[DDN] Drop Digital (in Digital Inclusion)

[Michael Maranda]

Feedback welcome:
Drop Digital (in Digital Inclusion and just about everywhere
else)<http://wrythings.net/2007/04/21/drop-digital-in-digital-inclusion-and-just-about-everywhere-else/>
http://wrythings.net/2007/04/21/drop-digital-in-digital-inclusion-and-just-about-everywhere-else/

*What is Digital Literacy without deep dedication to cultivating Literacy
and Judgment? What is Digital Citizenship without ongoing effort to promote
a robust Civic Life? What is Digital Inclusion without a true effort and
policy of Inclusion? What's the Expansion in Digital Expansion? Digital
Government? Digital Community? Digital Neighborhoods? The Digerati?  Don't
get me started on Digital Futures and Opportunities… *

Digital isn't the point, whatever the form: *e-this, i-that*. We single out
recent technologies with magical promise by such signals as they arrive in
successive waves. Technology that has permeated society is barely recognized
as technology by most of us: *television, telephone, tricycles, fire and
other dangerous things*. We know we need a mechanic when something goes
wrong (if we aren't technically inclined), but with the newer technologies
most of society remains mystified (including practitioners).

*We can no longer participate in the perpetuation of that mystification
through repetition and variation on the incantations. *We can't proclaim the
benefits of indiscriminate innovations and extensions in and of the virtual
world dreaming that that is enough and will necessarily and sufficiently
transform our society.

Digital Inclusion is the term of art that really broke the spell for me.
"What art?" you may ask… the selling of networks and network consulting and
ancillary services and technologies, whether wireless, WiMAX-WiFi or other
broadbands and slices of spectrum.  If we're
Keynesians<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keynesian_economics>after all,
then let's just say so. If not, or if we're moderated Keynesians,
we had better be more critical of our technology planning and spending. (And
by odd coincidence, promoting public discourse on media and technology is
just the prescription for an inclusive, civic minded, digital and media
literate citizenry ready to take up tools to their own purposes and to make
investments toward common purposes.)

We need to become serious about social justice questions, embrace them as
the core of our movement.  We need to become serious about issues that
demand a holistic view, we need to treat our work in the context of the
whole of lives of individuals, families and communities.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not anti-digital. To be clear: *the digital divide
has not gone away* but/and deserves our attention in so far as it is a
divide, not because it is digital.

I favor a positive view on the way forward as long as it doesn't deny where
we are and what it will take.  I see great potential in these technologies
and in the expansion of communication capacity. I just want the digital in
context and in service to the world we want and the dialogue that gets us
headed there, and I want our individual and collective investments to
consciously shape the character of our networks and our society. We can't
take these outcomes for granted. The sales pitch is always promising.

So, with each Digitized phrase, we must ask: *how does it stand on its
own?*Can we forget the technical innovation of the moment, live
without the
distraction and get serious about living together?

In our work promoting *Digital Excellence*, we're more than happy to *Drop
the Digital*, we *emphasize the Excellence*. That's what we want from
students, citizens, families, communities, companies, politics, education
and the economy.

If these digital prefix strategies are work-arounds (and no just new and
improved sales pitches) for some of us… our attempt at concealing
revolutionary socially transforming activity, it's time for a reality check.
We have to become clear about our goals. If it's a dance of revolutionary
work concealed behind revolutionary technologies and obstructed by
reactionary policies and practices, make sure it is we who call the tune
with the language we choose. Let's choose what we want and aspire to, not
settle upon the limited scraps we may or may not get.


-- Michael Maranda
---------------------------------------------------------------
Executive Director, CTCNet Chicago Chapter
Co-Founder, Chicago Digital Access Alliance
Co-Chair, Illinois Community Technology Coalition
President, Association For Community Networking

Support the efforts of the Chicago Digital Access Alliance:
http://www.digitalaccessalliance.org