Dear AoIR-ers - Perhaps only a philosopher would take two data points and create a generalization (smile) - but my curiosity has been tickled regarding the following scenario: a friend with a specific political viewpoint regularly forwards e-mails to a list of friends; at some point, someone in the group strongly disagrees with the perspective / argument represented in a forward - and, instead of ignoring the matter, fires back to the whole group; the original sender is embarrassed, angry, etc. - and promptly excludes the debater from the list for subsequently forwards. This has happened to me recently - and, entirely unrelatedly to my own experience, to a friend. The friend commented: I think e-mail is destroying friendships. O.k. - two data points; but I'm curious if the multitude of expert aoir researchers have looked into this phenomenon, especially in the current context (the war, notions of patriotism, etc., make for especially fractious debates) - perhaps as (a) an e-mail analogue to the now well-known and well-researched phenomena of flaming, etc.; (b) a counterpoint to the multiple ways in which e-mail works to foster and reinforce relationships? Curiously, Charles Ess Distinguished Research Professor, Interdisciplinary Studies Drury University 900 N. Benton Ave. Voice: 417-873-7230 Springfield, MO 65802 USA FAX: 417-873-7435 Home page: http://www.drury.edu/ess/ess.html Co-chair, CATaC: http://www.it.murdoch.edu.au/catac/ Exemplary persons seek harmony, not sameness. -- Analects 13.23
Charles ponders whether email is destroying friendships... Sounds to me like politics are destroying friendships. Is there anything radically different in the scenario Charles poses than a person who raises politics at a party, leading to disagreement, perhaps vehement, and no more party invitations for some of the arguers? Face-to-face communication is clearly the biggest threat to relational survival there is -- almost every relationship that ever gets started ultimately falls apart via f2f communication. But we don't even think to blame face-to-face interaction for their downfall. As an interpersonal communication teacher, I have yet to be convinced there is anything profoundly different about email's role in relationships. Communication builds friendships. Communication destroys friendships. Email is a communication medium. Why wouldn't email destroy friendships as well as help build them? Nancy -- Nancy Baym http://www.ku.edu/home/nbaym Communication Studies, University of Kansas 102 Bailey Hall, 1440 Jayhawk Blvd., Lawrence, KS 66045, USA Association of Internet Researchers: http://aoir.org
As usual, Nancy's critical acumen is helpfully forcing me to sharpen my admittedly vague and diffuse query. Question: in ways analogous to how the decontextualized venues of CMC seem to allow for more aggressive forms of communication - and forms of communication that are themselves decontextualized (e.g., the sharp reply sent not simply to a friend who might know the author well - but also to a range of strangers who have no experience with the author and hence have less ability to interpret his/her meaning, tone, etc.) - is it possible that such e-mail venues as I described might foster less judicious rhetoric (e.g., language use, etc., that one would never use face-to-face) that is thus more likely to be destructive of relationships? I really don't know! My query was sparked by discussion today with friends, in which two different examples of such destruction - severing of e-mail connections as well as reduction of f-2-f engagements with one another - were noted. Again, two examples hardly a generalization make - but at least help occasion a query? Still curiously, Charles Ess Distinguished Research Professor, Interdisciplinary Studies Drury University 900 N. Benton Ave. Voice: 417-873-7230 Springfield, MO 65802 USA FAX: 417-873-7435 Home page: http://www.drury.edu/ess/ess.html Co-chair, CATaC: http://www.it.murdoch.edu.au/catac/ Exemplary persons seek harmony, not sameness. -- Analects 13.23
From: Nancy Baym <nbaym@ku.edu> Reply-To: air-l@aoir.org Date: Sun, 20 Apr 2003 20:40:35 -0500 To: <air-l@aoir.org> Subject: Re: [Air-l] e-mail destroying friendships?
Charles ponders whether email is destroying friendships...
Sounds to me like politics are destroying friendships. Is there anything radically different in the scenario Charles poses than a person who raises politics at a party, leading to disagreement, perhaps vehement, and no more party invitations for some of the arguers? Face-to-face communication is clearly the biggest threat to relational survival there is -- almost every relationship that ever gets started ultimately falls apart via f2f communication. But we don't even think to blame face-to-face interaction for their downfall. As an interpersonal communication teacher, I have yet to be convinced there is anything profoundly different about email's role in relationships. Communication builds friendships. Communication destroys friendships. Email is a communication medium. Why wouldn't email destroy friendships as well as help build them?
