Always On: Language in an Online and Mobile World

Naomi S. Baron

Book Description
In Always On, Naomi S. Baron reveals that online and mobile technologies--including instant messaging, cell phones, multitasking, Facebook, blogs, and wikis--are profoundly influencing how we read and write, speak and listen, but not in the ways we might suppose.

Baron draws on a decade of research to provide an eye-opening look at language in an online and mobile world. She reveals for instance that email, IM, and text messaging have had surprisingly little impact on student writing. Electronic media has magnified the laid-back "whatever" attitude toward
formal writing that young people everywhere have embraced, but it is not a cause of it. A more troubling trend, according to Baron, is the myriad ways in which we block incoming IMs, camouflage ourselves on Facebook, and use ring tones or caller ID to screen incoming calls on our mobile phones. Our
ability to decide who to talk to, she argues, is likely to be among the most lasting influences that information technology has upon the ways we communicate with one another. Moreover, as more and more people are "always on" one technology or another--whether communicating, working, or just surfing
the web or playing games--we have to ask what kind of people do we become, as individuals and as family members or friends, if the relationships we form must increasingly compete for our attention with digital media?

Our 300-year-old written culture is on the verge of redefinition, Baron notes. It's up to us to determine how and when we use language technologies, and to weigh the personal and social benefits--and costs--of being "always on." This engaging and lucidly-crafted book gives us the tools for taking on
these challenges.

Handbook of Mobile Communication Studies

James E. Katz (Eds.)

Book Description
Mobile communication has become mainstream and even omnipresent. It is arguably the most successful and certainly the most rapidly adopted new technology in the world: more than one of every three people worldwide possesses a mobile phone. This volume offers a comprehensive view of the cultural, family, and interpersonal consequences of mobile communication across the globe. Leading scholars analyze the effect of mobile communication on all parts of life, from the relationship between literacy and the textual features of mobile phones to the use of ringtones as a form of social exchange, from the "aspirational consumption" of middle class families in India to the belief in parts of Africa and Asia that mobile phones can communicate with the dead.

The contributors explore the ways mobile communication profoundly affects the tempo, structure, and process of daily life around the world. They discuss the impact of mobile communication on social networks, other communication strategies, traditional forms of social organization, and political activities. They consider how quickly miraculous technologies come to seem ordinary and even necessary--and how ordinary technology comes to seem mysterious and even miraculous. The chapters cut across social issues and geographical regions; they highlight use by the elite and the masses, utilitarian and expressive functions, and political and operational consequences. Taken together, the chapters demonstrate how mobile communication has affected the quality of life in both exotic and humdrum settings, and how it increasingly occupies center stage in people’s lives around the world.

About the Author
James E. Katz is Chair of the Department of Communication at Rutgers University and director of the Center for Mobile Communication Studies. He is the author of Magic in the Air: Mobile Communication and the Transformation of Social Life and coauthor of Social Consequences of Internet Use (MIT Press, 2002).

New tech, new ties: How mobile communication is reshaping social cohesion.

Rich Ling

Book Description
The message of this book is simple: the mobile phone strengthens social bonds among family and friends. With a traditional land-line telephone, we place calls to a location and ask hopefully if someone is "there"; with a mobile phone, we have instant and perpetual access to friends and family regardless of where they are. But when we are engaged in these intimate conversations with absent friends, what happens to our relationship with the people who are actually in the same room with us?

In New Tech, New Ties, Rich Ling examines how the mobile telephone affects both kinds of interactions--those mediated by mobile communication and those that are face to face. Ling finds that through the use of various social rituals the mobile telephone strengthens social ties within the circle of friends and family--sometimes at the expense of interaction with those who are physically present--and creates what he calls "bounded solidarity."

Ling argues that mobile communication helps to engender and develop social cohesion within the family and the peer group. Drawing on the work of Emile Durkheim, Erving Goffman, and Randall Collins, Ling shows that ritual interaction is a catalyst for the development of social bonding. From this perspective, he examines how mobile communication affects face-to-face ritual situations and how ritual is used in interaction mediated by mobile communication. He looks at the evidence, including interviews and observations from around the world, that documents the effect of mobile communication on social bonding and also examines some of the other possibly problematic issues raised by tighter social cohesion in small groups.

About the Author
Rich Ling is Senior Researcher at the Norwegian telecommunications company Telenor and Adjunct Research Scientist at the University of Michigan. He is the author of The Mobile Connection: The Cell Phone's Impact on Society.

Mobile multimedia in action.

