My unexpected object is Vaseline petroleum jelly. I recently learned that Vaseline is a byproduct of oil drilling. I was completely surprised by that and then felt quite silly since petroleum is in the name of the product. I have been using it all of these years and thinking of it as a pure, natural, and healthy product while the label with petroleum written on it has been staring me in the face. After realizing this my associations with Vaseline shifted to see it as part of a very harmful and exploitative industry. This realization also made me question whether I still want to use it since I would not put petroleum or oil on my body.
I was curious whether other people in the class were aware of this connection and how they would respond to it. More people than I expected were already aware of the source of Vaseline and did not seem disturbed by it. I got some interesting feedback from a few people who pointed out that the fact that Vaseline is a byproduct of oil drilling could be seen as a good thing since it means there are more valuable outputs from the process. Other people said that they were aware that it is from petroleum and that it was interesting to them that I was so upset by it but that it made them think about it too.
I would say my intended outcome was accomplished, although not in the exact way I imagined since more people were aware of the connection than I expected. However, I think that by pointing it out and questioning it some people were moved to see Vaseline in a different and less innocuous light. I also experienced two interesting things from sharing my observation. One, prompted by Lisa, was that I thought about my motivations to choose this object in the broader context of my approach and voice and found unexpected connections to my interest in contextualizing and historicizing things that we take for granted or assume are inevitable. Two, I saw that there were many other ways to look at the object after I had altered the associations, that is, I thought if people knew about this they would be surprised and upset the way that I was but in fact, some of the people who knew saw it as a neutral or even positive and productive use of resources.
In order to alter my object I poured a dark liquid into the Vaseline container, imagining how we would respond to it if rather than being clear and odorless it retained the smell and color of oil.