Unframing/Reframing The Media Experience

This introduction explores the evolving paradigm of immersive media experiences through the lens of “unframing” and “reframing.” Beginning with Ray Bradbury’s The Veldt as a metaphor for immersive technological environments, the authors trace the historical and cultural tensions inherent in the desire to simulate reality through media. They argue that immersive technologies—such as virtual and mixed reality, spatial audio, and AI-enhanced experiences—challenge traditional perceptual and narrative frameworks, shifting the user’s role from passive spectator to embodied participant. Yet, rather than eliminating mediation, these technologies displace and redistribute framing operations across bodies, devices, and environments. The essays collected in this issue examine the technical, aesthetic, sensory, and ideological dimensions of immersion and demonstrate how the dissolution of visible frames often implies the emergence of new structures of perception, engagement, and meaning-making. The volume calls for a multidisciplinary perspective to understand immersion not as an escapist fantasy, but as a culturally and politically charged reconfiguration of media experience.