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Teresa Heinz Housel

SOLAR PANELS, SHOVELS AND

THE ’NET

Selective uses of technology in the

homesteading movement

Although the dystopian and utopian academic literature on technology presenteither a pessimistic or optimistic picture of its societal impact, people’s everydayuses of technology often counter such views. This paper examines the selective usesof technology, and particularly communications technology, in the everydaypractices of homesteaders, or members of the ‘back to the land’ movement in Bloo-mington, Indiana, USA. Using an ethnographic approach, this study analyzeshow homesteaders’ ideology of voluntary simplicity informs their complex, every-day engagement with technology.

Keywords technology; utopian; dystopian; voluntary simplicity;Luddite

Introduction

Although the dystopian and utopian academic literature on technology presenteither a pessimistic or optimistic picture of its impact on society, people’severyday uses of technology often counter such views. The ways thatpeople often selectively use technology are particularly reflected in the every-day practices of homesteaders, or members of the ‘back to the land’ move-ment, in the United States (Jacob 1997). Although homesteading ishistorically rooted in the white settlement of the US, this paper approachesit as an aspect of voluntary simplicity, a movement that began in the late1970s and embraces a core philosophy of anti-consumerism (Elgin 1981).Homesteaders have diverse demographic characteristics. Some live in envir-onmentally sustainable homesteads off the grid, or without utilities, whileothers selectively use utilities and a wide range of other contemporary tech-nologies. This ethnographic study reflects how homesteaders’ ideology of

Information, Communication & Society Vol. 9, No. 2, April 2006, pp. 182–201

ISSN 1369-118X print/ISSN 1468-4462 online # 2006 Taylor & Francis

http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals DOI: 10.1080/13691180600630765

voluntary simplicity informs their complex engagement with technology ineveryday life. By using data from Internet listserves and interviews withhomesteaders around Bloomington, Indiana, this paper examines how theirselective use of technology is connected to their views about its relationshipto capitalism, influence on people’s loss of personal control, impact on thehome’s domestic sphere, and effect on interpersonal relationships in capitalis-tic, technologically oriented societies.

Homesteading and voluntary simplicity: a briefhistorical overview

The homesteaders’ uses of technology are primarily grounded in the move-ment’s historical development. Contemporary homesteading will beapproached through a framework of voluntary simplicity because many home-steaders describe themselves as voluntary simplicity adherents. Homesteadingexists in countries other than the US (‘Homesteading’ 2004, p. 1). The home-steading movement is especially active through conferences, magazines, news-letters, online discussion lists and websites dedicated to the cause in capitalistpolitical economies such as Australia, Canada and Europe.

Even though homesteading and voluntary simplicity exist elsewhere, theyhave a history specific to the American cultural context. American home-steading’s central values of frugality and self-sufficiency can be traced backto American Puritanism and the Shakers, Henry David Thoreau’s transcen-dentalism, New Deal governmental social policies of the 1930s, and theradical social movements of the 1960s.

The shared ideological base between homesteading and voluntary simpli-city, which informs the homesteaders’ values, outward action and politicalactivism, encompasses their criticism of contemporary consumer culture.By the 1930s, American society had slowly shifted from a ‘culture of thriftto a consumer oriented culture of spending’ (Lipsitz 1988, p. 152). Simpleliving slowly gained a Marxist political focus with the counter-cultural move-ments, which rejected mainstream commercialism/capitalism that some per-ceived was responsible for underdevelopment and sociopolitical inequality.1

The contemporary voluntary simplicity/homesteading movement stillemphasizes ideals of anti-consumerism and self-sufficiency. Elgin (1981),who is viewed as the founder of the voluntary simplicity movement, firstencountered the phrase ‘voluntary simplicity’ in Gregg’s (1936) treatise onmaterialism in Manas, a humanistic journal (Elgin 1981, p. 297). Gregg, aGandhi follower, described voluntary simplicity as an ‘integration of innerand outer aspects of life’ (Elgin 1981, p. 31). Elgin analyzed how this inte-gration requires a ‘singleness of purpose’ and an ‘avoidance of exteriorclutter’ that permit a ‘greater abundance of life’ (Elgin 1981, p. 31). Using

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Gregg’s link between spirituality and materialism, Elgin and his colleagueArnold Mitchell theorized how the words ‘voluntary’ and ‘simplicity’contain inherent spiritual elements (Elgin & Mitchell 1977). In otherwords, Elgin and Mitchell suggested that ‘voluntary’ signifies a decision tolive more ‘deliberately, intentionally, purposefully’ (Elgin 1981, p. 32).‘Simplicity’, as Elgin and other literature suggest (see Bannister 1981;Avraham 1988), evokes practical ways to be less dependent on mainstreamconsumption. Together, the two words ‘voluntary’ and ‘simplicity’ revealthe remaining ‘most authentic and alive self’ (Elgin 1981, p. 33), whichseeks to balance the inner spiritual life with the outer challenges toconsumption.

