Technologies of the Self



  "TECHNOLOGIES OF THE SELF:" FOUCAULT AND INTERNET DISCOURSE (1)
                                       
   Alan Aycock
   Department of Anthropology
   University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
   
     _________________________________________________________________
   
  TABLE OF CONTENTS
     * Abstract
     * Introduction
     * Inner Substance
     * Degree and Kind of Commitment
     * Personal Routines or Disciplines
     * Goal of Personal Transformation
     * Conclusion: Implications for Research on Online Play
     * Footnotes
     * References
       
   
     _________________________________________________________________
   
  ABSTRACT
  
   While some have argued that computing via the Internet offers a vision
   of freedom and a shared humanity, others have claimed with equal
   vehemence that it may become the instrument of global surveillance and
   personal alienation. Foucault's notion of self-fashioning (souci de
   soi) exemplifies both sides of this debate, since fashions may both be
   imposed and freely chosen. To present a Foucauldian perspective on
   fashioning of self online I use instances of recent postings to the
   Usenet news group rec.games.chess. Key aspects of self-fashioning that
   I identify include romantic and modernist images of interior
   experience, the importance of keeping your "cool," the discussion of
   techniques designed to improve skill or strength, and the purchase and
   use of chess computers as icons of mastery. Finally, I consider some
   implications of this Foucauldian approach for future research on
   Internet self-constructions.
     _________________________________________________________________
   
   
   
  INTRODUCTION
  
   As the media breathlessly remind us several times a day, the Internet
   is a global computing network that makes it possible for people to
   talk to one another over great distances very cheaply and quickly.
   Newsgroups, one of the services available on the Internet, are
   electronic bulletin boards which allow subscribers to read and post
   messages in thousands of specialized areas. There are very few
   controls on postings to any newsgroup, which are as a result
   frequently off topic, repetitive, vacuous, or offensive. Newsgroup
   postings offer an opportunity for an anthropologist to do some
   "lurking" without the usual costs of time, money, discomfort, or
   political hassle associated with ordinary types of fieldwork. A
   disadvantage of Internet ethnography of this sort is that it is much
   harder to figure out what's going on when you can only observe what
   people say, and not what they actually do. <2>
   
   As part of my continuing research on play and modernity, I have
   downloaded several weeks of postings <3> to the Internet newsgroup
   rec.games.chess (henceforth "r.g.c") and studied them carefully; the
   examples that I use here are drawn from these postings, changed only
   to conceal individual identities. <4>/a>; To interpret these postings,
   I have devised a model of the online fashioning of personal identity.
   This model is based loosely upon Michel Foucault's notion of %soi de
   souci%, the ethical care of self, roughly equivalent to the idea of
   self-government which he addressed in his last writings (Foucault,
   1990: p. 32; 1991b: p. 93). The title of this paper refers to
   Foucault's notion of "technologies of the self" as devices --
   mechanical or otherwise -- which make possible the social construction
   of personal identity (Foucault 1988b). I take the Internet to
   represent one such technology of the self.
   
   The model has four components: (a) the private "inner substance" that
   is believed to be the ultimate source of personal identity; (b) the
   degree and kind of commitment that is made to a given activity; (c)
   the personal routines or disciplines that are adopted to reshape one's
   identity; (d) the eventual goal of the personal transformation that
   has been undertaken. <5> I shall show how each of these four
   components is aligned with a specific theme on r.g.c, and give
   pertinent examples. I shall then discuss some implications of this
   approach to understanding the fashioning of an Internet identity.
   
