Project Update!

For my final project Im doing a study in the virtual world of Second Life (SL) on how people define themselves, represent themselves, and act compaired to their Real Lives (RL, or 1st Life). Ill also be looking a little bit at how people communicate in SL, what they communicate, and why. I have a few shots from SL that I probably wont use in my project but that I like so I thought I would put them on here. Let me introduce my SL avatar, the medium through which I represent myself to the rest of the virtual community. My name is 00Syd Kidd.



Thats a photo that I took of myself that I included with a job application. Thats right, I am currently looking for a job on SL. I am running out of money from my last job and I feel compelled to get some more. There are different ways to get money on SL. Lots of people buy money (Linden Dollars, or $L) with real world money causing a very real SL economy. I dont know what the exchange rate is between US$ and $L right now, but there are people who create things on SL, sell them for $L, and then turn that into very real money. I dont buy or sell any money, keeping all my in-world money in world. So, Im trying to find a job. My last job was as a hostess, welcoming people to the Swing Club where I worked, making friends, introducing people, etc. Thats the same sort of job that Im applying for now.
Here is another photo that I am using for job applications:



I took that in a photo booth. Most job applications require you to include at least one photo, often specifying whether or not they want a close up of the face, or the whole body. The reason for this is that if you are going to be holding a position representing a company, or a store, or a club your employers are going to want you to look good, but not only good, they want you to look experienced, like you know what your doing. Because of this, another common requierment for jobs is that you must have been in world for at least 30 days. Appearence plays a huge role in SL, with everyone striving to look more experienced, more polished, less like a newbie. No one takes anyone seriously who is still walking around in a stock newbie body or newbie clothes. The desire to look less new is one of the main reasons people desire in-world money.

The huge economy in SL, the buying and selling of virtual objects, often seems absurd to outside viewers. Its not like you actually NEED anything in SL. you dont need to eat, or sleep, you dont need shelter because you'll never be affected by the elements, if there are any. But yet people are constantly buying. The biggest industries in SL are the clothing industry, the skin industry (you must either create your own "skin" or buy one, it is the outside appearence that covers your body shape), the shape industry (Like with skin industry, you can create your own but most people just buy one, it is that shape of your body, your form), and the hair inudstry (you can buy many different hairstyles, which can be worn and taken off at whim, mush like RL wigs).

Most new avatars main goal is to gain enough money ro buy good quality (experienced, polished looking, and often expensive) clothing, skin, shape. and hair. This is what they will be judged on. In effect, "quality" of appearence is a status symbol. The more polished your avatar looks, wearing a good quality shape, skin, hair, and clothing, shows that you have been on SL for some amount of time, put effort into it, that you take SL seriously (very important), and that you have money. Many avatars that have been on SL for a significant amount of time have more than one skin, more than one shape, More than one hair style, and many, many clothes. Appearences matter just as much in SL as they do in RL.

In both the photos of myself that I have shown you I have been wearing different outfits. Here is a photo of me with my good friend Dahral and his in-world neighbor. Here I am wearing a different outfit and different hair.



In SL it is possible to change your appearence in an instant, with a click of the mouse. A few people who I've talked to enjoy this impermanence because it allows them to remain a mystery to those who dont know them, while at the same time representing different facits of their personality to close friends. One woman who I interviewed drastically changes her appearence often and has looked completely different every time I've seen her. She enjoys the power provided to her to change how she looks, and how that in turn provides some amount of power over the people that she meets.



SL makes it possible for individuals to control the way people view them, down to the last detail. In RL, of course, you can control how you look, but in SL you can control not only how you look, but how you look to different people. You could appear one way with friends and then change your appearence for when you go out in public, so that strangers (potential new friends) view you a different way.

Anyway, I ended up getting a little more in depth with this post than I originally planned. The idea of appearnece in sl and its impermanence, and the way people use that, is one of the ideas Im looking into for my project. I'll just leave you with one last thought. A lot of newbies show up in SL thinking that its a game, asking how to play, wondering what they are supposed to be doing. There is no goal to SL, it is exactly what it says it is, a second life. A lot of people go to SL as an escape from RL, but all too soon they gain friends and responsabilities and when that happens it is no longer an escape, but a life onto itself. Many SL residents describe SL as "addicting" but I dont think thats true. Games can be "addicting" because of their ability to serve as an escape from life. People are not addicted to SL, but I think that they are attatched to it because it is life. They are compelled to go onto SL by their various in-world responsabilities.

So, if you were thinking about joining SL, do yourself a favor and think about it a little longer.

Conversations With Ogotemmeli: An Introduction to Dogon Religious Ideas

Conversations With Ogotemmeli is the telling of a white, European anthropologist's journey into Dogon culture of Africa. Written in the 40s, this text does little to appear scholarly, instead seeming like a meandering tale of some wild adventure. The beginning of the writing, written like a story, tells of the European's daily lives living amongst the Dogon people. We read of them waking up, taking care of sick natives, and doing research. It goes on to tell of how one of the Europeans received a cryptic invitation from a respected local philosopher and wise man. The European goes to the man's house with his African assistant, and there they meet Ogotemmeli. Ogotemmeli was once a great hunter but after an accident became blind, and spent the remainder of his years on pursuits of the mind, becoming renowned thinker. Ogotemmeli knew of the Europeans, and wanted to tell them of his culture himself.



The European is used to hearing the Dogon's lying to them of their customs and culture, and is eager to hear from such a well known Dogon about such things. The European never offers any more explanation for Ogotemmeli's actions except for saying that he had been waiting for fifteen years to impart his knowledge of his people on to a European. The European throughout makes assumptions of what Ogotemmeli is thinking and feeling, at times making it seem as if he is baffled as to how he could approach the European.

Ogotemmeli goes on to explain the Dogon origin story. The story is one of sex, disorder, and the restoration of order. The story is deeply concerned with gender, balance, numbers, language, order and disorder. the story connects the origin of life and humans with the order of the universe brought about by language.



There was also a lot said about the balance of the sexes, and that how originally men and women had the essence of both sexes in them, but how one would often take over and grow stronger than the other. This I thought was speaking about how balance is ideal, and can never be perfectly acheived, and that it will never last. This I thought was saying that humans almost represented disorder in the universe. But I could just be looking too far into it.


All of the talk of gender and balance, however, made me think of the documentry Southern Comfort that we watched in class about transgender people living in the south of the United States. The people featured in that documentry were people who were born one gender, but feel that they are actually the other. Throughout the film we see these people doing all they can to embody the gender that they feel they actually are. Instead of embracing both genders as the people in the Dogon myth may have, they disregard one and embrace the other. In the Dogon myth those first people born with the spirits of both genders were circumsised in order to remove the less dominant gender, as it created a conflict within them.