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SuperVision: An Introduction to the Surveillance Society
We live in a surveillance society. Anyone who uses a credit card, cell phone, or even search engines to navigate the Web is being monitored and assessed—and often in ways that are imperceptible to us. The first general introduction to the growing field of surveillance studies, SuperVision uses examples drawn from everyday technologies to show how surveillance is used, who is using it, and how it affects our world.
Beginning with a look at the activities and technologies that connect most people to the surveillance matrix, from identification cards to GPS devices in our cars to Facebook, John Gilliom and Torin Monahan invite readers to critically explore surveillance as it relates to issues of law, power, freedom, and inequality. Even if you avoid using credit cards and stay off Facebook, they show, going to work or school inevitably embeds you in surveillance relationships. Finally, they discuss the more obvious forms of surveillance, including the security systems used at airports and on city streets, which both epitomize contemporary surveillance and make impossibly grand promises of safety and security.
Gilliom and Monahan are among the foremost experts on surveillance and society, and, with SuperVision, they offer an immensely accessible and engaging guide, giving readers the tools to understand and to question how deeply surveillance has been woven into the fabric of our everyday lives.
Beginning with a look at the activities and technologies that connect most people to the surveillance matrix, from identification cards to GPS devices in our cars to Facebook, John Gilliom and Torin Monahan invite readers to critically explore surveillance as it relates to issues of law, power, freedom, and inequality. Even if you avoid using credit cards and stay off Facebook, they show, going to work or school inevitably embeds you in surveillance relationships. Finally, they discuss the more obvious forms of surveillance, including the security systems used at airports and on city streets, which both epitomize contemporary surveillance and make impossibly grand promises of safety and security.
Gilliom and Monahan are among the foremost experts on surveillance and society, and, with SuperVision, they offer an immensely accessible and engaging guide, giving readers the tools to understand and to question how deeply surveillance has been woven into the fabric of our everyday lives.
188 pages, Paperback
First published November 20, 2012
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
November 14, 2018
read for Criminology class at uni. Should be required reading for Everyone.
May 20, 2019
Very informative about our current surveillance society. So now go and read.
January 30, 2020
reshaped my view on surveillance and broaden my lexicon beyond simple terms such as "big brother"
December 31, 2014
really good!!!
September 25, 2016
Great, informative, accessible book. A definite must-read for anyone participating in society in any meaningful way. And that means pretty much all of us!
May 30, 2013
Very casual book about surveillance. Some eye opening stuff. Good examples.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews