My iPhone Is  My Mother

Students: Valeria Castillo
Tutors: Luís Sallés, Saúl Baeza, Oscar Tomico, Eric Weiss
Format: Research Project
Topic: TFG
Year: 2023




Being human is an evolving concept. As we move into the digital age, we !nd ourselves at an intersection where our human qualities, technology, and our social fabric converge and intertwine. This convergence creates a liminal space, a sort of in-betweenness that drives us through the technological medium, reshaping the way we experience and interact with the world. But how exactly does our human experience translate, what does it mean to be a human being in transition –or disruption–?

This is an autoethnographic research project that disentangles and reveals our intricate relationship with technology by exploring the complex transition of a human connection, the one between a mother and a daughter. It is a personal story that reveals how the body—with its new materials–, language —with its new interferences–, and the social fabric —with its a"ections–transform in order to adapt to the screen. In essence, it sheds light on the challenges and changes that a human being faces to be a human today.

MY IPHONE IS MY MOTHER: Rare People, Glitching Thoughts and Modern Feelings does not aim to provide de!nitive answers. Rather it attempts to expose the politics of our bodies, the loss of certain languages, the role of interference, and the complex emotions that arise when our devices become objects of a"ection. The !nal project concludes in a manual as a resource for studying personal relationships and constructing an alternative way of generating experiences on the screen, recognizing and exploring the space for human agency in the realm of these media, which can distort, obscure, and fragment our understanding of what it really means to be human.