Many studies focusing on voluntary simplicity/homesteading emphasizethe relationship between everyday practice and an ideology of voluntary sim-plicity. Most literature on voluntary simplicity/homesteading discusses how abalance between the internal, spiritual life and outer living practices isachieved through outward practices such as vegetarianism and recycling(see Freaney 1995; Devall 1995). As this paper will demonstrate, some home-steaders’ views of technology are similarly guided by an ideology of voluntarysimplicity with its critique of capitalism.

Homesteaders’ uses of technology: an ethnographicapproach

Homesteaders’ everyday practices are informed by the broader social, politi-cal and historical issues influencing the movement’s development (Briggs1993, p. 34). Their use of technology largely differs from the utopian litera-ture’s optimism in social progress, global communities, individual freedomand political agency (Miller & Slater 2000, p. 16; Swiss & Herman 2000,p. 2). A strictly utopian discourse often masks the ‘underlying factors of poli-tics and power’ (Carey & Quirk 1973, p. 501) in which technology isembedded. However, it is essential to point out that the homesteadersoften enact a selective use of technology that combines elements of utopianand dystopian views. Even though they question technology’s role insociety, the homesteaders’ technological practices contradict the pessimistic,technologically determinist discourses of dystopian literature.

An ethnography of homesteaders’ everyday technological choices revealshow strictly dystopian discourses are at odds with how they actually live. Thisanalysis follows Miller and Slater’s (2000) ethnography of Trinidadian cultureby focusing not on a material object (technology) being appropriated by‘another thing called society’ (p. 8); rather, an ethnography examines howtechnology as a sociocultural construction intersects the lives of ordinarypeople, or social subjects. This process opens up opportunities for

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ethnography to explore local ways of knowing and acting. Geertz (1983)suggests how people as actors negotiate and construct social realitiesthrough everyday choices. An important aspect of these choices is the waythey interact with communications technology through choices involvingself-reflection and struggle.

An ethnography reveals how everyday activities are far too complicated tobe contained in linear, neat categories of utopian or dystopian literature, oreven what comprises a homesteader. As this paper will point out, the home-steaders’ differing attitudes toward technology largely result from the move-ment’s demographic subsets, which range from left-wing adherents, toreligious practitioners, to survivalists. In the American cultural context, sur-vivalists often hold extremely conservative political and/or anti-technologyviews, separate themselves from society, and frequently live in very rurallocations. The diverse ways in which homesteaders interact with technologynot only reflect the multiple sociocultural practices within a movement, butalso reveal the equally fragmented and complex nature of dominant discoursesin society.

The homesteaders’ selective engagement with technology counters rigidstereotypes of them as Luddites who refuse to use technology at all. Luddismis deeply rooted in dystopian literature. Concerns about new technologies’impact on work and community have existed since the Industrial Revolution(Wellman 1997, p. 446). In his analysis of the relationship between Luddismand dystopian literature on technology, Lyons (1979) describes classicalLuddite views: technology is an alien, negative and inhuman force; peoplecannot make wise decisions regarding the use of technology; and technologywill only lead to more human crises because of its negative ecological andsocial effects (p. 397). As with Luddism, dystopianism focuses on technol-ogy’s capability to produce a ‘social order that is relentlessly harsh, destruc-tive, and miserable’ (Kling 1996, p. 42). Such views imbue technologies asartifacts that mobilize values and imperatives of the socioeconomic systemin which they are embedded (see Kraft & Vig 1988, p. xiii). In contrast,Kling points out how utopian literature emphasizes technological progress,speed, annihilation of time and space constraints and the Internet’s democra-ticizing potential (1996, p. 41). Luddism and dystopian literature, on theother hand, suggest how technology is negatively impacting society.

Even though the respondents in this study criticized technology, theirviews did not reflect a clear divide between utopian and dystopian, orLuddite, sentiment. The homesteaders’ selective use of technology reflectshow they place values on technological forms. These values are often con-nected to their ideology of voluntary simplicity, and their views of technol-ogy’s connection to capitalism. This selectivity contrasts to dystopianliterature, which portrays technologies such as computerization in extremewhite and black terms and obscures its complex operation in everyday life


(Kling 1996, p. 51). Kling’s focus on social realism rests less on social deter-minism and more on technology’s combined positive and negative socialimpact (1996, pp. 55–56). In this way, social realism suits this paper’s eth-nographic approach and the homesteaders’ uses of technology because theyconsider ‘computerization as it is actually practiced and experienced’(Kling 1996, p. 56) in daily life.

