Abstract
The field of international and development communications entered a new chapter with the emergence of digital information and communication technologies. Information and communication technologies (leTs) have long been a source of study for theorists and practitioners of international development, starting with study of the telegraph, fixed phone, and radio. However with the advent of digital technologies, the size of devices has shrunken while simultaneously their power has expanded. This paper discusses one segment of the development communications paradigm, the role of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in relation to gender. One focus that demands greater scrutiny is gender. It's important to ask who is benefiting the most from using ICTs in development. For women in particular, using and accessing communications is more difficult than it is for men, a situation that authors of gender and technology studies have coined 'the Gender Digital Divide'.
Highlights
This paper investigates how information and communication technologies (ICTs) are used by farming and merchant women from Apac, a small rural district in northern Uganda
Ya'u argues that the Digital Divide is expanding not closing, and that tactics being employed to close the gaps amount to information imperialism (Ya'u 100) This criticism frames the Digital Divide as techno-centric, with technology as a central indicator of advanced societies and robust economies, and information and communication technologies as conduits of this progress
Yunusa Ya'u proposes that the Digital Divide is part of a larger social divide, which cannot be eliminated in isolation of this wider divide (Ya'u 118) This approach would treat ICTs as corollaries to the development process, as accessories to deeper social and economic shifts in society
Summary
Theory 2.2 Defining the Digital Divide 2.2 Defining the Gender Digital Divide 2.3 The Social Shaping of Technology 2.4 The Evolution of African Communications 2.6 Theories of Gender in Development 2.7 International Policy Implications 2.8 Uganda's Communication Environment
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