Virtual reality
Subtitle: representations in contemporary media
By: Melanie Chan
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Published: 2014
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 204
ISBN-13: 9781441175311
Subjects: Virtual reality in mass media; Mass media and technology; Virtual reality; Social aspects
Description: The idea of virtual realities has a long and complex historical trajectory, spanning from Plato's concept of the cave and the simulacrum, to artistic styles such as Trompe L'oeil, and more recently developments in 3D film, television and gaming. However, this book will pay particular attention to the time between the 1980s to the 1990s when virtual reality and cyberspace were represented, particularly in fiction, as a wondrous technology that enabled transcendence from the limitations of physical embodiment. The purpose of this critical historical analysis of representations of virtual reality is to examine how they might deny, repress or overlook embodied experience. Specifically, the author will contend that embodiment is a fundamental aspect of immersion in virtual reality, rather than something which is to be transcended. In this way, the book aims to challenge distorted ideas about transcendence and productively contribute to debates about embodiment and technology
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages 185-198) and index.

Includes filmography.
Table of contents: title: Histories of virtual reality; title: Virtually real and really virtual; title: Technological intimacy and social estrangement in strange days; title: Virtual identities and material bodies; title: Virtual reality, transcendence and flights from embodiment in source code; title: Technology, embodiment and being-in-the-world; title: Virtuality and simulation in William Gibson's Zero history; title: Conclusion.