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The Production of Gendered Knowledge in the Digital Age
- Indiana University Press
- Chapter
- Additional Information
The Production of Gendered Knowledge in the Digital Age In the past decade, the Internet has revolutionized the availability of information and the dissemination of knowledge throughout the world, especially in Africa (Everett 2002, forthcoming). In every major town across the continent, cybercafés have opened, and most universities are equipped with computers connected to the Internet. In many ways, electronic transmission of information has leveled the playing ¤eld and provided equal access to previously excluded constituencies. However, as Aghi Bahi’s (2004) study about Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire has shown, Internet access in itself remains a gendered experience; 70 percent of the customers in cybercafés are men. African gender activists have creatively used the Internet for community building and information sharing. In Uganda, several organizations have developed information and communications technologies (ICT) to address issues of gender equity. The Women of Uganda Network (WOUGNET), founded in 2000, advocates ICT programs that are gender sensitive, taking into account women’s speci¤c needs. This includes opportunities for training and establishing access points (cybercafés) led by women. A high priority is the creation of software in local languages and a program interface accessible to illiterate users. WOUGNET, supported by allied groups, has trained coaches to pass on ICT skills to rural and urban women. One workshop showed women entrepreneurs how ICT use can strengthen their businesses: the program featured an introduction to computers, training in Internet and e-mail basic skills, and training in product marketing. Another workshop addressed the potential of ICT use for improving women’s health, such as distributing care information and HIV/AIDS prevention education. The Uganda of¤ce of Isis-WICCE (Isis-Women’s International Cross-Cultural Exchange) has incorporated ICT to document women’s experiences in situations of armed con®ict, which have ravaged parts of the country for thirty years. Dif¤culties of ICT use remain, especially in rural areas. Women’s poverty and illiteracy make it dif¤cult for them to pay for and access ICT services. Many ICT programs do not deal with women’s most pressing economic needs, such as access to credit and income-earning opportunities.1 The African Women’s Development and Communications Network, FEMNET, operates as a network that links African women and their groups together through the production and dissemination of information through e-mail and the Internet (see http://www.femnet.or.ke). Through the use of ICT, FEMNET has been able to play a leadership role in the organization of international and African regional conferences. From the Beijing conference of 1995 though the Beijing + 5 and Beijing + 10 conferences, FEMNET has been a focal point around which African women have accessed information to guide their participation in preparatory meetings at the regional level and in the main meetings in Beijing and New York. FEMNET’s leadership role in the African caucus has helped translate views and opinions into concrete decision-making positions. FEMNET played a lead role in organizing African women to contribute discussions about ICT from a gender perspective during the organization of the World Information Society (WIS). African women are also using ICT to gain visibility throughnetworks such as Dimitra, an information-sharing and -dissemination project that brings rural women’s organizations in the agricultural sector together through its Web site (see http://www.fao.org/ Dimitra/new index.jsp). Organizations such as ABANTU for development, an African-centered and genderoriented NGO with regional of¤ces in East and West Africa, has also trained grassroots women’s groups in the use of ICT, especially in terms of how to access information from the Internet and communicate through e-mail. ABANTU has also drawn attention to the gender gaps in ICT policies in West Africa. In South Africa, the African Gender Institute (AGI), established at the University of Cape Town in 1996, has become the most prominent site for coordination, stimulation, and dissemination of feminist research and teaching in gender studies across Africa. In 2001, the AGI launched the Gender and Women’s Studies for Africa’s Transformation Project (GWS Africa Project), which features several ICT initiatives: online discussion groups, a Web site, and electronic distribution of feminist research and teaching resources .2 Given the expense and dif¤culty of acquiring books and journals in Africa, electronic dissemination is proving to be a cost-effective alternative. The online journal Feminist Africa (see http://www.feministafrica.org) has become the AGI’s most important outreach instrument and a vehicle for engaging with...