[ecrea] book release-Dot Com Mantra: social computing in the Central himalayas

book release - Dot Com Mantra: social computing in the Central himalayas

>ABSTRACT: Billions of dollars are being spent nationally and 
>globally on providing computing access to digitally disadvantaged 
>groups and cultures with an expectation that computers and the 
>Internet can lead to higher socio-economic mobility. This 
>ethnographic study of social computing in the Central Himalayas, 
>India, investigates alternative social practices with new 
>technologies and media amongst a population that is for the most 
>part undocumented. In doing so, this book offers fresh and critical 
>perspectives in areas of contemporary debate: informal learning with 
>computers, cyberleisure, gender access and empowerment, digital 
>intermediaries, and glocalization of information and media.
>
>REVIEWS:
>  'A towering piece of research and writing, imbued with theoretical and
>methodological vigor, and sensitively illuminating the intersections of
>digital media and human ingenuity in the Central Himalayas. A must read.'
>Arvind Singhal, University of Texas at El Paso, USA, and Clinton School of
>Public Service, USA
>
>'In every age, innovative technology has been met with an awkward mixture
>of enthusiasm, indifference, scepticism and hostility. The advent in our
>time of cheap, mobile computing and cellular telephones has drawn a
>similar response, especially in the international development community.
>In Dot Com Mantra, Payal Arora goes beyond the familiar juxtapositions to
>show how poor individuals and communities actively negotiate their
>engagement with twenty-first century technology, documenting the
>conditions under which they use, abuse and reject it in their everyday
>lives. The result is a book that is fascinating in its own right, but also
>highly instructive to a new generation of development policymakers, in
>rich and poor countries alike, caught between an imperative for easy
>answers and the reality of messy complexity.'
>Michael Woolcock, World Bank
>==========================
>Dr. Payal Arora
>
>Assistant Professor in International Media & Communication
>Department of Communication, Erasmus University Rotterdam
>The Netherlands
>
>Website: <http://www.payalarora.com>www.payalarora.com
>==========================

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Nico Carpentier (Phd)
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Vrije Universiteit Brussel - Free University of Brussels
Centre for Studies on Media and Culture (CeMeSO)
Pleinlaan 2 - B-1050 Brussels - Belgium
T: ++ 32 (0)2-629.18.56
F: ++ 32 (0)2-629.36.84
Office: 5B.401a
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New Book:
Trans-Reality Television
The Transgression of Reality, Genre, Politics, and Audience.
Lexington. (Sofie Van Bauwel & Nico Carpentier eds.)
http://www.lexingtonbooks.com/Catalog/SingleBook.shtml?command=Search&db=^DB/CATALOG.db&eqSKUdata=0739131885
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European Communication Research and Education Association
Web: http://www.ecrea.eu
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E-mail: (Nico.Carpentier /at/ vub.ac.be)
Web: http://homepages.vub.ac.be/~ncarpent/
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