Internet Society: The Internet in Everyday Life

A highly topical, interesting and lively analysis of ordinary Internet use, based on both theoretically competent reflections and sound ethnographic material′ - Joost van Loon, Reader in Social Theory at Nottingham Trent University

Internet Society investigates Internet use and its implications for society through insights into the daily experiences of ordinary users. Drawing on an original study of non-professional, ′ordinary′ users at home, this book examines how people interpret, domesticate, and creatively appropriate the Internet by integrating it into the projects and activities of their everyday lives.

Maria Bakardjieva′s theoretical framework uniquely combines concepts from several schools of thought (social constructivism, critical theory, phenomenological sociology) to provide a conception of the user as an agent in the field of technological development and new media shaping. She:

- examines the evolution of the Internet into a mass medium

- interrogates what users make of this new communication medium

- evaluates the social and cultural role of the Internet by looking at the immediate level of users′ engagement with it

- exposes the dual life of technology as invader and captive; colonizer and colonized

This book will appeal to academics and researchers in social studies of technology, communication and media studies, cultural studies, philosophy of technology and ethnography.