Pathways to Higher Education

What scares a Digital Native? Blogathon

tettner — 2015-05-14T12:16:14Z

What Scares technologized young people around the world? In an effort to present a view often not heard in traditional discourses, on Monday the 18th of April 2011, young people from across the world blogged about their fears in relation to the digitalisation of society.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/what-scares-a-digital-native-blogathon-1

Who the Hack?

praskrishna — 2015-05-14T12:16:59Z

A hacker is not an evil spirit, instead he can outwit digital systems to bring about social change, writes Nishant Shah in this column published in the Indian Express on April 24, 2011.

One of the most sullied words that have pervaded public discourse, with the rise of the internet, is “hacker”. The word conjures up images of a silent, menacing, technology-savvy young man, who, with his almost magical control over the digital realm, manipulates systems, changes the laws, rewrites the rules and takes complete control. We hear stories about criminals hacking often enough — people who break into national security systems and retrieve sensitive information, teenagers who crash servers by spamming them with unnecessary traffic, users who commit credit fraud by phishing or breaking into bank accounts, or shutting down entire systems by erasing all the code.

Hackers v/s Crackers

As many of us know, the term hacker has a different origin and meaning than its abused application. In fact, people who perform maleficent activities using their technological prowess are called “crackers” — these are people who use their ability to interact with a system in order to make personal gains or to harass others. A hacker is a person who has extraordinary technology skills and is able to manipulate digital systems and makes them perform tasks which were not a part of their original design. Which means that a geek who can hack into a server and uses the free space to host a free website, aimed for public good, or a techie who writes a programme that can use the idle computing time of your machines to run peer-to-peer networks, or a teenager who can break the constraints of an existing software to integrate it with other programmes, are all hackers. A hacker is defined by his ability to play around with the basic elements of a system (not necessarily digital and internet-based) and perform actions, sometimes for social good, but often, for fun and to explore the digital world’s frontiers. They are not the evil spirits that we often imagine them to be.

Hackers can be suffused with a spirit of civic good and of social beneficence. Around the world, hackers have used their technology skills to make public interventions to resolve a crisis in their environments. From the now notorious Julian Assange and his WikiLeaks platform to more positive efforts like Ipaidabribe.com, a civic hackers have emerged as our new heroes. Ipaidabribe.com is a civic hacking website, which allows users to use digital storytelling as a method by which they can start discussions on corruption and what we can do to change the systems.

Many digital natives are civic hackers. Aditya Kulkarni, one of our earliest participants with the “Digital Natives with a Cause” programme, is a digital native civic hacker. Like many young people in India, Aditya, from Mumbai, found the field of electoral politics opaque. He found it difficult to understand why good people voted for bad leaders and why large sections of the society shirk their responsibility to vote, thus leading to flawed governments. He, with his friends, started VoteIndia.in, a website where they collected information from public domain sources about electoral candidates in their local constituencies, so that voters could make informed decisions. The website was an instance of civic hacktivism.

I talk about hacking because I want to draw your attention to the phenomenon that started with Anna Hazare’s anti-corruption stance and the series of public interventions that surrounded it. Hazare has emerged as a hero for many. He has been trending on Twitter, there are pages dedicated to him on Facebook, Tumblr blogs have been spreading his word, text messages have urged people to come out in support. While there is much speculation about Hazare’s politics and the media spectacle that it has created, little attention has been given to Hazare’s almost exclusively off-line campaign and the way in which social media tools have been able to capture his momentum and turn it into a series of civic hacktivist interventions.

Flashmobs with people bearing candles and chanting against corruption emerged in cities. Public consultations organised by young people saw critical engagement with questions of corruption. The interwebz have been abuzz with people expressing opinions and calling for public mobilisation. Anti-corruption convictions have found resonance with people who, otherwise, despite having access to these technologies, would not necessarily have engaged in these kinds of civic hacktivities. This, for me, is not only a sign of hope but also a moment of understanding that digital activism is not always restricted to the digital domain.

As in the case of Aditya, and that of Hazare, the germ of an idea is often offline. The processes of protest and demonstration towards social change travel across the physical and the digital world. The idea of a digital native as a civic hacktivist reminds us that the young person behind the computer, in a virtual reality, is not dissociated from the embedded contexts of everyday life. Their skills with the computer often help them make critical interventions to mobilise social change.

See the original article published by the Indian Express here

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/who-the-hack

Cyber Fears: What scares Digital Natives and those around them

tettner — 2015-05-15T11:45:05Z

Societies around the world are quickly digitising ...Twitter.... ...Facebook... ...Wireless accessible everywhere... “Digital Natives” are those who have figured how to use these technologies to their full potential But even they have real fears. If you are a Digital Native, are related to one or work with/alongside with one come share your fears with us! Blogathon: Many people bloging together at the same time on a shared topic Date: Monday April 18th, 2011 On http://digitalnatives.in

This is the 2nd blogathon of the "Digital Natives with a Cause?" project.

A blogathon is an event where people from all over the world blog about a shared topic together, at the same time, giving an interesting cross-cultural snapshot of the issue at hand.

We all have dreams, hopes and aspirations. What are you afraid of? in your personal life? in your practice? in your politics? or in your ideology?

As a young person using digital technologies - what scares you?

As someone who is related to a digital native - what scares you?

As someone who works with/along digital natives - what scares you?

Let's find out from 1st person accounts what scares young digital people, what scares their relatives and what scares their co-workers and team mates. Let's move beyond the stereotypes, the sensationalism and the mystery which surrounds this exciting concept, the "Digital Native". Tell us what you think!

come share your thoughts along with people from all over the world.

Blog together as one in the 2nd blogathon of "Digital Natives with a Cause?".

Sample fears:

If you are a digital native:
Are you scared of censorship or being denied access to the internet? are you scared of being stereotyped as geeky or nerdy? are you scared of the expectations society puts on you? Are you afraid of revealing too much of yourself online? are you simply afraid that the power might go out in the middle of the day?

If you are the parent / relative of a digital native:
Popular depictions paint older generations as paranoid of the access enjoyed by digital natives. Is this really true? is it true for you? are you afraid of what a digital native might be doing online? are you afraid of new technologies themselves? Do you have any fears that are not being articulated by current dialogues?

If you work with digital natives:
Are you afraid of the easy at which young people use digital technologies? are you afraid they might be under utilizing the potential of these tools?

Date: Monday April 18th, 2011
On http://digitalnatives.in
email: digitalnatives@cis-india.org
or check out the FB event: http://tinyurl.com/6h6vfmy

Check out the Cyber fears poster

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/cyber-fears-what-scares-digital-natives-and-those-around-them

One for the avatar

praskrishna — 2015-05-14T12:19:34Z

With increasing instances of online avatars being victimised, users who are part of these identities need to be protected against vicious attacks. A fortnightly column on ‘Digital Natives’ authored by Nishant Shah is featured in the Sunday Eye, the national edition of Indian Express, Delhi, from 19 September 2010 onwards. This article was published on April 3, 2011.

On March 21 the digital natives I worked with, across three continents, blogged to celebrate Human Rights Day in South Africa. The topic: What should be a right in the digital age? While the blogathon captured the diverse contexts and voices of digital natives around the globe, it got me thinking about the question of rights, technology and identity.

