How have new social media altered how individuals present themselves? What dilemmas have they introduced? In the age of Facebook, Twitter and other forms of instant communication, individuals are losing (or relinquishing) control over their personal information! Trottier provides a trenchant analysis of the paradoxes of privacy and the presentation of self in the early 21st century. This book is ideal for courses in Sociology, Media Studies and Communication.

This short book lays out a new definition for what constitutes a social problem: the violation of a group’s human rights, which are understood as commonly upheld standards about what people deserve and should be protected from in life. Evaluating U.S. society from an international human rights perspective, Bonds also stresses that human rights are necessarily political and can therefore never be part of a purely objective exercise to assess wellbeing in a particular society. His approach recognizes that there is no one single interpretation of what rights mean, and that different groups with differing interests are going to promote divergent views, some better than others. This book is ideal for undergraduate sociology courses on social problems, as well as courses on social justice and human rights.

This fascinating work explores the meaning of death in the digital age, showing readers the new ways digital technology allows humans to approach, prepare for, and handle their ultimate destiny. With DeadSocialTM one can create messages to be published to social networks after death. Facebook's "If I Die" enables users to create a video or text message for posthumous publication. Twitter _LIVESON accounts will keep tweeting even after the user is gone. There is no doubt that the digital age has radically changed options related to death, dying, grieving, and remembering, allowing people to say goodbye in their own time and their own unique way. Drawing from a range of academic perspectives, this book is the only serious study to focus on the ways in which death, dying, and memorialization appear in and are influenced by digital technology. The work investigates phenomena, devices, and audiences as they affect mortality, remembrances, grieving, posthumous existence, and afterlife experience. It examines the markets to which the providers of such services are responding, and it analyzes the degree to which digital media is changing views and expectations related to death. Ultimately, the contributors seek to answer an even more important question: how digital existences affect both real-world perceptions of life's end and the way in which lives are actually lived.

This book examines and engages with the ambivalence of digitization, illuminating the diverse ways in which researchers approach, negotiate, understand and interpret objects and practices of digital research.

"Timely new chapters on China and the ′sharing economy′ of Uber and Airbnb strengthen an already vital contribution to communication studies. Through the lens of critical theory, Fuchs provides the essential text for students of our new media world." –Vincent Mosco, Queen′s University, Ontario With social media changing how we use and understand everything from communication and the news to transport, more than ever it is essential to ask the right kinds of questions about the business and politics of social media. This book equips students with the critical thinking they need to understand the complexities and contradictions and make informed judgements. This Second Edition: Lays bare the structures and power relations at the heart of our media landscape Explores the sharing economy of Uber and Airbnb in a brand new chapter Takes us into the politics and economy of social media in China Puts forward powerful arguments for how to achieve a social media that serves the purposes of a just and fair world This book is the essential, critical guide for all students of media studies and sociology. Readers will never look at social media the same way again.

Drawing insights from nearly a decade of mixed-method research, Stephen R. Barnard analyzes Twitter’s role in the transformation of American journalism. As the work of media professionals grows increasingly hybrid, Twitter has become an essential space where information is shared, reporting methods tested, and power contested. In addition to spelling opportunity for citizen media activism, the normalization of digital communication adds new channels of influence for traditional thought leaders, posing notable challenges for the future of journalism and democracy. In his analyses of Twitter practices around newsworthy events—including the Boston Marathon bombing, protests in Ferguson, Missouri, and the election of Donald Trump—Barnard brings together conceptual and theoretical lenses from multiple academic disciplines, bridging sociology, journalism, communication, media studies, science and technology studies, and political science.

Through case studies, Outsourcing the Womb, Second Edition provides a critical analysis and global tour of the international surrogacy landscape in Egypt, India, China, Japan, Israel, Ukraine, the European Union and the United States. By providing a comparative analysis of countries that have very different policies, this book disentangles the complex role that race, religion, class inequality, legal regimes, and global capitalism play in the gestational surrogacy market. This book provides an intersectional frame of analysis in which multiple forms of social inequality and power differences become institutionalized and restrict the access of some individuals and families while privileging others, and concludes with a discussion of "reproductive justice" and "reproductive liberty." It is an ideal addition to courses on social problems, race, gender, and inequality.