1st Edition
The Mobile Media Debate Challenging Viewpoints Across Epistemologies
An accessible, engaging, and timely overview of the key debates surrounding the role of mobile media in today’s society.
Edited by Thilo von Pape and Veronika Karnowski, this volume includes contributions from a variety of geographical and disciplinary backgrounds, reflecting the diverse standpoints within the field of mobile media and communication. The collection explores perspectives from the micro-level of individual or small group appropriation of mobile media, to the uses and effects among larger communities, public spaces, and societies at large. The chapters address individual uses and effects of mobile media, such as problematic smartphone use, news consumption through mobile media, and mobile media as an empowerment tool for entrepreneurs. They also discuss the role of mobile media in private and professional social constellations (phubbing, personal mobile device use at work) and in struggles over personal empowerment, counter-power, and global development. Looking beyond the smartphone, the book also explores underlying infrastructures and emerging technologies such as augmented and virtual reality.
This book is a key resource for students and scholars of media and communication, as well as policy-makers and practitioners working in related areas such as media education.
Introduction Thilo von Pape and Veronika Karnowski Part I Mobile Media and the Individual 1. Mobile Media Empowering Micro-entrepreneurship? The Chinese Case Study Haiqing Yu 2. News on Smartphones: Exposure, Consumption, and Information through mobile media Logan Molyneux and Lexi Haskell 3. The Smartphone as Physical Object: Advancing The Debate on Problematic Smartphone Use Lara Wolfers and Kathrin Karsay Part II Mobile Media and Small Groups and Families 4. Phubbing: A Debate over Connection vs. Divided Presence Bree McEwan 5. Communication of Permanently Connected Groups (PeCoG). Harnessing the Potential of Small Group Research in Mobile Communication Katharina Knop-Huelss 6. Stop Co-opting Personal Mobile Devices for Organizational Use: Considering the Person and Equity Costs Keri Stephens, Emily Norman, and Jiayu Sun Part III Mobile Media and Space - local, public, and global 7. Networking Mobility as Urban Counter Power Tin-Yuet Ting 8. Infrastructures Enabling Creativity and Play in Hybrid Spaces Ragan Glover-Rijkse 9. But This Time It’s Different: The Debate Over Augmented/Virtual Reality Effects, Cognition, Consciousness, and Identity Tony Liao 10. The mobilization of global development Araba Sey
Biography
Thilo von Pape is Professor of Communication Studies at the Department of Communication and Media and Media Research (DCM) at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland. He was founding editor of the journal Mobile Media & Communication and is currently co-editor-in-chief of the journal Studies in Communication Sciences (SComS). His work focuses on the use of digital communication technologies and mobile media, as well as related transformations in communication and mobility.
Veronika Karnowski is Professor of Media and Communication at Chemnitz University of Technology, Germany. She is founding editor of the journal Mobile Media & Communication and currently also an associate editor for the Journal of Computer-mediated Communication. Her work focuses on media change in users’ everyday lives. She especially focuses on questions of mobile media use in various contexts, health communication, and social inequalities.
"The Mobile Media Debate brilliantly challenges mobile communication scholars to engage with the multiple—and often contradictory—aspects of how we interact with mobile media at the individual, small group, social, and spatial level. The authors in von Pape and Karnowski’s collection provide a state-of-the-art overview of the field by highlighting its intrinsic tensions, along with future directions." – Adriana de Souza e Silva, Professor, NC State University, USA
"The Mobile Media Debate presents a varied and up-to-date selection of debates on the social implications of mobile media that are at the heart of scholarly and public discussion. The thought-provoking chapters invite the reader to reflect upon the role of mobile media in contemporary society, asking questions such as whether mobile media empower or disempower, are social or antisocial, and have political power." – Mariek Vanden Abeele, Associate Professor, Ghent University, Belgium
