Successful aging and active aging policies frame independence in old age as an expectation and a virtue in opposition to the once desired reciprocity between generations. Due to digitalization trends worldwide, mastering digital skills becomes another responsibility for older adults to remain independent. However, this process can create new forms of dependency as support from skilled users – usually the younger generation – is crucial for technology adoption among older adults. This study addresses how older adults may experience digital dependency as a personal failure and a burden upon younger generations. We conducted long-term ethnography among older adults adopting new technology in Brazil and Chile, countries with rapidly aging populations that have implemented aggressive digitalization strategies. The fast digitalization of public services may increase the risks of social exclusion for older adults as the less connected and less skilled age group in Latin America. Contrary to expectations suggested by the research literature, participants preferred to enroll in smartphone workshops instead of relying on their children. We volunteered in smartphone workshops for older adults and mapped the difficulties they face when adopting new technologies and the strategies they develop afterward to use technology while avoiding dependency. Participants may restrict their use of smartphones due to their limited digital skills or claim a lack of interest in technology as a self-defense strategy against appearing ignorant or incompetent. We found that participants preferred relying on friends for support instead, perceiving their help as a form of peer collaboration.
{"title":"Digital Dependency as a Burden: Impact of Active Aging for Tech Adoption in Brazil and Chile","authors":"Marília Duque, Alfonso Otaegui","doi":"10.5195/aa.2023.422","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/aa.2023.422","url":null,"abstract":"Successful aging and active aging policies frame independence in old age as an expectation and a virtue in opposition to the once desired reciprocity between generations. Due to digitalization trends worldwide, mastering digital skills becomes another responsibility for older adults to remain independent. However, this process can create new forms of dependency as support from skilled users – usually the younger generation – is crucial for technology adoption among older adults. This study addresses how older adults may experience digital dependency as a personal failure and a burden upon younger generations. We conducted long-term ethnography among older adults adopting new technology in Brazil and Chile, countries with rapidly aging populations that have implemented aggressive digitalization strategies. The fast digitalization of public services may increase the risks of social exclusion for older adults as the less connected and less skilled age group in Latin America. Contrary to expectations suggested by the research literature, participants preferred to enroll in smartphone workshops instead of relying on their children. We volunteered in smartphone workshops for older adults and mapped the difficulties they face when adopting new technologies and the strategies they develop afterward to use technology while avoiding dependency. Participants may restrict their use of smartphones due to their limited digital skills or claim a lack of interest in technology as a self-defense strategy against appearing ignorant or incompetent. We found that participants preferred relying on friends for support instead, perceiving their help as a form of peer collaboration.","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"24 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135826858","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In this article we comparatively explore experiences and notions of retirement in two ethnographic sites of Milan, Italy, and Yaoundé, Cameroon, by paying attention to how grandparenting is perceived and practiced in relation to kinship roles and responsibilities. The paper draws on comparative insights from the ASSA project and focuses on Walton’s research in Milan and Awondo’s in Yaoundé, carried out between 2018–2019. The paper explores how both retirement and grandparenting can be embedded in social and moral narratives, gendered distinctions, and various idealisations, while also reflecting individual positionalities and economic roles and responsibilities. Our discussion moves beyond the family context as a unit for analysis, considering how grandparents enact care in urban communities and related online environments such as WhatsApp groups. After a brief introduction to the two field sites, the first section of the paper addresses retirement in Milan and Yaoundé, before turning to consider how grandparenting and retirement is linked to wider conceptions of obligation and freedom in these two different urban neighbourhood contexts.