Research site and data collection

Bloomington was chosen as the research site because of the state’s rich historyof homesteading that includes pioneers and Amish who settled there duringthe nineteenth century (Carmony 1946). The Bloomington-area homesteadingpopulation reflects the diverse contemporary movement in which homestea-ders are linked by attitudes of anti-consumerism and simple living practices.Some rural counties in the area have no building codes and draw people whodesire to leave the city and live on small farms or semi-sufficient homesteads.Several homesteading communes, which are almost 20 years old, exist justoutside Bloomington. In addition, the city has a well-established Center forSustainable Living office in which some members of the nearby universityare involved.

Even though the author herself has not homesteaded, she became inter-ested in the topic when reading about it in early 1997 while living inPerth, Western Australia. In Perth, she interviewed local organic farmersfor a class essay at Murdoch University. Gradually, the interview discussionsmoved toward the farmers’ wider beliefs about capitalism, homesteading andconsumption. When the author moved to Bloomington in August 1999, shebegan to investigate the area’s history of homesteading.

This paper incorporates data from interviews conducted with 10 home-steaders in the Bloomington area from March to April 2001.2 The respondentsincluded four men and six women who ranged in age from their early twentiesto early fifties. The respondents lived in Bloomington or in rural Monroe,Brown, Orange and Owen counties. They were planning, building or livingin environmentally sustainable homesteads. All were university educated,but only some had jobs outside the home. Although most used public utilities,three lived completely off the grid in cabins or cob houses made of mud andstraw. They were asked a series of structured interview questions addressingtheir overall philosophy of voluntary simplicity; their reasons for becominghomesteaders; their attitudes toward technology’s role in contemporarysociopolitical life; the types of communications technologies that they use;and the ways that their technology usage reflects their views on simplicityand mainstream society. These interviews were supplemented with datataken from two Internet homesteading discussion lists, ‘Countrylife’, and


‘Homesteading and Frugal Living News’, in early 2001 and again in 2004. Thelists included Christian homesteaders and left-wing homesteaders, respect-ively, but the discussion on both lists reflected a similar theme of selectivetechnology use. Together, the interviews and Internet data revealed thediverse ways in which homesteaders incorporate technology in their everydaylives.

This study’s respondents and listserve homesteaders described acutelytheir selective technology use. Primarily, their choices reflect a definitionof technology encompassing a continuum of technologies ranging fromhand-tools to computers. Steven Collinson, who lives off the grid in acabin, does not have a phone, computer or television and uses a propanestove and spring water for drinking. He has homesteaded since November1999. Despite his choice not to use communications or more advanced house-hold technologies, he said, ‘I look at my tools as technologies’. This broaddefinition of technology thus incorporates the homesteaders’ application ofpersonal values to their choices. Connie and Paul Harrison, who live offthe grid in a straw bale (made of wood-frame and straw bale walls) home,decided to homestead after years of questioning mainstream society andmeeting other homesteaders. They have homesteaded since the mid-1990s.They now use a telephone and car along with a combination of kerosene light-ing, hand-operated washing machine, woodburning stove, a graywatersystem, composting toilet and a gravity-driven water system.

In deciding what technologies to use, most homesteaders described therealities of homesteading. As one listserve writer noted:

Let me tell you, it is a very different lifestyle. If your [sic] consideringgoing off grid consider this: No microwave, no heating thermostat toadjust, no hot water at the turn of a tap. For that matter, no water atthe turn of a tap.

(‘Homesteading’ 2001)

One Bloomington-area homesteader, Amy Smith, described modern technol-ogy’s benefits. She and her partner have lived in a trailer on five acres sinceApril 1999. ‘Technology is a tool and I have electricity because I likehaving heat. I like having an electric well pump and not having to haul mywater’, she said.

The homesteaders emphasized technology’s usefulness in society, yet theywere critical about the values behind technology’s production and environ-mental impact. Self-reliance and environmental concerns are integral totheir selective technology uses. To this end, the criticisms of technology’ssocial impact that were shared by the responses tended to break down intofour different categories: technology’s connection to capitalism, thehuman’s loss of personal control, impact on the home’s domestic sphere,


and influence on interpersonal relationships in contemporary society. Afterthe interview data were collected, these categories were repeatedly andclearly apparent in an informal reading of the information. These themesare likewise present in the dystopian literature’s critiques of technology’ssocietal impact. All of the data from the interviews and listserves werecoded for these four categories, into which this paper’s discussion is alsoorganized.

The role of capitalism and personal control in selectiveuses of technology

The homesteaders’ views of technology are informed by capitalism, whichunderlies technology’s development. Capitalism’s effect on human relation-ships and society has frequently been addressed in critical cultural studies.Marx (1992) particularly discusses the inseparability between the state, econ-omics and power in capitalist economies when capitalism reshapes humanrelationships to ones based on commodity and exchange. This new relation-ship is rearticulated through capitalism that requires industrialization, con-sumption, bureaucracy, international trade and large-scale technologies ofproduction (see Weber 1978, p. 240; Beatley & Manning 1997, p. 29).Marx criticized the ways that technologies facilitated the division of laborand alienated people from one another in bureaucratized workplaces con-trolled by capitalists. Global forces and transnational flows are most apparentat the national and state levels (Knight 1989, p. 25; see also Appadurai 1990,p. 304). Therefore, the state’s control over people’s everyday living practicesis influenced by global economic flows connected to complex issues regardingprivate property, personal autonomy, government control and capitalism(Choko 1993, p. 3; Scott 1998, p. 12).

