Music in April

A few of my passions have been cropping up lately, much to my delight. 1) Good booty-shaking music. The Cape Town International Jazz Festival is coming up fast on April 3-4 and they have an insane line-up for the Saturday. A few of my favourites: Zaki Ibrahim (Canada), Napalma (Brazil), 340ml (Mozambique), Maceo Parker, Hugh Masekela and last but not least, MOS DEF! The decision to through down cash for a flight for this one day might be worth it!

When I get a chance, I like to flip over to CBC Radio 3, and Exclaim magazine websites to see what is going on back in the Canadian music scene. Lo and behold, a group that has grabbed my heart: Thunderheist! The Nigerian born, Canadian singing in this crew and the DJ have unleashed my inner soul of good dance, bass crunk, I can’t wait to get home and buy their album to be released March 31! It’s also ashame that they will be touring with Exclaim and they will be at the Biltmore on April 25… but at the same time as the Ski and Board Festival in Whistler… oh, how can I be in two places at the same time??? Oh and up on the hill, there is Metric (new album released April 14) and DJ Z-Trip on the 24 and 25 April. Too much good stuff at one time!

ICTs in Burkina and my Research

ICT Art in Burkina Faso

Still on the artist theme, shift to check out the mural work coming from Burkina Faso. I posted this one which has a computer user asking about finding a husband online. Yup. Penpals or mail order brides go online. I find it as a real reflection of how computers are starting to influence a few lives in West Africa.



As for ICTs on my front, I’ll be heading to the shindig, ICTD2009 conference in Doha mid April. There is this Young Researchers Workshop which should be fun, if you are hopefully looking for innovation gong show. I hope there is beer. Here’s my paper on my current work and the struggles of young African scholars in finding opportunities in collaboration.


ICTD Submission Final(2)

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Press Releases Other research africa

I also just submitted this short article about access to knowledge and gender to the genderIT.org website, will post if it ends up making the cut!

Besides the conference, I’m busy trying to sum up my research work on emergencies and ICTs in Ghana and Uganda. I’ve got my TAMs Analyzer qualitative tool working by my side. It just gets so tiring trying to get through the scripts and make sense out of it all. And especially when there is so much excitement coming up in April!

Happy International Womyns Day

I have never really celebrated it before but glad to acknowledge all the amazing women making it happen, in small ways or big ways. I am talking about the ladies who can break social norms and do what they want to do because it makes them happy and because they are creative passionate people.

Those are all my girls back in Vancouver, and those I have known throughout my stints to Europe (especially Belgium), Mozambique, Kenya, South Africa and beyond. And my mom, my grandma and girl cousins and nieces.

There is still a strong fight to give women the capabilities and chance to strive for their ideal job or ideal life. If things remain as it is, then we'll never see a world of non-violence and equality for all people. So even if you don't feel the pressure of inequality from where you are, know that it is still strong in other parts of the world, and we can always use your strength or words of support to know that you believe in a better world than what exists today.

fighting words for International Womyns Day (weekend).

Check out women and technology history:

wyatt, sally. 2008. Feminism, Technology and the Information Society: Learning from the past, imagining the future. Information, Communication and Sociey 11(1) - 111-130.

Within the article, it mentions Donna Haraway's 1985 "Manifesto for Cyborgs," -
"Taking responsibility for the social relations of science and technology means refusing an anti-science metaphysics, a demonology of technology, and so means embracing the skillful task of reconstructing the boundaries of daily life, in partial connection with others, in communication with all of our part" (1985, page 100) - Summary: Women's lives are intimately entwined with technologies.