Kristin Scott

I have to admit, I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with social networking. On the one hand, as a child of the 60s, I’m both continually amazed, impressed, and excited about all the social networking capabilities that I didn’t have growing up. It’s like being a kid all over again, except without all the teenage angst and melodrama (whew — don’t miss those days!). And I have been able to keep up with my friends and family better — if through nothing more than their frequent status updates. And in some cases, I actually learn more about people than I ever would have otherwise.

Case and Point: my brother and sister (both of whom are 26/25 years younger than I, respectively) were pretty much just figments of my imagination until Facebook. Since they live in NYC and I have been living in Chicago, I’ve only gotten to see them every few years — measuring their growth in terms of body parts in photographs (here, they’re just up past my waist — and here, they’ve sprouted to my chin!). I tried to create some sort of relationship with them over the years, as best as I could with 25-26 years and 850 miles between us. I tried writing letters (never a single response), I tried calling (a few sentences spoken here or there - and absolutely no response to cell phone calls or even text messages), and I tried emailing (never a reply!). Then last year, I got on Facebook, hunted them down, and befriended my unknown blood relatives. Now they post on my wall, send photos, and IM me through facebook. I’m actually getting to know them a bit . . . their hobbies, likes, dislikes, etc. And the constant status updates and photo/video additions keep me up to date on their daily lives. I have formed a relationship with them . . . but only with a social networking site as a medium.

I’ve also been able to stay in touch with previous students, keep up with colleagues (lots of faculty going online), and of course, maintain a consistent web presence and active scholarly engagement within my field of study. In fact, it’s this love/hate relationship that has driven me to study social networking, the various modes of cyber-embodiment, and the ways in which technology impacts and reflects our culture. I’m fascinated with all of it. And as one who was once a student of literature and language, I cannot help but be equally as fascinated with the emergence of a new lexicon.

But I also miss the f2f contact, which seems to diminish in both quantity and quality with each high-tech year. Sure, I probably make some sort of connection with at least 50-100 people on a daily basis via technology, but aside from the interactions I have with students in classes or around campus, I don’t actually get much qualitative time with friends anymore. And if I do, it’s usually through the fruits of much labor. First, there’s the multiple emails of inquiry (all those “let’s set a date” “no really, we should” “call me sometime to” and “really, we have to get together” emails); another handful of messages to actually set a date/time; and the all too often and almost seemingly inevitable emails and texts to reschedule or change that date/time to yet another. In the end, after a few weeks, sometimes even months, the date is made and f2f contact occurs — for an hour or slightly more — because both parties, of course, have yet another meeting, appointment, errand, or whatchamajigger to get to.

I long for the days when folks just dropped in or a group of us would get together for a spontaneous cook-out, or go out for drinks on a whim. I’m not saying technology is the cause of that decline in real-time social networking, but I do think it contributes. And it’s a major time-suck, too. I can spend hours upon hours in front of the damned computer — loving it and hating it. Dying to get away from it, yet unable to fully pull myself out of the cybervortex. And with each new method of social networking, whether online or mobile, I get sucked in even deeper.