Suchergebnisse

In such 3D virtual environments (3DVEs) as Second Life, one can 'be' re-created as avatar in whatever form one wants to be, facilitated by extensive beauty and cosmetic industries to help the residents of this world achieve a particular kind of glamorous image – limited only by their imaginations and Linden Dollar accounts. Yet, others in 3DVEs are working hard to re-create their avatars to be replicas of their 'offline' selves, appearing as they do in actuality. Such phenomena provide a rich opportunity to explore the cultural contexts of 'self-making', the process of 'becoming' and the transformative, often transgressive, processes of 'beauty practices' as bodily praxis and serious play. Drawing on their international ethnographic research undertaken in Second Life, the authors explore the phenomenon of image, affect, subjectivity and representation in this alternative arena. We focus specifically on three interrelated and paradoxical aspects of self-making in this 3D virtual world: first, the ways in which many of our respondents described their avatar personae as symbolically representing their 'authentic inner selves'; second, the ways our respondents used photography and video to verify and authenticate these 'inner selves', through capturing representations of their avatar bodies in action; and, third, the ways 'authenticity', for many of our respondents, depended on their avatar image aligning as closely as possible with their bodily appearance off-screen. The concept of what residents of Second Life understand as constituting the 'authentic inner self' both in and outside of the virtual world becomes particularly pertinent here.

. The American Communist movement included numerous "front" organizations which championed the political views and advanced the goals of the Soviet Union. Among them were movements whose main aim was to provide support for the Soviet project to establish a Jewish socialist republic in the Birobidzhan region in the far east of the USSR. One of the organizations prominent in this campaign was the American Committee for the Settlement of Jews in Birobidjan. The Committee, also called Ambijan, was formed in 1934. It sought to attract to its ranks philanthropists and men of financial prominence or wealth. As well, it captured public attention through the recruitment of celebrities and fairly eminent public figures who, while not known Communists, were sympathetic to the politics of the USSR. Though their detractors called them "fellow-travellers," these people often proved to be valuable assets to the cause. One champion of the Birobidzhan scheme, and a vice president of Ambijan after 1936, was the prominent Arctic explorer, scientist, and author Vilhjalmur Stefansson. A tireless proponent of settlement in Birobidzhan, he appeared at countless meetings, dinners, and rallies, recounting the exploits, real and imagined, of Jewish settlers trying to build a socialist republic in the tundra of the Soviet Far East. Given his fame and stature, he proved an invaluable resource for the leadership of Ambijan. .