When it comes to technology-based rights — right to access, right to information, right to dis/connect, right to be online, right to privacy, etc. — there seems to be an understanding that these rights are granted to the person who engages with digital and internet technologies.

For instance, if somebody steals your identity online, you can ask for legal arbitration. The right of the physical user who is interacting with digital technologies is clearly violated. Similarly, other kinds of economic abuse through phishing or spam are also instances in which the right of the individual is clearly breached and hence justice can be dispensed.

However, in the wide world of the Web, things often become blurry. For those who simultaneously live their lives in the fused spaces of the physical and the digital, there are instances when violence takes place but there are no arbitrators for justice. One way of thinking about this, is by looking at the digital avatars that we create online. Avatars are generally visual simulations that people create for themselves to mark their presence on the Web. Within the more traditional digital interactions, avatars are straightforward — pictures of people, icons, brands, photographs of pets, cartoons, or even text based signatures . Within role-playing games and virtual immersive environments, avatars can be more adventurous, often taking up the form of fantasy bodies that the users might aspire to have.

These avatars, for digital natives, are extensions of the self and an integral part of their online presence. A lucrative industry sells digital amenities, luxuries and brands to clothe and accessorise the avatars, so that they resemble the real-life user. The users invest time, money and resources to create unique avatars. However, these avatars, which are a combination of hardware, software and wetware — part machine, part code, part human being, despite their very material presence, do not really have any rights of their own.

Because they are treated only as cultural products, they are looked at only as objects rather than as animated identities. Popular law and culture treat avatars as external and not related to the users who create them. Within a digital universe, when an avatar gets abused, there are no rights that it can claim in order to find safety or justice. Our understanding of digital rights are so tied to the idea of physical loss and injury that unless a material loss to the physical body can be demonstrated, it becomes difficult to actually invoke the rights of the victim.

For example, in social networking sites like Facebook, it is common for younger users to bully people from their schools. Instead of a direct physical attack on the person, a series of “Hate pages” crop up, where conversations which were hitherto restricted to the circle of friends, are now openly hosted, attacking one particular person. Even more subtle are the campaigns to “De-friend” people, making them social pariahs by not allowing them access to social cliques. A common practice has also been to spam the person’s account with so many unnecessary emails that they can no longer access their important mails, which get lost in the deluge. These are serious attacks, which have direct impacts on the victim’s social and mental state.

Because no obvious physical harm is done, because there is no straightforward attack on the person involved or a demonstrable loss to any physical person, these attacks go unnoticed and unresolved. Even when these claims are brought to the notice of authority, the victim is asked to “move on” because it is “merely the internet”.

It is time to realise that there is nothing “mere” about the internet and the world of digital social interaction. What happens to the online persona has direct and often horrifying consequences to bodies in the physical world. And it is time to think of the right of the avatar, so that the users, who are a part of these identities, can also be protected. If I had to choose, in the digital age, the right to be an avatar, would be the right to vote for.

Read the original in the Indian Express here

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/one-avatar

I Believe that .......... should be a Right in the Digital Age

tettner — 2015-05-14T12:20:12Z

On Monday March 21, 2011, people from three continents blogged about what they believe will/should/are rights in the digital age, as part of the "Digital Natives with a Cause?" project. From "free music" to "many identities", people have a varied and rich set of beliefs of what should constitute a right.

What do you think should be a right in the digital age?

This is the question which community members, facilitators and organizers of the “Digital Natives with a Cause?” project asked themselves on Monday, 21 March 2011.

Juan-Manuel Casanueva, a facilitator at the workshop in Chile, talks about the right to be heard and read by anyone. Juan Manuel sets up a historical picture, explaining that the quest for global dialogue advanced tremendously with the implementation of the Internet. Early proponents of the Internet spoke of a world where people, enabled by the technology, would communicate with each other seamlessly. Casanueva explains that this is not the case; roughly 30 years after the Internet began people are still using the Internet as an extension of their community-based communication model. Now that the hardware is there, it is time to start questioning the other and possibly more subtle aspects of global communication like the linguistics and social attitudes…

But of course, how could we all communicate if not all of us have access yet? This is an issue that Nilofar, a participant of the workshop in Taipei, and Fernanda another participant from Ecuador explores more in depth in their post. The right to access information freely and universally is one which Nilofar advocates be expanded beyond those with disability to include “your friend, neighbour or the needy nerd?” This way, access will not only be provided to those below the poverty line, but for those who already enjoy access, it won’t continue to be politicized, corrupted, commoditized and in general under-utilized.

Paidamoyo also talks about access, specifically access by women. He describes the emergence of digital technologies as being crucial to the enlargement of the gap between men and women, simply because men enjoyed more access. Today, women have been left outside of the technology revolution, which is a huge problem since 52 per cent of the world’s population consists of women.

To properly access all of the wonders that the world of Internet offers we need to know how to physically operate a computer, but there are a series of more intangible skills needed. Simeon, a participant from the workshop in Johannesburg proposes that being digitally literate should be a right in the information age. What does he mean by being literate? Well, Simeon explains that “digital” is more of a mindset than a condition: it is an approach to life and not a method. “A number of people may have access to digital tools and technology but very few will get the opportunity to learn the techniques needed to maximize their investment on digital tools” he says, and it is as useful or sometimes more to teach people about the value and the potential uses of digital technologies than the mere skill.

Now, what do we do with all the information once we have accessed it? Jenny from Costa Rica believes we should share it. Spreading the digital love should be a right according to her, because sharing is analogous to growing: a process which makes us better. “we are entitled to share. We like to share our opinions, our work, to share questions and even complaints. It is a natural response, an impulse, you may think” She mentions platforms like bandcamp where musicians can upload their music and share it for free, and Creative Commons licenses which allow for legal ways of collaborating while maintaining authorship rights. But what happens when the information online is restricted and modifying it or sharing it is illegal? Adolfo from Nicaragua believes we all have the right to hack! Adolfo explains that nowadays “hacking” has negative overtones, but that the origins of the word simply refer to someone who modified trains for better performance or appeal. Adolfo believes that if he pays for something, he has the right to modify it, change it, tweak it, add to it, remove from it, and deface it in any way he wants. Adolfo and Shehla from India would get along very well, because Shehla believes free music should be a right in the digital age. What is stealing? Are we reaching a point where illegally downloading music is not morally incorrect? “(most people) would never think of stealing a CD from a store (or at least not that easily). So what exactly is stealing? And more so, in the online world? It’s as easy as the click of a button… can’t be that bad”.

Still, not everyone advocated for increasing access, Fieke from Hivos in the Netherlands believes that being able to unplug is a right. Fieke tells of how she lives a technologically savvy life, having a presence on Facebook, Twitter and other social media, answering emails for the better part of the day, but she does enjoy being able to turn off her cellphone and enjoy the sun on a clear day. Are we losing our ability to do that? When you send an sms message, do you expect the person to answer immediately? What kind of pressure does this put us under? It might not be as easy as we think to disconnect ourselves: The discourse of accessibility as a right plays an important role in development, so institutionalizing the right to disconnect might prove counter-productive if it is abused as an excuse to purposely alienate or marginalize certain groups. We also have to think that there are financial interests at play, as the more connected one is the more can be sold to one and the more that can be commoditized. Angela from the Philippines has a similar concern: Are we losing the right to not know? With the increasing arrival of web 3, the amount of information we constantly access, manipulate, assimilate and re-transmit is vast. In an age of ubiquitous information bombardment, can we choose to be ignorant? Are there any situations where actually not knowing is a valid alternative?

