Virtual Power and Geography

Title: Virtual Power and Geography

There are copious sites available on the Web for social networking. SIMS, a life simulation game is one of them. I recently joined this virtual space to explore a new social network site. However in my analysis I not only found a social network site, I found a three dimensional social space that connects with Buchanan’s (2002) idea that an individual prizes their future, to do and think what they will. SIMS is a space where the user can create a look, a style, a version of themselves, either new, similar or drastically different. Tuan (1977) established that “space and place are basic components of the lived world”. SIMS takes on, and challenges Tuan’s concept by providing a blank canvas for users in the virtual realm, where ultimately a virtual sense of geography is created. 

The power of geography goes back to many historical and political disputes. Allen (2003) states in the opening paragraphs of Lost geographies that most of the geographical disputes over land and territory, at both a government level and a ethnic level occur because geography is the core value. SIMS empowers the user by giving them the ability to create a landscape that reflects their individual values. Just as Allen (2003) states “Geography and power seem to run together in many ways. The connection of geography with power, if ones thinks about it, is pretty much a familiar one”. 


As Dr Kuttainen discussed in Lecture 2, power is unequally distributed. SIMS unlike the theory of domination allows for even dispersal of power rather than “power concentrated in the hands of people of similar status”. In a SIMS world the physical world’s idea of status is irrelevant. Power remains in the imagination and freedom of the individuals mind. This can be linked back to Tuan’s (1977) idea that space and place is influenced by the users “biological facts … relations of space and place … [and] range of experience or knowledge” rather than the status bound power, derived from domination.


Ultimately SIMS is empowering, because regardless of your own status and geography in the physical lived world, the user has the free will to not only reinvent themselves but create a community of their own.  

Reference List:

Allen, J. (2003). Introduction: Lost geographies, in Lost geographies of power (1-12). Malden, MA: Blackwell.

Buchanan, M. (2002).  Nexus: Small worlds and the groundbreaking science of network. New York: WW Norton and Company.

Kuttainen, V. (2012). BA1002: Our Space: Networks, narratives and the making of place, Lecture 2: Power: Big Brother and Self-Surveillance. [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from http://learnjcu.edu.au

Tuan, Y. (1977). Space and place: The perspective of experience. London, England: Edward Arnold.

Image Credits

Image 1: Retrieved from Airlandzz