Book: Lost and Found. Transforming Assistance at Digital Deutsche Bahn
Abstract
Paying close attention to the intricacies of the episode below, this paper sets out to reflect in situ a shift to digitizing “lost and found” services. Foreshadowing a more extensive study on a contemporary redistribution of assistance at Deutsche Bahn, it refers to a pragmatist tradition concerned with preserving the condition of voice. Following this vein, it faces a purist critical attitude – epitomized in the practice of economics (Orléan 2014), which defends market forces (“exit”) as a way to outperform voice in any situation of decline, decay or dissatisfaction (Hirschman 1970). Anti-elitist suspicions, brought to perfection by another branch of social sciences, have become a powerful ally of this position. Rather than criticizing elitism and privilege, however, the present contribution draws on ethnographic research which displays the ambiguity of privileged users’ encounters with assis- tants. Exploring ambiguous patterns in the practice of assistance, it seeks for a politics of pity which has been largely absent from current appraisals of digital sociality.
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@MISC{Potthast2021,
author = {Potthast, Jörg},
title = {Lost and Found. Transforming Assistance at Digital Deutsche Bahn},
year = 2021,
doi = "\url{http://dx.doi.org/10.25969/mediarep/19310}",
volume = 19,
address = {Siegen},
series = {SFB 1187 Medien der Kooperation – Working Paper Series},
}
author = {Potthast, Jörg},
title = {Lost and Found. Transforming Assistance at Digital Deutsche Bahn},
year = 2021,
doi = "\url{http://dx.doi.org/10.25969/mediarep/19310}",
volume = 19,
address = {Siegen},
series = {SFB 1187 Medien der Kooperation – Working Paper Series},
}
Keywords
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