SocietyNow – serie

On 23rd June 2016 the United Kingdom shocked the world by voting to leave the European Union. In this clear and concise book, Graham Taylor argues that the result is the most visible tip of an iceberg of social change that has been decades in the making. Hidden from view are a matrix of economic, socio-cultural and political dynamics that have wrought fundamental changes to the British state and society and the relationship between the UK and the rest of the world. These dynamics include the development of an increasingly financialized economy, de-industrialization and an increasing polarization of power and wealth, the resurgence of nationalism and sub-nationalisms and the realignment of electoral politics and emergence of political populism. This book highlights the historical and multifaceted nature of Brexit and its significance for Britain’s future, providing a rigorous and forensic analysis of the most dramatic event to confront contemporary British society since the Second World War.

Becoming Digital examines the transition from the online world we have known to the Next Internet, which is emerging from the convergence of Cloud Computing, Big Data Analytics, and the Internet of Things. The Cloud stores and processes information in data centers; Big Data Analytics provide the tools to analyse and use it; and the Internet of Things connects sensor-equipped devices everywhere to communication networks that span the globe. These technologies make possible a post-Internet society filled with homes that think, machines that make decisions, drones that deliver packages or bombs, and robots that work for us, play with us, and take our jobs. The Next Internet promises a world where computers are everywhere, even inside our bodies, “coming alive” to make possible the unification of people and machines in what some call the Singularity.This timely book explores this potential as both a reality on the horizon and a myth that inspires a new religion of technology. It takes up the coming threats to a democratic, decentralized, and universal Internet and the potential to deepen the problems of commercial saturation, concentrated economic power, cyber-warfare, the erosion of privacy, and environmental degradation. On the other hand, it also shows how the Next Internet can help expand democracy, empowering people worldwide, providing for more of life’s necessities, and advancing social equality. But none of this will happen without concerted political and policy action. Becoming Digital points the way forward.

Kardashian Kulture uses the royal family of celebrity culture to scrutinize wider understandings of 21st century life. Examining the worlds of business, politics, technology and entertainment, Ellis Cashmore shows how fundamental changes to the way we live have been prompted by celebrities. Examining today's celebrity-obsessed culture through the lives of a host of household names, including the Kardashians themselves, this book shows how celebrities have impacted on the wider culture from the birth of consumerism, the civil rights movements of the 1960s, and the growth of narcissism in the 1970s, to the rise of the paparazzi, reality television and the impact of social media, which has removed the barrier between celebrities and fans and led to the erosion of personal privacy. Celebrities are creations rather than people and ultimately, Cashmore argues, Kardashian Kulture is a product of our own making. Whether you regard celebrities as a witless bunch of overpaid show-offs or the conveyors of the zeitgeist is a matter of judgement and taste, the impact of the Kardashians and their kind is undeniable.

This book brings a rich and nuanced analysis of selfie culture. It shows how selfies gain their meanings, illustrates different selfie practices, explores how selfies make us feel and why they have the power to make us feel anything, and unpacks how selfie practices and selfie related norms have changed or might change in the future. As humans, we have a long history of being drawn to images, of communicating visually, and being enchanted with (our own) faces. Every day we share hundreds of millions of photos on Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat. Selfies are continually and passionately talked about. People take vast amounts of selfies, and generate more attention than most other social media content. But selfies are persistently attacked as being unworthy of all of this attention: they lack artistic merit; indicate a pathological fascination with one’s self; or attribute to dangerously stupid behaviour. This book explores the social, cultural and technological context surrounding selfies and their subsequent meaning.

What makes a city smart? The Smart City in a Digital World takes on this question by describing, challenging, and offering democratic alternatives to the view that the answer begins and ends with technology. In the wake of the 2008 global financial meltdown, corporations converged on cities around the world to sell technology, harvest valuable data, and deepen the private governance of urban life. They partnered with governments to promise what on the surface look like unalloyed benefits to city dwellers: safer streets, cleaner air, more efficient transportation, instant communication for all, and algorithms that take governance out of the hands of flawed human beings. Another story lies beneath that surface. Technology-driven smart cities deepen surveillance, shift urban governance to private companies, shrink democracy, create a hacker’s paradise, and hasten the coming of catastrophic climate change. The Smart City insists that people make cities smart, that human governance still matters, and that genuinely intelligent cities start with a vibrant democracy, a commitment to public space, and to citizen control over technology. To make this happen, we need to understand the technologies, the organizations, and the mythologies that power the global smart cities movement, as well as the growing resistance to the technology-driven city. Drawing on case studies from around the world that document the redevelopment of old cities and the creation of entirely new ones, The Smart City provides an essential guide to the future of urban life in a digital world.