Some people focused on how we access (or choose to not access) information and what we do with it, some others focused on how said access affects our personalities, our identities and who we perceive we are. Nishant from CIS in India thinks that having multiple identities should be a right in the digital age. Nishant explains that even though we all have different aspects of our personalities which constitute different identities, because of the nature of social interactions and the spaces where these occurred, we were forced to choose one identity at a time. “The analogue individual was subjected to the laws of linear physics and time, where s/he was allowed to be only one person at one time and mapped to the one body”. Now, with the arrival of the digital individual, we can be many in many ways, in many spaces, simultaneously.

Because we can express our different identities freely and without needing to be consolidated into “one”, this frees up the possibility of having multiple and often contradictory opinions. The Internet has the potential of being a place where one can explore the varying meanings and impacts of each of his/her identities. Yet, experiences online get “fixed” into one of these identities, for example, if I am the person who usually posts news on my Facebook page, the community around me tends to expect this kind of behaviour from me, to the point where if I want to change my mind I need to withdraw completely from the community. This is why Josine from HIVOS in the Netherlands thinks that there should be more online spaces where one is allowed to change one’s mind. A related idea to that one of being able to change one’s mind according to the particular identity is the ability to choose one’s identity. Samuel Tettner expresses that the analogue person’s personality was directly tied to his/her environment and surroundings. This way, the identity was determined by the place where one was born, the surrounding community and its language, customs and traditions. In the digital age, people have access to a much more culture, and the global quality of the Internet is helping to break the continuity between physical space and identity.

So, what do you think of cross-section of what people think should be rights in the digital age? Write down your comments please. Of course, if you don’t, you’d still be within your rights as a digital being, at least according to Prabhas who lives in Kosovo. Prabhas believes that the right to lurk should be a right in the digital age. “In an age of increasing digital participation, silent participation must be considered participation, and left be. Not everyone needs to comment, vote, whatever else. Some may just read/watch/listen, and perhaps, appreciate. It is okay if no thumb is clicked up, no quick reply sent back. No blog written."

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/i-believe-that-______-should-be-a-right-in-the-digital-age

Reflecting from the Beyond

maesy — 2015-05-14T12:21:29Z

After going ‘beyond the digital’ with Blank Noise through the last nine posts, the final post in the series reflects on the understanding gained so far about youth digital activism and questions one needs to carry in moving forward on researching, working with, and understanding digital natives.

Throughout the series, I have argued the following points. Firstly, the 21^st century society is changing into a network society and that youth movements are changing accordingly. I have outlined the gaps in the current perspectives used in understanding the current form and proposed to approach the topic by going beyond the digital: from a youth standpoint, exploring all the elements of social movement, and based on a case study in the Global South – the uber cool Blank Noise community who have embraced the research with open arms. The methodology has allowed me to identify the newness in youth’s approach to social change and ways of organizing. Although I do not mean to generalize, there are some points where the case study resonates with the broader youth movement of today. In this concluding post, I will reflect on how the research journey has led me to rethink several points about youth, social change, and activism.

While social movements are commonly imagined to aim for concrete structural change, many youth movements today aim for social and cultural change at the intangible attitudinal level. Consequently, they articulate the issue with an intangible opponent (the mindset) and less-measurable goals. Their objective is to raise public awareness, but their approach to social change is through creating personal change at the individual level through engagement with the movement. Hence, ‘success’ is materialized in having as many people as possible involved in the movement. This is enabled by several factors.

The first is the Internet and new media/social technologies, which is used as a site for community building, support group, campaigns, and a basis to allow people spread all over the globe to remain involved in the collective in the absence of a physical office. However, the cyber is not just a tool; it is also a public space that is equally important with the physical space. Despite acknowledging the diversity of the public engaged in these spaces, youth today do not completely regard them as two separate spheres. Engaging in virtual community has a real impact on everyday lives; the virtual is a part of real life for many youth (Shirky, 2010). However, it is not a smooth ‘space of flows’ (Castells, 2009) either. Youth actors in the Global South do recognize that their ease in navigating both spheres is the ability of the elite in their societies, where the digital divide is paramount. The disconnect stems from their acknowledgement that social change must be multi-class and an expression of their reflexivity in facing the challenge.

The second enabling factor is its highly individualized approach. The movement enables people to personalize their involvement, both in terms of frequency and ways of engagement as well as in meaning-making. It is an echo of the age of individualism that youth are growing up in, shaped by the liberal economic and political ideologies in the 1990s India and elsewhere (France, 2007). Individualism has become a new social structure, in which personal decisions and meaning-making is deemed as the key to solve structural issues in late modernity (Ibid).

In this era, young people’s lives consist of a combination of a range of activities rather than being focused only in one particular activity (Ibid). This is also the case in their social and political engagement. Very few young people worldwide are full-time activists or completely apathetic, the mainstream are actually involved in ‘everyday activism’ (Bang, 2004; Harris et al, 2010). These are young people who are personalizing politics by adopting causes in their daily behaviour and lifestyle, for instance by purchasing only Fair Trade goods, or being very involved in a short term concrete project but then stopping and moving on to other activities. The emergence of these everyday activists are explained by the dwindling authority of the state in the emergence of major corporations as political powers (Castells, 2009) and youth’s decreased faith in formal political structures which also resulted in decreased interest in collectivist, hierarchical social movements in favour of a more individualized form of activism made easier with Web 2.0 (Harris et al, 2010).

A collective of everyday activists means that there are many forms of participation that one can fluidly navigate in, but it requires a committed leadership core recognized through presence and engagement. As Clay Shirky (2010: 90) said, the main cultural and ethical norm in these groups is to ‘give credit where credit is due’. Since these youth are used to producing and sharing content rather than only consuming, the aforementioned success of the movement lies on the leaders’ ability to facilitate this process. The power to direct the movement is not centralized in the leaders; it is dispersed to members who want to use the opportunity.

This form of movement defies the way social movements have been theorized before, where individuals commit to a tangible goal and the group engagement directed under a defined leadership. The contemporary youth movement could only exist by staying with the intangible articulation and goal to accommodate the variety of personalized meaning-making and allow both personal satisfaction and still create a wider impact; it will be severely challenged by a concrete goal like advocating for a specific regulation. Not all youth there are ‘activist’ in the common full-time sense, for most everyday activists their engagement might not be a form of activism at all but a productive and pleasurable way to use their free time - or, in Clay Shirky’s term, cognitive surplus (2010).

Revisiting my initial intent to put the term activism under scrutiny, I acknowledge this as a call for scholars to re-examine the concepts of activism and social movements through a process of de-framing and re-framing to deal with how youth today are shaping the form of movements. Although the limitations of this paper do not allow me to directly address the challenge, I offer my own learning from this process for the quest of future researchers.

The way young people today are reimagining social change and movements reiterate that political and social engagement should be conceived in the plural. Instead of “Activism” there should be “activisms” in various forms; there is not a new form replacing the older, but all co-existing and having the potential to complement each other. Allowing people to cope with street sexual harassment and create a buzz around the issue should complement, not replace, efforts made by established movements to propose a legislation or service provision from the state. This is also a response I offer to the proponents of the aforementioned “doubt” narrative.

