Digital technologies and social change

In the four posts that I have previously written on this blog, I have reflected in a free, relaxed way about new technologies and social change. I have tried to contemplate issues such as voice, discourse, and power, and agency and perspective concerning digital transformation. In this fifth post, I …

A heartbreaking mouthful: Imperialist White Supremacist Capitalist Patriarchy.

In my previous four blog posts I spoke about Clicktivism, White Saviourism, the importance of intersectionality, and finally I offered some Dos and Don’ts when it comes to communicating social change. These were mostly lighthearted posts about deeply problematic issues, all, in my opinion, connected by what Nigerian author Chimananda …

Should Digital Transformation Prioritize Human Rights in all Future Policy Frameworks?

As I discussed in my previous post, the COVID-19 crisis has undoubtedly triggered a further disruption in the technology sector. From AI, to sterilizing robots, to rapid developments of new technology being reappropriated in ways we have never seen before, we have seen organisations and businesses turn to technology during …

NMICT & Development : Individual Assignment

ICT and Development How can we activate Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and New Media (NM) as an instrument for positive, inclusive, and sustainable change? To explore this question; the following paragraph briefly elaborates on Heeks’s (2017) invitation to deconstruct ICT 4 Development (ICT4D) terms. A deconstruction that is preliminary …

Black Lives Matter and its importance to international development

Three women running a movement that is uniting activists to participate in online and offline protests, addressing inequality, and pushing for social and political change is powerful. The Black Lives Matter movement is teaching us how a social movement can initiate social change, combine digital activism with traditional protests and …

J is for Joy

What a time to be alive, isn’t it? As learned from Hylland Eriksen: “Everything globalizes except democracy” (Eriksen, 2014: 86). Even a virus – we must now add. But let’s talk about the internet. Internet The Internet has passed through us like a gale, like a hurricane. All of a …

Your Guide to Network Protests

What a year! Hope this finds you as well as possible. Given the challenges we’re facing in this pandemic, campaigning and online activism has become even more important. So I was super excited to come across Zeynep Tufecki’s work, Twitter and Teargas, which is packed full of insights and recommendations, …

The Internet Meme: Memeingful or Memeingless?

I recently watched a Buzzfeed video about a woman in Texas, USA, who ‘accidentally became a meme.’ Known as ‘Kombucha Girl’, Brittany Broski recorded herself tasting Kombucha for the first time. Her face seems to physically recoil at the taste. But as she considers it for a moment, her expression …

Black Lives Matter and the aid industry (?)

With my previous posts (#blacklivesmatter – the story behind the hashtag, Is doing ‘something’ better than doing nothing? and Creating change through online and offline activism) I’ve tried to dig deeper into the origins and success of the BLM movement. However, this is not only a blog about social movements and …

Are all birds “Tweeting” ?

V is for Visibility; we ponder who is invisible on internet mediums Does a poor single mother who works 12 hours a day to provide for her family, takes care of house chores, makes a meal, follows up with her children’s schoolwork, looks after her retired father who has minimum retiring …