  INNER SUBSTANCE
  
   
   
   Inner substance may be discerned by the way people speak of
   themselves. A nineteenth-century emphasis upon "romantic" imagery,
   associated with mysterious inner passions and upwelling creativity,
   has been supplemented in this century by "modernist" notions of
   advancement through reason, study, and planning (Gergen, 1991, ch. 2).
   The posters on r.g.c use both romantic and modern images, a blurring
   of styles fairly common in everyday life as well, i.e., people often
   speak of themselves as being deep and authentic, while nevertheless
   receptive to personal improvements and achievements that reveal them
   "as they really are." On the basis of a qualitative content analysis,
   I have identified the inner substance of r.g.c with a romantic image
   of "strength" or a modernist image of "skill." I'll give some examples
   of this mixed romantic/modernist style of speaking from r.g.c
   postings. In the first, the thread is "how to advance from
   intermediate level:"

           It's just a matter of gaining intuition as
           to where your pieces belong so that they
           work well together.  Now that I've made some
           progress in this area, I really
           cringe when I see some B player put his
           pieces on all the wrong squares and tie
           himself in a knot.

           Well, I am an inactive 1711 player and I
           wish to interject the notion of "nerve" to
           ratings improvement. I have seen some lower
           rated players who just have no
           nerve to play an agressive move or even a
           move that looks good to them but
           where they cannot see the obvious lines. . .
           Perhaps nerve can be learned by
           getting comfortable with different positions
           but some seem to have more of it than others.

   
   
   The posting above combines the language of personal "progress" with
   the vocabulary of deep inward feelings or dispositions ("intuition,"
   "nerve"). The second example deals with the issue of creativity or
   "genius:"



           What I want to investigate is the innovators
           of the game. Those who played the game but
           revolutionized the game due to their own
           genius. . . Can anyone shed some light on these
           geniuses and what makes them different from
          the average player or even the average GM?

   
   
   Here the romantic idea of "genius" and intrinsic "difference" or
   uniqueness is juxtaposed to the modernist notion of progress
   ("revolutionized the game") and the "laws of logic and science." Yet
   the "average GM" referred to is a white male of Euro-American
   heritage: by implication, all are not equally capable of improvement.
   <6> 
   
  DEGREE AND KIND OF COMMITMENT
  
   
   
   An ideal commitment to chess adopts a demeanor which is neither too
   distant nor too involved, a "cool" emotional style which requires the
   routine expression of feelings in day to day public encounters, yet
   also constrains such talk lest it cause embarrassment or public
   disturbance (Stearns, 1994, p. 192). Posters to r.g.c use four devices
   to shape their sense of commitment.
   
   By far the most frequent such device, appearing in about
   three-quarters of all postings on r.g.c according to my count of
   subject-headers, is the posting of facts or techniques which display
   shared interest in a topic. Here is a common example, which refers to
   an opening sequence known as the Taimanov Benoni:



           My experience with this line goes back to
           1987 when ex-New Zealand player
           David Flude played it against me in a
           weekender in Melbourne. I responded with
           18.Qf3,Qxf3 19.Nxf3,Rhe8 20.Kf2,c4?! (rather
           than Shabalov's 20...Re4!) 21.Rd1
           and eventually won. However I wasn't
           convinced by my opening play, so took the
           opportunity to ask David Norwood . . . He
           offhandedly suggested 18.Qa4+,b5 (note
           that this is why Black plays 14...Bxc3+, as
           otherwise White could play Nxb5) 19.Qf4 ..

   This sort of analysis has been greatly intensified by the outpouring
   of chess literature since the 60's, the recent increase in the number
   of international tournaments, and the proliferation of specialized
   chess knowledge at every level of play. The emotional tenor of this
   posting is what I would characterize as "impersonal, but friendly"
   (cf. Stearns, 1994: ch. 7). There is much more that needs to be said
   about the use of factual or technical postings on r.g.c, and I shall
   return to this theme in the following section.
   
   A second device that expresses an appropriate middle distance is the
   "smiley" or "emoticon," which appear in 5-10% of all postings to
   r.g.c. The smiley uses computer keystrokes to create an orthographic
   picture that can be viewed only by cocking one's head to the left.
   Another device to express emotionn places the word designating an
   appropriate gesture or feeling in brackets. These are conventions
   which add emotional nuance to abstract messages otherwise hard to
   interpret. In this context, it serves to report the emotional standing
   of the poster just as if s/he had said "cool," "great," "boring," or
   another term of the current vocabulary of feeling. A couple of
   examples will suffice:
   



           Long time no talk.