I share the more optimistic viewpoint about how these new forms are presenting more avenues to engage the usually apathetic youth into taking action for a social cause. However, I also acknowledge that the tools that have facilitated the emergence of this new form of movement have existed for less than a decade; thus, we still have to see how it evolves through the years.

Hence, I also find the following questions to be relevant for proponents of the “hope” narrative. Social change needs to cater to the most marginalized in the society, but as elaborated before, the methods of engagement both on the physical and virtual spaces are still contextual to the middle class. Therefore, how can the emerging youth movements evolve to reach other groups in the society? Since most of these movements are divorced from existing movements, how can they synergize with existing movements to propel concrete change? These are open questions that perhaps will be answered with time, but my experience with Blank Noise has shown that these actors have the reflexivity required to start exploring solutions to the challenges.

The research started from a long-term personal interest and curiosity. In this journey, I have found some answers but ended up with more questions that will also stay with me in the long term. As a parting note before, I would like to share a quote that will accompany my ongoing reflection on these questions.

My advice to other young activists of the world: study and respect history... but ultimately break the mould. There have never been social media tools like this before. We are the first generation to test them out: to make the mistakes but also the breakthrough.

(Tammy Tibbetts, 2010)

This is the tenth and final post in the Beyond the Digital series, a research project that aims to explore new insights to understand youth digital activism conducted by Maesy Angelina with Blank Noise under the Hivos-CIS Digital Natives Knowledge Programme.

References:

Bang, H.P. (2004) ‘Among everyday makers and expert citizens’. Accessed 21 September 2010. http://www.sam.kau.se/stv/ksspa/papers/bang.pdf

Castells, M. (2009) Communication Power. New York: Oxford University Press.

France, A. (2007) Understanding Youth in Late Modernity. Berkshire: Open University Press.

Harris, A., Wyn, J., and Younes, S. (2010) ‘Beyond apathetic or activist youth: ‘Ordinary’ young people and contemporary forms of participaton’, Young Vol. 18:9, pp. 9-32

Shirky, C. (2010) Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age. London: Penguin Press

Image source:

http://blog.blanknoise.org/2009/08/street-signs.html

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/reflecting-from-the-beyond

Science, Technology and Society International Conference – Some Afterthoughts

tettner — 2015-05-14T12:22:08Z

An international conference on Science, Technology and Society was held at the Indore Christian College on March 12 and 13. It was sponsored by the Madhya Pradesh Council of Science and Technology, Bhopal and organized by the Indore Christian College. Samuel Tettner, Digital Natives Coordinator from the Centre for Internet and Society attended this conference and is sharing his experience about the workshop.

This past weekend I attended the “Science, Technology and Society International Conference”. The experience was one of learning, more so on the idiosyncrasies and social particularities of academic research than on the subject matters presented at the conference.

I arrived in Indore late on Friday night; my plan was to just check into the hotel and watch some Tom and Jerry before falling asleep. Then I met the conference organizer, the head of the Department of Sociology at the Indore Christian College, who informed me that I would be one of the key-note speakers the next day and that I had around 40 minutes of speaking time. My presentation at that time was around 20 minutes, so there was less Tom and Jerry than expected. This was the first indication of the interesting cultural experience I was about to have.

As I navigated the rather austere streets of Indore, I realized that this was really a modest city. Not in population of course, because Indian cities are huge compared to pretty much anywhere else in the world, but in its aspirations. I quickly noticed I was the only white person on the streets. “I made the conference international”, I thought, but I was wrong: There was one more white person, a middle aged man from Hungary named Laszlo who had come to present his research on population. And so as the first day of the conference rolled on, Laszlo and I got a taste of some bizarre reverence that continued throughout the two days. I can’t say for sure if it’s the result of some colonial baggage, the Indian tradition of treating guests like gods, may be a combination of both, the truth is that we got treated with way too much respect and an uncanny humility that was at times a bit embarrassing. Laszlo and I got to sit on the stage, next to the former Indian ambassador to Fiji, the head of the college, and other conference organizers.

The influence of Hinduism in more rural areas is very visible, on the stage next to the podium was a huge representation of Saraswati (goddess of wisdom) and there was a constant puja being offered to her. I thought of the academia, the temple of rationality, the house of reason, surely cannot co-exist with the world of religion. It can, if anyone in the world can make it happen, it’s the Indians. There were floral offerings, and introductions, and dedications. It seemed the organizers were very concerned with decorum and pomp and circumstance, pleasing local government officials (I recognized them because they were fat and everyone smiled at them awkwardly) and maintaining a tradition I got the feeling they didn’t understand properly. This whole exercise was ironic to me, as the building was almost in ruins, there was no proper ventilation, and the restrooms were a complete mess with no proper running water, and so on.

Finally I got to speak. I only got 15 minutes because one local man (maybe a friend of one of the local politicians) took his sweet time delivering his speech. This was definitely not my crowd. I was presenting a small paper I wrote called “iCare: Emergent Forms of Technology-mediated Activism” which was basically a summary of two of the findings of “Digital Natives with a Cause?”: One was a concept of activism which moves away from one time campaigns and looks at the practice of activism as an every-day activity, which can be valued without the need of an issue nor a community. The other was an observation about the language of activism and how it relates to different communities, through the use of voice, terminology, literary devices, and context. These were not the topics most attendees were familiar with, for example at the beginning of the talk I asked how many people in the audience used Facebook, and about 15 of out 150 people raised their hands. Relating to the issues of people who use technology incessantly was difficult for this crowd, who were not familiar with terms like “Slacktivism” and “Digital Native”, and who generally held the view that modern society and its overuse of technology were chipping away at traditional Hindu family values.

I tried my best in those 15 minutes, to illuminate some of the basic conceptual bases of the kind of work we’re doing with “Digital Natives with a Cause?”. They enjoyed the presentation, or at least I gathered that from several people who came up to me afterwards and told me so. Many people came up to me and asked me where I was from, and I started saying “USA” after a while, because “Venezuela” does exist in their mind, and “South America” just means the south of the United States.

I got to learn a lot about academic life in more rural traditional social spaces. I am generally completely ignorant of rural life, as I was born in the capital of Venezuela, and have in general lived in very cosmopolitan and metropolitan cities all my life. However what little slices of rural life I had encountered while backpacking through India, were concentrated in the work around the house and the fields. I was under the impression that research, that academic pursuit, and that critical thinking, were activities reserved for the urban, the middle class, the English speaking. Attending this conference opened my view a bit in this respect. People in rural areas have their own academic culture, with their own research interests, views and perspectives, and in most cases, reliable data backing them. Granted, in many cases these cultures are reflections or copies of what comes out of the cities, (and the west to a certain extend) but many times they are not, and getting to experience the complexity of it was a great experience. For example, there were many papers presented which dealt with the politics of caste, which is a concept I have barely come in contact with while being in Bangalore. A lot of people also talked about sustainable development, the impact of technology on agriculture, how new chemical fertilizers are changing the lives of farmers, and one teacher talked about the exiting potential uses for the novel technology called the podcast.

