Here, There, Nowhere
Lucinda Zhang
Family as a basic unit of social structure reflects the dynamics of societal change on a micro level. This thesis aims to study the positive and negative affordances of modern communication (such as social media, SMS, facetime, and email) in comparison and contrast to traditional communication methods within family interactions. This research will investigate the interpersonal dynamics across generations, space and time through the insights of my own family ethnographic research. Moreover, the study seeks to examine the refractory impact of communication in relations to technological, political and cultural forces, and speculate from the existing knowledge on how future family complexes may mutate and evolve.
This thesis aims to study the positive and negative affordances of modern communication in comparison and contrast to traditional communication methods within family interactions. This research will investigate the interpersonal dynamics across generations, space and time through the insights of my own family ethnographic research. Moreover, the study seeks to examine the refractory impact of communication in relations to technological, political and cultural forces, and speculate from the existing knowledge on how future family complexes may mutate and evolve.
LATENCY AND DISEMBODIMENT
Our communication is heavily evolved around digital spaces nowadays, disembodiment of communication is commonly experienced. Digital space cannot engage us in a fully immersive experience that replicates what we sense in reality. Rather, our experience is often fragmented, or disembodied.
RELATIONSHIP DYNAMICS IN DIGITAL COMMUNICATION
Modern society disrupted the inherent format of Chinese families and reshaped it with a more fluid, mobile, and deconstructed nature. Under this new kinship, the unfamiliarity, integration, tensions, and dynamics that appeared intra- and intergenerationally is stabilized, reconciled, and revolutionized by the somewhat involuntary experience within the digital space.
The thesis capstone is displayed in a series of printing objects. Each individual prints can be unfolded to a poster and tell the story of a piece of dialogue happening between two or multiple family members. The prints series are packaged in envelopes and mailed to 20-30 friends, family members, and strangers.
