Marie-Laure Ryan is by origin a Swiss independent scholar, presently working in American environment, in Colorado. Her scope of interest is crossing the borders of individual disciplines; she is writing and editing theoretical works dealing with narrative theory, theory of possible worlds, game theory, cyberculture and digital literature. In her monograph 'Narrative as Virtual Reality: Immersion and Interactivity in Literature and Electronic Media', Ryan is moving from the primary analysing of virtual reality as a philosophical concept through the presentation and explication of the poetics of immersion and interactivity to the projection of their synthesis as an ultimate aim for the perception of the work of art (concentrating mostly on literature and visual art). The theoretical parts are interwoven with seven interludes of hermeneutical interpretations, providing a direct exemplification of the presented theory. Narrative as Virtual Reality can be stimulating not only for the philosophical, art historical and cultural perspective on the piece of art or their interdisciplinary relations for theoreticians, scholars and scientists active in various humanistic and informational fields but can also function as a very inspiring source for the artists working with new media. The offered terminology and broad spectrum of concepts from diverse areas of art, science and technology can provide readers with a sufficiently stable basis for hermeneutical interpretation of the Works from electronic environment.
The article presents a historical and troubleshooting summary of the development of new media and their theoretical conceptualizations. In a connection with their advancement it formulates several theses: since 1950s the media theory arises as a phobic leftist reaction to the new media (Th. W. Adorno, G. Anders) criticizing the so-called cultural industry, although the leftist media theory was tolerant to the new media in the first half of the 20th century (S. Kracauer). The author places the rejection to debit of, among others, the one-sided interpretation of Benjamin's theses from his 'The Work of Art in the Age of its Technical Reproduction'. A compensation of the new media comes with M. McLuhan and his theorems that the media enlarge the possibilities of man, create autonomous messages, and change the world into a 'global village'. N. Postman followed McLuhan in sense of cultural-conservative criticism, and J. Meyrowitz derived a positive notion of a role of electronic media in his thesis on the implementation of the new social borders through media. The author considers theses stating that the new media implicitly include a power element and an element of violence, and he inclines to the opinion that elite criticism of the new media comes from misunderstanding of their capabilities and the late creation of the theories in view of the technical-civilization progress.
The article is dealing with the problem of mass media phenomenon in relation with elements of traditional culture. Electronic media are a constitutive feature of the contemporary cultural context, as they strongly influence transformations, which can be observed within folklore. The contemporary 'information community' can be best observed through Internet, where community groups are naturally activated within the virtual reality. The process of searching for folk elements in contemporary culture dignifies the anthropological folklore from using methods, developed within this field to study contemporary mechanisms of understanding the world. It considerably enriches the knowledge about human beings.
The paper considers the influence of the media picture on the mind and subjectivity of a man. It is the influence which is of considerable importance for the moulding of the cognitive process, attitudes towards life, spirituality of the individuals living in the present times. The ongoing philosophical and scientific explorations of this influence put the fundamental enquiries into the foundations of the classical theory of cognition and epistemology including the classical transcendentalism of Kant and Husserl in question. At the same time they present the possibility and necessity of their thorough revision and verification without absolute rejection. This thesis is supported in the paper by an initial analysis of the mechanism of creation of reality and cognitive functioning of electronic media, mainly television and internet, and the consideration of theory and cognitive assumptions of the philosophy of life and human existence of A. T. Tymieniecka and other contemporary concepts of a man and the cognitive process. The paper also determines the key tasks of the newly formed philosophy/epistemology of the media.
The main aim of the study was to examine a potential moderator role of social context in which children are exposed to media (alone, with peers, with parents) in the relationship between the frequency of media use and the frequency of committed peer aggression. The study included 880 elementary school students, which completed the following self-assessment measures: Peer violence among school children questionnaire (Velki, Kuterovac Jagodić, & Vrdoljak, 2012), and Exposure to the media scale (Velki & Kuterovac Jagodić, 2012). A moderation effect of parental and peer social context was found; e.g., social context had a positive effect on decreasing the correlation between watching TV and electronic peer aggression. Peers social context during playing computer games was associated with decrease in physical peer aggression. Browsing the Internet with parents or peers also decreased physical and/or electronic peer aggression. The importance of social context as a protective factor is highlighted in the discussion.
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