Blog Post #2: Technological Determinism

The technological determinism perspective assumes that new sets of technology define societal relationships, beliefs, and values. In this blog post, I will examine how technology has evidently shaped Katherine's life. By comparing the generational differences between her father's childhood and her's and how technology impacts her actions, we can clearly see the causal effects of technology.

In the article, Katherine's father reflects on his own childhood. Since phones weren't as developed nor popularized during his youth, many of his interactions were face-to-face and in physical spaces. He rode his bike his friends' houses and played outdoors until dinner. In comparison, Katherine's friends have never been to her house. Their presence is experienced through her phone - her everyday interactions are mediated by digital technologies.  Unlike her father's childhood, mobile telepathy has enabled Katherine's interactions to overcome the limitations of time and space.

From our readings, Baym argues that "machines change us" (17). Given the example of Nick Carr, who believes that technological developments, such as Google, has trained his attention span to be shorter. In the same way, we can see how Katherine's attention span is short from her ability to flip through many apps within 12 minutes. These apps are programmed to offer just seconds of information as you scroll your feed, rather than encourage long-form reading.

Furthermore, there are also emotional consequences of technology. As witnessed momentarily by Katherine when she misplaces her phone - she experiences a fear of loneliness and possibly missing out. The online world, created by technology, has a greater impact on Katherine and the interactions that occur there are not to be missed. She's so immersed in the virtual world on her iPhone, that she doesn't even notice when her dog wants to be let out of the car. In this sense, what's happening on her phone (how many likes she has, followers, views) has become more important than the material world she is.

Vivian Chow

Comments

  1. UnknownOctober 6, 2018 at 6:49 PM

    I like how you made the comparison between the fathers upbringing with limited technology to Katherine’s current situation where technology and her phone seems to take centre stage in her life. This comparison shed some light onto considering the technological determinism perspective in which I had initially overlooked when writing my original discussion post. Specifically, we can look at how differently the generations interacted with their friends simply due to the introduction of technology. When looking at the father’s formative years it’s almost as if he remembers it as a very carefree time in which spending time with friends was linked to having fun, playing outside and living in the present. Katherine on the other hand seems to be experiencing a lot of stress in to regards to how she is seen on social media and how interactive she's being with her followers on each platform. Her time "spent with friends" seems to have almost formed hostile and competitive environment where she feels pressure to conform. I feel as if many of her experiences with friends may have been more similar to those of her dads prior to obtaining a phone, therefore linking her current tendencies and anxieties to the cause of technological determinism.

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  2. UnknownOctober 6, 2018 at 6:51 PM

    I like how you made the comparison between the fathers upbringing with limited technology to Katherine’s current situation where technology and her phone seems to take centre stage in her life. This comparison shed some light onto considering the technological determinism perspective in which I had initially overlooked when writing my original discussion post. Specifically, we can look at how differently the generations interacted with their friends simply due to the introduction of technology. When looking at the father’s formative years it’s almost as if he remembers it as a very carefree time in which spending time with friends was linked to having fun, playing outside and living in the present. Katherine on the other hand seems to be experiencing a lot of stress in to regards to how she is seen on social media and how interactive she's being with her followers on each platform. Her time "spent with friends" seems to have almost formed hostile and competitive environment where she feels pressure to conform. I feel as if many of her experiences with friends may have been more similar to those of her dads prior to obtaining a phone, therefore linking her current tendencies and anxieties to the cause of technological determinism.

    ReplyDelete

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