Negotiating agency: Amish and ultra-Orthodox women's responses to the Internet. (January 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Neriya-Ben Shahar, Rivka
• Other Names: Campbell Heidi guest-editor.; Lövheim Mia guest-editor.
• Is Part Of: New media & society. Volume 19:Number 1(2017)
• Page Start: 81
• Page End: 95
• Publication Date: 2017-01
• Subjects: Agency -- agents-of-change -- Amish -- gatekeepers -- Internet -- nonuse -- religious communities -- ultra-Orthodox -- women; Mass media -- Social aspects -- Periodicals; Mass media and culture -- Periodicals; Information technology -- Social aspects -- Periodicals; Internet -- Social aspects -- Periodicals; 302.2305
• DOI: 10.1177/1461444816649920
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1461-4448

Abstract

This study explores how women in two devout religious communities cope with the Internet and its apparent incompatibility with their communities' values and practices. Questionnaires containing both closed and open-ended questions were completed by 82 participants, approximately half from each community. While their discourses included similar framings of danger and threat, the two groups manifested different patterns of Internet use (and nonuse). Rigorous adherence to religious dictates is greatly admired in these communities, and the women take pride in manipulating their status in them. Their agency is reflected in how they negotiate the tension inherent in their roles as both gatekeepers and agents-of-change, which are analyzed as valuable currencies in their cultural and religious markets.