Such economic and political interests equally inform the state’s overalltreatment of the natural environment. This treatment, Bjork (1980) suggests,is ‘controlled by economic forces’ (p. 77) when land that has not been alteredusing modern technology for private use is viewed as an economic resource inneed of development. This example reflects an amoral conception of technol-ogy as an inevitable agent of change that is autonomous from culture (Winner1988, p. 35; McOmber 1999, pp. 138, 146). As this paper will later pointout, the homesteaders also express this literature’s criticism.

In light of the issues discussed above, dystopian discourse opposes aview of capitalism as ‘benign and natural’ (McChesney 2000, pp. 7, 14).McChesney, especially, criticizes how technology is rooted in profit-driven, free-market capitalism (p. 7). Technological development is oftenconnected to dominant political interests, which underlie factors such asmilitary technologies that frequently discount their environmental effects


(Kraft & Vig 1988, p. xii). John and Marie Riley, who live outside Bloomingtonwith their young son, inhabit a trailer on reclaimed land that formerly was adump for old cars. Having moved to the site in the late 1990s, they hope tobuild a nature center and retreat amidst the rolling hills. Describing theenvironmental effects of technology, Marie Riley said, ‘Technology is busyfixing the problems that technology has caused’. She criticized discoursesthat equate ‘technology’s advancement with the growth of the economy’,or progress. Similarly, others criticized the deterministic emphasis oninevitable technological advancement in the mainstream media. ‘The use oftechnology is rampant, like an airplane on fire’, said Kyle Grant, who movedto a small homestead outside Bloomington with his wife Melissa in 1998.

The factors behind technology’s development and capitalism, therefore,inform the homesteaders’ technological choices. Primarily, the homesteadersdescribed how their technological choices symbolize their criticism of thecommodification underlying energy production and use. They frequentlyemphasized what they saw as the relationship between capitalism, consumer-ism and technology. As one homesteader mentioned on an Internet listserve:

What our great-grandparents called ‘common storage’ – simple, com-monsensical, hand-done, low-or-no-energy ways of putting up home-garden and orchard crops – is far from common any more. Now, mostof us are content to be fed by the SooperDooper [slang for high-techand factory production of food] or fueled by Exxon. (‘Countrylife’ 2001)

The writer’s criticism of corporations is characteristic of how otherhomesteaders emphasized the profit-oriented nature of utility companies.For example, Smith belongs to telephone and electric rural cooperatives,in which a local company purchases energy from utility corporations andre-sells it for a low cost to subscribing, voting members. Describing herdecision to join a cooperative, Smith said, ‘We couldn’t afford the upfrontcosts of solar and wind energy. We feel slightly better being part of theco-ops.’ She described the phone cooperative’s recent effort to maintainindependence from utilities corporations when it was almost sold to acorporation. Several thousand members voted the proposal down. Inanother case, the Grants use mainstream utilities now but they shared theirplans eventually to move off the grid. Taking a slightly different perspective,Collinson does not use solar panels because he said their manufacturingprocess in plants relies ‘on the grid’. ‘It can take more power to makesolar panels than you can get out of them in their lifetime’, said Collinson.‘They free people from the grid, but you are still connected through theirmanufacturing.’

Moreover, the Harrisons use a computer that belongs to theCatholic center (on whose property they live), but having such technology


in their home would require them to have solar panels. ‘It’s possible todo’, Paul Harrison said, ‘but solar panels are very toxic in theirmanufacturing’.

Embedded in the above comments is what Kimbrell (1997) describes asthe ‘individual and community control’ (p. 45) incorporated in alternativetechnologies such as solar and water energy off the grid, or living entirelywithout electricity or motors. Collinson’s criticism of solar panels reflectsthe movement’s diverse nature between homesteaders who live very primi-tively, and those who wish perhaps to maintain aspects of mainstream life-styles without using public utilities. Their assertions reflect the complexways that personal values are applied to technology use. However, theirchoices reflect the theme of personal control apart from capitalistic insti-tutions. As Collinson noted, ‘I can’t put a price on the freedom I have’.Other homesteaders’ comments reflected how solar energy, unlike electricityfrom a public utility, permits individual and community control. Solar energydiffers from other entities such as nuclear energy, which includes acentralized power source, bureaucracies that oversee safety regulations andscientific elites (see Kimbrell 1997, p. 45).

