Social theory in Melanesia: Cellular globalization in the mountainous rainforests of the island of Malaita

This paper seeks to bring sociology to the rainforest by looking at what social theory, through applied sociology, can reveal about emerging Melanesian cell phone practices. As there has been a paucity of qualitative, ethnography-based research on this topic, much work needs to be done not only in regards to generating ethnographic material, but also in regards to identifying and establishing a theoretical framework that accounts for the particularities of Melanesian modernity and its global encounters. The purpose of this paper is, therefore, to examine the dimensions of this theoretical framework by analyzing where Social Theory can be applied to intervene in both academic research as well as the engagement between Melanesians and globalization through cellular technology.

Latour’s actor-network theory and Boltanski’s pragmatic sociology of critique, among others, will be brought to bear on the case of cellular technology in the secluded mountains of the Kwaio jungles on the island of Malaita and in so doing this paper brings Sociology in Anthropology’s backyard, Melanesia. In the backdrop of a protracted civil war generative and symptomatic of a failed state, this paper argues that the arrival of digital technology allows for the emergence and creation of a “second-state”.