de Zeeuw, D.

English

This study analyzes the online “mask culture” of imageboards like 4chan in opposition to the dominant “face culture” of social media platforms like Facebook. It is argued that whereas the latter casts the user as possessing a clearly delineated and persistent personal identity, the former fosters a paradoxical sense of (non)identity that is ephemeral and im-personal, and that forms a monstrous and grotesque media body, in which the boundaries of the self are rendered porous by way of a festive immersion in digital dirt and anonymous contact. In this, it is shown, mask culture radically embodies the profane media logic that inheres in contemporary culture as a whole. The study seeks to understand this logic with an eye to its emancipatory potentials as well as its more problematic aspects, by situating it in the larger historical and aesthetic lineages of modern mass (media) culture and the carnivalesque tradition in popular culture and art. What this reveals is an affinity between mass and mask that, albeit precariously, continues to resonate in the present

International Migration, Integration and Social Cohesion online publications

UvA-DARE is a service provided by the library of the University of Amsterdam (https://dare.uva.nl)UvA-DARE (Digital Academic Repository)Between mass and maskThe profane media logic of anonymous imageboard culturede Zeeuw, D.Publication date2019Document VersionOther versionLicenseOtherLink to publicationCitation for published version (APA):de Zeeuw, D. (2019). Between mass and mask: The profane media logic of anonymousimageboard culture.General rightsIt is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s)and/or copyright holder(s), other than for strictly personal, individual use, unless the work is under an opencontent license (like Creative Commons).Disclaimer/Complaints regulationsIf you believe that digital publication of certain material infringes any of your rights or (privacy) interests, pleaselet the Library know, stating your reasons. In case of a legitimate complaint, the Library will make the materialinaccessible and/or remove it from the website. Please Ask the Library: https://uba.uva.nl/en/contact, or a letterto: Library of the University of Amsterdam, Secretariat, Singel 425, 1012 WP Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Youwill be contacted as soon as possible.Download date:11 Nov 2022   Between Mass and Mask The Profane Media Logic of Anonymous Imageboard Culture         Daniël de Zeeuw Ph.D. Dissertation, Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis University of Amsterdam     Between Mass and Mask The Profane Media Logic of Anonymous Imageboard Culture    ACADEMISCH PROEFSCHRIFT ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam op gezag van de Rector Magnificus prof. dr. ir. K.I.J. Maex ten overstaan van een door het College voor Promoties ingestelde commissie,  in het openbaar te verdedigen in de Agnietenkapel  op woensdag 18 december 2019, te 12.00 uur door Daniël de Zeeuw geboren te Utrecht       Promotiecommissie:   Promotores:  Prof. dr. R. Celikates, Freie Universität Berlin      Prof. dr. E. Peeren, Universiteit van Amsterdam Overige leden: Prof. dr. W.H.K. Chun, Simon Fraser University    Prof. dr. ir. B.J. de Kloet, Universiteit van Amsterdam    Prof. dr. P.P.R.W. Pisters, Universiteit van Amsterdam     Dr. M. Deseriis, Northeastern University    Dr. M.D. Tuters, Universiteit van Amsterdam   Faculteit der Geesteswetenschappen         Tout ce qui ne se consume pas, pourrit.1 Roger Caillois, L'homme et le sacré (1933)                                                     1 ‘Everything that doesn’t consume itself, rots’ (Caillois 1988, my translation).    Table of Contents Publication Acknowledgement i Acknowledgments ii List of Figures iii Introduction 1 1. Anonymous Imageboard Culture  1.1 4chan’s /b/ Random Board 7 1.2 Japanese Imageboards and Something Awful 18 1.3 Mask Versus Face Culture 24 2. Existence without Identity  2.1 The Significance of Anonymity in Online Mask Culture 30 2.2 Anonymity as a Modern Condition 35 2.3 Anonymous as the Faceless Inhabitant of Everyday Life 39 2.4 In Search of Anon 44 3. Profanation and Mass Media Culture  3.1 Immunity from the Image 46 3.2 The Mass Ornament: Between Alienation and Liberation 52 3.3 A Universal Prostitution: The Conflicted Legacies of Mass Modernity 55 3.4 Collective Pleasures of Anonymity: From the Public Restroom to Chatroulette 59 4. The Carnivalesque Spirit of Online Mask Culture  4.1 An Incest of Forms: Modernity as Masquerade 67 4.2 An Ocean of Mouths, Noses, Eyes, and Ears: The Carnivalesque Commoning of Faces 75 4.3 Profane Laughter: Of Comedy and Pornography 82 4.4 “Teh Internet is Serious Business”: Profanation as Parody and Play 89 5. 4chan’s Excremental Visions  5.1 Scatological Representations of 4chan as the Bottom of the Web 94 5.2 “A Brutal Barrage of Blistering Bullshit”: The Human Centipede 102 5.3 4chan’s Grotesque Media Body: The Naked Obese Man 108 5.4 In the Digital Flesh (I am a Beautiful Monster) 115 5.5 “Co-existence has Created a Fucking Monster” 120 Conclusion 127 Bibliography 131 Summary 155 Samenvatting 157     i Publication Acknowledgement Parts of section 3.1 have been published in ephemera (de Zeeuw 2017a). Parts of section 4.2 have been published in NECSUS (de Zeeuw 2017b).  

Between mass and mask:The profane media logic of anonymous imageboard culture

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Between mass and mask:The profane media logic of anonymous imageboard culture

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International Migration, Integration and Social Cohesion online publications