Joseph Markman

Applied Digital Anthropologist

03 / Framework

Co-Liminal Mediation Model

This model is a visual depiction of human–AI interaction as it relates to my theory of digital intimacy. It situates a human interlocutor in conversation with an AI chatbot, making sense not only of the relational position with that system, but also of adjacent variables: other people, policy, and cultural systems at large.

The framework treats human–AI interaction not as a single modular node, but as a recursive nexus: in contact with a pre-mediated AI chatbot, embodied selfhood, and dynamic iterations of the relationship over time.

This page presents a schematic of my current research on digital intimacy. It is subject to updates.

Schematic

A topographical map of the co-liminal threshold: the self (A), the artificial other (X), the human other (B), institutional gates (Y), and structural weather (O).

Nodes

Module descriptions

Aⁿ

The Nth vantage

Aⁿ is the position from which the whole framework becomes legible. It names a new vantage that emerges through repeated interaction: you can perceive your own layers (A⁰↔A¹) while also seeing X, B, Y, and O as part of the same terrain.

The exponent marks recursion: not “more self,” but a changed coordinate.

A⁰ ↔ A¹

The membrane conversation

A⁰ is the precognitive self (felt experience before it has language). A¹ is the narrating self (the part that explains, justifies, edits). The double arrow marks a continuous internal translation: how raw sensation becomes speakable.

This is the layer where rehearsal happens: journaling, drafting, the pause before saying the thing.

X⁰ → Xⁿ

Negotiated mirror

X⁰ is the baseline system. Xⁿ is what the system becomes in practice through repeated use: shaped by prompts, habits, refusals, tone, and the user’s interpretive frame. Xⁿ is co-authored—neither purely the user nor purely the machine.

This helps explain why “the same AI” can feel radically different across people.

Kinship orbit

B is human sociality: the field where recognition is embodied, reciprocal, and risky. It includes love, status, misrecognition, and the weight of being known. B does not disappear when X appears—it remains a separate orbit with different stakes.

Y⁰ → Yⁿ

Institutional gates

Y⁰ represents hard gates: platforms, policies, paywalls, terms of service, and stigma. Yⁿ is negotiated entry: the specific way access is gained (or denied) and how participation becomes shaped by what is allowed.

Y is where governance becomes felt as everyday friction.

Structural weather

O is the ambient atmosphere: cultural norms, economic pressure, attention regimes, and broader technological infrastructures. It is not a single cause, but the weather in which every interaction occurs—often unnoticed until it shifts.

Co-Liminal Mediation Model

Schematic

Nodes

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