Breaking up with a Smartphone

Smartphones are one of the most essential electronics in our lives. Almost everyone has one or more old smartphones in their cabinets, collecting dust. We should have already broken up, but we can’t let them go. Because they contain personal information, the unusable phones were left somewhere but cannot be recycled. Also, relying on or overusing digital devices such as smartphones may raise health and social problems. Now is the time to let them go and give them a new life as a recycled object. We will discuss how these abandoned or stacked smartphones affect the environment and share ways to dispose of them safely. This workshop covering technology and society offers an opportunity to think about the dynamics of the power surrounding smartphones, including how to engage with smartphones healthily, following the circulation and movement of resources and e-waste in the global era, from production to disposal.