About 12 hours later and we have finally arrived in Florida, warm weather greeted us, but the reason I am taking this time to blog about my spring break trip isn't because I am bragging and trying to make you all jealous that you're stuck up North while I am going to be working on my tan. No, the real reason that I am taking the time out of my "break" is because of what I noticed while I was in the airport waiting to board my plane.
It's funny because I was actually reading Sherry Turkle's new book, Alone Together, when I started to notice some interesting things developing around me. Although my project is about how technology affects the St. Lawrence community I still find it relevant and valid to blog about my time at the airport because although what occurred around me wasn't just based off the actions of my fellow teammates but numerous random people, it is important because it helps put things in perspective. Meaning, SLU as a community isn't the only place affected by technology, the entire world is.
So back to Turkle, I was sitting in the airport reading her book when I started to procrastinate a little and looked up from my reading to find almost everyone around me plugged into their laptops or cellphones. One girl on my team had her laptop open and was updating her twitter page to say that she was going to Florida for spring break. A couple of the boys on the men's team all had their cell phones out and were either texting or were just holding it for comfort. The kids on the team weren't the only people plugged in, pretty much everyone had their laptops out and headphones in to help them tune out their surroundings. I even walked by one man who was playing a video game, and from the quick glimpse that I got it looked like it was a multi-player game.
So, like the good little ethnographic observer that I am I pulled out my notebook and wrote some notes about what I was noticing and then returned to reading Turkle. Then it was as if the planets lined up because Turkle actually mentioned the phenomenon that I was witnessing in the airport right in her book. Turkle explains that "these days, being connected depends not on our distance from each other but from available communications technology...In this new regime, a train station (like an airport, a cafe, or a park) is no longer a communal space but a place of social collection: people come together but do not speak to each other. Each is tethered to a mobile device and to the people and places to which that device serves as a portal" (155). What Turkle is saying about everyone being "tethered" to their mobile device or computers is what I was witnessing in the airport. We were all there for the same reason, to fly someplace but we weren't talking or interacting with one another, even those of us who knew each other. We were too busy texting friends trying to make them jealous about our trip or updating our facebook and twitter statuses'.
On a separate yet still relevant note I again witnessed something interesting and note worthy on the plane ride. Sitting in front of me was a family with their son who could not be older than 2, I'm pretty sure he is probably 1 since he wasn't talking, but I digress. The little baby was actually holding and playing with his mother's iphone. He actually knew what to do and was tapping the screen just like how he had seen his mom do it. At some points the mom took the phone from the child but still held it in front of him so that he could see how she was working it. I found this interaction extremely interesting because this child is going to represent a new generation, a generation that has been involved with technology from before he could talk. Turkle mentions throughout the book how teens now a days are growing up differently. For example teens these days fear talking on the phone because "a telephone call can seem fearsome because it reveals too much" (188). So after watching this child interact with technology I am starting to wonder what is next for this upcoming generation, will they not even be able to communicate through text?
Works Cited:
Turkle, Sherry. Alone Together. New York: Basic Books, 2011.
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