Sensing a future beyond work lurking in an age of crisis, the ‘post-capitalist’ utopias of today spread the idea of a permanent escape from work aided by the automation of production, a universal basic income and the reduction of working hours to zero. By skilfully unpicking the political economy of contemporary work and its futures, this book mounts a forceful critique of the post-work society vision. Dinerstein and Pitts reveal that transitional measures towards a world beyond work do not do enough to break away from the key features of capitalist society, and instead potentially stifle the capacity for transformative social change. Proposing an innovative alternative, the authors envision the construction of ‘concrete utopias’ that shape and anticipate non-capitalist futures.

Social media and smartphones are criticised for being addictive, destroying personal relationships, undermining productivity, and invading privacy. In this book, Trine Syvertsen explores the phenomenon of digital detox: users taking a break from digital media or adopting measures to limit smartphone and social media use. Based on studies, documents, media texts and interviews with media users, Syvertsen discusses how media industries intensify the quest for attention, how companies and governments team up to get everybody online, and how the main responsibility for managing online risks and problems are placed on the users' shoulders. She provides a rich account of how users reduce their online engagement through time-limitations, restrictions on smartphone use, productivity apps, and use of analogue media. Syvertsen shows how digital detoxing has much in common with other forms of self-help such as mindfulness, decluttering and simple living and places digital detox within a culture of self-optimisation. But digital detox is also about sustaining face-to-face conversations, better work-life-balance, a deeper connection with nature and more meaningful interpersonal relationships. With a wealth of examples, analyses and stories, Digital Detox is a valuable guide to why digital detox and disconnection has becomea topic, how it is practised, what it says about the state of media industriesand how people express resistance in the 21st century.

The recognition that climate change is now a climate emergency has been endorsed by a wide range of scientists and the United Nations. Natural scientists focus on the aggregate impacts of human activity resulting from burning fossil fuels and producing food, and hence speak of anthropogenic climate change. Climate Emergency analyses the socio-economic and political forces driving the climate emergency, developing the complementary concept of 'sociogenic climate change' to show how societies both create the crisis and are challenged by it in different ways. Harvey demonstrates how societies inhabit different resource environments, whether for fossil fuel reserves, or for land, sun, and water, differences which condition their histories and cultures.In introducing the sociogenic approach to climate change, Harvey re-examines history through the lens of climate change, re-writing the climate impact of the British industrial revolution; US settler colonialism; slavery and Native American genocides; the electrification of societies and infrastructures for fossil-fuelled transportation; and changes in our eating habits. In the big historical picture, different societies and political economies have both created an unequal world and so continue to make an unequal contribution to climate change. This can only be understood by showing how societies have come to distinctively exploit planetary resources in different ways. Societies create the crisis and have to be politically involved in addressing the crisis.

Carers and caring are contemporary global issues of growing political and societal significance. Changing demographics in the UK and beyond, as well as policy drivers promoting community-based living, mean that the family is increasingly the site of care for relatives with long term support needs.Whilst there is a plethora of literature on carers it tends to be situated in separate subject areas. For the first time Family Carers and Caring brings together a range of material and evidence about carers from different sources presented in an accessible and yet academically informed way. Milne and Larkin help to make sense of the complexities of family carers and caring, carving a coherent path through the academic, policy, socio-political, and practice terrain. Family Carers and Caring is explicitly underpinned by principles of social justice and rights, focusing on how inequalities intersect with caring.

The post-pandemic world provides all of us with the opportunity to think differently about what we want for society. In Educating Tomorrow, Chris Brown and Ruth Luzmore explore what a post-Covid ‘blank slate’ education system could look like.  Taking you on a journey which considers the past and present to inform their prediction of the obstacles and opportunities posed by a post-pandemic future, the authors present a new vision for the future of education which might not have been possible without the eruption of Covid-19. Offering up a range of proposals for how education can begin to emerge anew, and ultimately reach an improved destination, Brown and Luzmore showcase how even in the midst of unprecedented global challenges, it might be possible for us to revolutionise education systems for the better.

