English 680V: Visual Rhetoric in a Technological Age (Purdue)

An interesting aspect of avatars is i suspect they are seldomly chosen haphazardly. Meaning-- when you see someone's avatar, you are seeing a very purposefully and consciously selected representation. An avatar is pre-meditation at a high level. We end up visually represented all the time by a variety of factors we can not control (a pimple erupts, running late leads us to put on the most wrinkled shirt ever, we are viewed at the moment we just happen to be picking our noses). In this sense, avatars (regardless of their actual content) represent us as in frozen moments of time in ideal perfection. A small area of representative control on the mad mad mad info superhighway!

Mark, I think you raise an issue here that relates to Morgan's comment (and my response) about the construction of online images. She claims (and rightly so) that people should be less trusting of the online image, considering that people create, change, and alter images “at home on their photoshop.”

As you nicely point out in your post, the fact that we can so thoughtfully select an avatar that we want to represent us speaks to the issue Morgan is raising about the manipulation of the visual. Yes, we can deliberate over which image we want to represent us, but is that image really us, or is it merely a snapshot of us at our best, a state we can rarely replicate? And if so, should we be more cautious of these “ideal” forms?

I agree with all this-- except I think I would change "less trusting" and "cautious" to "more critically aware." I think it's more than a semantic difference. The other phrases imply (to me) purposeful and malicious misdirection, which are only possible if someone doesn't expect avatars to be exactly what we're saying they are! In other words, we should expect them in most cases to be carefully deliberated snapshots (possibly of idealism), and that's only a problem if it's user or the audience tries to interpret it as some totalizing and complete representation. To use the terminology of "Blink," think of the avatar as a thin-slice possibility to interpret something about the person. That interpretation may be wrong (by standards of its intent), lacking, or right on. Either way, it's all a game of interpretation and I see nothing wrong with that!

Blink talks about the Warren Harding factor, which I think is a great shorthand for all the little visual elements that form associations--the same events that take place when we view an avatar. And while I'd hate to assume that anyone is purposefully being deceptive with avatars, I agree with Mark that they can be used strategically to invite interpretation of an online personality. William Gibson (of Neuromancer fame) does an excellent job of illuminating the difficulties of avatars as imagined in the mid-90s--and while he seemed to mispredict the future there for awhile, his fully imagined 3-D worlds of virtual persons seems to be more possible now. Check out Gibson's Idoru for a disability studies take on strategic avatar usage.

When I was teaching 420S over the summer, I deliberately chose an avatar that would represent the cheerful or at least kinder aspects of my personality. One of my concerns regarding communication with distance ed students was that my personality would not be accurately conveyed through my text. In other words, I feared that I might come across as overly harsh in my communications and I strive to be a teacher who is to some degree amiable. I want to convey a sense of approachability and caring, so that my students feel comfortable communicating with me. Since frequently time limitations require that my responses to student emails and questions posted to our course website be short and to the point, I was afraid that my economy of words would be interpreted as harsh. To offset this, I chose as my avatar a picture of me smiling. I hoped that students would associate this image with me and thus, even when they were reading emails that were not clearly connected to my avatar, they would "see" my words as "spoken" with a smile. For spaces where you never meet F2F, this visual representation can make all the difference in how your words are perceived by your audience
~Cat

The first time I saw an avatar pop up in my Yahoo mail (default: blonde, skinny chick in a miniskirt), I blogged sometihng quite clever about identfication and self-identification. I might have even cited Heidegger. What concerns me most is that avatars imply (argue for? promote?) a singular, unified self--a Self that is Other.
This did not stop me from "correcting" my Yahoo avatar into a brown haired, jeans wearing (still skinny) "me." Nor has it stopped me from thinking very hard about which icon best fits me on this Drupal page. The urge to complete a digital identity is strong: is it just the pretty images and cool special effects, or is it something deeper? And what does it mean to have many different avatars for different websites or groups? I'm fragmented across the internet, but for each site, I'm a unified whole. Is this a mirror of real life? If so, why can't I find any disabled avatars?
Oh, and there's a Nickelodeon cartoon (anime-style, but obviously American made) called "Avatar: The Last AirBender." I tried watching it, but gave up pretty quickly: the main character is avatar-like in that he is representative of an entire people ("Airbenders"). Right. Other than that, I'm guessing it's just a cool word they chose to use. http://www.tv.com/avatar-the-last-airbender/show/28841/summary.html

