Identity is, to me, a fascinating concept, but I didn't think much about it until a couple of years ago. That was when I got involved in Second Life (SL), a place I first went to investigate the technology.Perhaps I should start with some things about me. I'm a techie, a software developer and wannabe visionary. I first started investigating SL in 2006 to see what could be done with virtual world technology. If I did see a lot of possibility with the tech, I was also very surprised by relationship.
It turns out that SL is more about relationship–who and where–than it is about technology. And one of the most dramatic relationships, at least for me, has been that between my "real life" (RL)* and my SL selves. That almost sounds as if we're discussing a multiple personality disorder, but I don't think that's it. Rather, I find the relationship of Tho Millgrove and my RL self to be simple and complex. They are both me, yet they're not the same. Or, I could say they are both my identities, but they are not identical, each influencing as well as being influenced.
That is to say, Second Life and other virtual spaces have had a profound influnce on the inner me. I still recall my first month in SL as a time of very vivid dreaming, with my subconscious mind trying to make sense of and integrate this new self into my psyche. In the subsequent time, when things have become much calmer and steadier, there have still been periods of profound disturbance as events and realisations have affected me.
Once, I was experimenting with a text viewer, and wanted to see if my avatar was rendering properly. So I went in world with an alternate avatar–an alt–in the regular SL viewer. The effect was, surprisingly to me, very disturbing. I saw her there, looking like she always does. The normal viewpoint in SL is from a "camera" behind the avatar, and it's not unusual to move that camera view and look at your own avatar from many different angles. And yet, unlike that, this felt felt like an out-of-body experience. I quickly logged the alt out, and shook my head at how odd it had been.
So, ultimately, who am I? Who is "myself"? Is it RL self or SL self, or do they both exist as windows onto an inner reality? I tend to believe the later, and that has a profound effect on how I deal with many of the discussions about things like "immersion and augmentation", role playing, and even friendship, trust, sexuality, religion. I intend to talk about specifics in future posts, but I wanted to make a start.What do you think about identity and virtual worlds?
* Many SL users prefer not to use "real life", choosing alternatively to use "first life", "atomic life", or "physical life". But, by now "real life" has become rather ingrained in common usage, "first life" only makes sense in the context of "Second Life", and the other two sound to me more like biology terms. So I'll just use RL.
5 comments:
Ultimately, we are who we are. You are you and "you" includes in part, Thoria. You also may be sister, mother, aunt, computer techie, surfer, artist, cook, dog breeder, manager, mountain climber, accountant and brain surgeon. Who you are goes beyond the RL and virtual reality. You are, regardless of where you choose to be.
However, how you choose to portray yourself may vary greatly. Among my friends I am one person. Among my brothers, another. Among my colleagues, a third. Among my college buddies, a fourth. Among my boyfriends children, a fifth. (We won't even discuss my mother here.) The complexity of a woman's personality cannot be confined to an expectation of one self. We are who we are - in all our worlds.
Yes, Ribbons, I agree with your thoughts, but would add that who we are changes over time, and each of those roles (or avatars, in one sense of the word) feed back into that. I am a different person now than I would have been had I not raised three children. Yet I'm still me. Much to ponder.
Dusan Writer just added an apropo blog post on avatars and identity today: http://dusanwriter.com/index.php/2009/02/17/identities-constructed-virtual-worlds-and-anonymity/
God hun your making it hard on yourself your just you and your great just as you are whatever world you choose to live in :)
I'd agree and disagree Tho. Yes, we grow and change over time. Acquiring new knowledge and experiences may change us but it doesn't really change who we are. Course, that's what you just said, isn't it? LOL
Insightful post.
I think it's interesting that it's even *possible* to have a technology such as virtual worlds that allows a person to search for the self in such a radically different way than before.
What sorts of feedback mechanisms exist in offline life for a person to see his or herself? In a physical sense, a mirror, or a camera. In a personality sense, it's through meditation over the interactions we have with other people.
Certainly, SL resembles existing some existing mechanism. A person may start a new hobby, say, bowling, and discover something new about them that they may enjoy and have skill at. It is through the unfamiliar group - in this case, the bowling league with new friends who may not have a previous prejudice about who you are - that we explore our identity. Certainly Second Life is similar to that.
Yet, as you point out and as I think a lot of us become keenly aware of, having this avatar that can look like something other than your physical body is a whole new experience that something like a new hobby can't provide. One can explore what they are like when looking very different, whether it's shape, race, gender, etc. And I think for many people there's a tendency to role-play just a little, and people can have a medium to experiment with new facets of themselves. Certainly, it's still them, but it's a them that hasn't had an opportunity to be seen and observed before.
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