The moving family car, media and new interactions
A new century of technology and mobility has dramatically changed the way people experience and perceive each other’s presence in orders of interaction. Looking at a wide range of mobile technologies that enable people to remain connected , we explore how the use of mobile phones during car journeys enables people to connect and interact with distant others. As the car moves through public space of the city, we see how the private space of the car engages with the public world in a hybrid mesh. The current paper draws on mobility studies, focusing on how media and technology are used in the trajectory of the moving car. The paper looks at, firstly, the ordering of social life as encapsulated in the moving car, where limits on face-to-face interaction exist and, secondly, how the latter is subsequently adapted and managed, given the limited interactional resources. The focus of interest here is how family units-consisting of parents and children manage social interactions in the presence of digital media and material objects within the private space of the car. We see differences and similarities in media use in the car from use while walking in open public spaces and how this is made meaningful and adaptive to the demands of this moving space. In what follows, we observe how the conditions of the road and emergent traffic are oriented to in the context of the social interaction that they exist alongside. The present analysis is based on video vignettes of car journeys of families that record how passengers and drivers manage interactions in this unique space, with a focus on how a variety of media is used.