[Air-L] CMC - mobile phones included?

Tue Jul 16 08:08:54 PDT 2013

Who cares?

I don't mean that to be dismissive, I mean it as a real question. CMC
isn't a "thing" without its context. Louis mentions CMC as a "field."
And OK, but even that is awfully vague. It seems that this question is
often raised as a "that doesn't 'count' in our field"--a label for
excluding certain ways of doing research or thinking about it. Without
that context, the discussion of what to call this stuff seems to me to
be a bit like arguing about angels and pins. Who cares what it's
called or how it's clustered?

Off-hand, I can think of a few contexts in which people might care:

* The purview of a journal. ("Oh, no, we can't publish that in JCMC,
because it has to do with mobile communication!")

* A curriculum. ("How could we have a CMC degree without ever having a
course in social networks‽")

* A department. ("We can't hire her, she doesn't really *do* CMC.")

* To apply a theory. ("While I can't make the claim that this
relationship holds for all media, in CMC, X appears to be related to Y
in the following Z ways.")

The first three of these seem to me to be largely questions of setting
up borders for defending academic silos: again, the sort of
"psychiatry isn't a science!" border policing that lets people defend
turf. To me, those questions end up being pretty wasteful of time and
energy. Isn't it about time for another Crisis in the Field (name your
field) special issue?

The last of these might have some merit, but requires that the range
be provisionally and explicitly defined. I can say that what I am
writing about extends to social media, but I need to be clear about
what I mean when I say it, and whether it includes telephones (or
newspapers, or only Facebook, etc.).

I recognize that shorthand may be useful ("This is CMC; these are the
important theorists to the field; these are the journals that count;
these are the places where it is studied") but ultimately I suspect
that it's a lot of work to set up boundaries that have little hope of
holding and can do as much injury as good.

