From the Publisher: 
A Question of Identity 
Life on the Screen is a fascinating and wide-ranging investigation of the impact of computers and networking on society, peoples' perceptions of themselves, and the individual's relationship to machines. Sherry Turkle, a Professor of the Sociology of Science at MIT and a licensed psychologist, uses Internet MUDs (multi-user domains, or in older gaming parlance multi-user dungeons) as a launching pad for explorations of software design, user interfaces, simulation, artificial intelligence, artificial life, agents, "bots," virtual reality, and "the on-line way of life." 
Turkle's discussion of postmodernism is particularly enlightening. She shows how postmodern concepts in art, architecture, and ethics are related to concrete topics much closer to home, for example AI research (Minsky's "Society of Mind") and even MUDs (exemplified by students with X-window terminals who are doing homework in one window and simultaneously playing out several different roles in the same MUD in other windows). Those of you who have (like me) been turned off by the shallow, pretentious, meaningless paintings and sculptures that litter our museums of modern art may have a different perspective after hearing what Turkle has to say. 
This is a psychoanalytical book, not a technical one. However, software developers and engineers will find it highly accessible because of the depth of the author's technical understanding and credibility. Unlike most other authors in this genre, Turkle does not constantly jar the technically-literate reader with blatant errors or bogus assertions about how things work. Although I personally don't have time or patience for MUDs,view most of AI as snake-oil, and abhor postmodern architecture, I thought the time spent reading this book was an extremely good investment.

스크린 위의 삶 = Life on the screen : identity in the age of the internet

語用論(Pragmatics)を考える

Death is the new sex, last great taboo in Western society and Western medicine, as Richard Smith discusses in his editorial (p 129). In the trinity of births, marriages, and deaths, only death does not have glossy magazines devoted to stylish consumption at the attendant ceremonies. On the web, of course, …

Death and dying

Connections: New Ways of Working in the Networked Organization

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Writing space: The computer, hypertext, and the history of writing

The purpose of the present study is to investigate how written language is used and adapted to suit the conditions of four modes of computer-mediated communication (CMC). Texts from email, web chat, instant messaging and mobile text messaging (SMS) have been analyzed. The general human ability to adapt is deemed to underlie linguistic adaptation. A linguistic adaptivity theory is proposed here. It is proposed that three interdependent variables influence language use: synchronicity, means of expression and situation. Two modes of CMC are synchronous (web chat and instant messaging), and two are asynchronous (email and SMS). These are all tertiary means of expression, written and transmitted by electronic means. Production and perception conditions, such as text input technique, limited message size, as well as situational parameters such as relationship between communicators, goal of interaction are found to influence message composition. The dissertation challenges popular assumptions that language is deteriorating because of increased use in CMC. It is argued that language use in different modes of CMC are variants, or repertoires, like any other variants. Contrary to popular assumptions, results show that language use is adapted creatively and is well suited the particular modes of CMC. A number of linguistic features are shown to be characteristic of the modes of CMC investigated in the present study. Strategies such as syntactical and lexical reductions are employed to reduce time, effort and space. These techniques often appear to serve multifunctional purposes, by expressing interpersonal intimacy by the choice of words and phrases, while reducing keystrokes. This clearly indicates linguistic awareness. Texts in email, web chat, instant messaging and SMS are found to contain unconventional and not yet established abbreviations based on Swedish as well as words from other languages, unconventional or spoken-like spelling, unconventional use of punctuation and use of non-alphabetical graphical means (emoticons, asterisks). Thus, written language is found to have been developed and enhanced to suit the conditions of computer-mediated communication.

