The Church of Facebook
How the Hyperconnected Are Redefining Community
by Jesse Rice
GoodBookStall Review:
Jesse Rice's The Church of Facebook begins by addressing our need for connection with others and then goes on to look at why though Facebook and Twitter give us a form of connection, in the end they just don’t fulfil our more basic needs for contact - real contact - despite the length our 'contact' lists may be.
In the book he gives a great synopsis of the history and development of our socially networked internet and talks about how it has grown from our needs and wants, but he also points out how it can be a place of shallow depth and interaction that in some ways rather than satisfying actually leaves one more empty, or feeling more lonely and isolated and then needing more of it to assuage these feelings - for me this made me think of the addiction cycle and tied in to why we succumb to and talk of Facebook addiction etc. This is where the need for real community comes into play, says Rice, real human and physical contact can help fill the lonely spots and here is where faith can play an active and real part, faith should after all be about personal contact, outreach and growth - about more than just touching in through an update, but about real interaction. This is what Community and real connectedness is about.
Having said all this though The Church of Facebook does not dismiss social networking, no, instead it says it can be a positive thing - a way to work and grow our connectedness but only if we move beyond the shallowness of much of the interaction and instead anchor it in the reality of our lives, only if we are honest and open and resist the temptation to hide in urbanity and surface socialisation - only then can there really be a church on Facebook.
It is an excellent book and worth looking at even if you are not really interested in the faith angle as such because it's looking at the idea of Community more than anything and as the subtitle says, How the hyperconnected are redefining community.
Reviewer: Melanie Carroll (04/08/10)
Jesse Rice's The Church of Facebook begins by addressing our need for connection with others and then goes on to look at why though Facebook and Twitter give us a form of connection, in the end they just don’t fulfil our more basic needs for contact - real contact - despite the length our 'contact' lists may be.
In the book he gives a great synopsis of the history and development of our socially networked internet and talks about how it has grown from our needs and wants, but he also points out how it can be a place of shallow depth and interaction that in some ways rather than satisfying actually leaves one more empty, or feeling more lonely and isolated and then needing more of it to assuage these feelings - for me this made me think of the addiction cycle and tied in to why we succumb to and talk of Facebook addiction etc. This is where the need for real community comes into play, says Rice, real human and physical contact can help fill the lonely spots and here is where faith can play an active and real part, faith should after all be about personal contact, outreach and growth - about more than just touching in through an update, but about real interaction. This is what Community and real connectedness is about.
Having said all this though The Church of Facebook does not dismiss social networking, no, instead it says it can be a positive thing - a way to work and grow our connectedness but only if we move beyond the shallowness of much of the interaction and instead anchor it in the reality of our lives, only if we are honest and open and resist the temptation to hide in urbanity and surface socialisation - only then can there really be a church on Facebook.
It is an excellent book and worth looking at even if you are not really interested in the faith angle as such because it's looking at the idea of Community more than anything and as the subtitle says, How the hyperconnected are redefining community.
Reviewer: Melanie Carroll (04/08/10)
