Public defence: Bright Baffour Antwi

Bright Baffour Antwi will defend his PhD degree in Humanities, Cultural and Educational Sciences. His thesis explores the emergence, application, and socio-cultural implications of digital self-tracking technologies in Ghanaian fitness environment.

23 Mar

Practical information

  • Date: 23 March 2026
  • Time: 10.00 - 15.00
  • Location: Bø, Auditorium A.O. Vinje 6-103
  • Download calendar file

    • Zoom link for digital participation
    Meeting ID: 689 9055 8330
    Passcode: 263416

    Program

    10.00. Trial lecture: "Body, Gender, Identity, and Digital Metrics: Re-theorising Embodiment in the Age of the Smartwatch."

    12.00. Public defence: "The smartwatch as a social mirror: The adoption, use, and implications of self-tracking technologies in Ghana’s fitness spaces."

    Evaluation comittee

    • First opponent: Assistant Professor, Michael Crawley, Durham University
    • Second opponent: Professor Louise Mansfield, Brunel University
    • Chair of defence: Head of department Anika Aakerøy Jordbru, University of South-Eastern Norway
    • Administrator: Professor Pål Augestad, University of South-Eastern Norway

    Supervisors

    • Principal supervisor  Associate Professor Tommy Langseth, University of South-Eastern Norway
    • Co-supervisors: Professor Rayvon Fouché, Northwestern University and Professor Jonathan Finn, Wilfrid Laurier University
Any questions?

Bright Baffour Antwi is defending his thesis for the degree philosophiae doctor (PhD) at the University of South-Eastern Norway. 

Portrett av Bright Baffour Antwi som ser i kamera og smilerThe doctoral work has been carried out at the Faculty of Humanities, Sports and Educational Science in the program Humanities, Cultural and Educational Sciences.

You are invited to follow the trial lecture and the public defence.

Summary

This thesis concludes that the smartwatch is far more than a simple fitness-tracking device in Ghana; it has become a “social mirror,” reflecting and reshaping how individuals see themselves and relate to others. This research in Ghana’s fitness spaces shows that while these devices offer personal benefits, they also introduce new social tensions. Ultimately, the adoption of self-tracking technology represents a profound shift, where global ideas about data, fitness and health are being integrated into local ideas about community and identity, often with unintended consequences.

The study’s central finding is the identification of a “smartwatch paradox.” Through ethnographic fieldwork, the study reveals that the very features making smartwatches valuable for individuals simultaneously create communal challenges. While users achieve personal fitness goals through data, this same data can spark an unhealthy fixation on quantified metrics, a move away from a communal fitness lifestyle, and redefine what it means to be ‘fit’.

This research, detailed across three articles, unpacked how this happens. The findings in the articles demonstrate that Ghanaians are not simply adopting a global gadget. Instead, they are actively “domesticating” it, creatively integrating the smartwatch into local lifestyles. People use it to manage health anxieties, combat sedentary habits, and even as a symbol of status. Over time, users begin to trust the watch’s data (from step counts, heart rate readings to calories lost), sometimes more than their own physical feelings, and internalising a new, quantified way of understanding their bodies.

In the end, this thesis argues that the story of the smartwatch in Ghana is a key example of globalisation and digitalisation happening at the most personal level. The quiet negotiation taking place is not just about technology, but about the very definition of fitness and health itself. The core question this thesis raises is whether health and fitness will remain a holistic experience, connected to community and spiritual well-being, or if it is being silently redefined as an individual, data-driven project.