Thirteenth International Conference on The Image

Abstract

As we envision a metaverse in which the virtual and the real intersect in new ways, among our concerns will be the roles that “nature” and the “natural world” play in this design. Disneyland functions as an analog precursor of the metaverse–a wholly constructed, representational space that physically realizes our utopian fantasies while also revealing contradictions within our society. As Baudrillard argues, Disneyland is American society in “miniature, comic strip form”—a place where our values are distilled and made material, a hyperreality whose existence disguises the simulation that is our society as a whole. This paper employs poststructuralist critiques of Disneyland (Marin, Baudrillard, Eco) as well as ecocriticism and new materialism to deconstruct the “images” of “nature” in the theme park. By examining these images-made-material—including the animatronic animals of Critter Country, the supposedly edible greenery of Tomorrowland, the rodents that roam the park, the petrified tree that stands along the Rivers of America, and so on—we gain an understanding of how contemporary, late capitalist society perceives our relationship with the “natural world.” And this analysis of Disney’s version of “nature” also provides us with some lessons on how to design a metaverse in ways that might envision a more sustainable relationship with the “natural world.”