Digital identities – overcoming visual bias through virtual embodiment

ABSTRACT

This study sheds new light on the role of identity in virtual environments when virtual representation of self is in support of disabled individuals and the potential impact of their virtual identity on work opportunities. It is widely understood that individuals who live with disability often experience a lifetime of bullying, exclusion, marginalization and rejection. They often experience workplace bias and discrimination. Yet, when they can create an identity and experience embodiment in virtual environments, the results can be extraordinarily powerful – even life-changing. This research builds on nearly a decade of ethnographic research in 3D online immersive social virtual worlds; seven of those years working with disability communities to answer the following: RQ1: In a virtual world where one can choose any avatar form, how does that visual sense of self-representation influence one’s ability to gain access to a social network, to be a leader in that network, and to find work? RQ2: How does realism in representation influence work experiences in these digital worlds? The results reveal the importance of choice in online representation of avatars in creating work and online social engagement. Implications contribute to our understanding of visual bias in the workplace and how emerging virtual reality technologies may open new avenues for meaningful work and social interactions for people with disabilities.     

《阿凡达》与生态伦理

科幻影片《阿凡达》构造了一个由终极智慧（爱娃）维持和掌控的和谐发展的潘多拉星,地球人为了解决自身的能源危机,来到潘多拉企图掠夺那里的特殊矿石,从而对那里居住的纳美人展开了侵略战争。影片以科幻的形式给我们敲响了生态危机的警钟,启示我们对生态伦理和可持续发展问题进行深入反思。同时也告诫我们,仅仅诉诸于道德层面的伦理思考其作用仍然是有限的。也许,人类要摆脱所面临的生态危机困境,有必要在经济发展模式、政治与管理体制、伦理与道德观念、法律与法规约束、生活与交往方式等诸多层面进行综合治理。     

电影《阿凡达》的生态女性主义解读

生态女性主义是女性主义与生态学思想相结合的产物,生态女性主义者考虑性别歧视、种族歧视、人类对自然的控制与其他各种社会不平等之间的关系.它反对人类中心论和男性中心论,主张改变人统治自然的思想,它批评男权的文化价值观,赞美女性本质,它反对那些能够导致剥削、统治、攻击性的价值观.电影《阿凡达》的思想与生态女性主义思想有惊人的相似之处,影片解构了人类中心主义、反对男权社会、抗议现代科技对自然和人类的损毁、谴责种族主义,是生态女性主义思想最完美的诠释与展现.     

《阿凡达》与生态伦理

科幻影片《阿凡达》构造了一个由终极智慧（爱娃）维持和掌控的和谐发展的潘多拉星,地球人为了解决自身的能源危机,来到潘多拉企图掠夺那里的特殊矿石,从而对那里居住的纳美人展开了侵略战争。影片以科幻的形式给我们敲响了生态危机的警钟,启示我们对生态伦理和可持续发展问题进行深入反思。同时也告诫我们,仅仅诉诸于道德层面的伦理思考其作用仍然是有限的。也许,人类要摆脱所面临的生态危机困境,有必要在经济发展模式、政治与管理体制、伦理与道德观念、法律与法规约束、生活与交往方式等诸多层面进行综合治理。     

An Examination of a Theory of Embodied Social Presence in Virtual Worlds*

In this article, we discuss and empirically examine the importance of embodiment, context, and spatial proximity as they pertain to collaborative interaction and task completion in virtual environments. Specifically, we introduce the embodied social presence (ESP) theory as a framework to account for a higher level of perceptual engagement that users experience as they engage in activity‐based social interaction in virtual environments. The ESP theory builds on the analysis of reflection data from Second Life users to explain the process by which perceptions of ESP are realized. We proceed to describe implications of ESP for collaboration and other organizational functions.     

Avatarculture: Narrative, power and identity in virtual world environments

Drawing on the work of Raymond Williams, this paper examines avatar culture through the interplay of emergent and residual forces. A dual process is at work in the formation of cultural identities in which the enabling conditions of virtual worlds are understood alongside and in relation to pre-existing off-line phenomenon. Avatar culture confirms structure for participants, especially in relation to gender and sexuality, whilst at the same time providing a reflexive space to break with pre-existing features of social identity. Virtual environments are thus microcosms of a grounded cultural materiality that is simultaneously improvised on and transformed. With regard to the distinctive aspects of avatar culture the paper focuses on issues of narrative, representation, censorship and power relations and their formation within virtual worlds. It discusses how virtual worlds incrementally acquire a peculiar power and meaning in the lives of participants. The paper discusses the flows of social interaction in virtual environments and how intermittence best describes how users participate and withdraw from different encounters. Avatar culture binds people together temporarily and loosely and then frees them up to relocate themselves elsewhere. In this context, virtual environments might be regarded as putting structure and power into movement. The ethnographic approach adopted helps peel back the residue of social structure to reveal a virtual agency with its emerging shells of avatar-derived affiliations, tensions and conflicts.