Communications and Mobility

Communications and Mobility is a unique, interdisciplinary look at mobility, territory, communication, and transport in the 21st century with extended case studies of three icons of this era: the migrant, the mobile phone, and the container box. It urges scholars in media and communication to return to broader conceptions of the field that include mobility of all kinds, including information, people, and commodities. Drawing together the North American and European traditions of materialist communications studies, this book embraces a wide range of perspectives from media studies, science and technology studies, sociology, transport studies, media anthropology, and cultural geography. The book's first two sections outline the author's theoretical and conceptual agenda and reframe key concepts within media and communication in light of new mobilities and contemporary geographies. In the final section, the author uses migrants, mobile phones, and shipping containers as case studies which illustrate his expanded definition of communication in the world today. Transcending traditional boundaries of discipline, technology, and location, Communications and Mobility provides readers with a revitalized understanding of contemporary communication studies.