[-empyre-] Welcome to Week 3 on -empyre-: Internet/Online Representation

[Soraya Murray]

There are, once again, so many avenues for possible discussion, and I would definitely like to encourage "listeners" and lurkers to jump in with your questions and comments. 

If I may begin, there are several threads that run through each of our guests' initial posts. One of these is this slippage between what is not presence/absence, but more accurately recognition/lack of recognition. It seems that all of you are in some way either revising scholarship of online representation to include the under- or mis-represented, or mining the information to unveil realities that may not conform to the dominant understanding of who plays, who is online, etc. 

This also revolves around developing a methodology/methodologies that can be intersectional. Professor Everett mentioned the work of Cornel West briefly. However, in general my own experience is that these kinds of interventions-- especially utilizing tools of identity politics, multiculturalism, politics of recognition, cultural studies approaches, postmodern critique and the like, are still considered incompatible with discussions of advanced mass communication technologies. I would like to ask our guests (and empyreans):

Is this characterization consistent with your experience?
What interventions (beyond your own) are you coming across that seem to effectively integrate these concerns?
What are the sites of optimism around bringing together intersectional discussions of identity with Online Representation?

___________________________
Soraya Murray, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor 
Film + Digital Media Department
University of California, Santa Cruz