Performance using new media technologies often brings the performer into direct encounter with their virtual ‘other’, perhaps in the form of a projected image or a gaming avatar. What does this do to the performer’s understanding of their performance presence and kinaesthetic experience?
This paper and PhD research addresses the relationship between physical and virtual bodies as they are experienced by the performer. It draws upon Heidegger’s modelling of the hammer as the extension of the carpenter’s body, considering the virtual image as the extension of the performer’s body and ability to act in the world. I will build on common experiences identified in gaming culture such as the use of deictic markers to refer to a character (‘I’) and a kinaesthetic response to the shots fired at an avatar, and explore the nature of embodiment in a virtual body to explore key themes of agency, ownership and egocentric spatial representation.
Current research of the subject concerns challenging the myth of disembodiment in technology, fuelled by Cartesian dualism. I will go beyond this to examine more directly the experiential and philosophical nature of the embodiment of a virtual body, the factors which affect this and the effect that this has on the performer and/or audience member’s experience. It goes beyond questions of self and identity and impacts on our understanding of both our embodiment of technology and embodiment in everyday life.
This research crosses many fields including performance, philosophy and technology
5. Performance Using New Media
Technologies
Types of environments:
–Sensory environments
–Immersive environments
–Derived environments
–Networked environments
(Birringer, 2006: 45-46)
8. Inter-disciplinarily of Research
Understanding a performance phenomena
from a variety of perspectives
–Gaming theory and cultures
–Philosophy of the body
–Phenomenology
–New media philosophy
–Performance theory and analysis
–Spatial theory
–Language theory and philosophy
9. Focus of research
• The relationship between your physical body
and this virtual body or ‘avatar’
• What is the nature of embodied experience in
the synchronous, real time control of a digital
body/avatar?
• Based on the principle that this is a
relationship of embodied experience/
perception (Hansen, 2006: 5)
10. What is embodiment?
• Mind/body dualism
• Theories of embodiment unites this separation
of body and mind
• We are embodied/ we are our bodies
11. Embodiment in the age of
technology
‘…human embodiment no longer
coincides with the boundaries of
the human body…’
(Hansen, 2006: 95)
13. Tool use incorporation
• Heidegger’s hammer as an extension of
the carpenters body, of the lived body
• Extension of your ability to act
• Avatar as an equivalent to this
14. Agency and Ownership
• ‘…match between motor intention and
sensory feedback…’
• ‘…agency is a powerful cue to ownership:
my body feels like “mine” because I can
control it at will.’
(Tsakiris et al., 2007: 2235)
15. ‘I’/‘Her’
‘…so called deictic or context dependent
terms, notably the personal, spatial and
temporal markers ‘I’ and ‘you’, ‘here’ and
‘now’, in order to make manifest that their
meaning is inextricably embedded with a
pragmatic, perceptual and interpersonal
situation.’
(Stawarska, 2008: 399)
16. Egocentricity
‘The ego is defined, in this case, as the centre
of our perception – if we were to act, where
we would act from.’
(Schellenberg, 2007: 603)
17. Research Questions
• What is the nature of embodied experience in
the synchronous, real time control of a digital
body/avatar?
• What is the nature of our sensuous experience in
mixed reality?
• How does environment and experience of space
impact on embodied experience?
• What can description of experience reveal to us
about the nature of this embodied experience?
• What is the relationship in this performance work
between the body and the self?
18. Rethinking the Title
• Title implies a binary – there isn’t one
• My body and my avatar are the same
thing
• Ownership, the ‘I’ or ‘My’
• An approach to selfhood that
recognises that the body is fundamental
to this
19. Bibliography
• Birringer, Johannes (2008) Performance, Technology and Science New York: PAJ
Publications
• Hansen, Mark (2006) Bodies in Code: Interfaces with Digital Media London:
Routledge
• Kozel, Susan (1998) ‘Spacemaking: Experiences of a Virtual Body’ in Carter,
Alexandra (ed.) The Routledge Dance Studies Reader London: Routledge pp.81-88
• Leder, Drew (1990) The Absent Body London: University of Chicago Press
• Merleau-Ponty, Maurice (2009) Phenomenology of Perception London: Routledge
• Schellenberg, Susanna (2007) ‘Action and Self-Location in Perception’ Mind 16
pp.603-631
• Sokolowski, Robert (2000) Introduction to Phenomenology New York: Cambridge
University Press
• Stawarska, Beata (2008) ‘ ‘You’ and ‘I’, ‘Here’ and ‘Now’: Spatial and Social
Situatedness in Deixis’ International Journal of Philosophical Studies vol. 16 no. 3
pp.399-418
• Tsakiris, M. H. et al. (2007) ‘Neural Signatures of body ownership: A sensory
network for bodily self-consciousness’ Cerebral Cortex 17 pp.2233-2244
20. Contact details
Kelly Preece
Research Associate in Dance
School of Performance and Cultural Industries
University of Leeds
Woodhouse Lane
Leeds
LS2 9JT
Email: k.preece@leeds.ac.uk
Telephone: 0113 343 8726
Hinweis der Redaktion
Dance and Theatre background, coming from a dance perspective and interest in the body but research address wider field of ‘performance’ Performance using new technologies frequently brings us into contact with our virtual other Relationship between physical body and digital body in performance using new media technologies/avatars
Increasingly the most common point of reference for the term ‘avatar’ My research is not related to the movie but draws on a similar experience – acting through and being present in a body other than your own, in the movie this is the physiological body of the Navi, in my research a virtual or digital body