           You'll notice they haven't been developed
           before castling kingside in BOTH games. ;-)

   
   
   Emoticons and verbal representations of emotions are often used to
   take the edge off confrontational postings, though some posters use
   them routinely simply to enliven online talk.
   
   A third device, apparent in approximately one-third of the postings to
   r.g.c according to my subject-header count, is the "flame." Here is an
   extreme example of an r.g.c flame:
   

           Chess Clock: Mechanical
           Yugoslavia made, working great. I am selling
           this because I got a digital clock
           and don't need it anymore.  The only
           problem is the glass of one of the clocks
           is broken (just a little bit, not
           entirely). $10 , firm  + shipping. If you are
           interested, please e-mail me.

           (response)
           You are stupid.  If you are a girl I will
           add this:  You are a stupid bitch!!

   The next flame is more typical, excerpted from a lengthy, vitriolic
   debate that has continued for weeks on rgc concerning the financial
   probity of the United States Chess Federation (USCF):
   

           The Old Guard should say what's really on
           their mind: We report news
           that incommodes the powers-that-be and they
           hate us for it.

   
   
   It's certainly not obvious from these examples that flaming maintains
   an appropriate personal distance, since there seems to be too much
   involvement expressed. One way to interpret these flames would be to
   argue that flaming defines the rule of emotional distance by
   transgressing it, and certainly posters occasionally react to flames
   by reproaching the flamer for her/his excess.
   
   I have a strong impression, however, that the "flame" is also a kind
   of ritualized confrontation that expresses formulaic anger much as
   televised sports may express formulaic masculinity (Duncan, Messner,
   and Aycock, 1994). I will not attempt to demonstrate in this paper
   that "flames" are indeed formulaic, since that would be a major
   research direction in itself, but I will point to the standardization
   of verbal cues ("bitch," the "powers-that-be") which is characteristic
   of other more familiar confrontations such as bar fights, exchanges
   between motorists, letters to the editor, and abusive phone calls.
   
   The fourth device to shape commitment to chess is the purchase, use,
   and discussion online of commercial chess products and services (see
   Jackson Lears, 1994: pp. 46ff., and Miller, 1994: pp. 76ff. on
   romantic/modernist impulses in consumer culture). A formal methodology
   would offer a more reliable figure for the frequency of
   commodity-oriented postings on rgc, but my estimate of the content of
   such postings is over 50%. Postings about commodities are similar to
   factual postings because they demonstrate a shared interest in the
   discussions of rgc. As a financial commitment, commodities exhibit
   owners' personal involvement in online chess discourse. The good or
   service purchased shows that the owner maintains an appropriate
   distance, e.g., buying an book on the Taimanov Benoni, playing the
   opening in tournament games, and chatting about it online is a
   reasonable thing for a middle-class hobbyist to do. By contrast,
   spending many thousands of dollars on books and equipment might not be
   quite so reasonable, suggesting too great an involvement with the game
   (cf. Aycock, 1988a and Aycock, 1995 on the use of commodities in chess
   "over the board").
   
   Here is a simple example, which suggests the importance of
   commodification as a form of commitment to chess:
   


           I'm trying to complete my set of British
           Chess Magazine and would like to purchase three
           volumes if anyone has them. They are 1881 (vol 1),
           1882 (vol 2) and 1891 (vol 11).

   
   
   It is implicit in this posting that the personal ownership of a chess
   archive is in some sense equivalent to the mastery of chess knowledge
   (Foucault, 1989: p. 45).
   