- Alex

On Tue, Jul 16, 2013 at 7:05 AM,  <Richard.Ling at telenor.com> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I am interested that CMC is now (perhaps?) being applied to mobile comm. There is a long tradition (on the side of mobile research) of simply calling it mobile communication. My sense is that this has been common for the last decade. Clearly there are exceptions, but there is a legacy along these lines. There is a strong flavor of one-to-one interaction, mediated through telecom networks using mobile phones.
>
> More recently there has been the rise of smart phones that combine the more traditional mobile communication (that is one-to-one interaction) with more SNS type of quasi-broadcast mode. Again, there are many shades of this discussion.
>
> There are computers involved in all of this so in a broad sense "computer mediated" is applicable. However, it seems as though folding social networking into the mobile handset has given the discussion a turn in the direction of internet or PC-based nomenclature.
>
> Rich L.
>
> Sent from IPhone
>
> On 16. juli 2013, at 15:47, "Lois Scheidt" <lscheidt at indiana.edu> wrote:
>
>> Susan Herring has an article that addresses state of the field in CMC at:
>> Herring, S. C., Stein, D., & Virtanen, T., Eds. (2013). Introduction to the
>> pragmatics of computer-mediated communication. Handbook of pragmatics of
>> computer-mediated communication (pp. 3-31). Berlin: Mouton. Prepublication
>> version:
>> http://ella.slis.indiana.edu/~herring/CMC.pragmatics.intro.herring.et.al.pdf
>>
>> She also has an article that tackles the nomenclature issue but I'm not
>> putting my hands on it at the moment. I've cc'd her so maybe she can
>> contribute that information or one of the other readers may have it as well.
>>
>> Lois
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Jul 16, 2013 at 4:21 AM, Pask-Hughes, Alexander <
>> a.pask-hughes at lancaster.ac.uk> wrote:
>>
>>> Dear all,
>>>
>>> I did reply off list to suggest Caroline Tagg's book about the discourse
>>> of text messaging, though in retrospect I'm not sure that really answers
>>> Darja's question.
>>>
>>> One problem, which has been alluded to, is that the term CMC presupposes
>>> that the thing doing the mediating (the "computer"), is what defines the
>>> communication in some way. And it might be, but I think it might be
>>> dangerous to presuppose this.
>>>
>>> The other issue is what CMC is contrasted with. Are we saying that
>>> "computer-mediated communication" is somehow different from "face-to-face
>>> communication"? What about those contexts where face-to-face communication
>>> is computer-mediated in a less obvious way? For example, when I go into a
>>> coffee shop and am speaking to the cashier, is this "computer-mediated
>>> communication"? Well, yes, in the sense that the "computer" (the "till" or
>>> "cash register") is mediating our interaction. And if we're extending the
>>> term to account for practices such as these, does the term start to lose
>>> it's usefulness?
>>>
>>> From this perspective, I have a feeling that some of the Scollon's work
>>> (e.g. Mediated Discourse: The Nexus of Practice [2001] or Nexus Analysis:
>>> Discourse and the Emerging Internet [2004]) or work in Literacy Studies
>>> (e.g. by David Barton, Michele Knobel, Colin Lankshear, Guy Merchant) may
>>> be useful for you.
>>>
>>> Alexander David Pask-Hughes
>>>
>>> Department of Linguistics and English Language
>>> Lancaster University
>>>
>>> a.pask-hughes at lancaster.ac.uk
>>> adpaskhughes at hotmail.co.uk
>>>
>>> Twitter: @adpaskhughes
>>> ________________________________________
>>> From: air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org [air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org]
>>> on behalf of Lovaas,Steven [Steven.Lovaas at ColoState.EDU]
>>> Sent: 16 July 2013 07:33
>>> To: Charles Ess; Jennifer Stromer-Galley; Darja Dayter; Air list
>>> Subject: Re: [Air-L] CMC - mobile phones included?
>>>
>>> Charles, Jenny and Darja,
>>>
>>> Personally, as an IT security professional, I find the notion of 'digital
>>> bug spray' quite appealing :)
>>>
>>> But as for CMC, while the term has a certain cachet simply through
>>> repeated use, it does seem (to me) to suggest a limit on what counts as a
>>> valid instance of "communication": the transmissional model of
>>> person-->technology-->person and back again. The computer (or a network
>>> thereof) is the mediator... a mere tool; only people are privileged as
>>> proper communicators. I'm not necessarily suggesting that we always (or
>>> ever) have deep, meaningful relationships with our computing platform of
>>> choice, but certainly we ought at least to consider that some non-human
>>> elements of our vast global technological web might be considered valid
>>> communication partners in their own right. If that's even vaguely
>>> palatable, what then is the mediator in CMC?
>>>
>>> "ICT" seems too heavily technology-oriented, while "HCI" seems to ignore
>>> the human-to-human aspect. Ought we strive for an all-encompassing term
>>> that expresses something like "communication across, through, with, and
>>> about computer technology"? Or maybe we should take a step back... what did
>>> we call it before the advent of the interwebs? I believe we naively,
>>> quaintly referred to it simply as Communication, understanding that it
