Existential approach to studying the existence of the digital generation

Abstract

The article examines the existence of the digital generation from the viewpoint of the existential approach. The author shows that digital technolo- gies expand a person’s connection with reality; he goes beyond his own physicality and overcomes spatial and temporal boundaries. Virtuality begins to be perceived as a continuation of reality, there- fore being-in-the-world is defined by the author as a “hybrid being”, which is a synthesis of virtual and everyday life of the subject. In the article, the author concludes that the blurring of the bound- ary between the real and the virtual actualizes the need of the individual for self-determination and self-creation, which are realized in being-with- another. Digital culture leads to the transformation of being-with-another, because in the virtual world the other is absent in his physicality, which makes it possible to hide the identity by creating digital pres- entations. The construction of virtual images allows the subjects to manifest different sides of the multifaceted “I” and overcome social categorization, which makes the communication process deeper in an existential sense.