  Augmented reality, where digital objects are overlaid and combined with the
ordinary visual surface, is a technology under rapid development, which has
long been a part of visions of the digital future. In this article, I examine
how gaze and power are coded into three pop-cultural visions of augmented
reality. By analyzing representations of augmented reality in science fiction
through the lens of feminist theory on performativity and intelligibility,
visibility and race, gendered gaze, and algorithmic normativity, this paper
provides a critical understanding of augmented reality as a visual technology,
and how it might change or reinforce possible norms and power relations. In
these futures where the screen no longer has any boundaries, both cooperative
and reluctant bodies are inscribed with gendered and racialized digital
markers. Reading visions of augmented reality through feminist theory, I argue
that augmented reality technologies enter into assemblages of people,
discourses, and technologies, where none of the actors necessarily has an
overview. In these assemblages, augmented reality takes on a performative and
norm-bearing role, by forming a grid of intelligibility that codifies
identities, structures hierarchical relationships, and scripts social
interactions.
