Local information services in Medellin: technology, institutions, communities and power

Castaño Muñoz, Wilson and Van Klyton, Aaron Local information services in Medellin: technology, institutions, communities and power. Technology in Society, 2017, vol. 50, pp. 20-30. [Journal article (Paginated)]

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English abstract

This article examines the politics of technology and information by exploring a case study of local information service provision in Medellin, Colombia. Local Information Service (LIS) is defined as a community centre where information deemed relevant to local communities is generated, stored, organized and disseminated through print and digital means. Using a social construction of technology approach, the article attempts to deconstruct the implementation and delivery of LIS in Medellin, Colombia and analyse how empowering and disempowering discourses form through relationships between institutions and citizens laden with social and economic inequality. The article analyses the development and deployment of this artefact and positions LIS as a socio-technical system, embedded with political, social, cultural, and economic values. We describe the unintended consequences of this deployment through a multilevel perspective of the head organisation and the smaller 195 local institutions that support it. The article challenges and operationalises the social construction of ‘local’ in local information by highlighting practices of social exclusion and resistance embedded within the design of the service. This case provides a vantage point from which to examine how relevant social groups interpret and engage with technological devices and the implications of this for the communities the device is intended to serve.

Spanish abstract

Este artículo examina las políticas de tecnología e información mediante la exploración de un estudio de caso sobre la generación de servicios de información local en Medellín, Colombia. El Servicio de Información Local (SIL) se define como un centro comunitario donde se genera, almacena, organiza y difunde, información considerada relevante para las comunidades locales a través de medios impresos y digitales. Utilizando un enfoque de construcción social de tecnología, el artículo intenta desconstruir la implementación y entrega de SIL en Medellín, Colombia y analizar cómo se forman discursos de empoderamiento y desempoderamiento a través de relaciones entre instituciones y ciudadanos cargados de desigualdad social y económica. El artículo analiza el desarrollo y despliegue de este artefacto y posiciona SIL como un sistema socio-técnico, incrustado con valores políticos, sociales, culturales y económicos. Igualmente, se describen las consecuencias no deseadas de este despliegue a través de una perspectiva multinivel de la organización principal y las 195 instituciones locales más pequeñas que lo apoyan. El artículo desafía y operacionaliza la construcción social de "local" en la información local al destacar las prácticas de exclusión social y resistencia integradas en el diseño del servicio. Este caso proporciona un punto de vista desde el cual examinar cómo los grupos sociales relevantes interpretan y se relacionan con los dispositivos tecnológicos y las implicaciones de esto para las comunidades a las que el SIL está destinado a servir.

Item type: Journal article (Paginated)
Keywords: Community information services, Digital information, Local information, Politics of technology and information, Public libraries, Social constructivism, Technology in society; Servicios de información a la comunidad
Subjects: B. Information use and sociology of information
Depositing user: Lina María LMA Arredondo
Date deposited: 02 Oct 2019 14:35
Last modified: 02 Oct 2019 14:35
URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10760/39039

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