Both the Bloomington-area and listserve homesteaders discussed ways tocircumvent public utilities in their quest for personal autonomy. Jill Bradley,who has lived on a small homestead since early 1997, described heating andlighting in her home. ‘We have a wood stove for heat. We don’t need elec-tricity around here’, she said. ‘I like not having to depend on bureaucrats, likewith the utility company.’ Connie Harrison, who described the ‘institutionalforms of power’ in utility companies, said, ‘We went off the grid so we wouldnot use energy from sources we couldn’t see’. In early 2001, the ‘Homestead-ing and Frugal Living’ listserve spent several weeks discussing how to operatehome computers off solar and wind energy, thus allowing them to use thetechnology without the intrusion of bureaucracy. This discussion reflectshow the homesteaders differentiated between technological forms them-selves, energy production and the bureaucracies required to run corporations.Their comments reflect how tapping into alternative energy sources requiresmore self-initiative than using utilities, but most added that alternative energysources allow people more control and self-sufficiency.

The homesteaders’ emphasis on human control, which underlies theircritiques of technology, is also present in dystopian literature. Critics pointout how utopian and instrumental technological discourses, which disregardtechnology’s embeddedness in culture, mask the relationship between statecontrol and capitalism (see McOmber 1999, pp. 138, 142). For example,the promises of ‘progress and property’ (Carey & Quirk 1973, p. 486) histori-cally influenced the public’s confidence in technology from the IndustrialRevolution onwards (McOmber 1999, p. 142). Such promises are alsoembedded in contemporary discourse related to communications


technologies. In fact, the Clinton Administration focused on electronic net-working and information media as vehicles to improve the country’seconomy and educational systems in the 1990s (Clinton 1993; Milio 1996,p. 21). Such attitudes to communication technologies are informed byutopian discourses, which have historically focused on technology’s democra-tizing and communitarian aspects. For instance, early studies of Freenets inthe 1980s discussed how they supported local advocacy on behalf of interestgroups (Milio 1996, p. 80). Although technology often imparts an appearanceof control, some critics assert that people are becoming dependent onmachines and losing their freedom to computer-run organizations, whichoversee workers and gather personal information (see Meadows 1991;Kling 1996, p. 41). Technology therefore can be an instrument of concen-tration, centralized power and control in institutions that are embedded inglobal capitalistic flows.

This background informs Collinson’s description of a friend’s experiencewith online shopping, when he dealt with bureaucracies of dot.com compa-nies. One fellow homesteader and worker on the organic farm, Collinsonsaid, recently purchased seeds using a neighbor’s computer. ‘We weren’tsure if the order went through, so he called to make sure they got it’,Collinson said. ‘A few days later, two full orders showed up and it happenedagain a few days later. That was the end of our online shopping.’ Their deal-ings with operators and information that seemed to go into a ‘black hole’,Collinson added, affirmed his desire for self-sufficiency and personal controlapart from institutions. What is striking about the homesteaders’ views oftechnology is that they emphasized the human’s responsibility in protectingthe natural environment. Because corporations often disregard the environ-ment in favor of profit, the respondents criticized how capitalistic institutionstreat the environment.

The homesteaders’ views of technology thus incorporate a dialecticalrelationship between human actions and natural resources. To this end, theBloomington and listserve homesteaders described how their use of technol-ogy correlated with voluntary simplicity, which implies a thoughtfulnessbehind everyday practices. ‘Homesteaders are more contemplative aboutlife, and you are making decisions about technology and not letting it ruleyou’, Smith said. She discusses how she uses the Internet to research infor-mation, rather than driving into Bloomington, 40 minutes away. ‘Technologyis a tool and part of modern life. The computer saves us fuel and money.’Taking a slightly different perspective, Kyle and Melissa Grant said thatmodern technology has made some aspects of life easier, but they describedits alienation from nature. ‘Technology makes you distant from life’s pureprocesses’, Melissa Grant said. To this end, the couple then recounted howthey tried to minimize medical technology by using a midwife and avoidinga caesarian with their son’s recent birth.


As these respondents’ comments illustrate, they did not necessarilydescribe technology itself as negative. Instead, they criticized the capitalisticproduction of energy and people’s choices in using technology. As Kyle Grantnoted, ‘A person with a hoe is not going to do a lot of damage. The scale ofhuman effects is magnified with modern technology.’ Most homesteadersemphasized the need for making responsible technological choices that didnot damage the environment or other people. Collinson criticized the main-stream emphasis on technological advancement that disregards the environ-ment. ‘Computers are very wasteful. I was in the [Indiana University]Surplus Store and there were walls of computers just two years old’, Collin-son said. ‘Most are just thrown away and end up in a landfill.’ Said SusanMiller, who used to live on a homesteading commune in Brown County forfive years in the mid-1970s: ‘Technology is a great thing, but we need tokeep it in perspective. We shouldn’t overuse or abuse things.’ Collinson simi-larly described an ‘appropriate use of technology’, such as a bulldozer beingused for land restoration. In addition, Smith has an electric fence around herorganic garden, but it is powered by a small solar panel. Said Smith, ‘You canuse technology in different ways’. This position on technology differs from apurely dystopian one and is similar to that espoused by the earlier English Lud-dites. Even the Luddite weavers and cotton artisans did not oppose all tech-nology, but only machinery that was ‘“hurtful” to their “commonality” andtheir future’ (Pinsker 1997, p. 177; see also Sale 1995). Many contemporaryhomesteaders also selectively value technologies according to how they facili-tate the homesteading lifestyle, or not. In viewing technology as a tool fromwhich users derive power, the homesteaders therefore, in Steven Harrison’swords, asked, ‘What does the [technology] do? What systems is it empower-ing? Is it friendly to the earth?’ In this sense, technologies such as solar panelsreflect choices based on voluntary simplicity, as well as critiques of main-stream consumption, effects on the environment and corporations’ controlof people’s everyday lives in the home.

