虚拟世界的叙事认知:当代西方沉浸诗学及其问题

Narrative Cognition in the Virtual World: Contemporary Western Poetics of Immersion and Their Problems

近年来,虚拟现实技术中的“沉浸”一词开始受到叙事研究的关注,并被应用于叙事学的跨媒介理论建构。虽然各种“沉浸”理论的侧重点与阐释方式各有不同,但均以虚拟叙事的读者/用户体验及认知过程为基点,试图摆脱经典叙事学的局限性,开启叙事研究的数字转向。其中尤以简妮特·穆雷、玛丽-劳尔·瑞安与迈克尔·海姆的“沉浸”理论为代表,他们或深耕于“低技术”沉浸模式,或主张借用数字技术概念建构超越媒介的广义沉浸诗学,或从“高技术”的沉浸的极致感官体验中提取其“终极显现”性,构成了西方学界探讨虚拟世界沉浸体验的三种主要路径。“沉浸”是理解数字时代叙事认知的关键、对各种阐释路径的厘清,是理解和批评当代叙事学的技术介入与审美转向的前提。

Recently,“immersion”,a technical term in virtual reality,has gained attention in narratological studies and has been applied to the construction of multimedia theories.While the emphases and interpretations of different immersion theories are diverse,they share the focus on readers'and/or users'narrative experience and cognitive process,in order to break away from classical narratology and herald the digital turn.Among all these theories,Janet H.Murray,Marie-Laure Ryan and Michael Heim exemplify three approaches to exploring immersive experience in the digital world.Among them,Murray investigates immersion in“low-tech”narrative,Ryan constructs a general poetics of immersion beyond media,and Heim explores“ultimate display”from the unique sensory experience of“high-tech”narrative.Immersion is pivotal to the understanding of narrative cognition in the digital age.Clarifying different approaches is the premise of understanding the technological intervention and aesthetical change in contemporary narratological theories.