Questo lavoro è un tentativo di precisare dimensioni e condizioni del digital divide, a partire dalla scelta di una specifica accezione del termine, che lo inserisce nella più ampia e articolata problematica della disuguaglianza sociale. Le Information and Communication Technologies sollevano il problema del significato attuale della cittadinanza e dell’inclusione sociale, che nei contesti socialmente ed economicamente più arretrati si traducono in lotta alla povertà, chiamando in causa la complessa relazione tra tecnologia e sviluppo umano. L’accesso significativo alle tecnologie corrisponde all’applicazione di capacità intellettuale e comprende alcuni elementi di fondamentale importanza, come la gestione e rielaborazione dell’informazione, la crescita di competenze utili a sfruttare i vantaggi della tecnologia. La penetrazione delle tecnologie nella società contemporanea pone alcune sfide al rinnovamento della scuola e rende indispensabile valutare che tipo di competenze sono necessarie, come poterle sviluppare e quali metodologie adottare nella didattica, affinché le nuove generazioni crescano con la capacità di partecipare attivamente al cambiamento della società. A tale scopo, il presente contributo propone una ricerca sul campo che mette a confronto l’implementazione del progetto One Laptop Per Child in due realtà agli antipodi dell’indice di sviluppo umano – l’Italia e l’Etiopia – con un’attenzione specifica al potenziale sviluppo di “competenze digitali” e all’evoluzione della metodologia di insegnamento, elementi che in linea teorica corrispondono ai primi ingredienti di una incentivazione dell’inclusione sociale. La ricerca è di tipo qualitativo, utilizza gli strumenti del focus group, dell’intervista, del questionario e dell’osservazione partecipante, prendendo in esame 13 classi e 18 insegnanti/coordinatori per ciascun campo. I risultati più importanti mostrano che una azione efficace in termini di inclusione digitale è condizionata da una organizzazione educativa programmatica, promozione di iniziative con un valore locale, interventi di formazione e di capacity building che non sconvolgano sistemi socio-culturali consolidati, ma che incidano sulla motivazione dei destinatari valorizzando il capitale umano e sociale. È questo che intendiamo con innovazione della scuola. / The term digital divide echoes a kind of technological determinism. It has often suggested that inequalities depend on physical access to Information and Communication Technologies and that simply achieving such access would solve problems of social exclusion. In this work the original literal sense of “access” will be replaced by a set of more concrete operational definitions. It extends the model of a gap between haves and have-nots to a concept of a broader digital inequality, depending on the so-called “digital skills”. It calls attention to information as a primary good in the contemporary society, to be considered as the main goal to achieve through a meaningful use of ICT. The emphasis is therefore placed on education, where the digital literacy can provide the ability to access, manage, integrate, evaluate, and create information. Social opportunities of digital technology are underlined both in developed and developing countries. We argue in fact that, whenever integrated in school subjects, ICT might become a great opportunity to innovate learning and teaching, to accomplish a renovated citizenship in the Nord of the world and help to achieve better standards of development in the South. A comparative analysis of two opposite contexts investigate understandings of the digital inclusion by exploring best practices for sustainable projects. The field research focuses on the One Laptop Per Child worldwide project, comparing the use of the same technological tool in primary schools of Italy and Ethiopia. The data presented are based on observations, focus group and interviews with a sample of 13 classes and 18 teachers/coordinators for each field, conducted during the school year 2008-2009. Results indicate that often children capabilities are complementary to teachers’ ones, that ICT provide the flexibility to meet diverse learners’ needs, that training is essential to motivate and empower teachers to use ICT and revise traditional didactics, that social capital has a central role in the school. The concept of capacity building emerges from these concepts and suggests pathways to improve skills access in the long run and adapt school curricula to collaborative environments. This is what the present study calls innovation.

The refugee crisis is currently a major world event. However, not much is known about the technology adoption and digital skills of those fleeing these conflicts and seeking asylum in foreign countries. To study this, a qualitative study was conducted in Umeå, Sweden. Data was collected through interviews, written responses and observations. The results show that refugees and asylum seekers have positive attitude towards digital technology adoption. However, they perceived digital technology primarily as tools to fulfil their recreational needs. A strategic use of technology for improving productivity was not evident. While formal internet skills were generally common among every user, most interviewees were not able to carry out more complex tasks, such as finding facts online, as they found it particularly challenging to select appropriate search systems and to construct meaningful queries. This research wants to contribute to the literature in IT and social inclusion. The findings reported here suggest that digital divide can be conceptualized as digital illiteracy because of lacking awareness over data management and information processing capabilities. Moreover, identifying the digital practices of these minority groups could be extremely meaningful for the digital inclusion strategy efforts of Sweden and for a better design of public services.

