Essays
Computer Mediated Communication and the Problem of Sexual Identity
Tadej Prapotnik
Abstract
When analyzing communication and communicational patterns which are used in the computer mediated communication (CMC), we find the sex to be the most suitable factor which can help us to establish up to which degree virtual space withholds previrtual communication practice. Both men and women transfer in somewhat predictable manner already acquiered communicational patterns which are significant for previrtual world. Therefore, computer mediated communication reflects the duality of male and female discourse together with their particularities. Researches often point to sexually differentiated discourse and also to the fact that hypothetical potential of the internet culture is in tune with real life experience of the users of both sexes, because, as female users often point out there is a transfer of mental and empirical patterns which are typical for situations outside virtual culture and also to spaces, relations and communicational interaction within internet communication. Discourse analysis of computer mediated communication shows that female discourse involves excuses, questions, and support, while male discourse is full of assertion, self-advertisment etc. Female on-line communication is characterized by rapport talk, while male discourse is characterized by report talk.
To sum up, every virtual world is at the same time dependant on a physical, social and "previous" world and that dependance is maintained by the individuals of both sexes. The matrix of internet situations and meanings therefore presents merely a new addition to its original matrix, that is, the previrtual world matrix, because the people in front of the screen are still the same people as in the real life. That is the reason the virtual culture is only a part, that is, exstension, of the real culture, and not its alternative.
Keywords
computer mediated communication; internet; sexual identity; sexually differentiated discourse; social interaction
Hrčak ID:
172012
URI
Publication date:
1.12.2000.
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