Ilpo Koskinen

Book Description
Mobile Multimedia in Action displays a revealing picture of how people communicate using camera phones and other mobile multimedia devices. With such devices spreading faster than practically any other new technology, questions about how these devices are being used (and abused) to capture and distribute embarrassing or raunchy images and content, and what should be done about it, are surfacing. This volume presents the first detailed study of the use of these devices.

Using a variant of social science research known as ethnomethodology, Koskinen explores the kinds of images people take with camera phones and how they use sound to enhance these images. The book asks two main questions. First, what kinds of methods of expression, such as visuals or sound, do people use when they design multimedia messages? Second, how do people interact with and respond to each other through mobile multimedia devices? Koskinen has a broader objective centering on the impact of these devices on human relationships and society at large. He asks, What do people do with these devices? Is mobile telephony moving toward a more practical direction, or will it simply become a visual chatty channel fit for gossip but not for real news or other practical purposes? What kind of social activities and organizations does it best serve—peer-to-peer networks or institutional ones?

Koskinen examines these questions from three unique perspectives: the design elements of mobile multimedia, which considers methods of expression people use in designing multimedia messages; mobile multimedia as interaction, which looks into how people interact with each other using this technology and makes a case for studying multimedia as a naturally occurring activity; and mobile multimedia in society, which searches for answers as to the societal consequences of mobile multimedia usage.

A groundbreaking work, Mobile Multimedia in Action will be a fascinating read for both multimedia device professionals and everyday users alike. Providing a glimpse into the future, Koskinen asks where mobile multimedia technology is taking mankind and society.

Ilpo Kalevi Koskinen is a professor at the University of Helsinki, Department of Sociology. He is the author and editor of about a dozen publications including: The Politics of Expertise: Professions and the State in Finland and Managerial Evaluations at the Workplace: An Ethnographically Situated Conversation Analytic Study of Evaluations in a Research Institute.

Mobile understanding: The epistemology of ubiquitous communication.

Kristóf Nyíri (eds.)

About the Book
The content and structure of knowledge are at all times fundamentally moulded by the media through which knowledge is communicated. Today, the internet and mobile telephony are essential parts of these media. Minds have become bound up with technological devices. Face-to-face communication on the one hand, and the solitary study of documents on the other, merge with a world of continuous digital networking, texts with a world of images. Education is confronted by radical challenges; a revolution in epistemology is underway. The volume contains papers by, among others, Ian Hacking, Andrew Brook, Richard Coyne, Maurizio Ferraris, James Katz, and Mike Sharples.

Kristóf Nyíri has published widely on Wittgenstein, Austrian intellectual history, and the philosophy of communication. He directs the interdisciplinary research program COMMUNICATIONS IN THE 21ST CENTURY, conducted jointly by the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and T-Mobile Hungary.

Mobile communication in everyday life: Ethnographic views, observations and reflections.

Joachim R. Höflich and Maren Hartmann (eds.)

Book Description

The mobile phone has become an integral part of our everyday life communication – in this sense a domestication of a ‘nomadic’ medium has taken place. For the very reason that the telephone has left its fixed home environment, it requires us to take an ‘ethnographic view’ in describing both this development and the changes taking place therein. Mobile Communication in Everyday Life takes a closer look at the mobile phone as an object of inquiry in the tradition of the so-called media ethnography. Consequently, the bene- fits and limitations of such research designs are the focus of the book. Some contributions focus on the tension between private and public communication, others on cultural dimensions. Overall, the book presents a range of the most up-to-date research in the field of mobile communication.

The Authors
Joachim R. Höflich is a professor at the University of Erfurt, Germany. He is also a leading expert in the field of mobile technologies and interpersonal communication. Joachim has published several books on the topic in German as well as many articles in English.

Maren Hartmann joined the University of Erfurt in 2004 (and can soon be found at the University of Bremen). Her research interests include media ethnographies, cybercultures and the domestication concept. She has published books as well as several articles on these topics.

Magic in the air: Mobile communication and the transformation of social life.

James E. Katz

About the Book
In this timely volume, James E. Katz, a leading authority on social consequences of communication technology, analyzes the way new mobile telecommunication affects daily life both in the United States and around the world.

