Shonell in TCR Land

In early December 2011, I was able to go to a talk in Second Life by anthropologist and author of Coming of Age in Second Life: An Anthropologist Explores the Virtually Human, Tom Boellstorff [Tom Bukowski in-world].

Athabasca University Island in Second Life held the event.

As stated by Boellstorff: In this talk, I draw upon my ethnographic research in Second Life to talk about the history and future of virtual worlds. Building upon arguments developed in my book Coming of Age in Second Life: An Anthropologist Explores the Virtually Human, I will discuss ways in which virtual worlds are both continuous with and distinct from physical-world social life.

In his talk, Boellstorff talked about several topics, to include online interaction, the history of virtual worlds, the virtual body, and the use of imagination in online and virtual developments.

I managed to film some of Boellstorff’s talk and present it below for you in two parts. The first part is Boellstorff talking about the virtual body. The second part starts where the other video leaves off, with Boellstorff discussing imagination and where it might lead us in the future with virtual worlds.