Writings, Art and Research
Scott MacLeod's Anthropological Research
Research Interests
Scott MacLeod's research focuses on the ethnography of the Internet, particularly on the social life of information and the way people shape and are shaped by information technologies, especially vis-à-vis counterculture (scott-macleod.blogspot.com), as well as UNESCO World Heritage sites. The detailed, explanatory potential of anthropology & sociology in relation to the study of the social effects of information technology and to 'internet studies' and 'tourism studies' provides an interesting intersection of approaches / disciplines / methodologies and is my starting point. I would also like to theorize / "theorize" anthropology, especially vis-à-vis 'cyberspace.' I'm also interested in questions of anthropology vis-à-vis science. And I'm interested in anthropological, linguistic and philosophical questions of representation and language.
In 2007 - 2008, I've been teaching "Society and Information Technology" - socinfotech.pbwiki.com/ - on Berkman Island in Second Life (not on Harvard University's faculty) - slurl.com/secondlife/Berkman/113/47/25 (requires one gigabyte of RAM). I teach courses in anthropology and sociology, both in real life and in the 3-D virtual world of Second Life, which is 'placeless.'
I'm also interested in envisioning and realizing a global, degree-granting (Ph.D., M.D., & Music School, etc.), free-to-students, open, Global, Virtual-World University, and school, with great universities (e.g. Harvard, MIT, Ivy League Schools, Stanford, U.C. Berkeley, Oxford, T.U.M., Sorbonne, L.M.U., Juilliard, Cambridge, etc.) as key players, using a Wikipedia model {please add to globaluniversity.pbwiki.com}, and for the developing world and everyone. And in relation to this, I'd like to help converge and network Second Life, OpenSim, Google Earth, Croquet, and MIT's Open Course Ware, to facilitate an emerging virtual University~Universe, both real and fantastic.
At the University of Edinburgh (D.R.) where I studied from 2003 - 2004, I conducted a virtual ethnographic study of the UNESCO World Heritage site, St. Kilda, the island archipelago 40 miles west of the outer Hebrides on the west coast of Scotland, which was inhabited for more than 2000 years until 1930. In the 2000-2003 school years, I studied at the graduate level at the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of California, Santa Barbara (M.A.).
In addition, I'm interested in the concept of energy autonomy, and here are some interesting solar examples: scottmacleod.com/EnergyAutonomy.htm
In the falls of 1999 & 2005, I traveled on Semester at Sea, and here are some impressions from those voyages: Semester at Sea.
I also explore questions of how we can elicit naturally loving bliss neurophysiologically :).
copyright
Scott MacLeod's Arts 1998 - 2008
scottmacleod.com/daltonletter.htm
scottmacleod.com/LovingBlissPractices.htm
scottmacleod.com/LovingBlissFriends.htm
scottmacleod.com/EudaimoniaFlow.htm
scottmacleod.com/GuidelinesPracticingLovingBlissvavMusicalInstrument.htm
Anthropology References
Boellstorff, Tom. 2008. Coming of Age in Second Life: An Anthropologist Explores the Virtually Human. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press
Cerwonka, Allaine and Liisa Malkki. 2007. Improvising Theory: Process and Temporality in Ethnographic Fieldwork. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.