- Title
- Please Do Not Call It Human Right: A Southern Epistemological Perspective on the Digital Inclusion of People With Disabilities in South Africa
- Creator
- Dalvit, Lorenzo
- Subject
- To be catalogued
- Date
- 2023
- Type
- text
- Type
- book chapter
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/10962/468228
- Identifier
- vital:77034
- Identifier
- ISBN 9781003388289
- Identifier
- https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781003388289-5/please-call-human-right-lorenzo-dalvit
- Description
- South Africa is one of the world’s most unequal countries and has a well-known past of serious human rights abuses. Despite a progressive legal system, a relatively large economy, and one of the highest rates of Internet penetrations on the African continent, social inequalities extend to the digital domain. While digital inclusion for all is inscribed as a desirable goal in policy documents, in practice this is not the case. The rights based on which policy documents rely and from which much of the formal civil society sector draws is rooted in Western understanding of concepts such as “dignity”, “ability”, “inclusion”, and even “disability” itself. Employing a decolonial approach, this chapter problematises narratives about the digital inclusion of people with disabilities. It argues that for South Africans with disabilities, benefitting from government interventions and enforcing their rights depend to a large extent on their socio-economic background. An emerging body of research documents challenges associated with the new forms of exclusion/invisibility of people with disabilities online, such as inaccessible software/hardware, a steep learning curve, or the practice of hiding one’s disability to avoid pity or stigma. The ubiquity of digital technology makes digital inclusion of people with disabilities more of a necessity rather than a choice or a right.
- Format
- 15 pages, pdf
- Publisher
- Routledge
- Language
- English
- Relation
- Dalvit, L., 2023. Please Do Not Call It Human Right: A Southern Epistemological Perspective on the Digital Inclusion of People With Disabilities in South Africa. In Communication Rights in Africa (pp. 55-69). Routledge
- Rights
- Publisher
- Rights
- Use of this resource is governed by the terms and conditions of the Taylor and Francis Online Terms and Conditions Statement (https://www.tandfonline.com/terms-and-conditions)
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Dalvit, Lorenzo (Prof)
RU Books and Book Chapters
RU School of Journalism and Media Studies
SDG 10. Reduced Inequalities
| Thumbnail | File | Description | Size | Format | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| View Details | SOURCE1 | Please Do Not Call It Human Right.pdf | 584 KB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details |