Technology’s impact on the home’s domestic sphere

The private, domestic sphere of the home is central to the homesteaders’ cri-tiques. Although the homesteaders selectively use a wide range of technol-ogies, their criticism of technology in the domestic space centers oncommunications technologies. This sentiment is striking in light of their cri-ticism of technology and capitalism. In fact, some researchers discuss howtechnology’s presence in the home’s private sphere is related to the emergingconsumer capitalist culture of the early 1900s. Like the contemporary Inter-net, early communications technologies such as the telegraph and telephoneimpacted the private spheres after being developed for military and business


communication. As Flichy (1995) points out, the social usage of such technol-ogies preceded their initial development and often was a means to marketthem to mass consumers. The growing consumer market of the early 1900sparticularly influenced technology’s infiltration into the home’s privatesphere. Coontz (1988) discusses how the ‘social origins of private life’ (p.251), which developed primarily from 1870 to 1900, are rooted in capitalistproduction (see also Sproull & Kiesler 1992, p. 5; Drucker 1999, p. 48). Con-sumption and material objects denoted social status in this sociopoliticalenvironment (Marvin 1988, p. 208). As the private sphere was imposed onthe organization of cities, centers of community lessened and became a‘grouping of families accumulating capital’ (Warner 1968, pp. 3–4, citedin Flichy). This structure produced a contradiction between the home as an‘individualized place in which the personality of its occupants could beexpressed’ and the ‘mass organization of the construction of this newhabitat’ (Wright 1981, p. 94).

Within such a conception of the home, the mass consumption of technol-ogies occurred in the developing household consumer market (Sproull &Kiesler 1992, p. 5; Drucker 1999, p. 48). As a result, communications tech-nologies ranging from the telephone to the Internet have become part ofsociety, and influence how people construct their identities in the home’sdomestic space. Technology’s increasing presence in the home is impactingsocial relationships and family dynamics as more people have computers athome or work from home (Kiesler et al. 2000, p. 1; Nie & Erbring 2000,p. 1). Even though some homesteaders in this study criticized technology’sincreasing presence in the home, they selectively used certain types oftechnologies toward particular ends.

When describing technology in the home, the homesteaders criticizedthe ways in which some modern communications technologies intrude onthe domestic space. ‘I can live with technology in a central place ratherthan in my home’, said Connie Harrison, who uses a computer at hermassage therapy office and the nearby Catholic center. All the interviewedhomesteaders said they obtained information from newspapers, books andpublic radio. In addition, Smith described how technologies such as cable tel-evision and satellite contrast to other technologies that facilitate thehomestead’s everyday operation. The homesteaders thus make consciouschoices that are rationalized as consistent with their personal values. ‘Wellpumps have made life easier. Technologies such as cable have not’, Smithsaid. ‘Some people don’t have more time because they have allowed technol-ogy to rule their lives.’ She pointed to an example of a relative, who uses tele-vision as background noise when doing household tasks. ‘Television givespeople a sense of busyness.’ Miller agreed: ‘Technology creates more stressand there are too many choices.’ This activity reflects how technologyoften becomes closely connected to domestic routines (see Drucker 1999,


p. 50; Grusin 2000, p. 55), which are primary sites in which dominantdiscourses are naturalized in capitalist societies.

In fact, the homesteaders explicitly discussed how this naturalizationprocess informs their technology choices. For example, even though theGrants do not own a television or have cable, they use power tools in theirgarden. ‘TV is the gateway drug to all the rest [of commercialized technol-ogies]’, Kyle Grant said. Miller similarly described television as ‘mindlessentertainment’, and Paul Harrison said that among the technologies theygave up to homestead, they ‘chose to leave the TV behind because it’s away to promote commercialism’. Allowing technologies such as televisioninto the home, some homesteaders said, also brings the dominant messagesembedded in society. Smith criticized technologies such as television thatpresent images of what people should aspire toward, such as fancy homes.‘Technology can show an unrealistic picture and image of what life shouldbe like’, she said. ‘It’s easier to be satisfied with what you have withoutit.’ This view reflects Grusin’s (2000) discussion of how technologies suchas the Internet fit into existing networks of transportation, communicationand economic systems (p. 54). Rather than being separate from existingsystems, Grusin adds, the Internet remediates and extends previous media,which are ‘themselves embedded in and in turn embed material and socialenvironments’ (p. 54). In light of this research, it is not surprising that thehomesteaders’ discussion of technology’s relationship to capitalism informstheir uses of it in the home. The home also largely encompasses their inter-personal relationships, which are similarly important objects of theirconcern.

