“Nobody Is Ever Alone”: The Use of Social Media Narrative to Include the Viewer in SKAM

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Introduction: Electronic Literature as a Framework for the Digital Humanities

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Pandemic Genres: Processing the COVID-19 Pandemic through Electronic Literature

This essay surveys works of electronic literature and digital art initiated in the earliest months of the pandemic that are reflective of the specific conditions and anxieties of the period. Here, we offer critical readings of these works to provide a better understanding of how electronic literature and digital art were used to process the experience and communicate the experience of the COVID-19 pandemic. Through an analysis of 18 works, certain traits and commonalities are identified as characteristic of a period-specific genre of COVID E-Lit. These include: * an impulse towards the post-digital with crossovers both to analog artistic practice and forms such as net art more common to the early web; * a focus during the periods of lockdown on domestic, local, and interior environments; * digital takes on a chronicle mode of storytelling familiar from prior pandemic periods; * meditation on the loss and substitution of shared public space; * use of text generation to represent repetitive and interminable experiences of the pandemic; * consideration of the virus itself as a language and on language as a manifestation of power and control; * the influence of ubiquitous visualizations and statistical representations of the pandemic; and * a desire to wrestle with the implications of the massive cultural shift to digital platforms that took place during the pandemic.publishedVersio

"What's your pace?" Gedanken zum Forschen mit und über digitale(r) Selbstvermessung

Welche Vorstellungen über Körper sind digitalen Selbstvermessungsinstrumenten eingeschrieben und wie wird dieses Wissen in den Alltagspraktiken von Nutzer_innen angewandt? Neben diesem Fokus auf das Forschen über den Umgang mit digitalen Fitness-Tracking-Apps und Devices soll dieser Beitrag auch das Forschen mit diesen thematisieren. Dies meint zum einen meine eigene Nutzung von digitalen Selbstvermessungs-Instrumenten sowie meine Erfahrung als "laufende" Forscherin. In diesem Sinne thematisiert der Beitrag die verschiedenen Bedeutungsebenen von kulturanthropologischer Wissensproduktion über ein Feld, in dessen Mittelpunkt wiederum die Wissensproduktion über den eigenen Alltag zentral ist. Der Zugang kann zudem als "hacking" im Sinne des Auslotens der Möglichkeiten ethnographischer Forschung verstanden werden. Dieser Zugang und seine Relevanz ergeben sich durch zwei einander überlappende Charakteristika des Forschungsfeldes. Zum einen lässt sich die Omnipräsenz und ein Heranrücken an den Körper von mobilen digitalen Geräten im Alltag nennen, zum anderen die zentrale Stellung des Körpers als zu Vermessendes für das Forschungsfeld. Anhand von Beispielen aus meiner Forschung zum Umgang mit digitalen Fitness-Tracking-Apps und -Devices, im Rahmen derer ein Selbstversuch, Interviews und Beobachtungen durchgeführt wurden (bzw. werden), zielt der Beitrag darauf ab, die beiden Ebenen des "Forschens über" und des "Forschens mit" zusammenzuführen. Somit wird die Verwobenheit von Feldforscherin, Forschungsprozess und Forschungsfeld expliziert

Navigating Sociotechnical Power Structures: Dynamics of Conflict in World of Warcraft\u27s Player versus Player Events

As a result of technological advancement and exponential increases in global access, cross-disciplinary research has recently turned to digital online video games. Most anthropological research within this area has centered around player self-identification, gender construction, and gaming communities. Yet many interactions occur at nodes of dynamic conflict where agentic players navigate intersections of power, which are unaddressed in the scholarly corpus. By utilizing ethnographic methods in World of Warcraft\u27s player versus player events, I examine resources, relationships, and tools that underpin player actions and understandings. My findings reveal layered and dynamic patterns of sociotechnical conflict. Players\u27 geographical location impacts access to infrastructure while hardware and software constrain in-game action in fundamental and inescapable ways. Player versus player events add additional restrictions and create fluid situations where players continually negotiate fluctuating social tensions while event-dependent dispersions of power fluctuate between groups and individuals. Players become leaders by legitimizing power in contextually unique ways, and competing imaginaries generate conflicts that are interpreted through game-specific subjectivities. In exploring these occurrences and utilizing theoretical explanations within World of Warcraft contexts, this research contributes to disciplinary understandings and discussions addressing conflict, leadership, and power, and to methodological techniques utilized in virtual world study. By foregrounding how players navigate power differentials in conflict situations, this research informs broader conceptions of how individuals and groups manage social disputes within and outside digital social events, informs game design, and has policy implications for resolving virtual world conflicts in real world courts

What's your pace? Gedanken zum Forschen mit und über digitale(r) Selbstvermessung

