The social uses of the Internet: Introduction to the special section

2021 ◽  
pp. 146144482110159
Author(s):  
Jacob Ørmen ◽  
Rasmus Helles ◽  
Klaus Bruhn Jensen
Keyword(s):  
Digital Media ◽  
Special Section ◽  
The United States ◽  
Future Research ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Communicative Practices ◽  
Use Patterns ◽  
The Social ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
Social Uses

This Special Section takes stock of a shift toward an integrated and global digital media environment with a set of articles comparing and contrasting the social uses of the Internet in China, Europe, and the United States. Departing from James Lull’s typology of the social uses of television, the articles address both general media use patterns and the specific private and public uses to which the Internet is put in these different social and cultural contexts. A concluding commentary by Lull serves to place current communicative practices in historical perspective and to suggest implications for future research.

Children and Youth Making Digital Media for the Social Good

2019 ◽  
pp. 946-965
Author(s):  
Jill Denner ◽  
Jacob Martinez
Keyword(s):  
Civic Engagement ◽  
Digital Media ◽  
Social Practice ◽  
Children And Youth ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Marginalized Youth ◽  
Community Based ◽  
Social Good ◽  
Cultural Roots ◽  
The Social

This chapter describes how children and youth are using digital media to address inequity in their schools, communities, and in society. The chapter begins with a review of the historical and cultural roots of children making digital media for the social good, and situates the approach in the context of other civic and community-based movements. The next section focuses on the range of ways that children and youth are making digital media, including who is participating, and the social and institutional factors involved. The next sections describe the benefits for the participants and for society, as well as the barriers to broader participation. Two case studies highlight key strategies for engaging marginalized youth in making digital media for the social good, and ways to expand the popularity of this approach. The chapter concludes with suggestions for future research, and the broader implications for education, civic engagement, social practice and policy.

Digital Democracy in Authoritarian Russia

2019 ◽  
pp. 1533-1543
Author(s):  
Rachel Baarda
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Participation ◽  
Digital Media ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Print Media ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Civic Discourse ◽  
Digital Democracy ◽  
The World

Digital media is expected to promote political participation in government. Around the world, from the United States to Europe, governments have been implementing e-government (use of of the Internet to make bureaucracy more efficient) and promising e-democracy (increased political participation by citizens). Does digital media enable citizens to participate more easily in government, or can authoritarian governments interfere with citizens' ability to speak freely and obtain information? This study of digital media in Russia will show that while digital media can be used by Russian citizens to gain information and express opinions, Kremlin ownership of print media, along with censorship laws and Internet surveillance, can stifle the growth of digital democracy. Though digital media appears to hold promise for increasing citizen participation, this study will show that greater consideration needs to be given to the power of authoritarian governments to suppress civic discourse on the Internet.

Cross Cultural Perceptions on Privacy in the United States, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Taiwan

2009 ◽  
pp. 284-299 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andy Chiou
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Focus Groups ◽  
The United States ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Future Research ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Single System ◽  
Cultural Perceptions ◽  
Internet Privacy ◽  
Different Cultures

In this chapter, the authors will briefly discuss some cross cultural concerns regarding Internet privacy. The authors believe that due to the cross cultural nature of the Internet itself, different cultures will tend to result in different concerns regarding Internet privacy. As such, there is no single system of protecting Internet privacy that may be suitable for all cultures. The authors also utilize focus groups from various countries spanning Asia and the United States to discover the differences between cultures. Hopefully an understanding of such differences will aid in future research on Internet privacy to take a more culture sensitive approach.

Mobilisierung zu politischer Partizipation durch das Internet: Erwartungen, Erkenntnisse und Herausforderungen der Forschung

2013 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tobias Escher
Keyword(s):  
Political Participation ◽  
Digital Media ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Political Process ◽  
Future Research ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Information Communication ◽  
The Public ◽  
State Of Research ◽  
Politically Active

AbstractThis article is focusing on the state of research into the extent to which the opportunities for information, communication and participation opened up by the Internet have led to greater mobilisation of the public for political participation. After briefly presenting the diversity of conflicting expectations towards the Internet’s role for the political process, the article discusses the relevance of digital media as a means for mobilising greater and more equal political participation from a liberal-representative perspective on democracy. At the core of the article is a discussion of the last 15 years of research empirically testing the mobilisation hypothesis as well as the theories proposed to explain the observed participation patterns. What becomes dear is that the Internet does indeed slightly increase rates of political participation but with few exceptions those newly mobilised come from parts of the population that are already politically active. At the same time, the explanations still exhibit considerable gaps that remain to be dosed. To this end future research needs to address a number of challenges which are discussed in the final section of the article.

scholarly journals Inequalities in the social use of the Internet of things: A capital and skills perspective

2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (6) ◽  
pp. 1344-1361 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex van der Zeeuw ◽  
Alexander JAM van Deursen ◽  
Giedo Jansen
Keyword(s):  
Internet Of Things ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Internet Skills ◽  
The Social ◽  
Use Of The Internet ◽  
Social Use ◽  
Smart Things ◽  
Social Uses ◽  
The Internet Of Things

In this article, we set out to explain different types of social uses of the Internet of Things (IoT) using forms of capital and Internet skills. We argue that the IoT platform entices different manners of social communication that are easily overlooked when focusing on the novelty of smart “things.” How people use the IoT socially is crucial in trying to understand how people create, maintain, or absolve social relations in a networked society. We find inversed effects for social capital, income and education on private use, and on sharing IoT data with a partner. Sharing with acquaintances and strangers is predicted by cultural activities. Sharing IoT data with acquaintances can especially be attributed to social relations that escape the immediate household. We conclude that varying figurations of capital and Internet skills predict how the IoT is used socially.

