Ethnography From Physical to Digital Contexts

2022 ◽  
pp. 196-216
Author(s):  
Angela Delli Paoli

The term ethnography comes from the Greek ethnos (folk, the people, cultures) and gráphein (to write, to describe), and therefore, its literal meaning refers to the description of cultures. The current perspectives of ethnographic research are widening to digital contexts for several interrelated motivations: decolonization, globalization, information and communication technologies (ICTs). The classical loci of digital ethnography is represented by online communities, delimited digital spaces of social aggregation around a given domain of interest. However, in the last years, these privileged sites are complemented or sometimes substituted by social media sites and metadata in digital ethnographic research. As a result, new sites for ethnographic fieldwork are emerging fostering new types of ethnographic practice. The difference in digital ethnographic fields imply an internally diverse array of approaches. The chapter starts from the origins of ethnographic research to investigate its digital developments, methodological challenges, and variety of approach.

Author(s):  
Aakriti Sethi

The bittersweet characteristics of internet and social media have caught the imagination of the era we live in. No orb of this society is untouched by the marvels of information and communication technologies (ICT). The evolution of internet from ARPANET to social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or apps like Watsapp has changed the modern world from its core, impacting every nook of every society. These tools and services have made individuals way more involved in political, social, cultural, and economic happenings around the globe, making them feel authorized to send their message/opinion beyond their computer/phone screen. Amidst this backdrop, state and traditional diplomacy has seen remarkable technological changes. The birth of digital diplomacy has opened a plethora of opportunities for the people as well as the state. Postmodern understanding of a state's power beyond the realm of its military capabilities (hard power) and through the lens of soft power has led to many countries trying to win “hearts and minds” across the globe. But, the interaction of state and newer technologies in the midst of labyrinth unconventional threats has changed the traditional rules of the game.


Author(s):  
Tomas Brusell

When modern technology permeates every corner of life, there are ignited more and more hopes among the disabled to be compensated for the loss of mobility and participation in normal life, and with Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), Exoskeleton Technologies and truly hands free technologies (HMI), it's possible for the disabled to be included in the social and pedagogic spheres, especially via computers and smartphones with social media apps and digital instruments for Augmented Reality (AR) .In this paper a nouvel HMI technology is presented with relevance for the inclusion of disabled in every day life with specific focus on the future development of "smart cities" and "smart homes".


Author(s):  
Sarah J. Stein ◽  
Kwong Nui Sim

Abstract While information and communication technologies (ICT) are prominent in educational practices at most levels of formal learning, there is relatively little known about the skills and understandings that underlie their effective and efficient use in research higher degree settings. This project aimed to identify doctoral supervisors’ and students’ perceptions of their roles in using ICT. Data were gathered through participative drawing and individual discussion sessions. Participants included 11 students and two supervisors from two New Zealand universities. Focus of the thematic analysis was on the views expressed by students about their ideas, practices and beliefs, in relation to their drawings. The major finding was that individuals hold assumptions and expectations about ICT and their use; they make judgements and take action based on those expectations and assumptions. Knowing about ICT and knowing about research processes separately form only part of the work of doctoral study. Just as supervision cannot be considered independently of the research project and the student involved, ICT skills and the use of ICT cannot be considered in the absence of the people and the project. What is more important in terms of facilitating the doctoral research process is students getting their “flow” right. This indicates a need to provide explicit support to enable students to embed ICT within their own research processes.


Adam alemi ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 90 (4) ◽  
pp. 53-65
Author(s):  
V. Dunaev ◽  
◽  
V. Kurganskaya ◽  

The article deals with a number of cultural and historical forms of implementation of the principle of coevolution of technologies and the semantic organization of society. Using Plato's cosmogony as an example, the use of numerical symbolism as a matrix of the divine creation of the world and the human soul is analyzed. The article analyzes the difference between technologies introduced by ancient Greek philosophers and the philosophy of Taoism in China, based on: 1) on the cultivation of natural processes, and 2) on giving the material substrate any arbitrary shapes. The role of this difference in the endowment of ethical characteristics and power functions of key mythological characters is shown. Using the example of the mythological symbolization of metallurgy and blacksmithing, the features of the archaic perception of complex technological processes are analyzed. On the example of the architectural design of the "Panopticon" by I. Bentham, one of the first social technologies and its role in the transformation of the concept of power and the ways of its implementation is considered. Various forms of realization of the idea of the panopticon with the help of digital information and communication technologies are analyzed.


Author(s):  
Kamil Demirhan

This chapter analyzes the capacity of social media usage and the social media strategies of political parties that became the members of Turkish Parliament after 2011 election. The social media usage increases in parallel to the improvements in Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) and it becomes an important tool with its communicative functions to realize activities in social, political, and economic fields. In the globalization process, developments in ICTs and changes in the meaning of democracy have been realized parallel to each other. Politics has become more open to interaction and the participation of different actors. ICTs have created new opportunities to interaction and participation of social actors. These improvements require transformations in the role and functions of political parties. They have to arrange their programs and structures according to participative understanding of democracy and new technologies. Social media usage is seen as a requirement for political parties and party leaders for adaptation to these developments, and it is also seen as a device with its potential for realizing participation, communication, and interaction to adapt to the changes in the understanding of politics.