Welche Vorstellungen über Körper sind digitalen Selbstvermessungsinstrumenten eingeschrieben und wie wird dieses Wissen in den Alltagspraktiken von Nutzer_innen angewandt? Neben diesem Fokus auf das Forschen über den Umgang mit digitalen Fitness-Tracking-Apps und Devices soll dieser Beitrag auch das Forschen mit diesen thematisieren. Dies meint zum einen meine eigene Nutzung von digitalen Selbstvermessungs-Instrumenten sowie meine Erfahrung als „laufende“ Forscherin. In diesem Sinne thematisiert der Beitrag die verschiedenen Bedeutungsebenen von kulturanthropologischer Wissensproduktion über ein Feld, in dessen Mittelpunkt wiederum die Wissensproduktion über den eigenen Alltag zentral ist. Der Zugang kann zudem als „hacking“ im Sinne des Auslotens der Möglichkeiten ethnographischer Forschung verstanden werden. Dieser Zugang und seine Relevanz ergeben sich durch zwei einander überlappende Charakteristika des Forschungsfeldes. Zum einen lässt sich die Omnipräsenz und ein Heranrücken an den Körper von mobilen digitalen Geräten im Alltag nennen, zum anderen die zentrale Stellung des Körpers als zu Vermessendes für das Forschungsfeld. Anhand von Beispielen aus meiner Forschung zum Umgang mit digitalen Fitness-Tracking-Apps und -Devices, im Rahmen derer ein Selbstversuch, Interviews und Beobachtungen durchgeführt wurden (bzw. werden), zielt der Beitrag darauf ab, die beiden Ebenen des „Forschens über“ und des „Forschens mit“ zusammenzuführen. Somit wird die Verwobenheit von Feldforscherin, Forschungsprozess und Forschungsfeld expliziert

Treacherous Play

The ethics and experience of “treacherous play”: an exploration of three games that allow deception and betrayal—EVE Online, DayZ, and Survivor. Deception and betrayal in gameplay are generally considered off-limits, designed out of most multiplayer games. There are a few games, however, in which deception and betrayal are allowed, and even encouraged. In Treacherous Play, Marcus Carter explores the ethics and experience of playing such games, offering detailed explorations of three games in which this kind of “dark play” is both lawful and advantageous: EVE Online, DayZ, and the television series Survivor. Examining aspects of games that are often hidden, ignored, or designed away, Carter shows the appeal of playing treacherously. Carter looks at EVE Online's notorious scammers and spies, drawing on his own extensive studies of them, and describes how treacherous play makes EVE successful. Making a distinction between treacherous play and griefing or trolling, he examines the experiences of DayZ players to show how negative experiences can be positive in games, and a core part of their appeal. And he explains how in Survivor's tribal council votes, a player's acts of betrayal can exact a cost. Then, considering these games in terms of their design, he discusses how to design for treacherous play. Carter's account challenges the common assumptions that treacherous play is unethical, antisocial, and engaged in by bad people. He doesn't claim that more games should feature treachery, but that examining this kind of play sheds new light on what play can be

Whitman on TweetDeck: Community and Self Through Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass and Blogging

Denne avhandlinga tek for seg dikt-eposet Leaves of Grass (Gresstrå på norsk) av Walt Whitman og tradisjonen han etablerte gjennom verket, i relasjon til blogging. Leaves kom først ut i 1855 og er eit verk som ikkje har late seg fange inn i enkle kategoriar, eller utgåver (Whitman gav ut nye utgåver heilt til han gjekk bort i 1892). Gjennom Leaves skildra Whitman seg sjølv, naturen, samfunnet og universet med slik kraft at han har vorte ståande som ein sentral figur i amerikansk poesi den dag i dag. Sentralt for denne avhandlinga er korleis Whitman skildra seg sjølv til sine lesarar og gjennom den skildringa skapte eit fellesskap som framleis lever. Whitman vart rekna som arrogant, skammeleg og pervers i sin samtid, men i vår notid står han fram som svært nær med blogging, som også byggjer på å presentere seg sjølv for å skape samhald gjennom den presentasjonen av identitet. Dette har med åra ført til ein ubevisst kjensle av at Whitman på fleire vis er ein forløpar til bloggkulturen, som denne avhandlinga tek opp og utforskar. Avhandlinga gjer reie for bloggen og hans kopling til Whitman, slik det står fram i media frå 2010-talet. Denne koplinga vart så undersøkt gjennom ein større tradisjon av sjølv-presentasjon, nemleg «sjølvet sine teknologiar» av den franske filosofen Michel Foucault. Foucault såg ein lang linje i korleis mennesket formar seg sjølv gjennom korleis det skriv seg sjølv, dette blir teken i betraktning for analysen av Whitman og blogginga. Avhandlinga tek også opp bloggen i perspektiv av historia den ber i media. Utvalde dikt frå Leaves of Grass vert analysert opp mot «sjølvet sine teknologiar» og bloggen, med fokus på korleis Whitman diktar både seg sjølv og lesarane sine inn i ein felles stad, som her vert kalla «det imaginære rom». Gjennom det tek oppgåva opp korleis dette vært overført til blogg-tradisjonen, gjennom analyse av tre ulike eksempel. Den ser på to forsøk på å bære Whitman sin persona inn i sosiale media gjennom Facebook og Twitter og analyserer korleis Whitman sin persona kjem til uttrykk der. Til sist kjem arbeidet til Steve Roggenbuck, ein blogg-poet som i åtte år publiserte dikt gjennom sosiale media, som forsøk på å følgje Whitman sin tradisjon inn til blogging. Avhandlinga analyserer arbeidet hans på YouTube og diskuterer korleis tradisjonen han følgjer kjem ut gjennom blogging. Funna kan bane veg for seinare diskusjonar om både korleis Whitman er relevant for bloggen og korleis litterære fellesskap vært danna gjennom det digitale.Engelsk mastergradsoppgaveENG350MAHF-LÆFRMAHF-EN

