On 3 May 2023, 16h00-17h30 SAST (GMT+2), the Chair for Critical Studies in Higher Education Transformation (CriSHET) will be hosting ACUSAfrica member, Prof Su-Ming Khoo for a seminar. This hybrid event will explore "Digital Inequalities in Higher Education: A Kaleidoscope Approach".
Queries or in-person RSVPs can be sent via email to Fortunate.Jwara@mandela.ac.za.
Please register for the online event here.
Abstract
The pandemic affected more than 1.5 billion students and youth, and the most vulnerable learners were hit hardest, making digital inequality in educational settings impossible to overlook. Given this reality, a diverse group of educators came together to find ways to understand and address some of these inequalities. As a product of this collaboration, we propose a methodological toolkit: a theoretical kaleidoscope to examine and critique the constitutive elements and dimensions of digital inequalities. We argue that such a tool is helpful when a critical attitude to examine ‘the ideology of digitalism’, its concomitant inequalities, and the huge losses it entails for human flourishing, seems urgent. In the paper, we describe different theoretical approaches that can be used for the kaleidoscope, giving relevant examples of each theory, beginning with a human development and capabilities approach.
Biography
Su-Ming Khoo is Associate Professor and Head of Sociology at the University of Galway, Ireland and Visiting Professor in the Chair for Critical Studies in Higher Education Transformation (CriSHET) at Nelson Mandela University, South Africa (2022-27). She researches, teaches and writes about human development, human rights, public goods, development alternatives, decoloniality, global activism and learning, higher education and transdisciplinarity. She is co-editor with Helen Kara of: Researching in the Age of COVID-19, Volumes I Response and Reassessment, II Care and Resilience, III Creativity and Ethics (2020), and Qualitative and Digital Research in Times of Crisis (2021).
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