This fascinating and timely book examines the distressing psychological syndrome of 'cabin fever' in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic and the greatest confinement of people to their homes in history, offering antidotes for it. Exploring the definitions and social and cultural history of cabin fever, a condition provoked by prolonged isolation, the book will be of interest to anyone concerned about the impact of current or any future pandemic lockdowns, prison life, remote living, or even travelling to Mars.

While cohorts of Gen Z have flocked to TikTok, some governments are fighting to have it banned. But where has it come from and what has enabled its incredible market penetration across various countries and demographics?Crystal Abidin draws on original empirical work, news reports, and industry interviews to help readers understand TikTok as it has developed among youth cultures. Using anthropological methods to produce deep and insightful ethnographies about TikTok and its core users, TikTok and Youth Cultures will help readers develop a critical understanding of TikTok’s impact on society, its place in the social media landscape, and its cultural relevance around the world.

The COVID-19 pandemic crisis has changed the way we live and communicate. The phases of lockdown brought about by the pandemic fundamentally changed the way we work, lead our everyday lives, and how we communicate, resulting in Internet platforms becoming more important than ever before. Communicating COVID-19 explores the impact of these changes on society and the way we communicate, and the effect this has had on the spread of misinformation.Critical communication and Internet scholar Christian Fuchs analyses the changes of everyday communication in the COVID-19 crisis and how misinformation has spread online throughout the pandemic. He explores the foundations and rapid spread of conspiracy theories and anti-vaccination discourse on the Internet, paying particular attention to the vast amount of COVID-19 conspiracy theories about Bill Gates. He also interrogates Internet users' reactions to these COVID-19 conspiracy theories as well as how Donald Trump communicated about COVID-19 on Twitter during the final year of his Presidency.Communicating COVID-19 is an essential work for anyone seeking to understand the role of digital technologies, changes in communication and the Internet, and the spread of conspiracy theories in the context of COVID-19.

Wellness has become synonymous with yoga, meditation, and other forms of self-care. Over the past 60 years, what began as an alternative to mainstream medicine has coalesced with consumer culture and has been commercialised to such an extent that the term is now synonymous with an industry of exclusive products and services.This book traces the emergence of wellness culture as a countercultural movement to a trillion-dollar industry, examining the social, economic and political conditions that enabled wellness to assume mainstream cultural significance. It explores the role of the internet in making wellness more accessible to consumers, while simultaneously questioning who wields influence in these digital spaces. A must read for anyone interested in learning about wellness and its online penetration, Wellness Culture offers an in-depth yet accessible examination of how wellness has been weaponised during the COVID-19 pandemic to spread medical misinformation, conspiratorial thinking and political extremism.

AI and Popular Culture explores the development and social significance of artificial intelligence by looking at representations in fiction, film and television, as well as examining the effect of AI technologies on the way we consume culture.Lee Barron traces the evolution of AI – from the Turing Machine to deep learning, to interrogate the key issues and debates. He uses examples of AI from pop culture to help us understand how the technology is changing aspects of society from surveillance and work to human relationships with technology.AI and Popular Culture sheds light on how artificial intelligence has changed our world and helps you to understand where it might take us next. It also makes significant contributions to Media and Cultural Studies, Humanities, and Social Sciences, as well as to subjects such as AI Ethics and Society and Computing.

Our contemporary global digital society is not always a good place to live. Authoritarianism, hatred, false news, post-truth culture, the COVID-19 anti-vaccination movement, COVID-19 conspiracy theories, and political polarisation are organised via the Internet. The public sphere is highly polarised. Today, many humans tend to think of other humans mainly in terms of friends and enemies. Robots and Artificial Intelligence-based automation have created new challenges for the world of work. Decades of neoliberalism have increased inequalities. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown the vulnerability of humanity to viruses and health crises. Humanity and society are in a major crisis and digitalisation mediates this crisis. Digital Humanism explores how Humanism can help us to critically understand how digital technologies shape society and humanity, providing an introduction to Humanism in the digital age. Fuchs introduces the approach of Digital Humanism and outlines foundations of a Radical Digital Humanism, analysing what decolonisation of academia and the study of the digital, media and communication means; what the roles are of robots, automation, and Artificial Intelligence in digital capitalism, and how the communication of death and dying has been mediated by digital technologies, capitalist necropower, and digital capitalism. In order to save humanity and society, we need Radical Digital Humanism now.

