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@mullerCablingAtlanticWiring2016

Title: [@mullerCablingAtlanticWiring2016] date: 2023-03-09 type: reference project: Memex2

tags:: Memex2, politics, telegraph, globalization, imperialism,

Reference

Müller, SM. 2016 From Cabling the Atlantic to Wiring the World: A Review Essay on the 150th Anniversary of the Atlantic Telegraph Cable of 1866. Technology and Culture 57(3): 507–526. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2016.0069.

Summary & Key Take Aways

Müller, in From Cabling the Atlantic to Wiring the World, discusses the understudied impact of the telegraph globalization in non-Western countries. After the successful wiring of the transatlantic telegraph, more lines were expanded from Europe to India, Southeast Asia, Australia, Latin America, and Africa (Müller, 2016, 508). Müller argues that telegraphy creates globalization by intergrating parts of the world into a connected network (Müller, 2016, 509). However, he point to the need to pay attention to "whose globalization" are affected, and "what the globalization of politics, markets, and media means in its connection to communication" (Müller, 2016, 509). The transatlantic cable was deemed a "heroic struggle" but other cable projects like to India had little attention (Müller, 2016, 511). The telegraph to other Non-Western countries were used for colonial communications, which means the non-elite individual could not use it, only colonial rulers (Müller, 2016, 513). The telegraph was therefore "based on imperial structures - a global coloniality" (Müller, 2016, 516). The telegraph, as such, was used to uphold imperial control on non-Western countries, rather than helping to globalize and connect the public of these spaces.

How does it relate to class?

The transatlantic telegraph was a big part of this module as it painted a clear transitions from localized communication systems to global, interconnected networks of countries. It was the first step towards a connected system of communications that would become the internet as we know it today. However, the article only identifies the common theme of Control and imperialism, such as in the Imperialist_internet. Another theme, which has been mentioned since the first module, is that of Agency. The political agency of colonialism dictated how the telegraph lines towards the East would be used.

Globalization_of_communication