It was then that it dawned on me: “Science, Technology and Society” meant a completely different thing to my audience than it did to me. My presentation about how people conversing on Facebook can be viewed as activism must have seemed so alien and disconnected to them. I left the place very pensive about the whole experience. After taking pictures with some children, I went to a mall, and stood in front of a McDonalds and wondered how globalization is allowing for encounters like this one: A Venezuelan young man speaking at a local college in Indore, in the cultural and geographical centre of India. I’d like to think I was breaking barriers, participating in inter-cultural dialogue, exemplifying the exchange of intellectual and cultural capital that I hope takes places in the following years after our markets have gone global. Then again, I might not have been, I might have confirmed their perception of the well-dressed Westerner, who gracefully does them the favour of speaking at their college, and then talks in an accent about some random and obscure topic no one has any idea about. I’m still trying to decipher what happened. Eventually I went back to my hotel and experienced possibly the one and only truly cross-cultural and global thing in today’s world: Tom and Jerry.

See the agenda here

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/science-technology-and-society-conference-in-indore-march-12-13

Watson knows the Question

praskrishna — 2015-05-14T12:24:38Z

Now that an algorithm has given humans a run for their money on a quiz show, it’s time to rethink the idea of a machine. A fortnightly column on ‘Digital Natives’ authored by Nishant Shah is featured in the Sunday Eye, the national edition of Indian Express, Delhi, from 19 September 2010 onwards. This article was published on March 6, 2011.

Quantum theory suggests that multiple universes exist where every possible alternative can come true. If this were the case, somewhere there must be a world filled with machines that are looking at human evolution and figuring out new and advanced human machine relationships. Or for those who are not very quantum minded, imagine a world where machines are the evolved species and they depend upon human technology — emotional connections, semantic learning, etc. — for their daily transactions and survival. I am not suggesting a futuristic dystopia, like the kind that science fiction specialises in. However, it would be interesting to imagine a world where technology is not only at the periphery of human civilisation but at the centre of it.

I am proposing this world view to revisit the idea of a digital native. We have, so far, in scholarship and practice, education and policy, only looked at digital natives as young human beings who interact in new and innovative ways with evolving technologies, to form human-machine networks and assemblages. However, as Artificial Intelligence and Intelligence Augmentation develop to produce thinking technologies, it is time to start looking at being sapient as not necessarily a human condition.

Early last month, an artificially created super computing system called Watson (elementary, surely?) took the world by a storm as it competed against two human contestants on a popular American quiz show called Jeopardy! The trivia-based show provides answers clustered around a particular theme, and contestants have to ask the correct question to the answer, to win prize money. It is not a straightforward question-answer show because it relies on more than human memory and recollection. It gives cryptic clues (like the ones we are used to in a crossword), offers semantic relationships which need more than just a database memory, and relies on the contestants’ abilities to make creative connections between the clues in order to guess the right questions.

Watson, a product of seven years of research by IBM Research, works on an algorithm which simulates human language and cognitive patterns to make intelligent connections and deductions to understand the context of the clues and then provide answers. Powered by 2,800 super powered computers on a high-speed network, Watson competed against Jeopardy!’s biggest champions and made history as it showed extraordinary human learning and predictive powers. It has been one of the biggest achievements in advanced computing to develop an algorithm that mimics human learning and has changed the way in which we look at the human-machine relationship.

While much commentary on Watson revolves around what it means to be human, and subsequently, what it is to be a digital native, I have a different proposition to make. Perhaps, Watson’s debut on American television is not only about thinking what is human, but also about what it means to be a machine.

First, the Watson that appeared on TV was a sleek display screen that stood behind a lectern in the studio along with the human contestants. The original Watson was next door, being cooled by refrigeration units, but it appeared to the human audience (in and outside the studio) in its avatar. This was a radically new idea because we have always thought of the avatar as a technology based representation of human users. We find avatars on Facebook and in online role-playing games. To think of a machine appearing in a human form was radically new.

Second, Watson was not able to just make predictions by mining information. It was also able to display levels of confidence. If Watson was not confident about an answer, it did not push the buzzer to answer. In fact, once the information was harvested, it displayed its top three guesses to show that, like human contestants, it calculated risks of wrong answers.

Third, Watson was able to display or at least simulate human emotions. It took guesses even when in doubt. It showed a spirit of adventure and played big. It was disappointed when it lost or was happy when it got the answers. It was able to display its “emotions” through various displays in its form and could get the audience’s attention, applause and support.

What this experiment suggests to me is that Watson is perhaps a digital native. All our concentration has always been on human subjects, but synthetic life forms and technology-based intelligence, are blurring this distinction between humans and technologies. We should start thinking of a digital native as neither machine nor human being, but a combination of the two, residing simultaneously in both the realms of the physical and the digital. Watson is perhaps a new digital native, a technology that is growing and slowly learning from its interactions with the human world around it. One of these days, we might be living in the midst of computational devices, which, when we are flummoxed, might turn to us and say, “Elementary, my dear Sherlock!”

Contact: digitalnative@expressindia.com

Read the original in the Indian Express here

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/watson-knows

Activism: Unraveling the Term

maesy — 2015-05-14T12:25:05Z

After discussing Blank Noise’s politics and ways of organizing, the current post explores whether activism is still a relevant concept to capture the involvement of people within the collective. I explore the questions from the vantage point of the youth actors, through conversations about how they relate with the very term of activism.

Youth's Popular Imagination of Activism

As a start, I need to clarify that ‘activism’ is not a concept that the participants are generally concerned with. For a majority of them, the conversation we had was the first time they thought of what the term means and reflect whether their engagement with Blank Noise is activism. Regardless of whether one identifies Blank Noise as a form of activism or not, all participants share a popular idea of what activism is.

Generally speaking, at an abstract level all participants saw activism as passionately caring about an injustice and taking action to create social change. At a more tangible level, all participants mentioned three elements as popular ideas about doing activism. The first is the existence of a concrete demands as a solution to the identified problem, such as asking for service provision or state regulations. Since these demands are structural, activism is also seen dealing with formal authority figures in the traditional sense of politics, the state. The second is the intensity and commitment required to be an activist, for many participants being an activist means having prolonged engagement, taking risks, and making the struggle a priority in one’s life. In other words, being an activist means “... being neck-deep, spending most if not all of your time, energy, and resources for the cause” (Dev Sukumar, male, 34). The third element relates to the methods, called by some as ‘old school’: shouting slogans, holding placards, and doing marches on the streets – all enacted in the physical public space. This popular imagination of activism becomes the orientation for participants in deciding whether Blank Noise is a form of activism and whether they are activists for being involved in it.

Activism as the Intention and Action

“I have an idea of what activism is but not what it exactly looks like.”

(Apurva Mathad, male, 28).

For those who think that Blank Noise is a form of activism, there was a differentiation between the idea at the abstract level and how it is manifested at a more tangible level. The definition of activism is the abstract one, while the popular ideas of doing activism do not define the concept but present the most common out many possible courses of actions. Blank Noise is fulfils all the elements in the abstract definition: a passion about an injustice, having an aim for social change, and acting to achieve the aim. Hence, Blank Noise is activism, but the way it manifests itself does not adhere to the popular imagination of doing activism. The distinction between Blank Noise’s methods with popular ones was emphasized, along with the difference in articulating goals.

Interestingly, not all participants who share this line of thinking called themselves as activists for being involved in an activism. Again, it must be reiterated that no participants ever really thought of giving a name to their engagement prior to the interview. Instead of saying ‘I am an activist’, they said ‘I guess I could be called an activist’ for the fact that they are sharing the passion and being actively involved in a form of activism, albeit in an unconventional manner.

