Simulated Selves : The Undoing of Personal Identity in the Modern World

The notion of a personal self took centuries to evolve, reaching the pinnacle of autonomy with Descartes' 'I think, therefore I am' in the seventeenth century. This __'__personalisation' of identity thrived for another hundred years before it began to be questioned, subject to the emergence of broader, more inclusive forms of agency. __Simulated Selves: Undoing Personal Identity in the Modern World__ addresses the 'constructed' notion of personal identity in the West and how it has been eclipsed by the development of new technological, social, art historical and psychological infrastructures over the last two centuries. While the provisional nature of the self-sense has been increasingly accepted in recent years, __Simulated Selves__ addresses it in a new way - not by challenging it directly, but by observing changes to the environments and cultural conventions that have traditionally supported it. By narrating both its dismantling and its incapacitation in this way, it records its __undoing__. Like __The Invention of the Self: Personal Identity in the Age of Art__ (to which it forms a companion volume), __Simulated Selves__ straddles cultural history and philosophy. Firstly, it identifies hitherto neglected forces that inform the course of cultural history. Secondly, it highlights how the self is not the self-authenticating abstraction, only accessible to introspection, that it seems to be; it is also a cultural and historical phenomenon. Arguing that it is by engaging in cultural conventions that we subscribe to the process of identity-formation, the book also suggests that it is in these conventions that we see our self-sense - and its transience - best reflected. By examining the traces that the trajectory of the self-sense has left in its environment, __Simulated Selves__ offers a radically new approach to the question of personal identity, asking not only 'how and why is it under threat?' but also 'given that we understand the self-sense to be a constructed phenomenon, why do we cling to it?'. The notion of a personal self took centuries to evolve, reaching the pinnacle of autonomy with Descartes' 'I think, therefore I am' in the 17th century. This 'personalisation' of identity thrived for another hundred years before it began to be questioned, subject to the emergence of broader, more inclusive forms of agency. Simulated Selves: The Undoing Personal Identity in the Modern World addresses the 'constructed' notion of personal identity in the West and how it has been eclipsed by the development of new technological, social, art historical and psychological infrastructures over the last two centuries. While the provisional nature of the self-sense has been increasingly accepted in recent years, Simulated Selves addresses it in a new way - not by challenging it directly, but by observing changes to the environments and cultural conventions that have traditionally supported it. By narrating both its dismantling and its incapacitation in this way, it records its undoing. Like The Invention of the Self: Personal Identity in the Age of Art (to which it forms a companion volume), Simulated Selves straddles cultural history and philosophy. Firstly, it identifies hitherto neglected forces that inform the course of cultural history. Secondly, it highlights how the self is not the self-authenticating abstraction, only accessible to introspection, that it seems to be; it is also a cultural and historical phenomenon. Arguing that it is by engaging in cultural conventions that we subscribe to the process of identity-formation, the book also suggests that it is in these conventions that we see our self-sense - and its transience - best reflected. By examining the traces that the trajectory of the self-sense has left in its environment, Simulated Selves offers a radically new approach to the question of personal identity, asking not only 'how and why is it under threat?' but also 'given that we understand the self-sense to be a constructed phenomenon, why do we cling to it?'. The notion of a personal self took centuries to evolve, reaching the pinnacle of autonomy with Descartes' 'I think, therefore I am' in the seventeenth century. This 'personalisation' of identity thrived for another hundred years before it began to be questioned, subject to the emergence of broader, more inclusive forms of agency. Simulated Selves: Undoing Personal Identity in the Modern World addresses the 'constructed' notion of personal identity in the West and how it has been eclipsed by the development of new technological, social, art historical and psychological infrastructures over the last two centuries.00While the provisional nature of the self-sense has been increasingly accepted in recent years, Simulated Selves addresses it in a new way - not by challenging it directly, but by observing changes to the environments and cultural conventions that have traditionally supported it. By narrating both its dismantling and its incapacitation in this way, it records its undoing Cover page Halftitle page Series page Title page Copyright page CONTENTS PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS CHAPTER ONE Introduction CHAPTER TWO The Narrated Self: Time and the Dramatisation of Historical Agency CHAPTER THREE The Publication of the Self: the Sublimation of Personal Identity in Publicity and Art Appreciation CHAPTER FOUR The Disintegration of the Self: the Originsof Abstraction and the Deobjectification of the World CHAPTER FIVE The Democratisation ofthe Self: the Integration of Creative Endeavour into the Fabric of Daily Life and the Death of Art CHAPTER SIX The Transpersonalisation of the Self: the Material Culture of Communication and the Communalisation of Identity CHAPTER SEVEN The Psychological Self: the Pathology of Art and Cinematographic Modes of Self-remembering CHAPTER EIGHT The Linguistic Self: the Deverberatio nof the Self and the End of Meaning NOTES BIBLIOGRAPHY INDEX The narrated self: time and the dramatisation of historical agency -- The publication of the self: the sublimation of personal identity in publicity and art appreciation -- The disintegration of the self: the origins of abstraction and the de-objectification of the world -- The democratisation of the self: the integration of creative endeavour into the fabric of daily life and the death of art -- The trans-personalisation of the self: the material culture of communication and the communalisation of identity -- The psychological self: the pathology of art and cinematographic modes of self-remembering -- The linguistic self: the de-verberation of the self and the end of meaning