Modern Media in the Home: An Ethnographic Study

The book is a readable and lively account of recent empirical research on media use in the home. It reports an important study of the use of the breadth of the mass media in Wales in the digital era. Examining the place of the media in everyday life and social relationships, the book focuses on ten diverse households, and what emerges is a fascinating account of the diversity of contemporary media uses. Reporting the fine-grained detail of domestic interaction, it explores how the media are used and made sense of, and the sorts of experiences, interaction and identities that are sustained or developed through media use. \n \nEthnographic portraits map the patterns of taste in the ten households, and sections explore temporal rhythms, uses of domestic space, gender, spaces of identification and the Welsh language. Challenging the argument that modern media represent forces of globalisation and homogenisation, the book demonstrates how the media are implicated in local spatial identities, and contribute to the development of the language and culture of Wales. \n \nProviding a unique study of the breadth of the mass media, the authors address how older media are being transformed and how new media are being adopted and adapted. A picture emerges of a diversity of media uses and domestic life, in a landscape of transformation.