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In the midst of the affective networks of contemporary digital cultures, something seemingly of the opposite order is taking shape. It is a culture that contrasts speed with slowness, displaces the new with the old and the used, and replaces supposedly immaterial streams of data with highly material, tactile technologies, materials and fabrics. This chapter turns to steampunk cultures as compelling examples of a contemporary affective investment in the analog, coupled with intense digital connectivity. Drawing on affect theory in a neo-materialist vein, the author formulates a critique of Brian Massumi’s notion of the superiority of the analog and suggests that steampunk, rather than being understood as analog nostalgia, is more aptly understood in terms of the transdigital. The term transdigital accounts for analog passions that are shaped through the digital in ways that concretely activate, but also move across the borders of, or beyond the digital. Steampunk, rather than merely being a return to a bygone era, is a re-consideration, or transing, of the (digital) present. Within this chapter, steampunk is used as an especially intriguing example of a broader tendency toward transdigital modes of using and sensing media in contemporary media landscapes.
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