   
   
Personal Routines or Disciplines

   
   
   Routines or disciplines on the Internet consist of the use of "words
   without things," in which the words themselves become resources for
   self- fashioning (Poster, 1990: p. 17; cf. Foucault, 1973: pp.
   312ff.). Most of these words are offered online as "facts" or
   "techniques." I mentioned above that two-thirds of rgc postings were
   about "facts," but I haven't yet said what I think "facts" are. For
   purposes of this paper, I define a "fact" as an utterance which
   produces an effect of apparently simple referentiality, e.g., "the sun
   rises in the east," or "this is a picture of my child." This
   discursive effect of factual innocence usually reduces or eliminates
   altogether the opportunity for further explanation. The social
   stereotype of a bore or an ivory-towered intellectual would be someone
   who attempts to interpret things which appear to be factually
   transparent. It is intriguing that in a situation such as the Internet
   where referentiality is more or less impossible to determine, the
   majority of postings claim factual referentiality as their main source
   of legitimacy; I'll return to this in my conclusion.
   
   Factual talk is produced by a discursive purification which strips
   statements of their particular personal, institutional, and historical
   contexts, presenting them instead as universals. Information expressed
   as objectively true may be used to sustain global claims of
   rationality or common sense. When facts have been removed from an
   easily recognizable context and formalized in some way, I refer to
   them as "technique." <7> In addition to the legitimation lent by
   factual talk, discussion of technique gives an impression of being "in
   the know." <8> I'll give some examples of postings to illustrate how
   this important impression is produced on rgc.
   
   First, a request for information about the rules of play. This request
   is especially significant because it pertains to "blitz," a variety of
   chess that became popular in the 70's and 80's when chess clocks
   became more accurate and players' demands for increased tempo of play
   were formally registered by chess organizations (cf. Aycock, 1988b on
   the role of chess organizations in instutionalizing play at all
   levels).
   


           I am curious about some freak cases that can
           come about in blitz games
           I have the USCF Rulebook (3rd edition, not
           4th) which has FIDE 5-minute
           chess rules in it, but these cases are not
           clearly covered...

   
   
   Second, here is some "techie talk" which is peculiar to the
   computerization of chess in the last ten years, and to the development
   of the Internet:
   

           Hi. I have just discovered the Internet
           Chess Server and would like to ask for
           some advice.  I run X-windows on a Sun
           Sparc1, connect to an internet-connected
           site via 14.4 kB modem, and telnet to the
           ICS from there.   I am currently observing
           games using the ASCII graphics provided by ICS,
           but I do have Xboard on my machine.

   At one level of analysis, this posting is nothing but an invitation
   for enthusiasts on rgc to exchange abstruse technical information. At
   another, however, such exchanges construct a hierarchy of expertise
   and personal legitimation. The final series of examples shows how
   factual and technical talk becomes routinized through "political
   arithmetic" (Foucault, 1988b: p. 151) on rgc:
   

                (first example)
           My 2 bits are that I have never liked the
           BHB. I think the numbers are too small
           and it is hard to tell how much time you
           have left in sudden death.

                (second example)
           I am teaching 7- and 8- year olds to play
           chess.  What would be a good clock
           setting for children at this age?

                (third example)
           Why doesn't someone just sit down with a
           january issue of chess-life and the
           current FIDE rating list and post the
           difference in ratings for a dozen or so US
           players? then we can get an accurate
           picture, rather than debating about
           this flat 150 pt rating discrepancy hogwash.

   
   
   These examples are about the intensity of personal routines. Time
   controls and statistical ratings define how players are to discipline
   themselves for "serious" play, and how they are to be ranked against
   one another (Hacking, 1990; Aycock, 1992a). Both are commodified,
   since to be rated, one must pay tournament fees to participate in
   timed play under the auspices of a formal chess organization. Time and
   ratings are subject to long and passionate dispute on rgc and
   elsewhere, leading to identification of calculable artifacts such as
   "sudden death," "an accurate picture," "discrepancy," or "good clock
   setting."
   
Goal of Personal Transformation

   
   
   For most of those who post to rgc, the goal of personal transformation
   is the formal mastery of chess.<9> Postings to the Internet differ
   from other popular chess literature, however, in that there is far
   more attention lent to the mastery of chess by computers. Speaking of
   computer technology on rgc promotes notions of solidarity and
   empowerment (Nye, 1994, pp. 172, 277).
   
