Network Society: The Impact of Virtual Relationships on traditional Culture

Abstract

Abstract : This paper discusses the various challenges associated with the network society or post-society, an offshoot of post-modernity, which seeks to restructure the social system through universal principles of cognitive and technical rationality or instrumentalism. The social actor linked to the matrix of space and time transforms into a virtual identity that constantly seeks to change its cognitive scheme for harmony, symmetry, and redefining the meanings of things, away from emotions and face-to-face relationships. This causes a reconsideration of sociological analyses of reflexivity because what the individuals see in the mirror that constructs them may not be a social actor in the traditional sense but virtual entities reflecting a set of intertwined and sometimes contradictory global values. Keywords: Network society, postmodernity, weak ties, reflexivity, traditional culture