Digital Sociology

Author: Deborah Lupton
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317691806
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 381

Book Description
We now live in a digital society. New digital technologies have had a profound influence on everyday life, social relations, government, commerce, the economy and the production and dissemination of knowledge. People’s movements in space, their purchasing habits and their online communication with others are now monitored in detail by digital technologies. We are increasingly becoming digital data subjects, whether we like it or not, and whether we choose this or not. The sub-discipline of digital sociology provides a means by which the impact, development and use of these technologies and their incorporation into social worlds, social institutions and concepts of selfhood and embodiment may be investigated, analysed and understood. This book introduces a range of interesting social, cultural and political dimensions of digital society and discusses some of the important debates occurring in research and scholarship on these aspects. It covers the new knowledge economy and big data, reconceptualising research in the digital era, the digitisation of higher education, the diversity of digital use, digital politics and citizen digital engagement, the politics of surveillance, privacy issues, the contribution of digital devices to embodiment and concepts of selfhood and many other topics. Digital Sociology is essential reading not only for students and academics in sociology, anthropology, media and communication, digital cultures, digital humanities, internet studies, science and technology studies, cultural geography and social computing, but for other readers interested in the social impact of digital technologies.

What is Digital Sociology?

Author: Neil Selwyn
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1509527141
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 102

Book Description
The rise of digital technology is transforming the world in which we live. Our digitalized societies demand new ways of thinking about the social, and this short book introduces readers to an approach that can deliver this: digital sociology. Neil Selwyn examines the concepts, tools and practices that sociologists are developing to analyze the intersections of the social and the digital. Blending theory and empirical examples, the five chapters highlight areas of inquiry where digital approaches are taking hold and shaping the discipline of sociology today. The book explores key topics such as digital race and digital labor, as well as the fast-changing nature of digital research methods and diversifying forms of digital scholarship. Designed for use in advanced undergraduate and graduate courses, this timely introduction will be an invaluable resource for all sociologists seeking to focus their craft and thinking toward the social complexities of the digital age.

Digital Sociology

Author: Noortje Marres
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745684823
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 203

Book Description
This provocative new introduction to the field of digital sociology offers a critical overview of interdisciplinary debates about new ways of knowing society that are emerging today at the interface of computing, media, social research and social life. Digital Sociology introduces key concepts, methods and understandings that currently inform the development of specifically digital forms of social enquiry. Marres assesses the relevance and usefulness of digital methods, data and techniques for the study of sociological phenomena and evaluates the major claim that computation makes possible a new ‘science of society’. As Marres argues, the digital does much more than inspire innovation in social research: it forces us to engage anew with fundamental sociological questions. We must learn to appreciate that the digital has the capacity to throw into crisis existing knowledge frameworks and is likely to reconfigure wider relations. This timely engagement with a key transformation of our age will be indispensable reading for undergraduate and graduate students taking courses in digital sociology, digital media, computing and society.

Digital Sociology

Author: K. Orton-Johnson
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137297794
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 253

Book Description
Sociology and our sociological imaginations are having to confront new digital landscapes spanning mediated social relationships, practices and social structures. This volume assesses the substantive challenges faced by the discipline as it critically reassesses its position in the digital age.

Sociological Theory for Digital Society

Author: Ori Schwarz
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781509542963
Category : Information society
Languages : en
Pages : 218

Book Description
"How to rethink social theory in our digital times"--

Digital Sociologies

Author: Daniels, Jessie
Publisher: Policy Press
ISBN: 1447329015
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 528

Book Description
This handbook offers a much-needed overview of the rapidly growing field of digital sociology. Rooted in a critical understanding of inequality as foundational to digital sociology, it connects digital media technologies to traditional areas of study in sociology, such as labor, culture, education, race, class, and gender. It covers a wide variety of topics, including web analytics, wearable technologies, social media analysis, and digital labor. The result is a benchmark volume that places the digital squarely at the forefront of contemporary investigations of the social.

Left to Their Own Devices

Author: Julie M. Albright
Publisher: Prometheus Books
ISBN: 1633884457
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 370

Book Description
A sociologist explores the many ways that digital natives' interaction with technology has changed their relationship with people, places, jobs, and other stabilizing structures and created a new way of life that is at odds with the American Dream of past generations. Digital natives are hacking the American Dream. Young people brought up with the Internet, smartphones, and social media are quickly rendering old habits, values, behaviors, and norms a distant memory--creating the greatest generation gap in history. In this eye-opening book, digital sociologist Julie M. Albright looks at the many ways in which younger people, facilitated by technology, are coming "untethered" from traditional aspirations and ideals, and asks: What are the effects of being disconnected from traditional, stabilizing social structures like churches, marriage, political parties, and long-term employment? What does it mean to be human when one's ties to people, places, jobs, and societal institutions are weakened or broken, displaced by digital hyper-connectivity? Albright sees both positives and negatives. On the one hand, mobile connectivity has given digital nomads the unprecedented opportunity to work or live anywhere. But, new threats to well-being are emerging, including increased isolation, anxiety, and loneliness, decreased physical exercise, ephemeral relationships, fragmented attention spans, and detachment from the calm of nature. In this time of rapid, global, technologically driven change, this book offers fresh insights into the unintended societal and psychological implications of lives exclusively lived in a digital world.

Sociological Theory in the Digital Age

Author: Gabe Ignatow
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000038297
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 186

Book Description
What is the role of sociological theory in the information age? What kinds of theories are best suited to analyzing the social uses of digital technologies, and for using digital technologies in new ways to study the social? This book contributes to several ongoing conversations on how the social sciences can best adapt to contemporary information technologies and information societies. Focusing on practical or ‘usable theory,’ it surveys the challenges and opportunities of conducting social science in the information age, as well as the theoretical solutions that sociologists have developed and applied over the last two decades. With specific attention to three theoretical approaches in digital social research—critical theory, forensic theory and Bourdieusian theory—the author provides an overview of the history and main tenets of each, surveys its use in sociological research, and evaluates its successes and limitations. Taking a long-term view of theoretical development in evaluating schools of thought and considering their productivity in analyzing and using contemporary digital communication technologies, this book thus treats theory as a tool for empirical research and the development of theory as inseparable from research practice. As such, it will appeal to scholars of sociology and social theory with interests in research methods, the development of theory and digital technologies.

Bit by Bit

Author: Matthew J. Salganik
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691196109
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 448

Book Description
This essential guide to doing social research in this fast-evolving digital age explains how the digital revolution is transforming the way social scientists observe behavior, ask questions, run experiments, and engage in mass collaborations.

Digital Sociology in Everyday Life

Author: Jessie Daniels
Publisher: Policy Press
ISBN: 1447329058
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 201

Book Description
Digital technologies, digital media, and mobile technologies now shape the experience of everyday life in the Western world, yet the way our quotidian lives are enmeshed with these technologies is far from clearly understood. Through studies of the digital everyday, sociologists are beginning to reinvigorate the sociological imagination in light of digitization. Chapters in this Byte cover topics such as designing a research framework and how to work ethically as a digital researcher, continually interrogating one’s position as a researcher and reflecting on the process of knowledge creation. Cumulatively, they highlight the value of sociological theory for understanding our digital world.