From Ink to Web and Beyond

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heather McKee Hurwitz
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Digital Media ◽  
Women Activists ◽  
The United States ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Women's Activism ◽  
Media Activism ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
History Of ◽  
Feminist Movements

Mainstream media ignores the breadth and diversity of women’s activism and often features sexist, racist, and sexualized portrayals of women. Also, women hold disproportionately fewer jobs in media industries than men. Despite these challenges, women activists protest gender inequality and advocate a variety of other goals using traditional and new social media. This chapter examines the history of women’s media activism in the United States from women activists’ use of mainstream and alternative newspapers, magazines, radio, and television, to how activists adopted Internet technologies and new digital media strategies starting in the 1990s, to how contemporary feminists protest with Facebook and hashtag activism today. I argue that women activists’ use of new social media may necessitate significant shifts in how we research continuity and diversity in women’s and feminist movements, and how we conceptualize resources, micromobilization, and leadership in social movements broadly. I conclude with several suggestions for future research.

Re-Envisioning Iran Online

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 398-418
Author(s):  
Shireen Walton
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Production ◽  
Digital Photography ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Social Web ◽  
Cultural Representations ◽  
Digital Photographs ◽  
The Social ◽  
Everyday Aesthetics ◽  
Social Uses

Digital photography and the Internet play important roles in contemporary cultures. They can create semiotic spaces in which ‘local’ imaginaries are projected in ‘global’ frames and cultural representations can be collectively challenged. This article discusses the genre of popular photography and its convergence with the Iranian social web in the form of photoblogs (photography-oriented blogs). It describes how everyday images posted on photoblogs playfully move beyond representative tropes that constitute a visual legacy in contemporary Iran. The findings provide insights into contemporary Iranian online visual-cultural production and develop wider theoretical understandings of the social uses of digital photography, including notions of ‘everyday aesthetics’. The ways in which Iranian photobloggers select, curate, exhibit and manipulate personal digital photographs on their photoblogs are shown to be exemplary of a contemporary ethnographic ‘digital-visual moment’ of popular cultural storytelling, existing at the interface of local and global, as well as actual and virtual publics.

Digitalisierung und Nachbarschaft

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Digital Media ◽  
Local Community ◽  
Social Science Research ◽  
Science Research ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Internet ◽  
The Social ◽  
The One ◽  
The Relationship

There has hardly been any other development that has changed our everyday lives as significantly as digitalisation, and there is hardly anything as commonplace as neighbourship. Despite the links between these two concepts growing, they have been neglected in social science research in Germany so far. The prevailing sentiment is that the Internet and social media sites have no connection to the real world, but there are countless neighbourship groups on Facebook, Twitter hashtags named after neighbourhoods or entire websites, such as ‘nebenan.de’, which endeavour to strengthen local community bonds through digital means. In short, the social developments in this respect are already considerably more advanced than the knowledge that exists about it. This anthology makes a fundamental contribution to the sociological debate on digitalisation and neighbourship by aiming to provide an overview of the relationship between digitalisation and neighbourship on the one hand, and open up avenues for further research on the other. It therefore examines and systematises attempts to strengthen local community bonds using digital media from different perspectives.

The Bioarchaeology of Postmortem Agency: Integrating Archaeological Theory with Human Skeletal Remains

2014 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 429-435 ◽  
Author(s):  
John J. Crandall ◽  
Debra L. Martin
Keyword(s):  
Special Section ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Social Agency ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Main Theme ◽  
Social Archaeology ◽  
Human Skeletal Remains ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Dead ◽  
Archaeological Analysis

Taking the social agency of dead bodies as its main theme, this introduction discusses the articles in this special section on the bioarchaeology of post-mortem agency and discusses theoretical concerns relevant to the (bio)archaeological analysis of agency. In particular, the argument that only biological living persons have social agency or impact the direction of social processes, or the decisions of others is challenged. The challenges of defining and archaeologically detecting such agency of past humans as well as socially alive entities such as ghosts, corpses, relics and totem heads are discussed. A review of the ways investigations of the agency of the dead might unify bioarchaeologists and further integrate social archaeology into future research is also presented. It is argued that a holistic anthropological approach to humans and their ability to impact their surroundings is not complete if the symbolic and material effects of the dead are not considered.

Schooling in the Course of Human Lives: The Social Context of Education and the Transition to Adulthood in Industrial Society

1993 ◽  
Vol 63 (4) ◽  
pp. 409-447 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aaron M. Pallas
Keyword(s):  
Life Course ◽  
Transition To Adulthood ◽  
The United States ◽  
Institutional Arrangements ◽  
Industrial Society ◽  
Future Research ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Life Course ◽  
Cross National

This review examines the role of schooling in the life course of individuals, focusing on the timing and sequencing of schooling in the transition to adulthood. First, I examine conceptual issues in the study of schooling and the life course, drawing heavily on the sociological literature. I then consider the timing and sequencing of schooling in the transition to adulthood in the United States, and the consequences of variations in the timing and sequencing of schooling for adult social and economic success. I then discuss the role of social structure, norms, and institutional arrangements in the transition to adulthood, with special attention to cross-national comparisons with the U. S. and historical changes within countries. I conclude with speculations regarding trends in the role of schooling in the life course, and some directions for future research on this topic.

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