>>> could happen face-to-face or over a telephone line or two-way radio or even
>>> video-phone. If it was one-way, from single producer to many consumers, we
>>> might narrow it down to "Mass" comm, but it was still communication no
>>> matter what technology was used (paper, radio waves, or whatever).
>>> "Technical" communication had more to do with communicating technical
>>> topics than with any particular medium. In fact, "medium" is the mediator
>>> (if not always the message). Can I have mediated communication in which the
>>> mediator is a human? Certainly. Can I similarly have direct, unmediated
>>> communication with a computer artifact? I think so. And, based on the
>>> wonderfully diverse papers I heard in Salford last year, we care about all
>>> of those shades of meaning.
>>>
>>> OK, so where does that leave us? We tend to want to say things that are
>>> fairly broadly (if not universally) true, or at least useful across
>>> contexts. The internet (yes, including mobile phones) has become a pretty
>>> stinkin' huge context, and some folks are wondering whether we need to be
>>> attending to the possibilities of communicative relationships with
>>> non-human actors. So. If the M (mediated) feels too limiting, and the first
>>> C (computer) is too prescriptive, does retreating to "just" Communication
>>> feel somehow unsatisfying?
>>>
>>> Some organizations from the early days of the internet (q.v. Computer
>>> Professionals for Social Responsibility) have folded. I suspect, in part,
>>> that the ubiquity of the internet has lessened the interest or impact of
>>> groups specifically dedicated to looking at how computers have *changed*
>>> traditional fields. Computers are now inextricably *part* of every
>>> traditional field. So what does it mean to be an internet researcher? Is
>>> there a name we can claim that's different from those organizations that
>>> focus on traditional issues in Communication (though acknowledging internet
>>> issues)? I suspect that, as a baseline, our organization requires *some*
>>> sort of involvement with a technological element. As a newbie in some
>>> senses (though an experienced internet dude in others), I'll throw out a
>>> few possibilities... just to roil the waters.
>>>
>>> Human-Computer-Communication (HCC)
>>> Networked Communication
>>> Networked Human Communication
>>> Riding the Shockwave (sorry, just had to)
>>> Network Actors, Technologies, Communicating Humans ('natch!)
>>>
>>> Yikes... time for bed.
>>>
>>> Steve
>>>
>>>
>>> ===================
>>> Steven Lovaas
>>> IT Security Manager
>>> Colorado State University
>>> steven.lovaas at colostate.edu
>>> 970-297-3707
>>> ===================
>>> ________________________________________
>>> From: air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org [air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org]
>>> on behalf of Charles Ess [charles.ess at gmail.com]
>>> Sent: Monday, July 15, 2013 10:53 PM
>>> To: Jennifer Stromer-Galley; Darja Dayter; Air list
>>> Subject: Re: [Air-L] CMC - mobile phones included?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks for this, Jennifer, Darja -
>>> This helps reinforce my sense that we don't really have an accurate (much
>>> less sexy) term that is both broad enough and precise enough.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I've been objecting to "digital" media for some time now - though not
>>> nearly
>>> as long as Brian Massumi (2002) - because while the main processing and
>>> transmission technologies are certainly digital, they operate (necessarily)
>>> with analogue inputs and outputs.  (We remain stubbornly embodied, for
>>> better and for worse, and our senses are analogue, not digitally-based.)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> While CMC admittedly seems quaint (I'm sure I do too ...) - it does seem to
>>> me to be accurate: so far as I can tell, everything that we examine in the
>>> various foci and topoi characteristic of AoIR and what some of us simply
>>> call Internet Studies, depends on computer processing, whether within
>>> mobile
>>> devices or laptop/desktop computers, along with all of the processing that
>>> takes place in order to facilitate networked communication between these
>>> devices and ultimately those of us using them as communication devices.
>>> I have a vague hunch as to what Jennifer might mean by the term being too
>>> restrictive - perhaps along the lines of my finding "digital media" too
>>> restrictive?  But perhaps you could spell that out a bit just for the sake
>>> of discussion?  (For the record: "quaint" doesn't bother me so much ...
>>> Smile)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> In any event, while I don't have a handy scholarly reference or two to
>>> suggest as documentation, I don't think there's any question but that
>>> mobile
>>> communication - what some call mobile and mobility communication, others
>>> mobile and locative communication, and so on, all for good reasons -
>>> including
>>>> texting and voice communication on mobile phones
>>> certainly counts as CMC.  (Indeed, the current generation of smart phones
>>> offer more computational processing power and memory than the
>>> supercomputers
>>> of the 1970s, FWIW.  Maybe we could call it super-computer mediated
