The screen and the world
a phenomenological investigation into screens and our engagement in the world
pp. 295-318
in: Richard Baskerville, Jan Stage, Janice DeGross (eds), Organizational and social perspectives on information technology, Berlin, Springer, 2000Abstract
In this paper, we attempt to show how phenomenology can provide an interesting and novel basis for thinking about screens in a world where screens now pervade all aspects of our daily existence. We first provide a discussion of the key phenomenological concepts. This is followed by its application to the phenomenon of a screen. In our phenomenology of the screen, we aim to give an essential account of a screen, as a screen, in its very screen-ness. We follow Heidegger's argument that the screen will only show itself as a screen in its functioning as a screen in the world where screens are what they are. We claim, and aim to show, that our analysis provides many insights about the screen-ness of screens that we can not gain through any other method of investigation. We also show that although our method is not empirical its results have many important implications for the empirical world.
