Mobile technology appropriation in a distant mirror: baroque infiltration, creolization and cannibalism

In recent years, mobile phone penetration has increased dramatically throughout Latin America. Rising penetration numbers tell an important story, but only part of the story. To fully grasp the social, economic and political impact of mobile telephony, we need to understand appropriation: the process through which mobile phone users go beyond mere adoption to make the technology their own and to embed it within their social, economic, and political practices. The appropriation process fundamentally is a negotiation about power and control over the configuration of the technology, its uses, and the distribution of its benefits. Within the Latin American context, today’s negotiation surrounding mobile technological appropriation echoes earlier creative tensions about the appropriation of cultural objects, people, and ideas from abroad. This paper reviews existing theoretical approaches to the study of technology appropriation, re-considers them within the Latin American cultural context, and proposes a theoretical framework that can inform an in-depth study of the social, economic, and political impact of mobile phones in Latin America. * Annenberg School of Communication, University of Southern California ** Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License, and is part of the abaporu project on technology appropriation (http://abaporu.net)