Lecturer: Ilana Gershon, Indiana University

Date: 23.12.2014

Time: 12:15

Room: TBA

Under contemporary U.S. capitalism, white collar workers increasingly view themselves as a business:  they are the "CEO of me."  In this perspective, hiring resembles a business-to-business contract, a short-term connection centered upon solving market-specific problems. This has not been an easy transition for many Americans looking for jobs.   The social dilemmas present in U.S. job markets reveal many problems in enacting the self-as-business model, which are especially prominent when using new media that are designed presupposing the self-as-business model.  My talk draws on a year of fieldwork in California's Bay Area on how new technologies contribute to a challenge so many Americans face these days - getting a job in the digital age.