|
Showing 1 - 3 of
3 matches in All Departments
Virtual Realities presents a ground-breaking application of
phenomenology as a critical method to explore the impact of
immersive media. Specific case studies examine 360-degree
documentary productions about trauma, virtual military simulations,
VR exposure therapy for anxiety and posttraumatic stress disorder,
and the emerging debate about regulating violent content in
immersive media gaming. By addressing these texts primarily as
experiences, Virtual Realities deploys an analytic and critical
methodology that is sensitive to the bodily and cognitive impact of
immersive media, especially via the body of an appropriately
attentive researcher-critic. Virtual Realities provokes a
rethinking of many of the taken-for-granted ideas and assumptions
circulating in the field of immersive media. These include concepts
of empathy, embodiment, the affective impact of textual and
immersive properties on the users' experience, as well as the
"gee-whizz" mentality often associated with approaches to the
medium. The case studies provide fresh engagement with immersive
media such as cinematic VR at a time when dominant attitudes about
the technology display an evangelical fascination with VR and other
mixed realities as inexorably beneficial. Virtual Realities makes a
compelling case for VR-phenomenology to be employed as a
methodology by humanities scholars and also in cross-disciplinary
applications of immersive media in fields such as psychology,
human-computer interaction studies and the health sciences.
This book undertakes a concentrated study of the impact of degraded
and low-quality imagery in contemporary cinema and real-world
portrayals of violence. Through a series of case studies, the book
explores examples of corrupted digital imagery that range from
mainstream cinema portrayals of drone warfare and infantry killing,
through to real-world recordings of terrorist attacks and
executions, as well as perpetrator-created murder videos
live-streamed on the internet. Despite post-modernist concerns of
cultural inurement during the seminal period of digitalized and
virtualized killing in the 1990s, real-world reactions to violent
media indicate that our culture is anything but desensitized to
these media depictions. Against such a background, this book is a
concentrated study of how these images are created and circulated
in the contemporary media landscape and how the effect and affect
of violent material is impacted by the low-resolution aesthetic.
Virtual Realities presents a ground-breaking application of
phenomenology as a critical method to explore the impact of
immersive media. Specific case studies examine 360-degree
documentary productions about trauma, virtual military simulations,
VR exposure therapy for anxiety and posttraumatic stress disorder,
and the emerging debate about regulating violent content in
immersive media gaming. By addressing these texts primarily as
experiences, Virtual Realities deploys an analytic and critical
methodology that is sensitive to the bodily and cognitive impact of
immersive media, especially via the body of an appropriately
attentive researcher-critic. Virtual Realities provokes a
rethinking of many of the taken-for-granted ideas and assumptions
circulating in the field of immersive media. These include concepts
of empathy, embodiment, the affective impact of textual and
immersive properties on the users' experience, as well as the
"gee-whizz" mentality often associated with approaches to the
medium. The case studies provide fresh engagement with immersive
media such as cinematic VR at a time when dominant attitudes about
the technology display an evangelical fascination with VR and other
mixed realities as inexorably beneficial. Virtual Realities makes a
compelling case for VR-phenomenology to be employed as a
methodology by humanities scholars and also in cross-disciplinary
applications of immersive media in fields such as psychology,
human-computer interaction studies and the health sciences.
|
|