Hypes, hopes and actualities: new digital Cartesianism and bodies in cyberspace

Abstract

‘New Digital Cartesianism’ investigates the socio-material power inequities embedded in text-based, computer-mediated communication (CMC). Is the body really transcended in text-based computer-mediated communication? This article summarizes software and hardware advertising ‘hypes’, cyber-enthusiast ‘hopes’, and the ‘actualities’ of CMC which contradict this virtual dream of pure minds communicating. Marketing hypes and cyberhopes mythologize disembodied CMC with promises of anonymity and fluid identities. However, the actualities of how users interpret and derive meaning from text-based communication often involve reductive bodily markers that re-invoke stereotypes of racialized, sexualized and gendered bodies. Ironically, despite claims that CMC achieves Descartes’ dream of ‘pure minds’ and the transcendence of body, users frequently rely on stereotyped images and descriptions of bodies in order to confer authenticity and signification to textual utterances. In digital Cartesianism, the body actually functions as a necessary arbiter of meaning and final signifier of what is accepted as ‘real’ and ‘true’.

Giving the “Viewser” a Voice? Situating the Individual in Relation to Personalization, Narrowcasting, and Public Service Broadcasting

“…Though such claims have since been met with skepticism (Boler, 2007;Nakamura, 2002), the potential for the Web to create multi-directional dialogue between users sharing a ''public'' space has certainly persisted-''posting,'' ''liking,'' ''sharing,'' and ''retweeting'' are now common forms of Web interaction. As this Pew report recognizes, many-to-many models afford ordinary members of the public with a voice largely absent from one-to-many models traditionally implemented by public service broadcasters:…”

El cuerpo y la corporeidad simbólica como forma de mediación

“…Precisamente esta libertad para poder construir cuerpos ficticios es la que permite a los sujetos separarse de sus categorías sociales habituales tales como son el género, la etnia, la edad o la clase social (Boler, 2007), que generalmente se encuentran ancladas en el cuerpo físico. No olvidemos que muchas de estas etiquetas dependen del aspecto y la apariencia y, por tanto, mediante un avatar los sujetos pueden reafirmar, neutralizar, transformar o negar cualquiera de estos aspectos sociales impuestos.…”

How Compatible are Communities of Inquiry and the Internet? Some Concerns about the Community of Inquiry Approach to E-learning

“…A lack of knowledge about each other's backgrounds and situatedness is likely to impede communal inquiry rather than enable it because it can make it difficult for participants to really understand where each other is coming from and respond to each other appropriately. This is probably why Burkhalter found that 'participants in internet newsgroups seemed more interested in being known than remaining anonymous ' (1999, p. 63;see also O'Brien, 1999;Boler, 2007). Burkhalter found that users frequently revealed their race in online communication because they knew it would affect the way others understood and responded to them.…”

“…Such information is also conveyed through one's name, the language one uses, one's values, perspectives, experiences, the examples one gives, etc. Many researchers have criticised this persistent claim that social markers and personal attributes like race and gender disappear online (Burkhalter, 1999;O'Brien, 1999;Nakamura, 2002;Zembylas & Vrasidas, 2005;Boler, 2007;Friersen, 2009)…”