Over the past two decades, corporations and venture capitalists have adjusted business models to change the digital world. As a result, the global economy has undergone a massive shift, changing the way we work, consume and pay for things. Under this new ‘digital feudalism’, we find precarious employment via digital platforms, we buy goods and services in perpetuity through subscriptions, and we pay for it all with debt.Digital Feudalism explores this new moment in capitalism, and how reliant global economies have become on these processes of consumption, work, and debt.

The term "culture wars" has taken centre stage in British social and political discourse, characterized by deep divides over values, identity, and sovereignty. These conflicts, driven by class and emancipatory struggles, continue to evolve, highlighting critical divisions over issues such as Brexit, Scottish independence, and attitudes toward the monarchy.Nick Hubble reframes the debate, demonstrating how British culture wars are both unique and interconnected with broader global trends. They explore how cultural divisions shaped British society over the past century, challenging the pervasive narrative of British exceptionalism. Drawing on sources like the British Social Attitudes surveys, political studies, and even literary works such as those by George Orwell, the book traces the legacy of social liberalization and the authoritarian counter-revolution that has emerged in response. With clarity and nuance, Hubble unpacks the ideological dynamics behind terms like "identity politics" and "woke liberalism," offering a fresh framework for understanding the realities of cultural conflict in Britain today.

Ideas always have and always will change the world, whether this be via incremental shifts in understanding or behaviour, or from the introduction of revolutionary new ways of knowing and being. Being Human presents the concept of an ideas-informed society, in which new thinking and innovation drive decision-making and citizens are encouraged to engage in and actively participate in this process.Chris Brown and Ruth Luzmore present a practice-orientated manifesto that details what is needed to actualise an ideas-informed world, and the role of education systems and policymakers in facilitating an increasingly happier, healthier, smarter and more fulfilled society.

For ordinary people today, the future seems dark and forbidding. In generations gone by, parents looked forward with optimism, confident their children would do better. Not anymore. Standards of living continue to fall. Our institutions seem redundant, our cities dilapidated and dysfunctional. Electoral systems seem incapable of driving positive change. What is there to be optimistic about?A multiplicity of escalating pressures and a growing fear of the future encourage people to look to the past to identify something positive, and the bittersweet sting of nostalgia now plays a key role in working-class politics and community life. But how should we understand our increasingly common retreat into nostalgia?In this sweeping ethnography, Simon Winlow explores our common desire to take refuge in the past, and what it means for our political future.

Do the Olympic Games really live up to their glowing reputation? As the biggest global sport mega-event, the Olympics command public attention, while Olympic mythology obscures their underlying function as a profit-making business. Unlike terms such as 'Olympic movement' and 'Olympic family', the concept of 'Olympic industry' focuses on sport as an economic and political enterprise, with its beneficiaries including sponsors, media rights holders, developers, and politicians. Negative impacts on host cities disproportionately threaten the lives and well-being of disadvantaged minorities. Citizens' Olympic resistance campaigns address a range of human rights abuses, while recent athlete activism also focuses on the doping problem and the sexual abuse of girls and women. Female athletes with 'differences of sexual development' face discriminatory gender policies that disqualify them from women's events. All of these issues are analysed through a feminist, anti-racist lens.

Against the backdrop of an increasingly dynamic world, driven by rapid digital innovation and technological advances, drones are becoming prolific within society. In this book, Andy Miah delivers a comprehensive analysis of the wide-reaching applications of drones, as well as a critical interrogation of the social, cultural and moral issues that they provoke. Delving into philosophical discussions about the implications of drone technology, this book shines a light on their real-world applications, the challenges they pose, and what they reveal about the human condition, when faced with a future of autonomous, intelligent robots.

Reality television is one of the defining genres of the 21st century. It is shown worldwide, features people from all walks of life and covers everything from romance to religion. It has not only changed television, but every other area of the media. So why has reality TV become such a huge phenomenon, and what is its future in an age of streaming and social media? This book provides an overview of key theories and debates in the study of reality television and discusses industry practices in their global and national contexts. Deller also explores, through interviews with participants and analyses of key programmes, why people take part in reality TV, how they are represented and impact this has on their lives. From its documentary roots to its social media present and future - this is a guide to Reality Television: The TV Phenomenon that Changed the World.

