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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 July 2025
Abstract: Immersive experiences are typically associated with entering alternative worlds, often represented as distinct spatial environments. This paper challenges such conventional notions of immersion by arguing that the contexts of immersion aren't spatially articulated “worlds” but temporally structured “situations” of limited scope. We propose a novel concept of immersion, asserting that being immersed in a situation involves being experientially and actively in sync with its unfolding temporal structure, rhythm, vibe, and pace. Drawing on the phenomenology of (film) experience and following the wave metaphor, we examine the underlying dynamics of time experience in immersive encounters. This expanded understanding of immersion has profound implications, bridging the gap between film experience and everyday life and revealing the political dimensions of immersive experience.
Keywords: situation, wave, temporality, immersion, phenomenology, frame theory
“Qu’est-ce qu’on fait? On ne cesse pas de s’insinuer dans les plis de la nature. Pour nous, la nature c’est un ensemble de plis mobiles. On s’insinue dans le pli de la vague. Habiter le pli de la vague, c’est ça notre tâche a nous.”
—Gilles DeleuzeInhabiting the Waves: The Fluid Qualities of Immersion
Janet H. Murray's famous definition of immersion as the state of being plunged into a swimming pool is still the metaphorical key reference in speaking about immersion as a felt, intense experience of “being surrounded by a completely other reality.” Yet, as often as our underwater experiences are compared to immersive experiences, little has been written about what it means for conceptions of immersion that water very rarely is a static and homogeneous medium. Whether a flowing river, the sea with its currents, a waterfall, or rain, water is usually in motion. Can consequences for the theoretical understanding of immersion be drawn from this metaphorical implication?
In this chapter, we take the fluid nature of water as a starting point for a different approach to the conception of immersion. Usually, theories of immersion focus on the experienced change of the spatial environment. Based on the image of the wave, we propose that a much deeper understanding of immersion is gained by focusing instead on the way we dynamically relate to the rhythm, vibe, pace, and temporal unfolding structure of the different situations we find ourselves confronted with.
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