Le ‘droit de jouissance’ dans la culture du numérique : objets et représentations du netporn (slides)

La dernière séance de mon séminaire EHESS Corps et TIC : approches socio-anthropologiques des usages numériques a eu lieu le jeudi 24 févr. 2011 : comment se servir de la pensée de Toni Negri pour appréhender le sexe en ligne, ses utopies, ses articulations avec le Web 2.0 (à travers le porno participatif), la multiplication des fétichismes. Voici, comme d’habitude, les slides.

Retrouvez les comptes rendus de toutes les séances aux adresses suivantes :

* 25 novembre 2010 : Virus
* 9 décembre 2010 : Cyborg
* 13 janvier 2011 : Avatar
* 27 janvier 2011 : eSanté
* 11 février 2011 : Réseaux
* 24 février 2011 : Jouissance

février 25, 2011 | Filed Under body, social networks | 9 Comments

Bums, bridges, and primates: Some elements for a sociology of online interactions

This text was presented at the conference “Web Culture: New Modes of Knowledge, New Sociabilities”, Villa Gillet, Lyon (France), February 10^th, 2011. Check against delivery. Click here for the .pdf version. Click here for the French translation.

In today’s presentation I will focus on the kind of social structures that users of computer-mediated global online communication networks (notably, the Web and social media) contribute to put in place. The point I will try to make is that science understanding of Web-based sociabilities has progressed enormously in the last decade, and that this should inform public policies touching on the Web, its regulation and governance.

WHERE HAVE ALL THE COMPUTER BUMS GONE?

Early glimpses into the social implications of ICT at a micro-level (that is: for the users themselves) date back to the mid-1970s and focus on the negative effect of these technologies. At the very origins of computer culture, we witness the emergence of the stereotype of the socially awkward computer hacker, isolated by the calculating machine which alienates him and keeps him apart from his peers. This characterization dates back to a time before the Web. In his Computer Power and Human Reason : From Judgement to Calculation (1976) Joseph Weizenbaum delivers us the portrayal of this subculture of compulsive computer programmer – or, as he liked to dub them, “computer bums”.

These are “possessed students” who “work until they nearly drop, twenty, thirty hours at a time. Their food, if they arrange it, is brought to them: coffee, Cokes, sandwiches. If possible, they sleep on cots near the computer. […] Their rumpled clothes, their unwashed and unshaven faces, and their uncombed hair all testify that they are oblivious to their bodies and to the world in which they move. They exist, at least when so engaged, only through and for the computers.”

Since this first occurrence, and for a long time, common sense has almost unmistakably associated computer use and social isolation. Cultural analysts, novelists, commentators have been developing on this trope. Iconic cyberpunk author William Gibson, famously described Case, the main character of Neuromancer (1984), as a cyberspace-addict incapable of functioning in an offline social situation.

février 17, 2011 | Filed Under body, social capital, social networks, space | 11 Comments

My networked Valentine: half a century of love and computers

Computers are personal technologies, so it comes as no surprise that we vest them with so many of our personal aspirations and desires. Take love for instance: the quest for a partner is so central to our existence, that we would do anything to make it more effective. So we turn to those technologies that, in our cultural imaginary, « connect » people. And we ask them to show us their magic. Three exemples taken from our musical mainstream can help us understand how, as the role of communication technologies has been changing over almost 50 years, the way we put trust in them to fix our love life has changed too.

France Gall was a French teenage sensation who rose to continental stardom when she won the Eurovision contest. In this 1968 song, Computer Nr. 3 (in German), she asks an « electronic brain » to match her with the « perfect boy ». Post-WWII computers were still surrounded by this aura of scientific precision. France Gall maintains the « calculator » can be a support for her relationship, but only as far as its « logs » are in order. A very techno-deterministic take on love. Here the calculating machine oversees the relationship, framed into a bourgeois pursuit of happiness in the company of a rich and handsome husband.

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février 14, 2011 | Filed Under social networks | 8 Comments

Le corps dans les réseaux sociaux : technologie du soi, technologie du nous (slides)

La cinquième séance de mon séminaire EHESS Corps et TIC : approches socio-anthropologiques des usages numériques a eu lieu le vendredi 11 févr. 2011. Le sujet traité : le corps dans les réseaux sociaux en ligne, comment les amis sur Facebook influencent l’apparence physique des utilisateurs, comment le choix de la photo d’un profil peut avoir un impact sur le capital social en ligne. Voici, comme d’habitude, les slides.

La prochaine (et dernière séance) est prévue pour jeudi 24 février 2011 (17h, salle 5, 105 Bd Raspail). Il y sera question de jouissance et sexe en ligne. Pour s’inscrire, il suffit de m’envoyer un petit mail gentil.