MDIA1091 Chap.1 Mediated Life, Agency and Power
Mediated Life, Agency and Power
Media is often hardest to analyse when it feels ordinary. This chapter maps a mediated encounter as a relationship among people, devices, platforms, institutions, practices and ideas. It treats agency as a situated capacity to make a difference rather than a possession reserved for autonomous individuals.
The method then compares unequal capacities: a user may interpret or refuse, an interface can invite, a ranking system orders visibility and an institution controls rules. The result avoids both technological determinism and the opposite claim that media is only a neutral tool.
What this chapter covers
- 01
Everyday media becomes analytically visible when participants, technologies, routines and institutions are separated
- 02
Agency means situated capacity to alter an encounter, not complete freedom or moral equivalence among actors
- 03
Power appears through unequal control over options, attention, visibility, meaning and consequences
- 04
Technological determinism overstates uniform effects, while pure voluntarism ignores material and institutional conditions
- 05
Immediate choice, designed options, platform rules and political economy form connected levels of explanation
- 06
A defensible claim names the mechanism, the evidence available and the boundary beyond which inference would become speculation
Worked example · free
Mapping agency in a shared playlist
- +1Identify the human capacities: members select tracks, interpret the playlist's meaning, negotiate belonging and can reject recommendations.
- +1Identify non-human operations: the interface makes suggestions prominent and the ranking rule translates skips into lower visibility.
- +1Compare power: members control individual contributions, while the platform defines available actions, ordering rules and the data used for visibility.
- +1Qualify the conclusion: one group demonstrates co-production and unequal control but cannot establish how every listener responds to recommendation systems.
Key terms
- Relational agency
- Relational agency is the capacity to act that emerges through connections among people, technologies, practices and institutions.
- Mediated encounter
- A mediated encounter is a situated event in which communication and action occur through media forms and infrastructures.
- Power
- Power is the unequal capacity to shape options, attention, visibility, meaning or material consequence within a relationship.
- Technological determinism
- Technological determinism explains social change as a direct and largely uniform result of technology itself.
- Voluntarism
- Voluntarism treats outcomes as products of individual intention while minimising material, cultural and institutional constraints.
- Platform rule
- A platform rule is an institutional decision that structures permitted action, ranking, moderation or access across a service.
Mediated Life, Agency and Power FAQ
Can a technology have agency?
Agency can describe a technology's capacity to alter an encounter, such as a notification interrupting attention or a ranking system ordering visibility. That does not give the technology human intention or moral responsibility. The analysis should also identify the people and institutions that designed, deployed and govern the operation.
How is agency different from power?
Agency is a capacity to make a difference, while power compares how capacities are distributed and whose action can set conditions for others. A user may exercise agency by refusing a recommendation, yet the platform retains greater power because it can change defaults, data flows and ranking rules across the service.
How do I avoid technological determinism?
Name the feature or operation, show the mechanism, include user interpretation and context, and state a boundary. Instead of saying a medium causes one behaviour, explain how an arrangement makes an action easier, more visible or costly for situated users while leaving room for negotiation, resistance and different outcomes.
Assessment move
Draw a five-node map for each case: person, device, platform, institution and practice. Beside each node, list what it can do and what it cannot control. Add arrows only when you can explain the relationship in a sentence. Then compare levels of power: immediate choices, interface options, platform-wide rules and business or regulatory conditions.
Practise revising deterministic sentences by replacing abstract actors with observable operations. Keep evidence types separate: interface observation can demonstrate an invitation or ordering, but audience effects need reception or behavioural evidence. End every practice paragraph with a scope statement that explains what the case supports and what broader claim would require additional research.
Run a three-pass case audit after drafting. On the first pass, underline every actor and replace vague labels with the person, organisation, device or procedure involved. On the second, circle each causal verb and ask whether the available observation actually demonstrates that link. On the third, mark every place where capacity is unequal, including rule-setting, refusal, repair and access to information.
Rewrite one paragraph from the perspective of a less powerful participant, then compare what becomes visible. This exercise turns agency from a synonym for individual choice into a relational account of who can intervene, under which conditions, and with what consequences.
