Portable Communities: The Social Dynamics of Online and Mobile ConnectednessRunner-Up, 2009 Association for Humanist Sociology Book Award "I blog, text, IM, email, and I don't like to be without my cell phone or have to shut it off—even in a theater. Let's put it this way, my 'connections' are more important than whatever I'm doing that might force me to shut my cell phone off." — A Member of a Portable Community In contemporary American life, community has become a portable phenomenon—you can "get it to go" wherever and whenever it is desired at the push of a button, mouse, or keyboard. In Portable Communities, sociologist Mary Chayko examines the social dynamics and implications of having access to countless others at any time. Teeming with the observations of people who blog, email, instant message, game, and chat on cell phones, wireless computers, and other portable devices, the book captures the appeal and the excitement, the challenges and the complexities, of online and mobile connectedness. Chayko considers some of the external dynamics that emerge as these communities resonate within the larger society—constant availability, social interaction that is more controlled and controllable, and new opportunities for self-expression, creativity, and even voyeurism. Internal social dynamics involving emotionality, intimacy, play, romance, and networking are also fully explored. Portable Communities provides a unique view of shifts in the social landscape and points the way toward needed social and political change. |
Contents
3 | |
Cognitive Connectedness | 17 |
Emotionality and Intimacy | 43 |
Fun Games and Hanging Out | 63 |
Convenience Practicality and Sociability | 87 |
Constant Availability | 113 |
The Control of Time | 141 |
Creating Expressing and Extending the Self | 159 |
Equalities Inequalities | 183 |
Acknowledgments | 203 |
Profiles of Interview Subjects | 215 |
Notes | 233 |
255 | |
291 | |
Other editions - View all
Portable Communities: The Social Dynamics of Online and Mobile Connectedness Mary Chayko Limited preview - 2008 |
Portable Communities: The Social Dynamics of Online and Mobile Connectedness Mary Chayko Limited preview - 2008 |
Portable Communities: The Social Dynamics of Online and Mobile Connectedness Mary Chayko No preview available - 2008 |
Common terms and phrases
activities Baker Baym become behavior blogs boyd Cambridge Castells Caucasian female Caucasian male cell phone chapter Chayko cognitive resonance Computer-Mediated Communication connectedness create culture Cyberspace danah boyd dynamics electronic mailing list emotional emotionally everyday experience face-to-face feel gender Geser identity impact individuals instant messaging interview subjects intimacy Journal of Computer-Mediated keep in touch kind Lenhart Ling lives McKenna mental message boards mobile communities mobile phone mobile technologies moral panic offline online and mobile online groups participants physical play portable communities portable technologies posts Preece relationships Retrieved October sense sexual share social connections social interaction social networking sites social worlds Society sociologist Sociology sociomental space someone sometimes stories talk text messages things tion Turkle users visits websites Wellman writing