“No Place Like Now, Now Like No Place” presented by Benson
Symposium:
Session Title:
- Border Reckonings, Border Crossings 1
Presentation Title:
- No Place Like Now, Now Like No Place
Presenter(s):
Venue(s):
Abstract:
‘No place like now, now like no place’ will present a number of theses related to my PhD research and my ongoing creative research into online identity and community.
There are several key works I will refer to in the paper:- – A screen projection work titled ‘Swipezone’ presented at CUBE37 in Frankston in 2006;
- – a web based work titled ‘swipe: airports, borders and fences’, stage one published 2005 and stage two in 2007; and
- – ‘Facebook fictions’ a new work that is currently in development.
This paper examines the role of the Internet and how it relates to the development of social movements, online identity and the spaces in between.
All of the above mentioned works explore how alienation affects perceptions of identity. The intention is to present a range of issues related to notions of loss of identity and displacement. By investigating the implications of diaspora and the breaking down of safe, describable forms of identification as a process that creates alienation, I attempt to present the spaces in-between. There are many cases where the condition of social displacement may occur in terms of social relations. For instance, a change of residence and community can trigger feelings of isolation and lack of security in a previously affirmed sense of self. As a community, we have become dependant on technology to allow us to go between here and there. These works ask us to consider not just who, but, where we are and the implications of navigating the zones in-between.