Este estudo teve como objetivo entender os modos de uso de computadores por diferentes membros das camadas sociais médias na cidade de São Paulo, em um momento histórico de aumento do consumo das classes menos privilegiadas. Levando-se em conta a teoria dos campos de Bourdieu, a hipótese central deste estudo é a de que os diferentes modos de uso dos computadores são originados a partir da distribuição desigual dos capitais econômico e cultural entre membros dos diferentes grupos sociais pesquisados. Através da etnografia dos usos, foi possível observar e comparar diversos modos de uso do computador e da internet que colaboram com a hipótese central. Esta pesquisa apresenta as barreiras que a desigualdade digital impõe às classes menos privilegiadas assim como também apresenta algumas estratégias de superação dessas barreiras que essas classes adotam. / This research aimed to understand the different ways in which members of the middle classes in Sao Paulo City have been using computers. The timing of this study is particularly special as it took place in a period when the consumption power of the unprivileged classes was gaining momentum. Based on the Bourdieus fields theory, the main hyphotesis of this dissertation is that the different ways in which computers have been used stem from the unequal distribution of both economic and cultural types of capital among the members of the social groups analyzed. Having the ethnography of use as the main approach for the data collection procedures, it was possible to identify and compare different ways to use computers and the internet that corroborate the main hyphotesis. This study features the barriers that the digital inequality imposes to the unprivileged classes and the strategies those classes use to overcome such barriers.

Este estudo teve como objetivo entender os modos de uso de computadores por diferentes membros das camadas sociais médias na cidade de São Paulo, em um momento histórico de aumento do consumo das classes menos privilegiadas. Levando-se em conta a teoria dos campos de Bourdieu, a hipótese central deste estudo é a de que os diferentes modos de uso dos computadores são originados a partir da distribuição desigual dos capitais econômico e cultural entre membros dos diferentes grupos sociais pesquisados. Através da etnografia dos usos, foi possível observar e comparar diversos modos de uso do computador e da internet que colaboram com a hipótese central. Esta pesquisa apresenta as barreiras que a desigualdade digital impõe às classes menos privilegiadas assim como também apresenta algumas estratégias de superação dessas barreiras que essas classes adotam. / This research aimed to understand the different ways in which members of the middle classes in Sao Paulo City have been using computers. The timing of this study is particularly special as it took place in a period when the consumption power of the unprivileged classes was gaining momentum. Based on the Bourdieus fields theory, the main hyphotesis of this dissertation is that the different ways in which computers have been used stem from the unequal distribution of both economic and cultural types of capital among the members of the social groups analyzed. Having the ethnography of use as the main approach for the data collection procedures, it was possible to identify and compare different ways to use computers and the internet that corroborate the main hyphotesis. This study features the barriers that the digital inequality imposes to the unprivileged classes and the strategies those classes use to overcome such barriers.

Avhandlingen handlar om digital (o)jämlikhet. Begreppet (o)jämlikhet utgår från en sammanskrivning av jämlikhet och ojämlikhet men uttalas som det sistnämnda. Problematiken kring digital (o)jämlikhet belyses i avhandlingen i form av fyra olika delstudier samt en kappa. Avhandlingens övergripande syfte är att öka kunskapen om digital (o)jämlikhet genom att empiriskt kartlägga och teoretiskt tolka användning av informations- och kommunikationsteknik (IKT) bland barn och unga vuxna. Ett speciellt fokus läggs vid skolans roll i sammanhanget då den svenska skolan har i sitt uppdrag att ge alla elever en likvärdig utbildning. Skolan ska även kompensera för elevers olika förutsättningar. Genom en enkätstudie och en intervjustudie analyseras grundskole- och gymnasielevers användning av och tillgång till IKT i skolan och i hemmen. Elevernas digitala kompetens i allmänhet och deras kompetens i informationssökning i synnerhet, analyseras också för att skapa en bild av den digitala (o)jämlikheten. I dessa analyser studeras även skolans bidrag till elevers digitala kompetens och digitala jämlikhet. Resultaten av dessa analyser presenteras i två delstudier. För att få en djupare förståelse för fenomenet digital (o)jämlikhet ur ett internationellt perspektiv utgör en av delstudierna en systematisk forskningsöversikt. Ytterligare ett sätt att fördjupa kunskapen om digital (o)jämlikhet i avhandlingen är att studera fenomenet utifrån en utbildningssociologisk teori vilket genomförs i den sista delstudien. Inom ramen för det övergripande syftet prövas, och granskas kritiskt, därför Selwyns begrepp tekniskt kapital. Tekniskt kapital har sin grund i Bourdieus kapitalbegrepp och syftar därmed på tillgång till och användning av IKT som tillskrivs ett