Use and Adaptation of Written Language to the Conditions of Computer-Mediated Communication

We present a study of how awareness of presence affects content of instant messaging sent between students using WebWh o, an easily accessible web-based awareness tool. WebWho visualizes where people are located in a large university computer lab and allows students to virtually locate one another and communicate via an instant messaging system. As WebWho is there to be accessed through any web browser, it requires no programming skills or special software. It may also be used from outside the computer lab by students located elsewhere. The sender's user name is normally automatically added to the instant messages, but the messages can also be sent anonymously. We were interested in finding out if the sender's conscious hiding of his or her identity seemed to be reflected in the content of anonymous messages, and how these differed from those with identified senders. Awareness of presence seems to be one of several factors influencing message composition, both content and structural aspects. At this stage, we have primarily focused on examining how different factors affects the content of the messages. We cross-analysed the messages for content in relation to parameters such as sender location (collocated, distributed and distant) and sender status (anonymous vs. identified), in order to find out whether awareness of presence seems to be an influencing factor. Computer-mediated communication (CMC) is often claimed to be a sort of hybrid between spoken and written interaction c.f. Ferrara, Brunner & Whittemore (1991) and and several others]. We compared the messages that were sent using the instant messaging tool in WebWho with data from other types of CMC (email, chat) and also with corpora of spoken language and traditionally written language. The aim of the study was primarily to investigate awareness of presence affects on instant messaging, and only secondarily to investigate spoken vs. written features of the texts. Results show that awareness of both physical and virtual presence affects the content of the messages, and that these factors affects the text differently. Sender status, the nature of the computer-mediated medium, and the written mode shape the messages as well. Results show that the students use the messaging system to support collaborative work and coordinate social activities, and extensively for playful behaviour.

Instant messaging with WebWho

Language Use in Swedish Mobile Text Messaging

Drawing from a survey and focus group interviews, this study explores how Swedish upper secondary students reason about the usage of their personal mobile phones in school. As a contribution to the debate around the mobile phone’s role in school, we present the students’ own voices relative to the question of regulating mobile phone use. We use the notion of infrastructure for learning (Guribye and Lindstrom 2009) to analytically approach the social and technological dimensions of the students’ narratives on their use of mobile phones in school practice. The students’ narratives present an intricate account of students’ awareness and concern of the implications of mobile phone presence in school. The students describe that the mobile phone is both a tool that facilitates their school work and a distraction that the teachers pursue. In school, the students are balancing their mobile phone usage with the teachers’ arbitrary enforcement of policy. Despite this process, the mobile phone is becoming a resource in the students’ infrastructure for learning. The findings from this study add to the limited body of research on the use of mobile phone in upper secondary school from a student perspective.

/pdf/it-must-not-disturb-it-s-as-simple-as-that-students-voices-24hf27xbfk.pdf

“It must not disturb, it’s as simple as that”: Students’ voices on mobile phones in the infrastructure for learning in Swedish upper secondary school

The purpose of this paper was to study bereaved parents' use of a closed peer grief support community on Facebook and the features of the community that are important to them. The death of a child is an uncomfortable subject in most contemporary societies. This limits the exploration of experiences and possibilities for coping with grief. However, with the introduction of social media, this has changed. Theoretical perspectives on parental grief recognizing the importance of continued relational bonds with the lost child are used, together with the ontological assumption that social media enhance the dissolving of private/public and time/space. This study is based on questionnaire, interviews, and content from the closed peer grief support community, to which the research team has insider access. The community encompasses a diverse range of experiences and stages of grief, independent of the time elapsed since the loss of a child. Bereavement of children of all ages and from all conceivable causes of death is distributed among the members. The results show how the affordances of social media become vital resources for coping with grief in ways not available previously, comprising aspects of the closed nature of the group, shared experiences, time, and accessibility.

Ylva Hård af Segerstad

Papers

Use and Adaptation of Written Language to the Conditions of Computer-Mediated Communication

Instant messaging with WebWho

Language Use in Swedish Mobile Text Messaging

“It must not disturb, it’s as simple as that”: Students’ voices on mobile phones in the infrastructure for learning in Swedish upper secondary school

A community for grieving: affordances of social media for support of bereaved parents