'Your phone makes you, you': Exploring the youth script in teen magazine representations of mobile media

Abstract

Introduction In a highly mediatized country like Singapore where broadband penetration and mobile phone ownership are high, the use of mobile media is intense, especially amongst the young. The most ubiquitous mobile media device in the country is the mobile phone. Mobile phone subscription in Singapore has seen a phenomenal rise, from 200 per 1,000 residents in 1997 to 1225 per 1,000 residents in 2007. As of April 2008, mobile phone subscriptions had risen to over 5.9 million (Infocomm Development Authority 2008), exceeding the country’s population of 4.6 million (Statistics Singapore 2007). Beyond mobile phones, other popular mobile media devices include MP3 players, digital cameras, handheld games, personal digital assistants and laptop computers. To boost mobile Internet usage, the government has introduced the Wireless@SG scheme which provides free wireless broadband Internet access in public areas until 2010. With such infrastructure in place, mobile media usage of a variety of forms is growing in Singapore, particularly amongst the young. This chapter studies the representations of mobile media in four leading Singaporean teen magazines by analysing both promotional and editorial content. It will take a discursive approach to understanding how mobile media are represented and marketed to youths, and the symbolism of these representations. In so doing, it seeks to uncover the ‘youth script’ which undergirds these representations and the implications of this script.