Cybertypes: Race, Ethnicity, and Identity on the Internet

By Lisa Nakamura

Book Overview

First published in 2002. In Cybertypes, Lisa Nakamura turn sour assumption that the Net is color-blind on its head. Examining all facets of everyday web-life, she shows that racial and ethnic stereotypes, or 'cybertypes' are hardwired into our online interactions: Identity tourists masquerade in chat rooms as Asian_Geisha or Alatiniolover. Web directories sharply delimit racial categories. Anonymous computer users are assumed to be white. Lively, provocative, Cybertypes takes up computer relationship between race, ethnicity and technology and offers a candid and nuanced understanding of identity in the information age.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0415938376
• ISBN13: 9780415938372
• Release Date: July 2002
• Publisher: Routledge
• Length: 190 Pages
• Weight: 0.62 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.7" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

A Good Beginning

Nakamura is part of a movement that takes cybercultural studies past utopia and dystopia and describes how categories of race and identity work within this new ontological plane. Although the language is highly technical (accessable mainly to students of cultural studies and more specifically critical theory) the book can also be useful for those more adventurous readers who are willing to tough out an interesting book in order to learn a little bit more about the world they live in.Daniel Clausendaniel clausen dot com

Liberation from race, age, and gender restrictions

Cyberspace makes fluid the identification process and can allow for anonymity and even a kind of liberation from race, age, and gender restrictions. Author Lisa Nakamura argues that racial stereotypes are hardwired even in online interactions, with web directories narrowing racial categories and anonymity associated with white. Cybertypes is a simply fascinating examination of how racial ideas changed in the online environment.