Bell and McLelland
In the article The Age of the Thumb by Genevieve Bell tells how mobile technology has become such an important part of daily life for people living in China. Cell phone users in China account for one-third of the population of cell phone users in the entire world. Text messages are used more than the actual phone, the character rich language allows for more conversation in one text than an English language phone. Elsewhere in Asia, the popularity of cell phones is increasingly higher. In Singapore, there are more cell phones than citizens. Some of the main factors behind these high numbers are the competitive, and therefore cheap, calling plans and pricing policies. Another reason why the cell phone is such a popular way of communicating comes from the social norms in Asia. “Staying in touch” was one of the main reasons people used their mobile devices. Security, especially between parents and children, is another reason. Many users of cell phones have more than one phone for work or personal, or different ring tones to easily establish the severity of a call. Because the numbers of cell phone users is so high, a sort of social standard has been set on the appropriate situation or scenario in which a cell phone is used. Other advantages to cell phone use are the many wickets, or applications, that are used to do everything form hail a taxi or check flight information. Of course, with every new technology come the negative aspects, including the potential to be the victim of petty crime and studies showing cell phone use adds to rise of divorce and suicide. From this article, we have learned that cell phones are not only pieces of technology but also “constellations of social and cultural practice.”
In the second article Mark McLelland begins by addressing that the use and norms of cell phones differ from country to country based on their private and professional societies. McLelland agrees that technology is not universal, especially not between Asian countries and the United States. Cell phones in Japan became most popular by the teenage girls that used them not only to make phone calls, but as fashion statements and signs of wealth, mainly through downloadable ringtones, graphics, and wallpapers. Other fashion statements include adding decorative jewels or custom painting to the cell phone covers. McLelland reemphasizes a lot of points we’ve already made in class, including the relationship of migrant workers with cell phones, and how news of the SARS outbreak was spread through text message. Teenage girls take such a liking to cell phones because it provides a safe and private way of communication in a country where girls of this age have a lot of standards to follow. In the Philippines, some people choose not to take out their phones in public because it is a threat to their safety and can easily be stolen.
These articles relate to pretty much each of the previous topics we’ve discussed in class, we are now just seeing them in the context of Asian countries instead of America. We can see that a lot of what we consider common cell phone etiquette is actually much different in other countries. Still, there are similarities, like in the way we use cell phones to show status or personality. Also, the countries are alike in the use of text messaging as a way to be more private, faster, and to the point. McLelland uses a lot of quotes from Castells, but adds to it more research done by himself and even Genevieve Bell. The overall message of the two articles is that a simple piece of technology that we believe is used the same way and with the same intentions throughout the world actually has a much more broad social aspect behind it depending on the location.
Megan Forman