Introduction

A flourishing of screens increasingly defines our contemporary lifeworld. Screens have become more numerous and more protean, changing in size, position, and dimension as well as thickness, shape, and material. But with this increase in number and variety, the screen’s functions have also mutated. No longer solely surfaces for the display of representations, they are central to mobile, multi-directional communication. They are surfaces for writing and aggregating messages; they also serve as interfaces for the storage, sharing, and filtering of information. As their uses expand, screens also reshape the most public as well as the most intimate of experiences, obliterating many of the boundaries through which these spheres were formerly distinguished. We should not mistake the screen’s immediate visual impact as proffering transparent or universal access. The explosion of screens also depends on and produces new invisibilities, divisions, and enclosures. As more and more aspects of production, consumption, leisure, and communication rely on interactions with screens, so fears grow of the risks and dangers associated with screen exposure—fears that increasingly issue from the very technologists who design and program screens. ¹