Nominated for the short story category for both the Nebula and Hugo in 2013, I first discussed what I thought about it in the context of the Nebula nominees for SFF Audio. It is a complex story, full of questions and problems, what is identity, what is living, etc. I'd like to read more of Bodard.

"Immersion" was amazing, gave me goosebumps!

I logged this solely for the Aliette de Bodard story, 'Scattered Along the River of Heaven' — the rating is solely for this story, not any other content in this issue of Clarkesworld, as I have not read it.

I was as disappointed in this as the author's same-universe novelette On a Red Station, Drifting until about halfway through when something "clicked" with me. Immersion is set on a (different) space station, and roughly-speaking, is the story of a woman who has taken to wearing an "immersion device" in order to fit in with her husband's culture -- the dominant Galactic culture. In telling the story, de Bodard manages to say volumes about the compromises one must make to "fit in" with a different...

The best short stories leave me gasping, and this was one of those. "Immersion" is an all-too-familiar look at a culture overrun by Western tourists, Western culture, and Western values, with just a touch of externalization to emphasize particular bits. It's short and sharp - it could have gone on quite a bit longer, building a world instead of making a point, but ending it where it does is brilliantly effective.I never quite know what to say about short stories that are so clearly smarter than

A story of addiction set within the framework of cultural relativism. This story is told from two perspectives--Quy, a teenager who works at her family's restaurant on Longevity, and Agnes, a Galatic woman visiting Longevity to celebrate her 5th anniversary. Both stories center on the use of immersers, Galatic technology that gives the user an avatar and tells them what facial cues and wording to use. Certainly a well written story, but most of the characters, except for Quy, fell flat for me. I...

This is a character study of a woman addicted to her virtual-reality immerser, an alien technology that allows people to create avatars to interact with others. The actual plot is fairly superficial but I’m not sure I fully understood how everything fit together, a common complaint I have with stories involving virtual characters. To me, the story is more style than substance—not necessarily a bad thing, just not my cup of tea.

Holy crap what a story! This is the kind of thing that I have always admired science fiction for - transporting you to a different world in a way that lets you view important issues and ideas from a fresh perspective. It's one of my two favorite kinds of sci-fi stories (the other kind are those that completely f*ck with your head).At just over 5,000 words, this is a brief story, and because of the economy of words and the author's slow reveal of the situation, it was hard to understand just what...

So as not to spoil, I won't say a lot about the plot of Immersion, but it is a very well-told futuristic story that also deals with race/culture appropriation and societal beauty norms in a fascinatingly original way.

Read for the 2013 Hugo Short Story voting, and my first exposure to Bodard. She made a darned strong impression."Immersion" is an interesting experiment in identity disassociation. It follows a young woman in the future who is surrounded in immerser culture, devices that shroud how we look, sound, etc., in artifices. It has damning undercurrents of peer pressure, inadequacy fears folding in on themselves, and forgetting how you'd feel without everything weighing on you. Its opening is the most e...

I really would probably put this at a 4.5, but I definitely thought it was better than a 4, so I ended putting it at a 5.Aliette introduced us to a tourist colony controlled by a centralized government, that tend to believe differences in different people's cultures boils down to a few algorithms here and there. And then voila. On paper, I totally see what the galactic is thinking. The only main differences you can see are the obvious ones. Language, food choice, behavior patterns, but as this s...

Overall: 4 StarsAn excellent issue with great stories. Even those that aren't exceptional are worth the read.Favorite: "If The Mountain Comes" by An OwomoyelaStandout: "Immersion" by Aliette de BodardDud: "Another Word: Assimilation, Multiculturalism, and Me" by Daniel AbrahamFiction"Immersion" by Aliette de Bodard5 StarsA young waitress and a wife of an interacial marriage find an unexpected common ground.Set in her Xuya universe, De Bodard explores globalization, cultural identity, and western...

A few obeservations on Immersion and the theme of cultural dominance can be found here. Spoilers ahead.

"Immersion" by Aliette de Bodard de Bodard writes about a world in which devices known as immersers are used to help Galactics translate native cultures and languages into a form they can interpret. The story is told through the viewpoints of two women who are nearly polar opposites, and I found it an interesting examination of cultural imperialism as much as it was an interesting SFnal concept. "If the Mountain Comes" by An Owomoyela A water farmer and his daughter are the richest folks in

just a few short years after typical western TV was introduced to Fiji, a rather significant percentage of the women (especially the young ones) picked up typical western body image depression and eating disorders:http://www.nytimes.com/1999/05/20/wor...this story lays a future tech veneer over the ideas of western cultural dominance, but ultimately, didn't say a whole lot beyond what the current state of things is here and now. it's a solid, but not amazing story.

Immersion is an exemplary short story by Aliette de Bodard, with beautiful brevity, introduces us to two cultures, a sense of social strata, deals with over reliance on technology, our inability to be at peace with who we are physically and otherwise and our desire to project someone we want to be. In the process, she reminds me why I love short stories. See here for more detail: http://wp.me/p2XCwQ-bb

- fish sauce!- starting the universe of xuya with this

This story won the Nebula in 2012 and was nominated for a Hugo in 2013 and a whole list of other honors. She wrote another novella in this universe in 2012 that I'd like to read as well (On a Red Station, Drifting), but I can't rationalize almost $15 for a novella, I'll try to get my library to buy it. The Waiting Stars, a third story in this universe, was published in 2013 and was nominated for a Hugo Award as of the time of this review, among its other honors, which is what made me remember to...

Written well, but I strongly disagree with de Bodard's metaphorical characterization of sophisticated 'galactic' (global) culture as an addictive habit that will take over and destroy 'purer,' 'simpler' cultures. Sure, sure, the 'tourism' device she imagines certainly could have the problems and potentials she mentions, but that's not what she's really talking about. She's talking about 'cultural immersion,' and objecting to (or treating with condescending sympathy) people who choose not to rema...

A lot of things are stuffed into this short story. Imperialism, whether economic, cultural, or in the recent past nakedly military. Class and money. Identity, and how it ties into the imperialism. The use and abuse of technology. Common themes, but handled deftly, and with a genuine sf slant to them. There's some superb world-building done in a short story word count, and characters whose fate I care about. This one's my pick for the Hugo, although it was a hard choice between this and Ken Liu's...