Sirpa Tenhunen - Böcker

In A Village Goes Mobile, Sirpa Tenhunen examines how the mobile telephone has contributed to social change in rural India. Tenhunen's long-term ethnographic fieldwork in West Bengal began before the village had a phone system in place and continued through the introduction and proliferation of the smartphone. She here analyzes how mobile telephones emerged as multidimensional objects which, in addition to enabling telephone conversations, facilitated status aspirations, internet access, and entertainment practices. She explores how this multifaceted use of mobile phones has affected agency and power dynamics in economic, political, and social relationships, and how these new social constellations relate to culture and development. In eight chapters, Tenhunen asks such questions as: Who benefits from mobile telephony and how? Can people use mobile phones to change their lives, or does phone use merely amplify existing social patterns and power relationships? Can mobile telephony induce development? Going beyond the case of West Bengal, Tenhunen develops a framework to understand how new media mediates social processes within interrelated social spheres and local hierarchies by relating, media-saturated forms of interaction to pre-existing contexts.

In A Village Goes Mobile, Sirpa Tenhunen examines how the mobile telephone has contributed to social change in rural India. Tenhunen's long-term ethnographic fieldwork in West Bengal began before the village had a phone system in place and continued through the introduction and proliferation of the smartphone. She here analyzes how mobile telephones emerged as multidimensional objects which, in addition to enabling telephone conversations, facilitated status aspirations, internet access, and entertainment practices. She explores how this multifaceted use of mobile phones has affected agency and power dynamics in economic, political, and social relationships, and how these new social constellations relate to culture and development. In eight chapters, Tenhunen asks such questions as: Who benefits from mobile telephony and how? Can people use mobile phones to change their lives, or does phone use merely amplify existing social patterns and power relationships? Can mobile telephony induce development? Going beyond the case of West Bengal, Tenhunen develops a framework to understand how new media mediates social processes within interrelated social spheres and local hierarchies by relating, media-saturated forms of interaction to pre-existing contexts.

“An Introduction to Changing India” provides a comprehensive view of the rapid changes occurring in India, particularly in the fields of culture, politics, economics and technology, population, environmental issues and gender. Having carried out anthropological research on kinship, gender issues, politics, class and caste, population issues and the appropriation of information technology in India since the 1990s, the authors draw from their own fieldwork and extensive reading of research reports in order to provide a comprehensive picture of Indian life.

This book examines innovation as social change in South Asia. From an anthropological micro-perspective, innovation is moulded by social systems of value and hierarchy, while simultaneously having the potential to transform them. Peterson examines the printing press’s changing technology and its intersections with communal and language ideologies in India. Tenhunen explores mobile telephony, gender, and kinship in West Bengal. Uddin looks at microcredit and its relationship with social capital in Bangladesh. Jeffrey surveys imbalanced sex ratios and the future of marriage payments in north-western India. Ashrafun and Säävälä investigate alternative dispute resolution as a social innovation which affects the life options of battered young wives in Sylhet, Bangladesh. These case studies give insights into how the deeply engrained cultural models and values affect the forms that an innovative process can take. In the case of some South Asian societies, starkly hierarchical and holistic structures mean that innovations can have unpredictable sociocultural repercussions. The book argues that successful innovation requires taking into account how social hierarchies may steer their impact.This book was originally published as a special issue of Contemporary South Asia.

This book examines innovation as social change in South Asia. From an anthropological micro-perspective, innovation is moulded by social systems of value and hierarchy, while simultaneously having the potential to transform them. Peterson examines the printing press’s changing technology and its intersections with communal and language ideologies in India. Tenhunen explores mobile telephony, gender, and kinship in West Bengal. Uddin looks at microcredit and its relationship with social capital in Bangladesh. Jeffrey surveys imbalanced sex ratios and the future of marriage payments in north-western India. Ashrafun and Säävälä investigate alternative dispute resolution as a social innovation which affects the life options of battered young wives in Sylhet, Bangladesh. These case studies give insights into how the deeply engrained cultural models and values affect the forms that an innovative process can take. In the case of some South Asian societies, starkly hierarchical and holistic structures mean that innovations can have unpredictable sociocultural repercussions. The book argues that successful innovation requires taking into account how social hierarchies may steer their impact.This book was originally published as a special issue of Contemporary South Asia.