Re: [GKD] Geographical Information Systems and the Developing World
A couple of interesting sites for info on GIS and development: 1. Integrated Approaches to Participatory Development (IAPAD)'s Participatory Avenues site at http://www.iapad.org/ - ... aims at sharing significant progress in visualizing people's spatial knowledge (cognitive maps) and in providing communities added stake in tailoring and owning conservation and development initiatives. This takes into account other techniques as well as GIS. The IAPAD site and contents have been evolving since I last visited a couple of years ago and is well worth the visit. (Thanks to Giacomo Rambaldi of CTA http://www.cta.int for reminding me of this - CTA by the way has an electronic journal, ICT UpDate, that may also be of interest - the latest issue on livestock [#15 for Jan. 04] has an article on use of GPS GIS with herders in Senegal, including use of Pulaar for map references.). 2. Urban and Regional Information Systems Association site at http://www.urisa.org/ Among other things, URISA has sponsored several PPGIS conferences (public participatory GIS). And they are helpful with info too. Don Osborn Bisharat.net ***GKD is solely supported by EDC, a Non-Profit Organization*** To post a message, send it to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd Archives of previous GKD messages can be found at: http://www.edc.org/GLG/gkd/
Re: [GKD-DOTCOM] What's on the Horizon?
I'd like to add a set of technologies involving language to the list before this thread is entirely cold: translators, text-to-speech (TTS), and speech-to-text (STT). In societies of the global South that are multilingual, and have strong oral traditions and low literacy rates, these technologies might be used in some interesting ways. For instance, computer translators could be used to help speed up translation of educational materials for publication. TTS could turn any text web page into something oral (even if aethetically not as pleasing as the human voice). STT could be used to assist in transcribing oral histories etc., and I wonder about the possibility of creating synchronized audio-text files with this technology which would facilitate searching. All three of these language transformative technologies exist and are being refined. Aside from time and money to make them work for different needs settings, they do depend on staying with a standard orthography for each language - an area where ICT and language policies need to be coordinated. While computer translators are kind of a gimmick to many in the North and a tool used in a limited (?) way by some businesses, and TTS and STT are, so far as I'm aware, thought of mainly as a way to assist people with disabilities, I think all three could have a tremendous long term impact in the multilingual South. Don Osborn Bisharat.net This DOT-COM Discussion is funded by the dot-ORG USAID Cooperative Agreement, and hosted by GKD. http://www.dot-com-alliance.org provides more information. To post a message, send it to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd For the GKD database, with past messages: http://www.GKDknowledge.org
Re: [GKD-DOTCOM] Using Intermediaries to Facilitate Communication
Pat Hall's questions for Pam McLean open up a whole range of issues regarding the intersection of sociolinguistics, and language and education policies with ICT policy that are pertinent to the discussion but probably need to be explored in depth elsewhere. I'll let Pam reply on the particular case of Yoruba with which she is more familar than I, but the general situation in African educational systems has been to favor the official languages inherited from colonization even though these are no one's maternal languages. Many countries where English is used have policies for some African language instruction at lower grades shifting to English later, though I've heard that application is uneven at best, while the general rule where French is the official language has long been a French-only (from day one) approach. Although a few people manage to excel under (or despite?) these type of systems, many others end up with limited skills in their maternal language (e.g., can't write it, don't have as wide a range of expression as they might) and limited skills in the official language (in which, at least in the typical Francophone model, learning is by rote). One wonders if this isn't an underappreciated dimension to the development struggles of the continent: the means haven't been there or allocated to developing and applying effective bilingual education, hence the majority of school leavers don't end up with an optimal set of language skills and all that would go with that. On the ICT side, one of the reasons for pushing for multilingual capacities on computer systems and African language content on Internet for the continent, is to open up the possibility for use of and expression in - and indeed learning of/in - the mother tongues and vehicular languages, whatever does or doesn't happen in the educational systems (regarding the latter, there are some hopeful developments in some places like in Mali). But because even literate people may not be multiliterate, and also because of the importance of oral tradition, innovation - regarding audio especially, as many of us are saying - would seem to be an essential part of the strategy ... As well as a way to avoid having someone translate Yoruba to English to write in a letter/e-mail and perhaps someone else translate English to Yoruba on the receiving end. Don Osborn Bisharat.net This DOT-COM Discussion is funded by the dot-ORG USAID Cooperative Agreement, and hosted by GKD. http://www.dot-com-alliance.org provides more information. To post a message, send it to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd For the GKD database, with past messages: http://www.GKDknowledge.org
Re: [GKD-DOTCOM] How Much Bandwidth is Necessary?
