The Senses of Touch: Haptics, Affects and Technologies

215 Pages·2007·1.39 MB·English

by  Mark Paterson

The Senses of Touch

The Senses of Touch
Haptics, Affects and Technologies
Mark Paterson
Oxford • New York
First published in 2007 by
Berg
Editorial offices:
1st Floor, Angel Court, 81 St Clements Street, Oxford, OX4 1AW, UK
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010, USA
© Mark Paterson 2007
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form
or by any means without the written permission of Berg.
Berg is the imprint of Oxford International Publishers Ltd.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Paterson, Mark, 1972-
The senses of touch : haptics, affects, and technologies / Mark
Paterson.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.
ISBN-13: 978-1-84520-478-5 (cloth)
ISBN-10: 1-84520-478-6 (cloth)
ISBN-13: 978-1-84520-479-2 (pbk.)
ISBN-10: 1-84520-479-4 (pbk.)
1. Touch. I. Title.
BF275.P38 2007
152.1'82—dc22
2007028371
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978 1 84520 478 5 (Cloth)
ISBN 978 1 84520 479 2 (Paper)
Typeset by JS Typesetting Ltd, Porthcawl, Mid Glamorgan
Printed in the United Kingdom by Biddles Ltd, King’s Lynn
www.bergpublishers.com
Contents
Acknowledgements vii
Glossary ix
1 The Primacy of Touch 1
2 Learning How to See, Describing How to Feel: a ‘Felt’
Phenomenology 15
3 Seeing with the Hands, Touching with the Eyes 37
4 The Forgetting of Touch: Geometry with Eyes and Hands 59
5 ‘How the World Touches Us’: Haptic Aesthetics 79
6 Tangible Play, Prosthetic Performance 103
7 ‘Feel the Presence’: the Technologies of Touch 127
8 Affecting Touch: Flesh and Feeling-With 147
Notes 173
References 177
Index 199
v

Acknowledgements
This project was completed with a year’s Research Leave generously enabled by
the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) of the United Kingdom, and
supported by the School of Cultural Studies at the University of the West of England,
Bristol, during 2005/06. A great deal of the book was written in Australia as a
Visiting Scholar with the Department of Critical and Cultural Studies, Macquarie
University, Sydney. I am grateful to both staff and postgraduate students there.
At Berg, Hannah Shakespeare has been extremely supportive of the project
from the beginning. Thanks go to her tireless efficiency and enthusiasm. Emily
Medcalfe has made sure the cover remained as envisaged. Thanks also go to Giselle
Arteaga-Johnson at The Norton Simon Foundation of Philadelphia for allowing the
reproduction of José de Ribera’s painting The Sense of Touch as a cover image. Not
only is the title appropriate, but the relationship of touch and vision in the blind
man’s tactile exploration is a central theme in this book.
A few of the chapters have previously been published in various incarnations,
although each has been modified extensively.
Chapter 3, ‘Seeing with the hands’, is based on research conducted for the article
‘Seeing with the hands, touching with the eyes: Vision, touch and the Enlightenment
spatial imaginary’ published in The Senses and Society 1(2), 2006, pp 224–42.
Chapter 4, ‘The forgetting of touch’ is adapted from an article originally published
as ‘The Forgetting of Touch: Re-membering Geometry with Eyes and Hands’, in
Angelaki: Journal of the Theoretical Humanities 10(3), 2005, pp 115–31.
For chapter 7, ‘Feel the Presence’, I must acknowledge my great debt to
researchers Calle Sjöstrom and Kirsten Rassmus-Gröhn at CERTEC in Lund,
Sweden; Stephen Furner at BT Research Labs, Martlesham Heath, UK; The ReachIn
Technologies AB team in Stockholm, Sweden; and Dr. Mandayam Srinivasan at
MIT TouchLabs. Without exception they were welcoming and generous, with both
time and ideas. A version of this chapter was published as ‘Feel the Presence: the
technologies of touch’, in Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 24(5),
2006, pp. 691–708.
For chapter 8, ‘Affecting touch’, my thanks to two Reiki practitioners, ‘Louis’
and ‘Rachel’, in Bristol. Material from the research originally appeared as a chapter
in J. Davidson, L. Bondi and M. Smith (eds), Emotional Geographies (Aldershot:
Ashgate). The version in this book has been extensively modified, and I am grateful
to Ruth Barcan and Jay Johnston at the Department of Gender Studies, University of
Sydney, for their insights.
For related content, illustrations to accompany the text and helpful internet links,
please visit www.sensesoftouch.co.uk
vii

Glossary
Haptics terminology used throughout the book.
Haptic Relating to the sense of touch in all its forms, including those
below.
Proprioception Perception of the position, state and movement of the body and
limbs in space. Includes cutaneous, kinaesthetic, and vestibular
sensations.
Vestibular Pertaining to the perception of balance, head position, acceleration
and deceleration. Information obtained from semi-circular canals
in the inner ear.
Kinaesthesia The sensation of movement of body and limbs. Relating to sensa-
tions originating in muscles, tendons and joints.
Cutaneous Pertaining to the skin itself or the skin as a sense organ. Includes
sensation of pressure, temperature and pain.
Tactile Pertaining to the cutaneous sense, but more specifically the sensa-
tion of pressure (from mechanoreceptors) rather than temperature
(thermoceptors) or pain (nociceptors).
Force Feedback Relating to the mechanical production of information sensed
by the human kinaesthetic system. Devices provide cutaneous
and kinaesthetic feedback that usually correlates to the visual
display.
Compiled from numerous sources, including Cole (1995:xix–xx) and Oakley et al.
(2000:416)
ix