{"title":"Grandparenting and Retirement: Re-thinking Roles, Reciprocity, and Responsibility in Milan and Yaoundé","authors":"Shireen Walton, Patrick Awondo","doi":"10.5195/aa.2023.419","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/aa.2023.419","url":null,"abstract":"In this article we comparatively explore experiences and notions of retirement in two ethnographic sites of Milan, Italy, and Yaoundé, Cameroon, by paying attention to how grandparenting is perceived and practiced in relation to kinship roles and responsibilities. The paper draws on comparative insights from the ASSA project and focuses on Walton’s research in Milan and Awondo’s in Yaoundé, carried out between 2018–2019. The paper explores how both retirement and grandparenting can be embedded in social and moral narratives, gendered distinctions, and various idealisations, while also reflecting individual positionalities and economic roles and responsibilities. Our discussion moves beyond the family context as a unit for analysis, considering how grandparents enact care in urban communities and related online environments such as WhatsApp groups. After a brief introduction to the two field sites, the first section of the paper addresses retirement in Milan and Yaoundé, before turning to consider how grandparenting and retirement is linked to wider conceptions of obligation and freedom in these two different urban neighbourhood contexts.","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"62 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135885252","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Taking a comparative approach to two field sites – Shanghai in China and Dublin in Ireland – this paper explores the relationship between ageing, home, and the impact of the smartphone on domestic space. Although Shanghai and Dublin are extremely diverse contexts, both have seen rapid social shifts in recent decades, and domestic life seems to reflect these changes. Here, we outline how older people reconfigure their lives through the manipulation of their homes, variously upsizing, downsizing, and rightsizing – but also through sifting through their possessions, decluttering, and adopting or adapting to new domestic spaces in different ways. However, whereas these material practices may be found in cities worldwide, we examine the smartphone in domestic environments and consider how the digital expands, create, blurs, or traverses conventional views of the home in each field site. A central concept here is the ‘transportal home’ (Miller et al. 2021). Weaving perspectives from material and digital approaches in anthropology, we explore and expand the notion of the transportal home, as outlined in the comparative book, The Global Smartphone (Miller et al., 2021) and reiterated in brief here. We adopt this concept but take it further by asking how the transportal home differs in both fieldwork sites. This leads us to question the role of the transportal home in Shanghai and Dublin in terms of mediating, blurring, or traversing domestic boundaries, or expanding or shrinking social and architectural environments. Through these practices, conventional notions of home itself are challenged.
本文通过对中国上海和爱尔兰都柏林这两个实地地点的比较，探讨了老龄化、家庭和智能手机对家庭空间的影响之间的关系。尽管上海和都柏林有着极其不同的背景，但近几十年来，这两个城市都经历了快速的社会变迁，家庭生活似乎也反映了这些变化。在这里，我们概述了老年人如何通过操纵他们的家来重新配置他们的生活，各种各样的放大，缩小和缩小-但也通过筛选他们的财产，整理，并以不同的方式采用或适应新的家庭空间。然而，尽管这些材料实践可以在世界各地的城市中找到，但我们在家庭环境中研究智能手机，并考虑数字如何在每个现场扩展，创建，模糊或穿越传统的家庭视图。这里的一个核心概念是“运输房屋”(Miller et al. 2021)。从人类学的材料和数字方法的角度出发，我们探索和扩展了运输家庭的概念，正如比较书《全球智能手机》(Miller et al.， 2021)所概述的那样，并在这里简要重申。我们采用了这一概念，并进一步探讨了两个实地考察地点的运输住宅有何不同。这让我们质疑上海和都柏林的交通住宅在调解、模糊或跨越家庭界限，或扩大或缩小社会和建筑环境方面的作用。通过这些实践，传统的家庭观念受到了挑战。
{"title":"Ageing and the Transportal Home","authors":"Pauline Garvey, Xinyuan Wang","doi":"10.5195/aa.2023.420","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/aa.2023.420","url":null,"abstract":"Taking a comparative approach to two field sites – Shanghai in China and Dublin in Ireland – this paper explores the relationship between ageing, home, and the impact of the smartphone on domestic space. Although Shanghai and Dublin are extremely diverse contexts, both have seen rapid social shifts in recent decades, and domestic life seems to reflect these changes. Here, we outline how older people reconfigure their lives through the manipulation of their homes, variously upsizing, downsizing, and rightsizing – but also through sifting through their possessions, decluttering, and adopting or adapting to new domestic spaces in different ways. However, whereas these material practices may be found in cities worldwide, we examine the smartphone in domestic environments and consider how the digital expands, create, blurs, or traverses conventional views of the home in each field site. A central concept here is the ‘transportal home’ (Miller et al. 2021). Weaving perspectives from material and digital approaches in anthropology, we explore and expand the notion of the transportal home, as outlined in the comparative book, The Global Smartphone (Miller et al., 2021) and reiterated in brief here. We