Document details

Where Are You Africa? Church and Society in the Mobile Phone Age

Mankon, Bamenda (CM): Langaa (2010), xxii, 240 pp.

Contains bibliogr. pp. 221-240

ISBN 9956-578-45-2; 978-9956-578-45-0

Signature commbox: 100:70-Catholic 2011

"On the basis of a thorough review of the growing literature on the mobile phone and the cultures it inspires, Goliama highlights the ambivalent nature of mobile cultures for the Roman Catholic Church's evangelization mission in Africa. He argues not only for the continued merits of face-to-face communication for the Church's pastoral approach in the African context. He points to how this could be enriched by a creative appropriation of the mobile phone as a tool for theological engagement, in its capacity to shape cultures in ways amenable to the construction of a Cell phone Ecclesiology. Such emergent mobile cultural values include the tendency of mobile users to transcend social divides, to promote social interconnectedness, and to privilege the question 'where are you?" (Publisher description)