Literature wanted: what does it feel like to use a computer?
I presume there is literature out there taking a phenomenological view of what using a computer feels like but I am not sure where to start looking. I hope to use it to buttress a hunch I have about why people seem to have trouble in managing public vs private space online. My feeling is that its because typing stuff into a computer just doesnt feel like you're addressing a large crowd at that moment - it feels like you are talking to yourself (unless you are addressing it to particular named other people who you can then visualise). One can make a similar point about the long life of blog postings. They feel conversational, not like having something published and indexed. Anyway given this example I hope you can see the kind of literature which might help here. Any ideas? If not of texts directly about the experience of using a computer then perhaps just the best literature to apply to approach the subject generally. Schutz? --- David Brake, Doctoral Student in Media and Communications, London School of Economics & Political Science <http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/media@lse/study/ mPhilPhDMediaAndCommunications.htm> Also see http://davidbrake.org/ (home page), http://blog.org/ (personal weblog) and http://get.to/lseblog (academic groupblog) Author of Dealing With E-Mail - <http://davidbrake.org/ dealingwithemail/> callto://DavidBrake (Skype.com's Instant Messenger and net phone) Please access the attached hyperlink for an important electronic communications disclaimer: http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/secretariat/legal/disclaimer.htm
I'd suggest that you start with Sherry Turkle's _The Second Self_ - I'd think that that book, with all of its discussion of how we conceptualize the computer as tool and otherwise, would be the eventual lynchpin of whatever argument you're constructing, or at least on abutting it... --elijah On Tue, 18 Sep 2007, David Brake wrote:
Date: Tue, 18 Sep 2007 10:36:44 +0100 From: David Brake <d.r.brake@lse.ac.uk> Reply-To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org To: AoIR mailing list <air-l-aoir.org@listserv.aoir.org> Subject: [Air-L] Literature wanted: what does it feel like to use a computer?
I presume there is literature out there taking a phenomenological view of what using a computer feels like but I am not sure where to start looking. I hope to use it to buttress a hunch I have about why people seem to have trouble in managing public vs private space online. My feeling is that its because typing stuff into a computer just doesnt feel like you're addressing a large crowd at that moment - it feels like you are talking to yourself (unless you are addressing it to particular named other people who you can then visualise). One can make a similar point about the long life of blog postings. They feel conversational, not like having something published and indexed.
Anyway given this example I hope you can see the kind of literature which might help here. Any ideas? If not of texts directly about the experience of using a computer then perhaps just the best literature to apply to approach the subject generally. Schutz?
--- David Brake, Doctoral Student in Media and Communications, London School of Economics & Political Science <http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/media@lse/study/ mPhilPhDMediaAndCommunications.htm> Also see http://davidbrake.org/ (home page), http://blog.org/ (personal weblog) and http://get.to/lseblog (academic groupblog) Author of Dealing With E-Mail - <http://davidbrake.org/ dealingwithemail/> callto://DavidBrake (Skype.com's Instant Messenger and net phone)
Please access the attached hyperlink for an important electronic communications disclaimer: http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/secretariat/legal/disclaimer.htm _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
Clifford Nass and his colleagues have done a great deal of work on how people relate to computers. While this work doesn't exactly address the question you pose, it does examine the nature of human-computer interactions. Bascially, their results show that under surprisingly varied conditions people treat computers as they treat other individuals, invoking and following the same social rules and norms. Jacquelyn Burkell ----- Original Message ----- From: elw@stderr.org Date: Tuesday, September 18, 2007 9:46 am Subject: Re: [Air-L] Literature wanted: what does it feel like to use a computer? To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org
I'd suggest that you start with Sherry Turkle's _The Second Self_ - I'd think that that book, with all of its discussion of how we conceptualize the computer as tool and otherwise, would be the eventual lynchpin of whatever argument you're constructing, or at least on abutting it...
--elijah
On Tue, 18 Sep 2007, David Brake wrote:
Date: Tue, 18 Sep 2007 10:36:44 +0100 From: David Brake <d.r.brake@lse.ac.uk> Reply-To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org To: AoIR mailing list <air-l-aoir.org@listserv.aoir.org> Subject: [Air-L] Literature wanted: what does it feel like to use a computer?
I presume there is literature out there taking a phenomenological view of what using a computer feels like but I am not sure where to start looking. I hope to use it to buttress a hunch I have about why people seem to have trouble in managing public vs private space online. My feeling is that its because typing stuff into a computer just doesnt feel like you're addressing a large crowd at that moment - it feels like you are talking to yourself (unless you are addressing it to particular named other people who you can then visualise). One can make a similar point about the long life of blog postings. They feel conversational, not like having something published and indexed.
Anyway given this example I hope you can see the kind of literature which might help here. Any ideas? If not of texts directly about the experience of using a computer then perhaps just the best literature to apply to approach the subject generally. Schutz?
--- David Brake, Doctoral Student in Media and Communications, London School of Economics & Political Science <http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/media@lse/study/ mPhilPhDMediaAndCommunications.htm> Also see http://davidbrake.org/ (home page), http://blog.org/ (personal weblog) and http://get.to/lseblog (academic groupblog) Author of Dealing With E-Mail - <http://davidbrake.org/ dealingwithemail/> callto://DavidBrake (Skype.com's Instant Messenger and net phone)
Please access the attached hyperlink for an important electronic communications disclaimer: http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/secretariat/legal/disclaimer.htm> _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org> Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
_______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
Dr. Jacquelyn Burkell, Associate Professor Faculty of Information and Media Studies The University of Western Ontario London, Ontario Phone: 519-661-2111 ext 88506 Fax: 519-661-3506
David, I wonder if the literature on anonymity, flaming,trolls etc might be a place to start. -A David Brake <d.r.brake@lse.ac.uk> wrote: I presume there is literature out there taking a phenomenological view of what using a computer feels like but I am not sure where to start looking. I hope to use it to buttress a hunch I have about why people seem to have trouble in managing public vs private space online. My feeling is that its because typing stuff into a computer just doesnt feel like you're addressing a large crowd at that moment - it feels like you are talking to yourself (unless you are addressing it to particular named other people who you can then visualise). One can make a similar point about the long life of blog postings. They feel conversational, not like having something published and indexed. Anyway given this example I hope you can see the kind of literature which might help here. Any ideas? If not of texts directly about the experience of using a computer then perhaps just the best literature to apply to approach the subject generally. Schutz? --- David Brake, Doctoral Student in Media and Communications, London School of Economics & Political Science mPhilPhDMediaAndCommunications.htm> Also see http://davidbrake.org/ (home page), http://blog.org/ (personal weblog) and http://get.to/lseblog (academic groupblog) Author of Dealing With E-Mail - dealingwithemail/> callto://DavidBrake (Skype.com's Instant Messenger and net phone) Please access the attached hyperlink for an important electronic communications disclaimer: http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/secretariat/legal/disclaimer.htm _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/ --------------------------------- Yahoo! oneSearch: Finally, mobile search that gives answers, not web links.
participants (4)
-
Alecea Standlee -
David Brake -
elw＠stderr.org -
Jacquelyn Burkell