""Online a Lot of the Time" tackles the complex subject of telepresence more convincingly than anything else around. It suggests that the sign/body of an online digital avatar occupies a 'middle ground, ' analogous to the 'middle voice' produced through the novel's technique of free indirect discourse, in which the avatar functions as more than an image but less than an autonomous agent. Moreover, because of the psychic investments that operators project into the avatar, it also functions analogously to a fetish--or rather, a telefetish. Building on previous theorizations of the fetish, the book makes a decisive intervention by showing that these concepts can fruitfully be extended into the virtual realm. With an impressive range of references, including commodity theory, media theory, the history of the telegraph, and a host of other areas, "Online a Lot of the Time" is essential reading for anyone interested in virtuality and its effects."--Katherine Hayles, author of "Electronic Literature: New Horizons for the Literary"
Inhaltsverzeichnis
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction: Rituals of Transmission, Fetishizing the Trace 1
1. Rituals 47
2. Fetishes 79
3. Signs 103
4. "Avatars Become /me": Depiction Dethrones Description 133
5. So Near, So Far, and Both at Once: Telefetishism and Rituals of Visibility 203
Afterword: Digital Affectivity 261
Notes 267
Works Cited 287
Index 303
