Magic in the air : mobile communication and the transformation of social life
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
Magic in the air : mobile communication and the transformation of social life
Transaction Publishers, c2006
Available at 4 libraries
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  Kyoto
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  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
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  Tokushima
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  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
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  United Kingdom
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Note
Includes bibliographical references and index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
In this timely volume, James E. Katz, a leading authority on social consequences of communication technology, analyzes the way new mobile telecommunications affect daily life both in the United States and around the world.
Magic in the Air is the most wide-ranging analysis of mobile communication to date. Katz investigates the spectrum of social aspects of the cell phone's impact on society and the way social forces affect the use, display, and re-configuration of the cell phone. Surveying the mobile phone's current and emerging role in daily life, Katz finds that it provides many benefits for the user, and that some of these benefits are subtle and even counter-intuitive. He also identifies ways the mobile phone has not been entirely positive. After reviewing these he outlines some steps to ameliorate the mobile phone's negative effects. Katz also discusses use and abuse of mobile phones in educational settings, where he finds that their use is eroding students' participation in class even as it is helping them to cheat on exams and cut class. Parents no longer object to their children having mobile phones in class in a post-Columbine and 9/11 era; instead they are pressing schools to change their rules to allow students to have their phones available during class. And mobile phone misbehavior is by no means limited to students: Katz finds that teachers are increasingly taking calls in the middle of class, even interrupting their own lectures to answer what they claim are important calls.
In keeping with the book's title, Katz explores the often overlooked psychic and religious uses of the mobile phone, an area that has only recently begun to command scholarly interest. Magic in the Air will be essential reading for communications specialists, sociologists, and social psychologists.
Table of Contents
Preface and Acknowledgements, Part 1: Mobile Communication and Social Transformation, Part 2: Telecommunication and Information in Society: Past, Present, and Future, Index
by "Nielsen BookData"