This paper explores the dystopian visions presented in Charlie Brooker’s “Nosedive” and Ken Liu’s “The Perfect Match,” delving into their unsettling portrayals of a future (or parallel present) that challenges the optimistic narratives tech giants tend to spin about digitally augmented, eternally connected world. Both narratives, featuring worlds run by corporations resembling Meta and Google, prompt reflection on how personal online behaviors contribute to a dehumanizing surveillance structure that erodes autonomy, reducing individuals to exploitable data within the neoliberal capitalist market. The earlier half of this paper explores the ways in whichthe lateral surveillance we see in “Nosedive” turns society into a glass paneled panopticon, making the world shallower and narrower. The rating system based on lateral surveillance undermines democracy and disempowers individuals, forcing them behave asdocile consumers and monetizable data to be harnessed by corporations and the State in their efforts to reinforce surveillance capitalism. The latter part of this paper focuses on “The Perfect Match,” which offers a more direct glimpse into surveillance capitalism’s mechanisms. The story portrays a future where people willingly surrender personal data and autonomy to tech giants, lured by the convenience provided by high-tech devices such as “Tilly,” a personal assistant program. The story also serves as a cautionary tale, revealing how this surrender reduces humans to data reservoirs and consumers that can be easily exploited through specifically targeted product recommendations. While Brooker and Liu’s futures appear grim, I interpret “Nosedive” and “The Perfect Match” as critical dystopian texts infused with hope, for the open endings we find in both reveal the writers’ beliefs in human’s resistant agency, which cannot be fully extinguished under the grip of high-tech surveillance societies.
목차
1. Introduction 2. Critical Look into the Rose-filtered Dystopia of Lateral-Surveillance 3. Disillusioning Digital Empowerment under Surveillance Capitalism 4. A Critically Dystopian Conclusion Works Cited [Abstract]
키워드
“Nosedive” “The Perfect Match” Lateral SurveillanceSurveillance CampitalismDystopiaCharlie BrookerKen Liu
저자
Joohyun Park [ 박주현 | The Catholic University of Korea ]
국제언어인문학회 [INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR HUMANISTIC STUDIES IN LANGUAGE]
설립연도
2000
분야
인문학>언어학
소개
국제언어인문학회는 '언어를 통한 인문학 연구'의 필요성에 동감하는 여러 전공분야 학자들의 뜻을 담고 있습니다. 언어에 초점을 맞추는 것은, 다양한 전공분야의 참여에서 생겨날 수 있는 '이질적 집합'의 상황을 극복하기 위한 장치입니다. 현재로서는 작은 불씨를 지핀 것에 불과합니다. 그러나 이렇게 일구어진 불꽃이 새로운 학풍의 바람결에 커다란 섬광으로 빛나게 될 날이 올 것을 우리는 확신합니다. 우리의 학회와 학술지는 인문학 불변의 가치와 시대적 사명을 인식하는 국내외의 학자들을 향해 활짝 개방되어 있습니다. 특정 전공의 범위를 넘어서서 철학, 문학, 언어학, 종교, 역사, 문화, 예술 등의 시각에서 언어의 본질을 토론할 기회가 될 것입니다.