värde. Resultaten visar att det finns en digital ojämlikhet bland de unga som ingår i studien, trots den till synes höga tillgången till IKT. Avhandlingen visar även att skolan inte klarar sitt uppdrag då eleverna inte får en likvärdig utbildning samt att skolans uppdrag avseende elevers digitala kompetens är oklart. Vidare visar resultatet att begreppet teknisk kapital ger möjlighet till en djupare förståelse av digital (o)jämlikhet. Samtidigt ges förslag på hur begreppet tekniskt kapital kan förfinas ytterligare. / This doctoral thesis focusses on digital (in)equality; a new concept construed by combining the notions equality and inequality. The concept will for the purpose of this thesis be written as (in)equality constituting a new domain of study as explored in four separate studies together comprising this thesis. The general aim of the thesis is to increase the knowledge base of digital (in)equality by empirically charting and theoretically interpreting the use of in-formation and communication technology (ICT) by children and adults alike. A specific focus is how ICT is utilised in schools since the Swedish school system is commissioned by law to provide equal education for all. Compulsory school pupils' use and access to ICT in schools as well as at home was investigated both by a survey study and an interview study. In addition, pupils' general digital competence as well as their skills in searching information were studied in order to gain insight into digital (in)equality. The Swedish school system and its role in conveying such competence was a particular concern. Results are presented in two of the four articles constituting this doctoral thesis. To gain a wider understanding of the ICT (in)equality phenomenon an international outlook was incorporated into thesis in the form of a systematic literature review. This literature review is presented in the third article of the thesis. The fourth and final study widens the scope even further by analysing the phenomenon in the light of sociological theory. The general aim of the thesis was scrutinised and critically analysed using Nathan Selwyn's construct of Technology Capital, which in turn is derived from Pierre Bourdieu's notion of cultural capital. Technology capital defines both access to and the use of ICT, which of course also implies that ICT indeed has cultural value. The results of this sociological analysis showed that there does indeed exist a digital inequality amongst the younger generation in Sweden in spite of having easy access to the technology. It is demonstrated that the Swedish school system actually fails its commission. In respect to the use of and access to ICT the school system is not equal and pupils do not receive equal education. Furthermore, the analysis suggested that the task given to the school system is unclear and that the use of a concept such as technological capital is a promising one in gaining further insights into the phenomenon of digital (in)equality. In conclusion, suggestions are also made how the notion of technology capital could be further developed made more precise.

<div> <p>New information and communication technologies (ICTs), such as cell phones, email, and social media, have been transforming how social movements recruit, organize, participate in collective action, and experience repression. Yet, limited scholarship has addressed the uses of these technologies by social movements organizing within American prisons. Using a dialectical interpretive approach, I examine how a coalition of prisoners’ rights organizations uses ICTs to plan and participate in collective resistance across prison walls. The coalition, referred to here as the New Prisoners’ Rights Coalition (NPRC), organizes against low and no-wage prison labor, unhealthy and unsafe prison conditions, and inhumane prisoner treatment. The NPRC has a multi-platform public digital presence and mobilizes prisoner activists and free activists. Through narrative description, I summarize the ways NPRC activists use ICTs from December 2013 through September 2016, noting changes in ICT use over time and in response to movement repression. I find that new ICTs offer innovative ways for NPRC activists to record and document their environments, communicate privately, and communicate publicly. ICTs, however, do not remove all barriers to activism or ensure that activists’ concerns are resolved or even taken seriously. NPRC activists struggle to overcome stigma and mischaracterization online. They face physical repression, interpersonal hostilities, institutional sanctions, economic repression, legal sanctions, interpretive repression, surveillance, and monitoring. In different circumstances, the NPRC responds to repression by increasing ICT use, decreasing ICT use, going dark, migrating from one online platform to another, and shifting digital responsibilities from prisoner activists to free activists. I explain how, most of the time, the digital unreachability of the prison environment makes it difficult for NPRC activists to substantiate their claims of mistreatment, abuse, and injustice. Moreover, I consider how current prison technology policies may be inadvertently pushing NPRC activists into difficult-to-monitor online spaces and exacerbating safety concerns of corrections workers.</p></div>

