The Digital Gothic: Haunted Interfaces, Algorithmic Hauntology, and the Crisis of Autonomy in the Cyber-Age

Dr. Asim

doi:10.71097/IJTAS.v10.i2.1273

The Digital Gothic: Haunted Interfaces, Algorithmic Hauntology, and the Crisis of Autonomy in the Cyber-Age

Author(s)	Dr. Asim
Country	India
Abstract	Conventionally, Gothic was linked to buildings. Fortresses, monasteries, hallways, locked rooms, and inherited castles provided the setting within which fear could be structured. However, with the rise of cyber age, the setting for fear has transformed into silicon from stone and digital interface from feudal manor. It is the storage of personal data and circulation of one's algorithmic profile that now haunts the person, rather than ghosts of the past haunting the person. The figure who was considered to be ghost is turned into the double of personal data: the creation of another self through technology capable of surviving the original, misrepresenting the original, or even replacing the original altogether. This essay explores how "The Digital Gothic" utilizes and rewrites conventional themes of haunting, doubling, specter returning, and enclosure to represent the problem of autonomy in the era of surveillance capitalism. The study employs concepts elaborated in Sigmund Freud's understanding of the uncanny, Mark Fisher's hauntology and the theory of the eerie, and a critical approach to digital circulation and data extraction. The interface becomes a threshold, the algorithm becomes a revenant, and the database becomes a necropolis where the past cannot be deleted. Through its analysis of Sarah Gailey’s The Echo Wife, the episode of Black Mirror called “Be Right Back,” and Sarah Moss’s Ghost Wall, this paper demonstrates the ways in which the Digital Gothic expresses an important anxiety: not only that it is conceivable that machines will exert their influence on human lives, but also that digital technologies can document, re-create, and act upon one’s identity without the knowledge of the individual himself.
Keywords	Digital Gothic, hauntology, uncanny, surveillance capitalism, data double, interface, algorithmic haunting, autonomy, Black Mirror, The Echo Wife.
Published In	Volume 10, Issue 2, February 2019
Published On	2019-02-07
Cite This	The Digital Gothic: Haunted Interfaces, Algorithmic Hauntology, and the Crisis of Autonomy in the Cyber-Age - Dr. Asim - IJTAS Volume 10, Issue 2, February 2019. DOI 10.71097/IJTAS.v10.i2.1273
DOI	https://doi.org/10.71097/IJTAS.v10.i2.1273
Short DOI	https://doi.org/hbxj7z

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The Digital Gothic: Haunted Interfaces, Algorithmic Hauntology, and the Crisis of Autonomy in the Cyber-Age

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