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(More customer reviews)This work is honestly not for the non-academic. Rich Ling takes up an interesting question: can mediated interactions - ones that take place through some form of technology rather than face to face - have the same outcomes that we would expect from interaction ritual theory?
To begin with, one needs to understand the context of that question and what his claim - that interactions through phones (particularly cellphones) meet the criteria of interaction ritual - and know that he is engaging Randall Collins (and by extension Erving Goffman and Emile Durkheim's work on interactions) theory about what makes up a "successful interaction".
By analyzing cellphone conversations (admittedly, his methodology is a little spotty, but not to an extent that undermines his findings) Ling is able to point to how phone conversations still involved the entrainment of the participants and an emotional engagement usually thought to be the product of embodied interaction. At the very least, Ling's book points toward further research questions on how different forms of technology and media affect our social interactions and what that means for emerging social life.
i recommend this for those interested in social theory, media, and technology. i DO NOT recommend this to the casual reader unless you are looking for something completely different.
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How cell phones and mobile communication may in many cases strengthensocial cohesion.
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