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-26T18:17:53Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Francisco de Assis Carvalho Arten.pdf: 5378555 bytes, checksum: add31412bfad3b724a5276d089582794 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009-05-08 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / This research investigates the Legislative and Executive powers in the use of information technologies, particularly the Internet, evaluating the quality of official portals, with regard to facility of use, government information, services, public control, participation and interactivity. The main purpose of empirical research is proving that, despite all the talk of politicians who bow to public communication online for closer and interactivity with citizens, this does not happen in practice. The Internet user is treated as a taxpayer and not as a citizen. The empirical research studied the public portal of the Federal Government, the Chamber of Deputies, the Government of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro and the Legislative Assemblies. However, the empirical analysis is a specific moment in the research, which in fact occurs as demand tematize social participation, which is based on models of democracy: liberal, participatory and deliberative; it will be examinated the ways in which these models deal the public participation in things of the state. The epistemological proposal of this work aims to contribute to the development of critical studies on communication, specifically online communication. It examines the wrong use of the Internet that are turning online communication in a new avatar of the metamorphosis of the system of inequality and exclusion from the study of some aspects of the revolution made of information technology in various regions of the world. It examines also the effects of computerization and virtualization generalized processes and social relations, individuals, businesses, institutions and states, in short, a process of ciberacultureness widespread, a condition that tends to aggravate the existing pattern of social injustice, producing more inequality and exclusion an area that drew anarchic and democratic. The stratifications are already happens in these fields, establishing a new hierarchy: perverse and oppressive. It points out as the main responsible for this new social order to " estrutural recycle", the very ciberdemocracy global capitalism, which requires of each one, states or individuals, the constant recycling and cognitive growth, in a pace increasingly accelerated. This situation has caused peculiar feelings : confusion, disorientation and perplexity. This new form of colonialism and exclusion is unprecedented in actuality, in the viewing of authors such as Boaventura de Souza, Eugênio Trivinho and Zygmunt Bauman, main theoretic used in this analysis / Esta pesquisa investiga a competência dos Poderes Legislativo e Executivo no uso das tecnologias de informação, particularmente da Internet, avaliando a qualidade dos portais oficiais, com relação a navegabilidade, informações governamentais, serviços, controle público, participação e interatividade. A principal finalidade da pesquisa empírica é provar que, apesar da fala dos agentes políticos que reverenciam a comunicação pública on line para maior proximidade e interatividade com os cidadãos, isso não ocorre na prática. O internauta é tratado como um contribuinte e não como cidadão. A pesquisa empírica estudou os portais públicos do Governo Federal, da Câmara dos Deputados, dos Governos de São Paulo e Rio de Janeiro e respectivas Assembléias Legislativas, procurando tematizar como se dá a participação social, que é baseada nos modelos de democracia: liberal, participativo e deliberativo; examina-se a maneira pela qual estes modelos tratam a participação pública nas coisas do Estado. A proposta epistemológica deste trabalho busca contribuir para o desenvolvimento de estudos críticos sobre comunicação on line. Para tanto, analisam-se desvirtuamentos do uso da Internet que vêm tornando a comunicação on line em avatar de uma nova metamorfose do sistema de desigualdade e do sistema de exclusão, a partir dos estudos de alguns aspectos de como se deu a revolução da tecnologia da informação em diversas regiões do mundo. Tematizam-se ainda os efeitos da informatização e virtualização generalizadas dos processos e relações sociais, atingindo indivíduos, empresas, instituições e Estados, caracterizando um processo de ciberaculturação generalizada, condição que tende a agravar o padrão de injustiça social vigente, produzindo mais desigualdade e exclusão num espaço que se desenhava anárquico e democrático. As estratificações já ocorrem neste espaço, estabelecendo uma nova hierarquia, perversa e sufocante. Aponta-se como principal responsável por esta nova ordem social a reciclagem estrutural , própria do capitalismo ciberdromocrático global, que exige de cada um, Estados ou indivíduos, o constante reciclar cognitivo e econômico, num ritmo cada vez mais acelerado. Essa situação tem provocado sentimentos peculiares: de confusão, desorientação e perplexidade. Uma nova forma de colonialismo e de exclusão sem precedentes ocorre na atualidade, na visão de autores como Boaventura de Souza Santos, Eugênio Trivinho e Zygmunt Bauman, principais teóricos utilizados nesta análise