Participatory content creation: voice, communication, and development

Abstract

This article uses the example of a mobile mixed-media platform -a converted three-wheeled autorickshaw -in Sri Lanka in order to explore whether and how content-creation activities can enable marginalised communities to have a voice. It draws upon research into participatory content-creation activities conducted in 15 locations across India, Indonesia, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. The main findings are: the need to pay attention to context when thinking about what might be locally appropriate, relevant, and beneficial in terms of participatory content creation; the benefits that can be gained from creatively reaching out to and engaging marginalised groups and encouraging a diversity of voices; the usefulness of locally produced content for generating local debate around local issues; and the benefits of encouraging participation at all stages of content creation, so that content is locally meaningful and might lead to positive social change. IntroductionIn this article, we explore participatory content creation as a tool for communication for development. We focus on the e-Tuktuk initiative in Sri Lanka, which constitutes an unusual example of a mobile mixed-media platform that integrates a laptop, printer, telephone, loudspeakers, and data projector in a three-wheeled auto-rickshaw. The e-Tuktuk supports outreach activities by the Kothmale Community Multimedia Centre (CMC) and its surrounding communities. A range of content creation and distribution activities were researched between 2006 and 2008 at a number of sites as part of the Finding a Voice research project. Our observation of the e-Tuktuk and other participatory content-creation activities emphasises two factors of particular relevance for this article: first, how content-creation activities can enable marginalised communities to have a voice; and second, the need to pay attention to local contexts and related debates during such activities.These findings are drawn from the research undertaken during Finding a Voice at 15 sites across India, Indonesia, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. 1 The research team investigated how information and communications technology (ICT) and media centres might enable marginalised, disadvantaged communities to be heard in the public sphere. All the research sites offered a basic computer infrastructure and some Internet connectivity. Research sites included telecentres; community multimedia, radio, and video centres; and community library or learning centres.Every local context differed in terms of local mediascape, communicative ecology, culture, geography, history, and organisational structure. In each of the 15 research sites -including Kothmale CMC -a community member was trained and supported to conduct action -research on content-creation activities undertaken by local communities in collaboration with the research site.

¿Se puede definir qué es contenido desde la gestión de la información?

“…For many people and consumers, content is a terrible word that encompasses everything (Tacchi;Watkins;Keerthirathne, 2009). At the beginning, we only have the now omnipresent User Generated Content (UGC), but now the net is full of contents; the TV programming is full of content; the radio stations use the content to complete the transmission time, and all the newspapers and magazines are full of contents.…”

“When words become unclear”: unmasking ICT through visual methodologies in participatory ICT4D

“…Emancipatory principles espoused by ICT4D scholars are frequently based on notions of freedom, empowerment, transformation, agency, justice and voice (Buskens and Webb 2009;Tacchi et al 2009;Kleine 2010). However, ICTs are not normatively principled, and are often conceived as a means to change emancipatory conditions.…”

“…Some scholars have argued against technological determinant views that emphasize access and adoption of ICT as the primary avenue to development (Kleine 2010;Toyama 2015). As a response, a growing number of ICT4D scholars have focused on the use of participatory methods to enable transformation from the ground up (Buskens and Webb 2009;Tacchi et al 2009;Sadowsky 2012). Participatory ICT4D can have practical or emancipatory objectives, which attempt to empower and protect poor and marginalized populations.…”

Social Media and Community Radio Journalism in South Africa

“…Similarly, the increased prevalence of the mobile phone has changed the practice of newsgathering in a number of ways. The most notable has been the rise of citizen journalism, and the spread of news without being subject to gate-keeping or editorial processes (Tacchi, Watkins, and Keerthirathne 2009). In Africa, in particular, the penetration of mobile phones above fixed lines has reduced issues related to the digital divide, as more people also have access to the internet via their phones (Donner, Gitau, and Marsden 2011. This study adopted a qualitative approach, drawing on a purposive sample of three community radio stations in three of South Africa's largest urban centres: Cape Town, Johannesburg and Durban.…”