A Transnational History of the Internet in Central America, 1985 2000

This Palgrave Pivot analyzes how six countries in Central AmericaCosta Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panamaconnected to and through computer networks such as UUCP, BITNET and the Internet from the 80s to the year 2000. It argues that this story can only be told from a transnational perspective. To connect to computer networks, Central America built a regional integration project with great implications for its development. By revealing the beginnings of the Internet in this part of the world, this study broadens our understanding of the development of computer networks in the global south. It also demonstrates that transnational flows of knowledge, data, and technologies are a constitutive feature of the historical development of the Internet.

Explores the early development of the Internet in an understudied region, and connects the past of the Internet in Central America with its present Emphasizes the importance of transnational processes in the historical development of the Internet Discusses a Latin American case that enriches our understanding of transnational histories

Auteur
Ignacio Siles is a professor of media and technology studies in the School of Communication, and a researcher in the Centro de Investigación en Comunicación (CICOM) at the University of Costa Rica. He is the author of Networked Selves: Trajectories of Blogging in the United States and France (2017) and Por un sueño en.red.ado: Una historia de Internet en Costa Rica (2008).

Texte du rabat

This Palgrave Pivot analyzes how six countries in Central AmericäCosta Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panamäconnected to and through computer networks such as UUCP, BITNET and the Internet from the 80s to the year 2000. It argues that this story can only be told from a transnational perspective. To connect to computer networks, Central America built a regional integration project with great implications for its development. By revealing the beginnings of the Internet in this part of the world, this study broadens our understanding of the development of computer networks in the global south. It also demonstrates that transnational flows of knowledge, data, and technologies are a constitutive feature of the historical development of the Internet.

Résumé
"A Transnational History is an attempt to detach the histories of the internet in Latin America from national narratives and early adopters. Siles's contribution interweaves local histories of technology, highlighting the common processes that made it possible to integrate the internet in Central America." (Fabian Prieto-Ñañez, Technology and Culture, Vol. 63 (2), April, 2022)

Contenu

1. "Follow the Networks".- 2. Matters of Central American Integration (1960s1990s).- 3. The Founding Networks of Central America.- 4. An Internet for the Global South.- 5. A Central American Internet.- 6. Internet and Integration in the Era of Privatization.- 7. The Inconclusive Project of Technological Integration.