Making Time

This paper draws on research on time and technology, with a view to examining the notion that technology is implicated in the speeding up of everyday life. We begin by looking at research that shows how the adoption of the clock and of ‘clock time’ was framed by more general shifts in ways of conceptualising and using time. Likewise, we suggest that the ways in which digital technologies are said to shape experiences of time need to be understood in the context of the fractured routines of the modern Western world. We argue that ‘redesigning’ these experiences necessitates a broader way of dealing with the temporal structures of social life. Technology may play various roles here, for instance by shaping temporal infrastructures and highlighting reified temporal patterns. However, complex challenges also need to be addressed, central to which are recent accounts that position time as collective and entangled.