Njideka, This is an interesting initiative and the notion of scanning handwritten letters is a nice innovation as it permits a more direct communication of content. It's not clear from your third point, 3) The youth agents will have a customized form they will use to document the message(s). .. if this means translating or transcribing. One goal I think would be to reduce or eliminate the need for translation (with the inevitable interpretation and transformation of content, however benign the intent). Another thing to keep in mind is that the language of the letters might also be by the sender's choice - not just limited in the case people haven't learned other languages - and indeed some people may wish to use more than one language in a single communication. Is it possible that the young people involved are or could be trained in transcribing the local languages of the area (presumably mainly Igbo, but others as well)? This brings up also the degree to which the computer center is able to facilitate composing of text (e-mail in this case) in languages other than English. I.e., if one wanted to send a letter in Igbo or another Nigerian language, how easy is that (or is scanning the best option they have?). Of course the receiving end has related issues (re utf-8 mail). Another possibility that would be interesting but would require a small investment (relative to the computer cost, but not to local income or perhaps your project budget), would be to find a way to use audio e-mail. There exists good software for this but it is not terribly popular in the Northern countries - might it be interesting to users whose cultures have stronger oral traditions? To make this work one would probably have to use something like a minidisk recorder to record messages in the villages to upload and send as e-mail attachments (.wav, .mp3). Altogether, the extent to which the young people's intermediary roles are for transmission of content without the need for transformation means less work for them and increased directness of the communication they are facilitating. As one might say in one of the languages of SE Nigeria: Jisie ike! Don Osborn Bisharat.net Njideka Ugwuegbu [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I am a Digital Vision Fellow at Stanford and the focus of my work is to develop a rural messaging service that will give villagers a voice to the world. What I am proposing is a youth-led process to help villagers that don't use computers or the Internet, but want to communicate with their loved ones outside the village (in other towns or even in the Diaspora). The process will begin at the Owerri Digital Village, a community technology and learning center in eastern Nigeria. ..snip... What the program hopes to achieve is the promotion and empowerment of marginalized youth through ICT skills training for creation of socially responsible citizens, access to computers and most of all the satisfaction of doing something that the community places a significant value on. This DOT-COM Discussion is funded by the dot-ORG USAID Cooperative Agreement, and hosted by GKD. http://www.dot-com-alliance.org provides more information. To post a message, send it to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd For the GKD database, with past messages: http://www.GKDknowledge.org
Re: [GKD-DOTCOM] The Importance of Speech
Some interesting thoughts here. A couple of months ago the NY Times had a feature on voice e-mail (v-mail) entitled The Talking E-Mail Blues. Search their site http://www.nytimes.com or read part of it at http://lists.kabissa.org/lists/archives/public/a12n-forum/msg00034.html with add'l comment re v-mail in the African context. The various potential audio + image + text uses of ICT are really only beginning to be explored. Perhaps societies with stronger oral traditions will find different combinations than those of us from the North would come up with... Audio and text don't have to be an either/or choice in some applications. Same language subtitling (SLS; rather like closed captioning) could be added to video + audio web presentations, perhaps as an option to be activated by a toggle key or click. SLS is used some in film TV in India as a literacy tool. I've heard suggestions of using it with music videos of African artists for similar uses, or use by students studying those languages. Such could be done via the web also. Don Osborn Bisharat.net Pat Hall [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: This discussion line has taken a really interesting turn, moving towards the use of speech. Even though literacy rates are rising, writing and using keyboards and other input devices is still a barrier for maybe half the worlds population. I am not sure that Cliff had this in mind, but Vickram has a wonderful idea here for voice e-mail, not that difficult stuff of phoning somebody and leaving a 'voice-mail' message if they are not there, but the real thing, voice messages 'posted' through the Net. But how about going further than this, and having voice only web-sites, with technology available to help people who cannot read and write to compose their own websites and through that share their knowledge with others? This DOT-COM Discussion is funded by the dot-ORG USAID Cooperative Agreement, and hosted by GKD. http://www.dot-com-alliance.org provides more information. To post a message, send it to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd For the GKD database, with past messages: http://www.GKDknowledge.org
[GKD-DOTCOM] Using Intermediaries to Facilitate Communication
Regarding the messages of Herman Wasserman and Cliff Missen, this is interesting but there is a danger I think in any strategy that seeks to rely on intermediaries. Cliff uses the word griot but in fact it may be more like marabout or priest (although these latter analogies are not perfect either) - a class of more educated people to mediate between common folk and the knowledge (technology), and by extension do the interpreting for them. Cliff is right to point out the use of notes and more knowledgeable or mobile intermediaries in communications. Long before internet, of course, there were some people who would help their illiterate neighbors to write letters. But such is no one's ideal, just something that works. Likewise for e-mail etc. Access is the issue and that has 2 parts in the case of computers intenet: the physical aspect (are you in proximity and can you afford to log on?) and the meaningful or soft aspect (if you had physical access and found yourself seated in front of a connected computer, would anything make sense?). The latter overlaps with user skills of course (basic literacy again, and now computer literacy) but depends also on the user interface, design of software, content, and language. The fact is that even, say, the old lady who grilled kebabs and fried