adopt this concept but take it further by asking how the transportal home differs in both fieldwork sites. This leads us to question the role of the transportal home in Shanghai and Dublin in terms of mediating, blurring, or traversing domestic boundaries, or expanding or shrinking social and architectural environments. Through these practices, conventional notions of home itself are challenged.","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"3 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135880542","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Realizing Possibilities: A Conversation with Akaninyene A. Otu","authors":"Tiina Maripuu","doi":"10.5195/aa.2023.472","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/aa.2023.472","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"49 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135880744","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In this paper, we investigate whether there exists in different societies something analogous to the idea of ‘life purpose.’ Drawing on examples from across the entire range of ASSA project field sites, the paper is organised as a spectrum, starting from the case of Japan where ikigai is the most explicit example of having a life purpose and is a commonly used expression. We then argue that, in some regions, such as Palestine, the idea of life purpose is entirely subsumed within religion. This is followed by several cases where social reproduction seems to dominate life purpose, often based on securing the success of future generations. We then turn to more implicit examples of life purpose, starting with Xinyuan Wang’s study of the relationship between the Cultural Revolution and the smartphone revolution in Shanghai. We then examine the case of Ireland where life purpose is extrapolated from a more general expansive cosmology. We end the paper with the possibility that some people in England may see an advantage in not having any sense of life purpose. In the conclusion, we argue that, just as we now recognise that social cohesion does not require the moral guidance of religion, so too is there no need to have a category of life purpose. But, either implicitly or explicitly, most cultures do have a variety of ideals that we might equate with life purpose.
{"title":"Life Purpose in the Age of the Smartphone: Reflections from Comparative Anthropology","authors":"Laila Abed Rabho, Maya De Vries, Daniel Miller","doi":"10.5195/aa.2023.423","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/aa.2023.423","url":null,"abstract":"In this paper, we investigate whether there exists in different societies something analogous to the idea of ‘life purpose.’ Drawing on examples from across the entire range of ASSA project field sites, the paper is organised as a spectrum, starting from the case of Japan where ikigai is the most explicit example of having a life purpose and is a commonly used expression. We then argue that, in some regions, such as Palestine, the idea of life purpose is entirely subsumed within religion. This is followed by several cases where social reproduction seems to dominate life purpose, often based on securing the success of future generations. We then turn to more implicit examples of life purpose, starting with Xinyuan Wang’s study of the relationship between the Cultural Revolution and the smartphone revolution in Shanghai. We then examine the case of Ireland where life purpose is extrapolated from a more general expansive cosmology. We end the paper with the possibility that some people in England may see an advantage in not having any sense of life purpose. In the conclusion, we argue that, just as we now recognise that social cohesion does not require the moral guidance of religion, so too is there no need to have a category of life purpose. But, either implicitly or explicitly, most cultures do have a variety of ideals that we might equate with life purpose.","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"566 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135879527","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book Review: Fragile Resonance: Caring for Older Family Members in Japan and England","authors":"Shvat Eilat","doi":"10.5195/aa.2023.489","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/aa.2023.489","url":null,"abstract":"<jats:p>n/a</jats:p>","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"28 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135826863","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Film Review: Ben Jij Bij Mij/Are You With Me","authors":"Aagje Swinnen","doi":"10.5195/aa.2023.471","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/aa.2023.471","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"30 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135884324","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book Review: Robots Won't Save Japan: An Ethnography of Eldercare Automation","authors":"Robert C. Marshall","doi":"10.5195/aa.2023.488","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/aa.2023.488","url":null,"abstract":"<jats:p>n/a</jats:p>","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"59 