Definition of "itness"

Theatricality is foregrounded in the simple moment of pointing to an absence, as in the mask that points to itself as it advances. In this moment the itness of the I shows itself as what it is not in the act of self-reference.

1991, Barbara Freedman, Staging the Gaze

This script declares: the universe is so right as to need no justification, existence is no longer a problem because of the 'itness' of everything, the whole world had become your own body […]

1992, Stanley Cohen, Laurie Taylor, Escape Attempts: The Theory and Practice of Resistance to Everyday Life

The beauty of the book is in the book, in its itness and in the itness of the author who, in looking through is also seen in the pane, the lens, on which she leaves her own print.

2012, Cindy Weinstein, Christopher Looby, American Literature's Aesthetic Dimensions, page 285