Amy, forgive me for assuming I'm agreeing with you, but I find the whole idea of an avatar to be quite disturbing. As you and Mark both said, the avatar is a stabilized and consumable identity. I am not stable, nor am I represetented by pop culuture icons meant to embody (and domesticate through definition) my quirks.

I was pleased to find that Yahoo avatars can be one of six "plus-sized" variations whose heads do not fit their bodies, but at least it's gesture). But I was still asking myself what the purpose was. I am a brunette with brown eyes and I get to choose some fashion options that are generated to appeal to the largest and most "diverse" (read "there are some Hot Topic options") audience. This information is only valuable to those who think that a visual representation of me with idealized features is accurate or revealing.

Of course these are not the only avatars available, I could choose a scene from a movie or some other image I identify with. Even then, however, I am limited to a specific and narrowly defined notion of self. For whatever reason, I am resistant to having myself tokenized or to taking such token representations of others as valid, much less truthful. Perhaps this is my inability to properly identify and isolate my e-audience.

Yes, perhaps they are an instance of "stabilized" identity. But I think for some, that is the appeal. An avatar does not mean your whole identity is stabilized (cause as you suggest, really, whose is?) But there's certainly a longing for stability in postmodern culture, and playing around with an idea and instance of stability is not the same as claiming you actually are. Besides, since your avatar can be interpreted a million different ways by any person, it actually creates more fracturedness, i'd reckon.

And I'm not sure an avatar choice shoots for "validity" or "truthfullness." They are an aspect, a moment, a flash of something identified with by the person behind it. It says something about the "real" person behind it, that by their conscious choice to use it, is an aspect of themselves they publically wish to express. I don't understand the leap to claiming they represent any kind of totality that you seem to imply.

Here's another story about avatars, this time as they (and virtual worlds at Second Life) might be useful for distance education. Again, it's at the New York Times and so you will need a (free) account:

http://tinyurl.com/ylfnox

Second Life, in case you want to check it out, is here (their education page):

http://secondlife.com/businesseducation/education.php

I like the story about the bare-chested guy who breaks into a class session, shooting people with a crossbow, sending them to the Himalayas. A smart teacher would orchestrate that so that they'd be sent to the library or the writing lab!

Check it out on the Second Life blog ~Cat

Lo and behold, I just read an article about James Cameron's new film called Avatar. It's one that will be the first ever "to create an entirely photorealistic world, complete with virtual characters." The film will also be presented in 3D "even in conventional theaters."

Read more about it in today's New York Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/09/movies/09came.html?th&emc=th

(Free account required.)

Dave

A film based on the video game series "Final Fantasy" took a stab at this a few years back. It was nowhere near photo-realistic, but I suppose you can see what they were trying to do. Funny thing is-- for a video game series that is loved by millions-- I believe the movie completely tanked. It seems that maybe even people who enjoy virtual worlds don't want to see such things on a movie screen. Maybe it has something to do with control. We are so accustomed to controlling virtual images that to have them presented as entertainment only to be watched is not all that enticing.

Also, I'll be a monkey's uncle if Cameron is able to make this movie for a paltry 200 M.

L-Train

The film's description reminds me vaguely of Simone, the Al Pacino film in which he plays a director trying to pass of a computer-generated animation (I'm not sure if that's the right term) as an real actress. Simone (Simulation One) is set up in contrast to a real actress, played by Winona "Five Finger Discount" Ryder.

There were some decent performances, including one by Elias "Casey Jones" Kotias, but the movie itself was very disappointing. Not funny enough, not moving enough. Somehow, though, it garnered a glowing review from Entertainment Weekly, confirming my suspicion that EW's writers are routinely bribed.