Copying to the CARDICIS list because this is an interesting thing for that list as well.
Sandra Andrews wrote: >Good point about sharing. Similarly, I have been hearing from an elder that, >in the case of a cultural group that I am working with in Mexico, they'd >also want to start with just a few laptops. Giving laptops to all the > > >children would impact the culture too much too quickly. Who knows what the > > > culture might lose before members even became aware of the value of what > would be lost?! I don't understand this way of thinking, and I'm interested in the premises of it. Having just come back from a Culture and ICT conference (http://www.cardicis.org ) last week, I know what I don't know and part of what I don't know revolves around the fact that technology changes culture. Managing cultural change really isn't my business, it sounds a bit too 'Mein Kampf'ish... but understanding the cultural change is interesting, and teaches just as it learns. Rapid technological change, I believe, is a cultural change by definition - because culture is not separate from people, and people produce technology (though we do have technology being created by technology now through evolutionary algorithms). Any rapid change in a culture comes at a cost, and that cost is based on a value of the change as perceived by the culture. If the value is too low for the cost, people of a culture do not accept the change. If the value is high and the cost is low, people accept the change. Marketing of hardware and software revolves around changing culture with every evolution of Moore's Law. This is not too different from Friedman's, 'The Lexus and the Olive Tree' - in fact, it may be derivative of that and many other things. In Mexico, the Olive Tree - or identity - is important, and the Lexus (technology change) may not be seen as important. But the two aren't as distinct as academic discussion can allow for. The two terms exist so that people can think about them in an encompassing way, but too often we talk about dominance between the two when the real trick is balance. So now, when we speak of technological change in a culture, we are talking about many different kinds of changes. First, there is the effect of the technology itself. Second, there is the technology's original culture. Third, there are derivative changes in culture - as time progresses, more changes occur because of previous changes. So yes - giving laptops to everyone might have a negative cultural impact - and it surprises me that I could come to that statement - but I have to also redirect to the point of value and cost. If in Mexico, as an example, the culture sees a value that outweighs the cost - the change can still be 'good' or 'bad' depending on where one is standing and where you are relative to a stream of light. But the changes do have to occur as well. Good and bad are subjective. But if we are intent in building technological bridges in a world where every country is promising it's citizens that the specific country will be a 'developing nation' - well, I'm sure that the real problem is not technological, but rather seeking a culture's identity while trying to implement the technology. I think cultural change is inevitable. And one of the points I have been trying to make in the $100 million laptop debate is similar - technology change has to be managed by the culture that is implementing it, not the culture that insists that it 'knows the right way'. India has seen an upsurge in problems with it's technological changes. Some say some of those those changes are good, some say that they are bad - but isn't a culture's primary job that of regularizing the changes within the culture itself? Do we measure progress in how many dual income families there are? How does one measure the progress of a culture - the change? Indeed, the only progress measurement I know of is a weird thing called 'survival'. But that doesn't mean that all aspects of the culture survive. Greece didn't have coffee before the Ottoman empire, but how many Greeks consider coffee a part of their culture? Interesting thing to consider. Change can be a nasty bad thing, or it can be a good thing. The answer, really, lies with the younger generations because whatever changes occur to the culture of their parents, it's their future culture we're discussing. And oddly enough, it's not ours. What a strange world. -- Taran Rampersad Presently in: San Fernando, Trinidad and Tobago [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.knowprose.com http://www.digitaldivide.net/profile/Taran Coming on January 1st, 2006: http://www.OpenDepth.com "Criticize by creating." — Michelangelo _______________________________________________ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@mailman.edc.org http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