   An initial example of the goal of personal transformation, as I have
   described it, is a posting about a computer program that plays chess.
   

           Grandmaster Sagalchik returns to UMBC to
           play one slow, rated game against a CM-5
           Supercomputer running the MIT Star Socrates
           chess program. . . .Kuszmaul (MIT) will
           deliver a technical lecture on massively
           parallel search and its application to computer
           chess. . . Star Socrates is one of the best computer
           chess programs in the world and plays at the
           grandmaster level.

   
   
   The notion of chess programs which play "at the grandmaster level" is
   especially fascinating for rgc posters, who debate endlessly whether a
   computer will ever be world champion, whether computers signal the
   "death" of chess, and whether the published ratings of computers are
   equivalent to those of human players. In this instance the chess
   program has been constructed discursively as a competent agent, the
   precise analog of human players (Aycock 1990).
   
   A second example is one of human play mediated by Internet computer
   linkages.

           Some of you might like to play "live" chess
           on the internet, and may not be aware
           of the Internet Chess Server! . . . It's a
           fun, club-like atmosphere, with people talking
           about chess, kibitzing during games,
           shouting greetings to each other, discussing
           sports, arguing politics, etc.

   
   
   The sense of community <10> is explicit here ("a fun, club-like
   atmosphere," etc.), and it is interesting to note that by contrast
   with the instance of the computer which plays chess "at a grandmaster
   level," here the computer linkage has become effectively transparent,
   a mere facilitator of the human agents who use it.
   
   My model of the online fashioning of personal identity has helped me
   to identify some interesting aspects of online discourses. In
   particular, I have drawn attention to the significance of romantic and
   modernist images of inner substance, the importance of maintaining a
   middle distance or "cool" commitment to chess, the value of factual
   and technical postings as personal routine or discipline designed to
   improve skill or strength, and the intense rgc interest in chess
   computers as icons of mastery.
   
Conclusion: Implications for Research on Online Play

   One of the most common themes in popular computing literature is that
   computers and the Internet are making us strong, smart, fast, and
   free. <11> Yet this is what fills my screen every time I sign on to
   the university mainframe that serves as my gateway to the Internet:
   

***********************************************
            USE OF THIS SYSTEM BY UNAUTHORIZED
                                USERS IS PROHIBITED

***********************************************

           INDIVIDUALS USING THIS COMPUTER SYSTEM
           WITHOUT AUTHORITY, OR
           IN EXCESS OF THEIR AUTHORITY, ARE SUBJECT TO
           HAVING ALL OF THEIR ACTIVITIES ON THIS SYSTEM
           MONITORED AND RECORDED BY SYSTEM PERSONNEL.

           In the process of monitoring individuals
           improperly using this system, the activities
           of authorized users *may* also be monitored.
           Anyone using this system without
           authorization or in excess of their
           authorization expressly consents to such
           monitoring and is advised that if such
           monitoring reveals possible evidence of
           criminal activity, system personnel may
           provide the evidence of such monitoring
           to law enforcement officials.

   This panoptic regulation raises a variety of important issues such as
   freedom, power, technique, and privacy, and links them closely in
   Internet practice: in only four sentences, some variation of the word
   "authority" is used six times, "monitor" or its variants are used
   another six times, "use" appears five times, and the word "system" is
   used seven times. The message is that authorities monitor users on
   behalf of the system; authorities are aligned with law enforcement,
   users with impropriety or criminal activity.
   
   Perhaps this is an extreme example of Internet surveillance, but much
   Internet discourse is at least covertly normative despite the overt
   emphasis that Internet practitioners place upon its factual or
   technical nature (e.g., "monitor" is both a physical object and a kind
   of surveillance). By the same token, the Internet is largely a domain
   of words without things, which nevertheless are represented by those
   who post there as being utterly referential (e.g., a "system" is both
   a hardware arrangement and an image of a self-governing organism). The
   agents of discourse themselves are unequal irrespective of their
   technical prowess (e.g., in computing jargon, authorities have
   "privileges" that users do not). These contradictions permeate the
   discourse of self fashioning on the Internet in general and, as I have
   shown, on rgc in particular. What broad strategies of self fashioning
   are available under these circumstances? I'll suggest three
   possibilities, all of which tread the narrow line between constraint
   and freedom.
   
