Kendy and other lurkers,
it seems that I'm the only one who feels like being hit on the face, being
cheated somehow. I was so astonished when I read the apologises etc.
Maybe I'm childish even if being adult, but I trusted on the list,
thinking that all of you are so wise, belonging to an academic community
that is devoted to design in several disciplines. I don't think this is
funny. Of course one reason for my misunderstandings and feelings might
root from the problem of foreign language. Certainly I do not understand
everything.
Like I mentioned before, I already am thankful for all the good things I
have got through the list. Maybe it is the price for that?
- Raija
> This reminds me of the case of "Julie Graham" from 1982. A
> psychologist wanted to explore the liberating possibilities of changing
> gender and circumstance online. Having found that people approached
> him differently when he presented himself as a woman he enhanced the
> character making her a mute paraplegic who, due to a car accident was
> so disfigured she didn't want to go out in public. People were very
> attracted to this character because she embodied many people's
> conception of internet technology as a radical site for transformation.
> Like Cindy Jackson, many people became wary of Julie Graham after her
> characteristics did not meet the realities that those characteristics
> would embody.
>
> Nicholas Mirzoeff writes, "given that the chat-line lends itself so
> readily to this kind of posturing, the truly surprising element of the
> story might be that people were so surprised by the deception."
> (Mirzoeff 1999, 112) In the case of Cindy, I would say the same holds
> true. There's no shame in playing something that we are not. I
> perceive it like playing house. Ken plays the responsible father, then
> switches to the pugnacious child - maybe now he feels like the family
> dog that has been sent out to the kennel, but it's all play.
> Furthermore, given Ken's background in Fluxus and inter-arts, working
> with an avatar within a design context is perfectly legitimate.
>
> I don't see it any different than learning in a workplace. To advance
> we have to take on roles that are not us. I remember feeling like a
> big fraud the first term that I taught at the college level, like I had
> really pulled the wool over someone's eyes and that it wasn't even me
> at the lecture stand. We have to design ourselves. Exploring roles
> that we do not perceive as "ourselves" is an important part of that
> play and that process.
>
> Anyway, it's almost halloween - if Ken comes trick-or-treating as Cindy
> Jackson I've got a bag full of candy. No apology needed.
>
> Best,
>
> Alan
>
> Mirzoeff, Nicholas (1999), An Introduction to Visual Culture, New York,
> Routledge.
>
> For more on Julie Graham see Stone, Allucquere Rosanne (1995), The War
> of Desire and Technology at the Close of the Mechanical Age, Cambridge,
> MA, MIT Press.
>
---------------------------
Raija Halonen (Mrs.)
Project Manager
University of Oulu
Department of Information Processing Science
P.O. Box 3000, FI-90014 University of Oulu
tel. +358-40-5639678 (gsm)
+358-8-5531979 (office FY254A)
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