The Sage Handbook of Digital Labour

Ergin Bulut, Julie Yujie Chen, Rafael Grohmann, Kylie Jarrett

• Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd
• Year: 2025
• Print ISBN: 9781529669831
• eBook ISBN: 9781036202439
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Sciences sociales
• Subtopic: Industrie des médias et des communications

The Sage Handbook of Digital Labour is a comprehensive exploration of the multifaceted and evolving concept of digital labour. Originally coined in Marxist analyses to explain the exploitation of user data in the digital economy, the term has since expanded to encompass a wide range of paid work influenced by digital technologies. This includes traditional jobs transformed by platforms, new roles emerging in today?s digital society, and cultural producers like influencers and online creators. The handbook also addresses the material aspects of digital labour, highlighting its dependence on traditional manufacturing and manual labour.

This volume brings together leading scholars from diverse disciplines to examine the intersections of labour and digital technologies. It approaches digital labour as an interdisciplinary field of inquiry, exploring the material and ideological conditions of work in contemporary society. The handbook aims to chart the extensive territory of digital labour studies, covering theoretical traditions, key concepts, emblematic sites of production, normative cultures, and worker subjectivities. It also showcases the spectrum of worker organizing repertoires and tactics across the world.

The handbook is organized into seven sections. Section 1 highlights major theoretical traditions, while Section 2 focuses on the material sites along production chains. Sections 3 and 4 delve into key concepts and sites of production, and Section 5 explores normative cultures and worker subjectivities. Section 6 examines worker organizing tactics, and Section 7 introduces research methods for scholars in the field. The volume concludes with discussions on how digital labour studies can provide unique perspectives to imagine digital futures.

The Sage Handbook of Digital Labour is an essential resource for scholars, practitioners, and students seeking to understand the complexities of digital labour. It provides a comprehensive and nuanced exploration of the field, equipping readers to engage with the theoretical and practical aspects of digital labour in a rapidly changing world.

Part 1: Theoretical Traditions
Part 2: Material Sites of Production
Part 3: Key Concepts in Digital Labour
Part 4: Emblematic Sites of Production
Part 5: Normative Cultures and Worker Subjectivities
Part 6: Worker Organizing Repertoires and Tactics
Part 7: Research Methods in Digital Labour Studies

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Acknowledgements
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Acknowledgements
• Illustration List
• Notes on Editors and Contributors
• Introduction: Digital Labor as a Field of Inquiry
• 1 Globalization and Information Work
• 2 The Social Factory of Data Capitalism: Cybernetics, Logistics, and Labour
• 3 Digital Labour, Precarity, and Employment Status: Continuity Through Change
• 4 Retooling Ethics for a Critical and Just Digital Future
• 5 Race, Digital Labor, and Gig: Concepts, Histories, and Solidarities for Why (and How) We Study Race
• 6 Overview of Platform Work and Gender Equality
• 7 An Infrastructural Optic to Digital Labour
• 8 Mining for Digital Culture: Dispossessed Lives Through the Lens of Art
• 9 Data Centers and the Politics of Labor: The Relational Nature of Infrastructure
• 10 Materialities of Everyday Digital Labour
• 11 The Rise of Independent Work and the Challenges of Realizing Autonomy
• 12 Platform Mobilities: Migration and Digital Labor
• 13 Value Struggles in Digital Taylorism: Scientific Management and Social Mediation
• 14 Rethinking Industrial Automation: A Marxist Perspective
• 15 Dynamics of Surveillance: Unveiling Surveillance in Workspaces and Work Management
• 16 Redefining Skills in a Digital Age: Fragmentation and Underutilization
• 17 Affective Computing, Algorithmic Affect Management, and the Quantified Worker
• 18 Labor’s Odyssey Through Algorithmic Systems
• 19 Studying the Gig Economy “Beyond the Gig”: A Research Agenda
• 20 Digital Labour Platforms and the Future of Care Work(ers)
• 21 Platformization and Digitalization of Journalists’ Work in Brazil
• 22 Designing for Global Data Work
• 23 Silver Halmeoni Influencers in the Social Media Spotlight: Navigating Geriatric Cuteness, Labor, and Ageism
• 24 Digital Sex Work and the Contested Boundaries of Material and Immaterial Digital Labour
• 25 Digital Labor and the Inconspicuous Production of Artificial Intelligence
• 26 Digitalization and Resistance in Logistics Work
• 27 Navigating the Sociotechnical Imaginaries of Brazilian Tech Workers
• 28 Seed Sowing in Nollywood: Labour, Precariousness, and the Promises of the Streaming Video Market in Nigeria
• 29 The Pain of Love: Passionate Work and Spousal Support as Digital Labor
• 30 Play-at-Home Jobs: A Critical Feminist Viewership of Labour, Leisure, and Livestreaming on Twitch
• 31 Qualculative Practices of “Hustle” in Platform Labor
• 32 The Life/Work Mishmash in Platform Labour: Towards a Livelihood Approach
• 33 Professional Identity Formation of Social Media Creators
• 34 Digital Labour and Uneven Developments
• 35 Unionisation of Digital Labour
• 36 Turkopticon: From Software to Worker Organizing On Organizing Form as Emergent Strategy (2009–2024)
• 37 New Realms, New Responses: Alternative Worker Collectivization After Platforms
• 38 Cooperatives for Worker Empowerment in the Digital Economy
• 39 Action Research: The Fairwork Project
• 40 Workers’ Inquiry: A User’s Guide
• 41Código Doméstico in the Flesh: Feminist Oral History Methodologies for Digital Care Work Research1
• 42 Confronting Methodological and Ethical Challenges in the Study of Algorithms and Digital Labour
• 43 Exploring Imaginaries on Digital Labour
• 44 Worker Advocacy and Data Collection: Methodological Sensibilities for Studying Digitally Mediated Work
• Conclusion: Digital Futures
• Index