Social shaping as discussed in Chapter 2 describes how culture and society adapts and revolves around the introduction and continual use of new technologies. According to Baym, "Social media platforms engineer particular kinds of sociality even as their users develop morns around their use (van Dijck, 2013)". This highlights how social media platforms in particular, such as Instagram and Snapchat are responsible for indicating how people should live their lives, and what should be most important to them. In the article "13, right now: This is what it's like to grow up in the age of likes, lols and longing", it describes Katherine Pommerening's habits and mannerisms concerning her phone in great detail. The young teen is constantly opening and closing social media apps on her phone in a short amount of time. When she finally peers her head up from her phone screen, she realizes that she is home and that duration of time has escaped her while she was so enveloped by her phone and the virtual profiles on each platform.
There are several anxieties concerning the young generation and social shaping due to technological advances. One anxiety is the ability to waste incredible amounts of time without fully engaging in one activity. For example, Katherine is constantly opening and closing the apps on her phone on the car ride home, and isn't fully absorbing any information from a single app. Instead, Katherine's focus for each app is limited as she moves onto the next without really thinking- almost as if she was bored in a matter of seconds. A second anxiety is regarding Snapchat is the ability to document ever second of your life, with the mindset that your "friends" really care to see it. The anxiety revolves around both parties, the person posting the story, and the person viewing the story. The person posting the story feels the need to let her "friends" know what she is doing at all times, in hopes of reassurance or jealousy. The person viewing the story is blindly viewing someone's day without really absorbing the information. As well as this person can feel left out or FOMO (fear of missing out) for not participating or experiencing the same event as the person who posted the story. People always try to make their profiles as "cool" as they can to provoke jealousy and a false sense of admiration.
An important ideology to mention, is the fact that before the creation and introduction of social media platforms or new digital media, people were not subject to feeling this way. This is technology shaping our society and our cultures without us even being aware that it is happening. It moves too fast for us to stop, and in the blink of an eye, the entire generation has become so dependent on mobile devices, as well as so concerned with likes and followers- things that never used to matter. People are becoming obsessed with virtuality and are no longer living in the moment.
Hi Taylor!
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading your blog. I agree with everything in this post. Technology and social media are shaping the way we see ourselves and the way we see others. We are so dependent on our cell phones to stay connected and up-to-date. The constant need for checking in with social media is all because society has developed a deep fear of missing out (FOMO). You are right on with saying that people are no longer just living in the moment. I was just in Ottawa and the amount of people that were looking at the Parliament Building through the camera on their phone instead of with their own two eyes was astounding. Sometimes I find myself doing the same thing which is a big change in the ways I used to do things as a child.
I completely agree with your spot. I really enjoyed the part where oy are talking about FOMO because I think that social media plays a big part in that. A lot of people do not experience FOMO until they go on social media and see how much of a good time what had at the thing they missed, I don't think FOMO would be as much of a issue if social media was not a thing. I might not really care about missing a night out with friends but when I see on instragram how much fun they look like they are having, I might suddenly wish I went.
ReplyDeleteGreat post, I really enjoyed reading it!
ReplyDeleteI as well agree with you that technology has shaped the way we see ourselves and how we interact with others to a concerning degree. This summer when I was at the Dixie Chicks concert I caught myself paying more attention to snapchatting the concert on my phone instead of enjoying the concert itself. As I looked around I saw I was far from the only one, we are not living in the moment instead we are missing out on the actual moment and living through a lens.