Algorithmic Assemblages, the Natural Attitude, and the Social Informatics of the Pandemic Lifeworld

• Published in: The Usage and Impact of ICTs During the Covid-19 Pandemic pp. 248 - 271
• Main Author: Rosenbaum, Howard
• Format: Book Chapter
• Language: English
• Published: United Kingdom Routledge 2023; Taylor & Francis Group
• Edition: 1
• Subjects: Algorithmic Neutrality; Social Phenomenology; Powerful Corporate Actors; CoP Literature; Health Information Behavior; Low Health Literacy Group; Conspiratorial Sites; Inherent Power Asymmetries; Social Informatics; Vaccine Hesitancy; LIWC Lexicon; Opinion Radicalization; Critical Data Studies; Ontological Trust; ICT Consequence; LIWC; ICT Governance; Social Informatics Research; Public Engagement; Major Depression Group; Natural Attitude; Virtual CoP; Algorithmic Authority; Information Behavior; Technological Frame
• ISBN: 9781032139746; 9781032139753; 1032139757; 1032139749
• DOI: 10.4324/9781003231769-14

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to run its course, the discourse about the virus has splintered into diverse narratives characterized by different views of, for example, its origins, vaccine hesitancy, and the efficacy of masking. This chapter provides a theoretical understanding of the grounds of the polarization of this information environment. In doing so, it addresses a core assumption of social informatics, the relationship of mutual shaping among people, technologies, and their contexts of use, by providing an initial sketch of a conceptual framework that grounds this assumption in concepts from phenomenology, postphenomenology, and critical data studies. Using the example of the emergence of competing and deeply held and starkly different narratives depicting the COVID-19 pandemic, concepts of the lifeworld, the natural attitude, algorithmic assemblages, algorithmic imaginary, and technological frames are used to account for the generation, spread, and persistence of these narratives. The argument proceeds in three sections. First, algorithms and algorithmic assemblages are introduced. Second, the concepts of the lifeworld and the natural attitude are described. Third, these concepts are used to explain how algorithmic assemblages are shaping the lifeworld and the natural attitude, using examples of the algorithmically mediated and polarized responses to fundamental issues of the pandemic. This chapter provides a theoretical understanding of the grounds of the polarization of this information environment. Schools have been closed and reopened, nonessential workers have been sent home, public events have been cancelled, public gatherings have been limited, and international travel has been curtailed. Except for such digital channels as personal email, direct messaging, and texting, people's routine online social exchanges are mediated by social platforms, services, and their typically hidden and proprietary algorithms. An algorithmic assemblage is a sociotechnical accomplishment and a communication technology, connecting people, groups, companies, governments, and other actors in an ongoing exchange of data, information, and services. The assumption of the ontological intersubjectivity of the lifeworld marks Schutz's departure from Husserl and prepares the foundation for his social phenomenology. The natural attitude is relatively stable because it "takes the world and its objects for granted until counterproof imposes itself", meaning that people typically suspend doubt about the existence of the social world and its objects.