[Air-l] Postal mail and e-mail

[Steve Jones]

In addition to what others have suggested, I'd also recommend the work 
of my UIC colleague Richard John, particularly his book Spreading the 
News: The American Postal System from Franklin to Morse. While it 
doesn't directly address the "email vs. postal mail" matter, it is a 
remarkably insightful history of the U.S. postal service from the 
perspective of a media historian, and I think it can provide much 
material for you concerning the evolution of postal mail, its use and 
attitudes toward it.

His cv with an extensive list of publications is online at 
http://www.uic.edu/depts/hist/Faculty/john.html

Sj


On Aug 5, 2005, at 12:10 PM, Ledbetter, Andrew Michael wrote:

> I am currently writing a literature review on how various 
> communication modalities are used in interpersonal contexts. One 
> modality I am (not surprisingly) finding little material on is postal 
> mail. In particular, I am looking for sources that either (a) address 
> changes in postal mail use with the advent of e-mail or (b) 
> qualitative comparisons of the use of postal mail and e-mail within 
> interpersonal relationships. In particular, I have heard anecdotal 
> reports of e-mail being more "convenient" but postal mail being 
> "special" in a way that e-mail is not, though I have not found 
> scholarly material that documents this perception.
>
> Does anyone know of scholarly articles that address these issues?
>
> Thanks,
> Andrew
>
> ----------------
> Andrew M. Ledbetter
> Ph.D. student, University of Kansas
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