Segueways into Cyberspace: Multiple Geographies of the Digital Divide

Warf, Barney

doi:10.1068/b2691

Cited by 158 publications

(80 citation statements)

References 39 publications

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“…Most women were white (81%), married (63%), and had at least one child (89%), most commonly under 2 years of age (81%). Our sample thus replicates the uneven social and spatial distribution of the internet (Warf 2001) and the specificity of this sample of women should be borne in mind when reading the paper. Any conclusions must be limited to this specific group of (predominately) technically proficient white women from the UK and care must be take not to project their concerns as universal:…”

Section: The Virtual Research Processmentioning

confidence: 61%

Parenting gone wired: empowerment of new mothers on the internet?

Madge

O’Connor

2006

Social & Cultural Geography

233

222

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The extension of information and communication technologies is purported to provide great opportunities for women, with the potential for empowerment and feminist activism. This paper contributes to the debate about women and cyberspace through a focus on the role of the internet in the lives of a group of technologically proficient, socially advantaged white heterosexual new mothers. The internet played a central role in providing virtual social support and alternative information sources which increased these women's real sense of empowerment in the transition to motherhood. Simultaneously, however, very traditional stereotypes of mothering and gender roles persisted. A paradox is evident whereby the internet was both liberating and constraining: it played an important social role for some women while at the same time it encouraged restrictive and unequal gender stereotypes in this particular community of practice. An examination of new virtual parenting spaces therefore has a contribution to make in understanding changing parenting practices in the new millennium.Key words: Cyberspace, internet, mothers, empowerment.3 Women, the internet and empowermentRecent research suggests that the extension of ICT (information and communication technologies) into virtually every area of society provides great opportunities for women (Cherny and Weise 1996;Kennedy 2000). It is claimed that ICT have the potential for empowering women, enabling feminist activism and resistance to male power (Harcourt 1999;Sutton and Pollock 2000;Youngs 2001). Much has been made of the support, information exchange and political potential afforded to women through online community membership (Kramer and Kramarae 2000;Pudrovska and Ferree 2004;Vehvilainen 2001) and how ICT offer new opportunities for women to develop as entrepreneurs and innovators (Martin and Wright 2005). Others suggest cyberspatial technologies can enable a radical renegotiation of gender relations and challenge patriarchal hegemony (Haraway 1985;Jenson et al. 2003;Travers 2003).However, over zealous claims of the power of ICT for transforming women's lives are not without critics (Gajjala 2003;Gajjala and Mamidipudi 1999;Mitra 2001;Woolgar 2002). Studies have shown how online discourses and practices continue to reflect and reinforce the unequal gender power relations present in onsite institutions and social conventions (Hocks 1999;Josok et al. 2003) and sexist practices abound (Cunneen and Stubbs 2000). Moreover, while the gender gap with regard to internet use is narrowing, the majority of women on the internet still continue to be white academic professionals (Travers 2003). The majority of participants on bulletin boards and listserves are also still men and men also dominate participation volumes and agenda setting even in feminist and mixed-gender cyberspaces (Gurak 2001). Recent studies suggest that effective use of the internet to increase women's empowerment may be overshadowed by its commercialization (Shade 2003) and its role in affirming norms of femi...

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Section: The Virtual Research Processmentioning

confidence: 61%

Parenting gone wired: empowerment of new mothers on the internet?

Madge

O’Connor

2006

Social & Cultural Geography

233

222

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“…Users in all the cities are also all similar in respect to preferred time of day for posting activity-at least no statistically significant differences were found in the data (t-test at 0.05 level) However, cities differ greatly in the number of Twitter users. One may observe that there is a large gap between "Western" cities (Dublin, Edinburgh, Valencia) and their post-socialist counterparts (Krakow, Poznan), and that it may be the result of digital divide [40,41] or rather digital divides [42].…”

Section: Twitter Users In Different Spatial Contextsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spatial Characteristics of Twitter Users—Toward the Understanding of Geosocial Media Production

Rzeszewski¹,

Beluch²

2017

IJGI

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Social media is a rich source of spatial data but it has also many flaws and well-known limitations, especially in regard to representation and representativeness, since very little is known about the demographics of the user population. At the same time, the use of locational services, is in fact, dependent on those characteristics. We address this gap in knowledge by exploring divides between Twitter users, based on the spatial and temporal distribution of the content they produce. We chose five cities and data from 2015 to represent different socio-spatial contexts. Users were classified according to spatial and non-spatial measures: home range estimation; standard distance; nearest neighbor index, and; proposed localness index. There are distinct groups of geosocial media producers, which suggests that such datasets cannot be treated as uniform representations. We found a positive correlation between spatial behavior and posting activity. It is suggested that there are universal patterns of behavior that are conditioned by software services-the example of Foucauldian "technologies of self". They can also represent the dominance of the most prolific users over the whole data stream. Results are discussed in the context of the importance and role of user location in social media.

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“…For example, certain BDSM spaces are restricted due to economic and mobility issues; clubs where you have to pay, need the right dress code, must be above a certain age and need transport to get to the cities where they are often located. Cyberspace, on the other hand, allows almost anyone access to virtual BDSM communities; and as long as they have internet access they are free to enter and partake in this space (although clearly there are restrictions on this due to the unequal nature of internet access and the 'digital divide', see for example Warf 2001). Therefore, the autonomous and unstructured nature of virtual space can have potentially democratizing potential.…”

Section: Bdsm and Rights To Spacementioning

confidence: 99%

‘Extreme pornography’ and the contested spaces of virtual citizenship

Wilkinson

2011

Social & Cultural Geography

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Segueways into Cyberspace: Multiple Geographies of the Digital Divide

Cited by 158 publications

References 39 publications

Parenting gone wired: empowerment of new mothers on the internet?

Parenting gone wired: empowerment of new mothers on the internet?

Spatial Characteristics of Twitter Users—Toward the Understanding of Geosocial Media Production

‘Extreme pornography’ and the contested spaces of virtual citizenship

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