>>> communication, just to gum up the works further?)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Again, many thanks -
>>> - charles
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 16.07.13 04:38, "Jennifer Stromer-Galley" <jstromer at syr.edu> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> This is a great question. I ponder a lot the terminology we toss about
>>> these
>>>> days related to the phenomena we study that has something to do with the
>>>> Internet, but now that the Internet is accessed through so many devices
>>>> "computer-mediated" communication seems too restrictive, maybe even
>>> quaint.
>>>>
>>>> The shift to reference the technologies, such as information and
>>> communication
>>>> technologies, or my made-up phrase 'digital communication technologies'
>>> (or
>>>> simply digital media) are what I have shifted to using as my covering
>>> terms,
>>>> rather than CMC.
>>>>
>>>> I don't find those satisfying either. DCT is an unsexy acronym that
>>> makes me
>>>> think of bug spray, but I liked it better than ICT for reasons I can't
>>> really
>>>> articulate.
>>>>
>>>> I personally find 'social media' objectionable, since the telephone and
>>> e-mail
>>>> are also social media (strictly speaking), but most mean Facebook or
>>> Twitter,
>>>> which is too limiting, so I avoid that phrase as much as possible.
>>>>
>>>> I would be curious what others think about the jargon and covering terms
>>> we
>>>> use these days.
>>>>
>>>> ~Jenny
>>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org [mailto:
>>> air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org]
>>>> On Behalf Of Darja Dayter
>>>> Sent: Monday, July 15, 2013 10:24 AM
>>>> To: air-l at listserv.aoir.org
>>>> Subject: [Air-L] CMC - mobile phones included?
>>>>
>>>> Dear all,
>>>>
>>>> I am wondering what exactly is included into the term 'CMC' these days.
>>>> Does texting and voice communication on mobile phones count, for
>>> instance?
>>>> It would be great if you could point me in the direction of sources that
>>> deal
>>>> explicitly with this issue!
>>>>
>>>> Thanks beforehand,
>>>> Darja
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Darja Dayter, M.A.
>>>> Universität Bayreuth, Englische Sprachwissenschaft Tel. 0921/55-4644
>>>> daria.dayter at uni-bayreuth.de_______________________________________________
>>>> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association
>>> of
>>>> Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or
>>> unsubscribe
>>>> at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
>>>>
>>>> Join the Association of Internet Researchers:
>>>> http://www.aoir.org/
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list
>>>> is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org
>>>> Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at:
>>>> http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
>>>>
>>>> Join the Association of Internet Researchers:
>>>> http://www.aoir.org/
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list
>>> is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org
>>> Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at:
>>> http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Join the Association of Internet Researchers:
>>> http://www.aoir.org/
>>> ===================
>>> Steven Lovaas
>>> IT Security Manager
>>> Colorado State University
>>> steven.lovaas at colostate.edu
>>> 970-297-3707
>>> ===================
>>> ________________________________________
>>> From: air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org [air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org]
>>> on behalf of Charles Ess [charles.ess at gmail.com]
>>> Sent: Monday, July 15, 2013 10:53 PM
>>> To: Jennifer Stromer-Galley; Darja Dayter; Air list
>>> Subject: Re: [Air-L] CMC - mobile phones included?
>>>
>>> Thanks for this, Jennifer, Darja -
>>> This helps reinforce my sense that we don't really have an accurate (much
>>> less sexy) term that is both broad enough and precise enough.
>>>
>>> I've been objecting to "digital" media for some time now - though not
>>> nearly
>>> as long as Brian Massumi (2002) - because while the main processing and
>>> transmission technologies are certainly digital, they operate (necessarily)
>>> with analogue inputs and outputs.  (We remain stubbornly embodied, for
>>> better and for worse, and our senses are analogue, not digitally-based.)
>>>
>>> While CMC admittedly seems quaint (I'm sure I do too ...) - it does seem to
>>> me to be accurate: so far as I can tell, everything that we examine in the
>>> various foci and topoi characteristic of AoIR and what some of us simply
>>> call Internet Studies, depends on computer processing, whether within
>>> mobile
>>> devices or laptop/desktop computers, along with all of the processing that
>>> takes place in order to facilitate networked communication between these
>>> devices and ultimately those of us using them as communication devices.
>>> I have a vague hunch as to what Jennifer might mean by the term being too
>>> restrictive - perhaps along the lines of my finding "digital media" too
>>> restrictive?  But perhaps you could spell that out a bit just for the sake
>>> of discussion?  (For the record: "quaint" doesn't bother me so much ...
>>> Smile)
>>>
>>> In any event, while I don't have a handy scholarly reference or two to
