Examining realised and unrealised contacts: theoretical thoughts on digital interculturality

Article / Journal

Author(s):
Fergal Lenehan

Year: 2024

Lenehan, F. (2024). Examining realised and unrealised contacts: theoretical thoughts on digital interculturality. Language and Intercultural Communication, 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1080/14708477.2024.2419666

Keywords: Digital interculturality, digital contacts, postdigitality, platformisation, Jürgen Bolten
Language(s): English

Abstract:
This article argues for a Digital Interculturality Studies by bringing together a variety of theories including postdigitality, platformisation, Jürgen Bolten’s concept of interculturality, agency theory and Foucaultian media archaeology. It is argued that the internet should be viewed as a postdigital patchwork of bordered platforms, in which human agents drift between digital culturality and interculturality in a type of digital cultural fuzziness. It also centres digital agentive fragments: pieces of human ‘doing’ ‘within’, ‘above’ and ‘around’ the internet, which are often embedded in systematic agency. It lastly argues that a Digital Interculturality Studies should be centred on the materiality of contacts, exclusions and also incorporate digital intercultural contacts which have not been realised or not allowed to be realised. A methodological sketch is proffered in relation to how this could be undertaken, combining a post-qualitative perspective with the philosophical area of counterfactual theories of causation.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14708477.2024.2419666#abstract

Post created by: Fergal Lenehan