2015 ◽  
pp. 1196-1225 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kamil Demirhan

This chapter analyzes the capacity of social media usage and the social media strategies of political parties that became the members of Turkish Parliament after 2011 election. The social media usage increases in parallel to the improvements in Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) and it becomes an important tool with its communicative functions to realize activities in social, political, and economic fields. In the globalization process, developments in ICTs and changes in the meaning of democracy have been realized parallel to each other. Politics has become more open to interaction and the participation of different actors. ICTs have created new opportunities to interaction and participation of social actors. These improvements require transformations in the role and functions of political parties. They have to arrange their programs and structures according to participative understanding of democracy and new technologies. Social media usage is seen as a requirement for political parties and party leaders for adaptation to these developments, and it is also seen as a device with its potential for realizing participation, communication, and interaction to adapt to the changes in the understanding of politics.


Author(s):  
Serkan Gürsoy ◽  
Murat Yücelen

This chapter deals with the evolution of communities of practice by considering two key components which facilitate knowledge sharing: Organizational Learning and Social Capital. Dualities and intersections between the building blocks of these two components are investigated by discussing organizational learning in its explorative and exploitative forms, while considering social capital in its bridging and bonding forms. As a critical contemporary step of evolution, information and communication technologies are also elaborated in order to examine the impact of constant and instant tools on these facilitators of knowledge sharing. The study aims to derive proxies among these components of organizational learning and social capital in order to design an integrated framework that reflects the nature of online communities of practice.


2012 ◽  
pp. 187-200
Author(s):  
Kristina Pitula ◽  
Daniel Sinnig ◽  
Thiruvengadam Radhakrishnan

Requirements engineering is an important stage in any software development. It is more so in the case of software development for social development projects in rural areas of the developing countries. ICT4D which stands for “Information and Communication Technologies for Development” is gaining more and more attention as computing is more widely affordable. This article is concerned with requirements engineering in the ICT4D domain. In many developing counties, a significant effort is being put into providing people in rural areas with access to digital content and services by using Information and Communication Technologies. Unfortunately most ICT4D projects pursue a top-down development model which is driven by the technology available and not by the very needs and social problems of the people living in rural communities (Frohlich et al., 2009). Existing technologies are often applied in a non-inclusive manner with respect to the local population, without sufficient adaptation or re-invention, and often without regard for user’s needs and their social contexts.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Duncan B. Hollis ◽  
Jens David Ohlin

Election interference is one of the most widely discussed international phenomena of the last five years. Russian covert interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election elevated the topic into a national priority, but that experience was far from an isolated one. Evidence of election interference by foreign states or their proxies has become a regular feature of national elections, and election interference is likely to get worse in the near future. Information and communication technologies afford those who would interfere with new tools that can operate in ways previously unimaginable: Twitter bots, Facebook advertisements, closed social media platforms, algorithms that prioritize extreme views, disinformation, misinformation, and malware that steals secret campaign communications. Defending Democracies: Combating Foreign Election Interference in a Digital Age tackles the problem through an interdisciplinary lens and focuses on: (1) defining the problem of foreign election interference; (2) exploring the solutions that international law might bring to bear; and (3) considering alternative regulatory frameworks for understanding and addressing the problem. The result is a deeply urgent examination of an old problem on social media steroids, one that implicates the most central institution of liberal democracy—elections. This volume seeks to bring domestic and international perspectives on elections and election law into conversation with other disciplinary frameworks, escaping the typical biases of lawyers—preferring international legal solutions for issues of international relations. Taken together, the chapters in this volume represent a more faithful representation of the broad array of solutions that might be deployed, including international and domestic, legal and extralegal, ambitious and cautious.


Author(s):  
Androniki Kavoura ◽  
Leszek Koziol

This chapter examines the implementation of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) as innovative tools and the use of Social Media (SM) by Polish medium and small sized companies. The chapter aims to present the scope and importance of the use of Information Technology (IT) and SM in the process of companies' functioning and management. Presentation of the results of empirical research is another important aim. Companies' assessment of IT tools and SM's effective use as a prerequisite to improve the company performance is also examined. This is an exploratory study based on a sample of 166 southern Polish firms and it adds to the scant literature on firms' internal IT capabilities to support SM. The paper makes a theoretical and practical contribution in that it brings forth the emerging theme of IT resources that small and medium-sized enterprises adapt to their processes. It further examines the SM use from these firms based on the IT technology they implement as a whole. Managerial implications for marketers are provided since findings illustrate the tendency from small and medium-sized Polish companies not to implement ICTs and SM to a full extent and they could further incorporate SM in the firms' advertising and communication campaigns. Limitations and further research are discussed.


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