Communications technology and interpersonalrelationships

Homesteading historically emphasizes self-sufficiency, but interpersonalrelationships play an important role in the respondents’ resistance to main-stream culture. As this paper suggested earlier, support networks arefrequently key to the homesteaders’ practices that are antithetical to main-stream society. Even though the homesteaders criticized technology’sembeddedness in everyday life, their views of its impact on interpersonalrelationships reflected a selective use of technology. Countering the dystopianview’s criticism of technology’s negative impact on interpersonal relation-ships, other researchers argue that the telephone, radio and theInternet allow communication across time and space, and therefore fosterinterpersonal relationships (see Marvin 1988, p. 191; Sproull & Kiesler1992, p. 7; Melkote & Liu 2000, p. 501).


The Bloomington-area and listserve homesteaders expressed neither apurely dystopian nor utopian view of technology’s impact on relationships.Collinson and the Rileys do not have computers, but they use the telephoneand letters to communicate with others. In addition, they all use cars to travelto visit friends and relatives. Except for Collinson and the Rileys, most alsosaid they generally use the Internet to obtain information about homesteading,communicate with others or counteract isolation from living rurally. TheGrants, who said they ignore advertisements on the Web, use the Internetto research information about tools, organize volunteers for the farmer’smarket, and communicate with friends and family. Corresponding withDimmick et al.’s (2000) study of comparisons between phone and emailuse, the homesteaders who used email preferred it for communicationacross distances, and the phone was used to communicate with business associ-ates, close friends, family and those living nearby. Smith, who has been onlinefor several years, uses the computer instead of the phone for communicationpurposes because she did not want a ringing phone to interrupt their peacefulhome life. ‘I email friends all over. I wouldn’t communicate as much withthem without it’, Smith said. Unlike some homesteaders, she does not usethe Internet to subscribe to homesteading listserves, but mentioned that itespecially offers support to homesteaders who live in very rural areas. More-over, several people described the Internet’s impact on the quality of relation-ships. Said Miller, ‘It’s easier to be honest over the Internet, but people oftendon’t realize that there is a lasting copy of what they say’. Clearly, then, theInternet plays a role in maintaining or enhancing interpersonal relationshipsacross distances.

However, the homesteaders clearly differentiated between computer-mediated and face-to-face communication. As a result, many homesteadersemphasized how they supplement the Internet and telephone with face-to-face communication. For example, Paul Harrison suggested that emailcould be encouraging an interpersonal trend in society. Even communicationover the phone, he said, ‘has less quality than when the person is right withyou’. Said Marie Riley, ‘The Internet is a springboard to get to the real thing’,or face-to-face communication. This process reflects Birkerts’s (1994) discus-sion of how, even though Internet users communicate across distances,‘humanly meaningful events and experiences are most often anchoredin human-scale and bodily experiences’ (p. 50). Kling (1996) and Slouka(1995) focus on how the computer revolution can change social life, nega-tively affects human creativity, alienates human relationships, and producesthe loss of community and sense of place. This assertion is striking because,as Kyle Grant pointed out, homesteading allows him to experience a ‘senseof place’ free of many distractions of contemporary modern life. Said PaulHarrison, ‘Technology further detaches people from the earth’. Birkertsalso equates communication technology’s development with people’s


increasing alienation from the natural environment and other people. Hefocuses on how computer networks remove people from their ‘naturalworlds’ (Birkerts 1994, p. 50), noting that this is similar to how ‘pavedand built-up cities have removed us from the rhythms and textures of thenatural world’ (1994, p. 51). Such an emphasis on the environment iscrucial to the homesteaders’ criticism of technology’s impact on interpersonalrelationships.

The homesteaders’ use of communications technology reflects howpeople often interweave communication between off-line and on-linerelationships (Wellman 1997; Dahlgren 2000, p. 339). The process exempli-fies what Hampton and Wellman (1999) describe as ‘glocalization’ (p. 12), inwhich virtual relationships across distances articulate with those in interper-sonal, local contexts. In fact, the homesteaders said they relied on either theInternet or interpersonal communication, depending on the particularrelationship at hand. Melissa Grant uses the Internet to email volunteersfor the farmer’s market, but often meets with close, local friends inperson. Smith emails friends and relatives far away, but is involved in localactivities such as community theater. Just as technology can be used in mul-tiple ways, the homesteaders participate in multiple communities at variouslevels for different purposes. In this way, the homesteaders’ discussionreflected how communications technology fits into their pre-existingrelations, or ‘social order’, that are maintained on a local level as well asacross distance (Miller & Slater 2000, pp. 3, 2, 55; ‘Tracking’ 2000, p. 7).This action of integration and selectivity is important because homesteadersoften interact with others interpersonally and through cyberspace to tradeskills and support.

