“To see the iPod as an agent of isolation rather than a symptom of, or a clever adaptation to, that isolation is to confuse cause and effect. When I was in college, I heard almost all of my music on stereos in friends’ dorm rooms and apartments. Few of my students today have that luxury; they simply don’t have the time. So maybe we professors can change our perspective somewhat and see in those white iPod earbuds a symbol not of willful retreat, but of community deferred.”