Anthropological Studies of Mobile Phones

摘要

As far as I am aware, The Cell Phone (2006) was the first attempt at an ethnography of the mobile phone. Our funding came from UK aid, and this meant we had quite specific concerns with the impact of the phone upon poverty. One result of this was that we emphasized the way people expanded their social connections. In order just to get by, many Jamaicans without any income tried to find ways to "link-up" with Jamaicans who had some kind of income. This was in contrast with much of the more general writing of the time, which showed how connections via mobile phone tended to replicate the tight network of close friends and relatives.