Define the term Avatar is not exclusively gaming or computer generated or ‘fictional’ When you Skype the image of yourself on the screen is your avatar May or may not look like you – may or may not be human or humanoid
Phenomenology as a philosophical tradition and as a methodology Natural attitude is the focus of our world directed stance Phenomenological attitude is about reflection on the natural attitude, so reflection on the way we interact with the world Interrogation of phenomena – my phenomena is embodiment in a virtual body, the relationship between the physical body controlling the avatar and the virtual body – the avatar Embodied perception of digital other as defined by Mark Hansen (Hansen, 2006: 5), so takes Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s Phenomenology of Perception for its basis, looking at motility and spatiality as the key components of perception and being in the world (3 parts of the book/thesis)
Avatar the movie - mixture of CGI imagery, motion capture and live action sequences (60% CGI imagery) Types of environments: Sensory environments (sensors, motion tracking such as Isadora) Immersive environments (Virtual Reality such as Second Life) Derived environments (motion capture such as Gollum in LOTR, Avatar is a mixture of CGI, motion capture and live action (60% CGI) Networked environments (telepresence, communication across distance such as videoconferencing/skype and telematic technologies) My research addresses Immersive and Networked
Immersive environments Performance event that can be attended in person at a variety of venues (including Royal Opera House in Nov 2009) and in Second Life, in which the avatar Casper Helendale hosts his own funeral service Physical body/avatar relationship is both the means of access for the audience and the performers
Networked environment Two identical beds, one in gallery on display the other in another room with a performer, who is filmed and projected onto the bed on display – as clear in picture. Audience member can interact with performer’s projected image, performer has a TV screen with the composite image of both environments Projected image as avatar Won’t be addressing performance or performance analysis in this presentation because it involves in depth disciplinarily and might alienate an inter-disciplinary audience. Instead, I will address the theoretical material and make references back to this work and take examples from my own experience of gaming which will hopefully address a wider common experience
Research into avatars/virtual reality crosses a variety of fields – neuroscience, sociology, psychology…
The relationship between your physical body and this virtual body or ‘avatar’ Initial research question of; What is the nature of embodied experience in the synchronous, real time control of a digital body/avatar?
Reuniting mind and body in philosophy, cognitive science and neuroscience in the 20 th century
Myth of technological disembodiment Mark Hansen’s Mixed Reality paradigm - fusion of/dialogue between digital and physical ‘… human embodiment no longer coincides with the boundaries of the human body…’ (Hansen, 2006: 95) Not body as physiological, but the phenomenal body, the body as lived
Lived body is the body as experienced by yourself – your first person perspective/kinaesthesia (give example) Korper is an aspect of Leib Leib not limited to Korper
Phenomenological osmosis (Leder, 1990: 34) Driving a car, know the size of it, shape to parallel park, you are aware of its size both visually and kinaesthetically Digital body/avatar as an equivalent to this
This process of embodiment of a digital body, and incorporation of it into the lived body, is dependant on motor activity Tsakiris et al. is an investigation into neural signatures of body ownership, and whilst the neuroscience here is relatively new research they provide scientific and philosophical definitions of agency and ownership that can be utilized philosophically – theorists such as Patrick Haggard, Shaun Gallagher and Dan Zahavi working between philosophy and cognitive and neuroscience Avatar becomes ‘I’
I refer to my avatar Lily Willful in Second Life as ‘I’ when she is performing my intended action, flying up the college library rather than taking the stairs, and as a character when there is a severance between action and intention - when ‘she’ won’t land. Dependent of intended action/visual feedback loop – when I intend an action and it is not achieved (verified in sensory feedback) I no longer feel the jelly-leg sensation as a result of ‘her’ flight (I am terrified afraid of heights), as ‘she’ is no longer a part of my extended bodily presence, and therefore sense of self. Addressing the language used to describe the phenomena/experience – not linguistic analysis but addressing what language usage can tell us about the experience
‘ I’ as implying an egocentricity As ability to act is extended, so it spatiality Egocentric space organises our spatial relationship to objects around a locus or anchor related to the ‘ego’ Ego as centre of perception – if we were to act, where we would act from Merleau-Ponty – use deictic marker ‘here’ to signify the locus from which we would act (2009: 115)
What is the nature of our sensuous experience in mixed reality? Touched on prioritisation of the visual, kinaesthesia reciprocity of vision, kinaesthesia and touch Spatial perception as connected to action – egocentric space, orient space around ability to act Use of language – binaries of mind and body, physical and digital as separate, and use of deictic markers I, here etc.
Duet implies a binary – there isn’t one My – signal of ownership Body and avatar – lived body/one body Frank Biocca asked in his seminal essay The Cyborg’s Dilemmai n VR ‘ Where am ‘I’ present?’ The Presence Project out of Exeter University is dealing with presence, I am interested in the ‘I’, in the bodily sense, spatially and in terms of selfhood
