Glocal intimacies as non-West and global South theory-building for mobile media and communication

Using the theory of glocal intimacies as an illustrative case, this article argues for the value of non-West and global South theorizing for mobile media and communication scholarship. It focuses on the two key ways glocal intimacies draws on postcolonial scholarship to enact such theorizing. One is foregrounding the context of the genesis and development of its key assumptions in order to conceptualize mobile technology's development, adoption, and use in ways that are not universalist but instead markedly contextual. The second is building into its theorizing a consideration of diverse contexts, so that it foregrounds the entanglements of mobile technologies with the colonial histories and complex rationalities of contemporary globalization that bind together different societies across the globe. In doing so, this article hopes to show that the future of mobile media and communication research would benefit from practices that enable more nuanced and inclusive ways of theorizing.