Cyborg Systems: Sociology's Proper Unit of Analysis

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5 Responses

  1. kiyallsmith says:

    The three problems that you identify–in linking theories of technology to the lives of “others” in society–are old problems in social theories. Lemert’s designation of professional theorists and non-professional theorists recognizes that there might be a way to make theories relevant. This is to reach out to the publics who are engaged in theoretical thinking daily.

    Keri

  1. 9th March 2010

    […] (Reposted from Sociology Lens) […]

  2. 16th March 2011

    […] In the tradition of much post-Modern theorizing, “augmented reality” offers a new conceptual paradigm, seeking to implode/queer/do category work on the real/virtual dichotomy and make room for a more flexible understanding of social media that allows for recursivity between these two concepts.  A person embedded in augmented reality is a cyborg in the Harawaysian sense.  For this reason, the editors of this blog have proposed – somewhat tongue-in-cheek – that our research is best understood as “cyborgology.”  In augmented reality, the culture is hyper-literally super-imposed on the material.  Our bodies and all other objects in the world become canvases for the digital and its rapid circulation of signs and symbols.  In Bauman’s term, everything becomes a conduit of Liquid (post-)Modernity.  However, the symbolic order expressed through the digital does not emerge out of nothing; it is a reproduction or extension of what has always existed.  The digital and material are always in circulation and neither can be abstracted from the new order of social relations.  That is to say, society is neither online or offline; it is augmented.  Thus, augmented reality and the cyborgs who populate it are now the proper objects of sociological inquiry. […]

  3. 16th March 2011

    […] In the tradition of much post-Modern theorizing, “augmented reality” offers a new conceptual paradigm, seeking to implode/queer/do category work on the real/virtual dichotomy and make room for a more flexible understanding of social media that allows for recursivity between these two concepts. A person embedded in augmented reality is a cyborg in the Harawaysian sense. For this reason, the editors of this blog have proposed – somewhat tongue-in-cheek – that our research is best understood as “cyborgology.” In augmented reality, the culture is hyper-literally super-imposed on the material. Our bodies and all other objects in the world become canvases for the digital and its rapid circulation of signs and symbols. In Bauman’s term, everything becomes a conduit of Liquid (post-)Modernity. However, the symbolic order expressed through the digital does not emerge out of nothing; it is a reproduction or extension of what has always existed. The digital and material are always in circulation and neither can be abstracted from the new order of social relations. That is to say, society is neither online or offline; it is augmented. Thus, augmented reality and the cyborgs who populate it are now the proper objects of sociological inquiry. […]

  4. 30th August 2012

    […] Pj Rey (@pjrey) offers a more intensely theoretical explanation of augmented reality, in which he states, In the tradition of much post-Modern theorizing, “augmented reality” offers a new conceptual paradigm, seeking to implode/queer/do category work on the real/virtual dichotomy and make room for a more flexible understanding of social media that allows for recursivity between these two concepts. …However, the symbolic order expressed through the digital does not emerge out of nothing; it is a reproduction or extension of what has always existed.  The digital and material are always in circulation and neither can be abstracted from the new order of social relations.  That is to say, society is neither online or offline; it is augmented.  Thus, augmented reality and the cyborgs who populate it are now the proper objects of sociological inquiry. […]

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