The Digital Practices of Mobile Phones

From a global perspective, the mobile phone is by far the most widely used information and communication technology (ICT). People in both developed and developing nations have found ways to integrate the mobile phone into their daily lives. Despite the ubiquity of the mobile phone, the cultural impact of the mobile phone in and of itself has not been a major topic within the sociology of culture. To this end, there are two goals of this paper. First, three common uses of the mobile phone are presented. To separate cultural practices associated with mobile phones from practices associated with other domains of social life, the term digital practices is used. Second, this paper will discuss the domestication of technology approach, and its applicability to the study of mobile phones. Identifying practices and providing a framework for interpreting these practices can help scholars interested in theorizing and teaching the cultural (as opposed to economic or technological) aspects of mobile telephony.