Orgad, Shani

From Online to Offline and Back: Distinctions and Continuities Between the Offline and the Online

Abstract

This paper explores the question of the significance of offline information about the offline context of users, in order to adequately account for their online experience.

The discussion is grounded in my empirical study, which involved a move from online correspondence with patient-users (participating in interactive breast cancer websites as part of the experience of their illness and recovery) to face-to-face interviews. It shows how, in the case of my study, 'capturing both sides of the screen' (Bakardjieva & Smith, 2001) was crucial for making sense of the conditions and contexts of Internet use by women suffering from breast cancer.

In particular, I examine a few substantial issues that were tied in with the move from an online to an offline relationship with my informants. These are: moving from utopian politics of users' empowerment to a more dialectical account of users' agency; deconstructing 'the Internet' into the different things for which it stands in users' lives; moving from a singular meaning of the notion of 'use' and 'users' to a complex understanding of the experience of use; accounting for similarities between the online experience and the use of other media, rather than focusing exclusively on the distinctiveness of the online experience.

In discussing these issues, the paper sheds critical light on the online/offline distinction that has been constitutive of many accounts of the Internet and its sociological significance (Slater, 2002).

References

Bakardjieva, M. and Smith, R. (2001). The internet in everyday life: Computer networking from the standpoint of the domestic user. New Media and Society, 3 (1): 67-83.

Slater, D. (2002). Social Relationships and Identity Online and Offline. In: Lievrouw, L & Livingstone, S. (eds.). The Handbook of New Media. London: Sage.