Editorial: encounters with Western media theory

Abstract

Beginning in 2020, the Crosscurrents section of this journal featured 10 provocative essays on the theme of “Encounters in Western Media Theory.” These essays stemmed from scholars’ engagements with various canonical texts in media, cultural, and communication studies that took the Anglophone Global North as a taken-for-granted site for making sweeping theoretical claims. In this editorial, we reflect on the critiques and arguments that scholars have developed to move past debates about “internationalizing” and “de-westernizing” the field of media, communication, and cultural studies. Taken together, the essays published in this themed section grapple with the shifting terrain of academic knowledge production and the potential for redefining practices of reading, citation, and teaching.

¿Cómo enfrentar las desigualdades de la academia global en los estudios de comunicación?: colaboración, crítica y curiosidad

“…Não foram nem réplicas perfeitas de tipo ideal de formação ocidental nem foram "descolonizados" absolutamente; foram espaços de competência de uma variedade de olhares teóricos e enfoques epistemológicos. Essas questões e demandas articularam esforços para desenvolver um pensamento "latino-americano" muito antes de argumentos sobre a importância de cultivar uma "teoria do Sul" (Comaroff & Comaroff, 2012) e os "encontros com teorias ocidentais" (Jin, 2021;Keightley et al, 2023) ganharem notoriedade no Norte Global.…”