Research Summary

In my research I study how a rhetorical perspective can help to improve the construction of virtual communities. By applying rhetorical theory to environments and communication, my research demonstrates that the relationship between a speaker and audience is in part determined by spatial cues. That means that the architecture of a virtual environment creates interactional expectations that guide activity within the environment. A major component of these expectations is the authority of a participant in relation to others; spatial cues help speakers determine the ethos -- or relational background -- of others. Researching this relationship across a variety of online environments has demonstrated that the structure of public and private spaces within an online community will affect congregating patterns, conversational habits, genres of discourse, community coherence, and social structure. In addition to spatial cues, representational choices also influence participants’ expectations of themselves and others. In my most recent study I have created an online environment that incorporates an @race property into the familiar litany of @gender, @description, and @research found in many educational and social environments. This experiment is in its early stages, and the limited data collected thus far demonstrates specific patterns in how and when participants choose to mark @race within the environment.

Research Methodology

My research can be characterized as using ethnographic methodology, discourse analysis, and rhetorical analysis. I examine patterns of discourse in online communities that include how speakers mark their authority, how they assert their social position with respect to other particpants, and how they use linguistic patterns to discursively represent identity. Analyzing conversational patterns online is a first step in a more extensive examination of individual users’ approaches to discursive interaction.

Future Directions for My Research

• Rhetoric of Space. How do we approach the architecture of online environments? My work asks how to build text-based and graphical spaces that provide cues adequate to mark interactional expectations. Public and private gathering spaces within online environments require different strategies and they also facilitate different kinds of interaction. The construction of a space also provides cues that help participants read the authority of users and the social structure of a community. How can we build in such a way to evoke the kinds of interaction and conversation most appropriate?
• Choices of Self-presentation. Given the opportunity to represent race in a text-based environment, will users choose to do so? Gender has been a component of online communities almost consistently, in part because of the pronoun requirement. Giving users the choice to represent race via text can provide valuable data regarding how important such criteria are perceived to be by users. Will the property be set? Will users ignore the property despite prompting by the system? Will interaction within the environment acknowledge the @race property? Examining such questions in a text-based environment will provide valuable information for the design of graphical environments.

Other Important Issues for the Field

• Language and Identity. How much does language usage within an online community reveal about participants? Given the importance of discourse within such environments, it is important to consider the pivotal role language plays in constructing experience and identity. Rhetorical theory is one of the most useful frameworks for helping understand the role of language.
• Perspective. What are the advantages of first-person versus third-person perspective in graphical communities? Given the importance of situating oneself and others within a social hierarchy in order to achieve meaningful interaction, how can we best represent an environment with its spatial cues to users?

Selected Publications

• “Human Factors in Virtual World Design: Psychological and Sociological Considerations.” Member of panel presented at Siggraph International Conference on Computer Graphics and Interactive Technologies, Orlando, FL, July 1998. Panelists: Lynn Cherny, Mary Czerwinski, Tammy Knipp, Beth Kolko, Elizabeth Reid Steere.
• “Intellectual Property in Synchronous and Collaborative Virtual Space.” Computers and Composition 15 (1998): 163-183.
• “Dissolution and Fragmentation: Problems in Online Communities.” With Elizabeth Reid Steere. In Cybersociety 2.0, Ed. Steven Jones. Sage Press: Thousand Oaks, 1998. 212-229.
• "Bodies in Place: Real Politics, Real Pedagogy, and Virtual Space." In High Wired: On the Design, Use, and Theory of Educational MOOs>/i>. Ed. Cynthia Haynes and Jan Rune Holmevik. University of Michigan Press: Ann Arbor, 1998. 253-265.
• "We Are Not Just (Electronic) Words: Learning the Literacies of Culture, Body, and Politics.” In Literacy Theory in the Age of the Internet. Ed. Irene Ward and Todd Taylor. Columbia UP: New York, 1998. 61-78.
• "Virtual Communities as Ethical Space, or, Why Cyberspace Does Not Signal the End of Civilization as We Know It." Published electronically by the Wyoming Center for the Advancement of Ethics, January 1997.
• "Building a World With Words: The Narrative Reality of Virtual Communities." Works and Days 25/26 (1995):105-126.
• “Representing Bodies in Virtual Space: The Rhetoric of Avatar Design.” Forthcoming 1999 from The Information Society.
• “Discursive Citizenship: The Body Politic in Cyberspace.” Forthcoming from the International Journal of Virtual Reality.
• “Erasing @race: Going White in the (Inter)Face.” In Race in Cyberspace. Ed. Beth Kolko, Lisa Nakamura and Gil Rodman. Routledge. Under contract.