unit4AVirtualLife.doc

精品文档Maia Szalavitz, formerly a televisi on producer, now spe nds her time as a writer. I n this essay she explores digital reality and its con seque nces. Along the way, she compares the digital world to the "real" world, ack no wledgi ng the attracti ons of the electro nic dime nsion.迈亚•塞拉维茨曾是电视制片人， 目前从事写作她在本文中探索了数字化世界及其后果与此同时，她将数字化世界与真实世界做了比较，承认电子空间自有其魅力A Virtual LifeMaia Szalavitz1 After too long on the Net, even a phone call can be a shock. My boyfriend's Liverpool accent suddenly becomes impossible to interpret after his easily understood words on screen; a secretary's clipped tone seems more rejecting than I'd imagined it would be. Time itself becomes fluid -- hours become minutes, or seconds stretch into days. Weekends, once a highlight of my week, are now just two ordinary days.虚拟世界的生活迈亚•塞拉维茨在网上呆了太久，听到铃声也会吓一大跳。

显示屏上看多了我男朋友那些一目了然的文字，他的利物浦口音一下子变得难以听懂； 而秘书的清脆快速的语调听上去比我想象的要生硬时间本身变得捉摸不定一一几小时变成几分钟， 或几秒钟延伸为几天周末原本是我一周的黄金时段，现在却不过是平平常常的两天2 For the last three years, since I stopped working as a television producer, I have done much of my work as a telecommuter. I submit articles and edit them via email and com muni cate with colleagues on Internet mail ing lists. My boyfrie nd lives in En gla nd, so much of our relati on ship is also computer-assisted.在我不再当电视制片人的这三年间， 我的大部分工作都是在家里使用计算机终端进行的我通过电子邮件投稿和校订， 利用互联网上的人名地址与同行交流。

我男朋友住在英国，因此两人的关系也在很大程度上借助于电脑维系3 If I desired, I could stay in side for weeks without wanting anythin g. I can order food, and man age my mon ey, love and work. I n fact, at times I have spe nt as long as three weeks alone at home, going out only to get mail and buy n ewspapers and groceries. I watched most of the en dless sno wstorm of '96 on TV.我要是愿意的话，可以一连几个星期不出门而什么也不缺我可以在网上订购食品、 网上理财、网上恋爱、网上工作事实上我有时独自呆在家里长达三个星期，只偶尔出去拿 信、买报纸及日用品1996年那一场接一场的暴风雪我大都是在电视上看到的4 But after a while, life itself begins to feel unreal. I start to feel as though I've become one with my mach in es, tak ing data in, spitt ing them back out, just ano ther link in the Net. Others on line report the same symptoms. We start to feel an avers ion to outside forms of socializ ing. We have become the Net critics' worst ni ghtmare.然而，一段时间之后，生活本身就显得不那么真实了。

我开始觉得自己似乎与机器融为一体了，我接收信息，再发送出去，就如同互联网的一个连接点其他上网的人也谈到了 同样的症状我们开始厌恶外面的社交方式我们的状况成了批评互联网的人们最害怕见到的一幕5 What first seemed like a luxury, crawli ng from bed to computer, not worryi ng about hair, and clothes and face, has become a form of escape, a lack of discipline. And once you start replaci ng real huma n con tact with cyber- in teract ion, coming back out of the cave can be quite difficult. 一下床就上机，不再为发型、服饰、面部化妆烦心，起初看似高级的享受如今却成为一种对生活的逃避，一种缺乏自律的表现你一旦开始用网络交际取代人与人的真 实接触，要走出这种穴居状态就会相当困难6 I find myself shyer, more cautious, more an xious. Or, con versely, whe n sudde nly confron ted with real live humans, I get overexcited, speak too much, interrupt. I constantly worry if I am dressed appropriately, that perhaps I've actually forgotten to put on a skirt and walked outside in the T-shirt and un derwear I sleep and live in.我发现自己变得比以前怯生、谨慎、焦虑。

或者，反过来，当我突然面对现实中活生 生的人时，会变得过于兴奋，说个不停，爱打断别人的讲话我老是担心自己衣着是否得体， 担心自己会不会真的忘了穿裙子，只穿着夜间睡觉、白天活动的那件 T恤和内衣就出门了7 At times, I turn on the televisi on and just leave it to talk away in the backgro und, someth ing that I'd never done previously. The voices of the programs are comforting, but then I'm jarred by the commercials. I find myself sucked in by soap operas, or needing to keep up with the latestnews and the weather. "Dateline," "Frontline," "Nightline," CNN, New York 1, every possible an gle of every story over and over and over, even whe n they are of no possible use to me. Work moves into the backgro un d. I decide to check my email.有时我把电视机开着， 让它作为背景声音一直响着， 以前我从不这样做。

电视节目中的说话声让人感到宽慰，可那些广告又叫我心烦我发现自己沉浸在肥皂剧里，或者不停地 收看最新的新闻报道和天气预报一而再再而三地从“每日新闻” 、“一线新闻”、“夜间新闻”、有线新闻电视网、纽约一套上收看有关每一条新闻的各种不同视角的报道， 尽管它们对我毫无用处工作成了次要的我决定去看一下自己的电子信箱8 On lin e, I find myself attack ing every one in sight. I am bad-tempered, and easily an gered. I find every one on my maili ng list insen sitive, believi ng that they've forgotte n that there are people actually reading their wounding remarks. I don't realize that rm projecting until after rve been embarrassed by some one who politely poi nts out that I've attacked her for agree ing with me.在网上，我发现自己见谁攻谁。

我脾气暴躁，动辄生气我觉得我与之通信的每一个人都麻木不仁，认为他们已经忘却还有人真会去读他们那些刻薄伤人的言辞 直到有人礼貌地指出，她同意我的观点却遭到我的抨击时， 我才意识到，自己是在以己度人，不由得深感尴尬9 When I'm in this state, I fight my boyfriend as well, misinterpreting his intentions because of the lack of emotional cues given by our typed dialogue. The fight takes hours, because the system keeps crash in g. I say a line, the n he does, the n crash! And yet we keep on, doggedly.在这种精神状态下，我也和男朋友吵架，常因键出的对话缺乏情感暗示而误解他的本意由于系统常出故障，两人一争就是几个小时我写一句，他回一句，接着系统失灵！可 我们俩还是锲而不舍地接着吵10 rd n ever realized how importa nt daily routi ne is: dress ing for work, sleep ing no rmal hours.rd never thought I relied so much on co-workers for co。