[Air-L] reformatting internet studies

Charles Ess charles.ess at gmail.com
Fri May 22 03:26:05 PDT 2015


Barry and colleagues,
a belated but hearty thanks for this - with your permission, will take this
on board as I update and expand on the lecture that lead to my first effort
at a definition, with all due recognition and grateful acknowledgment, of
course.
And ditto on the hi to the ICA folk, etc.

again, many thanks,
- charles

On Wed, May 20, 2015 at 8:48 PM, Barry Wellman <wellman at chass.utoronto.ca>
wrote:

> This is what Charles Ess wrote:
>
> Drawing on disciplines throughout the natural sciences, social sciences,
> and the humanities, Internet Studies explores Internet-facilitated human
> (and machine) communication with characteristic (but not exclusive) focus
> on how identity, agency, relationship, community, and power interact with
> the affordances of Internet-based communication technologies, often with a
> careful view towards larger ethical, social, political, cultural, economic,
> legal, and other human contexts. Internet Studies further includes
> meta-theoretical development and refinement of various research
> methodologies; specific attention to the ethical challenges and possible
> resolutions to these challenges that arise in the course of such research;
> and the histories of the Internet, including web history as a domain in its
> own right.
>
> Without commenting much on its validity (first glance seems pretty good),
> I would like to rewrite in shorter sentences and some simplifying
>
> Internet Studies describes and analyzes internet-facilitated human and
> machine communication with a characteristic (but not exclusive) focus on
> the affordances of internet-based communication and information
> technologies. It draws on disciplines throughout the social sciences,
> humanities, and the natural sciences. Internet Studies often takes a
> careful view of ethical, social, historical, political, cultural, economic,
> legal and other human contexts, and it also includes germane theoretical
> and methodological developments.
>
> That's a straight rewrite, but I wonder why "Internet" when Mobile and
> Things are becoming important. Should it be rewritten as Digital Media
> Studies?
>
> Just my .02 for the day
>
> and hi to the ICA folks. Wish I could be there.
>
>
>   Barry Wellman
>  _______________________________________________________________________
>   FRSC                 INSNA Founder               University of Toronto
>   http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman           twitter: @barrywellman
>   NETWORKED:The New Social Operating System.  Lee Rainie & Barry Wellman
>   MIT Press            http://amzn.to/zXZg39        Print $14  Kindle $9
>   _______________________________________________________________________
>
>



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