   One rgc poster, for instance, turns romantic images against modern
   ones:
   

               Computers are tools that we have created
               to assist us improve in chess. The
               fact that [computers offer] the illusion
               of a well-played game of chess are irrelevent,
               because there is no player. My
               chessmaster 3000 can beat me all the time, but
               I have not forsworn the game: the game is
               fun. I use the computer as an opponent toD
               improve my skill. But I play the game
               against other human's for the fun and
               competition of it. We just need to be
               philosophically clear: computers are tools.
               Humans are sentient creatures, worthy opponents.

               And if some day we humans become
               universally bored with chess because we have
               exhausted the possibilities of it . . .
               change the rules a little. It is our game, we
               created it... Chess can still evolve if we grow
               bored with it. But in the meantime, it is still fun
               to play, fun to learn, and fun to compete. I can't
               drive in a nail with my fist: does that mean I
               should make my hammer out of nerf to
               preserve my ego? I can't lift my car off the
               ground: does that mean I should thrown
               away my hydraulic jack? No body builder
               will ever be able to lift as much weight
               as a motorized winch. So why do they bother?
               To improve themselves, and to compete
               against humans.

   As the Internet moves rapidly to a private enterprise model, the
   limits and possibilities of self-fashioning proliferate. This poster
   suggests that the self fashioning of play can be much more diverse
   than "the illusion of a well- played game of chess" by a computer.
   Here "worthy" "sentience" supplements strength or skill as the inner
   substance to be worked upon, while fun as well as mastery is a goal of
   play. Although the poster argues that personal disciplines should
   include competition against other humans and the use of computers to
   "improve," he has carefully referred to them as mere "tools" and
   compared them to lesser, utilitarian objects such as the "hammer," the
   "motorized winch," and the "hydraulic jack." Most interestingly, the
   poster recommends that commitment to chess include not only buying the
   tools of play, but also altering the rules of the game at will to
   diminish the effects of those tools.
   
   Another debate on rgc suggests a modernist, rather than a romantic
   solution:
   


           Let me compare the human limit to the
           computer limit: ... The exponential complexity
           of chess is such that increases in speed are
           becoming incredibly ineffective at
           furthering . . . depth... .So what are GM's
           limits?  All it takes to beat the best
           computers is to follow strong strategic plans
           that don't produce a win until 20-30+ moves down
           the pike. . .

           The strongest programs and the best humans
           are playing two different games. The
           strength of the strongest programs is in
           killer tactics, and the strength of the
           strongest humans is in killer strategy.. .
           It's not obvious to me that the program will
           have to play the human's game in order to
           achieve dominance; but it  obvious
           that the human has to play the program's
           game to retain dominance, since he has to
           survive the near term in order to cash in on
           the long term.

           If it's "easy" to avoid deep tactical
           blunders while building a long-range strategic
           plan, the human GM can continue to win or
           draw.  If not, then not.  It all depends
           on the shape of the chess draw/win space.
           If there is a broad flat plain of
           draws/wins out there for the first player,
           then it's a GM game.  If it's a narrow
           knife-edge of variations leading to co-
           optimal play, then it's a program game, in the
           limit.

           I would find it an amazing coincidence if
           world championship level chess were
           forever almost but not quite within reach of
           the best possible program on the best
           possible hardware.