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135884796","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This introduction provides a basic description of the Anthropology of Smartphones and Smart Ageing (ASSA) project, including the project’s range of field sites, methods, and ethics. I compare this project with prior comparative studies in the anthropology of ageing. I also discuss certain other findings of the ASSA project as they relate to the ASSA researchers’ re-conceptualisation of the smartphone and our work on mHealth. I then consider how an anthropological approach to comparison differs from that of other disciplines, partly through examining methods of comparison found within the articles in this Special Issue. In particular, I contrast the idea that anthropologists can compare data regarded as commensurable because of a standardisation in how they were collected, to a view that anthropologists mostly do not collect commensurable data at all; in which case, perhaps anthropologists are best at making comparison at the level of implied causation, sometimes developing a spectrum of field sites where implied causation can itself act as a parameter of difference.
{"title":"Introduction: Comparative Insights from the ASSA Project","authors":"Daniel Miller","doi":"10.5195/aa.2023.487","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/aa.2023.487","url":null,"abstract":"This introduction provides a basic description of the Anthropology of Smartphones and Smart Ageing (ASSA) project, including the project’s range of field sites, methods, and ethics. I compare this project with prior comparative studies in the anthropology of ageing. I also discuss certain other findings of the ASSA project as they relate to the ASSA researchers’ re-conceptualisation of the smartphone and our work on mHealth. I then consider how an anthropological approach to comparison differs from that of other disciplines, partly through examining methods of comparison found within the articles in this Special Issue. In particular, I contrast the idea that anthropologists can compare data regarded as commensurable because of a standardisation in how they were collected, to a view that anthropologists mostly do not collect commensurable data at all; in which case, perhaps anthropologists are best at making comparison at the level of implied causation, sometimes developing a spectrum of field sites where implied causation can itself act as a parameter of difference.","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"24 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135826247","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article offers a comparative ethnographic study of ageing as both category and experience. Drawing on simultaneous 16-month ethnographies conducted as part of the ASSA project, we focus on how ageing is being re-defined in eight contexts around the world, with particular focus on the authors’ field sites: rural and urban settings in both Japan and Uganda. Despite being among the world’s oldest and youngest populations, respectively, there are various affinities in both ethnographies of age and technology use related to the reconfiguration of family-care norms across distances. This shared finding informs the articulation of age categories, which we found to be negotiated in line with established intergenerational expectations and family roles. This paper is illustrated with ethnographic examples of how people redefine ageing in context and in turn bring ‘age’ to life, demonstrating the social significance of age categories.
{"title":"Bringing Ageing to Life: A Comparative Study of Age Categories","authors":"Charlotte Hawkins, Laura Haapio-Kirk","doi":"10.5195/aa.2023.480","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/aa.2023.480","url":null,"abstract":"This article offers a comparative ethnographic study of ageing as both category and experience. Drawing on simultaneous 16-month ethnographies conducted as part of the ASSA project, we focus on how ageing is being re-defined in eight contexts around the world, with particular focus on the authors’ field sites: rural and urban settings in both Japan and Uganda. Despite being among the world’s oldest and youngest populations, respectively, there are various affinities in both ethnographies of age and technology use related to the reconfiguration of family-care norms across distances. This shared finding informs the articulation of age categories, which we found to be negotiated in line with established intergenerational expectations and family roles. This paper is illustrated with ethnographic examples of how people redefine ageing in context and in turn bring ‘age’ to life, demonstrating the social significance of age categories.","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"41 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135884656","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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