300634 Navigating Digital Exchange: Smartphones and Social Life (30-M25) (S) (SoSe 2025)

This course explores the role of smartphones in shaping contemporary social life, focusing on how smartphones have become integral to daily life, influencing communication, identity formation, and social networks.

Central to our study is the concept of reciprocity in digital exchange. We will investigate how people use smartphones to navigate social obligations, share information, and engage in gift economies, where the exchange of digital content and services often reflects deeper cultural values of trust, obligation, and social reciprocity. From messaging apps to social media, the course will explore how these exchanges create new forms of digital kinship, community, and solidarity.

By the end of the course, students will develop critical insights into the cultural and economic significance of smartphones, understanding their transformative role in everyday life and global systems of exchange. The course will include ethnographic case studies, theoretical readings, and practical explorations of mobile technology’s impact on society.