ABSTRACT
This chapter considers how domestication theory can help our understanding of social inequalities. It draws from ethnographic studies on the lived experiences of digital exclusion in low-income households to emphasise how practices that take place within the home impact digital inclusion. Using empirical material, this chapter argues that domestication theory offers a means to understand how contextual factors impact the way in which people engage with digital participatory practices. These influences have often been overlooked in digital inclusion research. Although digital inclusion research demonstrates that low-income households are particularly likely to experience digital disadvantage, the majority of research in this area is conducted at the individual level. That is, individuals are surveyed, or interviewed, or observed to generate understanding about the influence of affordability on those individual’s experience of digital inclusion. However, this individualised focus disregards the influence that the social contexts in which these individuals exist may or may not have on their digital inclusion. In neglecting these influences, digital inclusion research perpetuates the individualised focus of both digital inclusion research and initiatives intended to resolve digital exclusion. In seeking to understand how digital inclusion is confronted by low-income households, applying the domestication framework may better account for contextual structures.
