Knowing culture in Second Life: international literacy and the technological know how in a virtual world

In this article, the author presents a theoretical overview of the connections among education, technology and intercultural literacy within Second Life, a multiuser virtual environment. Some researchers and educators are advocating that SL can enhance and encourage intercultural literacy. However, educators and researchers need to be fully aware of how complex culture and cultural identity are, especially when considering their relationship to the complexities of technology. To have complete literacy of something is to have complete understanding of its essence. The author argues that intercultural literacy within SL is more than knowing a process of cultural exchanges within one context; it is understanding a convergence of cultures, identities, economies, politics, histories, and technologies; it is understanding the attraction and activation of cultures and cultural identities through discourse by having a telepresence within a virtual reality; and it is understanding that a context in SL is connected to numerous other contexts within the virtual and the real, each influencing the other. This article will first explain what SL is, giving brief background of its history and concept. The article then discusses what makes a virtual world and what it means to have a telepresence in one. Moving from there, the author explains what is meant by cultural and intercultural literacy and their relationship to technology. Then a connection between cultural literacy and technological literacy is drawn. The article concludes by discussing how a virtual reality is by no means culturally neutral and that any cultural discourse within it will be directly or indirectly influenced by the essence of its technology.