Nancy
-- Nancy Baym http://www.ku.edu/home/nbaym Communication Studies, University of Kansas 102 Bailey Hall, 1440 Jayhawk Blvd., Lawrence, KS 66045, USA Association of Internet Researchers: http://aoir.org
_______________________________________________ Air-l mailing list Air-l@aoir.org http://www.aoir.org/mailman/listinfo/air-l
Who says "venues of CMC" are "decontextualized"? ;-) Sheizaf Rafaeli, Quentin (Gad) Jones, Michael Schudson, are among those who I found very useful as I thought through some of the issues associated with the dualisms we tend toward when it comes to face-to-face communication in my Cybersociety 2.0 collection (or to put it another way as I pondered the "f2f vs. the world" card). I continue to be fascinated by the primacy of f2f in our thinking and scholarship, and the privileging of sight it entails and entwines. At the same time as we privilege sight, most often by noting that without seeing communication is "decontextualized" because we cannot see non-verbal expression, in the realm of CMC we are in fact using the sense of sight to read. We're just seeing different "stuff." Is that a loss? Is it a sign of nostalgia? Is it a real difference? Or is it d) all of the above? And what does it mean that we talk about "tone of voice," a decidedly non-visual matter in human perception, in f2f communication? I need not face anyone to hear their tone of voice. Along with Nancy I'm dubious about claims regarding particular forms of communication as, at least implicitly, "ideal" or even "more human" than others (which is not to say that some may not be "more mediated" than others). I'd prefer, I suppose, to center relationships in the human, and to put the onus on humans as actors who create, destroy or repair relationships, making choices from numerous means of communicating one with the other. Sj At 10:26 PM -0500 4/20/03, Charles Ess wrote:
As usual, Nancy's critical acumen is helpfully forcing me to sharpen my admittedly vague and diffuse query. Question: in ways analogous to how the decontextualized venues of CMC seem to allow for more aggressive forms of communication - and forms of communication that are themselves decontextualized (e.g., the sharp reply sent not simply to a friend who might know the author well - but also to a range of strangers who have no experience with the author and hence have less ability to interpret his/her meaning, tone, etc.) - is it possible that such e-mail venues as I described might foster less judicious rhetoric (e.g., language use, etc., that one would never use face-to-face) that is thus more likely to be destructive of relationships?
I really don't know! My query was sparked by discussion today with friends, in which two different examples of such destruction - severing of e-mail connections as well as reduction of f-2-f engagements with one another - were noted. Again, two examples hardly a generalization make - but at least help occasion a query?
Still curiously,
Charles Ess Distinguished Research Professor, Interdisciplinary Studies Drury University 900 N. Benton Ave. Voice: 417-873-7230 Springfield, MO 65802 USA FAX: 417-873-7435 Home page: http://www.drury.edu/ess/ess.html Co-chair, CATaC: http://www.it.murdoch.edu.au/catac/
Exemplary persons seek harmony, not sameness. -- Analects 13.23
From: Nancy Baym <nbaym@ku.edu> Reply-To: air-l@aoir.org Date: Sun, 20 Apr 2003 20:40:35 -0500 To: <air-l@aoir.org> Subject: Re: [Air-l] e-mail destroying friendships?
Charles ponders whether email is destroying friendships...
Sounds to me like politics are destroying friendships. Is there anything radically different in the scenario Charles poses than a person who raises politics at a party, leading to disagreement, perhaps vehement, and no more party invitations for some of the arguers? Face-to-face communication is clearly the biggest threat to relational survival there is -- almost every relationship that ever gets started ultimately falls apart via f2f communication. But we don't even think to blame face-to-face interaction for their downfall. As an interpersonal communication teacher, I have yet to be convinced there is anything profoundly different about email's role in relationships. Communication builds friendships. Communication destroys friendships. Email is a communication medium. Why wouldn't email destroy friendships as well as help build them?
Nancy
-- Nancy Baym http://www.ku.edu/home/nbaym Communication Studies, University of Kansas 102 Bailey Hall, 1440 Jayhawk Blvd., Lawrence, KS 66045, USA Association of Internet Researchers: http://aoir.org
_______________________________________________ Air-l mailing list Air-l@aoir.org http://www.aoir.org/mailman/listinfo/air-l
_______________________________________________ Air-l mailing list Air-l@aoir.org http://www.aoir.org/mailman/listinfo/air-l
Again, my thanks to Steve and Nancy for helping me to sharpen my (increasingly evanescent) question (smile)... I'd be very sorry indeed if my question suggested a privileging of one communication context over another, or a related nostalgia for one form or another. I'd also be sorry to suggest any form of technological determinism (though this wasn't your primary point, I realize). FWIW: I couldn't agree more with the point, that it is best to proceed by way of centering
relationships in the human, and to put the onus on humans as actors who create, destroy or repair relationships, making choices from numerous means of communicating one with the other.