“Magic in the air” is the most wide-ranging analysis of mobile communication to date. Katz investigates the spectrum of social aspects of the cell phone’s impact on society and the way social forces affect the use, display, and reconfiguration of the cell phone. Surveying the mobile phone’s current and emerging role in daily life, Katz finds that it provides many benefits for the user, and that some of these benefits are subtle and even counter-intuitive. He also identifies ways the mobile phone has not been entirely positive. After reviewing these, he outlines some steps to ameliorate the mobile phone’s negative effects. Katz also discusses use and abuse of mobile phones in educational settings, where he finds that their use is helping students to cheat on exams and cut class. Parents no longer object to their children having mobile phones in class in a post-Columbine and 9/11 era; instead they are pressing schools to change their rules to allow students to have their mobiles available during class. And mobile phone misbehavior is by no means limited to students; Katz finds that teachers are increasingly taking calls in the middle of class, even interrupting their own lectures to answer what they claim are important calls.

In keeping with the book’s title, Katz explores the often overlooked psychic and religious uses of the mobile phone, an area that has only recently begun to command scholarly interest.“Magic in the air” will be essential reading for communication specialists, sociologists, and social psychologist.

James E. Katz is professor of communication at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey and director of the Rutgers University Center for Mobile Communication Studies, the first academic center dedicated to the study of social aspects of mobile communication. His books include "Perpetual contact: Mobile communication, private talk and public performance" (co-edited with Mark Aakhus), "Connections: Social and cultural studies of the telephone in American life," published by Transaction, and "Social consequence of Internet use: Access, involvement, expression" (co-authored with Ronald E. Rice).

Mobile communications: Re-negotiation of the social sphere.

Rich Ling and Per E. Pedersen (Eds.)

Book Description
T his book surveys some of the broader issues associated with the adoption & use of mobile communication, & explores developing areas of inquiry. Mobile communications are looked at in the context of other types of mediated interaction, demonstrating the uniqueness of this form of communication & how it is influencing the renegotiation of the social sphere. The book considers how mobile communication has impacted on society and reflects on how it is used (& sometimes resented) in various public & private spaces. It provides an in-depth analysis of specific areas which complement our understanding of the phenomena including:-The psychological dimensions of mobile communication (addiction, proclivity to be disturbed by others' use of the mobile phone), -The linguistics of mobile communication, & -The understanding of mobile communication’s commercialisation. A valuable addition to any researcher’s or professional’s reading material in the area of interaction of technology & society.

When mobile came: The cultural and social impact of mobile communication (Mobile communication & society, 1).

Shin Dong Kim

Book Description
W hen mobile arrived into our daily lives... The mobile phone perhaps is the fastest diffused medium in th eentire history of human communication. Where lined telephones took over a century to reach the majority of people in developed societies starting in the late 19th century, it took less than a decade for mobile phones to sneak into peoples' pockets and bags. Since the diffusion process took such short terms in many developed countries, the study of the initial stages of diffusion was not easy in many cases. By the time scholars turned their attention to the phenomenon of mobile communication, people were already largely hooked up to the machine. The papers collected in this volume provide a valuable report in that sense. ...

A sense of place: The global and the local in mobile communication.

Kristóf Nyíri (eds.)

Mobile democracy: Essays on society, self, and politics.

Kristóf Nyíri (eds.)

Mobile communication: Essays on cognition and community.

Kristóf Nyíri (eds.)

Reviews
This book brings together the perspectives of key researchers to explore lessons on social shaping, examining what can be learned from the adoption of mobile devices that can be applied to other, newer, digital technologies. Forecasting the impact of new technology is always difficult. Occasionally demand is underestimated, but more often it is overestimated, & at great cost. Digital technology is unlike anything that has gone before, making it particularly difficult to understand its implications for businesses, public services & society in general. By looking at what has happened in the past & now, & offering methods of using this knowledge to look forward, this book will contribute to reducing expensive forecasting errors in the future. Key reading for all those involved with the future of mobile communications, this book is a valuable resource, particularly for advanced undergraduates & postgraduates on Mobile Technology courses, practitioners, & researchers working in mobile communications, CSCW & HCI.

Mobile learning: Essays on philosophy, psychology and education.

Kristóf Nyíri (eds.)

Short summary
The changing conditions for the accumulation and transmission of knowledge in the age of multimedia networks make it inevitable that old philosophical problems become formulated in a new light. Above all, the problem of the unity of knowledge is once again a topical issue. The situation-dependent acquisition of knowledge that is made possible by mobile learning transcends the boundaries of traditional disciplines, linking the domains of text, diagram, and picture. Database integration and multimedia search become central problems in the epistemology of the 21st century, while handheld devices are emerging as vital technologies for supporting collaborative learning.

Kristóf Nyíri has published widely on Wittgenstein, Austrian intellectual history, and the philosophy of communication. He directs the interdisciplinary research program COMMUNICATIONS IN THE 21ST CENTURY, conducted jointly by the Institute for Philosophical Research of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and Westel Mobile Telecommunications, Budapest.