular affect on their audience. While the intent may have been to use the rhetoric in this video to convey a nostalgia for the former president’s affinity towards non-American cultures, there is much more heavy lifting behind the scenes.