Homesteaders’ selective uses of technology:implications and issues for future research

The homesteaders’ views and uses of technology, which can only be broadlyexplored in this small-scale ethnographic study, point to important issues forfuture research. Given the Internet’s role in supporting the homesteaders’‘social cohesion, social interaction and socialization’ (Melkote & Liu 2000,p. 495), their use of technology primarily reflects how they can selectivelyuse it toward their own aims. This process also applies to their uses of tech-nologies such as solar panels, which can allow homesteaders to leave theutilities grid and maintain their lifestyle. Rather than focusing solely on tech-nology’s societal impact, the respondents’ discussion thus illustrates technol-ogy’s flexibility that allows it to be ‘relevant to specific contexts of use’(Boczkowski 1999, p. 91) and reconstructed by its users. As a result, theirchoices point to how technologies such as computers ‘support different


styles and cultures because they can be approached in different ways’ (Turkle1995, p. 33). As the homesteading listserves and websites especially illustrate,the Internet can be used by grassroots groups to disseminate information onparticular sociopolitical causes (see Fidler 1997, cited in Rivett 2000,p. 39; Grusin 2000, p. 50). In fact, Marie Riley does not own a computernow, but in the early 1980s she was one of the first subscribers to an earlyenvironmental activist listserve, EcoNet. Even though she emphasized theimportance of questioning technology, she described activist friends whorely on the Internet for international networking. To this end, the homestead-ing movement follows earlier movements in using communications technol-ogy to build public spheres and encourage different types of communication(Schultz 2000, p. 207). Moreover, the homesteaders’ myriad uses of technol-ogies (such as powering computers off solar panels) suggests that the technol-ogies may have to adapt to users’ needs (Boczkowski 1999, p. 91), as with thesolar-powered radio’s introduction. Most importantly, their selective uses oftechnology also reflect the complex, often difficult choices they make tobalance their ideology of voluntary simplicity with the demands of everydayliving. As Paul Harrison noted, ‘You need to make judgements ontechnology’.

Ultimately, the homesteaders’ uses of technology reflect power’s multi-dimensional and fragmented nature in society. Although power is predomi-nantly produced by dominant relations such as capitalistic institutions andthe state, it is embedded in cross-currents of multiple power discourses(Foucault 1990, p. 30). As a site of power, homesteading exists alongsideother power sources extending from innumerable points in the interplay ofrelations. The homesteaders’ possession of self-awareness, as well as theirunderstanding of personal freedom and difference, informs the complexways in which they negotiate with technology in everyday life. An ethnogra-phy highlights how their choices to use solar energy; to not own a television;to use power tools in the garden but not to play computer games; and to listento public radio but not watch cable television are all connected to how theirpersonal values are played out, moment by moment, in their technologyusage. Additional research could further address how their choices, whichcomment on technology’s relationship to capitalism, interpersonal relation-ships, human control and its place in the domestic sphere, reflect the politicalsignificance of everyday decisions in a consumer society. In this way, suchresearch could delve more deeply into the homesteaders’ choices, askinghow they also facilitate homesteading’s activism as a social movement.

In the end, these issues point to the complex ways in which people nego-tiate their personal values with outward actions in everyday life. Choicesregarding technology especially intensify this act of balance because technol-ogy is intricately connected to dominant discourses of the state in capitalisticsocieties. When members of a social movement such as homesteading use


voluntary simplicity to criticize consumerism and other aspects of mainstreamsociety, their selective uses of technology reflect choices that are often con-tradictory and yet intensely political. An ethnographic approach reveals howtheir actions counter strictly utopian and dystopian views of technology,which are limiting approaches to people’s complex interactions withtechnology in everyday life.

Notes

1 Homesteading is continually expanding. When Jacob (1997) began his pilothomesteading study in 1981, he estimated that several million peoplenationwide had adopted homesteading. It waned during the 1980s, butthe early 1990s’ recession revived some people’s search for rural ‘reces-sionary and psychological security’ (Jacob 1997, p. 3).

2 This study refers to respondents using pseudonyms.

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Teresa Heinz Housel is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Communi-

cation at Hope College, Holland, MI. Her teaching and research intersect the

areas of journalism, communication theory, and media and cultural studies.

Address: Department of Communication, Martha Miller Center for Global Com-

munication, Hope College, Holland, MI 49423, USA. [email: [email protected]]


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