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distinct realities (Jurgenson
2009
,
2011
). We see digital dualism in the persistence
of terms such as 'real' versus 'virtual,' which imply there is a disjuncture between
the two conditions. These terms point to a lag in the cultural conceptual models
we use to discuss this dynamic. Jurgenson proposes that augmented reality offers a
more useful conceptual model with which to discuss and explore our contemporary
relationship with digital technology. He proposes that, in addition to a technological
application, augmented reality offers a useful conceptual model with which to
discuss an emerging cultural paradigm (Jurgenson
2011
).
Jurgenson argues that digital dualism is a faulty ontological conception that our
online and offline lives are separate, and that the former is somehow inferior to the
latter. As Jurgenson points out, 'online' behaviour has real-world consequences,
and this can be successfully traced through political activism like the Occupy
Movement. Jurgenson does not suggest that our online and offline profiles are the
same (as he points out, there will always be a distinction between flesh-and-blood
interactions and our engagement through new media), but rather that the barriers
between online and offline behaviours have collapsed, and that we traverse multiple
realities as part of a conceptual framework he refers to as Augmented Reality
(Jurgenson
2012
). “I am proposing an alternative view that states that our reality
is both technological and organic, both digital and physical, all at once. We are not
crossing in and out of separate digital and physical realities, a la The Matrix, but
instead live in one reality, one that is augmented by atoms and bits” (Jurgenson
2011
).
We wish to consider Jurgenson's concept of digital dualism, and in particular the
argument that understanding 'real' and 'virtual' space as distinct conditions is an
artefact drawn from a now outdated kind of computing experience, as elaborated
by Boesel and Rey (
2013
), in relation to digital performance. Digital performance
involves the integration of live, physical performance with digital image-creation
techniques.
In dance, the advent of digital performance has generated new debate about
the nature of 'virtual' dance. The concept of the virtual in dance pre-dates digital
technology. Art philosopher Susanne Langer suggested 'virtual force' as the primary
means of symbol-creation in dance in the 1940s (Langer
1953
: 169-207). Respond-
ing to the need to re-define 'virtual' dance in the light of digital performance
works, Burt (
2009
: 442-467) and Boucher (
2011
) have argued that the term 'virtual'
relates to 'what might be' rather than a specifically computer-based paradigm. This
thinking is expanded by Erin Manning in her concept of 'movement-as-becoming'
in which 'pre-acceleration' implies the possibilities of movement that constitute a
virtuality that is temporal in nature, evocative of what a movement could become
in the moment of its initiation, and destroyed as soon as actual displacement of
the body takes place (Manning
2009
: location 67-81). In this sense, dance theory
aligns with Jurgenson's position in dismantling the idea that there is a fundamental
difference between the idea of virtuality in physical and digital spaces.
Digital performance provides an example of a domain in which new kinds
of technically-enabled artwork generate the need to explore and examine new
conceptual paradigms. Just as Auslander argued in the 1990s (Auslander
1999
:
