In 2022, the smartphone, first introduced by IBM, will celebrate its 30th birthday. Most of us now use a smartphone every day—whether we like it or not. Previously associated with young people, these technologies have become ubiquitous around the world and among all age groups. But what exactly is a smartphone, and what are these devices doing to people’s connections with one another, especially across generations?
That is precisely what our long-term collaborative study, the Anthropology of Smartphones and Smart Ageing, set out to investigate. A team of 11 anthropologists conducted 16-month-long ethnographic studies across nine countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, and South America. Our researchers then compared their findings on the impacts of the device on the experience of midlife and aging, paying special attention to the field of mobile health technologies.
One major finding with implications for public health is that people are adapting popular messaging apps such as WhatsApp to support their health, rather than relying only on formal mobile health apps and other top-down public health initiatives. As COVID-19 took hold in 2020, looking at how people were using smartphones became even more urgent. Smartphones became seen as devices that can receive and deliver care—but they also are used for what could be perceived as surveillance, whether by relatives, friends, authorities, or the state.
At the same time, for many during the pandemic, smartphones became the main instruments facilitating social connection and communication with family and friends. Our project aimed to capture the positives, the negatives, and the complexities in between when it comes to how people around the world relate to these devices.
Along with publishing our findings in book format, our project is committed to pushing the boundaries of academic dissemination through research-driven visual storytelling. Three comics that illustrate our findings are presented below. These were created through a collaboration with U.K.-based comics artist John Cei Douglas.
“Where the Heart Is” (Milan, Italy)
Comic based on Shireen Walton’s research in Milan, Italy. Scripted by Laura Haapio-Kirk and Georgiana Murariu, and illustrated by John Cei Douglas.
The smartphone, several of our researchers found, has become a place within which we live—what we call a “transportal home.” Our researcher Shireen Walton found that migrants from Egypt, Peru, and other countries who were living in Milan, Italy, were especially connected to their smartphones for this reason. Smartphones allowed migrants to be together simultaneously with loved ones in their home countries and where they live now, making it possible for them to locate “home” in interwoven digital and physical domains.
In the comic below, meet Heba*, an Egyptian migrant in her mid-40s living in Milan. Heba maintains attachments to multiple homes within the space of her smartphone.
John Cei Douglas
John Cei Douglas
“Becoming a Tortoise …” (Kyoto, Japan)
Comic based on Laura Haapio-Kirk’s research in Japan. Scripted by Laura Haapio-Kirk and Georgiana Murariu, and illustrated by John Cei Douglas.
Prior to the rise of smartphones, people mainly …….
Source: https://www.sapiens.org/culture/anthropology-smartphones/