Book ID: CBB882667788

Virtually Amish: Preserving Community at the Internet's Margins (2022)

unapi

Lindsay Ems (Author)


MIT Press


Publication Date: 2022
Physical Details: 208
Language: English

The Amish are famous for their disconnection from the modern world and all its devices. But, as Lindsay Ems shows in Virtually Amish, Old Order Amish today are selectively engaging with digital technology. The Amish need digital tools to participate in the economy—websites for ecommerce, for example, and cell phones for communication on the road—but they have developed strategies for making limited use of these tools while still living and working according to the values of their community. The way they do this, Ems suggests, holds lessons for all of us about resisting the negative forces of what has been called “high-tech capitalism.” Ems shows how the Amish do not allow technology to drive their behavior; instead, they actively configure their sociotechnical world to align with their values and protect their community's autonomy. Drawing on extensive ethnographic fieldwork conducted in two Old Order Amish settlements in Indiana, Ems explores explicit rules and implicit norms as innovations for resisting negative impacts of digital technology. She describes the ingenious contraptions the Amish devise—including “the black-box phone,” a landline phone attached to a device that connects to a cellular network when plugged into a car's cigarette lighter—and considers the value of human-centered approaches to communication. Non-Amish technology users would do well to take note of Amish methods of adopting digital technologies in ways that empower people and acknowledge their shared humanity.

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Reviewed By

Review Steven M. Nolt (2023) Review of "Virtually Amish: Preserving Community at the Internet's Margins". Technology and Culture (pp. 227-228). unapi

Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB882667788/

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Authors & Contributors
Martin Gibbs
Sabine Lenk
Jessa Lingel
Joanna Partyka
Con Diaz, Gerardo
Jenny Kennedy
Concepts
Internet
Users of technology
Technology and religion
Technology and society
Christianity
Online social networks
Time Periods
21st century
20th century, late
20th century, early
Early modern
Modern
Medieval
Places
United Kingdom
Oklahoma (U.S.)
United States
Poland
Pakistan
Germany
Institutions
Oral Roberts University
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