But this still leaves me (I think) with my question - helped along very nicely by Holly Kruse's recent post (thank you!). Let's grant that people who use e-mail and forwarding are actors who create, destroy, and/or repair relationships, and who make choices - with varying degrees of awareness, I would qualify - about the means they use to communicate with one another. Is it possible that (a) the ease of forwarding e-mail to large numbers of people, including friends of one's friends who likely hold to a large range of views and beliefs, perhaps as coupled with (b) the relative ease of saying something rhetorically powerful (perhaps too powerful, all things considered) in response to such e-mails as they offend or contradict - in contrast with the ways in which we may (perhaps because of greater experience, prudence, familiarity with "the other," etc.) exercise greater rhetorical / social restraint in other contexts (including embodied contexts, as these include a range of both verbal and non-verbal modes of communication), may issue in (c) uses of e-mail (rhetorically sharp replies to a whole group, most of whom are strangers, etc.) that (d) evoke sharper, more hostile responses in turn than one would otherwsie expect, based especially on one's experience/relationship with "the Other" in other contexts, (including embodied contexts, as these include a range of both verbal and non-verbal modes of communication)? If this is possible - and it certainly seems so, based on the experiences I alluded to - then it would seem to be of interest as a potentially important phenomenon associated with e-mail and its use. Perhaps research would demonstrate that (a) this sort of thing in fact doesn't happen very often, and / or (b) this sort of thing has no statistically significant impact on long-term friendships, etc. Indeed, this would be interesting to understand better, so that especially if there were statistically significant impacts of this sort, humans as communicative actors could be informed about these and exercise more informed choice and use of specific communication venues. Again, I've no idea what the truth of the matter is here. I was simply hoping that one or more members of the aoir list might have (a) some pointers to research already done that would help illuminate these possibilities, and/or (b) comments and observations that would likewise help me understand all of this more fully from an empirical basis. Again, thanks to Nancy and Steve, as always, for their perspicacious comments and suggestions. with eternally burning hope... Charles Ess Distinguished Research Professor, Interdisciplinary Studies Drury University 900 N. Benton Ave. Voice: 417-873-7230 Springfield, MO 65802 USA FAX: 417-873-7435 Home page: http://www.drury.edu/ess/ess.html Co-chair, CATaC: http://www.it.murdoch.edu.au/catac/ Exemplary persons seek harmony, not sameness. -- Analects 13.23
From: Steve Jones <sjones@uic.edu> Reply-To: air-l@aoir.org Date: Mon, 21 Apr 2003 06:36:39 -0500 To: air-l@aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-l] e-mail destroying friendships?
Who says "venues of CMC" are "decontextualized"? ;-)
Sheizaf Rafaeli, Quentin (Gad) Jones, Michael Schudson, are among those who I found very useful as I thought through some of the issues associated with the dualisms we tend toward when it comes to face-to-face communication in my Cybersociety 2.0 collection (or to put it another way as I pondered the "f2f vs. the world" card). I continue to be fascinated by the primacy of f2f in our thinking and scholarship, and the privileging of sight it entails and entwines. At the same time as we privilege sight, most often by noting that without seeing communication is "decontextualized" because we cannot see non-verbal expression, in the realm of CMC we are in fact using the sense of sight to read. We're just seeing different "stuff." Is that a loss? Is it a sign of nostalgia? Is it a real difference? Or is it d) all of the above?
And what does it mean that we talk about "tone of voice," a decidedly non-visual matter in human perception, in f2f communication? I need not face anyone to hear their tone of voice.
Along with Nancy I'm dubious about claims regarding particular forms of communication as, at least implicitly, "ideal" or even "more human" than others (which is not to say that some may not be "more mediated" than others). I'd prefer, I suppose, to center relationships in the human, and to put the onus on humans as actors who create, destroy or repair relationships, making choices from numerous means of communicating one with the other.
Sj
Charles Ess wrote:
(a) the ease of forwarding e-mail to large numbers of people, including friends of one's friends who likely hold to a large range of views and beliefs, perhaps as coupled with (b) the relative ease of saying something rhetorically powerful (perhaps too powerful, all things considered) in response to such e-mails as they offend or contradict - in contrast with the ways in which we may (perhaps because of greater experience, prudence, familiarity with "the other," etc.) exercise greater rhetorical / social restraint in other contexts (including embodied contexts, as these include a range of both verbal and non-verbal modes of communication),
I think all of this nicely ties into: 1. Alstyne, M. V. and Brynjolfsson, Erik. "Electronic Communities: Global Village or Cyber-Balkanization?" Proceedings of the International Conference on Information Systems, Cleveland, OH. (1996). 2. My research on online groups and information overload. See the paper coming out in ECSCW2003! The logic is that the internet lets us interact with more social information, so much so that we have to become more and more selective about what we read and who we interact with. Your physical neighbors and physical colleagues with which you often have face-to-face interactions with you often do not have that choice. The result is that email list differences I would argue are more likely to led to a parting of the ways. Although email groups are more stable than usenet newsgroups. Hence off topic discussions about Iraq or other political issues being a problem for many online groups, where as physical groups may have more stability. Quentin
participants (4)
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Charles Ess -
Nancy Baym -
Quentin (Gad) Jones -
Steve Jones