final pre-publication version Citation: Ong, J.C. (2009). “The Cosmopolitan Continuum: Locating Cosmopolitanism in Media and Cultural Studies”. Media Culture & Society, 31(3): 449-466. The Cosmopolitan Continuum Locating Cosmopolitanism in Media and Cultural Studies Jonathan Corpus Ong Faculty of Social and Political Sciences University of Cambridge Abstract The purpose of this paper is to provide not only a review of how cosmopolitanism has been theorized in the past; it also aims to propose a new way of thinking about cosmopolitanism. Beginning with a critique of how media and morality literature (Silverstone 2006, Chouliaraki 2006) ignores an exploration of cosmopolitanism from the perspective of everyday life, this article proposes that we examine cosmopolitanism as an identity with four key ‘performances’ with a distinct moral hierarchy: a) ecstatic cosmopolitanism, b) banal cosmopolitanism, c) instrumental cosmopolitanism, and d) closed cosmopolitanism. I argue that individuals weave in and out of expressions of openness to the Other based on particular contexts. Taking a bottom-up perspective, I posit that the field of media and morality will benefit from asking when and why do individuals ‘open up’ and ‘close in’ from the wider world and how is the media significant (or not) in expressions of cosmopolitanism. Studying cosmopolitan identity as a contextual, fragile identity that is enabled/disabled by various factors allows us to see which media contents and contexts transform our ‘fear of touch’ to a ‘caress’ for the Other and which ones prompt us to fall back on the scale. Keywords media and morality, cosmopolitanism, the Other, everyday life, identity Bio Jonathan Corpus Ong is a PhD student in Sociology at Corpus Christi College, University of Cambridge, where he is also a Bill Gates Scholar. He also lectures in the Department of Communication at the Ateneo de Manila University. His research interests include media and morality, media and migration, and mediated public