WEEK 5 – Acceleration & Detoxification

Judy Wajcman, 2015, ‘Finding Time in a Digital Age’ in Pressed for Time: The Acceleration of Life in Digital Capitalism, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, ch.7.

The concept of living in an “acceleration society” is the focus of this weeks reading. We supposedly live in a Frankenstein style society where we have “lost control over the machines to which we gave birth”, meaning that technology doesn’t produce leisure and downtime but instead creates a faster pace lifestlyle. We as society make sense of the world, with the machines of our making.

An interesting point that resonated with me this week was that a counterproductive way to free up time is to have a “digital detox”. There seems to be so much talk about doing these detoxes by going a day without technology or putting your phone on silent for the day but really, in this day and age, it only creates more pressure and stress on the person once that “detox” is over. It is so easy to fall behind on the world and the constant demands of other people online, even in just 24 hours. Personally I feel so disconnected when I don’t have reception, or I’m at work and can’t check my phone – even if it’s just for a few hours.

Touching on the idea of work, this reading discusses that we live in a “capitalist economy” that “gives employers to dictate hours and terms of work” – which becomes relevant when discussing if the most straightforward way to alleviate stress is to simply cut down hours of work. I don’t see how this could possibly work, given the demands of consumers, especially for people like myself in retail who really are an asset in terms of the company’s success. I really liked the quote that was used too, which summarises a typical 9-5 job/life very well – “they work too much, eat too quickly, socialise too little, drive and sit in traffic for too many hours, don’t get enough sleep and feel harried too much of the time”.

We live in a self-service economy – checkouts at supermarkets, petrol stations, and even the new McDonalds create your own burger stations. This is because we have become so focused on immediacy and getting a personalised touch on our service. This is why companies such as Apple – who offer services that the average person couldn’t understand (such as an iPhone repair) seek to emulate this self service idea in order to make us feel like we’re getting it done ourselves, if the Apple employee is only helping us.