Üksildus küberruumis: autori individuaalsus ja teksti autonoomia. Solitude in Cyberspace: the Individuality of an Author and the Autonomy of a Text

The keywords in analyses of digital literature and cybertexts (literature that has been created by and is read on a computer) mostly derive from the vocabulary of increasing collectivism: shared authorship, readerviewer interaction, their active participation in creating text etc. However, this article focuses on the opposite phenomenon: the essence of individualism in the process of digital text creation, that is, solitude. At the same time, the paradoxes related to collectivism and solitude are also addressed. In this article, solitude is regarded as a technical term, indicating the number of different agents in a creative process. This primarily means: whether the text can be associated with one author and his intention, or whether authorship is distributed between several people who have participated in the creation of the text, as well as if and how much texts presume activity on the part of the reader. We can claim that when writers write their texts they are usually on their own. A text is born in the writer’s head and he or she needs some kind of form to present it. When the form of literature was mostly what was recorded on paper, we could say that the author formalised his text in solitude – writing alone on pieces of paper. Only after the manuscript was handed in were other participants added, such as the editor, designer and printer, who took part in the completion process of the literary work. However, when the end result of production is not a printed book, but a cyber- or hypertext, we can assume that these relationships change significantly in the case of digital literature. In addition to the author of the text, cybertexts and hypertexts need active co-authors: programmers, designers etc. Creating a cybertext is, therefore, basically a collective act (although there are of course exceptions). The author of a cybertext is no longer the only and unique creator. At the same time, the solitude of a creative work in cyberspace disappears. After publishing a book in print, the text is left alone; it begins living its own life. In cyberspace, on the contrary, connections in various forms between the author, the work and the reader are retained. Alan Kirby has launched the concept of digimodernism, which marks the cultural stage connected with the spread of Web 2.0. The “digimodernist turn”, in the form of blogs, Facebook and Twitter, has also brought about a change for authors of digital literature. The technological simplicity of the new software means that authors no longer need any urgent technical assistance. This again raises the problem of the author’s solitude: he formalises his work in his blog on his own, alone. It might thus seem paradoxical that in the printed world both the author and his work are solitary, whereas in the cyberworld the solitude of creative work vanishes, because it requires interaction between authors and readers. At the same time, the author’s solitude in cyberspace is twofold – creating cybertexts mostly requires assistance, whereas digimodernist blog literature can be produced in solitude, independently. Very few cybertexts in Estonia have been produced as teamwork, with technical assistance. In this article, two showcases have been studied: the hypertextual poem “Trepp” (“Staircase”, 1996) by Hasso Krull and the grand team project Sonetimasin (Sonnet Machine, 2000) by Märt Väljataga, which consists of a book, an Internet text generator and an enormous electromechanical sonnet machine, which was displayed in an art gallery. Considering the technological experimentation of Estonian writers, these two examples are exceptional rather than normal. Estonian authors have traditionally been reluctant to try out computer-technological experiments. However, the digimodernist turn has altered this situation. Many Estonian writers are active bloggers and Facebook users. Estonian writers who were earlier afraid of technology have become very keen on it in the digimodernist world. We think that the reason for this significant change is that Estonian writers wish to be independent. We can claim that Estonian writers want to be solitary in cyberspace, to avoid participating in technological teamwork, and the new and easy technological platforms make it possible. Literature in Estonia therefore, in a way, continues the tradition of the modernist author who does not wish to give up the position of being an individual author. Digimodernist technological simplicity has indeed made possible the organic transfer from printed text to digital literature, which does not endanger the authorial position