Assignment 7 - Narratives of Progress

In this week’s lecture we discussed the concept of the “symbolic universe” as a cultural “structure of legitimation” capable of organizing the social world as comprehensible and connected. The structure of the symbolic universe then, places the individual in a known and knowable space. Such social structures are critical for societies in transition. Can you identify the creation of any “symbolic universe” today (or in recent years)? How might media and design be implicated in the construction of these social universes today?

A “symbolic universe” of today would have to be Facebook. Facebook is a social network website which has created a new social structure contrasting with “the real world”. There is no real social status in Facebook as only the title of "Friend" can existed in this cyber world. People make new relationships easily by simply clicking the accept and/or request friend button. In this cyber world, people are equal and share information with people that they accept as "Friend". In “the real world” however, you would have systems which would involve other social statuses such as father/son, mother/daughter, employer/employee.

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Facebook is linked to other countries via the internet, so people can share information and make new friends from all over the world. This was mearly an unattainable nerdish dream until mid 21^st century, but with the continuing development of technology and the internet people can now have conversations with friends anywhere without the limit of time and place. These changes also gave new views of nationality. Now people are getting closer and it doesn't matter who you are or where you're from - this is the forming a new way for society around the world. As the world is getting closer, the simple notion of nationality is getting weaker. Media and design have also been helping to bring about these changes.

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Facebook emoticons. retrieved from:http://facebookemoticons.biz/
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KREMSA-an interactive agency-facebook. retrieved from:http://www.kremsa.com/work/facebook