Going with the affective flows of digital school absence text messages |
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| Authors: | Linnea Bodén |
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| Institution: | 1. Department of Social and Welfare Studies, Link?ping University, Norrk?ping, Swedenlinnea.boden@buv.su.se |
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| Abstract: | Focusing on digital text messages containing information about students’ absences and sent to parents by schools, the paper investigates the way school absenteeism is produced within affective assemblages. The paper unfolds a theoretical and methodological approach of ‘going with’ the text messages, in entanglements of affective flows. The empirical engagements, produced together with multiple agents in two Swedish schools, show that within the assemblages of human and nonhuman bodies, the text messages can become ‘stirrers’ that evoke nervousness and anxiety, but also excitement and feelings of control that affect the production and conception of absenteeism. The affective flows of text messages thus travel in all directions, with and against notions of linearity. The conclusion emphasizes how the text messages, as affective materialities, are an inextricable part of the production of school absenteeism in multiple and sometimes unexpected ways. |
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| Keywords: | Digital text messages school absenteeism affect affective flows assemblages |
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