   The "limits" of play are defined by the GM (always a "he") and by the
   "best possible program on the best possible hardware," both presented
   as social agents who in romantic images attempt to perfect their
   "complexity" and "depth," and in modernist terms, must "plan" 20-30+
   moves ahead, "cash in on the long term," use "killer" tactics and
   strategy, "retain dominance," and avoid "blunders." The poster uses
   mathematical analogs drawn from geometry and game theory to display a
   "cool" distance toward the fate of the game and those who play it: the
   "shape of chess space" is studied by ideal social agents,
   super-computer and super-GM, who search for "co-optimal play." The
   conclusion is that unless there is "an amazing coincidence" computers
   will achieve "world championship level chess," the triumph of the
   modern (Adas, 1989; Segal, 1985, 1994).
   
   Finally, Foucault himself offered, in quite another context, a
   problematique of the Internet that might be neither romantic nor
   modernist. I'll cite it without comment:
   

           So many things, in their language, have
           already escaped them; they do not mean to lose,
           in addition, what they say, that little
           fragment of discourse . . . whose frail and
           uncertain existence is necessary to prolong their
           life in time and space. . .
           In each sentence that you
           pronounce -- and very precisely in the one
           that you are busy writing at this moment, you who
           have been so intent, for so many pages, on
           answering a question in which you felt
           yourself personally concerned and who are going
           to sign this text with your name -- in every
           sentence there reigns the nameless
           law, the blank indifference: 'What matter
           who is speaking; someone has said:
           what matter who is speaking' (Foucault,
           1991a, pp. 71-72).

   
     _________________________________________________________________
   
Footnotes

   
    1. A substantially different version of this paper was originally
       presented on February 22, 1995, during my tenure as Visiting
       Fellow at the Center for Twentieth Century Studies at the
       University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. I would like to thank Kathy
       Woodward for inviting me to join the Center during the 1994-95
       year. I would also like to thank Carol Tennessen, Cathy Egan, and
       Nigel Rothfels for their continuing administrative and collegial
       support during the year. Paul Brodwin made some valuable
       suggestions that led me to reconsider the conclusion of my paper,
       as did the reviewers for the _Journal of Computer-Mediated
       Communication_. I especially thank Margaret Carlisle Duncan for
       her critical reading of several versions of this essay.  
    2. Cf. Aycock, 1989, 1992b on issues arising from discursive
       approaches to the ethnography of play; see also Aycock, 1993a,
       1993b, and Aycock and Buchignani, 1995, on Internet ethnography.
        
    3. In all, I downloaded about a megabyte of information.  
    4. I have not corrected spelling, grammar, or typos, as the examples
       themselves make evident.  
    5. The corresponding Foucauldian categories are (a) the
       identification of an individual's ethical component, or substance,
       which s/he must develop; (b) a mode of subjection which
       establishes an individual's relationship to the ethical rule or
       discipline in question; (c) an ethical labor that transforms the
       individual's substance; and (d) a goal of self-care (Foucault,
       1990, pp. 26-28).  
    6. A perennial favorite of rgc posters is gender disproportion in
       chess, where male masters outnumber females manyfold. This is
       often attributed to "natural" causes, i.e., different brain
       structures. It's interesting that although the white-black
       disproportion is far greater, there is no comparable debate about
       that, because it is taken as given that blacks'social
       disadvantages prevent them from participating fully.  
    7. I'll not deal here with the difficult question of how "facts" and
       "techniques" are linked as practices.  
    8. The term "pure technique" that is so often used in ordinary
       parlance on rgc or elsewhere seems exactly right, since it
       suggests both the exalted, refined essence of those who share this
       understanding, and as well the process of definition that is
       associated with purification (Douglas, 1992; Zerubavel, 1991;
       Lamont and Fournier, 1992).  
    9. For those very few who have already become masters, achievement of
       an international title is the next step.  
   10. Though not necessarily a substance shared by everyone, since
       solidary talk about "sports" and "politics" seem to focus on
       stereotypically male interests.  
   11. For instance, Nelson, 1987; Naisbitt, 1990, 1994; Tapscott and
       Caston, 1993; Kehoe, 1994; and Toffler, 1990. 
       
   
     _________________________________________________________________
   
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