Being There

Work Title: Being There
Medium: Film
Episode Title:
Year: 1979
Writer(s): Jerzy Kosinski
"Original" Writer: Yes Own work?: Yes
Summary:

A simple-minded gardener named Chance has spent all his life in the Washington D.C. house of an old man. When the man dies, Chance is put out on the street with no knowledge of the world except what he has learned from television. After a run in with a limousine, he ends up a guest of a woman (Eve) and her husband Ben, an influential but sickly businessman. Now called Chauncey Gardner, Chance becomes friend and confidante to Ben, and an unlikely political insider. Written by Scott Renshaw.

Era/Year of Portrayal: present_day
Distinctive characteristics of the world in portrayal:

Chance. He is a brain-damaged orphan. He talks about gardening and what he says is interpreted as metaphors, metaphors about contemporary society.

Technology

  • Name of portrayed presence-evoking technology: TV
  • Description of the technology: “He sank into the screen. Like sunlight and fresh air and mild rain, the world from outside the garden entered Chance, and Chance, like a TV image, floated into the world, buoyed up by a force he did not see and could not name.” (p.6)
  • Nature of task or activity: Anything can be done that can be physically done
  • Performance of the Technology: Works very well
  • Description of creator(s): TV manufacturers
  • Major goal(s) of creator(s): Entertainment
  • Description of users of technology: Chance. He is the viewer of the TV programs. He is (an example of) an simple-minded individual; an individual that do not analyzes or reflects on the difference between the face-to-face world and what is presented on TV.
  • Type(s) of presence experience in the portrayal: both
  • Description of presence experience: Quite realistic. He experience everything just as a person in the face-to-face world is doing.
  • User awareness of technology during experience: yes
  • Valence of experience: Enjoyable
  • Specific responses: Higher involvement. Copying behavior
Long-term consequences:

is misleading. The choice or judgments are based on fake, not on reality.

Other:

Coder name: Ingvar Tjostheim
Coder email: ingvar@nr.no
Coder affiliation: Norwegian Computing Center