One of the dominant views of technological development is that of an increasingly elaborated system of tools and machines—or prostheses—that extend and amplify the capabilities of the human body. Thus the cane augments the power of the legs; glasses, the capacity of the eyes; the computer, the computational-solving ability of the brain. But technology can also be understood as increasing our possibilities for attachment to each other, not only in terms of decreasing social isolation and heightening social interaction but also in terms of affectional bonding, to draw on psychoanalyst John Bowlby’s important work. The stereotypical view that older people are technophobes is not only wrong; it is itself an instance of agism. In 2000, according to the U. S. Department of Commerce, almost thirty million Americans over the age of fifty used the Internet, an increase of 150 percent in only two years. According to National Public Radio’s Tovia Smith, older people who are on line report that they love the experience.
This paper considers the role of communication technologies—the Internet as well as two more developed technologies, television and the telephone—in heightening meaningful connections between older people, contributing to the development of social spaces (both in face-to-face interaction and in cyberspace) and to the deepening of psychic space. While the expansion of telecommunications has radically increased access to information, intellectual and cultural resources, and consumer markets, the focus in this paper is on the possibilities of these technologies to encourage engagement in civic culture, inspire reminiscence, and intensify the bonds between child and parent. In the past few years Web sites designed for older people have proliferated exponentially, including SeniorNet, AARP’s Online Community Message Boards, Elders Without Walls, Third Age, Internet Grandfather, and the Purple Hat Centenarians (a site for women 100 years and older), to name only a few, and people have testified that online experience has changed their lives, giving them new meaning. As someone posted on SeniorNet on April 3, 2003, for example, “when something triggers a memory . . . I just start ‘talking.’ Guess that’s what is so special about this place, we find we aren’t alone in our thoughts or memories.”
Ultimately, however, maintaining meaningful connections over a substantial period of time is the challenge, as we see in the work of the gifted French psychoanalyst and writer J.-B. Pontalis. Reflecting on his own experience, Pontalis writes about his connection to his own mother as it is sustained through technology—unquestionably technology provides them a life line of trust in each other and in the future. More, he movingly envisions the possibility of infinitely healing and intimate communication between the two of them, reminding us in the process of the irreducibility of psychic space to mere social interaction.
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