Those who would categorize Blank Noise as activism but not call themselves activists related with a particular element on the popular idea of doing activism, which is getting “neck-deep”. They were helpers, volunteers, idea spreaders, but not an activist because their lives are not dedicated for the cause or their involvements were based on availability. On the other hand, these participants all said that Jasmeen is an activist for being completely dedicated to Blank Noise from its inception until today.

Activism as Particular Ways of Doing and Being

“What are the repercussions if activism is so fluidly defined? It can mean not questioning

privilege... not seeing the class divisions and still call yourself activist.”

(Hemangini Gupta, female, 29).

Most participants did not consider Blank Noise as an activism. Generally, this can be explained by the discrepancies between Blank Noise and the popular imagination on the tangible ways of doing activism. Blank Noise does not propose a concrete solution or make concrete demands to an established formal structure nor did it march on the streets and make slogans. However, the underlying attitude to this point of view is not of a younger generation finding the ‘old’ ways of doing activism obsolete. Rather, there was an acknowledgement that the issue itself causes the different ways of reading an issue and taking actions to address it.

Furthermore, there is an appreciation to the achievements and dedication of activists that deterred them from calling themselves activists. These people referred to their occasional participation and the fact that Blank Noise is not the main priority in their lives as a student or young professional despite being a cause they are passionate about. As reflected in the opening quote, being an activist for some participants also means deeply reflecting on their self position in terms of class, acknowledging their privileges, and putting themselves in a position that will enable them to imagine the experience of people who are also affected by the issue but has a different position in the society. In other words, being an activist is not just about doing but also about critically reflecting on one’s position in relation to the issue and how it influences the way an issue is being pushed forward. Thinking that they are not up to these standards, these youth choose to call themselves ‘volunteers’, ‘helpers’, or ‘supporters’.

Youth: The Activist, the Apathetic, and the Everyday

“Blank Noise is a public and community street arts collective that is volunteer-led and attempts to create public dialogue on the issue of street sexual violence and eve teasing.”

(Jasmeen Patheja)

“... a group of people against street sexual harassment and eve teasing.”

(Kunal Ashok, men, 29)

“... an idea that really works.”

(Neha Bhat, 19)

As clarified before, the participants did not use the words ‘movement’ and very few used ‘activism’ during our conversations. Instead, the terms they used to describe Blank Noise are represented in the quotes above: collective, community, group, project, and even as an idea. These phrases do not carry the same political baggage that ‘movement’ or ‘activism’ would; they also do not conjure a particular imagination that the other two terms would. These phrases are de-politicized and informal; they imply fluidity, lack of hierarchy, and room for manoeuvre.

The implied meanings in the terms reflect the debates on the average youth and political engagement. For the past decade, various youth scholars criticized the dichotomy of youth as either activists or apathetic in explaining the global trend of decreased youth participation in formal politics. The activists are either politically active Digital Natives engaged in new forms of social movements influenced heavily by new media or sub-cultural resistances, which only account for a fraction of the youth population that are mostly completely apathetic. This dichotomy ignored the ‘broad “mainstream” young people who are neither deeply apathetic about politics on unconventionally engaged’ (Harris et al, 2010).

These mainstream young people actually are socially and politically engaged in ‘everyday activism’ (Bang, 2004; Harris et al, 2010). These are young people who are personalizing politics by adopting causes in their daily behaviour and lifestyle, for instance by purchasing only Fair Trade goods, or being very involved in a short term concrete project but then stopping and moving on to other activities. The emergence of these everyday activists are explained by the dwindling authority of the state in the emergence of major corporations as political powers (Castells, 2009) and youth’s decreased faith in formal political structures which also resulted in decreased interest in collectivist, hierarchical social movements in favour of a more individualized form of activism (Harris et al, 2010). Internet and new media technologies are credited as an enabling factor, being a space and a medium for young people to express their everyday activism.

All of the research participants, perhaps with the exception of Jasmeen as the only one who has constantly been the driver Blank Noise its entire seven years, are these everyday makers, people who were involved with the Blank Noise either on a daily basis as a commentator, one-time project initiator and leader, or people who were active when they are available but remain dormant at other times. Blank Noise is a space where these individual forms of engagement could be exercised while remaining as a collective. The facilitation is not only by the flexibility of coming and going, but also the lack of rigid group rules and the approach of allowing Blank Noise to be interpreted differently by individuals. Considering that the mainstream urban youth are everyday makers who would not find ‘old’ or ‘new’ social movements appealing, this can be the reason why Blank Noise became so popular among youth; however, I would also argue that the fact that Blank Noise is the first to systematically address eve teasing is a determining cause.

The implications of this finding, together with other concluding thoughts, will be shared in the next and final post in the Beyond the Digital series.

This is the ninth post in the Beyond the Digital series, a research project that aims to explore new insights to understand youth digital activism conducted by Maesy Angelina with Blank Noise Project under the Hivos-CIS Digital Natives Knowledge Programme.

References:

Bang, H.P. (2004) ‘Among everyday makers and expert citizens’. Accessed 21 September 2010. http://www.sam.kau.se/stv/ksspa/papers/bang.pdf

Castells, M. (2009) Communication Power. New York: Oxford University Press.

Harris, A., Wyn, J., and Younes, S. (2010) ‘Beyond apathetic or activist youth: ‘Ordinary’ young people and contemporary forms of participaton’, Young Vol. 18:9, pp. 9-32

Image source: http://blog.blanknoise.org/2010/02/tweet-now-feb-17-27.html

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/activism-unraveling-the-term

"Digital Natives with a Cause?" newsletter Volume I

tettner — 2015-05-15T11:44:19Z

For everyone who is interested in learning more about the Digital Natives who form part of the "Digital Natives with a Cause?" community. The Newsletter includes opinion posts by participants from the three workshops, interview with them, comics and cartoons highlighting current issues affecting the community, as well as current news and discussions happening at the project website, www.digitalnatives.in

"Links in the Chain" is a bi-monthly publication which highlights the projects, ideas and news of the "Digital Natives with a Cause?" community members. The first volume was introductory and experimental in nature. Here are the two issues of volume I:

Links in The Chain - Volume I

Links in The Chain - Volume I issue II

For more information on"Digital Natives with a Cause?" please check out www.digitalnatives.in

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/digital-natives-with-a-cause-newsletter-volume-i

Internet, Society & Space in Indian Cities - A Call for Peer Review

praskrishna — 2015-04-06T15:52:21Z

Pratyush Shankar's research project on "Internet, Society & Space in Indian Cities" is a part of the Researchers @ Work Programme at the Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore. His monograph explores the trajectories of transformation and perception of cities in India in context with the rise of Information Technologies for communication and presence of an active digital space.

There has been, in the fields of design and architecture, a close link between the shape and imagination of the city spaces and the dominant technologies of the time. The study of space (architecture, public places and city form) can lead to very interesting insights into the expression of the society with respect to the dominant technologies. Manuel Castells argues that space is not a mere photo¬copy (reflection) of the society but it is an important expression (Castells, 2009). Fredric Jameson, in his identification of the condition of post-modernity demonstrates how the transition into new technologies is perhaps first and most visibly reflected in the architecture, as physical spaces get materially reconstructed, not only to house the needs and peripheries of the emerging technologies but also to embody their aesthetics in their design and built form (Jameson, 1991).

