Social, Cultural and Technological Changes (Auto-Ethnography)
“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”
- Nelson Mandela
For the past 20 years, I have been a witness to various transformation in the social, cultural, and technological domains. From mobile phones that resembled the cordless landline phones to AI-powered I-phone’s, from “come to home before 11” to “let’s go to that club tonight,” from “let’s go and play cricket” to “let’s play PUBG,” things have changed so drastically, that if I were to cover each and every detail, perhaps blog would be the wrong format of the documentation.
So, what are the changes that happened?
Let’s begin with technological advancement. During the childhood days, mobile phones did not pack the overwhelming computational power, neither did the pc of that time. 512GB of storage and 1GB RAM were considered advanced. Windows X dominated the PC’s OS. Only upper-class people could afford the internet. Hence there was no digital connectivity among masses. Yes, I did live in a world where all communication had to be done over call, documents had to be shared physically or needed to be emailed after getting it scanned from the market. I remember I used to get class-notes photocopied on paper while now all I do is scan the pages with my phone.
In the past 5–10 years, computational power has drastically increased, the devices have become more compact and mobile, connectivity has stabilized owing to the internet prices dropping. Almost every family has one or more computers/laptops. A shift of era from information temples such as the library to information at the fingertips has brought about several cultural and social changes as well.
In the previous decade, kids were more willing to visit each other’s house, sit together, decide what they want to do or where they would go from there, took our 2-wheeler’s, and just rushed along. Families used to call other families for social gatherings. The notions of social exclusion, generation gaps, nuclear “families are the best” did not exist around me. Now the scenario has changed to an extent such that I feel a generation gap prominent between me and juniors belonging to my generation. Lol! With the advancement in technology, collaboration is done over the internet, decisions mostly made on texts, distances have been reduced, but so did social activities. From outing with families to a family outing, people are getting less social than ever.
ocial changes were also influenced by cultural transformations. From “log kya kahenge” to I’ll do what I wish,” has impacted the society that people used to live in and now would like to live in. Kids are becoming more and more conscious about moving away from a place devoid of opportunities to cities where opportunities exceed human resources available. Awareness through the availability of information has led to the questioning of blind faiths. Religious boundaries are getting blurred, old rituals like dowry, eating food before sunset, etc. have been removed. The society is becoming more and more practical than the last decade.
The 3 dimensions have blended in so much and have become so complexly interconnected, that pin-pointing one as the cause of changes in others would be a fatal error. What will the blend result in the coming decade, will result in a complete shift in the life that my elders know. Good or bad, we’ll have to wait and watch as the next phase unfolds.
