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''Communications media play an accelerating role in social
change and global connections. But what people make of them is not
determined by technology nor by the way technologies are used in
rich countries of the global north. With rich ethnographic
narratives, Don Slater offers a truly global look at how the
meaning of technologies is shaped by people who use them in
settings from Sri Lanka to Ghana to Trinidad. People working in
development agencies and living in local communities become part of
the same analysis, as Slater wisely and helpfully stresses the kind
of symmetries identified by Paulo Freire's model of
learning.''
Craig Calhoun, Director, London School of Economics and
Political Science
''This is a book of really major importance that could have been
written by no one else; its core thesis is both powerful and
urgent. Slater draws on a remarkable series of empirical projects
on “new media for development” which enable him to
speak with real authority about what is wrong and what might remain
useful about notions of “development” and the use of
networking resources in “development” settings. It will
have a major impact in the fields of media sociology and media
studies, media-for-development and media anthropology.''
Nick Couldry, Goldsmiths, University of London
''In this book, Slater brilliantly brings together a range of
ethnographic engagements with theoretical interests in reshaping
our understandings of “media,”
“development,” and “globalization.” His
analysis speaks powerfully to questions of knowledge production and
social justice in emerging contexts of both global inequality and
global coalition.''
Tom Boellstorff, University of California, Irvine
Acknowledgements vi
1 Introduction: Frames and Dialogues 1
2 Communicative Ecology and Communicative Assemblages 27
3 Media Forms and Practices 68
4 Making Up the Future: New Media as the Material Culture of Development 99
5 Scaling Practices and Devices: Globalizing Globalization 130
6 Conclusion: Politics of Research: Forms of Knowledge, Participation and Generalization 155
Notes 189
References 191
Index 205
