Paper short abstract:

Global psy technologies migrate into the digital medium. This paper focuses on new ways of self-production, (self) care and affective labor enabled through digital psy-technologies, situated in specific local social, moral (and spiritual) worlds.

Paper long abstract:

Stress, tension and depression range high in India's megacities. Global psy are technologies related to psychological expertise of knowing, managing and optimizing the distressed self. They not only pervade business and management, education and private lives but also increasingly migrate into the digital medium. Indian entrepreneurs have discovered the commercial value of digitally catering for mental distress for the young, tech-savvy Indian 'netizens'. Providing digital affective work or self-care, they promise nonstigmatized, anonymous and 24/7 services outside the clinic, based on connecting customers to online counselors or artificial intelligence. How do digital technologies and their affordances contribute to a new norm in India's rising Middle Class to be mentally well, happy, productive and consuming? In which way are they part of a neoliberal government of life? Does digital mental health expand the medicalization of distress and suffering, or does it offer something like a counter clinic? Which new socialities emerge through digital mental health technologies in daily lives? While optimists celebrate digital (self) care as new forms of agency, empowerment and (self)care, critics are concerned about (self)surveillance and control, depolitization, medicalization and de-humanization of care. Building on fieldwork in Bangalore and theories from medical and political anthropology and STS, this paper will move beyond normative debates and focus on new ways of self-production, (self) care and affective labor enabled through digital psy-technologies, situated in specific local social, moral (and spiritual) worlds.