Earlier technologies have led to new understandings of the notions of the public and commons. Jurgen Habermas argues on how the emergence of print cultures and technologies led to a structural transformation of the public sphere by creating new and novel forms of participation and political engagement for the print readers. Within cinema studies in India, Ashish Rajadhyaksha and Madhav Prasad have looked at the 'cinematic city' — how material conditions of the city transform to house the cinema technologies, and how the imagination of certain cities is affected by the cinematic representations of these spaces (Rajadhyaksha, 2009). Mike Davis' formulations of an 'Ecology of Fear'(Davis, 1999) and Sean Cubbit's idea of 'The Cinema Effect' (Cubitt, 2005) also show the integral relationship that technologies have with the imagination and materiality of urban spaces.

I wish to explore the trajectories of transformation and perception of cities in India in context with the rise of Information Technologies for communication and presence of an active digital space. The issue of imagination is an important one here as much as the material realities of our cities. However, to begin with one needs to look at the very idea of cities in the Indian context. The fundamental idea of a city and that of a space becomes important here and has been explored in the chapter on cities. The issue of representation as related to ideas of 'social space' and 'abstract space' (Lefebvre, 1992) has been used as a methodological framework while analyzing cities. The social space of a city here refers to the production of space that is biomorphic and anthropological. From this perspective people and history and memory along with social economic processes play a strong role in its definition. Hence, city spaces cannot be understood as a collection of building and other material production alone but rather as an act of social production involving people over a long period of time. The appropriation and representation of cities is another important concern as it creates an imagination structure and often justifies the material transformation.

The research is primarily concerned with first creating an understanding of the cities in Indian context from the point of view of their social, technological and material productions. The ideas and representations of space therefore, become critical issues of exploration to understand the nature of imagination of space with reference to Indian cities. An empirical study of issues of spatial transformation was conducted in Bangalore and Gurgaon to find certain patterns and its correlation with the present discourses on the technology and the city. The issue of perception of lived in space, cartography and myth became important issues to understand the nature of the imagination of space and positioning of the digital space. The contradiction of a networked geography with the present spatial arrangement of cities that is the centre of a larger territory becomes important shifts to be accounted for while understanding the new geography. The patterns and possibilities in these new geographies of information technologies have been understood by studying three building programmes in the city. The question of transformation and future of cities and the position of digital space in these times then became an important one to answer. The initial study concerns with laying out a framework for examining the techno-spatial discourses in cities in general while establishing the key characteristics of its narration in the Indian context.

The Researchers At Work Programme, at the Centre for Internet and Society, advocates an Open and transparent process of knowledge production. We recognise peer review as an essential and an extremely important part of original research, and invite you, with the greatest of pleasures, to participate in our research, and help us in making our arguments and methods stronger. The first draft of the monograph is now available for public review and feedback. Please click on the links below to choose your own format for accessing the document.

We appreciate your time, engagement and feedback that will help us to bring out the monograph in a published form. Please send all comments or feedback by April 5, 2011 to nishant@cis-india.org or you can use your Open ID to login to the website and leave comments to this post.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/histories-of-the-internet/blogs/internet-society-and-space-in-indian-cities/internet-society-space-in-indian-cities-a-call-for-peer-review

Digital Natives with a Cause? - Workshop in Santiago FAQs

tettner — 2015-05-15T11:46:01Z

The third and final workshop of the Digital Natives with a Cause? research project will take place in Santiago, Chile, from 8 to 10 February 2011. Below are some frequently asked questions.

The Open call for participation can be found here

1.When and where is the workshop going to be held?
The workshop will take place over three days from 8 to 10 February 2011, in Santiago, Chile.

2. Who should apply?
The organizers,Rising Voices, Hivos and the Centre for Internet and Society are interested in hearing from young people, who utilize digital technologies to create social change in their societies or social circles.
Further, the regional focus of the workshop is on Latin America and The Caribbean, hence, only those citizens or those in that setting should apply. The event is not public in nature, only those who fit the criteria and are selected will be invited to participate. However, there might be a larger public event associated with the workshop.

3. How can I apply?
You can fill an online application. Alternatively, you can email digitalnatives@cis-india.org and ask for an email application.

4. What is Digital Natives with a Cause?
"Digital Natives with a Cause?" is an international, collaborative research project which aims to increase the current understanding of Digital Natives (there is not one single definition, that’s why we’re doing this project! – but it could be understood as people who interact naturally with digital technologies) and their role in their particular societies.

5. What are the objectives of Digital Natives with a Cause? How does this workshop fit in?
"Digital Natives with a Cause?" aims to incorporate a first-person narrative of the use of technology by youth for social change into the ongoing dialogue. To do this, several case studies of varying cultural backgrounds and diverse methodologies will be compiled into a book. The case studies will be the result of three-day workshop conducted across the developing world. Last summer the Asian workshop happened in Taipei, Taiwan, and last fall the African workshop happened in Johannesburg, South Africa.
"Digital Natives with a Cause?" also aims to incorporate the participants into a broad network of Digital Natives from around the world, with similar methodology and approach. Through this network, Digital Natives will be able to express concerns, share resources, stay connected with peers and learn from each other.
You can read a report on "Digital Natives with a Cause?" here.

6. OK, so what can I expect from this workshop?
You can expect an informal setting where interactive methods of communication help you gain a better understanding of the context of your project. For example, you will get to meet and interact with the participants of the previous workshop in Taipei and Johannesburg. You can expect to reflect about your project: Your motivation, methodology, focus, and context, to name a few, and to draw parallels into other projects in the region. You can expect to interact with a varied and diverse group of young people from around Latin America and the Caribbean who like you, use technology for social causes. Overall, you can expect to gain a new perspective about yourself, and the importance of your work.

7. Will I learn any new skills in this workshop?
The short answer is no. The "Digital Natives with a Cause?" project does not aim to train or to build existing capacities among youth users of technology. That said, you will definitely gain a lot of perspective on your individual project and you will learn how it relates to ongoing development processes in the region. You will also meet, interact and hopefully befriend other young users of technology like yourself, enlarging your scope and enriching your experience.

8. Are there any language requirements?
Yes. Even though the communication during the workshop will take place both in Spanish and English, we really need the participants to have at least a working proficiency of English to be able to interact both with the organizers who come from India and the Netherlands, as well as with the participants from other workshops, thus fully contribute to the project.

9. Will expenses be covered?
Yes. Expenses associated with the workshop (travel and accommodation) will be provided for those selected participants.

10. When is the last date to apply?
The last day to apply is Tuesday, 4 January 2010.

11 Where can I get more information?
Do check out www.digitalnatives.in for more information, and please email digitalnatives@cis-india.org for questions and concerns. We would be pleased to answer them.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/digital-natives-with-a-cause-workshop-in-santiago

The Leap of Rhodes or, How India Dealt with the Last Mile Problem - An Inquiry into Technology and Governance: Call for Review

praskrishna — 2015-04-03T10:55:07Z

Re-thinking the Last Mile Problem research project by Ashish Rajadhyaksha is a part of the Researchers @ Work Programme at the Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore. The ‘last mile’ is a communications term which has a specific Indian variant, where technology has been mapped onto developmentalist–democratic priorities which have propelled communications technologies since at least the invention of radio in the 1940s. For at least 50 years now, the ‘last mile’ has become a mode of a techno-democracy, where connectivity has been directly translated into democratic citizenship. It has provided rationale for successive technological developments, and produced an assumption that the final frontier was just around the corner and that Internet technologies now carry the same burden of breaching that last major barrier to produce a techno-nation. The project has fed into many different activities in teaching, in examining processes of governance and in looking at user behaviour.

