Children and young people's telephone use and telephone cultures in Britain c. 1984-1999

英国儿童和青少年的电话使用和电话文化 c．

• 批准号: AH/V008943/1
• 负责人: Eve Colpus
• 金额: $ 25.66万
• 依托单位: University of Southampton
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Fellowship
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2021 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=AH%2FV008943%2F1
• 关键词: Children; young; people; telephone; use

The shift in young people's use of telephones from one-to-one voice communication to written and visual communication through texting and engagement with social media represents a pivotal cultural development. While the potentially harmful effects on young people of excessive mobile phone use continue to be studied, the COVID-19 emergency is emphasising further the importance of telephone technologies as tools for young people's social connection, education and skills development. These developments in young people's distanced communication have a vital, yet largely unstudied, history. My research is the first study of young people's telephone use in modern Britain, covering the period c.1984-1999. Through combining archival research, oral history research and research with community participants and in contemporary youth contexts, I investigate young people's access (and restrictions) to using telephones in this era, incorporating the landline, public telephone and mobile phone. I examine the significance of telephones in diverse facets of young people's lives, including in play cultures; leisure; the construction of home; mediation of family life and friendships; the assertion of fashionable identities; as an educational tool; in the workplace; and for locating advice and help. In doing so, I trace how young people's telephone use has been historically at the heart of debates over the meanings of privacy, protection, dependency, and social inequality.Young people's current-day phone use is analysed typically as an expression of individualisation. I ask what this illuminates and overlooks about the historical connection between telephony and children and young people's empowerment; their negotiation of family and community surveillance; their socialisation; and construction of selfhood. These connections evolved particularly rapidly in the years between 1984 and 1999, linked to changes in the marketization of the UK telecommunications sector; the rise of mobile phone ownership; and new ethical formulations of children's and young people's rights. Potentially unmediated by adults, telephone use was mobilised by the media, state and market in this era as a tool for young people's self-expression and social participation. This research centres children's own experiences and feelings in its analysis, moving between examples as varied as five-year-olds learning how to dial '999' and telephone providers' advertisements encouraging teenage boys to talk to their girlfriends. Tracing contestations between corporately-prescribed messages; those constructed in the media and popular culture; and informal ('everyday') education, I examine young people's telephone use in the 1980s/90s as both an activity in itself and its contribution to identity formation. The value of this research extends beyond historical scholarship. The Fellowship enables deeper understandings of the affective, cultural, and social impact of young people's telephone use upon modern debates about the relationship between telephones and young people's wellbeing and safety. I am collaborating with BT Heritage & Archives and the John Hansard Gallery, and the project combines historical research and co-research with community groups and young people in three strands: i) archival research in local and national collections, and research in cultural and media sources, to recover historical voices of children in relation to telephone use across diverse settings; ii) oral history research, collecting adults' childhood memories about their experiences using telephones; and iii) co-research using arts practice in contemporary youth settings, and crowd-sourced research using digital humanities methods to create an interactive online map of young people's 'phone spaces' in Southampton since the 1980s. The map is a pilot-study for a planned UK-wide project mapping where, when and how young people have used telephones, to be conducted after the Fellowship.

年轻人使用电话的方式从一对一的语音交流转变为通过发短信和参与社交媒体进行书面和视觉交流，这是一项重要的文化发展。虽然过度使用移动的电话对年轻人的潜在有害影响仍在继续研究，但COVID-19紧急情况进一步强调了电话技术作为年轻人社会联系、教育和技能发展工具的重要性。年轻人远距离交流的这些发展有着重要的历史，但在很大程度上未被研究。我的研究是第一次对现代英国年轻人使用电话的情况进行研究，时间跨度为1984 -1999年。通过结合档案研究，口述历史研究和研究与社区参与者和当代青年的背景下，我调查年轻人的访问（和限制），使用电话在这个时代，将固定电话，公用电话和移动的电话。我研究了电话在年轻人生活的各个方面的重要性，包括在游戏文化中;休闲;家庭建设;调解家庭生活和友谊;时尚身份的主张;作为一种教育工具;在工作场所;以及寻找建议和帮助。在此过程中，我追溯了年轻人的电话使用如何在历史上成为有关隐私、保护、依赖和社会不平等含义的争论的核心。年轻人当今的电话使用通常被分析为个性化的表达。我问这说明和忽视了电话和儿童和年轻人的赋权之间的历史联系;他们的家庭和社区监督的谈判;他们的社会化;和自我建设。这些联系在1984年至1999年期间发展得特别迅速，与英国电信部门市场化的变化有关;移动的电话所有权的兴起;以及儿童和青少年权利的新道德表述。在这个时代，电话的使用可能不受成年人的影响，被媒体、国家和市场动员起来，成为年轻人自我表达和社会参与的工具。这项研究在分析中以儿童自己的经历和感受为中心，在各种各样的例子之间移动，比如五奥尔兹学习如何拨打“999”和电话供应商鼓励十几岁的男孩和他们的女朋友说话的广告。追踪企业规定的信息之间的联系，那些在媒体和流行文化中构建的，和非正式的（“日常”）教育，我研究了年轻人的电话使用在20世纪80年代/90年代作为一种活动本身及其对身份形成的贡献。这项研究的价值超出了历史学术。该奖学金使人们能够更深入地了解年轻人使用电话对现代关于电话与年轻人的福祉和安全之间关系的辩论的情感，文化和社会影响。我与英国电信遗产与档案馆和约翰·汉萨德画廊合作，该项目将历史研究与社区团体和年轻人的共同研究结合在三个方面：i）地方和国家收藏的档案研究，以及文化和媒体来源的研究，以恢复儿童在不同环境中使用电话的历史声音; ii）口述历史研究，收集成年人童年使用电话的记忆;以及iii）在当代青年环境中使用艺术实践进行共同研究，人群，利用数字人文方法进行研究，创建自20世纪80年代以来南安普顿年轻人“电话空间”的互动在线地图。该地图是一项试点研究，计划在研究金之后开展一个全英国范围的项目，绘制年轻人使用电话的地点、时间和方式。