1: Immersion as an Intermedial Phenomenon in Medieval Literature and Modern Games

1: Immersion as an Intermedial Phenomenon in Medieval Literature and Modern Games

Florian Nieser, @FlorianNieser, University of Heidelberg

Introduction

In this paper I want to present some thoughts on the topic of immersion. I will build my argument up to the concept at the end of this paper by presenting ways of understanding and interpreting immersion before presenting my observations on the interdependency of reception and construction of fictional worlds. These observations are shown in the diagram at the end. The ways of understanding and interpreting immersion as a literary and medial reception phenomenon are diverse. Within this piece I try to differentiate between the most important ones and to show basic lines of connections between them. To begin it must be stated, that no medium is made to be involuntarily immersive, but there are certain conditions that work to encourage Immersion. Although Immersion has become some kind of a vague concept involving ‘including’ or ‘absorbing’ the recipient, there are specific characteristics and conceptual lines.

Aside from the more audiovisual character of digital games, with which their mode of presentation can depict supposedly 'lifelike' spaces, the sentence "I was completely immersed" is primarily linked to a literary experience in the English language (Curtis, 90) – where does this connection originate from?

This is not a coincidence, although one might initially associate immersion with audiovisuality, but there is no need to seek the primacy of the immersion experience exclusively in audiovisuality: "Immersion in a pictorial space is possibly not a genuinely optical question at all" (Bleumer, S. 8). As far as I can tell, there are two main conceptions to categorize and analyse Immersion. There are the more passive types of interpretation and the considerations aimed at active participation of the recipient. In both cases, however, an underlying basic concept can be identified.

Passive aspects of Immersion

A more common conception of immersive phenomena seems to be that the recipient experiences Immersion as “perceptual superimposition” - it is about the “experience side” of a media-induced “(out-)controlled occupation of perception” (Lechertmann, 105). The text almost ‘captures’ the recipient and the immersive effect results from “the interplay of apparatus and disposition”. A performativity of the text that stimulates the imaginatio of the recipient and ‘draws’ him out of the role of viewer into the text seems to be central to this (Nemes, 43). Following these perspectives on immersion as a primarily experienced phenomenon, one ‘gets’ immersed by getting drawn into an artificial world, i.e. a state of self-forgetfulness and emotional involvement, when the distance between the recipient and the medium is reduced. The aesthetically staged and the real world surrounding the recipient are blurred. Apart from these research approaches there is also the thesis about Immersion as an active construction of fictional realities.

Active aspects of Immersion

Starting from a more ‘active’ approach on Immersion gets more complex. It is distinguished by very dense hybrid and ambivalent mode of reflection and perception. H. Bleumer speaks of the “active, self-observing immersion in imaginative worlds that are produced by the viewer as paradoxical aesthetic objects [...]” (Bleumer, 7). Based on the concept of Fascination as an emotion with a high cognitive component it can be stated that there is an alternation of attention between the

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aesthetic object and the simulated situation. Immersion becomes a cognitive as well as a semantic search movement of the viewer towards an aesthetic object that he co-constructs and that leads him to a deeper reading precisely because it makes the perception of his own reflective parts recede.

Immersion as a transmedial phenomenon

With the last observation from Bleumer it has to be emphasised, that regardless of media staging strategies, immersion as a transmedial phenomenon in active and passive form describes a ‘semantic search movement of the recipient’ that requires a certain ‘attitude’. This form of attitude lies at the core of any successful immersive effect. The assumption of a semantic search movement is already evident in medieval literature. The creation of a pictorial illusionary space with modern means is a renewal of the fundamental idea of a deep connection in between the image produced and the person receiving and interpreting it – thereby co-constructing narrative meaning.

Mechthild's von Magdeburg ‘Fließendes Licht der Gottheit’ for example is aurated in the reception by Heinrich von Nördlingen by targeting a certain attitude of the recipient. In spite of the religiously elevated character of the writing as divine presence in the word, instructions are given to the recipient to immerse himself in the text. The text and the object is not deprived, but in order to comprehend the text, the recipient has to appropriate the relation of the text through mantra-like repetition, until her attention shifts from the real to the text-mediated higher level of order of reality. Furthermore there are intradiegetic prototypes of immersive images, more accurate literary mirror images, because the medium fulfils its function and eludes perception in the representation of an image (Witthöft, 125f.). Literary mirror images function as a metareflexive on immersive phenomena in fables. The shadow of Reinhart Fuchs in the reflection of a fountain for example suggests the presence of his wife, because the archetype-image relation is not recognised (v. 836-840); Something similar happens with the wolf and its vivified shadow, that overpowers the wolf's perception (v. 874876). Like immersion itself, these mirror-images possess the quality of an existence in the in-between of reflection and absolute immediacy. Something is visualised that does not exist or does not exist in the same place - but the disillusionment is left to the recipient.

Final observations

To summarise: these examples show a core element of immersion, because whether it is created literarily or in an audiovisual format, it only works in the in-between of distanced reflection and active involvement of the recipient. One is not so much drawn into a fictional world as that world is first actively constructed and permanently kept extant. The essence of a game is rooted in its interactive nature - there is no game without a player and no narrative world without an active reader. This is linked to the Spatial Situation Model (SSM), where semiotic references to the nature of the space and its basic characteristics are given in the medial space - mostly metonymically. The medial space must become the primary frame of reference to get ‘immersed’. According to the hypothesis theory of perception, perception is not a direct image of the environment, but the result of the reconciliation between expectations (hypotheses) about its nature and the incoming information. In media reception situations, two hypotheses are formed based on the competing Egocentric Reference Frames (ERFs): The first states that the ERF of the recipient's real environment is his Primary Egocentric Reference Frame (PERF), the second takes the media environment as PERF. So the basic prerequisite for experiencing immersion is attention. Based on the SSM an ERF is built up and then it has always to be reconsidered which is the primary egocentric reference frame PERF. The more information about the media space, the more likely the acceptance

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of the media environment as PERF and thus the spatial experience of presence. Constantly engaged in decoding semiotic references to the nature of space and its basic characteristics are given. Finally building on these observations I will show you my understanding of immersion as a transmedial phenomenon. The immersive effect consists of an ongoing construction of fragile fictional worlds by the recipient. The effect is created by the momentary existence of two spaces with the same need for attention.

Figure 1.1: Transmedial Immersion

References

Bleumer, Hartmut: Immersion im Mittelalter: Zur Einführung, in: Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik (42/2012), p. 5-15.

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Curtis, Robin: Immersion und Einfühlung. Zwischen Repräsentionalität und Materialität bewegter Bilder, in: montage AV (17/2/2008), p. 89-107. Lechertmann, Christina: Momente des Vergessens. Immersion als Erwartung in der Crône Herinrichs von dem Türlin, in: Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik 167(3), p. 104-123. Nemes, Balázs, J.: Der involvierte Leser. Immersive Lektürepraktiken in der spätmittelalterlichen Mystikrezeption, in: Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik Bd. 42, (167/2012) p. 38-62. Wirth, Werner / Hofer, Matthias: Präsenzerleben. Eine medienpsychologische Modellierung, in: montage AV (17/2/2008), p. 159-175. Witthöft, Christiane: Der Schatten im Spiegel des Brunnens. Phänomene der Immersion in mittelalterlichen Tierepen und Fabeln (Reinhart Fuchs), in: Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik Bd 43. (167/2012) p. 124-146.

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