|
|
AEGIS European Conference on African Studies
11 - 14 July 2007
African Studies Centre, Leiden, The Netherlands
Show panel list
'Mobile networks': mobile phones, trade and translocality among young 'Swahili' traders
| Panel |
73. New Social Spaces. Mobility and technology in Africa
|
| Paper ID | 65 |
| Author(s) |
Pfaff, Julia
|
| Paper |
No paper submitted
|
| Abstract | In this paper I want to investigate the relations between mobility, communication technologies and social space by analysing the 'mobile networks' and flows of translocal trading practices through Dar es Salaam. Examining the socio-spatial processes by which actors and their networks forge and sustain translocal connections and translocalities, this study concentrates on recent trading initiatives of young ‘Swahili’. Regarding the so-called ‘Swahili corridor’ as a ‘mobile margin’ it will be highlighted how recent technological innovations and new opportunities and notions of mobility facilitate, revive and (re)create long-standing translocal connections in socio-cultural as well as in economic terms.
Mobile phones are a primary material form of these trading connections, both as objects of exchange and as technologies of communication. Based in part on mobile ethnographic research with a small number of traders dealing in and with the help of mobile phones, the paper presents an insight into the everyday experiences, mobile practices and the performativity of trading and networking. By doing so, this paper resonates and contributes to current debates on mobility, translocal (commercial) spaces, object geographies, as well as on the role of ICT in trading practices in Africa. Moreover, investigating the interconnections between mobile traders and mobile phones shows how these goods and notions of mobility interrelate with the traders’ identities and social statuses. Finally, this can be linked to ways in which young ‘Swahili’ deal with their ‘marginality’ and how they find their way in or even out of a 'mobile margin'. |
|