Mobile Communications An Introduction to New Media

by Haddon, Leslie; Green, Nicola

• ISBN13: 9781845208134
• ISBN10: 1845208137
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-12-15
• Publisher: Berg Pub Ltd

Summary

The mobile phone has achieved a global presence faster than any other form of information and communication technology. A global multi-billion dollar industry, this small, mundane device is now an intrinsic part of our everyday life. This communications medium has had an immense social and cultural impact and continues to evolve. Talking, texting, photographing, videoing, connecting to a network of other media the cellphone now seems essential. But, beyond the ways in which it has actively restructured our daily lives, the mobile has changed our sense of ourselves and the way we see the world. The relationship between public and private space, how we view time and space, how we rely on and negotiate social networks all are increasingly centred on this small piece of technology. Mobile Communications presents a succinct, challenging, and accessible overview of the transformations and challenges presented by this most personal, yet most overlooked technology.

Author Biography

NICOLA GREEN is Senior Lecturer in New Media and New Technologies in the Department of Sociology at the University of Surrey.

 

LESLIE HADDON is Researcher and Associate Lecturer in the Department of Media and Communications at the London School of Economics and Political Science. 

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. 1
Perspectives on Technologies and ICTs	p. 3
Innovations and Visions	p. 3
Socially Relevant Groups	p. 5
The Experience of Technologies	p. 6
Domestication	p. 7
Reflection: The Meaning of Products	p. 8
The New Mobilities	p. 8
A History of Mobile Communications Research	p. 9
An Emerging Research Field	p. 9
Emerging Research Themes	p. 11
An Outline of the Following Chapters	p. 13
History and Industry	p. 17
A Brief History of Mobile Communications Technologies	p. 18
Consumption Histories	p. 29
The Relationships Between Technologies	p. 33
ICT Use: Evolution or Revolution?	p. 34
Mobile Technologies and Choices in Communications	p. 36
A Case Study in Communications Choices: Texting	p. 42
Origins and Trajectories: The Early History of an Innovation	p. 43
The Domestication of Texting?	p. 44
Social Consequences of Texting	p. 46
Public and Private Spaces	p. 51
Mobilities and the Transformation of the Public and Private Spheres	p. 52
Negotiating the Mobile Public and Private	p. 55
Cross-Cultural Norms and Personal Space	p. 63
The Regulation of Mobile Phone Behaviours	p. 68
Time	p. 73
Time, ICTs and Mobile Communications	p. 73
Time and Mobile Communications	p. 76
Mobile Phones and the Changing Organization of Time	p. 78
Mobile Communications and the Experience of Time	p. 82
The Experience of Meeting: A Case Study	p. 84
Social Networks and Peer Relationships	p. 87
Communities, Social Capital, Social Networks and ICTs	p. 88
The Strength of Mobile Ties	p. 91
Young People and Social Networks	p. 96
Status and Cultural Value	p. 98
Group Identification and Differentiation	p. 100
The Management of Availability	p. 101
Power Relations	p. 107
Dimensions of Power	p. 108
Power and the Social Shaping of ICTs	p. 110
Power and the Social Shaping of Mobile Phones	p. 112
Mobile Phones, Children and Their Parents	p. 116
Ownership	p. 118
Children's Use and Parental Monitoring	p. 120
The Negotiation of Independence	p. 121
Peer Relations and Organizational Networks	p. 122
Mobile Images: The Cameraphone	p. 127
Introduction of the Camera Phone	p. 128
Youth and Mobile Images: Content, Sharing, Posting	p. 133
Issues Related to Images: A British Case Study	p. 136
Media Producers and Changes in Photography	p. 140
Applying Frameworks, Going Forward	p. 145
The Mobile Internet and Mobile Television	p. 146
Analysing Emerging Technology	p. 147
Going Forward	p. 152
Annotated Guide to Further Reading	p. 153
Questions and Exercises	p. 159
Notes	p. 165
Bibliography	p. 169
Index	p. 187
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