Apparatus Shift
O R A L I T Y . . . L I T E R A C Y . . . E L E C T R A C Y
"There is an analogy for what we are doing when we collaboratively explore the possibilities of new media. We are to the Internet what the students of Plato and Aristotle were to the Academy and the Lyceum."
"Electracy is similarly being invented, not to replace religion and science (orality and literacy), but to supplement them with a third dimension of thought, practice, and identity."
Electracy is "partly technological, partly institutional."
-Gregory Ulmer
"Electracy is similarly being invented, not to replace religion and science (orality and literacy), but to supplement them with a third dimension of thought, practice, and identity."
Electracy is "partly technological, partly institutional."
-Gregory Ulmer
Gregory Ulmer's Apparatus Theory, outlining the changes in behaviors and cultural ideals from orality to electracy.
Electracy is more than just online interaction.
Rather, there are "three interrelated invention streams forming a matrix of possibilities for electracy, only one of which is technological. There is no technological determinism, other than the fundamental law of change: that everything is mutating together into something other, different, with major losses and gains."
-Ulmer
-Ulmer
V O I C E
The question of voice as a metaphor once again advents in the age of electracy. Within the apparatus of electracy, and with its practices, ontologies, philosophies, and other qualities, the more emotive, bodily, and intuitive nature aligns with values of voice.
Within the apparatus of orality, the metaphor of voice appears naturally: religion, ritual, faith, worship, and narrative all make use of voiced sounds to communicate and exchange knowledge/beliefs. Both literal voice and inward voice of intuition and individuality align with orality.
Within the apparatus of literacy, voice becomes lacking. With science, method, epistemology, reason, category, and an axis of true/false, voice and its more intimate qualities fall short. Voice becomes irrelevant as more knowledge is composed rather than spoken, and its metaphorical values are questioned as unreasonable and too reliant on the self.
The question of voice as a metaphor once again advents in the age of electracy. Within the apparatus of electracy, and with its practices, ontologies, philosophies, and other qualities, the more emotive, bodily, and intuitive nature aligns with values of voice.
Within the apparatus of orality, the metaphor of voice appears naturally: religion, ritual, faith, worship, and narrative all make use of voiced sounds to communicate and exchange knowledge/beliefs. Both literal voice and inward voice of intuition and individuality align with orality.
Within the apparatus of literacy, voice becomes lacking. With science, method, epistemology, reason, category, and an axis of true/false, voice and its more intimate qualities fall short. Voice becomes irrelevant as more knowledge is composed rather than spoken, and its metaphorical values are questioned as unreasonable and too reliant on the self.
Voice Finds Its Home In Electracy
In electracy, voice as a metaphor engages with the various qualities surrounding the apparatus: practices of entertainment, procedures of style, the institution of the Internet, states of mind of fantasy, behaviors of play, philosophies of aesthetics, grounding of the body, an ontology of chora, modes of the figure, and an axis of pleasure/pain and sorrow/joy. These are all largely subjective and based on personal preference and perspective, as opposed to the categorical or factual determinism of literacy. With subjectivity comes an "individuation of knowing," wherein a person's voice validates the aforementioned components of electracy-- their voice guides or aligns with their preferred style, fantasies, play, and aesthetics.
E L E C T R A T E V O I C E
With electracy, as an apparatus, undergoing a cultural shift from the rigid reason of literacy to a more bodily and emotion-driven space, "voice is a means of expression, creation, and communication that lives according to the interaction of several variables: a writer ... a reader ... and the language itself, the culture it embodies."
Just as electracy is not just digital literacy, voice is not only isolated within the self. Both delineate the cultural and intertextual dimensions that contribute to each space.
With electracy, as an apparatus, undergoing a cultural shift from the rigid reason of literacy to a more bodily and emotion-driven space, "voice is a means of expression, creation, and communication that lives according to the interaction of several variables: a writer ... a reader ... and the language itself, the culture it embodies."
Just as electracy is not just digital literacy, voice is not only isolated within the self. Both delineate the cultural and intertextual dimensions that contribute to each space.