Laying out a theoretical review of the history of technologies of archiving in the country, the project aims at building case studies of public and private archives in the country and the needs for a local capacity building network of historians, archivists, technologists and state bodies which exploits the digital and Internet technologies for building new archives of Indian material.

The monograph has emerged out of the "Rethinking the Last Mile Problem" project that was initiated in September 2008. The first draft of the monograph is now available for public review and feedback.Please click on the links below to choose your own format for accessing the document:

PDF
Word

We appreciate your time, engagement and feedback that will help us to bring out the monograph in a published form. Please send all comments or feedback by 30 December 2010 to nishant@cis-india.org or you can use your Open ID to login to the website and leave comments to this post.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/histories-of-the-internet/blogs/the-last-cultural-mile/last-mile-problem

Digital Natives with a Cause? Thinkathon: Position Papers

praskrishna — 2015-05-15T11:34:35Z

The Digital Natives with a Cause? Thinkathon conference co-organised by Hivos and the Centre for Internet and Society is being held from 6 to 8 December at the Hague Museum for Communication. The position papers are now available online.

The emergence of digital and Internet technologies have changed the world as we know it. Processes of interpersonal relationships, social communication, economic expansion, political protocols and governmental mediation are all undergoing a significant translation, across the world, in developed and emerging Information and Knowledge societies. These processes also affect the ways in which social transformation, political participation and interventions for development take place.

The Digital Natives with a Cause? research inquiry seeks to look at the potentials of social change and political participation through technology practices of people in emerging ICT contexts. It particularly aims to address knowledge gaps that exist in the scholarship, practice and popular discourse around an increasing usage, adoption and integration of digital and Internet technologies in social transformation processes.

The programme has three main components. The first is to incorporate the users (often young, but not always so) as stakeholders in the construction of policies and discourse which affect their lives in very material ways. The second is to capture, with a special emphasis on change, different relationships with and deployment of technologies in different parts of the world. The third is to further extend the network of knowledge stakeholders where scholars,practitioners, policy makers and the Digital Natives themselves, come together in dialogue to identify the needs and interventions in this field.

In the late summer of 2010 two workshops, in Taiwan and South Africa, brought together 50 Digital Natives from Asia and Africa to place their practice in larger social and political legacies and frameworks. The ‘Talking Back’ workshop in Taiwan looked at the politics, implications and processes of talking back and being political and the ‘My Bubble, My Voice and My Space’ workshop in Johannesburg looked at change, change processes and the role of Digital Natives in it.

For the Digital Natives with a Cause? Thinkathon that will be held in The Hague, The Netherlands from 6 to 8 December 2010, Digital Natives from the workshops in Taipei and Johannesburg have provided us with their take on social change and political participation in the following position papers. They look at issues of: what does it mean to be a Digital Native? What is the relationship of people growing up with new technologies and change? What are the processes by which change is produced? Can you institutionalize Digital Natives with a Cause Activities? How do you make it sustainable in each context?

We hope you will find the Digital Natives with a Cause? position papers inspiring, thought-provoking and challenging.

Download the position papers here [PDF, 1173 KB]

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/position-papers

The 'Beyond the Digital' Directory

maesy — 2015-05-15T11:33:39Z

For the past few months, Maesy Angelina has been sharing the insights gained from her research with Blank Noise on the activism of digital natives. The ‘Beyond the Digital’ directory offers a list of the posts on the research based on the order of its publication.

Have you ever wondered what is really “new” about the activism of digital natives? In May 2010, the Hivos-CIS ‘Digital Natives with a Cause?’ Knowledge Programme started a collaboration The Blank Noise Project in India and Maesy Angelina, a student-researcher from the Erasmus University of Rotterdam – International Institute of Social Studies in The Hague who is taking up the research agenda for her final project to qualify for her Masters degree in International Development with a specialization in Children and Youth Studies.

Maesy has been blogging about the insights she gained from her field work in Bangalore in the CIS website under the ‘Beyond the Digital’ series, which consists of the following posts:

1. Beyond the Digital: Understanding Digital Natives with a Cause

Digital natives with a cause: the future of activism or slacktivism? Maesy Angelina argues that the debate is premature given the obscured understanding on youth digital activism and contends that an effort to understand this from the contextualized perspectives of the digital natives themselves is a crucial first step to make. This is the first out of a series of posts on her journey to explore new insights to understand youth digital activism through a research with Blank Noise under the Hivos-CIS Digital Natives Knowledge Programme.

2. First Thing First

Studies often focus on how digital natives do their activism in identifying the characteristics of youth digital activism and dedicate little attention to what the activism is about. The second blog post in the Beyond the Digital series reverses this trend and explores how Blank Noise articulates the issue it addresses: street sexual harassment.

3. Talking Back without “Talking Back”

The activism of digital natives is often considered different from previous generations because of the methods and tools they use. However, reflecting on my conversations with Blank Noise and my experience in the ‘Digital Natives Talking Back’ workshop in Taipei, the difference goes beyond the method and can be spotted at the analytical level – how young people today are thinking about their activism.

4. Taking It to the Streets

The previous posts in the Beyond the Digital series have discussed the distinct ways in which young people today are thinking about their activism. The fourth post elaborates further on how this is translated into practice by sharing the experience of a Blank Noise street intervention: Y ARE U LOOKING AT ME?

5. The Digital Tipping Point

Is Web 2.0 really the only reason why youth digital activism is so successful in mobilizing public engagement? A look into the transformation of Blank Noise’s blog from a one-way communication medium into a site of public dialogue and collaboration reveals the crucial factors behind the success.

6. Diving Into the Digital

Previous posts in the ‘Beyond the Digital’ series have discussed the non-virtual aspects and presence of Blank Noise. However, to understand the activism of digital natives also require a look into their online presence and activities. This post explores how Blank Noise’s engagement with the public in their digital realm.

7. The Class Question

Blank Noise aims to be as inclusive as possible and therefore does not identify any specific target groups. Yet, the spaces and the methods they occupy do attract certain kinds of volunteers and public. This raises the class question: what are the dilemmas around class on digital interventions? Are they any different from the dilemmas on street interventions?

8. The Many Faces Within

Blank Noise, as many other digital native collectives, may seem to be complete horizontal at first glance. But, a closer look reveals the many different possibilities for involvement and a unique way the collective organize itself.

9. Activism: Unraveling the Term

10. Reflecting from the Beyond

While the posts present bits and pieces of field research notes and reflections from data analysis, the full research products are:

- Angelina, M. (2010) 'Beyond the Digital: Understanding Contemporary Forms of Youth Activism - The Case of Blank Noise in Urban India'. Unpublished thesis, graded with Distinction. The Hague: International Institute of Social Studies - Erasmus University of Rotterdam.

- Angelina, M. (2010) 'Towards a New Relationship of Exchange'. Position paper for the Digital Natives with a Cause Thinkathon.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/the-beyond-the-digital-directory