Here’s the trailer for the book — all you need to know about it in under a minute!

The book:

• Gathers findings from multiple fields that overlap — including communication, sociology, psychology, media studies, and information and data science — so that key understandings and insights can be integrated to give a comprehensive picture of modern techno-social life.
• Opens with a short, engrossing history of internet and digital/mobile/social media to provide context for the chapters that follow.
• Recognizes that the entire world is not “superconnected” and contrasts high-tech societies with those that are less developed technologically.
• Incorporates excerpts from face-to-face and email interviews from my 20-plus years of research to illustrate relevant points.

I’m thrilled that the third edition is available in time for adoption for in Digital Technology and Society-type courses, and for general readership too, of course. It is intended to speak to multiple audiences. Please click around this site to see the supplemental teaching resources available, including editable lecture slides, discussion questions, assignments, and podcasts. Here is the new trailer for the book: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIgzAKUJxew.

Free review copies of Superconnected are available from SAGE Publications at https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/superconnected-the-internet-digital-media-and-techno-social-life/book259314?priorityCode=0B0686.

Click on the photo of the book on the right sidebar to order it on Amazon.

Please contact me with any requests for editable lecture slides or to do guest lectures or speaking engagements. More instructional materials to support Superconnected are found throughout this site.

My thoughts on this, published by NBC News Online.

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/what-50-years-spent-internet-worth-humanity-ncna1073656

 

Rutgers Today interviewed me about the relevance of my research on digital connectedness to the global coronavirus crisis. You can read the Q and A, which includes some of my suggestions for keeping connections strong online and offline, here:

Strengthening face-to-face connections online during Covid-19 pandemic https://www.rutgers.edu/news/strengthening-face-face-connections-online-during-covid-19-pandemic

Why do so many of us “shame” those with whom we disagree? This is a common behavior online, which can become even more pernicious in times of crisis, as in the global coronavirus pandemic. See more in this article by Amanda Hoover for NJ.com, to which I contributed.

Why we’re shaming NJ residents who don’t social distance.

https://www.nj.com/coronavirus/2020/05/why-were-shaming-nj-residents-who-dont-social-distance-even-though-it-wont-make-them-stay-home.html

In research published in JASIST, The Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology, my colleague at Rutgers’ School of Communication and Information Vivek Singh, our students Raj Imandar and Diana Floegel, and I have found occupational gender bias to be prevalent in images on several mediated platforms. Our work has implications for the design of platforms and algorithms and for gender equity and fairness, and has received considerable international attention. It will be highlighted in the third edition of Superconnected, slated to be published in Fall 2020.

Here is a story about the research in Rutgers Today: https://news.rutgers.edu/occupational-gender-bias-prevalent-online-images-rutgers-study-finds/20200204#.Xlamu2hKg2w

Here are several links to media stories about the research:

Telengana Today. Online images reinforce gender stereotypes. https://telanganatoday.com/online-images-reinforce-occupational-gender-stereotypes

ET&T Magazine. Online images reinforce engineering stereotypes. https://eandt.theiet.org/content/articles/2020/02/online-images-reinforce-engineering-stereotypes/

Physics.org. Occupational gender bias prevalent in online images, study finds. https://phys.org/news/2020-02-occupational-gender-bias-prevalent-online.html

Hyperallergic.com.Online Images Reinforce Gender Biases Around Professions, Study Says. https://hyperallergic.com/541323/online-images-reinforce-gender-biases-around-professions-study-says/

Business Standard. Occupational gender bias prevalent in social media images: study. https://www.business-standard.com/article/pti-stories/occupational-gender-bias-prevalent-in-social-media-images-study-120020401232_1.html.

…and here is the link to the actual article on JASIST.

https://asistdl.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/asi.24335

 

Change is a constant in the digital world, and the pace of change in technology-rich societies continues to accelerate. To address the many changes in our techno-social lives, SAGE Publications will publish a fully revised third edition of Superconnected in 2020, with plenty of new multidisciplinary, global content.

To date, the second edition of Superconnected has been adopted by over 25 courses worldwide, at institutions that range from Stanford University to Penn State to Aalborg University in Denmark, in such departments as Communication, Sociology, Psychology, Geography, English, Media Studies, Information Science, and Human Resource Management. It has been translated into three languages thus far, Korean, Turkish, and Serbian. Here’s a story on my September 2019 trip to Belgrade, Serbia to launch the translation (called Superpovezani in Serbian) with a series of talks and appearances:

https://comminfo.rutgers.edu/news/faculty-member-mary-chayko-lectures-and-keynotes-conference-belgrade-serbia

 

It’s very easy to request a free review copy of the second edition of Superconnected for prospective classroom use! Just go to http://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/superconnected-the-internet-digital-media-and-techno-social-life/book257696

…and click on “Request Review Copy.”

In addition to the many free classroom materials and resources found on this site, please also know that I would be happy to Skype with any class that adopts the book, visit in person if arrangements can be made, or do a Twitter chat — whether live or asynchronously. I’m always happy to interact with students reading the book! Contact me at mary.chayko@rutgers.edu to set it up!

Finally, please feel free to share with me your students’ responses to the book, whether as part of formal class activities or their informal reviews. Responses to the first edition were extremely helpful to me when it came time to revise the first edition, and responses to the second edition will help me revise that one, as the third edition is now under contract. Any and all feedback would be gratefully received at the above email address. Thank you, and thank you for your interest in Superconnected!

 

 

 

Superconnected‘s second edition was officially “launched” at the 2018 Eastern Sociological Society conference in Baltimore, MD. I signed books, met up with mentor/friend Karen Cerulo and grad school buddy Wayne Brekhus at the signing, and discussed some of the book’s ideas on a panel on digital sociology.

Course adoptions are already starting for Fall ’18! Check out the customizable lecture slides and questions for discussion (brand new for this second edition) on their “pages,” above. Contact me at mary.chayko@rutgers.edu for more info or to arrange a Skype or in-person visit to your class — or, a Twitter chat (fun, and instructive about digital society in both form and content!)

I’m very pleased to announce the publication of the fully revised and updated second edition of Superconnected: The Internet, Digital Media and Techno-Social Life.

This new revised edition features:

• Current events, the latest statistics and new research findings
• Brand new sections on the rise of “fake” news and information, the human-machine relationship, and the history and implications of the “dark web” and the “deep web”
• Customizable lecture slides and discussion questions for each chapter available on this blog

This edition also pairs nicely with the short podcasts I wrote, voiced, and produced for each chapter, available on this blog.

Enjoy this new, updated version of Superconnected.