46
AdAptAtion in the Age of MediA ConvergenCe
the heuristic function of applying the network metaphor to the study of
convergence culture? Of the various implications the network perspective may have, I would argue that three are particularly relevant. Firstly,
convergence culture “as network” focuses more on the process rather than
on the result or “art work.” Secondly, the decentralized quality of adaptation
and convergence urges us to rethink agency and control. Thirdly, adaptation
processes display emergent properties that result from complex reciprocal
interaction. Taken together, these three principles shift the focus from “fidelity” and “origin” to “function” and enable a scalable, thus multidimensional,
approach to the study of adaptation as a shifting configuration of ideas,
media, and human actors.
While the processual nature of adaptations as evolving and circular
practices of approximating the “truth” have been discussed in relation to
the Pragmatist “adaptation” of Darwinian evolution, the problem of agency
becomes even more pressing in relation to network theory. If adaptation
takes place within interlocking semiotic, cultural, and social systems, agency
has to be reconceptualized as distributed within these networks. Debates
in the context of a new materialism and particularly within Actor-Network
Theory prove helpful for reconsidering adaptation and convergence. Bruno
Latour suggests that the social is to be understood as “a type of momentary
association which is characterized by the way it gathers together into new
shapes.” 54 Latour claims that these agents are not necessarily human agents,
but that “any thing that does modify a state of affairs by making a difference
is an actor,” including non-humans. 55 Accordingly, media can just as well be
considered agents in a complex network of production and signification, as
are writers, producers, recipients, or cultural institutions. Media, in fact,
are perhaps closest to what Latour calls “mediators,” which, due to their
complexity, “transform, translate, distort, and modify the meaning or the
elements they are supposed to carry,” as opposed to “intermediaries” which
simply carry meaning without transforming it. 56 Media therefore have two
functions within the assemblage of the social, being at once conveyers of
social “meaning” as well as actors generating and reflecting this meaning. If
we consider media and other objects to be agents in processes of adaptation
and convergence, we need to rethink the concept of creativity as a faculty
reserved to the human mind. Whether we embrace such a distributed process
of cultural production or whether we remain skeptical with regard to the loss
54 Latour, Reassembling the Social, 64–65.
55 Ibid., 71.
56 Ibid., 39.
AdAptAtion in the Age of MediA ConvergenCe
the heuristic function of applying the network metaphor to the study of
convergence culture? Of the various implications the network perspective may have, I would argue that three are particularly relevant. Firstly,
convergence culture “as network” focuses more on the process rather than
on the result or “art work.” Secondly, the decentralized quality of adaptation
and convergence urges us to rethink agency and control. Thirdly, adaptation
processes display emergent properties that result from complex reciprocal
interaction. Taken together, these three principles shift the focus from “fidelity” and “origin” to “function” and enable a scalable, thus multidimensional,
approach to the study of adaptation as a shifting configuration of ideas,
media, and human actors.
While the processual nature of adaptations as evolving and circular
practices of approximating the “truth” have been discussed in relation to
the Pragmatist “adaptation” of Darwinian evolution, the problem of agency
becomes even more pressing in relation to network theory. If adaptation
takes place within interlocking semiotic, cultural, and social systems, agency
has to be reconceptualized as distributed within these networks. Debates
in the context of a new materialism and particularly within Actor-Network
Theory prove helpful for reconsidering adaptation and convergence. Bruno
Latour suggests that the social is to be understood as “a type of momentary
association which is characterized by the way it gathers together into new
shapes.” 54 Latour claims that these agents are not necessarily human agents,
but that “any thing that does modify a state of affairs by making a difference
is an actor,” including non-humans. 55 Accordingly, media can just as well be
considered agents in a complex network of production and signification, as
are writers, producers, recipients, or cultural institutions. Media, in fact,
are perhaps closest to what Latour calls “mediators,” which, due to their
complexity, “transform, translate, distort, and modify the meaning or the
elements they are supposed to carry,” as opposed to “intermediaries” which
simply carry meaning without transforming it. 56 Media therefore have two
functions within the assemblage of the social, being at once conveyers of
social “meaning” as well as actors generating and reflecting this meaning. If
we consider media and other objects to be agents in processes of adaptation
and convergence, we need to rethink the concept of creativity as a faculty
reserved to the human mind. Whether we embrace such a distributed process
of cultural production or whether we remain skeptical with regard to the loss
54 Latour, Reassembling the Social, 64–65.
55 Ibid., 71.
56 Ibid., 39.