1st Edition

Social Theory and Communication Technology

By Terje Rasmussen Copyright 2000
    228 Pages
    by Routledge

    228 Pages
    by Routledge

    This title was first published in 2001. An investigation of new forms of interaction and communication. The essays address theoretical contributions and insights which may assist us in the understanding of modern society inhabited by a wide range of new media.In order to answer questions on this subject, the text suggests a "structural hermeneutic" - a view on the public as agents embedded in their lifeworlds (rather than as consumers and receivers), who play a large part in reproducing structural and distanciated processes of meaning. The essays explore the implications of such daily practices as making a telephone call or sending an email, receiving money from a bank machine using a credit card, or retrieving information from a Web site. Each of these practices reproduce patterns of information and communication practices, which reshape communication processes in society. The essays examine the relationship between media change and social change, with particular emphasis on their contribution to social interaction in everyday life and in the reproduction of social systems.

    1. Introduction: New Media Theory.  2. Structuration Theory and the New Media: Insights and Problems.  3. Habermas' Critical Theory of Modernity: Insights and Problems.  4. Social Action in a Digital World.  5. New Media and the Contexts of Daily Life.  6. The New Risks: Digital Disembedding and Reembedding.  7. New Media and the Social Integration of Society.

    Biography

    Terje Rasmussen is Professor of Media Studies at the Department of Media and Communication, University of Oslo, Norway. His books in English include Social Theory and Communication Technology and Digital Media Revisited: Theoretical and Conceptual Innovations in Digital Domains (with Gunnar Liestol and Andrew Morrison).