Technology of the Oppressed: Inequity and the Digital Mundane in Favelas of Brazil (The Information Society Series)

How Brazilian favela residents engage with and appropriate technologies, both to fight the oppression in their lives and to represent themselves in the world. Brazilian favelas are impoverished settlements usually located on hillsides or the outskirts of a city. In Technology of the Oppressed, David Nemer draws on extensive ethnographic fieldwork to provide a rich account of how favela residents engage with technology in community technology centers and in their everyday lives. Their stories reveal the structural violence of the information age. But they also show how those oppressed by technology don't just reject it, but consciously resist and appropriate it, and how their experiences with digital technologies enable them to navigate both digital and nondigital sources of oppression--and even, at times, to flourish. Nemer uses a decolonial and intersectional framework called Mundane Technology as an analytical tool to understand how digital technologies can simultaneously be sites of oppression and tools in the fight for freedom. Building on the work of the Brazilian educator and philosopher Paulo Freire, he shows how the favela residents appropriate everyday technologies--technological artifacts (cell phones, Facebook), operations (repair), and spaces (Telecenters and Lan Houses)--and use them to alleviate the oppression in their everyday lives. He also addresses the relationship of misinformation to radicalization and the rise of the new far right. Contrary to the simplistic techno-optimistic belief that technology will save the poor, even with access to technology these marginalized people face numerous sources of oppression, including technological biases, racism, classism, sexism, and censorship. Yet the spirit, love, community, resilience, and resistance of favela residents make possible their pursuit of freedom. Cover 1 Half title 2 Series title 3 Title 4 Copyright 5 Dedication 6 Contents 8 Acknowledgments 10 1 | Introduction 14 Favelas: The site of oppression 24 Territory Of Good: Gurigica, São Benedito, Itararé, And Bairro Da Penha 30 Digital Inequalities In Vitória 40 Positionality 42 2 | Repairing the Broken City 46 Repair As Mundane Technology 48 Repairing The Keyboard 50 The Internet Of The Oppressed 54 Mobile Mundane Technology 59 Mundane Technology: Resistance As Repair 63 3 | Community Technology Centers as Mundane Technologies 68 Rethinking The Role Of Telecenters In Communities 69 The Bottom Of The Sociotechnical Pyramid 79 LAN Houses: Can A Mundane Technology Be For-Profit? 84 LAN Houses As Safe Social Places 88 Bringing Homework To The LAN House 91 4 | Social Media for Survival 94 Social Media: Facebook And Youtube 95 The Liberation Of The Selfie 104 Breaking The Culture Of Silence Through Selfies 106 5 | Proud Faveladas: Resisting Gendered Oppression in Territory of Good 112 Paulo Freire, Pedagogy Of The Oppressed, And Feminist Criticism 114 CTCs As Spaces Of Gender Oppression 116 Telecenter As Safe But Limited Spaces For Women 120 Digital Technologies Amplifying Gender Oppression 124 6 | Geographies of Oppression: Uncovering Spaces of Silencing 134 The Social Movement Of The Oppressed 136 Social Boundaries On Social Network Sites 141 The Orkutization Of Shoppings 143 "Is It Because I'm Black?" 150 7 | Technology of the Oppressor 154 From June Journeys To The Rise Of Bolsonaro 155 From Facebook To Whatsapp 160 The Rise Of Right-Wing Extremism 163 The Human Infrastructure Of Fake News 165 From Misinformation To Radicalization 169 Why Bolsonaro And The New Right Hate Paulo Freire? 175 8 | Technology of Hope: Reliving Technology of the Oppressed 178 Appendix | Methodology 186 Fieldwork Phases 187 Data Collection 189 Primary Data 190 Participant Observation 190 Interviews 191 Audio Recording 192 Focus Groups 193 Field Notes 194 Secondary Data 194 Government Documents 196 Data Analysis 197 Triangulation 198 References 200 Index 224 "A look at the role technology (ICTs) plays in the lives of Brazilian favela dwellers, which the author explores through his own notion of "mundane technologies""-- Provided by publisher