The aim of this edited collection is to understand the role of digital technology in contemporary society dialectically. While many authors, journalists, and commentators have argued that the Internet and digital technologies will bring us democracy, equality and freedom, digital culture often results in loss of privacy, misinformation, and exploitation. This collection challenges celebratory readings of digital technology by suggesting digital culture’s potential is limited because of its fundamental relationship to oppressive social forces.

Contributors to this collection are particularly interested the ways the digital realm challenges and/or reproduces power. Contributors provide innovative case studies of phenomenon including #metoo, Etsy, mommy blogs, music streaming, sustainability and net neutrality to reveal the reproduction of neoliberal cultural logics. In seemingly transformative digital spaces, these essays provide dialectical readings that challenge dominant narratives about technology. Even more, by writing about specific aspects of digital culture that are often under explored, the collection will interest a variety of students and researchers across disciplines and fields of interest.

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Reviews:

Arditi and Miller wrap some excellent essays with an introduction and conclusion centering on Frankfurt School dialectical theory and the emergence of the digital disaster. The core of the book deals with the idea of a digital dialectic and its analysis in chapters on power, politics, culture, and being human. The editors have lined up a stellar group of essays that profoundly engage our digital world and the edges between questions of music, economy, ecology, memes, and related topics. The dialectical nature of the analyses provides both an entryway and unity to the essays. The book makes numerous substantive contributions to several fields and is worth a read for its scholarship and for those building a knowledge base about our contemporary digital world.
— Jeremy Hunsinger, Wilfrid Laurier University

In The Dialectic of Digital Culture, Arditi and Miller have assembled a fascinating collection of essays exploring the promise and peril of contemporary digital culture. Insisting that we think about digital media dialectically—as both empowerment and capture—the authors collectively inspire readers to pierce through facile narratives of progress and to think more critically about their relationship to digital technologies. Readers will also find the rich diversity of technologies, platforms, practices, and case studies covered in this book to be engaging and enlightening. This is required reading for students and scholars of digital culture.
— Timothy A. Gibson, George Mason University