During the past decade or so, much HCI research has, according to many researchers, become increasingly phenomenologically oriented. Some have gone so far as to argue that HCI is now in a phenomenological paradigm. But how does such a paradigmatic view work for understanding interaction in the ever growing sphere of social media? Prima facie it may look as it would work only well since social media has become increasingly richer in terms of the sheer range of phenomenologically possible user experiences provided by new and emerging interaction technologies. However, through a critical reading of three major phenomenological works in HCI, we argue that phenomenology as traditionally applied in HCI points indirectly to alternative approaches for engaging in much of contemporary social media research due to its associated semiotic and relationally oriented contents. One possible family of approaches for analyzing such content can be found, as we will argue, in poststructuralist theory. We propose an increased engagement with poststructuralist semiotics grounded in Jacques Derrida's philosophy and exemplify how this could contribute to the study of social media in the context of HCI.
Processes of digitalization continue to have a profound effect on many old, traditional organizations. In institutions such as banks, theaters, and churches, established structures and practices are being challenged by digitization in general and the participatory logic of social media in particular. This article draws on Mark C. Taylor’s concepts of figuring and disfiguring to analyze empirical data gathered from the Church of Sweden Facebook page. The aim is to discuss how social media affects the conditions for religious communication and what the consequences are for a traditional religious organization such as the Church of Sweden.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.