Reem Hilu's "The Intimate Life of Computers" explores the integration of personal computers into American homes during the 1980s, focusing on their impact on family relationships. The book challenges traditional narratives of computer culture, highlighting the role of women's culture and feminist critiques in shaping the development of personal computing. Hilu introduces the concept of "companionate computing," examining how computer applications addressed the emotional and relational needs of users. By analyzing software, advertisements, and cultural discourse, the book reveals the surprising ways domesticity and family life influenced the early stages of digital culture. The book ultimately demonstrates how technology and social change intertwined in the 1980s.
In 'Games People Play', Dr. Eric Berne introduces his theory of transactional analysis as a way to interpret social interactions. He proposes that individuals switch between three ego states: the Parent, the Adult, and the Child. The book catalogs various 'mind games' that people engage in, which are patterned and predictable interactions that conceal hidden motivations and lead to specific outcomes. Berne argues that understanding these games can help individuals recognize and change dysfunctional patterns in their relationships. The book was a commercial success and has been influential in popularizing transactional analysis, despite receiving some academic criticism for its simplification of psychological concepts.
Digitizing Domesticity in the 1980s: The Intimate Life of Computers (U Minnesota Press, 2024) shows how the widespread introduction of home computers in the 1980s was purposefully geared toward helping sustain heteronormative middle-class families by shaping relationships between users. Moving beyond the story of male-dominated computer culture, this book emphasizes the neglected history of the influence of women’s culture and feminist critique on the development of personal computing despite women’s underrepresentation in the industry.
Proposing the notion of “companionate computing,” Reem Hilu reimagines the spread of computers into American homes as the history of an interpersonal, romantic, and familial medium. She details the integration of computing into family relationships—from helping couples have better sex and offering thoughtful simulations of masculine seduction to animating cute robot companions and giving voice to dolls that could talk to lonely children—underscoring how these computer applications directly responded to the companionate needs of their users as a way to ease growing pressures on home life.
The Intimate Life of Computers is a vital contribution to feminist media history, highlighting how the emergence of personal computing dovetailed with changing gender roles and other social and cultural shifts. Eschewing the emphasis on technologies and institutions typically foregrounded in personal-computer histories, Hilu uncovers the surprising ways that domesticity and family life guided the earlier stages of our all-pervasive digital culture.
Peter C. Kunze is an assistant professor of communication at Tulane University.
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