sliced yams in front of the Binnta cybercafé in Bamako - and most of the passers by who would sit and eat on the corner there - would have to send something through an intermediary not because of distance (assuming for a moment that access fee inside was not a problem) but because the technology would not facilitate their use of their first language, written, or provide for mailing an audio message (for the lady and others among them who were not literate). I'm not at all comfortable with the notion of person-to-person or web-to-individual(s) information being mediated where it's not absolutely necessary, and then only as a temporary strategy and with as few transformations as possible - i.e., if as a service, more like a postal relay (can what the sender says be recorded and transmitted exactly as such through the media to the receiver?) than like the traditional letter writer in much of Africa who hears in one language, translates into another, and writes a letter that may have to be back-translated on the other end. Maybe handhelds will help in this regard. On another level some internet for development efforts have relied on people who surf and translate (e.g., in connection with a local community radio) - in effect another kind of intermediary. This is certainly helpful, but if the vision does not extend to developing at least some content that bypasses the need for such intermediation (and interpretation), then it risks institutionalizing a relationship that by its nature keeps some people marginalized. Don Osborn Bisharat.net This DOT-COM Discussion is funded by the dot-ORG USAID Cooperative Agreement, and hosted by GKD. http://www.dot-com-alliance.org provides more information. To post a message, send it to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd For the GKD database, with past messages: http://www.GKDknowledge.org
Re: [GKD-DOTCOM] Bringing Connectivity to Under-Served Communities
Dear GKD Members, Pertinent to our current discussion is the following article, forwarded from the Togo-L list, which delineates the problems as seen from an African perspective. Don Osborn ** Africa Takes On the Digital Divide Africa Recovery (New York) ANALYSIS October 23, 2003 By Gumisai Mutume New York New information technologies change the lives of those in reach Across Africa, new information technologies are rapidly changing the lives of a small but growing number of people. In rural Togo a farmer gets real-time information on market prices in the capital, Lomé, through a cellular phone. In Accra, Ghana, entrepreneurs who in the past were not able to get a dial tone on their land-line telephones can now connect immediately using Internet telephony, technology that allows phone calls to be made through the Internet. And in Niger, the Bankilare Community Information Centre downloads audio programmes from the African Learning Channel and rebroadcasts them on local radio. So far, these are some of the few, fortunate Africans. For most people even making a telephone call is still a remote possibility in an era when most of the world is now communicating almost instantly across cities, regions and the globe using wireless and satellite technologies to send high-speed electronic messages. Africa has the fewest telephone lines, radios, television sets, computers and Internet users of any part of the world. These tools, used to package and transmit information and knowledge, are broadly referred to as information and communications technologies (ICTs). The gap between those with access to ICTs and those without is generally referred to as the digital divide. It is most extreme in Africa, where in 2001, out of 800 million people, only 1 in 4 had a radio, 1 in 13 a television set, 1 in 40 a telephone and 1 out of 130 a computer. The divide widens in Africa's countryside, where a lack of roads, telephone lines and electricity separates the rural majority from their urban counterparts. Bridging the digital divide The digital gap brings with it a danger of isolating certain peoples, those in Africa in particular, says Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade. It is paradoxical and ironic that the continent which invented writing . . [is] excluded from universal knowledge. In December, President Wade will be popularizing his digital solidarity programme at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) to be held in Geneva, Switzerland. Under the programme, technologically advanced nations would commit to assisting poorer ones. A country can express solidarity, for example, by signing onto a digital charter committing itself to a specified, quantified action for the benefit of countries where the rate [of Internet access] is lower than a given level, explains President Wade. A digital solidarity fund should be set up to pay for ICT projects in poor countries, he says, financed by raising large amounts of money collected painlessly because the contributions are so small. Levies of one US cent could be charged on every international call or one dollar on the purchase of each personal computer or software package. African leaders looking for ways to bridge the digital divide between their region and the rest of the world see the WSIS as an opportunity to obtain international commitments to extend information and communications technologies to the majority of their people. The summit is expected to adopt a plan of action to close the gap between the haves and have nots of information technology. At its summit in July, the African Union passed a resolution stressing the importance of the information society on economic, socio-political and cultural development and the strategic objectives of developing countries. The second part of WSIS will be held from 16-18 November 2005, in Tunisia, which first proposed holding the meeting to promote the use of ICTs to overcome poverty and achieve the Millennium Development Goals agreed to by world leaders in 2000. Extending the arm of technology Low bandwidth (the amount of data transmitted through a communications line) and expensive call charges characterize most of Africa's telecommunications facilities. An analysis of Internet use can give a representative picture of the ICT situation in Africa, says Mr. Mike Jensen, an independent ICT consultant based in South Africa, since connecting to the Internet involves different individual ICT components such as computers, telephones and satellites. By mid 2002, 1.7 million Africans had dial-up Internet services, 1.2 million of them in South Africa and North Africa alone. Assuming that three-to-five people use each Internet-connected computer, notes Mr. Jensen, it is possible that 5-8 million Africans have access to the Internet. In sub-Saharan Africa (excluding South Africa), there are some 1.5-2.5 million users - one in every 250-400 people, compared to 1 in 15 people in the rest
