The Discourses Of Intimacy And Love

Our conceptions of intimacy and love are in a constant state of flux. Rituals of courtship, relationships and marriage, while they exist today, exist in a manner that has seen a great evolution with the influence technology. There is no doubt that technology has become one of the fastest paced and constantly moving fields in the world. With constant technological development, it has become more and more a part of our lives. The Internet is an incredible feat that has created a global community, bringing people from all around the world together. The presence of smart phones that allow us to be in constant contact with each other and existence of dating websites and apps that allow people to meet in circumstances they otherwise wouldn’t have

As such, love is a technology”. The discourse of intimacy can be framed via new and mobile media. The developments in technology have meant that relationships have become increasingly mediated by technology, reflecting the fluid nature of the discourse of intimacy and love. The issue that this creates focuses on embodiment and physicality and how important this is to a relationship and whether they are the components of a legitimate relationship. Discourses of intimacy and love are expanding, encompassing more things such as the existence of relationships, mediated with technology, such as long distance relationships via Skype and online messaging. As such, love and intimacy is fluid. Physicality and intimacy are parts of an authentic relationship, physicality is indispensable to love as we know it. This authenticity is lacking when compared to Berlant’s description of the intimate sphere,

“this view of “a life” that unfolds intact within the intimate sphere represses, of course, another fact about it: the unavoidable troubles, the distractions and disruptions that make things turn out in unpredicted scenarios. Romance and friendships inevitably meet the instabilities of sexuality, money, expectation and

Though cyborg relationships seem at this time to be inauthentic due to their intangibility and lack of physicality and human elements, that isn’t to say that in the future this kind of relationship and intimacy wont become the norm. That the normative relationship as we see it today will someday be seen as out-dated in a world where technology has expanded and developed, and is no longer seen as taboo. It is quite possible that in the future, technology can learn and be taught to be more human than humans, and then where does the authenticity