>>> suggest as documentation, I don't think there's any question but that
>>> mobile
>>> communication - what some call mobile and mobility communication, others
>>> mobile and locative communication, and so on, all for good reasons -
>>> including
>>>> texting and voice communication on mobile phones
>>> certainly counts as CMC.  (Indeed, the current generation of smart phones
>>> offer more computational processing power and memory than the
>>> supercomputers
>>> of the 1970s, FWIW.  Maybe we could call it super-computer mediated
>>> communication, just to gum up the works further?)
>>>
>>> Again, many thanks -
>>> - charles
>>>
>>>
>>> On 16.07.13 04:38, "Jennifer Stromer-Galley" <jstromer at syr.edu> wrote:
>>>
>>>> This is a great question. I ponder a lot the terminology we toss about
>>> these
>>>> days related to the phenomena we study that has something to do with the
>>>> Internet, but now that the Internet is accessed through so many devices
>>>> "computer-mediated" communication seems too restrictive, maybe even
>>> quaint.
>>>>
>>>> The shift to reference the technologies, such as information and
>>> communication
>>>> technologies, or my made-up phrase 'digital communication technologies'
>>> (or
>>>> simply digital media) are what I have shifted to using as my covering
>>> terms,
>>>> rather than CMC.
>>>>
>>>> I don't find those satisfying either. DCT is an unsexy acronym that
>>> makes me
>>>> think of bug spray, but I liked it better than ICT for reasons I can't
>>> really
>>>> articulate.
>>>>
>>>> I personally find 'social media' objectionable, since the telephone and
>>> e-mail
>>>> are also social media (strictly speaking), but most mean Facebook or
>>> Twitter,
>>>> which is too limiting, so I avoid that phrase as much as possible.
>>>>
>>>> I would be curious what others think about the jargon and covering terms
>>> we
>>>> use these days.
>>>>
>>>> ~Jenny
>>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org [mailto:
>>> air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org]
>>>> On Behalf Of Darja Dayter
>>>> Sent: Monday, July 15, 2013 10:24 AM
>>>> To: air-l at listserv.aoir.org
>>>> Subject: [Air-L] CMC - mobile phones included?
>>>>
>>>> Dear all,
>>>>
>>>> I am wondering what exactly is included into the term 'CMC' these days.
>>>> Does texting and voice communication on mobile phones count, for
>>> instance?
>>>> It would be great if you could point me in the direction of sources that
>>> deal
>>>> explicitly with this issue!
>>>>
>>>> Thanks beforehand,
>>>> Darja
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Darja Dayter, M.A.
>>>> Universität Bayreuth, Englische Sprachwissenschaft Tel. 0921/55-4644
>>>> daria.dayter at uni-bayreuth.de_______________________________________________
>>>> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association
>>> of
>>>> Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or
>>> unsubscribe
>>>> at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
>>>>
>>>> Join the Association of Internet Researchers:
>>>> http://www.aoir.org/
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list
>>>> is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org
>>>> Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at:
>>>> http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
>>>>
>>>> Join the Association of Internet Researchers:
>>>> http://www.aoir.org/
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list
>>> is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org
>>> Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at:
>>> http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
>>>
>>> Join the Association of Internet Researchers:
>>> http://www.aoir.org/
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list
>>> is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org
>>> Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at:
>>> http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
>>>
>>> Join the Association of Internet Researchers:
>>> http://www.aoir.org/
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list
>>> is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org
>>> Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at:
>>> http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
>>>
>>> Join the Association of Internet Researchers:
>>> http://www.aoir.org/
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Lois Ann Scheidt
>> Doctoral Candidate
>> Department of Information & Library Science, School of Informatics &
>> Computing
>> Indiana University, Bloomington IN USA
>> Webpage:  http://www.loisscheidt.com
>> CV:  http://www.loisscheidt.com/cv.html
>> Blog:  http://www.professional-lurker.com
>> _______________________________________________
>> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list
>> is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org
>> Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
>>
>> Join the Association of Internet Researchers:
>> http://www.aoir.org/
> _______________________________________________
> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list
> is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org
> Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
>
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> http://www.aoir.org/

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