The rise of tattoos into the mainstream has been a defining aspect of 21st century western culture. Tattoos and Popular Culture showcases how tattoos have been catapulted from 'deviant' and 'alternative' subculture, into a popular culture, becoming a potent signifier of 'difference' for the Millennial generation. From tattooed film superheroes such as Harley Quinn, MTV’s Just Tattoo of Us, and the extensively tattooed and mediated bodies of celebrities across social media, tattoos are now not only inscribed into increasing numbers of Millennial and Gen Z bodies, but also into mainstream culture. As the entrenched stigmas associated with tattoos are eroded Barron asks, how do subcultural and mainstream tattoo images and practices co-exist? Which cultural expressions are at the forefront of modern tattoo culture?

Sex on and with social media is often construed as deviant, risky, or something only teenagers do because they don’t know better. Yet, academic scholarship has shown that sex on/with social media can allow people to create and playfully experiment with their identities; build meaningful relationships; accept themselves or build communities. This book brings the multiplicity and richness of sexual practices on, with, and around social media to a curious, intelligent lay reader, and highlights the discrepancy between the media headlines (people fearing it) and what popular Google searches show (people wanting it).The authors describe how social media has changed and shaped sex; address the common misconceptions about socially mediated sex; explain the spaces where social media sex happens, and the practices that count as social media sex. Chapters examine the main misconceptions and anxieties pertaining to socially mediated sex; explore how sexual social media practices are part of our identity; look at it as a communal/ group phenomenon; and analyse social media platforms as the intermediaries and infrastructures shaping and constraining sex. It offers an academically informed, critical but accessible discussion on sex and sexuality on and with social media.

This book investigates the growing politicization ofMumsnet and its use by politicians to influence middle-class women in the UK.The site's discussion topics go far beyond traditional 'mothering' subjects andencompass politics, feminism and current affairs. Understood as a safe spacefor gender-critical voices, the site has spawned real-life activism andcontinues to be both praised and attacked for its support of free speech oncontroversial subjects.Sarah Pederseninvestigates how Mumsnet has become a central part of a resurgent women'srights movement in the UK. She  arguesthat its openness to discussion around this subject has allowed the site tofunction as a subaltern counter-public - a space where gender-critical feminists have been able to share information andmake plans for action and agitation.

DAN GOODLEY draws on two decades of research and writing and weaves personal stories, scholarly literature, social media and other cultural narratives together with concepts from the interdisciplinary field of disability studies. His argument is simple: disability invites great insight into the wider project of understanding the human condition. Goodley argues that the study of disability is of great importance in its own right but also has much to offer us all in considering what it means to be human in the 21st Century. Chapters address questions such as 'who's allowed to be human?'; 'are human beings dependent?'; and 'what does it mean to be human in the digital age?' and respond to these questions in ways that get us thinking about how we might productively engage with, listen to and understand one another.

Our diets are going to change dramatically as global warming affects growing seasons and the availability of different foods around the world. Meanwhile, our foodways are among the biggest contributors to greenhouse gas emissions. To address these challenges Food in a Changing Climate demands we look beyond our plates to the roots of inequity in our food systems. It presents an unashamedly political agenda for 'deep adaptation', focused on the rejuvenation and strengthening of local and regional food systems that have been steadily eroded in the name of economic efficiency. The colonial origins of fossil-fuel based food production and trade persist in the  marginalisation of farmers, food workers, and fishers in a corporatized food system that promotes the exploitation of the environment, excess production, and hyper-consumerism. These factors contribute to climate change, poverty, and health inequities on a global scale. Drawing on case studies from around the world, this book illustrates how the commodification of food has made us particularly vulnerable to climate change, extreme weather events, and pandemics such as COVID19. These shocks reveal the danger of our reliance on increasingly complex supply chains - dominated by a decreasing number of mega-companies - for our food security.The unsustainability of the way we produce and eat food is clear. It has been for a long time. Food in a Changing Climate explores how we can cultivate resilient communities through the just application of new technologies, the recovery of traditional knowledges, and by building diversity to protect the livelihoods of food producers everywhere.