Digital Inequalities in Latin America: The effects of Code and Infrastructure in Indigenous Access to the Internet

FAIN: DOI-293831-23

Virginia Tech (Blacksburg, VA 24061-2000)
Fernanda Ribeiro Rosa (Project Director: February 2023 to present)

Research and development of an open access monograph analyzing internet infrastructure and digital access in Latin American Indigenous communities. 

The goal of this ethnographic and single researcher led project is to examine and address the effects of digital inequalities embedded in code and infrastructure on people's access to the internet, with a focus on Indigenous people in Abya Yala [Latin America]. I aim to identify dangers and opportunities in the design of internet code and infrastructure in light of the agency of Latinx people and their lived experiences. While internet services are taken for granted in many contexts in the global North, in Indigenous territories in the global South cellphone networks and internet networks are frequently not available, having to be built from scratch by people in the communities. Parallel to that, this project will apply participatory design research to collectively prototype new forms of internet interconnection with the goal of leveraging Indigenous control over their digital data, also known as Indigenous digital sovereignty.