Moreover, even as access to technology continues to expand and new modes of participation emerge to shape digital media culture, significant social and economic inequalities persist.
Black, Latino, and lower income teens use social media more than their white or affluent counterparts. On any given day: they spend more time on social media and also post more content on social media.43 These trends point to a series of enigmas that researchers, including our team, have not fully explored. What are the unintended consequences of black and Latinos teens’ valiant efforts to bridge the digital divide? More specifically, what are the perils and the possibilities associated with their greater participation in a digital world that Facebook once described as “more open and more connected?”
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The Mobile Paradox
Understanding the Mobile Lives of Latino and Black Youth
S. Craig Watkins
Our very first round of interviews with Freeway students occurred one afternoon shortly after they had been released from school. It was a focus group with about seven students from various backgrounds. Amina was a senior whose family had arrived in Austin via New York and before that via Ethiopia. She was bright and articulate, and had a serious side that reflected the serious circumstances that characterized her turbulent home life. Sergio joined us too. Early in our fieldwork we learned that he was generally ambivalent about school but incredibly engaged, active, and driven in the after-school world Freeway offered.
Selena also attended the session. Throughout the school year Selena swayed back and forth, unsure whether she should continue at Freeway and graduate. Many of her friends had dropped out of school, and she had skipped so many classes that she spent as much time in credit recovery as she did in her regular classes. Kyle, always full of energy, joined us. He enjoyed rapping, skateboarding, and playing video games even though his personal and familial life was in serious flux. After losing practically everything in a devastating fire, Kyle, along with his mother and younger sibling, had recently moved in with relatives. Like the majority of students at Freeway, Kyle had no intentions of going to college. Each Friday his father picked him up after school and the two repaired air conditioners together, the trade Kyle decided to pursue after high school.
Cassandra was present and in her typical pleasant mood. But beneath her amiable exterior was grave concern about the changes that were remaking life at home. Her mother and father had recently lost their jobs, creating a great deal of financial strain on the family. Antonio, Jasmine, and Jada also participated in the group discussion. During part of the school year, Jasmine lived with her grandparents, a loving couple who worked hard to steady her life as she navigated the ups and downs of high school. Jada showed up despite a busy schedule. In addition to working practically every day after school, she also held a spot on the school’s dance squad and was a member of the business council. Her parents and siblings had their own phones and computers, making them one of the most tech rich families in our study.
We opened with an icebreaker, a get-to-know-you session that was loosely structured rather than rigidly scripted. To get things started we distributed construction paper, colored pencils, crayons, markers, and provided these simple instructions.
“What we want you to do is draw whatever technology you use the most, right now.” Someone blurted out, “Does it have to be electrical?”
“No, your favorite, or what you use the most, right now,” a member of our team replied.
Amid the thinking, daydreaming, and drawing one student jokingly suggested a Betamax, which provoked a friendly response from another student, “You took my idea.”
As the pictures began to come into form, a clear pattern emerged: most students elected to draw a mobile device.
Jada drew her phone. “I chose my phone because I listen to all my music on there, I get on the Internet, download apps, do everything with my phone.” She had owned several phones throughout her teen years, but she described her current phone, an Android, as “the highest technology I’ve owned.” When asked to describe her phone in three words, she chose “awesome,” “crap,” and “all right.” “Because sometime it freezes up on me and I have to turn it off, take out the battery.”
“The Android sucks,” someone chimed in. Adding, “Even though I have an Android, I think the Android sucks. They have so many problems.”
Antonio concurred, “I like it [Android] better than the iPhone, because iPhones cost too much.” Cassandra agreed, “That is true.” Kyle, in a self-deprecating tone, noted that he was in the stone age, a reference to his small, outdated flip phone. Kyle’s device lacked all of the features common in phones today: no camera, no apps, and no ability to email, browse the web, play games, or listen to music.
After noticing Kyle’s picture, one interviewer asked, “Did you draw a pager?”
“No. I did my Playstation 2, and an iPod, and my skateboard, because I enjoy listening to music while I skate, and while I play video games, and I pretty much play video games all the time, because that’s all I have to do, other than skate.” Kyle chose the words “fun,” “time-consuming,” and “adventurous” to describe his favorite technologies.
Jada drew her phone. “Why is it important to you?” one of our interviewers asked.
“Kind of like the main thing that I use, like, when I come home from work, and stuff, like, sometimes I’m curious, so I get on my phone and like, look, whatever up, you know.” She added, “And I talk on the phone forever and I listen to music, mainly so … I do practically everything on it.” Jada chose the words “beneficial,” “convenient,” and “interesting” to describe her phone.
Amina drew her iPod Touch, “because it’s the only thing I use, pretty much.” She uses the iPod to text, go on Facebook, listen to music, and take pictures. Her phone was broke, which forced her to rely heavily on the iPod for social connections and media consumption. Referring to the broken phone she said, “I have to get a new one, but I probably won’t.” At the time of our focus group she did not have enough money to purchase a new phone. Amina described her iPod as “useful, entertaining, and pretty.” Her last adjective, “pretty,” reflects the degree to which the social identities of teens are heavily wrapped in the mobile devices they own—that is, mobile phones as a source of status, personal expression, and identity construction.1
Sergio produced a picture of his computer because he uses it for everything. “Like, mainly music, because I have some music software on there and I can record my guitar, … or I can make different beats, kind of like GarageBand, but better.” His aunt purchased the digital music production software for him. The computer, according to Sergio, had been in the family a long time. “My sister got it from her boyfriend.” He described the computer as slow. “It’s the family computer, so, all these files are bringing it down,” he explained. Sergio selected the words “slow,” “crap,” and “green” (the color of the computer) to describe the laptop.
Cassandra sketched a meticulous picture of her phone.
“Because I use it a lot … all the time. It’s my only, like, electronic device that’s mine,” adding, “I use it for texting, calling, my calendar, my notepad, music.” She claimed that this must have been her thirteenth phone. “Sometimes they break, and sometimes I break them.”
“How would you describe your phone?” an interviewer asked.
“Handy,
