Introduction

Abstract

Back in 1971, The Who’s main songwriter, Pete Townsend, perfectly captured globalization’s restless, placeless, nomadic spirit in ‘Going Mobile’, a song that appeared on the Who’s Next album:

When I’m driving free, the world’s my home when I’m mobile. (Songmeanings, 2013; lyrics © SPIRIT ONE MUSIC OBO TOWSER TUNES)

‘Going Mobile’ celebrates the joys of the open road, one that stretches way beyond the confines of Highway 51 or Route 66 to embrace a borderless world in which the late-twentieth century, jet-setting rock star can be an ‘air conditioned gypsy’ (Songmeanings, 2013) living in his (nearly always ‘his’) mobile bubble which keeps him out of reach of the police and the taxman. As with many other socio-cultural practices pioneered by 1960s/1970s, rock stars — recreational drug use, casual sex and finding God (Buddha, Allah, etc.) — ‘going mobile’ has become a routine part of life for millions of people across the Global North as they criss-cross the globe for business or tourism.